Let me function or else come down and shoot it yourself

David O. Selznick's final film was his production of A Farewell to Arms (1957), based on Ernest Hemingway's successful novel of the same name. Prior to and during production of the film, Selznick went totally overboard with his infamous memos, reportedly dictating about 10,000 (!). Trying hard to control every aspect of the picture, the producer bombarded just about everyone with his directives. Director John Huston took the brunt of it, a very lengthy memo eventually causing him to quit the film before shooting had even started. (Huston and Selzick had constantly clashed, in particular about the script.)

As Huston's replacement, Selznick chose Charles Vidor who now became the main recipient of the producer's memos. Vidor grew increasingly annoyed with Selznick as more of his messages came pouring in. The director would occasionally send back angry responses, at one time accusing Selznick of not wanting a first violinist as a director, but a piccolo player. 

Charles Vidor (left), David Selznick and the film's leading man Rock Hudson on the set of A Farewell to Arms.

Another time, Vidor reacted angrily to a memo from Selznick regarding a kitchen scene. On 26 May 1957, the producer had written: "I am bothered by the stirring of the gruel for such a long period of time in the kitchen scene. I think it is going to be a bore. Couldn't the nurse be fiddling with an Italian coffee machine and/or preparing Italian bacon .... ". 

Vidor responded by telegram the following day:

I received your memo regarding the kitchen scene STOP in the light of my past performance on this picture alone I find it idiotic and I think that by the light of Monday morning you will too STOP the memo indicates that you think you have on your hands a hopelessly inexperienced director STOP if you don't stop I will think that I am stuck with a totally inexperienced producer STOP for heaven's sake let me function or else come down and shoot it yourself.

Vidor   

Source: Selznick (1970) by Bob Thomas

An offended Selznick answered by memo (of course), feeling their relationship did not call for such a telegram. He also wondered: "It is only two days since you were flattering enough to be enthusiastic about my memoranda, and to ask me to "keep them going." I am now confused: am I to keep sending them, but first to screen them through your sensibilities?..." Eventually, Selznick suggested he and Vidor have lunch together and to "get on with the show!"

Above: Charles Vidor with his leads Jennifer Jones and Rock Hudson on the set of A Farewell to Arms. Below: Having dinner in a restaurant in Rome during the film's production, (l to r) Hudson, Jones, Vidor and Selznick.

A Farewell to Arms, starring Selznick's wife Jennifer Jones and Rock Hudson in the leads, ultimately proved both a commercial and critical failure. Ernest Hemingway hated the film and especially resented the fact that Selznick had cast Jones, at the time nearly 40 years old, to portray the author's 24-year-old heroine. After this film Selznick would never produce another again. While he did plan to make other pictures (including a film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald's novel Tender is the Night), A Farewell to Arms remained his final achievement.

_____

Concluding this post, I will leave you with excerpts from a column by Art Buchwald. The columnist had travelled to Italy, where A Farewell to Arms was filmed, in order to cover the film's shooting. Intrigued by Selznick's compulsive memo-writing, Buchwald wrote this funny piece:

There is a legend in Rome that if you throw a memorandum by David O. Selznick into the Fountain of Cinecitta Studios, you will never work on A Farewell to Arms again.

The people who have said farewell to A Farewell to Arms now number in the hundreds and include one director, John Huston, one chief of photography who quit two weeks ago, three art directors, a film editor, a special effects director, four chauffeurs, and the entire staff of the villa where Mr. and Mrs. Selznick were staying.

Most of the people claim it was not Mr. Selznick but his memorandums that got them down.

(....)

Since he dictates them at night to three secretaries who work in shifts, Mr. Selznick has no time to read them once they are typed up. This occasionally leads to misunderstandings between the producer and his help and most everyone on the picture keeps a bag packed in case he wants to leave Rome in a hurry.

(....)

People on A Farewell to Arms collect Selznick memorandums like other people collect stamps. The memo written to John Huston which caused him to quit is worth three memos that Selznick wrote to the cameraman about photographing Jennifer Jones. One person in the company has a collector's item, a Selznick memorandum of one line. He has been offered 50,000 lire for it, but refuses to sell it.

Each person reacts differently to a Selznick memo. One department head who is no longer there thought he would fight fire with fire and so when he received a memo from Selznick he sent him back a memorandum of the same length. But he got a memo the next day from Selznick saying please don't send him any memos any more because he doesn't have time to read them.

(....)

Mr. Selznick, according to his detractors, has a tendency to keep referring to Gone with the Wind when trying to make a point in a memorandum. He was so intent on making A Farewell to Arms as big a success that he insisted that all of the technical staff attend a special screening of GWTW.

An outsider who attended the command performance came up after it was over and said: "What is Selznick worried about? The rushes look great to me."

Source: Selznick (1970) by Bob Thomas 

David O. Selznick, champion at memo-writing

Shearer does not seem to be associated with sex

Norma Shearer was one of the first serious contenders for the role of Scarlett O'Hara in David O. Selznick's Gone with the Wind (1939). On 21 March 1937, Walter Winchell, a famed newspaper gossip columnist and radio commentator, reported that Selznick desperately wanted her to play Scarlett. The announcement evoked a public response which was overwhelmingly negative. People felt that Norma, at the time a major MGM star, was not at all right for the part; while some could see her play Melanie, Scarlett she was not.

Above: Norma Shearer as the poet Elizabeth Barrett Browning in a publicity still for The Barretts of Wimpole Street (1934). Below: Norma playing a loose woman in A Free Soul (1931), the first of three films she made with Clark Gable.

Two days prior to Winchell's announcement, Kay Brown (Selznick's representative and talent scout) had sent a memo to her boss, sharing the opinions on Norma Shearer of several people, including GWTW's author Margaret ('Peggy') Mitchell. Like the general public, none of them was enthusiastic about Norma playing Scarlett, feeling she was "not the type". Brown believed that the actress was being associated too much with her "good girl" roles in The Barretts of Wimpole Street (1934) and Romeo and Juliet (1936), despite having also played less virtuous characters in films like A Free Soul (1931) and Riptide (1934).

