Room 1219: The Life of Fatty Arbuckle, the Mysterious Death of Virginia Rappe, and the Scandal That Changed Hollywood

Room 1219
The Life of Fatty Arbuckle, the Mysterious Death of Virginia Rappe, and the Scandal That Changed Hollywood
by Greg Merritt
Hardcover - 440 pages
ISBN 9781613747926
Chicago Review Press
September 2013

Barnes and Noble

IndieBound
Powells

"He is forever the life of the party, forever a defendant, forever a villain or a victim or both, forever remembered – when he is remembered – for his tremendous and devastating fall from grace.” – pg 342, Greg Merritt

It was Labor Day 1921. A lively party was happening in Room 1219 of the St. Francis Hotel in San Francisco, California. Movie stars Roscoe "Fatty" Arbuckle and Lowell Sherman were there, dressed in their pajamas and sipping on cocktails, along with their cohort Fred Fishback. They booked the two adjacent rooms and invited some ladies to join them in some Prohibition-era naughtiness. Young up-and-coming actress Virginia Rappe was one of those ladies. Everyone was having fun when things took a turn for the worse. At one point, Arbuckle and Rappe had sneaked off to be alone. Rappe suddenly began to write in pain. She was in agony, tearing at her clothes and the fellow party goers had no clue how to help her. She was moved to room 1227 where nurses and doctors treated her and eventually she was moved to a local sanitarium. Rappe died on September 9th, 1921 of a ruptured bladder and all fingers pointed to the larger-than-life movie star Fatty Arbuckle as the person to blame for Rappe's untimely death.

Virginia Rappe

The death of Virginia Rappe and the trials against Fatty Arbuckle that followed was a series of events that forever changed film history. A movie star acting badly was one thing but being linked to someone's death was a whole other story. It was a result of the very public Arbuckle case and some other Hollywood scandals that the Hays Code was inevitably written and eventually enforced. Movies and their stars were now seen as a potential bad influence on movie goers and Hollywood had to reign that in quickly if it wanted to prosper. Arbuckle was never convicted of a crime against Rappe but was forever marred by the scandal. His acting career and his flamboyant Hollywood life was essentially over. He went on to direct films and found himself behind the same camera that he had once found so much success in front of.

Greg Merritt's Room 1219 is probably the best book I've read all year. It's incredibly well-organized, insightful, thoughtful, unbiased, thorough, clear and well-written. I was very interested in the Arbuckle-Rappe scandal but was worried that I would be overwhelmed with boring information about the three trials. My experience was quite the opposite. I was enthralled and found myself not wanting to let the book go.

The key to the book's success is Merritt's organization of the chapters. Each chapter alternates from the details of the scandal to biographical chapters on Arbuckle and one on Virginia Rappe. Flipping back and forth gives you a respite from being overwhelmed with too much detail. And this book has a lot of information to take in so the structure really helps. You go from the minute details of the scandal, the case and the three (yes three!) trials to the humanity of the lives and careers of Arbuckle and Rappe.

Even though there is only one chapter devoted to Virginia Rappe I don't feel like she was neglected at all in this book. There isn't much information on her but Merritt does very well with the sometimes conflicting data he acquired. He pieces together her life in a way that we really get a sense of who she was. He also devotes a chapter to Will H. Hays, the man who developed and enforced the Hays Code which restricted what could be shown in films. The Arbuckle-Rappe scandal is one of the major reasons why the Hays Code was put into effect so it's crucial for readers to understand what implications that scandal had for film history. You also learn quite a lot about Arbuckle as a man and as an actor. Arbuckle was married, yet privately separated from his first wife Minta Durfee, and very popular and well-known at the time of the scandal. It really couldn't have come at a worst time in his career. There is a lot of humanizing of Arbuckle. We learn about his three marriages, his troubled relationship with his father, his penchant for buying expensive automobiles and his friendship and working relationship with Buster Keaton. However, Arbuckle is painted not as a martyr but as a man with all his strengths and weakness on display.

