Why A Christmas Story writer Jean Shepherd was kicked off set and Jack Nicholson lost out on role

We triple-dog-dare you to find a better depiction of the holidays.When “A Christmas Story” premiered in 1983, screenwriter Jean Shepherd pulled antidotes from his own life to create the Christmas comedy — including the infamous leg lamp.And Quentin Schultze, the author of “You’ll Shoot Your Eye Out! Life Lessons from the Movie “A Christmas Story,” taught storytelling with Shepherd, leading the pair to become fast friends.From their time together, Schultze gained a deeper insight into the holiday classic — and it turns out it was a rocky start for the late screenwriter, who died at 78 in 1999.“Jean Shepherd wrote scripts that he wanted done exactly the way he wrote them,” Schultze exclusively told The Post.

“And I have a copy of [the] script the way he wrote it, and it’s almost twice as long as it needs to be for a 90-minute film.So, he was at constant loggerheads with the director, Bob Clark, over this.”The author continued, “So the stuff is getting cut, and Jean Shepherd is getting angrier and angrier about this and at the same time, at the shooting, Jean is going to the actors and telling them how to deliver their lines in tune with the parables.” Clark, who died in 2007 at age 67, had eventually had enough.“Finally, Bob Clark literally kicked him off the set,” Schultze shared.

“He said, ‘You cannot be here anymore.I can’t make this film with you hanging around.’ That hurt Jean.

But, Jean understood it because he was there telling the characters how to act, including Ralphie [played by Peter Billingsley].”There was also one scene in particular that got the axe.“I can think of a lot of the material that Bob Clark took out, both from the script and actually shooting scenes.Whole scenes that they shot that they took out.

Including two more dream scenes,” Schultze revealed.Another interesting twist at the start of making “A Christmas Story” is that Jack Nicholson was originally supposed to be casted.“The studi...