Hollywood, The Dream Factory
Chapter VII. Pps. 131-149

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WRITERS, as well as producers, are part of the mésalliance which eventually gives birth to a script. What kind of people are the writers? Although they differ as do all members of any occupational, certain uniformities appear; and as usual, the exceptions as the norm contribute to our understanding.

The best way to understand writers, or any other people, is through their motivations. The primary one for Hollywood writers is the same as it is for everyone else there, namely, the inflated salaries for which the industry is famous. Mediocre writers with no particular ability swarm there with the expectation of earning up to a thousand or more dollars a week. Gifted and talented writers come when they are broke, or are attracted by the idea of getting rich quickly. Usually they do not plan to remain, but many stay and are sucked into the system only a few struggle against it. There are the ones who, in the addition to big salaries, have a genuine interest in making movies, a special facility for seeing stories and film imagery, and who are hopeful of utilizing some of the potentialities of the powerful medium. For some, also, the traditional fascination of anything connected with theater or movies acts as an added spur. Diverse motives are blended but underlying all is the basic one of easy and big money, which few writers, gifted or ungifted, can earn outside of Hollywood.

Most of them before coming to Hollywood made only a precarious living. They were newspaper reporters, sold an occasional radio script, did play reading in the offices of Broadway producers, read manuscripts or proof in publishing houses, or wrote advertising copy. Some had won a one-act play writing contest in college or the local Y. A number had written unproduced plays which an agent or producer said showed promise. Others were white-collar

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workers, salesmen, or businessmen. A few were established novelists and playwrights.

Some writers came "on their own" to take their chances in getting Hollywood "gold." Others arrived at the suggestion of a friend or relative who promised to help them. Many were brought out by producers on a contract with the usual six months' option clause, often given little or nothing to do, and then dropped at the end of the six months. But the writers stayed on hoping to get a break. Some became successful; others are still waiting for their chance.

Of the slightly more than a thousand members of the Screen Writers' Guild, which includes practically all the writers, only a relatively small proportion achieve their goal of big money. Probably not more than two hundred earn their living by writing exclusively for the movies, and even in a period of prosperity less than half are employed at any one time. During unemployment periods in script writing, many of them go back to their former occupations of writing for radio, newspapers or magazines.

Their salaries range from $187.50 to $4500 or more a week. In what was considered the last relatively prosperous year, from November 1, 1945, to October 31, 1946, 57 per cent of the members of the Screen Writers' Guild earned more than $5000 in the industry and 22 per cent less than $5000. The remaining 21 per cent were not employed in movie writing that year. In the first half the same year, 150, or slightly more than 25 per cent, worked full time. During the same half-year, weekly earnings were:

Less than $500 a week 248 writers
$500-$1000 a week 163 writers
$1000-$2500 a week 124 writers
Over $2500 a week 12 writers

More than half were thus earning over $500 a week. Slightly more than a year later, July 21, 1947, fewer writers were employed, but more were in the upper-salary brackets. There were 114 who were earning over $1250 a week as compared to the 86 the year before.1 This increase in top-salary brackets points to one of the business anomalies of Hollywood, that in times of increasing

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unemployment and layoffs the writers in the lower brackets suffer more than those in the upper ones. When the producers are most worried about the market and their profits, they employ the highest-paid writers, whose salaries then go up because they are in such demand. The average producer's idea of insuring success and profits is to spend more money. This strong belief in the magical efficacy of money is common to our society. But while there
is the general assumption by the studio that the more a person earns the better he is, neither writers nor producers always think that everyone in the top-bracket class is necessarily gifted.

Although no one would expect all members of any group to be equally able, it is not easy to evaluate writers (or actors, directors, or others) according to their ability. Two methods, however, can be used for a general appraisal. One is to take the studios' judgments in terms of their own value system: salaries; and the other, to consider the informal opinions of producers and of writers. Presumably anyone in the salary bracket between $1250 and $4500 a week would be considered "tops" by the industry. By "tops" is meant creative people with ideas and the ability to write a finished script. There were 114 writers in this salary bracket on July 21, 1947. But neither the writers themselves nor the producers thought there were 114 gifted writers then in Hollywood. The estimates of the actual number of really talented writers were much lower and ranged from 25 to 50. The same and sometimes greater discrepancy occurred between the number in the high-salary class and those estimated by their own groups to be gifted, among actors, directors and producers. If competent writers are considered, it might be assumed, again in the studio's scale of values, that anyone earning between $500 and $1250 a week would be so regarded. For the six months preceding April 30, 1946, there were 213 people in this salary bracket, or about 20 per cent of the Guild membership. The informal estimate of a large number of writers and producers ranged between 10 and 20 per cent, averaging about 10 or 15 per cent. It is not that there are fewer gifted and competent writers in Hollywood than anywhere else. There are probably more. But the salaries of all writers, with and without talent, competent and incompetent, far exceed what they could earn else-

