Early draft of Didion and Dunne’s screenplay for the 1971 film The Panic in Needle Park. The film, starring Al Pacino and Kitty Winn, was a commercial and critical success, and had an interesting journey to become a feature-length film, beginning as a short piece of photojournalism in Life magazine. The article documented the lives two lovebird heroin addicts and the lives of a group of users on the Upper West Side of New York City. Mills took his article and turned it into a novel, Didion and Dunne drew on both of these pieces to adapt the story to film.

Didion’s career in screenplay writing is an interesting facet of her writing life, having moved to California when she married Dunne and began to write more essays, books, and also develop a career working as a writing team for Hollywood films. They collaborated on over twenty screenplays, seven of which made it to the screen: The Panic in Needle Park, Play It As It Lays, A Star is Born, True Confessions, Hills Like White Elephants, Broken Trust, and Up Close and Personal.

Panic in Needle Park received a nomination for the Palme d’Or. And Winn won Best Actress Award at Cannes for her performance.

Avco Embassy Pictures Corp., 1971. Screenplay format, 132 pp. 28 x 22cm. Early draft of Didion and Dunne’s screenplay for a critically acclaimed film, listing George Bloomfield as director (the film was later directed by Jerry Schatzberg). Red die-cut Avco Embassy textured covers. Photocopied sheets printed rectos only, punch-binding with Acco metal binders. In very good condition. Scarce, one copy seen in WorldCat, at the Pierpont Morgan Library.