Coming Home (1978 Film) - Production

Production

Coming Home was conceived by Jane Fonda as the first feature for her own production company, IPC Films (for Indochina Peace Campaign), in association with Bruce Gilbert, an old friend from her protest days. Fonda had in mind to make a film about the Vietnam War inspired by her friendship with Ron Kovic, a paraplegic Vietnam War Veteran, who she met in an antiwar rally. At that time Ron Kovic had recently completed his autobiographical book Born on the Fourth of July which would later become an Oscar-winning motion picture of the same name directed by Oliver Stone, starring Tom Cruise as Kovic.

In 1972, Fonda hired Nancy Dowd, an old friend from her days in the feminist movement, to write a script about the consequences of the war as seen through the eyes of a military wife. Originally, Dowd’s story, tentatively titled Buffalo Ghosts, focused on two women, volunteers at a veteran’s hospital, who must come to grip with the emotional toll the war takes on its casualties and their families. The project dragged on for six years, until Bruce Gilbert and producer Jerome Hellman took it. The screenplay was reshaped significantly by the circle of talent who would eventually bring it to the screen: Fonda, Ashby, Wexler, Jon Voight, producer Hellman and screenwriters Waldo Salt and Robert C. Jones. They were united by their opposition to the Vietnam War and by their concern for the veterans who were returning to America facing difficulties adapting to life back home.

The film was going to be directed by John Schlesinger who had worked with producer Hellman and Voight in Midnight Cowboy, but he left the project finding the material too alien to his background. He was replaced by Hal Ashby. Fonda was cast from the beginning as Sally Hyde, the housewife. A top box office star was sought for the male lead, to offset the grim nature of the story. Al Pacino, Jack Nicholson, and Sylvester Stallone were all offered the part but declined. Jon Voight had been considered for the role of the husband, but after become involved with the film, he campaigned to play the paraplegic veteran. Voight had participated in the antiwar movement and was a friend of Fonda, who was instrumental in helping him land the role, even though he had fallen from popularity since his Midnight Cowboy day. Bruce Dern, long stereotyped in sadistic roles, was chosen as the husband. The screenplay was written and rewritten until the project could wait no longer. Jane Fonda who just finished Julia (1977) was soon going to star in Alan Pakula’s Comes a Horseman (1978). For director Ashby, this was his second film about the 1960s since his 1975 film Shampoo: where in 'Shampoo' he dealt with the beautiful people of the 1960s immersed in the good life and not thinking about Vietnam, Coming Home found others dealing with the horrors of the war and its tragic after effects.