"To me the great virtue of the science-fiction story doesn't reside in its elaborate gadgets and twistings of time and space -- although these can be majestically entertaining -- but in its possibilities for analysis of man and the social order.  From the vantage point of one hundred years hence, the writer is free to speak his mind on what he thinks of present-day developments, or -- by laying his story on another planet -- he can parody our worldly strengths and weaknesses without fear of being stoned by his neighbors.  He can damn or praise governments, wipe out offending religious faiths, expose hypocrisies, create Utopias, and bring on the millennium simply by means of an unfettered imagination."

- David Duncan

An Interview with David Duncan

David Duncan didn't begin to write full-time until the age of 33, in 1946, after around ten years of work in government administration and public services. He began screenwriting in 1953 and started writing science-fiction movies after one of his SF novels, "Dark Dominion," was serialized in "Collier's" magazine. After "The Time Machine," David wrote the screenplay for "Fantastic Voyage..." and before "The Time Machine," he wrote, or contributed to, a number of late 50's genre films.

His favorite among the sci-fi films he wrote was "The Time Machine"--"by a huge margin."

With relentless insistence -- perhaps for the sake of simplicity -- many people tend to ignore the collaborative nature of filmmaking... and attach a single name to each film, assigning each film a single "creator."

For "The Time Machine," that name is, unquestionably, George Pal.

While Pal perhaps deserves that credit, he unquestionably benefited from the contributions of a number of  people. Even a quick review of Duncan's scripts (I've seen the first and second drafts) reveals Duncan's role as a primary contributor. Duncan himself was quick to acknowledge the blending of talents that created the film: in the interview that follows, he explains that one of the film's most memorable sequences -- as well as one of its most regrettable lines of dialogue -- was not written by him.

Welles had his Mankiewicz, Hitchcock his Ernest Lehman... and George Pal was no doubt quite pleased at the way "his" movie  developed thanks to the substantial talents... of David Duncan.

Or did you think that two of the main characters in this movie happened to be called "George" and "David" by sheer coincidence?

David graciously agreed to answer a few questions for this web page.
(Conducted via mail, David's answers were written May 29, 1999.)

Your most recent work related to "The Time Machine" was on "The Journey Back," for which I'm told you wrote the brief 'reunion' scene between George and David. Was it enjoyable?

The five-minute scene I wrote for "The Journey Back" came at a good time for me. My wife had died a few months previously and I had been spending my time driving aimlessly around the Northwest -- not because I enjoyed driving but because I couldn't stand our empty house. So the job kept me home long enough to learn to endure it. I met the producer only by telephone. The scene was supposed to be a prologue but ended up as an epilog.

I liked the assignment because Wells's "The Time Machine" was one of my favorite stories when I was a boy.

To the best of my memory I wrote the screenplay pretty much on my own.

George Pal was great to work for. He wanted to keep the project secret lest someone forestall him by bringing out a cheaper film on a similar subject. So I worked in my bedroom at home and occasionally he'd drop by to discuss things.

I never met Philip Yordan, but he is responsible for what I consider an excellent scene with the "talking rings."

In Chapter 8 of "The Time Machine," Wells writes: "And so, in that derelict museum, upon the thick soft carpeting of dust, to Weena's huge delight, I solemnly performed a kind of composite dance, whistling THE LAND OF THE LEAL as cheerfully as I could. In part it was a modest cancan, in part a step dance, in part a skirt-dance (so far as my tail-coat permitted), and in part original. For I am naturally inventive, as you know."

Your first draft incorporated this song... and the second draft contains a page of lyrics titled "The Land of the Leal" with "Words and Music by Peggy Lee." Was this written for the film?

I don't know why [the original] "Land of the Leal" wasn't used as the theme music. It was a wonderfully sad melody that  Wells referred to. It bears no relationship to what Peggy Lee wrote.

I visited the set only once. At the time, a bunch of costumed Morlocks, being off camera, were performing antics that had others on the set laughing loudly. I recall a worried George Pal approaching me and saying "My God, do you think people will laugh at them in the film?" Or words to that effect.

I've read that you actually had a hand in designing that set.

