Heinlein continued, attempting to prompt a more energetic representation from Brown:
Ned, you are an extremely busy man and science fiction is a specialized field. I don’t expect you to have time to become a specialist; you haven’t the time, it is too much to ask. There do happen to be two agents in Hollywood who know this field well, but I tell you frankly that I would never consider leaving you for either one of them (although they have each repeatedly urged me to do so)—as I like your business methods and I don’t like theirs. But do you have an associate who knows science fiction, likes to read it for pleasure, and who could take hold of my stuff under your supervision and push it? If there were such a person, someone slightly less busy than yourself, Lurton and I could provide him with a complete file of my published works and I could work in close cooperation with him. If he thought that “By His Bootstraps,” for example, merited a screen treatment or even a master-scene screenplay, he could tell me so and I could see what could be done about putting it into a more salable form. I know the damned stuff is hard to sell. I don’t expect you fellows to go out and make me rich without cooperation from me. (RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 10/21/52.)
However, this state of dissatisfaction with his Hollywood representation was to continue for some time.
Heinlein’s experience echoes that of Hollywood insiders generally. There is a fundamental “disconnect” of expectations between an agent’s clients—particularly writers—and the agent. The agent sees his job as to prepare and keep track of the appropriate paperwork for contracts and so forth—to protect his client’s interest with respect to the studio or production company—whereas the writer (and this is generally true of Hollywood’s “creative types”) wants someone who will actively promote their work, get new work for them. Promotion does happen in an agent’s daily activities—but usually only incidentally.
46. RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 08/23/52.
47. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 08/21/52.
48. RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 09/19/52.
49. RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 09/19/52.
50. RAH, letter to Mildred Frary, Editor, Bulletin of the School Library Association of California, 08/20/52.
51. The California Bulletin version is complete, and it is this version that was republished in the Virginia Edition, vol. xxxvii Nonfiction 1. This article for librarians is notable for containing the first public reference to “a Martian named Smith.”
52. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Tape 9, Side A. The Iditarod dogsled race commemorates this incident, as does a statue of Balto in New York’s Central Park. Balto was the husky who led the team on the last leg of the anti-diphtheria serum delivery to Nome. In 1995 Stephen Spielberg produced a combination live-action/animation film about the dog, titled Balto.
53. RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 09/19/52.
54. RAH, letter to “O’Donnell,” 10/04/73.
55. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Tape 3, Side B.
56. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Tape 3, Side B.
57. RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 09/19/52.
58. Janet Taylor, Rockhill Radio, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 09/30/52.
59. RAH, letter to Tom Stimson, 10/04/52.
60. RAH, letter to Tom Stimson, 10/04/52.
61. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Tape 9, Side A.
62. RAH, letter to Ned Brown, 03/16/53. The treatments for “Home Sweet Home” (about a bratty kid sabotaging an automated house) and “The Tourist” (about an alien visitor sampling Earth’s culture as he possesses a space traveler) are printed in the Virginia Edition, vol. xlv Screenplays 2.
63. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 12/05/52.
64. Undated three-by-five card in RAH’s hand.
65. RAH, letter to Ted Carnell, 10/28/52.
66. RAH, letter to Ted Carnell, 10/28/52.
67. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 10/28/52.
68. Lurton Blassingame, letter to RAH, 10/23/52.
69. RAH, letter to Willy Ley, 11/04/52; RAH, letter to Bill Corson, 12/29/52.
70. RAH, draft letter to Gregory Benford, 11/08/73.
71. Alice Dalgliesh, letter to RAH, 12/10/52.
72. RAH, letter to Bill Corson, 12/29/52.
73. RAH, letter to Jack Seaman, 05/04/53.
74. Virginia Heinlein seems to have thought that Heinlein did not know about the decision to turn “Ring Around the Moon” into a feature film, but this cannot be so, as a separate contract was negotiated for the film version—at Heinlein’s insistence—and Heinlein himself did the additional writing to expand the script from a one-hour television production (i.e., 44 minutes of screen time, since television commercials take time away from story) to 63 minutes of screen time for a film (including opening and end titles).