Source: Martin Turnbull

Transcript:

TO  Mr. David O. Selznick

FROM  Miss Katharine Brown

DATE  March 19, 1937

SUBJECT  NORMA SHEARER

Dear David:

I am sorry to make this kind of report on Miss Shearer, as I was so terribly in favor of the idea when it was first discussed.

I selected three people, as we decided on the telephone, one of whom is the editor of RedBook, Edwin Balmer; Lois Cole of Macmillan, and a rank outsider to the picture business.

The suggestion in each case proved a shock and the response was "but, she's not the type." Then, as I advanced arguments about the fact that she is a great actress and could play Scarlett, they warmed up to the idea.

Mr. Balmer thought her selection would be analyzed as a compromise. They didn't feel that she could hurt the picture, but nobody reacted enthusiastically. This was all a great disappointment to me.

Peggy Mitchell was scared to death to say anything at first, but I reassured her that her conversation would be only for your ears. She, too, was very lukewarm; not against her but, like the others, not enthusiastically excited about the idea. 

Shearer seems to be tied up with pictures like JULIET and ELIZABETH BARRETT. People forget her first great success in THE FREE SOUL and RIPTIDE. Shearer does not seem to be associated with sex. Both Balmer and Mitchell said you couldn't imagine Shearer killing in cold blood and bargaining her body.

Everybody says get someone with no name so Scarlett can be Scarlett and it won't be Miriam Hopkins making believe she is Scarlett, just as if we weren't all half crazy trying to do this!

(signed) Kay

On 30 March 1937, following Winchell's announcement and the public outcry it had caused, both Selznick and Norma issued statements in which they denied Norma being a candidate for Scarlett. Selznick said: "Miss Norma Shearer and we of Selznick International have jointly come to a conclusion against further consideration of the idea of Miss Shearer playing the role of Scarlett O'Hara in "Gone with the Wind". Miss Shearer has made other arrangement, and we are continuing the search begun several months ago, and never interrupted, for an unknown, or comparatively unknown, actress for the part ..." And Norma said: "... I have other plans, which I cannot divulge at this time, which preclude my giving the idea any further consideration. I shall be watching with great interest to see who Mr. Selznick selects and whether she will be a well known star or a newcomer. I know she will be wonderful, and I will be wishing her luck."

Dallas Morning News, 24 June 1938

Despite these statements, Norma's GWTW adventure did not end here. About a year later, the actress would again be a contender for the role of Scarlett. In fact, on 24 June 1938, several newspapers announced that she had already been cast, including The New York Times and The Dallas Morning News. And again, like Walter Winchell's announcement had done a year earlier, this announcement also evoked a great many negative reactions from people who felt Norma was unsuited for the role. On top of that, people were shocked by the fact that she had asked Selznick to change the script in order to make Scarlett more sympathetic. (In a previous post, I reproduced four of the many letters that Selznick received regarding Norma's casting as Scarlett; you can read them here.) Ultimately, due to public pressure, Norma withdrew from the picture and gave up the role for good. 

In November 1938, several months after giving up Scarlett, Norma wrote the following letter to Marjory Pollock, one of her fans who had been in favour of her playing Scarlett. Norma reflects on her decision not to play the part and in particular talks about the traits of Margaret Mitchell's heroine that had bothered her. 

Source: Bonhams

Transcript:

November 10, 1938.

Dear Marjory Pollock:

Reading some of the thousands of letters that came in after the announcement that I would play Scarlett O'Hara, I find your gracious note. I am so happy to know that you wanted me to play the role, even tho I have decided against it. Your confidence in me is most inspiring.

When the studio asked me if I would accept the role, I gave it careful consideration; but I was troubled by traits - such as her disrespect for the death of her husband, her neglect of her child, her marriage to a man for whom she even had no respect, her indifference to the revelation of Rhett Butler's love at the end of the story - which I knew would be unpleasant to portray on the screen. I think any woman - no matter how hard she has been - must be redeemed by such a great love as Rhett's.

It has always been my desire to vary my roles, as you know, but I felt I had been associated with such idealistic characters in the past few years that to play Scarlett whole-heartedly might be offensive and leave an unpleasant impression on the minds of the public.

I was so glad to read that your father recovered so completely from his illness, and the nice things he said about me were most pleasant to listen to.

My sincere appreciation, and good wishes to you both,

(signed) Norma Shearer

Miss Marjory Pollock,
Fine Arts School,
South Bend, Indiana.

Norma Shearer and Clark Gable at a Hollywood event in 1938; they played in three films together (i.e. A Free Soul (1931), Strange Interlude (1932) and Idiot's Delight (1939)) but their fourth was not to be. Instead of Shearer, Vivien Leigh would star in GWTW in her only pairing with Gable.

Sam, I am frank to say that I don't understand you

David O. Selznick and Samuel Goldwyn were two of Hollywood's most successful independent producers, both with their own group of contract players. Among Selznick's contracted stars were (at one time or another) Joan Fontaine, Ingrid Bergman, Gregory Peck and Joseph Cotten, while Goldwyn had under contract such stars as Gary Cooper, Joel McCrea, David Niven and Danny Kaye. One of the people also under contract to Selznick was British director Alfred Hitchcock, who came to Hollywood in early June 1938 at the invitation of Selznick. 

Before being signed by Selznick, however, Hitch met with Samuel Goldwyn. Goldwyn was also interested in Hitch but made no serious bid to land him. (According to Selznick, Myron Selznick (David's brother and Hitch's agent) could "not get bids for [Hitch] at the time I signed him".) Eventually in mid-July 1938, Selznick and Hitch struck a deal, entering into a seven-year contract. The two worked together only four times, i.e. on Rebecca (1940), Spellbound (1945), Notorious (1946) and The Paradine Case (1947). More often than not, Hitch was loaned out by Selznick to other studios at considerable profits (much to Hitch's resentment as he didn't share in the profits).