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where. This situation is not unique to the writers, but applies to everyone concerned with the production of movies. There is no other field, except radio, where a writer or anyone else on the lower rungs of the success ladder earns $500 a week and where such a salary is described as "peanuts."

It is for this reason that many writers (and others) are willing to sit it out and wait for the breaks. The stakes for which they play are high.

While waiting, they have lower expenses than if they were living in New York or Chicago, since it is not necessary to buy winter clothing and, in the past, rent and food have been less than Eastern cities. Another advantage is that since there are so many other writers in the "same boat" they do not feel lonely.

But neither the structure nor the atmosphere of Hollywood is conducive to helping writers broaden their experiences, sharpen their insights and become good movie writers, either as they wait for good fortune or after they get it. Their private life away from the studio does little to offset the disadvantages of the assembly line on which they work. The isolated suburban quality of most of the areas in which Hollywood people live has been mentioned. The writer's social life is usually with other writers, occasionally with producers and directors, but almost always confined to people connected with the making of motion pictures. This means a withdrawal from the everyday life which might provide experiences and new ideas for movies. Of course, this is important only for those who are writers in the literary sense of the word. The large number of mediocrities would not be creative in any situation.

Writers vary in how much they play the Hollywood game. Some cultivate important people, entertaining and being seen at big parties and popular night clubs. A few employ a publicity man to keep their names in the trade press. But those doing this and extensively playing the game seem to be considerably fewer than actors, producers and directors who do so. There are successful writers who live unostentatiously, picking their friends on the basis of congeniality. In one small group are three or four such

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men whose friendships date back to many years ago when they were struggling in New York. The settings for their parties are now more comfortable and the liquor a better brand, but conversation is a bit dull-although there may be some critical conversation about books and events of interest in the writers' world.

More typical of a successful writer's party is one with a dozen or more people present when conversation opens on the latest bit of Hollywood scandal, with each one vying with the other to say something clever about it. Then there may be some superficial talk about a new book or movie or politics. After this the men may separate for gin rummy or poker, leaving the women alone to their gossip. Or if they all remain together, the discussion turns to their troubles with a producer or the MPAA office which enforces the Code and to boasting about how much money they are making. Rarely is there serious discussion about writing or movies.

For only a few writers is participation in Guild affairs and politics a major activity. But-whether they play the "game" or politics, give small unostentatious parties or big lavish ones-the lives of most writers, like everyone else in Hollywood, are limited to the movie world.

The general atmosphere tends to make people soft. Most of the writers, good and bad, have never previously known financial security. Now for the first time, if they have any success, they have money. Instead of living in dingy apartments, they have homes, gardens, a servant and enough money in the bank to pay the doctor's bills, and those in the higher salary brackets have luxury. The much-heralded Southern California climate contributes to the softening process. There is a natural temptation to spend a considerable amount of time out of doors; and for many writers, as well as for other people, one of the major advantages is the ease with which children can be brought up in Los Angeles.

The perpetuation of this pleasant, comfortable life, therefore, becomes the goal for which writers-gifted and ungifted-are willing to be a producer's "lead pencil."

There are the exceptional men and women who do not become soft. One consistently refuses Hollywood offers on a contractual

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basis but comes instead for one picture a year; the rest of the time he is in New York. He admits that Southern California is a good place for bringing up children and that the weather is most enjoyable, but his main drive happens to be creative, and he says that for him the best place to write is a small hotel room, and whether or not there is sunshine is irrelevant. There are others who do not have to be quite so drastic in their efforts to resist the California sunshine.

Of course, there is nothing "wrong" about enjoying the Southern Californian life. It is merely that the creative person who functions as such has to make some sacrifices. Creation has its price, too. Writers outside of Hollywood have likewise been known to succumb to the ease brought on by returns from their first best seller. But the temptations in Hollywood are much greater.

This abstract picture of writers, like that of the producers, becomes clearer through specific examples of the different kinds of individuals and the manner in which they work and live.

