Old Hollywood
Cinema
1900-1979
Nostalgia is a seductive liar - George Wildman Ball
Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961, dir. Blake Edwards) (via) “The ragbag colors of her boy’s hair, tawny streaks, strands of albino-blonde and yellow, caught the hall light. It was a warm evening, nearly summer, and she wore a slim cool black dress, black sandals, a pearl choker. For all her chic thinness, she had an almost breakfast-cereal air of health, a soap and lemon cleanliness, a rough pink darkening the cheeks. Her mouth was large, her nose upturned. A pair of dark glasses blotted out her eyes. It was a face beyond childhood, yet this side of belonging to a woman. I thought her anywhere between sixteen and thirty.” -Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1958)

Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961, dir. Blake Edwards) (via)

“The ragbag colors of her boy’s hair, tawny streaks, strands of albino-blonde and yellow, caught the hall light. It was a warm evening, nearly summer, and she wore a slim cool black dress, black sandals, a pearl choker. For all her chic thinness, she had an almost breakfast-cereal air of health, a soap and lemon cleanliness, a rough pink darkening the cheeks. Her mouth was large, her nose upturned. A pair of dark glasses blotted out her eyes. It was a face beyond childhood, yet this side of belonging to a woman. I thought her anywhere between sixteen and thirty.”

-Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1958)

Marilyn Monroe & Truman Capote dance at El Morocco in New York (1955, via Bettmann/Corbis) Monroe & Capote were good friends and drinking buddies during the last decade of her life. In 1980, Capote released Music for Chameleons, a collection of short works that included an account of an afternoon he spent with Monroe in 1955. We’ll never know if and how their conversations were embellished by Capote (who claimed to have transcribed his talk with Monroe in his diaries later that same afternoon), but they certainly make for entertaining reading. An excerpt from the piece, which was titled A Beautiful Child: TC: Now do you think we can get the hell out of here? You promised me champagne, remember? MARILYN: I remember. But I don’t have any money. TC: You’re always late and you never have any money. By any chance are you under the delusion that you’re Queen Elizabeth? MARILYN: Who? TC: Queen Elizabeth. The Queen of England. MARILYN: (frowning) What’s that cunt got to do with it? TC: Queen Elizabeth never carries money either. She’s not allowed to. Filthy lucre must not stain the royal palm. It’s a law or something. MARILYN: I wish they’d pass a law like that for me. TC: Keep going the way you are and maybe they will. MARILYN: Well, gosh. How does she pay for anything? Like when she goes shopping? TC: Her lady-in-waiting trots along with a bag full of farthings. MARILYN: You know what? I’ll bet she gets everything free. In return for endorsements. TC: Very possible. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised. By Appointment to Her Majesty. Corgi dogs. All those Fortnum & Mason goodies. Pot. Condoms. MARILYN: What would she want with condoms? TC: Not her, dopey. For that chump who walks two steps behind. Prince Philip. MARILYN: Him. Oh, yeah. He’s cute. He looks like he might have a nice prick. Did I ever tell you about the time I saw Errol Flynn whip out his prick and play the piano with it? Oh well, it was a hundred years ago, I’d just got into modeling, and I went to this half-ass party, and Errol Flynn, so pleased with himself, he was there and he took out his prick and played the piano with it. Thumped the keys. He played You Are My Sunshine. Christ! Everybody says Milton Berle has the biggest schlong in Hollywood. But who cares? Look, don’t you have any money? TC: Maybe about fifty bucks. MARILYN: Well, that ought to buy us some bubbly. (Outside, Lexington Avenue was empty of all but harmless pedestrians. It was around two, and as nice an April afternoon as one could wish: ideal strolling weather. So we moseyed toward Third Avenue. A few gawkers spun their heads, not because they recognized Marilyn as the Marilyn, but because of her funeral finery; she giggled her special little giggle, a sound as tempting as the jingling bells on a Good Humor wagon, and said: “Maybe I should always dress this way. Real anonymous.” As we neared P.J. Clarke’s saloon, I suggested P.J.’s might be a good place to refresh ourselves, but she vetoed that: “It’s full of those advertising creeps. And that bitch Dorothy Kilgallen, she’s always in there getting bombed. What is it with these micks? The way they booze, they’re worse than Indians.” I felt called upon to defend Kilgallen, who was a friend, somewhat, and I allowed as to how she could upon occasion be a clever funny woman. She said: “Be that as it may, she’s written some bitchy stuff about me. But all those cunts hate me. Hedda. Louella. I know you’re supposed to get used to it, but I just can’t. It really hurts. What did I ever do to those hags? The only one who writes a decent word about me is Sidney Skolsky. But he’s a guy. The guys treat me okay. Just like maybe I was a human person. At least they give me the benefit of the doubt. And Bob Thomas is a gentleman. And Jack O’Brian.” We looked in the windows of antique shops; one contained a tray of old rings, and Marilyn said: “That’s pretty. The garnet with the seed pearls. I wish I could wear rings, but I hate people to notice my hands. They’re too fat. Elizabeth Taylor has fat hands. But with those eyes, who’s looking at her hands? I like to dance naked in front of mirrors and watch my tits jump around. There’s nothing wrong with them. But I wish my hands weren’t so fat.” Another window displayed a handsome grandfather clock, which prompted her to observe: “I’ve never had a home. Not a real one with all my own furniture. But if I ever get married again, and make a lot of money, I’m going to hire a couple of trucks and ride down Third Avenue buying every damn kind of crazy thing. I’m going to get a dozen grandfather clocks and line them all up in one room and have them all ticking away at the same time. That would be real homey, don’t you think?”) (…) MARILYN: Remember, I said if anybody ever asked you what I was like, what Marilyn Monroe was really like—well, how would you answer them? (Her tone was teaseful, mocking, yet earnest, too: she wanted an honest reply.) I bet you’d tell them I was a slob. A banana split. TC: Of course. But I’d also say… (The light was leaving. She seemed to fade with it, blend with the sky and clouds, recede beyond them. I wanted to lift my voice louder than the seagulls’ cries and call her back: “Marilyn! Marilyn, why did everything have to turn out the way it did? Why does life have to be so rotten?”) TC: I’d say… MARILYN: I can’t hear you. TC: I’d say you are a beautiful child. *** A full-ish version of the piece was published in People in 1980 & can be read here (“full-ish” because in a concession to propriety, People excised, among other things, Monroe’s colorful nickname for Queen Elizabeth and any references to Errol Flynn’s piano-playing penis). Incidentally, Capote had actually wanted Monroe to play the part of Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Capote: “Marilyn would have been absolutely marvelous in it. She wanted to play it too, to the extent that she worked up two whole scenes all by herself and did them for me. She was terrifically good, but Paramount double-crossed me in every way and cast Audrey. Audrey is an old friend and one of my favorite people, but she was just wrong for that part.”