Arbuckle and Keaton - Source

My favorite chapter in the book is entitled Labor Day Revisited. In this chapter, Merritt carefully lays out each and every scenario of what happened that evening on Labor Day 1921. Did Arbuckle really kill Rappe or was he a victim of circumstances? Merritt gives us the scenarios presented by the Defense and the Prosecution and examines the strengths and weaknesses of each argument. And with all the information he has collected, Merritt gives us his own conclusion of what happened. What I love about this books is how unbiased it is. Merritt is working off of his research and lets the information speak for itself. It's in stark contrast to all the articles published in many news outlets during the scandal that wanted to paint a story that tantalized and entertained.

Whenever I write a book review I try to present a books strengths and weaknesses. I really couldn't find any fault with Room 1219. If you are not interested in the time period, the context or the people involved then this book might not be for you. However, if you do have an interest in the Arbuckle-Rappe scandal, film history or 1920s history in general, then you need to run out and buy this book immediately! My only very small complaint is that I wanted to learn more about the Mishawum Manor scandal that Arbuckle was indirectly linked to prior to Rappe's death. Merritt dedicates only a few pages to this. My reason for wanting to know more is that this scandal happened in my very own neighborhood! And I had no clue! Thanks to Merritt I have a new research project on my hands.

Greg Merritt is also the author of Celluloid Mavericks: A History of American Independent Film Making, Film Production: The Complete Uncensored Guide to Filmmaking and Off the Lot: A History of American Independent Film.

Thank you to Meaghan from Independent Publishers Group for sending me a copy of the book for review!

The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) Filming Locations ~ Part 3 Cambridge Cemetery

After finding the filming locations in Downtown Boston and Beacon Hill for The Thomas Crown Affair (1968),  Carlos and I headed to Cambridge, MA to find the cemetery from the film. Finding specific locations in cemeteries is more difficult than it seems. I personally have tried to find the graves of the author Henry James (Cambridge, MA) and the actress Thelma Todd (Lawrence, MA) with no luck and even though I had photo and location references from the Find-A-Grave website.

You would figure that cemeteries would not change much over time, with the exception of new headstones, but that's just not the case. Weather causes damage, teenagers vandalize and knock over headstones, many gravestones get replaced, plants and trees grow or are taken down, etc. Also, unless you are looking for something in a small cemetery, most cemeteries are complex labyrinths of stone, pavement and plants and are difficult to navigate if you don't know what you are looking for or don't have some guidance.

I went into this particular project with an open mind. Carlos didn't. He thought he could find the exact spots right away but I knew better! Our first mistake was thinking that the cemetery scenes in the film were shot at Mt. Auburn Cemetery. We went there and good thing Carlos asked someone at the visitor center because we were told the actual filming location was the adjacent Cambridge Cemetery and not Mt. Auburn. IMDb clearly states Cambridge Cemetery so I'm still confused why I thought it was Mt. Auburn to begin with!

The well-organized bank heist in the films ends with a money drop off at a cemetery just outside of the city. The bags of money are deposited in a trash can and shortly afterwards Thomas Crown arrives to pick up the loot. There are several shots of the Cambridge Cemetery, before you get to the drop off location, and I picked this one above because it stood out. The sculpture is of four cannons topped off with cannon balls and what look like graves of veterans surrounding it. I figured this one would be the easiest to find. It took some time but I found it.

And here it is! Notice how all the headstones are gone? They were replaced by flat markers. See what I mean about cemeteries changing over time? This part of the cemetery was a Civil War memorial and the graves were of fallen soldiers. It was very sobering to be there.

What the Civil War memorial looks like from the other side

Then we started looking for the money drop off location. I knew this one would be tricky and that we would need to compare screen shots from the movie with the areas and specific headstones we came across. I made an album on Picasa of my screen shots and accessed them on my iPhone. It helped a lot to have the screen shots on hand to compare with what we were seeing in real life.

This is the spot we were looking for!

This is the one screen shot I was most grateful for because it helped me find the exact location of the drop off. Compare the three tombstones in the foreground of the shot with the ones below.

I tried to line up the shot as close as I could to the original, even trying to get that pointed headstone in the bottom left of my picture. Notice how different the tombstones look 45 years later. That one on the right seems to be sliding off some sort of pedestal. The trashcan where Steve McQueen picks up the trash would have been towards the back.

Here are some more shots of the area.

If you watch the film closely, you'll spot these two headstones, the Skelton above and Nourse below. Kudos to Carlos who took the time to note the names.