Project Moonbase was an obvious cheapie, with production values embarrassingly out of touch with standards for films in the early 1950s. But Destination Moon had kicked off what was virtually a craze for space movies, and Karl Johnson and Jack Seaman had decided between themselves to cash in on the craze, apparently hoping that a successful film release would help the series get picked up for broadcast.
Although Heinlein was dubious about this reasoning, his handler at MCA thought it would do his career and reputation good to have another screen credit at that time. (Malcolm Stuart, MCA, letter to RAH, 01/28/53.)
Project Moonbase was released in mid-1953 and had a very short run, disappearing into the attic trunks of Hollywood until it was revived for its camp value on VHS and DVD in the 1990s.
75. RAH, letter to L. Sprague de Camp, 12/15/52.
76. RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 03/28/53.
7. Out and About
1. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with Leon Stover, Tape 3, Side A, p. 10 of transcript in RAH Archive, UC Santa Cruz.
2. Virginia Heinlein, letter to the author, 11/07/99; Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with Leon Stover, Tape 3, Side A (October 22?, 1988); Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Tape 9, Side A (March 1?, 2000); RAH Accession Notes (1967) for Starman Jones.
3. In RAH, letter to Bill Corson, 12/29/52, Heinlein notes that he has the next boys’ book on his professional agenda, with no indication that he has a story at this point; but he began writing, according to the Opus cards that contain his working history for each project, quoted in Marie Guthrie-Ormes’s doctoral dissertation, on February 2, 1953. Given that Heinlein typically began writing as soon as a project was fully clear in his mind, the principal part of the layout of the book must, then, have come together in January 1953.
4. RAH, letter to Annette and Mick McComas, 08/26/53.
5. J. Francis McComas, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 03/01/53.
6. John W. Campbell, Jr., letter to RAH, 02/03/53.
7. The lawsuit was apparently threatened in a 1952 letter by Leslyn to Lurton Blassingame, which is no longer extant (apparently Heinlein destroyed the file he was collecting, as it never was received by the RAH Archive). He also received and acknowledged a similar letter sent on to him by Doña Smith. RAH, letter to Doña (Campbell) Smith, 02/18/52. On the same day, Heinlein wrote to his lawyer-friend Sam Kamens (who had represented both him and Leslyn in their divorce action—a practice that is still common when the break-up is cooperative and more or less amicable), saying that the current batch of letters was so over the top that he no longer thought even the most hungry lawyer would be persuaded by them to bring an action.
8. John W. Campbell, Jr., letter to RAH, 03/24/53.
9. RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 03/28/53.
10. Lurton Blassingame, letter to RAH, 03/24/53.
11. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 03/25/53. Extracts from his letter were published in Grumbles from the Grave at 67.
12. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 03/25/53.
13. RAH, letter to E. J. Carnell, 05/08/53.
14. “Project Nightmare” was actually
purchased by Howard Browne in May 1952 for the fantasy magazine Fantastic, but the magazine folded before the story could be published. The details of how the manuscript was acquired by Fantastic’s Ziff-Davis sister magazine Amazing Stories were not recorded.
15. Lurton Blassingame, letter to RAH, 05/03/53.
16. RAH, letter to Robert Moore Williams, 05/21/47.
17. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Tape 4, Side B.
18. RAH, postscript to George O. Smith, undated but 1953:
V. V. himself is all over his nervous mannerisms and exudes the charm and self-confidence of W. C. Fields about to sell a sucker a gold brick. I liked him much better than I did four years ago, but that left plenty of room to increase liking without wanting to kiss him.
Four years previously would have been 1949, presumably when Heinlein was in Los Angeles working on Destination Moon.
19. RAH, letter to George O. Smith, undated but around 05/10/53.
20. RAH, letter to George O. Smith, undated but around 05/10/53.
21. RAH, letter to John W. Campbell, Jr., 03/20/53.
22. Van Ronkel’s letter has not been preserved, but Heinlein’s reply to van Ronkel, 05/17/53, conveys his shock, analyzes the possibilities (as given in the text), and concludes that any payment to Schor can only have been a bribe to conceal from them the difference between 10 percent of the production (which is what they thought they were negotiating for) and 10 percent of the producer’s share (which is how the paperwork was drawn up). As Schor was a lawyer who practiced in entertainment law before becoming an agent, Heinlein concluded Schor “took a dive” and went on to say the matter was so distressing he could hardly stand to think about it.