It's impossible for me to write dialogue and stage directions without knowing what the stage looks like. And no scene designers had been put to work yet. So I spent a couple of hours with pencil and paper sketching out a picture of the Morlocks' underground world. When George [Pal] saw it, he took it home with him. The following Sunday morning, when I went to his home for a conference, I was flattered to find him out on the lawn before his easel translating my sketch into a full-color finished version -- upon which the actual set was later based.

No, I never expected to have credit on a comic book. I wouldn't have known if you hadn't told me.

Yes, I attended the premiere. No photos, but I recall my wife giving me a vicious jab in the ribs with her elbow when The Time Traveler made some remark indicating that the people of Bali were as stupid as the Eloi. I quickly gasped, "I didn't write that! I didn't!" But I don't know who did.

It was George Pal who told me to name The Time Traveler "George" and to name Filby "David." So I did.

In my version the department store was always Filby's. His son grew up awfully fast to take it over.

I know that George Pal wanted to have all the Eloi nude in the scene by the river but couldn't.

The real poet in my family is my sister, Joyce La Mers, seven years younger than I, who is becoming well known among those who still read poetry. I'm enclosing one of hers which a computer bug like yourself might appreciate. [Joyce's Poem]

No. I wasn't influenced by "Peter Pan."

Several people have asked me what three books The Time Traveler took with him. The truth is -- I don't know. But the idea of the three books dates back many years to a time before I became a writer and was manager of a farm workers community in Ceres, California. One of the tenants struck me as a very intelligent man, and it was odd that he supported his family by working in the fields. So I got part of his story.

He had been reared by an aunt and uncle on a remote farm in Kansas. He had never attended school and was about ten years old when he went with his uncle in a horse-drawn wagon to the closest town for supplies. Here he met some boys his own age and discovered that there was such a thing as reading and writing. Subsequently he taught himself to do both and told me that three books had been very important in his life. Of course, I wanted to know what they were. He told me.

(a) The Bible. He read passages from it every morning and evening to his family.

(b) Charles Darwin's "The Origin of the Species" which the bibliophiles of Darwin's day found nauseous.

(c) "Das Kapital" by Karl Marx -- about as far from the other two as one can get!

I found this trilogy very strange which is why it stuck in my memory, but they are not the three books The Time Traveler took with him.

In the original story, Wells uses the Industrial Revolution to explain why mankind split into two species. By the time I was writing the screenplay this would have seemed absurd. So air-raid alarms which sent people underground seemed a good substitute.

I was not aware that anyone would take this as prophecy.

I suppose this was just a production action.

Draft two becomes more and more mysterious!

Not now.

(David Duncan circa 1949)

DAVID DUNCAN also wrote these novels:

Most of David's books were written in the 40's, 50's and early 60's and are hard to find. Complicating matters is the presence of another author, "Dave Duncan," who has written quite a bit of science fiction and fantasy.  He and "our" David Duncan  met a few times and Dave told David that he's Dave in order to differentiate himself from David. There's also a famous photographer, David Douglas Duncan. And there's at least one other David Duncan of note, since Carl Sagan, who sat in Pal's Time Machine during an episode of Sagan's PBS series Cosmos, was David Duncan Professor of Astronomy and Space Sciences and director of the Laboratory for Planetary Studies at Cornell University.

David's favorite of his books was "The Serpent's Egg," which he believed to be  "the best  written." Appropriately, it received the best reviews... and made the least money. "The Bramble Bush" and "The Madrone Tree" were serialized in Colliers Magazine. "The Trumpet of God," about the children's crusade, was an alternate book club selection. "Dark Dominion," "Beyond Eden," and "Occam's Razor" are all science fiction, and were also published in paperback editions. The last book Duncan  published was "The Long Walk Home from Town," in 1964. Duncan  had an ongoing correspondence with a man in England, a published writer himself, who claimed this book caused him to have some sort of cathartic experience, and he holds it in very high esteem. While David viewed most of his TV and movie work more as income than as art -  he was "proud of" his work on "The Time Machine."

David Duncan passed away in December, 1999. 

How many people were inspired... and will continue to be inspired.... by the work of David Duncan?

One cannot choose but wonder.

Who is Angus Duncan?

In the Feb/Mar 1998 issue of Famous Monsters of Filmland, an interview with Alan Young appeared. Early in the interview, Young suggests that it was his idea to have Filby be red-haired in "The Time Machine." Well, Filby has red hair in H. G. Wells's novella. But that's not the only intriguing statement Young makes.