Mr. Hopeful, in his late twenties, is one of those waiting for the breaks. Back East he had written four or five plays, none of which had been produced. A New York producer who thought he had promise went to Hollywood and took him along on the usual six months' option contract. Mr. Hopeful thought "heaven had opened" and was sure that his days of poverty were over. During the six months at the studio he was given the opportunity to do only a few small bits on different scripts, not enough to earn screen credit or to give any indication of whether he had ability. At the end of the six months his option was not taken up. The producer who had sponsored his coming had gone to another studio and no one was particularly interested in Mr. Hopeful. He now began working on original scripts. After several years of no success in selling them, he is working with a more successful collaborator, who, he feels, has no more ability, but whose name is better known. Mr. Hopeful has also begun to write a novel.

After a couple of years in Hollywood he does not seem particularly worried. He feels that any moment his luck will change, and that he will sell a screen play and be made as a writer. He

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and his wife, who is employed, live very modestly in a one-room furnished apartment. Although he has no screen credit and has been unemployed except for the first six months, he thinks as a movie writer and part of the motion picture industry. He is an active member of the Screen Writers' Guild and is in constant social contact with a large number of other movie writers, some in the same class as himself and others more successful. His life is a pleasant contrast to the lonely one in New York, where he was simply an unsuccessful playwright with little or no contact with other playwrights. Although he talks a great deal about the play and novel he wants to do after he has hit the jack pot in Hollywood, he nevertheless gives the impression that he could settle quite comfortably for becoming a movie writer in the $750-a-week class.

Hollywood is filled with young people (writers, actors and others) who in their home communities stood out as being different from the average. The very desire to write or act set them apart from their neighbors. Success on an amateur level encouraged them to think of this difference as talent. Every big city is filled with them. Outside of Hollywood they tend to come to terms with reality more often and settle for less. But in the movie world they see other mediocre people in prestige jobs, earning big money. So they too wait for the breaks.

Miss Sanguine is one of these. In college she won a prize in a playwriting competition and after graduation came to Hollywood "cold," that is, completely on her own. For two years she wrote screen originals, which she took around to story editors and producers, without the help of an agent. At the end of two years a producer who had read some of her originals and with whom she was friendly, had a story he could not lick and gave Miss Sanguine a job. She was employed by the studio for twenty weeks at $150 a week, writing the treatment and then the screen play. On the latter she had a collaborator with a prominent name, and with whom she shared the credit. When the picture was finished Miss Sanguine was not given another job. Everyone, according to Miss Sanguine, thought the "name" writer was responsible for the screen

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play. She went back to writing original stories in the hope of selling one of them and getting a chance to do a screen play from it, but this has not yet happened. She is now thirty years old and has been in Hollywood three and a half years. She feels successful, since she has succeeded in getting one credit, and she is optimistically waiting for the chance to get more.

Mr. Pretentious is one of those who thinks of himself as a "real" writer, though frustrated, and blames his low status on not getting the breaks. He majored in playwriting at an Eastern University and came straight to Hollywood upon graduation about ten years ago. For a number of years he wrote originals for B pictures, receiving about $500 for each one. He never sold more than seven in any one year and only once succeeded in selling a script for which he was paid $2500. That year he sold nothing else. When the number of B pictures was drastically reduced by many studios he had no income at all. He was quite desperate and finally secured a job on a small Los Angeles newspaper.

Mr. Pretentious speaks bitterly about others who, he says, have achieved their positions only because they got the breaks. Yet, there is nothing to justify his claim to be a real writer. He always works through a card catalogue, in which he keeps an analysis of every movie he has seen, giving its plot and characters. One of his methods of doing an original, particularly when he is in a hurry, is to run through his file and pull out a movie he has analyzed; he changes the characters, keeping much of the same plot; sometimes he keeps the characters and makes a small change in the plot. He says that the story analysts, the first readers of these originals, like a certain opening; so he uses the same paragraph with slight modifications over and over again. He adds that this is a common practice among writers of originals for B movies. One such writer, who was getting his story ready, mislaid his traditional first paragraph and, hurriedly going through his papers looking for it, asked, "What did I do with my paragraph?"

