The Devil’s Guide To Hollywood

by Joe Eszterhas

  In an effort to convince me to change the ending of my script, a studio head listed for me all the television series that he had written, worked on, or supervised.

  I said, “I know you’ve done all those things. That’s exactly the problem.”

  Insult their pampered white asses.

  I am extremely allergic to big shots of all types wherever found,” said screenwriter/author Raymond Chandler. “I lose no opportunity to insult them whenever I get the chance.”

  They begrudge you the money they have to pay you.

  Playwright/screenwriter David Mamet: “In my experience, almost every financial interchange with Hollywood ends with an accusation by the corporation of theft. ‘You didn’t do what I wanted, you didn’t work hard enough, you intended to defraud me.’ These are the recurring plaints of industry. They may be translated as: You forgot to work for nothing.”

  ALL HAIL

  Doug Kenney!

  Doug Kenney, the screenwriter of Caddyshack, hated the poster for the movie so much that he confronted studio head Mike Medavoy outside his office and the two wound up grappling on the ground.

  The poster was changed.

  The Green Light

  The decision by a studio to film (green-light) a script.

  Until recently, this was the decision of the studio head—he took the blame when the movie failed, or got the credit when it was a hit.

  Today, though, many studio heads have figured out that they’ll last longer in the job if they alone don’t make the decision to green-light.

  So, at many studios today, a committee makes the decision to green-light a script. The committee is made up of the top execs on all levels—even publicity, advertising, and marketing.

  Since you can’t fire the whole committee (all the executives) and have a studio left, everybody holds on to their jobs.

  Thanks to The Mummy, we got Graham Greene.

  The Quiet American was green-lighted by Intermedia Films only when Brendan Fraser agreed to take the supporting role. Brendan had just starred in The Mummy Returns and the studio felt he was a big-enough star for it to be able to take a chance on Graham Greene.

  Sherry Lansing speaks doublespeak.

  Director Phillip Noyce, discussing The Saint: “At the end of the first screening, Sherry Lansing, the head of the studio, was genuinely crying. She said it was a brilliant film and it was Doctor Zhivago-ish. … Later I did feel resentful that Sherry Lansing had initially been so enthusiastic about the movie, only to eventually talk me into cutting those things which had most moved her when she first saw the film.”

  A Bomb Thrower

  A studio executive who disagrees with a reader’s coverage of a script will be known as a “bomb thrower.”

  To Do a DeLuca

  To be caught publicly in flagrante delicto—as was then New Line head Mike De Luca at a party at then agent Arnold Rifkin’s house (with the sister of a William Morris agent). To trip on your own dick.

  With ding-a-lings like this in charge …

  David Picker, the former head of United Artists, MGM, and Paramount, looking back on his career: “If I would have reversed all my decisions—if I hadn’t made the pictures I did and made the pictures I didn’t, the results would have been exactly the same.”

  A studio boss is an orchid.

  Studio mogul Louis B. Mayer: “You see, wherever I go there are girls who want to become actresses. I have a sixth sense for it. She would follow me into my stateroom, if I snapped my fingers, and stay all night. Just for a bit role in any picture. But I am not interested in fast affairs. I am interested in relationships. I am a human being. I need warmth—like an orchid.”

  To Sweat Dollars

  To wait for the box-office results from your film’s opening weekend.

  It’s not about money, it’s about getting laid.

  An agent told Hedy Lamarr this story: “Phil Kamp has had an office at a major studio for four years and he has never made a picture. He’s a distant relative of the president of the studio. He just auditions girls. That’s his whole life. He gets a salary but he’s a producer who doesn’t produce. Phil is so dedicated to his art that he occasionally goes to another city and there he tries another variation. He puts in ads for a secretary to a movie producer—if he were to advertise for an actress it would look suspicious. As a producer, girls who are really secretaries often want to be actresses. Phil does well both in and out of town.”

  They’ll want you to write dishonest stories.

  Paramount studio head B. P. Schulberg: “We can’t afford to alienate our movie audience by telling them the truth about themselves.”

  Creative Executive

  There’s no such thing. It’s an oxymoron, like “lady producer.”

  The barbarians are inside the gates.

  Frank Pierson, screenwriter (Dog Day Afternoon) and president of the MPAA: “We had been having too much fun to notice: the barbarians were inside the gate. … We began to see Harvard Business School MBAs sit in on our story conferences. Lawyers multiplied.”

  They don’t like to say no.

  Columbia studio exec Peter Guber was instructed by his boss, Leo Jaffe, to tell the once-powerful Jack Warner, now an old producer, that his movie 1776 was being canceled.

  Guber went to see Warner but didn’t have the guts to tell him.

  Leo Jaffe didn’t have the guts to tell him, either.

  1776 was made … and bombed.

  Dumb Fuck Films

  The late director Hal Ashby’s movie company, generally thought by Hollywood cynics to be the best name of a production company ever.

  Lew made a big boo-boo.

  Not long before his death, former Universal tycoon Lew Wasserman said, “Sold the company to the Japanese. It wasn’t the price that was wrong, but the sale itself.”