Above: Selznick and Hitchcock — the men had a difficult working relationship. Below: At a dinner in Los Angeles in October 1953, (l to r) Goldwyn, Jennifer Jones (Selznick's second wife) and Selznick. The two producers reportedly admired and liked each other.

In late December 1942, Hitch had a meeting with Goldwyn about a production deal. Shooting on Shadow of a Doubt (1943) had already ended and Hitch's next project would be Lifeboat (1944) on loan-out to Twentieth Century-Fox. When Selznick heard about the Hitchcock-Goldwyn meeting, he was furious and next wrote a letter to Goldwyn. With Hitch still having a few years left on their contract, Selznick resented Goldwyn for trying to "seduce" Hitch into coming to work for him, and for telling Hitch not to waste his talents on projects like Shadow of a Doubt (which was not produced by Selznick but by Skirball Productions). Ironically enough, Shadow was to become Hitch's personal favourite.

 

January 6, 1943

Mr. Samuel Goldwyn
1041 North Formosa
Hollywood, California
cc: Mr. O'Shea

Dear Sam:

Recently, you have had a couple of occasions to remind us forcibly that you are a "frank" man, although God knows no reminder was necessary. However, I do hope that you grant to others —such, for instance, as myself— the right to be equally frank: 

Sometimes, Sam, I am frank to say that I don't understand you. You scream and yell about other people's ethics, and then behave in a fashion that makes my hair stand on end with a combination of anger and incredulity.

You recently have sent direct for one of my people, Alfred Hitchcock, and talked with him without so much as either asking us, or even letting us know after the fact. I wonder just how you would behave if I reciprocated in kind — or if any of the big companies did it with your people. I have always maintained that no one is in permanent bondage in this business, and that once a contract has expired, or is soon to expire, every individual in the business should be free to negotiate with anyone he sees fit, without giving offense to the studio to which he or she has been under contract, and regardless of the desire of the original contracting studio to make the bondage permanent. I am not talking about such a case: rather, I am referring to a man who you know full well is still under long-term contract to me. Or if you don't know it, everyone else in the business does, and you ought to know it. The very least you could have done was to find out. Ignorance is no more a defense in these matters, if that be your defense, than it is in the law. 

Hitch has a minimum of two years to go with me, and longer if it takes him more time to finish four pictures, two of which I have sold to Twentieth Century-Fox. And not alone did you try to seduce him, but you tried something which I have never experienced before with any company or individual— you sought to make him unhappy with my management of him. When you told Hitch that he shouldn't be wasting his talents on stories like Shadow of a Doubt, and that this wouldn't be the case if he were working for you, what you didn't know was that Hitchcock personally chose the story and created the script— and moreover that he is very happy about the picture, which I think he has every right to be. Further, that in the years since I brought Hitchcock over here from England (at a time when nobody in the industry, including yourself, was willing to give him the same opportunity...) and established him as one of the most important directors in the world with the production and exploitation of Rebecca, he has never once had to do a story that he was not enthusiastic about. This has always been my attitude about directors, and I happen to know that it has not always been your attitude toward directors under contract to you ...

By contrast with your own behavior, I have for months met criticisms of you with praise for your work, and for your contributions to the business, and for your integrity of production. I have said to literally dozens of people in important positions that you have never received as much recognition in the industry as is your due. And just yesterday, and despite my growing rage with you, I went even further than this with an important magazine writer who is doing an article about you. I not alone sang your praises, but I painstakingly corrected some impressions he had gained elsewhere, taking half an hour out of a very busy day for the purpose. When I hear of you doing the same thing, instead of doing your best (which would appear to be synonymous with your worst) in the opposite direction, I will believe your fine statements, and not before. I regret that I have to write you in this vein, and I do so not because I have any reluctance about rebuking you verbally, for you know from our past relationship that I have never been hesitant about such matters when I felt you to be in the wrong. I write you now, first, because I want it a matter of record, in connection with my future dealings with you; and second, because I have learned from experience that it is impossible to get you to listen to this many words unless they are in writing.

With best wishes for a fine and reformed New Year,

Sincerely yours ,

Source: Memo from David O. Selznick (1972); selected and edited by Rudy Behlmer. 

On the set of Shadow of a Doubt with Hitch (far right, seated) and Shadow's main players (l to r) Joseph Cotten, Teresa Wright and Macdonald Carey. The film was shot on location in Santa Rosa, California. It was  Hitchcock's own favourite of his films because —in Hitch's own words—  it "brought murder and violence back in the home, where it rightly belongs" .

Selznick's most successful achievement was his 1939 Gone with the Wind, and Goldwyn will probably be best remembered for The Best Years of Our Lives (1946). Both films won numerous Oscars, including Oscars for Best Picture.

I'm a great deal better now

In May 1956, during production of Raintree County (1957), Montgomery Clift attended a party at the house of co-star and friend Elizabeth Taylor and her husband Michael Wilding. On his way home from the party —feeling exhausted and having had too much to drink— Clift lost control of his car and smashed into a telephone pole. The actor had a severe concussion, broken jaw, broken nose and other facial injuries, which required surgery and several months of recovery. Clift's face eventually healed, although the left side of his face was left partially paralysed.

At the time of the accident, studio work at MGM had already been completed and the cast and crew of Raintree County were about to go on location to Mississippi. Due to the accident, however, the location shooting was postponed and it wasn't until 23 July that Clift returned to work. Two days earlier he had written a letter to his friend, theater actor William LeMassena, mentioning his recovery, his new dentures and the location shoot. Clift had reportedly been in a relationship with LeMassena during the early 1940s. The two remained close friends until Clift suffered a fatal heart attack in July 1966 (following years of drug and alcohol abuse). At the time of his death, Clift was only 45 years old. 

