ASJA Author Jack El-Hai on the Long Road from Page to Screen
We see our ASJA colleagues’ bylines on our computer or phone screens every day. It’s not so often, however, we get to see an ASJAer credited on a cinema screen.
That chance is coming in November. “Nuremberg,” an historical drama set at the end of World War II, is based on the 2013 nonfiction book, “The Nazi and the Psychiatrist,” by Jack El-Hai, an ASJA past president and longtime member. The film, staring Rami Malek and Russell Crowe, will be released by Sony Pictures Classics on Nov. 7, 2025.
According to Deadline.com:
Set post-World War II, “Nuremberg” chronicles the true story of the eponymous trials held by the Allies against the defeated Nazi regime. Pic centers on American psychiatrist Douglas Kelley (Malek), who is tasked with determining whether Nazi prisoners are fit to stand trial for their war crimes. He finds himself in a complex battle of wits with Hermann Göring (Crowe), Hitler’s right-hand man.
“The timing is so good for a movie to be coming out now about the nature of authoritarianism,” El-Hai said. “How are we to regard the people who put themselves higher above others?
Although El-Hai’s books had been optioned before, and PBS based one of its “American Experience” documentary episodes on his book “The Lobotomist,” “Nuremberg” is the first full-length film adaptation of his work that has come to fruition.
“Very few (adaptations) get to the finish line,” he said. “In the beginning, it was literally unbelievable. My wife, Ann, and I didn’t believe it would actually happen until shooting began in 2024.”
It Started with an Article
The first step of the long road from page to screen was in 2011, when El-Hai published an article, also called “The Nazi and the Psychiatrist,” in Scientific American Mind, a now defunct magazine. The article was a test drive to see if there would be enough source material to support a book, to gauge reader response, and to see if it would hold his own interest long term.
“I thought this was a story worth telling, and one I was particularly suited to tell,” he said. “I have written quite a bit about the history of psychiatry. This is about a psychiatrist and his encounter with a man who did heinous things. It’s about motivations in medicine, what motivates a doctor to do what he does. It’s a dark story – I write dark stories. That felt like a good fit, too.”
The article was optioned for film in 2012 by Mythology Entertainment, a production company co-founded by writer, producer, director James Vanderbilt, whose credits include “Zodiac,” which El-Hai called “one of my favorite crime movies ever.” After Mythology disbanded in 2019 another company, Blue Stone Entertainment, picked up the option. Vanderbilt stayed on as screenwriter and director, to El-Hai’s delight.
“I had a lot of confidence that he was the right person,” El-Hai added.
Vanderbilt occasionally sent him versions of the script, and there were early contract negotiations. But there were many years, El-Hai said, where he had no involvement with the making of the film.
“Authors who get too involved or feel too proprietary about their work are troublesome,” he said “Their efforts do not necessarily result in a better movie. I don’t have expertise. I don’t know how to direct a movie or write a movie.
“I may be unlike some other writers in that I feel like I had my chance with this story,” he said. “My book is there. No matter how this movie has turned out, my book will still be there. I’m happy to have other creative people use it as inspiration for what they envision. I don’t think it’s my role to interfere. I don’t want to interfere. I want them to do their thing with it.”
On Set
In early 2024, El-Hai visited Budapest, where the movie was filming, and met with members of the cast. “I was more of a sympathetic listening ear than somebody who was offering acting advice or interpretation advice. I trusted them completely,” he said.
“I don’t have the right to offer the definitive interpretation of what happened. I have my interpretation, but somebody else could have another interpretation.”
According to El-Hai, the movie is “basically factual” with some changes. A primary character who was married in real life is unmarried in the film. Many of the plot points were real, but the order of some of the events was rearranged.
“I did not see it as my role or really my interest, either, to maintain the factual accuracy of the story. It’s a movie. It’s not going to be completely accurate,” he said.
El-Hai will be involved with some of the promotional aspects of the film, including attending film festivals, though he is not at liberty to say which ones.
The film is giving the book a second life, including a new printing with movie tie-ins. His publisher, PublicAffairs Books, and Sony are planning a collaboration to cross-promote the book and the movie. “I hope I’ll be involved with aspects of that,” El-Hai said.
He also hopes to have the opportunity to speak at universities about the book and the movie, including how both came to be, the differences between the two, and what it’s like for a writer to have a book adapted for the screen.
“It’s a pleasant feeling overall,” he said. “This is not a movie based on a comic book. It’s not a movie for kids. It is a movie for thinking adults, and it feels good to me that those movies are still made. I am really loyal to this story. That it has an afterlife like this, is thrilling and still, to me, unbelievable.”
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Holly Leber Simmons is a recovering newspaper reporter turned content marketing writer for higher education institutions and associations. She delights in the opportunity to interview people who love learning and love their work. Holly is the editor of the ASJA Weekly newsletter.