Stream Films ABOUT Notable Authors XII

Love the author? Rereading something pithy? Here are films – fiction and documentary – about the person.

James Salter

James Salter: A Sport and a Pastime 2011 Directed by Edgar Howard and Sandy Gotham Meehan. James Salter was a favored only child, graduated West Point and became a fighter pilot. At some point, he found himself in Paris where his book A Sport and A Pastime, takes place. We hear from low key Salter himself, his French publisher – who addresses cultural differences in writing about sex, author Reynolds Price – reading some of Salter’s work aloud (beautifully) which location shots evoke, and critic/fan James Wolcott.

The book was partly written during military service in the Korean War. After demobilizing, Salter had to convince himself that writing during the day was allowed. Price calls the book one of the most successful stories of sexual romance in modern literature, that Americans, certainly up to that point (1967), wrote about sex as either mechanics or ego. Wolcott calls it “a sexy book you won’t feel ashamed of yourself for reading.”

As narrated by a third character in love with both people, who admits including fantasy, the story depicts a short, tragic, erotic affair between a middle-class American Yale drop-out/photographer and an 18 year-old French girl. French countryside is almost a third character. Repeatedly turned down for publication, it was finally picked up by The Paris Review who changed not a word. “She begins to strip like a roommate and climb into bed…She comes to life with a soft exhausted sound, like someone saved from drowning.” Free with Amazon Prime.

Isaac Asimov

Interview with Isaac Asimov (1920-1992) 1975 Directed by Sprocket Flicks. Interviewer Simon Borgan. Biochemist Isaac Asimov wrote hundreds of stories and articles; 155 books – science fiction, mystery novels, Greek and Roman History, science and technology, even guides to the Bible and the United States. One of our most popular/well known science fiction authors, Asimov came to this country at three, enrolled at Columbia University at 15, sold his first story at 18, enlisted in WWII, received his graduate degree, then taught ten years before becoming a full time writer.

What used to be confined to magazines like Amazing Stories, the author notes, is now in the New York Times. Asimov says SF writers make up futures based on what’s interesting and seems feasible. Asked why SF stories so often center on space, he responds, “The history of man has been crossing the hilltop to see what’s in the next valley. Also strange environments are made to order for our purposes…No matter what happens in the background, however, what happens in the foreground should illuminate the human condition.”

Asimov is asked about sending writers to the moon, his international peers, what he envisions in 2000, then 500 years from the interview, and the three laws of robotics he wrote which has been mirrored by writers ever since: 1. A robot can’t harm a human 2. A robot must obey orders given by humans except when this conflicts with 1. 3. A robot must protect itself until this conflicts with 1 & 2. “I defined this in order to avoid a Frankenstein.” The writer is articulate and low key. An entertaining 25 minutes. Free with Amazon Prime.

Maurice Sendak

Maurice Sendak 2017 Directed by Nicholas Kuskin. Those of you who are fans of the multi-Caldecott winning illustrator/designer are aware that after a point, he wrote as well as illustrated the iconic books. It’s surprising how much one can learn about an artist in a short, one-on-one interview. This under 30 minute film finds Sendak at his house in the country surrounded by an extensive collection of early Mickey Mouse dolls/figures. He talks about his Bensonhurst youth: “I thought Italians were happier Jews with better food.”

Working on other people’s books felt like an apprenticeship to the artist who always had a passion for words. His first solo effort Where the Wild Things Are began as wild horses “until I discovered I couldn’t draw horses…The trouble was the writing. Why would a child turn the page? You’ve got to catch them in a kind of rhythmic  pattern…there was a lot of criticism that it would frighten children. It didn’t frighten me…” Text is completely symbiotic.

Night Kitchen is an answer to the childhood question- why did bakers work while he was asleep and not during the day? Outside Over There is based on the Lindbergh baby kidnapping. Fearing for his family, Sendak’s father slept on the floor by his bed for days. “My subject is childhood. How does a child get through 24 hours?” We close with Sendak’s design for the ballet Nutcracker Suite and an opera of Where the Wild Things Are. Extraordinary talent. Lovely man. Free with Amazon Prime.

Where the Wild Things Are is a marvelous film. (NOT animated) Rent on Amazon Prime.