Source: Gotta Have Rock and Roll

Monty Clift and Liz Taylor on the set of Edward Dmytryk's Raintree County. While the film did well at the box-office —people went to see it en masse, if only to see the difference in Clift's facial appearance before and after the crash— it did not recoup its huge costs.

_______

Billy LeMassena

Also addressed to William LeMassena is the following letter from Monty Clift several years earlier, dated 5 January 1952. Besides the personal content of the letter —with repeated use of the F-word— Clift fleetingly mentions David Selznick, whom he despised and reportedly called "an interfering f*ckface" behind his back. Clift worked with Selznick on Terminal Station (1953), a film directed by Vittorio De Sica and co-produced by De Sica and Selznick. The actor hated Selznick's interference with De Sica's picture and sided with the Italian director in his disagreements with Selznick. Terminal Station was re-edited by Selznick and in 1954 re-released in the USA under the title Indiscretion of an American Wife. When Clift saw the American cut, he hated it and called it a "big fat failure".

"Eternity" mentioned in the letter is Fred Zinnemann's From Here To Eternity (1953), in which Clift played the role of Private Robert Prewitt. He was the first actor to be hired for the film, with production starting in the spring of 1953. For his performance Clift would receive his third Oscar nomination but didn't win (the other nominations were for The Search (1948) and A Place in the Sun (1951)).

Source: Gotta Have Rock and Roll

Note:

Monty Clift probably misdated his letter, the year being 1953 instead of 1952. Terminal Station was filmed in Rome, Italy from October until December 1952. So it seems likely that the letter was written in January 1953 after production of the film had ended, with Clift being more than eager to go home.

David Selznick and Monty Clift

Fields would probably make better Micawber

Published in 1850, Charles Dickens' David Copperfield is an autobiographical novel which was also the author's personal favourite. The story follows the life of David from childhood into young adulthood, during which he encounters hardship, abuse, poverty but also love and happiness as he meets an array of vivid characters. It was a big wish of producer David O. Selznick to adapt David Copperfield for the screen, a novel he had cherished since childhood. Selnick's Russian father had learned English by reading the novel and had next read it to his sons. Initially, MGM boss Louis B. Mayer saw nothing in Selznick's idea to turn the book into a film but Selznick —at the time under contract to MGM— eventually convinced Mayer to okay the project. Subsequently, Selznick hired Hugh Walpole to adapt the story from Dickens' novel and Howard Estabrook and Lenore J. Coffee to write the screenplay. George Cukor was hired to direct.

It took a bit of effort to cast some of the film's pivotal roles. Selznick and Cukor extensively searched in the USA, Canada and the UK for a child actor to play young David. While Mayer had wanted MGM child actor Jackie Cooper, Selznick was adamant about casting a British youngster in order to stay true to the novel. In 1934 on a scouting trip to London, Selznick and Cukor eventually found young Freddie Bartholomew and gave him the part.

The casting of Mr. Micawber was a different story. While W.C. Fields, who eventually played Micawber, had been under consideration from the start, it was Charles Laughton who was Selznick and Cukor's first choice. Laughton had just won the Best Actor Oscar for The Private Lives of Henry VIII (1933) and would be the most important and bankable name in the large cast. Amid much publicity, Laughton was given the role but after just two days of shooting he wanted to be released from it. Having lost his confidence and convinced he was all wrong for the part, Laughton was eventually dismissed. Cukor said Laughton just didn't know how to play Micawber, lacking the geniality that was required. (According to cameraman Hal Kern, in the rushes Laughton "looked as if he was going to molest the child".) 

Selznick now set out to hire Fields and borrowed him from Paramount. Although Fields wasn't right physically —with his head shaven Laughton had "looked Micawber to the life", said Cukor— he was quite eager to play the role, despite his dislike of working with children. Fields was a Dickens fan and David Copperfield is the only film where he followed the script and refrained from ad-libbing. Although his contract stipulated he should speak with a British accent, the actor wouldn't drop his American accent and in his defense later said: "My father was an Englishman and I inherited this accent from him! Are you trying to go against nature?!"

_______

Laughton in 1933

Regarding the casting of the Micawber role David Selznick wrote several memos, two of which are seen below. The first one was sent to Louis B. Mayer in May 1934 and the second one several months later (in September) to MGM executive Robert Rubin. As stated above, it is generally believed that Laughton himself wanted to be released from the film, a viewpoint that was also shared by Laughton biographer Simon Callow. Selznick's memo to Rubin, however, suggests that other factors led to Laughton's dismissal, having to do with costs as well as "certain difficulties" the actor experienced with MGM. (What those "difficulties" with MGM were, I don't know. As for the costs, Selznick was afraid that they would be "impossible" if he had to wait for Laughton to finish the Paramount film Ruggles of Red Gap (1935); during rehearsals Laughton had fallen ill with a rectal abscess and spent a number of weeks hospitalised, causing the picture to be delayed.)

 

MAY 17 1934 

LONDON

TO: L.B. MAYER

...MUST KNOW WHAT CHANCE CHARLES LAUGHTON FOR ROLE OF MICAWBER. FEEL MORE THAN EVER VITAL IMPORTANCE OF BENDING EVERY EFFORT TO SECURE HIM, BUT MUST KNOW WITHIN FEW DAYS SO CAN DECIDE WHETHER TO SIGN ANOTHER MICAWBER. IF LAUGHTON UNAVAILABLE FOR MICAWBER, MIGHT LIKE W.C. FIELDS. CAN WE GET HIM? TO AVOID NECESSITY OF TRYING PARAMOUNT, THINK WE SHOULD GET WORD TO FIELDS DIRECT, WHO WOULD PROBABLY GIVE EYE TOOTH TO PLAY MICAWBER ... CORDIALLY

DAVID

SEPTEMBER 27, 1934

J. ROBERT RUBIN

1540 BROADWAY

NEW YORK, N.Y.

