It may not be considered Cancon on Genie night, but David Cronenberg’s acclaimed and most mainstream film to date, A History of Violence, about an unassuming husband and father (Viggo Mortensen) whose past comes back to reclaim him in small-town America, is in the hunt for a pair of major Oscars.

Academy Award winner William Hurt is nominated in the best supporting actor category for his brief but memorable turn as a Philly mob boss, while Josh Olson has a shot at best adapted screenplay for the film, which, according to biz tracker Box Office Mojo, has grossed an estimated US$58 million worldwide.

Although he won’t be up on the podium should either Hurt or Olson claim gold, Cronenberg can claim an assist on both, in the latter case due to his uncredited work on the screenplay, which was inspired by a graphic novel by John Wagner and Vince Locke.

Ironically, Cronenberg was converted rather late to the idea of collaborating on the screenplays for his movies.

‘I went through a period when I was very arrogant and rigorous in my feeling that to be a true auteur you had to write your own stuff,’ he told Playback prior to History’s release. ‘But then I had a great experience doing The Dead Zone [scripted by Jeffrey Boam].’

Since then, he’s shared credit on Dead Ringers, adapted William Burroughs’ novel Naked Lunch, and directed Patrick McGrath’s adaptation of his own novel, Spider. Cronenber’s office says the director is hard at work – presumably with Bruce Wagner, finessing an original Hollywood satire scripted by the novelist (see story, p. 10).

As far as History is concerned, backer New Line Cinema asked Cronenberg to get involved in developing the script, which was sent to him as a first draft.

‘I did do a rewrite on my own,’ he says, adding that Olson was always kept in the loop.

Cronenberg made significant contributions to the screenplay, adding a pair of highly charged sex scenes between the married couple played by Mortensen and Maria Bello. He also decided to make the characters played by Hurt and Mortensen brothers, which no doubt made Hurt’s abbreviated role and their inevitable confrontation more appealing to the actor.

‘I get a lot of respect in the acting community in general,’ Cronenberg says. In fact, when thesp Jeremy Irons won his Oscar in 1991 for Barbet Schroeder’s Reversal of Fortune, he publicly thanked Cronenberg, who almost fell out of his bed at home. That doesn’t mean, of course, that the director always gets his first choice. ‘I do find that the role comes first. That’s why you often see very good actors working with first-time directors and genuinely mediocre directors.’

While Hurt no doubt brought his own insights to the character, he and Cronenberg spent a great deal of time figuring out who Richie Cusack was and fashioning the hard-to-place Philly accent.

‘If you can mix your blood with someone else’s, you can produce a hybrid, a mutant,’ says Cronenberg on collaborating in general. ‘It’s something that you wouldn’t have done on your own. That’s exciting and unpredictable.’

-With files from Mark Dillon