We looked for this headstone in particular but couldn't find it. It was supposedly next to the Skelton and Nourse headstones but when we were there that spot was empty. There wasn't even a marker. I'm wondering if this was a fake headstone added for effect. "Blessed are the Pure in Heart" is what you see when Steve McQueen drives away with the bank loot.

You might think it's pretty strange of me to visit a cemetery looking for filming locations and photographing graves. That's actually pretty normal for me. Ever since I was a teenager, I have been fascinated with cemeteries and I did a lot of photography work at many of them.

I hope you enjoyed my little series on the filming locations of The Thomas Crown Affair (1968). Carlos and I plan to find more locations but we may have to wait a while before we have time to do this kind of research again.

The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) Filming Locations ~ Part 2 Beacon Hill

After Carlos and I explored Downtown Boston in search of filming locations for The Thomas Crown Affair (1968) (you can see a post about that here), we headed to Beacon Hill where the character Thomas Crown (Steve McQueen) lived. Beacon Hill is a district of Boston that has great historical importance for both local history and American history in general. In Beacon Hill you'll find the Massachusetts State House and the African Meeting House, it was a stop on the Underground Railroad,  important writers, politicians and dignitaries have lived and worked there. It's also an aesthetically beautiful neighborhood. It is so sought after that properties there have a very high value and are sold for top dollar. Where else would Thomas Crown, a man whose main goal in life is to seek wealth at any cost, call home?

In the film, we first see Beacon Hill when Thomas Crown drives up Mt. Vernon Street.

What the drive up Mt. Vernon Street looks like today

Thomas Crown's car takes a left and enters the driveway of 85 Mt. Vernon Street.

85 Mt. Vernon Street

The same cobblestone driveway you see in the movie is still there. It's a private residence so we couldn't go in. It looks like some contractors were there hence all the extra cars parked in the driveway.

Source: GlamAmor

In the film, Vicki Anderson (Faye Dunaway) and Thomas Crown (Steve McQueen) attend an auction in Beacon Hill. I wasn't even looking for this location and didn't grab my own screen cap for it. However, Carlos really wanted to find it and we did! 

46 Beacon Street

46 Beacon Street

Vicki Anderson and Thomas Crown have a love affair. Is she trying to use her feminine charms on Thomas Crown to find out if he was responsible for the bank heist or is she falling for him in earnest? The line between business and pleasure starts to get really blurry. In this scene, Thomas Crown is taking Vicki Anderson back to his place. They walk up Acorn Street in Beacon Hill, one of the most photographed streets in America.

Sign for Acorn Street, which is to the right of this picture

Acorn Street, Beacon Hill

Acorn Street is beautiful and if you compare the screen cap from the movie and these pictures, it doesn't seem that much has changed from 1968 to 2013. Acorn Street seems to be frozen in time.

Acorn Street, Beacon Hill

It's a gorgeous little street, perfect for a romantic walk and a discreet kiss.

I hope you enjoyed my second installment in this filming location series on The Thomas Crown Affair (1968). Next up, I look for the cemetery featured in the film.

10 Tips on Getting in More Classic Film Reading

I hear a lot of people say that they don’t read classic film related books or don’t read enough of them because they don’t have time. This is an issue for all of us really. We lead busy lives and it’s difficult to get a movie in sometimes let alone a whole book!

As you can tell by my Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge and my many book reviews on this blog, reading classic film books is incredibly important to me. I try my best to fit it into my life because I want to learn. There is so much to learn and even with all the books I’ve read already, I feel like I’ve only hit the tip of the iceberg. I know there is so much more out there and my insatiable curiosity won’t let me rest. However, even with my own self-motivation, I still struggle.

Here are ten tips that have helped me get more reading in. I use almost all of them on a regular basis (I have to get better at #10!). I find that I need as much motivation as possible to get in all the reading I want to do. And even then I wish I could read more. Some of these tips might help you, some might not. Look through the list and see if there are any that might help you get in more reading.

 1. Read what you want – I came up with the idea of a Summer Reading challenge instead of a book club because I wanted to people to read what they wanted instead of being assigned something. Don’t pick up a book you think you should read, pick up something you know you want to read. It can be a book about your favorite actor, actress or director or about a genre you love.