CONFIDENTIALLY, ENTIRELY POSSIBLE WE WILL NOT, IN SPITE OF EVERYTHING WE WENT THROUGH, BE ABLE USE CHARLES LAUGHTON IN "COPPERFIELD" BECAUSE HIS ILLNESS HAS DELAYED HIS PARAMOUNT PICTURE AND IF WE WAITED UNTIL HE FINISHED THAT, COST WOULD BE IMPOSSIBLE. ALSO WE ARE HAVING CERTAIN DIFFICULTIES WITH HIM. WHAT I WOULD LIKE TO KNOW IMMEDIATELY IS WHETHER IF IT COMES TO ISSUE, HOW MUCH DIFFERENCE COMMERCIALLY WOULD THERE BE HAVING W.C. FIELDS INSTEAD OF LAUGHTON? IT OF COURSE NOT CERTAIN WHETHER WE CAN OBTAIN FIELDS, BUT AM RAISING QUESTION IN HOPE WE COULD. FIELDS WOULD PROBABLY MAKE BETTER MICAWBER, BUT WE'VE ALWAYS FELT WE REQUIERED THE ONE IMPORTANT NAME IN CAST IN LAUGHTON. WOULD YOU CHECK THIS IMMEDIATELY WITH FOREIGN AND DOMESTIC SALES DEPARTMENTS AND ADVISE ME. REGARDS

DAVID SELZNICK 

 

Source:  Memo from David O. Selznick (1972); selected and edited by Rudy Behlmer. 

1934 - Selznick & Co on their return from England after a "David Copperfield" work visit. Left to right: Peter Trent (who was considered for the role of the adult David but eventually lost the part to Frank Lawton), screenwriter Howard Estabrook, Irene Mayer Selznick and David O. Selznick, Hugh Walpole (who adapted the story from Dicken's novel and also played the vicar in the film), George Cukor and Fritz Lang (who had just been signed by Selznick to a MGM contract).  

Freddie Bartholomew as young David and WC Fields as Mr. Micawber in a publicity still for David Copperfield. Upon its release in January 1935, the film was a big success with both critics and audiences. It was nominated for three Academy Awards, including Academy Award for Best Picture (losing to Mutiny on the Bounty).

I personally feel that audiences are waiting to see you in a smart, modern picture

In 1935, while under contract to MGM, David O. Selznick was assigned to produce the next Greta Garbo picture. After being head of production at RKO, Selznick had joined MGM in 1933 and was given his own production unit, alongside the unit headed by Irving Thalberg. Prior to his film with Garbo, Selznick had already produced a string of successful films for MGM, including Dinner at Eight (1933) and David Copperfield (1934).

Greta Garbo was already a star by the time she and Selznick worked together. With her role in Anna Christie (1930) Garbo had made a successful transition from silent films to talkies and other successes soon followed, like Mata Hari (1931) and Grand Hotel (1932). For her project with Selznick the actress wanted to play the titular role in a new film adaptation of Leo Tolstoy's Anna Karenina. Garbo had played Anna in the 1927 silent film Love but, unhappy with the film's tacked-on ending, she was eager to reprise the role in a production that would stay closer to Tolstoy's novel.

Selznick was far from enthusiastic, however, about making Anna Karenina with Garbo. He very much wanted her to play in a contemporary drama and the project he had in mind was Dark Victory, a 1934 play written by George Brewer Jr. and Bertram Bloch, which had starred Tallulah Bankhead on Broadway. Trying to convince Garbo to choose Dark Victory over Anna Karenina, Selznick wrote her a letter in January 1935, his impassioned plea ultimately proving fruitless. Garbo didn't like Dark Victory and was intent on doing Anna Karenina. Seeing that her contract gave her the right to decline any project she disliked, Selznick had no choice but to accept Garbo's decision.

Above: Greta Garbo as Anna Karenina and Fredric March as Count Vronsky in David Selznick's production of Tolstoy's famous novel. Below the two actors are pictured on the set, with director Clarence Brown seated.

This is the letter Selznick wrote to Garbo, who at the time was vacationing at La Quinta near Palm Springs. Needing an immediate answer, Selznick had his letter hand-delivered to the actress by her close friend, screenwriter Salka Viertel.

January 7, 1935

Miss Greta Garbo

La Quinta, California

Dear Miss Garbo:

I was extremely sorry to hear this morning that you had left for Palm Springs, because we must arrive at an immediate decision, which, I think, will have a telling effect on your entire career.

As I told you the other day, we have lost our enthusiasm for a production of Anna Karenina as your next picture. I personally feel that audiences are waiting to see you in a smart, modern picture and that to do a heavy Russian drama on the heels of so many ponderous, similar films, in which they have seen you and other stars recently, would prove to be a mistake. I still think Karenina can be a magnificent film and I would be willing to make it with you later, but to do it now, following the disappointment of Queen Christina and The Painted Veil, is something I dislike contemplating very greatly.

Mr. Cukor shares my feeling and it seems a pity that we must start our first joint venture with you with such a lack of enthusiasm and such an instinct of dread for the outcome. If we make the picture, Mr. Cukor and I will put our very best efforts into it and I am sure we could make a fine film, hopefully one excellent enough to dissipate the obvious pitfalls of the subject from the viewpoint of your millions of admirers. But I do hope you will not force us to proceed.

We have spent some time in searching for a comedy and although several have been brought to me, there are none I feel sufficiently important enough to justify the jump into comedy; to say nothing of the difficulty of preparing a comedy in the limited time left to us.  

