Famous author Paul Theroux was a E.Lit lecturer at NUS in the
1970s. He was fired because he was too much of a dissenter and his
contract was never renewed.
Upon leaving NUS(then University of Singapore), he continued to
write and slowly became a famous writer. He happened to write Saint
Jack while in Singapore and that movie was made, with the funding
of Playboy founder Hugh Hefner, and the director, Peter Bogdanovich
was inspired by Orson Welles, the man who directed Citzen Kane.
Orson Welles was supposed to have directed Saint Jack, but he and
Bogdanovich had a disagreement, and pressure from Peter's
girlfriend, Cybill Shepherd, ensured Peter directed it
eventually.
Peter Bogdanovich's Director of Photography for Saint Jack was
Robby Mueller, who later had an apprentice, Martina Radwan, who
became the Director of Photography for Singapore Dreaming.
Saint Jack was banned for showing Singapore in a bad light then, of
it's representations of gambling, prostitutions and Singapore as a
R&R stop for American sailors coming home from Vietnam. It
opened in New York to decent reviews.
Quentin Tarantino bought the rights of distribution a few years
back, and he was quoted as saying that he was inspired by this film
when he was a young and fresh director.
The film crew for Saint Jack stayed at the Goodwood Park Hotel,
where a young teenage boy used to follow them around the place
during shoots, being that it was his family's hotel.
That boy's name is Eric Khoo.