Mr. Pretentious has never written anything for the movies or for any other medium which indicates talent or even a minimum of creative ability. But he continues to think of himself as the "real

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thing" and is jealous of successful writers. When he mentions a prestige literary person, also successful in movies, who came to Hollywood about the same time as Mr. Pretentious, he insists that the successful writer has no more ability than he, but knew how to play politics and was lucky. It is far easier in Hollywood than elsewhere for a person like Mr. Pretentious to believe that his lack of success is due only to not getting the breaks; because almost everyone, successful and unsuccessful, talented and mediocre, regards those same breaks as the most important factor in success.

Mr. Modest started as a newspaperman and short-story writer, without too much success, and came to Hollywood when he was about thirty-five years old as a $75-a-week writer. Before the war he worked up to $250 a week on B pictures and Westerns at one of the smaller studios. Then he was away for the duration of the war. When he returned, he had no job, but a good friend, with a well-established reputation as both playwright and screen writer, suggested him to a producer for a particular script. The producer gave Mr. Modest a short story he had purchased and asked him to do a treatment. He took the story and thought about it very carefully, came back to the producer and said that he did not think it was possible to do a script from it. He added that if the producer would permit him to make certain changes, which he then described, he might be able to do something. The producer, impressed with his ideas and honesty, told him to work along the suggested lines, and liked the story treatment which Mr. Modest then did. The executive head of the studio then O.K.'d it, making suggestions which were passed on to Mr. Modest. He incorporated them in the script and a gifted director who had been assigned to the job sat in on the story conferences. Upon the producer's and director's recommendation the front-office executive agreed to let the writer go with the director to do any rewriting on location that might be necessary. Since Mr. Modest was earning only $450 a week, the executive did not think his salary would unduly increase the budget. Mr. Modest says he learned a great deal by working closely with the director, the cutter and the cameraman on location. The picture,

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produced on a relatively low budget, turned out highly successful from the points of view of both the box office and critics.

After the picture was finished, Mr. Modest was raised to $600 a week. Although not in the upper brackets, he is happy, and is now working with the same director and producer on another picture which he thinks is good. If it turns out successfully he will get a substantial raise. Also, it is likely that some other studio will bid for his services and his value will be increased. Mr. Modest says that the writing of Westerns and B melodramas was good training on how to build up suspense, which he now uses in A pictures. His outstanding qualities are his honesty, unpretentiousness and ability as a good craftsman.

Mr. Cynic is one of the many who once hoped to write the great American novel. He started as a newspaperman in the East and came to Hollywood, when a friend, well-established in the movie industry, secured him a writer's job at two and a half times his newspaper salary. Today, he is a successful writer of B pictures and over the last five years he has earned from the movie industry approximately $100,000, or an average of $20,000 a year. He considers this very good, and much in advance of what he would have earned if he had stayed in the newspaper world.

Now he is in his early forties, has an attractive home, and is seemingly content with his life. However, he opened a conversation with the statement, "I am a hack writer," in a rather bitter tone, and then mentioned that he had no respect for anything that he had written in Hollywood. He never goes to see any of the movies on which he has worked, because, he says all the original meaning has been taken out and he cannot stand looking at them. He has likewise no respect for any of the producers for whom he has worked and very little for other writers. He seems to have accepted the limitations of the medium, but his acceptance is bitter. He tells a number of funny stories which always show the producers, who are his bosses, are also employees who might be fired tomorrow, and that they are more insecure than he is, because it would be more difficult for them to get another job. Mr. Cynic

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disparages his own work, jeers at his employers, but enjoys his comfortable home and a substantial bank account.

Not all successful writers are frustrated. Mr. Acquiesce has been in Hollywood about fifteen years and before that he, too, was a newspaperman doing publicity also, and advertising, but he never succeeded in making a good living for his family. Today he is in a high-salary bracket-over $1200 a week- owns a very attractive home, has steady work and a large number of screen credits. He thoroughly enjoys the medium and seems to feel no frustration about working on someone else's ideas or having other people follow him on his script. He appears to have completely accepted all the limitations of writing in Hollywood, and says that these are the conditions which writers must accept and that he is prepared to take them in his stride. He feels the same way about the censorship Code, most of which he considers "rather silly", but he obeys it without getting upset and indignant. He stresses the large movie audience as one of the major compensations and talks about getting a message across. Since his pictures are all the most conventional stock melodramas and mysteries devoid of any message, this appears to be wishful thinking or rationalization. It is interesting, however, that Mr. Acquiesce has to have that, in spite of all his talk about accepting the limitations of the medium and enjoying his work and his life.