To Lurton Blassingame (letter of 05/17/53), Heinlein wrote in summary:
Rip and I have a dirty, dark suspicion that he was handed this piece of the picture for working against the interests of his clients in the negotiations. It would explain a hell of a lot of things about his behavior and about some of the very real faults of the contract. I had thought he was just stupid; now I am tentatively of the opinion that he is dishonest.
Of course, he may have some legitimate explanation as to how he got a piece of the picture—but what the hell could it be? And why has he concealed from Rip and myself that he had an interest much greater than his interest in his clients—and concealed it for three years? I just can’t see any explanation other than that he sold us out.
But neither Heinlein nor van Ronkel had access to hard data, and so it remains only a speculation. As Ginny Heinlein remarked, “That was never confirmed, and I don’t know whether it is true or not. Robert considered that a part of the Hollywood treatment and felt that almost everyone on the film had betrayed him…” (Virginia Heinlein, letter to the author, 12/10/99.)
23. Twain’s late book Christian Science (1907) predicted that Christian Science would have the United States in a theocracy within forty years.
24. Author’s note of a dinner conversation with Virginia Heinlein in early March 2001.
25. RAH, letter to Irving Pichel, 05/29/53. Fifteen thousand words into the story is about where Secretary-General Douglas interviews Mike while still in the hospital and tries to get him to sign away his problematical Larkin Rights.
26. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 06/10/53.
27. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 07/05/53.
28. Virginia Heinlein, letter to the author, 07/07/99.
29. Virginia Heinlein, letter to Leon Stover, 04/08/89.
30. Rex Ivar Heinlein was diagnosed with Involutional Melancholia in, probably, 1938. This matter is treated in Volume 1 of this biography, Learning Curve, 202–4.
31. RAH, letter to Rex Heinlein (brother), 10/25/53.
32. Rex Ivar Heinlein (father), letter to RAH, 08/03/53. The note suggests just how difficult and awkward this visit must have been:
Just want to repeat that I appreciate your efforts to make us enjoy our stay with you and Ginny. I especially appreciate the time Ginny spent playing Samba, since it seems she does not like the game.… Might have stayed a few days longer, but you seemed to feel that it wasn’t fair to the rest of you for us to stay longer here than we did at your home. Besides we are beginning to feel that it will be nice to be in our own home once more.
I am sorry that there were a couple of unpleasant episodes, and I hope time will efface some of the recollection of these …
As to belittling Ginny’s service, such was not my intention. I did not know that the service women carried rifles and drilled. It doesn’t make sense. The war in which I had a very small part [the Spanish-American War, 1898–99] was of course a little one but just as big as any other to those who lost their sons. It also led to the United States being lifted up to a first class power in the world and give her a place in the world, good or bad, which she hadn’t enjoyed before …
I am sorry if Ginny considers herself an outsider. We have always tried to feel and make the new members feel that they were truly members of our family. I think it is true with the rest and I hope Ginny will come to feel that way also.
I sincerely hope you and Ginny can come to see us before too long, since it is not possible that we will ever again make such a trip as the one we are soon to complete.
All in all it has been very pleasant and will always be remembered that way.
Love to both of you
33. Ned Brown, letter to RAH, 07/28/53, forwards a clipping from Variety about distribution being picked up for Project Moonbase.
34. Quoted in “Destination Moon: Robert A. Heinlein, Filmwriter” by Christopher Schaefer, New Libertarian 187 (undated but 1999): 63.
35. RAH, Tramp Royale, 2. The Heinleins contemplating building a rental property is not mentioned elsewhere in correspondence. It is always chancy to take as factual such a statement in so mannered a book as Tramp Royale, but in this case it is so plausible an idea that I elected to treat it as factual.
