Remember my summing-up in Crazy Sunday--don't give the impression that these are bad people.
Actress--introduced so slowly, so close, so real that you believe in her. Somehow she's first sitting next to you, not an actress but with all the qualifications, loud and dissonant in your ear. Then she is one, but don't let it drift away in detailed description of her career. Keep her close. Never just use her name. Always begin with a mannerism.
The Beard. Monty Woolley's beard. 50 peddle the muff. Family supported by beard. It hasn't worked for seven weeks. It was wonderful in Hurricane. It got a poor deal Wednesday. For a gag going to cut it off--work I lose. How much prestige, amour propre. Damage to ego. $30,000. Fake beard cut off.
Tillie Losch worried about what "exotic" meant.
He was so new as a scenarist that when the agent came in, he thought he wanted him to write something for the paper. [This refers to the habit of the Hollywood trade papers of shaking down newcomers for ads under threat of giving them bad publicity or none.]
Man [from Hollywood trade paper] advising me not to read the book.
Character of X, poor producer.
---saying afterwards that he died with silent pictures.
We need a new formula.
The cleverly expressed opposite of any generally accepted idea is worth a fortune to somebody.
Joke about "Shoot it both ways."
"We could tap out something," she said--as a colored maid says, "I'll rinse out your stockings," to minimize the work.
Great masses of wires on floor--can hear everyone through dictophone.
Her ash-blond hair seemed weather-proof save for a tiny curtain of a bang that was evidently permitted, even expected, to stir a little in a mild wind. She had an unmistakable aura about her person of being carefully planned. Under minute scallops that were scarcely brows, her eyes, etc. Her teeth were so white against the tan, her lips so red, that in combination with the blue of her eyes, the effect was momentarily startling--as startling as if the lips had been green and the pupils white.
She feared the black cone hanging from the metal arm, shrilling and shrilling across the sunny room. It stopped for a minute, replaced by her heartbeats; then began again.
Hollywood child. The little hard face of a successful street-walker on a jumping-jack's body, the clear cultured whine of the voice.
Most of us could be photographed from the day of our birth to the day of our death and the film shown, without producing any emotion except boredom and disgust. It would all just look like monkeys scratching. How do you feel about your friends' home movies about their baby or their trip? Isn't it a godawful bore?
A football team on a blazing hot July day. Two hot teams mousing around at $500 a day. Actors, extras and a camera crew. High in the empty stadium, Stahr and his girl.
There was, for example, a man who in all seriousness asked him this favor: Stahr was to say, "Hello, Tim," and slap him on the back in front of the commissary one morning. Stahr had the man's record traced, and then slapped him on the back. The man ascended into Heaven.
Almost literally, for he was taken into one of the best agencies--which is what George Gershwin referred to when he said, "It's nice work if you can get it." He sits there today, with a picture of his wife and children on the wall, and has his nails manicured at the Beverly Hills Hotel. His life is one long happy dream.
Stahr remembered how they had used the three freaks back in 1927. X was being bothered by a really appalling woman. The day before the case came to trial, he sent a dwarf and [two other freaks] to her with messages. His counsel opened by stating that the woman was crazy. On the stand she told about her visitors--the jury shook their heads, winked at each other and acquitted.
Cecilia's uncle is an idiot like---'s brother.
"--the rugged individualism of Tommy Manville, Barbara Hutton and Woolie Donahue." Never forgiven Wylie for slipping it into his speech when he was supporting Landon.
There is a place for a hint somewhere of a big agent, to complete the picture.
A tall round-shouldered young man with a beaked nose and soft brown eyes in a sensitive face.
The awful reverberating thunder of his absence.
[Airplane Trip]
My blue dream of being in a basket like a kite held by a rope against the wind.
It's fun to stretch and see the blue heavens spreading once more, spreading azure thighs for adventure.
Girl like a record with a blank on the other side.
There are no second acts in American lives.
Tragedy of these men was that nothing in their lives had really bitten deep at all.
Bald Hemingway characters.
wily plagiarist
exigent overlordship
not one survived the castration
Don't wake the Tarkington ghosts.
ACTION IS CHARACTER.
The Love of the Last Tycoon Page 18