'Shazam!' Lightning strikes twice for Memphis movie writer

According to folk wisdom, lightning never strikes the same place twice.

According to the federal National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, it does.

"Actually, lightning can, and often does, strike the same place repeatedly," reports the administration's website, "especially if it’s a tall and isolated object."

At 5-foot-10, screenwriter Henry Gayden is not especially tall. Yet the new superhero sequel "Shazam! Fury of the Gods" represents the second time that the Memphis-born-and-raised scribe has been tagged by the magic lightning that transforms teenaged Billy Batson into Shazam, a grown-up do-gooder who has been a beloved comic-book star since 1940.

Gayden also penned the first "Shazam!," released in 2019. The movie was a hit, earning $366 million at the worldwide box office along with the affections of moviegoers who enjoyed encountering an insecure goofball hero amid a landscape of dark avengers and genocidal supervillains.

"I do think I'm pretty good at writing for kids," said Gayden, 43, noting that the "Shazam!" movies are not only generally kid-friendly but flaunt the heroics of a foster family of schoolkids. "I'm getting a little too old at this point to keep doing it, but there's a part of me that's still connected to that perspective."

The connection makes sense. Gayden's movie love represents a lifelong relationship, fostered by a childhood VHS tape collection that began with "Back to the Future"; an indulgent mother who exposed him to Francois Truffaut; and the presence of Tom Cruise on Tuckahoe Road in 1992, when Gayden was 11, and director Sydney Pollack spent several days shooting "The Firm" in Gayden's neighborhood.

"I'm really lucky to be able to make a living doing what I love," he said.

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Gayden's fourth produced feature film screenplay, "Shazam! Fury of the Gods," written with "Fast & Furious" franchise veteran Chris Morgan, opened March 17 on 4,071 screens in North America. For the most part, the sequel is as spirited as its predecessor, a refreshingly comedic comic-book adventure that was the first big-screen outing for its superstrong superhero since 1941, when Republic Pictures released a 12-chapter serial showcasing the character created by writer Bill Parker and artist C.C. Beck.

Borrowing the basic premise if not all the details of the comic books, the "Shazam!" movies star Asher Angel as Billy Batson, a troubled teen in a foster home who becomes a muscular costumed hero (Zachary Levi) when he shouts the magic word "Shazam!," an acronym that enumerates the character's power: Shazam possesses "the wisdom of Solomon, the strength of Hercules, the stamina of Atlas, the power of Zeus, the courage of Achilles, and the speed of Mercury." He also can fly and shoot lightning out of his hands, like the bolts that strike when he shouts his name.

Billy was chosen to be Shazam by a wizard (Djimon Hounsou) who was seeking a "champion" who was "pure of heart." Apparently Billy's five foster siblings are pretty noble, too: Billy shares his power, so these kids — a diverse bunch, in terms of ethnic identity, sexual orientation and functional ability — also become adult heroes when they shout "Shazam!"

The diversity is not window dressing. It is as inseparable from the "Shazam!" story as imagined across two films by Gayden and director Billy F. Sandberg as Shazam himself is inseparable from Billy Batson. "Everyone can be worthy, if given a chance," the wizard tells Billy in "Fury of the Gods." The message is intended to resonate during this particular cultural moment, when certain politicians and commentators want to place limits on definitions and expressions of identity.

"That quote is really meaningful," Gayden said, and reflects what Billy ultimately realizes "is possible in all his family members, warts and all."

A 1998 graduate of Memphis University School (he also attended Presbyterian Day School), the precocious Gayden was accepted into the prestigious Summer Production Workshop at the University of Southern California at the age of 16 and later attended the University of Texas at Austin before moving to Los Angeles in 2002, to pursue a film career. (He still returns to Memphis from time to time, to visit family.)

His first produced screenplay was "Earth to Echo" (2014), a found-footage "E.T."-esque adventure directed by Gayden's friend, Dave Green, about four neighborhood kids who discover an owl-eyed lost alien robot in the desert. His credits also include "There's Someone Inside Your House," a 2021 Netflix horror movie.

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The first "Shazam!" screenplay is credited solely to Gayden, but the second is a collaboration between Gayden and the more experienced Morgan, whose résumé receives an in-joke shout-out when Shazam tells the villainous goddess Hespera: "I have seen all of the 'Fast and Furious' movies, lady. It's all about family!"

Hespera is played by the regal Oscar-winner, Helen Mirren; her sibling, also a "Daughter of Atlas," is portrayed by Lucy Liu. The star power was one reason Gayden was grateful to be deeply involved in the film's production and on set. "That was the dream, just watching an actor of the caliber of Helen Mirren read things that I wrote," marveled Gayden.

Loaded with action, "Fury of the Gods" boasts such mythological (and digitally animated) monsters as harpies, minotaurs, manticores, a huge dragon, a pointedly Harryhausenesque cyclops and several Skittles-eating unicorns. But as in the first "Shazam!," the banter is more memorable than the bludgeoning.

"That scene, but with superhero names inserted into it, was almost directly lifted from a therapy session I had three weeks before writing it," said Gayden, who said he also has struggled with questions of worthiness as he has pursued his dream life (which now includes a wife, screenwriter Cat Vasko, and their 3-year-old, Ruby).

"Unless you're a malignant narcissist, most people have some healthy sense of self-doubt," he said. "The more I get to meet even the most successful writers and directors, the more I find most of them also feel that way."

An early scene finds Shazam on the couch in a doctor's office, expressing his thoughts as if he were in therapy (notwithstanding the fact that the doctor is a pediatrician, not a psychiatrist). "I feel like a fraud," Shazam worries, while the doctor diagnoses a case of "imposter syndrome."

That theme finds expression in "Fury of the Gods" as Billy Batson deals with the extreme nature of his surreal double life, compounded by his status as a child abandoned by his biological mother but embraced by his new family.

Said Gayden: "If the first movie's about a kid who always wanted his family and is denied that but then gets a real family in the end, the sequel is about how he's so terrified of losing it he holds onto it so tight he threatens to destroy it." For all his size and muscles and flying ability, Shazam "feels imposer syndrome because he's literally a boy inside."

Whatever the plot onscreen, the stories in the entertainment news media that followed the release of "Fury of the Gods" have focused on the film's underwhelming box-office performance. The movie's opening gross of $30.5 million topped the weekend, but it was well below the $53.5 million earned by the first film; ultimately, this second "Shazam!" is unlikely to recoup what Variety estimates as its $110 million-plus budget and its $100 million in marketing costs.

Analysts blamed "superhero fatigue"; the general unfamiliarity of Shazam as compared to the top-tier likes of Batman and Wonder Woman; and the much-publicized regime change at the DC division of Warner Bros., a move that presumably will nip several franchises in mid-bud ("Fury of the Gods" features two end-credits teasers that now appear unlikely to fruit).

"It's a little disappointing because we put a lot of our life into it," said Gayden, who said the sequel was "greenlit" a week after the first movie opened. "Everyone I know is legitimately proud of it and puzzled by the reception. We all feel it really does succeed."

Of course, Shazam's relative lack of celebrity is what enabled Gayden and Morgan and Sandberg to construct their jokey and even proudly corny superhero saga in the place, without the scrutiny that would accompany a Batman or Superman project.

"Warner Bros. barely knew we were making it," Gayden said. "We were in our little universe, off on our own, making our fun and heartfelt stories."

This article originally appeared on Memphis Commercial Appeal: 'Shazam! Fury of the Gods': Who is screenwriter Henry Gayden?