The Wayward Bus is a 1957 American drama film directed by Victor Vicas and starring Joan Collins, Jayne Mansfield, Dan Dailey and Rick Jason.

Slowly making their way through a treacherous California mountain region, the passengers undergo a variety of life-altering experiences.

[4] In March 1947 George Stevens announced that he had bought screen rights to the novel on behalf of Liberty Films, the production company he established after the war along with Frank Capra, William Wyler and Sam Briskin.

In June 1949 Charles Feldman announced that the novel was one of four properties he was developing for screen treatment (other others being the plays The Silver Whistle and Finian's Rainbow and the novel Tender Mercy).

[8][9] In January 1952 Feldman announced that William Saroyan had written a script and he wanted to start filming in April at Sam Goldwyn Studios.

He said Jennifer Jones wanted to star and he hoped to get Marlon Brando as the male lead under the direction of George Stevens.

It was part of a package deal along with five other properties, the others being Bernadine, Heaven Knows, Mr Allison, Hilda Crane, Lonely Steeple and Tender Mercy.

[18] Fox eventually decided to delay production until Mansfield had finished her run in Rock Hunter so she could appear in the film.

"We've reduced the sex angle so it's acceptable to the film medium, lowered the overall ages of the passengers and thrown in a few of the modern conveniences such as a helicopter rescue service.

And instead of the bus getting mired in the mud, we have it caught with one wheel over the edge of a cliff on a washed out road.

[27] Fox had hoped to repeat the success of 1956's Bus Stop (starring Marilyn Monroe), but ended up crafting the Steinbeck novel into what one commentator called "the kind of lowbrow schlock the novel had satirized".