Trivia / Petulia

• Mid-Development Genre Shift: The John Haase novel and the initial screenplay by Barbara Turner both had a Romantic Comedy tone. The final shooting script by Lawrence Marcus darkened things up considerably, with Marcus especially using his own bitter divorce experience to inform Archie's marital strife. Haase reportedly didn't care for how the film turned out.
• Playing Against Type: The two male leads—George C. Scott as the emotionally repressed Archie and Richard Chamberlain, best known at the time as Dr. Kildare, as the Jerkass David.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The film had a lengthy development process, changing directors and bouncing through different screenplay drafts. Robert Altman, who was still mainly known as a TV director at the time, was the original director, and played a big role in the development phase, but he had a personal falling-out with producer Raymond Wagner (tied in with a TV pilot the two were making at the time that they butted heads over). After paying off Altman, Wagner then enlisted the more bankable Richard Lester, which helped the film finally get greenlighted. Lester's first major move after getting hired was changing the story's setting from Los Angeles to San Francisco.^note An Altman-directed Petulia set in L.A. almost sounds like it could've been a precursor to his later skeptical looks at SoCal life in The Long Goodbye, California Split and Short Cuts.
  • A whole bunch of names were tossed around to play Archie before Scott got the role. James Garner had been the original choice, but Lester didn't think he fit the character. Paul Newman and Frank Sinatra both expressed interest. Henry Fonda was courted. Lester wanted Lee Marvin.

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