36. RAH, Tramp Royale, 4. The tenor of Heinlein’s remarks about Ginny in his correspondence and to a certain extent also in Tramp Royale, written the following year, sound insensitive and patronizing to our ears but were considered merely “humorous” at the time and were intended as ironic playing with “little wife” conventions then current—expected possibly because of the age difference between them.
37. RAH, letter to Dorothy and Clare Heinlein, 09/23/53.
38. RAH, letter to Mick, Annette, and Tony McComas, 08/26/53.
39. RAH, letter to Annette and Mick McComas, 08/26/53.
40. RAH, letter to Lurton Blassingame, 10/24/53. A petition to adopt is not otherwise mentioned in the correspondence. A mention of being too old legally to adopt in Heinlein’s letter to Greg Benford, 11/08/73, may conflate two different incidents some time apart, as he mentions Ginny’s “plumbing problem,” which occurred much later, but says she was then thirty-six, which would place it in 1954—although they are still actively considering adoption in 1955. RAH, letter to Bud Bacchus, 04/15/55, also mentions being too old to adopt by the laws of the State of Colorado.
41. RAH, Tramp Royale, 29.
8. World Travelers
1. Virginia Heinlein, letter to Reginald Bretnor, 12/09/79.
2. This incident is recorded in two places: RAH, Tramp Royale, 48; and in slightly different detail in Michael J. Patritch, “One Hundred and Fifty Minutes into Forever: A Meeting with Robert A. Heinlein,” Thrust SF & Fantasy Review, no. 33 (Spring 1989): 10.
3. Heinlein’s discussion of his challenged assumptions and the conclusions he drew from his exposure to South American lifestyles and politics are scattered through chapters 2 through 6 of Tramp Royale, and Heinlein touches on them again in the concluding chapter.
4. RAH, letter to Robert A. W. Lowndes, 03/13/56.
5. RAH, letter to Robert A. W. Lowndes, 03/13/56.
6. RAH, Tramp Royale, 63–64. These sentiments and conclusions appear at various places in Tramp Royale, sometimes somewhat repetitively, including Hei
nlein’s summation at the end of the book, of what he had learned by his travel.
7. RAH, Tramp Royale, 368–9.
8. RAH, Tramp Royale, 133.
9. RAH, letter to T. B. Buell, 10/03/74.
10. The title is taken from Rudyard Kipling’s “Sestina of the Tramp-Royal” (1896)—a poem which Heinlein has said he often reread (RAH, letter to “Mr. and Mrs. Collier,” 12/08/76). Mrs. Heinlein could not remember in her interviews with the author in 2000 and 2001 why the book title had the hyphen omitted and a rogue final e added.
11. RAH, Tramp Royale, 93. Many of Heinlein’s remarks in Tramp Royale, especially about Ginny (he calls his wife “Ticky,” one of their pet names, throughout the book) are crafted to be funny and endearing, as she is treated as a viewpoint character for the travelogue. Nevertheless, at least some of them may be taken as factual, in one degree or another. This remark, about Ginny not being able to contain her disgust for the Perón fascist regime in Argentina, comports with other reported behavior later in the trip, as well as with Heinlein’s chosen persona for Tramp Royale.
12. Virginia Heinlein, letter to “Doc & Mimi [Knowles], Lucky & Art & Barby [Herzberger],” 12/13/53. Heinlein repeated this sentiment in Tramp Royale, 108.
13. Virginia Heinlein, letter to Robert and Vivian Markham, undated but by internal evidence about 12/15/53.
14. In the Argentinian newspaper reports, Heinlein found the reporters had simply made up answers to questions he would not answer (boasting about how much money he earned stuck in his craw, though it seemed to be ordinary and expected in Argentina). The questions might be odd and even offensive by his admittedly parochial standards, he concluded—but reporters are the same everywhere.
15. RAH, Tramp Royale, 112.
16. RAH, Tramp Royale, 136.
17. Virginia Heinlein, taped interview with the author, Second Series, Tape D, Side B.
Robert A. Heinlein, In Dialogue with His Century, Volume 2 Page 68