Therefore, since you feel that you must leave the end of May and cannot give us additional time, we have been faced with the task of finding a subject that could be prepared in time and which might inspire us with a feeling that we could make a picture comparable to your former sensations and one that would, at the same time, meet my very strong feeling that you should do a modern subject at this particular moment in your career. The odds against our finding such a subject were very remote and I was very distressed and felt there was no alternative left to us but to proceed with Karenina. Now, however, I find that if I act very quickly, I can purchase Dark Victory, the owners of which have resisted offers from several companies for many months. The play is at the top of the list at several studios and if we do not purchase it, the likelihood is that it will be purchased at once for Katharine Hepburn. The owner of the play, Jock Whitney, is leaving for New York tomorrow and it would be a pity if we were delayed in receiving your decision concerning it .... Therefore, I have asked Salka to see you and to bring you this letter and to tell you the story— which I consider the best modern woman's vehicle, potentially, I've read since A Bill of Divorcement and which I think has the makings of a strikingly fine film. Mr. Cukor and many others share this opinion .... 

Fredric March will only do Anna Karenina if he is forced to by his employers, Twentieth Century Pictures. He has told me repeatedly that he is fed up on doing costume pictures; that he thinks it a mistake to do another; that he knows he is much better in modern subjects and that all these reasons are aggravated by the fact that Anna Karenina would come close on the heels of the Anna Sten- [Rouben] Mamoulian- [Samuel] Goldwyn picture, We Live Again, from Resurrection [Leo Tolstoy's 1899 novel], a picture which has been a failure and in which March appeared in a role similar to that in Karenina. Mr. March is most anxious to do a modern picture and I consider his judgment about himself very sound. We are doubly fortunate in finding in Dark Victory that the male lead is also strikingly well suited to Mr. March.

For all these reasons, I request and most earnestly urge you to permit us to switch from Anna Karenina to Dark Victory and you will have a most enthusiastic producer and director, respectively, in the persons of myself and Mr. Cukor.

I have asked Salka to telephone me as soon as she has discussed the matter thoroughly with you, and I can say no more than that I will be very disappointed, indeed, if you do not agree with our conclusions. 

Most cordially and sincerely yours, 

 

Source: Memo from David O. Selznick (1972); selected and edited by Rudy Behlmer.

_____

Selznick purchased the rights to Dark Victory and tried to get Merle Oberon for the female lead after Garbo had turned it down. Oberon was not available, however, and since Selznick was also facing problems with the script he eventually sold the property to Warner Bros in 1938. In the end, Dark Victory (1939) was made with Bette Davis and George Brent in the leads. Directed by Edmund Goulding, the film was a big hit.

Garbo got what she wanted and made Anna Karenina (1935) with Selznick. As her leading man Fredric March was cast, against his own wishes but at the insistence of his studio. (Selznick initially wanted Clark Gable but he was not interested.) Since George Cukor was not keen on doing the project, Clarence Brown was hired to direct. Anna Karenina became both a critical and commercial success. The film is the only collaboration between Selznick and Garbo. 

Above: Selznick in his MGM offices, ca. 1933-1935, photographed by Clarence Sinclair Bull. After doing Anna Karenina, Selznick made one more film for MGM (A Tale of Two Cities) and then quit to found his own production company, Selznick International Pictures. Below: Bette Davis and George Brent in the weepie Dark Victory in roles Selznick had originally envisaged for Greta Garbo and Fredric March. Bette plays the socialite Judith Traherne who suffers from a brain tumour and Brent is Frederick Steele, the doctor she falls in love with.

Signed, David-in-quest-of-his-Mate

In her autobiography A Private View (1983) Irene Mayer Selznick said that David Selznick didn't seriously propose to her until long after they knew they were going to be married. Once he had begun to propose, he never stopped. In fact, not a day went by without yet another proposal, each one more original than the previous one. 

One of Selznick's marriage proposals to Irene Mayer is seen below. In a letter the producer first discussed several film-related matters and then, seemingly as an afterthought, added this great proposal:

I've been thinking of you and decided to marry you if you'll have me. I'm middle-aged to be sure; I have a hammer toe and I run into things; I'm ex-arrogant, and once I wanted to be a big shot; I snore loudly, drink exuberantly, cuddle (i.e. snuggle) expansively, work excessively, play enthusiastically, and my future is drawing to a close, but I'm tall and Jewish and I do love you. David-in-quest-of-his-Mate.  

David Selznick and Irene Mayer (daughter of MGM mogul Louis B. Mayer) were married from 1930 until 1949 and had two sons. They eventually grew apart as a result of Selznick's infidelity —he had started an affair with Jennifer Jones— and his gambling addiction. The couple separated in 1945 but their divorce wouldn't be finalised until 1949. Having worked as an executive at her husband's production company Selznick International Pictures, Irene began a career as a theatre producer after the separation, producing the 1947 play A Streetcar Named Desire.  

Source letter fragment: Ingrid Bergman: My Story (1980) by Ingrid Bergman and Alan Burgess.

David Selznick and Hitler's "Mein Kampf"

When America entered World War II in December 1941, David Selznick very much wanted to join the Army. About his wish to be a soldier Selznick's then-wife Irene said: "His spirit was fine, his idea impractical— he was nearsighted, slewfooted, overweight, overage. He didn't need an enemy, he'd kill himself." 

While Selznick never fought in the war, he desperately wanted to make his contribution to the war effort. Apart from being Hollywood's chairman to the China War Relief, at one point the producer intended to make a film adaptation of Adolf Hitler's book Mein Kampf (1925). For his film Selznick considered hiring Ben Hecht to write the screenplay and Alfred Hitchcock to direct. In the end, however, the US government torpedoed Selznick's plans and the film was never made. (It would have been quite interesting to see what kind of film Selznick had in mind, especially with Hitchcock directing.) 

The war film Selznick eventually did make was Since You Went Away (1944) about an American housewife and her teenage daughters living life on the homefront, while the husband/father is fighting overseas (starring Claudette Colbert, Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotten). Selznick had written a long speech about the war effort and shot the scene with Charles Coburn delivering it but in the end decided not to use it.