2. Challenge yourself – Make goals. Whether it’s to read 6 books in 3 months or to get that one book you’ve been reading for a long time finished by next week. You can even set page goals. For example, make a small goal to finish 100 pages of your book by the end of the day. I know this all makes reading sound like a chore. It really isn’t. Reading is a joy but it comes with effort. And it's more difficult these days with all the distractions. Our attention spans have become shorter. Reading a book will help you work on your attention span and you’ll feel accomplished after each book. Also, if you have an hour to devote to reading and you'll find you'll get advance more pages in an hour straight of reading than an hour's worth of reading in little bits. However, if little snippets of time is all you have then that’s better than nothing.

3. Keep track of your reading – I like to use a website like Goodreads. There is also LibraryThing, All Consuming and a few others. I keep track of books I’m currently reading, books I've read in the past, and how many books I want to read in a year (Goodreads has a cool tracking widget for that). You can also keep an offline journal or keep track of your reading on your blog if you have one. You can do full reviews or small ones to keep track of your thoughts on what you’ve read.

4. Find motivation – Read book reviews by other bloggers or readers, learn about new books coming out, take a look at the book section on TCM’s website, sign up for e-newsletters from your favorite publishers, talk to friends online and offline about what they are reading, etc. I find that talking to people about books or learning about them on and offline really encourages me to read more.

 5. Keep a book by your side constantly – Right now I’m reading Room 1219: The Life of Fatty Arbuckle, the Mysterious Death of Virginia Rappe, and the Scandal That Changed Hollywood. It goes everywhere with me. It’s often found in my car, at my desk at work, in my purse, on my nightstand, on the coffee table by the couch and even in the bathroom sometimes. I read it in the morning when I wake up, at night before I go to sleep and I even read it during my lunch break. Bring a book with you when you travel or go to appointments. You’ll have a lot of down time and you can get some good reading in that way. In fact, if you have a lot of travel time ahead of you, such as a long flight or bus/train trip, then bring TWO books. When you get bored of one, switch to the other. And on that note...

6. Alternate your reading – Do you find yourself overwhelmed with a particular book no matter how much you enjoy reading it? Or is the book your reading a bit of a slog to get through? You don’t have to be faithful to one book at a time. Have a few going at once. I almost always have 3 or 4 books going at the same time. I also read young adult and children’s books for work. So sometimes I’ll alternate between my classic film book and one lighter book I’m reading for my job. Or I’ll alternate between two classic film books. I also like reading general non-fiction, history, classic literature and some contemporary fiction. I try to mix things up and it keeps things interesting.

7. Reward yourself – I remember one time I was so happy that I had finished a particularly long classic film book that was chock full of just so much information, that I rewarded myself with a day of luxury. On that day, I did beauty treatments, went shopping and watched my favorite films. Your rewards don’t have to encompass entire days. They can be small too! Sometimes I even reward myself with finishing one book by buying another. Just don't reward yourself with cake. Ha!

8. Do active reading – I keep a notebook or a pad of paper and a pen handy to make notes while I'm reading. I write down quotes (with page numbers), trivia bits I liked, things that struck me as interesting, thoughts I had about what was discussed and points maybe I want to include in my review if I’m doing one. This is especially useful when you are reading non-fiction like a biography. If I don't have paper nearby, I'll take notes on my iPhone and I'll even take pictures of quotes from the book that I want to refer to later! If you're reading a book about a specific genre of film, sometimes I stop to go to YouTube or TCM's MediaRoom to watch a trailer, scene, musical number, interview, etc. that was mentioned in the book. Or if I read about a film I haven’t seen yet, I go to Netflix or Classicflix to see if I can rent it. Or I’ll look it up on TCM’s website to see if they are showing it in the future. All of this may increase the time it takes you to finish a book. However, it will make you more absorbed in the reading experience and you'll enjoy it more because you have become an active participant instead of just a passive one.

9. Be realistic – You can’t read all the books in the world. There are so many classic film books out there and more are being published every year. Even though our niche is really specific, there is still a huge variety of books on it. So be picky. As I said before, read what you want. Also, if you have a super busy schedule, be realistic about what you can fit in. You might want to read 100 books in a year but if 10 or 20 is more realistic stick with that.

10. It’s okay to put a book down – I should take my own advice because I rarely do this. If you had high hopes for a book and your reading experience has been nothing but a big disappointment, then give yourself permission to stop reading the book . There are a lot of books out there that you will enjoy. It doesn’t make sense to waste your precious time on something that you just don’t like.