Theodor Seuss /”Ted” Geisel = Dr. Seuss

The Dentist and Dr. Seuss 2017 Directed by Christopher Ming Ryan. Eight minutes. Charles D. Cohen DDS (no relation) was a perpetually curious hobbyist deep diving into subjects, amassing collections until he’d exhausted pursuit. Passions generally held sway about six months. That was until Cohen started acquiring old editions of Dr. Seuss books. A touring exhibit fueled the fire and the Seuss expert now owns thousands of books and objects based on the work of Theodor Seuss “Ted” Geisel. Cataloging and researching has become his sole endeavor.

The children’s book author was also a political cartoonist, illustrator, poet, animator, screenwriter, and filmmaker. The film is fun, but just a glimpse. Too bad. One would love to know more about the artist himself. Dr. Cohen is the author of The Seuss, The Whole Seuss, and Nothing But the Seuss. Free with Amazon Prime.

Dominick Dunne

Dominick Dunne: After the Party 2009 (Dunne died August 2009) Directed by Kristy de Garis, Timothy Jolley. Dominick Dunne, producer of television and film (Humphry Bogart brought him to California), author of fiction and biographies (11), is probably best known for the latter part of his career as a journalist specializing in high profile trials of the rich and infamous: OJ Simpson, The Menendez Brothers, the Michael Skakel/Martha Moxley case, Phil Spector…in great part for Vanity Fair Magazine.

Dunne was a handsome young man when he moved to Hollywood with his equally attractive wife. First a television stage manager and then a producer, he met and cultivated much of the entertainment community, many of whom were on their way to stardom. Home movies are rich with famous faces. More than one person calls him star struck. Dominick and Ellen gave some of the best parties in tinsel town including an opulent black and white ball that preceded Truman Capote’s New York version by two years. The Dunne kids were left with nannies.

Exhausted, his wife divorced him. “She was the real thing,” he muses, “I became a fake.” (He was never seriously involved again.) Dunne turned to alcohol and drugs. He retreated to an Oregon cabin, got clean and wrote the The Two Mrs. Grenvilles jump starting the next chapter of his career. When beloved daughter/actress Dominique was strangled by an ex-boyfriend, the writer plunged into chronicling the world of criminal violence. Inadvertently he found the unique voice employed until his death.

Few people are aware that Dominick Dunne also suffered the loss of two infant children to natural causes and a brother to suicide. The documentary subject is candid and remorseful. Photos and film abound, including courtroom testimony. It’s a fascinating, cinematic story. Free with Amazon Prime.

Jacqueline Susann

Isn’t She Great? 2000 Based on a New Yorker article by Michael Korda. Directed by Andrew Bergman. Jacqueline Susanne (Bette Midler) is a loud, crass, aspiring actress with no social boundaries. We “meet” her in tiny roles. Her besotted soon-to-be husband (here, narrator), press agent Irving Mansfield (Nathan Lane), thinks she’s the best thing since sliced bread. He tracks down Jackie, tells her so, and takes her on as a client securing a game show appearance during which she’s rude and inappropriate. Irving is determined. Jackie just wants to be famous. Why is it so difficult?

The pair get married and have an autistic child, soon institutionalized. It occurs to Irving that authors can be world famous. The only thing she knows about, Jackie protests, is “people fucking their way into movies, doing drugs…tits and truth…” With his unconditional encouragement, she authors Valley of The Dolls, a roman a clef turned down by every “respectable” publisher in New York, then accepted at Henry Marcus Co. (A stand in for Bernard Geis.)

The publisher  (John Cleese) slides down a fire pole wearing a Mao suit. (This screenplay skirts the author’s first book-about her poodle.) Editor Michael Hastings (David Hyde Pierce) is assigned. Mirroring upcoming reviews, he declares the book not only pornographic but execrably written. Pinning her down to changes is next to impossible (and amusing).

When the book comes out, Jackie, Irving, and a publicist (Amanda Peet) drive cross-country promoting it to every small town bookstore they can find. Jackie buys donuts for teamsters in warehouses. Valley becomes, to date, the bestselling book of all time. The author is diagnosed with cancer. She continues professionally successful until her death, reveling in every moment of celebrity. Doggedly upbeat, mostly fun. Rent on Amazon Prime.

Top photo: Shutterstock