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After AMERICAN GRAFFITI’s surprise boxoffice success, the writing was on the wall that George Lucas was now an A-List director.

Lucas’s only film prior to GRAFFITI, which premiered Aug. 2, 1973 at Switzerland’s Locarno Film Festival, was the 1971 sci-fi thriller THX 1138 for Warner Bros. & Francis Ford Coppola’s American Zoetrope. GRAFFITI, a comedy drama targeted to teens, was a big departure from sci-fi for Lucas.

As things turned out, Lucas never directed anything but sci-fi after making GRAFFITI. His next movie was STAR WARS (1977). He went on to produce that franchise’s films and to direct three of its later episodes — THE PHANTOM MENACE (1999), ATTACK OF THE CLONES (2002) & REVENGE OF THE SITH (2005).

GRAFFITI’s roots go back to when Lucas was making THX and Coppola asked him to write a coming-of-age film. Lucas recalled his own teenage years in 1960’s Modesto, Calif. when guys cruised around town at night in all sorts of cars to meet girls.

While THX was in post-production at WB, Lucas was writing an early screenplay draft for what became Coppola’s 1979 masterpiece APOCALYPSE NOW. When WB passed on it, Lucas continued developing his teen project, which was then called ANOTHER QUIET NIGHT IN MODESTO. He needed to get a treatment written and hired Willard Huyck & Gloria Katz to work on it. Lucas & GRAFFITI co-producer Gary Kurtz began pitching studios to finance the screenplay. Columbia, MGM, Paramount & 20th Century-Fox all reportedly passed.

After THX opened in March 1971, Lucas had offers to direct several films, including TOMMY and HAIR. Instead, he decided to develop only his own projects. That’s when he came up with the idea for the space movie that evolved into STAR WARS.

At the 1971 Cannes Film Festival, where THX was in the Directors’ Fortnight competition, Lucas met with United Artists production chief David Picker, who liked both GRAFFITI and the sci-fi project. In the ’60s, it was Picker who’d brought The Beatles’ A HARD DAY’S NIGHT and a brand new James Bond project into UA for distribution. Picker agreed to put up $10,000 to get a GRAFFITI screenplay written.

UA later turned down GRAFFITI, thinking it would cost too much to license the 75 rock ‘n roll hits Lucas wanted to use as his soundtrack. Worse yet, UA passed on releasing what became STAR WARS. Lucas & Kurtz finally managed to get a GRAFFITI deal done at Universal that gave Lucas  creative control and final cut along with a shoestring budget.

Universal wanted to change the film’s title to ANOTHER SLOW NIGHT IN MODESTO. Coppola proposed ROCK AROUND THE BLOCK. Fortunately, Lucas persuaded Universal to stay with AMERICAN GRAFFITI. He made it for about $750,000 and it grossed an enviable $115M.