2013 Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge ~ Final Round-up

Here is the final round-up for the 2013 Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge. Check out the First Round-Up and Second Round-Up if you haven't already.

Congratulations to Laura and Travis! They completed the 6 book challenge. Instead of awarding a prize to one winner, I decided to split the prize and give them both their pick of any Warner Archive title they want.

ETA: Sara also won too! I didn't find all her reviews on my searches. Whoops! Good job Sara! I added links below and she'll also be getting a prize.

I'm very impressed with everyone's reading and reviews. Here are the last ones:

ETA: Karen of Shadows and Satin submitted 4 after the deadline but I'll still take them!

Born to Be Hurt: The Untold Story of Imitation of Life by Sam Staggs
Hollywood Myths: The Shocking Truths Behind Film’s Most Incredible Secrets and Scandals by Joe Williams
Hollywood Book of Death: The Bizarre, Often Sordid, Passings of More than 125 American Movie and TV Idols by James Robert Parish
Norma Shearer by Gavin Lambert

Laura of Laura's Miscellaneous Musings
Joan Blondell: A Life Between Takes by Matthew Kennedy
Movie Love in the Fifties by James Harvey
Romantic Comedy in Hollywood: From Lubitsch to Sturges by James Harvey
Yvonne: An Autobiography by Yvonne DeCarlo

Lê of Vintage Classic Scrapbook
Bonjour Tristesse by Francoise Sagan
Film Noir by Alain Silver and James Ursini
Suspects by David Thomson

Margaret of The Great Katharine Hepburn
Celluloid Gaze by Boze Hadleigh

Raquel of Out of the Past
Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations by Ava Gardner and Peter Evans
Cagney by Cagney
Saul Bass: A Life in Film and Design by Pat Kirkham and Jennifer Bass
Young Man with a Horn by Dorothy Baker

Rich of Wide Screen World
I Do and I Don't: A History of Marriage in the Movies by Jeanine Basinger

Sara on Goodreads
The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
The Measure of a Man by Sidney Poitier
To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway

Sebina on Goodreads
Killer Tomatoes: Fifteen Tough Film Dames by Ray Hagen and Laura Wagner
Without Lying Down: Screenwriter Frances Marion and the Powerful Women of Early Hollywood by Cari Beauchamp

Travis of Cinemalacrum
License To Thrill: A Cultural History of the James Bond Films
Mining The Home Movie: Excavations In Histories And Memories
Korean Film: History, Resistance, and Democratic Imagination


Total Books Counted
Karen - 4
Laura - 6
Lê  - 5
Lindsay - 1
Margaret - 5
Raquel - 6
Rich - 3
Sara - 6
Sebina - 4
Travis - 6

(If I'm missing a link or I incorrectly counted your reviews, let me know!)

Everyone did a great job with their book reviews. Thanks so much for participating! I hope to be able to do this next year.

Saul Bass: A Life in Film and Design

Saul Bass: A Life in Film and Design
by Jennifer Bass and Pat Kirkham
Foreword by Martin Scorsese

Laurence King Publishers
(distributed in the U.S. by Chronicle)
Hardcover, 428 pages
October 2011
ISBN: 9781856697521

Barnes and Noble
IndieBound
Powell's

I was so excited when Saul Bass: A Life in Film and Design came out. I anxiously waited for a good deal and when I found one I immediately bought the book. As with most books I get really excited about, it quickly got queued along with a lot of other books that were begging for my attention. My Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge was just the swift kick in the pants I needed to devote some time to it.

Many people will buy this book, flip through the pages, ogle at Saul Bass' many gorgeous designs and display the book proudly in their homes. But this book deserves so much more than to just be another adornment on someone's coffee table for cursory perusing. It's a beautiful book meant to be slowly consumed with just as much time spent reading the text as looking at the designs.

The book starts off with a foreword by Director Martin Scorsese, a preface by design historian and Bass family friend Pat Kirkham and an additional preface by Saul Bass' daughter Jennifer Bass. Her preface is very touching and reads like a love letter to her dad. It's not to be missed. Right from the beginning we get the sense that Saul Bass didn't do this alone. He collaborated with his talented wife Elaine Bass and had the support of a team that grew to over 50 employees. Bass worked tirelessly up until his death in 1996.