Three days after America had entered WWII, Selznick sent the following memo to his associate Kay Brown. Determined to turn Hitler's book into a film, he told Brown to immediately register Mein Kampf with the Title Registration Bureau of the Hays Office and to keep the whole affair "utterly secret". Even Alfred Hitchcock and Ben Hecht were not to know about his plans yet.  

December 11, 1941

To: Miss Katharine Brown

Immediately upon your receipt of this wire please drop everything and rush over to the Hays Office to register "Mein Kampf" as well as anything else necessary to protect it, such as "Life of Adolf Hitler" and "My life, by Adolf Hitler." I hope that there will be no nonsense about whether this is copyrighted or noncopyrighted work, and I hope the Hays Office has the good sense to realize that I consider it noncopyrighted and have no intention of buying rights or of paying royalties, which in circumstances would of course be ridiculous. Even before we were at war, publishers considered it in these terms... Keep it utterly secret until I have had opportunity to check with Washington on the making of this film... Will await wired word from you, but better address me to my home to further guard secrecy, and please caution not to leave any wires concerning it around the desks, and not to even discuss it with people in our own organization... For purpose of wires and letters suggest you refer to it as "Tales from History"... To point out importance of treatment I plan for subject, I am thinking about Hecht for script and Hitchcock for direction, but don't want anything said even to these two. 

David  

Source: Memo from David O. Selznick (1972); selected and edited by Rudy Behlmer.

David Selznick and Katharine Brown, photographed in 1936 with John Hay Whitney and John Wharton.

I forgot everything you had done for me

A Swedish elevator boy, who worked in the New York building where Kay Brown had her office, once told Brown of his parents' enthusiasm for a new Swedish star named Ingrid Bergman and her role in the Swedish film Intermezzo (1936). A talent scout and assistant to producer David Selznick, Brown sought out the film and went "madly overboard about the girl", feeling she was "the beginning and end of all things wonderful". Her boss was very interested in remaking foreign films for the American market and as he loved the story of Intermezzo, Brown was sent to Europe (London) in the fall of 1938 to purchase the film rights. Later Selznick sent Brown back to Europe, this time to Stockholm to find the girl and sign her to a contract. (Bergman and Brown hit it off right away and became close friends.)

In May 1939, Bergman met Selznick for the first time at a Hollywood party at Miriam Hopkins' house. Selznick immediately told her that certain things wouldn't do —her name was impossible, her eyebrows too thick and her teeth no good— to which Bergman said she would go back to Sweden if he tried to change her. Realising she meant it, Selznick got an idea. He would do what no one in Hollywood had ever done before. He would allow Bergman to keep her real name and to remain herself. No heavy make-up, no plucking of eyebrows, nothing about her was to be changed. Ingrid Bergman, the Swedish star, was going to be the first "natural" actress in Hollywood.

Earlier, in Stockholm at Bergman's home, Kay Brown had already negotiated Bergman's contract. Selznick wanted to give Bergman the standard seven-year contract, but her husband Petter Lindström objected. In the end, a contract was signed for one picture with the option to do another. 

The picture was, as said, Intermezzo: A Love Story (1939), Selznick's remake of the Swedish Intermezzo, in which Bergman reprised her role of the piano teacher. Immediately after production of the film had ended, Bergman returned to Sweden to make Juninatten (1940). She had loved her Hollywood adventure and desperately hoped that Selznick would want her back for another film. Well, she needn't have worried, because aboard the Queen Mary en route to Sweden she received a telegram saying: "Dear Ingrid. You are a very lovely person and you warm all our lives. Have a marvellous time but come back soon. Your boss." 

In her diary (her "Book"), Bergman wrote about Selznick in the summer of 1939, while aboard the Queen Mary:

From the first minute, I liked him and every day my admiration and my affection grew. He knew his metier so well; he was artistic and stubborn and worked himself to the bone. Sometimes we worked until five o'clock in the morning. I would come to him with all my problems. He left important meetings to come out and discuss with me a pair of shoes. Hundreds of times he saved me from the publicity department. I trusted him when we saw the rushes and he told me what he thought. His judgement was very hard but it was just. To work for him is often terribly demanding and very hard on the nerves. But always there is the feeling that you have somebody to help with understanding, encouragement, and wisdom, and that is beyond price. When I left, he asked me to sign an enormous photograph, and I wrote: For David, I have no words, Ingrid. Which is true.

Back in Hollywood, Bergman was signed to a five-year contract with Selznick. During those five years she would work with him on only two more films, both directed by Alfred Hitchcock, i.e. Spellbound (1945) and Notorious (1946). For her other films she was loaned out to other studios — e.g. Casablanca (1942) to Warner Bros, For Whom The Bell Tolls (1943) to Paramount, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1941) and Gaslight (1944) to MGM, and The Bells of St. Mary's (1945) to RKO. Towards the end of the five-year period, Selznick tried to sign Bergman to a new contract (for seven years) but she wanted more freedom and decided to go freelance. 

Being loaned out all these years, Bergman knew that Selznick had made huge profits on her. She didn't mind, as she loved her work and was earning a lot more than she ever did in Sweden. However, with the expiration of her contract, Bergman felt she was entitled to some of the money Selznick had earned by loaning her out. When she asked him for money, Selznick became offended and angry and would not speak to her anymore. He found her ungrateful, seeing that he was the one who had made her a big star. Bergman, in turn, was very hurt by Selznick's anger, as she had always looked up to him and regarded him as a father and mentor. 

 

The three films Bergman did for Selznick: Intermezzo with Leslie Howard, Spellbound with Gregory Peck and Notorious with Cary Grant. Notorious started out as a Selznick production but, busy with Duel in the Sun (1946), Selznick lost interest and sold the rights to RKO. Nevertheless, with a 50% stake in the profits, Selznick (being Selznick) kept meddling in the project. Hitchcock was eventually credited as the film's producer.

