a trained actor. The young Jane featured at the beginning of the film is portrayed as American, which is consistent with Burroughs' story. Sir Ralph Richardson, who played The 6th Earl of Greystoke, died shortly after filming ended, and he received a posthumous Oscar nomination for Best Supporting Actor. The film was dedicated to his memory. Warners cut out 25 minutes from the jungle footage of Tarzan growing up. "I was sorry to lose those scenes", said Hudson. "But you can't have everything." Vangelis was going to do the music, but according to Hudson, he got "writer's block", so they got John Scott, "and he did a very good job in a very short space of time", said the director. When the film finished, Hudson said that the result was "70%" of the film that he wanted to make. Relationship with other Tarzan stories In a departure from most previous Tarzan films, Greystoke returned to Burroughs' original novel for many elements of its plot. It also utilized a number of corrective ideas first put forth by science fiction author Philip José Farmer in his mock-biography Tarzan Alive, most notably Farmer's explanation of how the speech-deprived ape-man was later able to acquire language by showing Tarzan to be a natural mimic. According to Burroughs' original concept, the apes who raised Tarzan actually had a rudimentary vocal language, and this is portrayed in the film. Greystoke rejected the common film portrayal of Tarzan as a simpleton that was established by Johnny Weissmuller's 1930s renditions, reasserting Burroughs' characterisation of an articulate and intelligent human being, not unlike the so-called "new look" films that Sy Weintraub produced in the 1960s. The second half of the film departs radically from Burroughs' original story. Tarzan is discovered and brought to Scotland, where he fails to adapt to civilization. His return to the wild (having already succeeded his grandfather as Lord Greystoke) is portrayed as a matter of necessity rather than choice, and he is separated, apparently, forever from Jane, who "could not have survived" in his world. In his book Harlan Ellison's Watching, Harlan Ellison explains that the film's promotion as "the definitive version" of the Tarzan legend is misleading. He details production and scripting failures which in his opinion contribute to the film's inaccuracy. Reception Box office The film grossed $45.9 million upon its release, making it the 15th most popular film at the box