All who become part of the Hollywood pool of writers have not started with literary ambitions. The idea of writing had never occurred to Mr. Coincidence. He was a resident of Los Angeles and his chief interest was aviation. He happened to know a big-name writer doing a script based on an aviation story, who asked him to help with the technical details, for which he was paid $75 a week. When the big-name writer moved to another studio he took Mr. Coincidence along, paying part of his salary. Mr. Coincidence learned the game and started writing originals, selling them under an assumed name, since he did not want the studio to know about it. In a couple of years he was averaging between ten and twenty thousand dollars, more than he had ever earned before.

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For Mr. Coincidence movies provide an exciting life. He has always been susceptible to beautiful women and he finds more of them in the movie industry than in any other one place. In addition there is always the chance of making big money. He lives gregariously, going to many parties and drinking fairly heavily, partly because he enjoys it and partly also because he considers it necessary to getting along. His becoming a movie writer was accidental; he was intelligent and developed a certain knack or craftsmanship, and then, by playing the game, he managed to achieve some success.

None of the people so far described are especially gifted. Mr. Literary, however, before coming to Hollywood, was well known for his novels, short stories and essays, some of which had appeared in anthologies of distinguished writing. But he had been poor, insecure and living a "hand-to-mouth" existence; and so he too jumped at the opportunity of coming to Hollywood when it was offered him. Today he is a successful writer of A scripts, in the over-$1250-a-week bracket, and with steady employment.

He has the sensitive literary person's knowledge of people and of their motivations. He is highly intelligent and his background is rich in experience and knowledge of literature. He can also write very well. Without many screen credits, he was much in demand and fortunate in working for more than a year with a producer who had originally come from the theater an whose goals were still influenced by it. The two men became close friends; and the writer, having the stronger personality, dominated the relationship and had more than usual freedom in the choice of conditions under which he worked.

He regards his work at the studio as a form of play and rather enjoys it as such. He uses the word "play" because he says that he cannot take it seriously. He and some of the others pretend to themselves and each other that it is serious. Each day there is a crisis; a crisis about getting the star to interpret her lines in such a way as to bring out their meaning; a crisis in the front office which lays down the law in a way contrary to what he and the producer regard as the best interest of the picture; a crisis because

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someone gets sick or they cannot get the proper actor for a part. Although he gets excited about all these "crises," deep down he knows that they are not really important and that the film will be
made one way or another.

It will be made, and in the end it will not please him. It will not have the integrity that any work of his own would possess. He has never worked on any movie which has even moderately satisfied him. Each time he starts with high hopes that this one will be different, but each time it is the same: so many interferences, so many changes, that the final script is not his, although he has far more influence over it than do most writers. He does not have this attitude of "play" toward writing a novel or a short story. That is deadly earnest. Then he is concerned with working out a real problem and any interference with it he would regard as a real crisis.

His attitude of "play" may well be a defense mechanism. If he took the script as seriously as he takes a novel, he would suffer too much. This way he manages to "get by" and even to enjoy it. He lives comfortably, but not luxuriously, and saves about $500 a week toward his goal of a quarter of a million, when he plans to retire and write as he pleases. He does not play the usual social Hollywood game, but chooses his own friends discriminatingly on the basis of congeniality. On the surface it would seem that he had made a good accommodation to the situation. But-he has ulcers.

Mr. Gifted has an even more distinguished literary reputation. Before coming to Hollywood he was well known for several novels and short stories, and a play. None of them, however, had been sufficiently popular to enable him to support his family in even modest comfort. After a protracted period of family illness he was broke, and a writer friend in Hollywood suggested that he come there. Mr. Gifted traveled on a bus because it was cheaper than the train, and left his family with relatives, until he could earn sufficient money to send for them. When he arrived his friend talked to the story editor about him, and it so happened that at this studio a producer had read some of Mr. Gifted's short stories, and thought highly of them. Because of this combination Mr.

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Gifted was employed on a contract basis. But he was assigned not to the producer who had appreciated his writings, but to another, one who made only fast-action B pictures and Westerns. Mr. Gifted was known through his novels for subtle insight and understanding delineation of characters and their motivations. Westerns obviously did not call for these qualities. Nor did he have the particular abilities or training required for these action pictures. His work was not successful. The producer was displeased and Mr. Gifted was unhappy. The studio was about to drop him. The first producer, who had known his work and his potentialities, saved him by having him loaned to another studio.