Marilyn Monroe & Truman Capote dance at El Morocco in New York (1955, via Bettmann/Corbis)

Monroe & Capote were good friends and drinking buddies during the last decade of her life. In 1980, Capote released Music for Chameleons, a collection of short works that included an account of an afternoon he spent with Monroe in 1955. We’ll never know if and how their conversations were embellished by Capote (who claimed to have transcribed his talk with Monroe in his diaries later that same afternoon), but they certainly make for entertaining reading.

An excerpt from the piece, which was titled A Beautiful Child:

TC: Now do you think we can get the hell out of here? You promised me champagne, remember?

MARILYN: I remember. But I don’t have any money.

TC: You’re always late and you never have any money. By any chance are you under the delusion that you’re Queen Elizabeth?

MARILYN: Who?

TC: Queen Elizabeth. The Queen of England.

MARILYN: (frowning) What’s that cunt got to do with it?

TC: Queen Elizabeth never carries money either. She’s not allowed to. Filthy lucre must not stain the royal palm. It’s a law or something.

MARILYN: I wish they’d pass a law like that for me.

TC: Keep going the way you are and maybe they will.

MARILYN: Well, gosh. How does she pay for anything? Like when she goes shopping?

TC: Her lady-in-waiting trots along with a bag full of farthings.

MARILYN: You know what? I’ll bet she gets everything free. In return for endorsements.

TC: Very possible. I wouldn’t be a bit surprised. By Appointment to Her Majesty. Corgi dogs. All those Fortnum & Mason goodies. Pot. Condoms.

MARILYN: What would she want with condoms?

TC: Not her, dopey. For that chump who walks two steps behind. Prince Philip.