  What if he had hemorrhoids?

  Harry Cohn, the Columbia czar, said, “If my fanny squirms while I’m watching it, the movie is bad. If my fanny doesn’t squirm, it’s good.”

  A Civilian Question

  A stupid question asked at a story meeting—the kind of question asked by someone outside the industry, a “civilian,” who doesn’t know anything.

  Those poor scared studio execs …

  Screenwriter/novelist Raymond Chandler: “Sometimes I feel kind of sorry for the poor bastards. They are so damn scared they won’t make their second or third million. In fact, they are just so damned scared, period.”

  We’ve all got a spiritual side.

  The wife of a studio exec said to me, “Jack was so wound up, we really needed a relaxing evening. We went to a séance for Henry Fonda and Katharine Hepburn.”

  Hollywood Sperm

  The children of studio executives.

  Lew had a big problemo.

  Lew Wasserman said, “I was unfortunate not to have a son, only a daughter.”

  They’re all sleep-deprived.

  The wife of a studio exec told me that he woke up many nights yelling things in his sleep.

  Things like:

  “He’s going to hand me my head on a platter? I’m going to hand him his head on a platter!”

  “He wants to see a professional? I’ll show him a professional!”

  “The hat has been thrown in the ring! So he better be ready!”

  “If he tries to take credit for this movie, I’ll fucking kill him.”

  Three-Piss Picture

  Jack Warner felt that if he had to go to the bathroom during a screening, the movie would fail. A movie that would be a disastrous embarrassment was “a three-piss picture.” Nobody could ever convince him that he had a weak bladder.

  They live in the reel world.

  Sony had financed the ill-fated Roland Joffe–directed City of Joy, set amid the dire poverty of India.

  A few months later, Mark Canton, Sony’s head of production, was showing me around the studio lot, which was in the midst of massive construction. Bulldozers were everywhere; much of the lot seem
ed to be in ruins.

  “This,” Mark Canton greeted me, “is our City of Joy.”

  Dick Zanuck’s dad “passed” on Marilyn.

  Studio chief Darryl Zanuck refused to cast Marilyn Monroe in any “serious” roles.

  Marilyn said, “I would have been happy to do anything—you know—to get him to let me try something different. He wasn’t interested at all. Every other guy was. Why wasn’t he?”

  Suckfish

  The junior executives who scuttle the corridors at a movie studio. Also known as “hall mice.”

  I hope he got Bill Goldman’s next job.

  James Ryan, adjunct professor of playwriting at the New School in New York City, writes in his book Screenwriting from the Heart, “Most executives who run Hollywood, in my experience, are incredibly bright and often very well educated.”

  Sorry, but this won’t work.

  Discussing the making of his Blue Dahlia, Raymond Chandler said, “I threatened to walk off the picture, not yet finished, unless they stopped the director putting in foolish dialogue out of his own head.”

  A Halfway Girl

  A studio executive who slept her way not to the top, but to the middle.

  They’re all fans of Robert McKee.

  Screenwriter Dan Pyne (Pacific Heights): “Maybe that’s who’s taking all these screenwriting courses—story editors or producers who want to write one. I met up with a guy yesterday, a very nice guy from Disney. He wants me to read something … if he writes it. For them, it’s all about writing that one script and then cashing in on it. Whereas, I think, for the real writers, it’s about a career.”

  Bob’s lucky he’s still alive.

  In a disagreement with Universal titan Lew Wasserman, director Bob Rafelson said, “What’s this fuckin’ bullshit?” and swept all of Wasserman’s medals and awards off his desk.

  A Total Fucking Disaster

  The worst kind of disaster, a movie that does such a belly slam that it clears all the water out of the pool, a movie like my Showgirls (before it became a cult classic).

  Make ’em show you theirs first.

  If you’re sitting in a meeting with a young studio exec who says, “Tell me what you’ve done,” reply this way: “You first.”

  Michael Eisner’s is bigger than yours.

  Screenwriter John Gregory Dunne ran into Disney chairman Michael Eisner at Morton’s.

  Dunne: “I asked him how his heart was, and Michael said it was fine. He had come through his bypass surgery in good order. ‘You know,’ I said, ‘I had the same operation,’ and without missing a beat, Eisner replied, ‘Of course, mine was more serious.’ I have rarely been struck dumb, but this seemed to be ‘mine is bigger than yours’ Hollywood-style.”

  Putting Your Dick on the Table

  What studio bosses do when they agree to pay a big star 20 million to do a movie. They put their “dicks on the table”—ready to be chopped off if the movie fails.

  Harry Cohn had big balls.