Here he was given a chance to work on a good script, more in line with his particular ability, on which he could use his knowledge of people and his skill in dialogue. The movie was successful, and he went on to another script of the same type; again the picture was successful. Now he was made as an A writer in the upper-salary brackets and in great demand. As soon as his reputation was established he refused to work on a contractual basis and became a freelance writer at over $3000 a week. He has enough prestige to negotiate his own terms and to exercise a certain amount of choice on the scripts he works on. He does a sufficient number to give him the financial backlog necessary for taking time to write novels. He regards himself primarily as a novelist, and his creative satisfaction comes in functioning as such. He and his family live modestly, but comfortably, in an unfashionable neighborhood. He saves a considerable portion of his income from movie writing and for at least six months out of a year works on a novel.

He plays none of the usual Hollywood games. He has, however, a very good relationship with most of the producers and directors with whom he works. He uses the same understanding of people which comes out in his novels and stories in his working relationships. Instead of giving the producers fulsome flattery, he is aware of their little foibles in an understanding way. He also has confidence in his own taste and judgment and says "no" rather frequently to producers. This increases their respect and confidence in his judgment.

Mr. Gifted is exceptional in a number of ways. He has continued

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his writing of novels and at the same time become a movie writer in the top-salary bracket, so sought after by studios that he can work whenever he wants to. He lives in the present rather than in some mythical future, has the satisfactions of doing his own creative work and at the same time being regarded as one of the top movie writers. Unlike most writers, he has almost no bitterness, but is tolerantly amused by Hollywood and defends it if necessary.

Mr. Truly Interested is another successful and gifted movie writer, understanding Hollywood and aware of his own goal, which differs from those of the community. His accommodation to the situation is, however, different from that of Mr. Gifted. Mr. Truly Interested passionately cares about movies and persists in trying to reach his goals through this medium. He came to Hollywood ten years ago from New York where he had been a playwright with some minor prestige but no financial success. The year before he left New York his net earnings had been between $2000 and $2500 a year. On his last job there, a temporary one, he earned $150 a week, which he regarded as exceptionally good. He came to Hollywood on a contract at "only" $300 a week-now, ten years later, he uses that term to describe a salary which was twice what he had in New York.

His first job was at a big studio, where he worked with a producer who had more than average ability and knowledge. The first story given to Mr. Truly Interested was not particularly good, but he thought it had possibilities. The theme was laid in the past. With out anyone suggesting it, he began to read widely about the historical period in that part of the country, and got a number of new and interesting ideas for the picture. The research enabled him to do what he considered a good script from a story which had not been much to start with. The producer liked it, particularly because it was different from the run-of-the-mill picture in this category. It was then given to the executive head of the studio, who when had finished reading it, called the producer and writer in for a conference. This was the first time that Mr. Truly Interested had ever been in the front office; he was quite excited about meeting the executive. He was confident that the latter would

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like the script, since the producer was enthusiastic and since he himself had a real faith in it. He was therefore surprised and angry when, at the opening of the conference, the executive, without any preparation, lashed angrily out at him saying, "We did not hire you to write a new script", and then criticized it from beginning to end. He gave no praise at all.

Mr. Truly Interested was mad. The producer, who was present surreptitiously motioned him not to give vent to his anger. He obeyed and said very little. Later he followed a few of the executive's injunctions, but retained a great deal of the material which the latter had criticized, and kept his original story line relatively intact. The script was again sent to the front office, and this time it was O.K.'d.

The picture then went into production, and Mr. Truly Interested was put to work on another script in the same studio. However, again without anyone's suggesting it, and without asking permission, he took time off to go on the set where his first script was being shot. He talked to the director and the actors, trying get them to understand the meaning. Finally, the front-office executive heard about the strange phenomenon of a young and inexperience writer in the $300-a-week class going on the set and trying to influence the shooting of the picture. He did not think a $300 writer important enough to call in for a reprimand, but instead called the producer and asked whether Mr. Truly Interested did not know that a writer is forbidden to go on the set and that his job on the picture was finished when he wrote the end of the script? The sympathetic producer, instead of telling Mr. Truly Interested to stop going on the set merely cautioned him to be "careful". There was one amusing incident when the writer hurriedly made an exit from the set just as the executive entered from the other side. Mr. Truly Interested continued struggling with the director, winning on some points and losing on others. He is a diplomatic person, and his fight was carried on subtly, trying to instill ideas into the director's mind. He won the director over to his side about a long speech which was delivered by one of the characters at the end of the film, and which was planned to tie the picture together and to point up its theme. However, after the picture was shot the