Pat Kirkham wrote most of the text and Jennifer Bass worked on the design and layout of the book as well as curating all of the design work that is so lovingly displayed. Saul Bass had intended to write a book of his own but had to abandon it while in the middle of the process. Many of the writings in his early draft can be found within the pages of this book. It's divided into 6 chapters: 1. From the Beginning; 2. Renaissance Designer, 3. Reinventing Movie Titles, 4. Beginnings, Middles and Ends, 5. The Wheel Comes Full Circle, 6. Corporate Identity, 7. Personal Handwriting. This structure isn't immediately intuitive but works chronologically through Bass' life and career and the necessity for this structured flow becomes apparent as you work through the book.

Saul Bass' work is vast and encompasses many formats and mediums. He did movie title sequences, movie posters and ads, corporate logos, album covers, food and product package designs and he even designed buildings. His portfolio of logos for companies and organizations such as AT&T, The Girl Scouts, The United Way, United Airlines, Continental Airlines, Dixie Cups, Warner Communications, etc. is remarkable. He and his wife Elaine also directed short films, commericals and one feature length film Phase IV.

His movie title sequences are what I think most of us are enchanted by and we get to ogle at screen shots of his collaborations with directors such as Otto Preminger (they worked on 13 films together), Alfred Hitchcock (did you know that Bass "designed" the famous shower sequence in Psycho?) and Martin Scorsese (who gave Bass complete creative control).

What's really wonderful about this book is not only are Saul Bass' designs presented to us in a visually appealing format, we are also given the history, context and meaning behind each design. You'll learn a lot about why Bass decided to go with a certain look or design element. He was incredibly thoughtful and retentive and each design, no matter how simple, is packed with meaning and symbolism.

My only very slight criticism of this book is that it is presented with bias and definitely glorifies Bass and his work. His talent was incredible and after reading this I wonder if he was super-human and almost without fault? Who knows, maybe he was? Otherwise, this book is a glorious tribute to an incredibly talented man. I love the last chapter which includes quotes, reminiscences and advice from the man himself.

Here are some quotes from Saul Bass and from the book in general along with some of my favorite Saul Bass designs. I also included a making-of-the-book trailer from the publisher. This is my sixth and final entry for my 2013 Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge.

On Movie Title Sequences - "... the nature of films was changing, partly in terms of content but also because of competition from television - opening up new possibilities for designers like Saul." - pg 16

On Creativity - "Interesting things happen when creative impulse is cultivated with curiosity, freedom and intensity." - Saul Bass

On Conformity "... Saul noted the links between creativity and non-conformity, pointing to the fear of risk-taking and the stigma attached to failure in a success-oriented society." - pg. 32

 On Criticism -  "You see an artist, a creative person, can accept criticism or can live with the criticism much more easily than with being ignored. Criticism makes you feel alive. If somebody is bothered enough by what you have done to speak vituperatively about it, you feel have touched a nerve and you are at least “in touch.” You are not happy that he doesn’t like it, but you feel you are in contact with life.”- Saul Bass

On Movie Title Squences - "Saul believed that a film, like a symphony, deserved a mood-setting overture, and used ambiguity, layering and texture as well as startingly compact imagery to reshape the time before the film proper began.” p. 106

On the Care and Feeding of Creative People - "When a client repeatedly rejects good ideas the effect on creative people can be devastating. Joy evaporates, motivation diminishes. Conversely, when a client recognizes and supports excellent work, the motivation to be even better is enhanced.”- Saul Bass

On Saul Bass’ ideal title – “a simplicity which also as a certain ambiguity and a certain metaphysical implication that makes that simplicity vital. If it’s simple simple, it’s boring.” pg. 107 

Title sequence for Ocean's 11 (1960)

Title sequence for The Man With a Golden Arm (1955)

Cover of the music album Tone Poems of Color conducted by Frank Sinatra

Corporate Logos by Saul Bass

 

Anatomy of a Murder (1959) movie poster

 

Bonjour Tristesse (1958) movie poster

Saul Bass: A Life in Film and Design from Laurence King Publishing on Vimeo.

Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations

Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations
by Peter Evans and Ava Gardner
Simon and Schuster
Hardcover, 304 pages
July 2013
ISBN 9781451627695


Barnes and Noble

IndieBound
Powell's

In 1986, actress Ava Gardner suffered a stroke. Two years later she found herself in some financial difficulty and decided to write a memoir so she wouldn't have to "sell the jewels". Biographer Peter Evans was hired to help Gardner write the book after being personally recommended by Gardner's friends including fellow actor Dirk Bogarde. Evans knew that this project would be difficult but couldn't imagine what was in store for him. After months of late night phone calls, bizarre meetings and endless massaging of a fading beauty's ego, the book was called off. A more sanitized autobiography was published much later with the help of someone else. But Peter Evans never let go of the idea of publishing a book about Ava Gardner in her voice and with the permission of her estate put together Ava Gardner: The Secret Conversations.

Me reading this book is me keeping a very open mind. As some of you know, I do not like Ava Gardner. But many people do like her and are fooled dazzled by her manipulation charm. I set my differences aside because I thought this book sounded really interesting and I wanted to learn more about her.

The end result was that I quite enjoyed my experience reading this book and learning more about Ava Gardner as an actress and as a woman. This book defies any categorization. It's a sort of biography (Peter Evans' voice), autobiography (Ava Gardner's voice), transcript of conversations and a biography about a biography that never happened. The book is also a tribute to Peter Evans who passed away before he could finish it. Both voices are gone but we have this treasure to remember them by.

Because the initial project was cut short, we don't really have the full story of Ava Gardner's life but we do get quite a bit. Most of Gardner's conversations with Evans are about the romantic relationships she's had. We learn a lot about her first marriage to Mickey Rooney and to some extent her marriages to Artie Shaw and Frank Sinatra. All those marriages ended badly. She also had a long romance with Howard Hughes, but refused to marry him, affairs with Robert Mitchum and a bull fighter in Spain and was in an abusive relationship with actor George C. Scott. In her conversations with Evans, Gardner is very restrained but with Evans patience and a couple of drinks, she does open up to reveal some very personal information. She would often times panic later about what she had revealed and plead Evans not to include it. Evans was essentially in the middle of a tug-of-war. He had a publisher to answer to but he also needed to keep Gardner happy and on board with continuing the book. Evans struggle was a significant one and you get really get a sense of his dilemma.

Ava Gardner can come off very vain in this book. She was highly focused on her appearance and how people perceive her. But in many ways this is understandable. Here is an aging beauty who once had
an incredible power over men, driving many of them wild with desire, and doesn't want to let that power go. Who would?

My favorite part of the book was when Peter Evans recalls the time when he arranged a meeting with Ava Gardner and the publishers. The event was to take place at Gardner's home and she was very worried about her appearance. She was much older now and her stroke had left part of her face paralyzed. Gardner told Evans she would only do the meeting if cinematographer Jack Cardiff arranged the lighting so she could look her best. Cardiff came over, staged the lighting around the chair she would sit in and made everything work for her. Evans talked to Cardiff and this is what he said:

When she sits in that chair tomorrow, keep telling her how beautiful she looks. Keep on saying that. How beautiful she looks. Lay it on thick. She won't believe you, she's too smart to fall for blarney, but it's what she wants to hear. It's the tribute you must always pay to great beauties when they grow old. Remember, it's always the camera man who grows old, never the star. - Jack Cardiff (page 83)

This book is amazing and I highly suggest you read it. Did it change my opinion of Ava Gardner? No. But it did give me some insight into this iconic actress and made me understand her allure. I loved reading about her relationships with her mom and her sister Bappy. Evans included parts of the draft that he was working on before he had to cancel the project. Those were really interesting to read. I loved the story of how Mickey Rooney traveled with Gardner to see her mom and made a big fuss over her and made her mom so happy. I really enjoyed how Gardner was open about her mistakes and frank about her career. While she was concerned about what would go into her book, I felt that at heart she was a very honest and open person.

If there is an actress or actor you don't like, I suggest taking some time out to read a bit more about them. It might not change your opinion but it will definitely open your eyes.

This is my fifth review for my 2013 Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge. Just one more to go!

 
 

Young Man With a Horn by Dorothy Baker

Young Man With a Horn
by Dorothy Baker
New York Review of Books
Paperback, 192 pages
Originally Published 1938
ISBN 9781590175774

Barnes and Noble
IndieBound
Powell's

Young Man With a Horn by Dorothy Baker is considered to be the first ever Jazz novel. It was published in 1938 and was a critical and commercial success. The novel was adapted into a movie which was released in 1950 and starred Kirk Douglas, Lauren Bacall and Doris Day (read my review of the movie here). Baker turned down the opportunity to adapt her own novel into a screenplay and because of that the book and movie are very different.