In January 1947, Selznick wrote Bergman a long letter, pointing out all he had done for her and accusing her of being ungrateful and unreasonable for demanding a $60,000 compensation for a film she had never made. Selznick's letter is seen below, although it won't be shown in full as it really is quite looong. The letter is very unusual, because —in order to get his point across— Selznick had made it appear as though it was a letter from Bergman to him. David Thomson, Selznick's biographer, once said that he found it a wonderful idea for a letter but "one that a grown man should have abandoned in the morning".

Incidentally, the $60,000 compensation was eventually paid.

Mr. David O. Selznick

Selznick Studio

Culver City, California

January 13, 1947

Dear David:

I shall set forth herein a summary of the facts in my dispute with you. It is agreed that upon your receipt of my signature to these facts, you will pay me $60,000 in payment for the picture that I did not make for you under my contract, and for which I am claiming compensation.

These facts are as follows: 

You brought me to this country when I was unknown to American- or English-speaking audiences. When I finished my contract with you, under your management, I had become one of the greatest stars in the world, this development taking place entirely while I was under your management.  

[....] 

When my contract drew near to an end, our negotiations for a new contract bogged down upon your insistence on an exclusive contract for a period of seven years. Through these long negotiations, which had gone on for years, I repeatedly assured you that there could be not the slightest question about my continuing with you, but that I wanted to be free to do an occasional picture on the outside. I stated to you verbally and in writing, and repeatedly, that there could be not the slightest question but that I would continue with you. I made these statements right up to a few months before the expiration of my contract with you.

[....] 

When I went to Europe, I sent you a letter, a copy of which is attached hereto, in which among other things I said, "I think friendship and trust are of more worth than a piece of paper called contract. And if you never get that slip of paper you still will have, changed or unchanged, whatever you think, but still, your Ingrid." 

[....] 

Unfortunately for you, when I returned from Europe, and had everything that I wanted, I forgot all about my promises and statements through the years. I forgot everything you had done for me. I forgot my promises, and even my letter. And I demanded payment for the picture which I asked you to give up, and which you had given up, and which could have been one of the subjects listed above, on which you would, of course, have made a great deal of money, as well as absorbed your overhead, which was idle, largely as a result of my not making a picture. It is true that I entertained the troops on my own insistent desire to do so, but I didn't see and still don't see why you shouldn't pay me $60,000 for having done so.

I complained that you did not make more pictures with me, both privately and in the press. I neglected to say to anybody that you wanted to buy The Valley of Decision and make it with me, but that I didn't want to do it; or that you wanted to make The Spiral Staircase with me... or that you wanted to do Katie for Congress [The Farmer's Daughter] with me; or that you wanted to buy A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and make it with me, making it more the story of the mother, but that I didn't care to do it, and that Twentieth Century-Fox thereupon bought it and made it into a great success for themselves and for your Dorothy McGuire; or that you wanted to make Anna Christie with me, but that I didn't want to do it because Garbo had done it; or that you wanted to make Anna Karenina but that I didn't want to do it, for the same reason; or that there were half a dozen other stories you wanted to make with me, but that I didn't like; or that you took the unprecedented attitude that you would lend me to others for pictures I wanted to make rather than ask me to do pictures that you wanted to make, but in roles that I didn't care for.

Throughout the years, you devoted an enormous amount of time to going over material for me, and to reading scripts submitted from every studio in town, in order to be sure that I was the first actress in the history of the screen that had her pick of the best stories of every studio in town, plus the insistence of yourself as to how the picture should be set up and who should make them in each department. This insistence on your part meant that I had Fleming, Cukor, Curtiz, Wood, McCarey as my directors; that I had the best cameramen in the business, all selected and approved by you, since I didn't know any of them; that I had Spencer Tracy, Gary Cooper, Charles Boyer, Joseph Cotten, Bing Crosby, Gregory Peck, Cary Grant as my leading men, although any other rising young actress would have given her eye teeth for any one of these occasionally, and all of this through the formative period of my career. I am aware that I was the envy of every young actress in town, and even of every already established star, and that a great deal of trouble was caused at other studios by actresses who contrasted your handling of me with what they had to play in, whom they had to be directed by, and scripts, stories, leading men, publicity, etc..

When everyone in Hollywood disbelieved in me and wondered why you had brought me over, and through the long period when you couldn't lend me to anyone, and through the secondary period when you were lending me at cost and at less than cost, you insisted that I was the great actress of this generation, that I would be the greatest star in the industry, that I would be the Academy Award winner, that I would be universally acclaimed...

And in consideration of the above, I herewith make demand upon you for €60,000 for the picture which I asked you not to make, and for the period that I was entertaining troops. Upon payment of this amount to me, you are free of the obligation which I feel that you owe me, having had the privilege and glory of lifting me from obscurity to great stardom.

Ingrid Bergman 

Source: Memo from David O. Selznick (1972); selected and edited by Rudy Behlmer

In the end, Bergman and Selznick did part as friends. Realising he had to let her go, Selznick wrote Bergman this goodbye letter, wishing her luck for the future.

Dear Ingrid, 

I am informed that even Dan O'Shea [Selznick's associate] has reluctantly and at long last come to the conclusion that no new deal with us has been seriously envisaged as part of your future plans. This conclusion comes as no surprise to me, despite our final reliance and faith that I expressed in our conversation and in no way lessens my sorrow over our 'divorce' after so many years of happy marriage. You once said you had 'two husbands'. But Petter was the senior, and of course he knew all the time that his will would prevail. I do regret all the futile gestures and elaborate 'negotiations' but that is all I do regret in a relationship which will always be a source of pride to me. I am sure you know that I have the greatest confidence that your career will go steadily up to new heights, achieving in full the promise of your great talent; and that my good wishes will always be yours no matter what you do. So long Ingrid! May all the New Years beyond bring you everything of which you dream. 

David.

Source: Ingrid Bergman: My Story (1980) by Ingrid Bergman and Alan Burgess