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front-office executive looked at the rushes and did not like this final speech, and so ordered it cut out. Mr. Truly Interested was extremely angry, because he thought the speech necessary to the picture. The director did not feel strongly on the matter and was the type of person inclined to do as he is told. The producer was a weak man, and although he thought the speech good, he had resigned himself many times to giving in to front-office demands. He explained his resigned attitude to the writer by saying that no picture was important enough to make a big fuss over. Then Mr. Truly Interested, without realizing its unconventionality, wrote a long letter to the executive, spending an entire Sunday typing and revising it so it would express his ideas as clearly as possible. In this letter he gave, in considerable detail, his reasons for thinking the final speech should be retained; he ended by hoping that the executive would understand them and change his mind about cutting it. An answer came very promptly. It was, "This picture cost $1,500,000. If you decide to buy this picture you can have any ending you like."

Mr. Truly Interested continued writing scripts and not only went on the sets but into the cutting room, watching the cutter at his work. In every way possible he learned as many details as he could. All of this he did on his own initiative, which seems to have sprung out of a sincere interest and curiosity about the medium in which he was working. It seemed natural to him to find out as much as possible about it.

During his early years at the studio he was suspended a couple of times for refusing to work on scripts which he insisted could not be made into good pictures. Suspension meant, of course, that he lost financially, because under the terms of his contract he could not work at any other studio and his salary stopped. It then became a question of how long he could hold out. It is most unusual for a young writer without financial assets to refuse to work on a script simply because he does not think it is good.

Today, Mr. Truly Interested is now in the top bracket of the writer's group and works only in those situations where he has some control. At present he has an arrangement whereby he does one year with a director whom he regards as one of the

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best in Hollywood. Within his contract, he has the freedom to refuse to work on a picture if he chooses. He sees the movies as his major medium of expression. He respects them and is fascinated by their potentialities, many of which have not yet been realized. What set him apart from most other writers of equal ability are his personal honesty and courage, his passionate interest in carrying through his ideas and his ability to fight diplomatically. He carries over the standards of a functioning artist into a situation where they are strange and unusual.

He is an exception; he has been successful in spite of the Hollywood structure, rather than because of it.

There are very few writers in Hollywood for whom the satisfaction is not primarily limited to the pay checks. Of course, salaries are important to all people who have to earn their living, in and outside of Hollywood, and for the majority of workers may be the only or major compensation. But for writers, artists and scientists, the satisfactions inherent in their work have always been primary. It is questionable whether money ever can be the only satisfaction for any of them. The essence of a writer's drive is his interest and curiosity about his fellow men and a desire to communicate the results of his observations to an audience. It so happens that if the latter is large, financial rewards follow almost automatically. In Hollywood the situation is reversed. The financial rewards come first, in weekly pay checks. The script on which he works is apt to be a confused jumble of many people's ideas and unrelated notions. The occupational satisfactions, traditionally part of the writer's craft, are lacking. Even though the script writer's name may be among the list of credits for a movie' it rare-unless he has taken on functions other than writing, or an exceptional position-for him honestly to feel that he communicated anything of his own to an audience. He has ceased to be a writer in the real sense of the word. Instead, he takes dictation. For men who have known the satisfactions of creation out of their own experiences and imagination, this must inevitably cause frustration.

Many writers rationalize the situation by saying that they were

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frustrated also when they were newspaper hacks and that they were not free then, either. They compare that position to the prostitute and identify the Hollywood situation with that of the "kept" woman in a New York Park Avenue penthouse. In Hollywood they maintain they are merely paid more highly for "selling out" as writers. This reasoning is, however, deceptively simple. There is a large quantitative difference of money returns from the sellout to the tabloid press, and to Hollywood. This quantitative difference is so great that it frequently results in a qualitative difference in attitude. Many of the writers who work on the tabloid press for a small salary are not satisfied with their jobs, employers or wages, and never fully accept the situation. They are always looking for a way out and planning an escape, and sometimes succeed. But in Hollywood the money rewards are so great that the average individual tends to become satisfied, and not only to accept the system, but even to defend it and build up a set of rationalizations.

Writing for the movies becomes the means to wealth or comfort, which eventually becomes the goal. The writers take over the executive and producers' values more successfully than the latter take over the artists' goals.

1 All figures from the Screen Writers' Guild.

Link to Chapter 8