Spoiler alert! In comparing the book with the movie I reveal some important plot points. 

Young Man With a Horn follows the story of Rick Martin from when he was a young boy in the poor part of Los Angeles to when he becomes a professional jazz trumpeter to his downward spiral to his inevitable death. In the movie, Rick comes out of his sickness alive with the help of friends. In the book, it's only Smoke who is by his side and the story ends with his demise.

Race is a big issue in the novel and much time is spent on exploring the class and social difference between whites and blacks. It's unclear whether Dorothy Baker was prejudiced herself but much of the language is very demeaning towards African-Americans and this is dialed down quite a lot in the film. The language in the book might come as a bit of a shock to contemporary readers so its important to note the time frame this book was written in. I thought it interesting that Rick's friendship and collaboration with black musicians isn't questioned much in the film except for when Rick is doing double-duty playing at a fancy nightclub during the evening and a dive with his friend Art later in the night.

Let's talk about the two important men in Rick's life: Art Hazzard and Smoke Jordan. The film has an African-American (well really an Afro-Latino) playing Art Hazzard and a Caucasian man playing Smoke Jordan. In the novel, they are both African-American and it's really Smoke who is Rick's lifelong pal and not Art. Art Hazzard is a musician who helps Rick get ahead but not much more. The whole sop story of Art getting older and sickly and dying because of Rick neglect's is purely an invention of the movie and does not happen in the book. Baker's character Smoke is split into two characters in the movie with some story lines are given to Art and the rest to Smoke. Perhaps it was too much for the time the movie came out for Rick to have one African-American friend and no Caucasian buddy.

I was surprised how little the two main female characters play in the novel versus the film. In the movie adaptation, Jo Jordan is played by Doris Day, a blonde Caucasian actress known for her singing and for playing good girls on screen. Amy North is played by Lauren Bacall, with cat-like features she's excellent playing a seductress and femme fatale. Jo's part in the movie is much bigger than it is in the book. In the novel, Jo is a singer who only briefly comes into Rick's life enough to introduce him to Amy North and to interact with him one other time. She's described as dark-skinned and doesn't have a romance or even a flirtation with Rick in the novel. Both Jo Jordan and Amy North don't come into the story until about 127 pages into the 172 page novel where as Jo appears 21 minutes in and Amy 50 minutes into the 112 minute movie and take up much more time after their initial appearance than they do in the book. The portrayal of Amy is pretty accurate in the movie and although she becomes Rick's wife, she seems to be more of a disastrous mistake in the book than a big cataclysm like the movie portrays her.

The two portrayals of Rick Martin are not that different from each other. However, the book spends a lot more time exploring Rick's childhood and how he develops his skills over the years playing the trumpet. We see Rick, desperately poor and parentless trying to find something in the world worth living for. The novel explores his struggles in school, his fascination with reading library books, his piano playing and his switch to the trumpet, his African-American pals and their adventures together. Some of this is explored in the movie but a lot is cut out to focus more on Rick's adult life.

The movie is much more entertaining than the book possibly because of the love triangle of Jo, Amy and Rick which adds much romantic drama. The book's focus is more on Rick as a jazz musician and less as an object of romantic desire. One thing I thought was really intriguing is that the author Dorothy Baker was fascinated with homosexual relationships and as she wrote more books she became more open in exploring them. Amy North as a lesbian or a bisexual woman is hinted at much more in the movie than in the book. The movie focuses a lot more on sex and I wonder if Dorothy Baker had tackled the screenplay (she refused to do it) whether she would have gone that route or maybe found some other drama to play up.

I'm not sure what I was expecting when I read the novel Young Man With a Horn but to me it read almost like a completely different story than the film. The novel has a lot less drama and is an introspective look at the life of a jazz artist. Both the film and the novel have their good qualities, so while I compare them both together in this review they should in fact be seen as two different stories.

I bought the book from New York Review of Books which put Young Man With a Horn after it had been out of print for many years! This is my fourth entry into my 2013 Summer Reading Classic Film Book Challenge.