  My fellow Hungarian, actor Tony Curtis: “Some people were glad the studios were disintegrating, because they hated the moguls, Harry Cohn in particular. I always liked Harry, myself. One day I got an inside look at the way he operated. He liked to see me, and I’d stop by now and then, just to talk. One day I’m in his office with a friend, just sitting there, talking, and Harry’s buzzer rings. He says to the secretary, “Well, send her in.” And in walks this beautiful girl, maybe twenty years old, just a magnificent young woman in a beautiful silk summer dress. … She takes a look around, nervously, and says, ‘Harry, I have to talk to you.’ He says, ‘So talk.’ She looks at us and says, ‘Harry, I’d rather not talk in front of these gentlemen.’ He says, ‘Anything you’ve got to say, you can say in front of them.’ She takes a deep breath and says, ‘Harry, I can’t go on this way. You promised to take care of me, put me in a movie. It’s been eight months now, and it just can’t keep on like this. You have to do something, or I’m going to have to call your wife.’ He looked at her, picked up the telephone, dialed the number, held out the phone to her, and said, ‘Tell her yourself.’ … She just slowly walked out. After a silence my friend had the nerve to ask, ‘Harry, was that really your wife?’ Harry Cohn just looked him straight in the eye and said, ‘You’ll never know.’”

  ALL HAIL

  Ben Hecht!

  This is the advice screenwriter Ben Hecht gave to a director who had been asked by Columbia chief Harry Cohn if he was a member of the Communist party.

  “Tell him to go fuck himself,” Hecht said. “It’s none of his goddamn business. Ask him if he’s a Jew.”

  Hecht didn’t call Cohn by name. He called him “White Fang.”

  Perry King gave birth to Sylvester Stallone.

  Arthur Krim, the respected octogenarian head of United Artists, signed Sylvester Stallone up for Rocky after he saw The Lords of Flatbush and was impressed by the actor he thought was Sly in that movie. It was only when Rocky was released that Krim realized he’d confused Sly in Flatbush with another actor in that film, Perry King.

  Without Perry King’s acting ability, the world today would be without Rocky and Sylvester Stallone.

  Spitballing

  Usually used as “just spitballing,” as in “We’re just spitballing here.” Often used in creative meetings by studio execs who (1) are trying to write your story for you and (2) know that what they’re suggesting is stupid. Therefore they cover themselves by saying, “We’re just spitballing here, right?” or “This isn’t a very good idea, probably but we’re just spitballing here, aren’t we?”

  Ingratiate yourself with your superiors.

  Jack Valenti, the head of the Motion Picture Academy of America, and I were on the Today show.

  Jack was berating me (I deserved it) for telling teenagers to use their fake IDs to see Showgirls, an NC-17 movie.

  Jack, exasperated and angry with me, said, “Oh, you’re just here publicizing your movie.”

  And I said, “So are you, Jack.”

  Stereotypes

  A word used by directors, producers, and especially studio executives to get you to rewrite a character. If you force them to admit that a character is acting in a realistic manner, then they tell you that while the behavior is realistic, it’s also stereotypical.

  The word is frequently used when discussing black or gay characters.

  Jack Valenti is not an Oliver Stone fan.

  Said Jack about Oliver’s JFK: “Young German girls and boys in 1941 were mesmerized by Leni Riefenstahl’s Triumph of the Will in which Adolf Hitler is pictured as a newborn God. Both JFK and Triumph of the Will are equally a propaganda masterpiece and equally a hoax. … Does any sane human being truly believe that President Johnson, the Warren Commission, the CIA, the FBI, the Secret Service, local law enforcement officers, assorted thugs, weirdos, all conspired together as plotters in Stone’s wacky sightings?”

  Studio execs feel no pain there.

  AWarner Bros. executive who didn’t think Bonnie and Clyde was releasable said this after a preview audience got up and cheered it at the end: “Well, I guess Warren Beatty just shoved it up our ass.”

  Send Me Some Pages

  What producers, directors, or studio execs say when they are worried your script won’t be any good. Don’t ever send anyone pages from your script until you are finished with the script—then send the script in toto. Their hope is that if you send pages before you’re finished, they can tell you where to take the story from there … or tell you to start all over again.

  DBTA

  Dead by the third act … this usually refers to the protagonist’s best friend or partner, killed off by the third act … usually to motivate the protagonist to take revenge for his pal’s death.

  Studio execs have impeccable taste.

  Istill think Pinocchio is a perfect movie,” said Dreamworks coboss Jeffrey Katzenberg. “Perfect story, perfect characters and stunning animation.”

  Off Point

 
A scene that doesn’t work.

  Lew tells me it ain’t so.

  When I was a young screenwriter, I ran into Universal potentate Lew Wasserman and his wife, Edie, one morning near the deli Nate and Al’s on Beverly Drive. I introduced myself and said that I knew that both Lew and Edie were from Cleveland, like me.

  Then I said that I had a gangster friend in Cleveland named Shondor Birns, who’d told me that Lew had worked handling the racing wire across the street from the Theatrical Grill on Short Vincent Street (before he became a mogul).

  Lew Wasserman looked at me, smiled, and said, “You got some bum information. I never did that.”

  Then he said, “Is Shondor Birns still alive?”

  I said, “No, he got blown up in a car bomb on the West Side.”

  Lew Wasserman smiled and said, “There you go,” and walked away with Edie into Nate and Al’s.

  That Doesn’t Work

  Usually uttered by producers and studio execs, it means “I don’t like it.”