MARILYN: Him. Oh, yeah. He’s cute. He looks like he might have a nice prick. Did I ever tell you about the time I saw Errol Flynn whip out his prick and play the piano with it? Oh well, it was a hundred years ago, I’d just got into modeling, and I went to this half-ass party, and Errol Flynn, so pleased with himself, he was there and he took out his prick and played the piano with it. Thumped the keys. He played You Are My Sunshine. Christ! Everybody says Milton Berle has the biggest schlong in Hollywood. But who cares? Look, don’t you have any money?

TC: Maybe about fifty bucks.

MARILYN: Well, that ought to buy us some bubbly.

(Outside, Lexington Avenue was empty of all but harmless pedestrians. It was around two, and as nice an April afternoon as one could wish: ideal strolling weather. So we moseyed toward Third Avenue. A few gawkers spun their heads, not because they recognized Marilyn as the Marilyn, but because of her funeral finery; she giggled her special little giggle, a sound as tempting as the jingling bells on a Good Humor wagon, and said: “Maybe I should always dress this way. Real anonymous.”

As we neared P.J. Clarke’s saloon, I suggested P.J.’s might be a good place to refresh ourselves, but she vetoed that: “It’s full of those advertising creeps. And that bitch Dorothy Kilgallen, she’s always in there getting bombed. What is it with these micks? The way they booze, they’re worse than Indians.”

I felt called upon to defend Kilgallen, who was a friend, somewhat, and I allowed as to how she could upon occasion be a clever funny woman. She said: “Be that as it may, she’s written some bitchy stuff about me. But all those cunts hate me. Hedda. Louella. I know you’re supposed to get used to it, but I just can’t. It really hurts. What did I ever do to those hags? The only one who writes a decent word about me is Sidney Skolsky. But he’s a guy. The guys treat me okay. Just like maybe I was a human person. At least they give me the benefit of the doubt. And Bob Thomas is a gentleman. And Jack O’Brian.”

We looked in the windows of antique shops; one contained a tray of old rings, and Marilyn said: “That’s pretty. The garnet with the seed pearls. I wish I could wear rings, but I hate people to notice my hands. They’re too fat. Elizabeth Taylor has fat hands. But with those eyes, who’s looking at her hands? I like to dance naked in front of mirrors and watch my tits jump around. There’s nothing wrong with them. But I wish my hands weren’t so fat.”

Another window displayed a handsome grandfather clock, which prompted her to observe: “I’ve never had a home. Not a real one with all my own furniture. But if I ever get married again, and make a lot of money, I’m going to hire a couple of trucks and ride down Third Avenue buying every damn kind of crazy thing. I’m going to get a dozen grandfather clocks and line them all up in one room and have them all ticking away at the same time. That would be real homey, don’t you think?”)

(…)

MARILYN: Remember, I said if anybody ever asked you what I was like, what Marilyn Monroe was really like—well, how would you answer them? (Her tone was teaseful, mocking, yet earnest, too: she wanted an honest reply.) I bet you’d tell them I was a slob. A banana split.

TC: Of course. But I’d also say…

(The light was leaving. She seemed to fade with it, blend with the sky and clouds, recede beyond them. I wanted to lift my voice louder than the seagulls’ cries and call her back: “Marilyn! Marilyn, why did everything have to turn out the way it did? Why does life have to be so rotten?”)


TC: I’d say…

MARILYN: I can’t hear you.

TC: I’d say you are a beautiful child.

***

A full-ish version of the piece was published in People in 1980 & can be read here (“full-ish” because in a concession to propriety, People excised, among other things, Monroe’s colorful nickname for Queen Elizabeth and any references to Errol Flynn’s piano-playing penis).

Incidentally, Capote had actually wanted Monroe to play the part of Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany’s. Capote: “Marilyn would have been absolutely marvelous in it. She wanted to play it too, to the extent that she worked up two whole scenes all by herself and did them for me. She was terrifically good, but Paramount double-crossed me in every way and cast Audrey. Audrey is an old friend and one of my favorite people, but she was just wrong for that part.”

The Innocents (1961, dir. Jack Clayton, screenplay by Truman Capote, based on Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw)

The Innocents (1961, dir. Jack Clayton, screenplay by Truman Capote, based on Henry James’s The Turn of the Screw)


Robert Blake, John Forsythe, and Scott Wilson in In Cold Blood (1967, dir. Richard Brooks) “Although none of the journalists anticipated violence, several had predicted shouted abuse. But when the crowd caught sight of the murderers, with their escort of blue-coated highway patrolmen, it fell silent, as though amazed to find them humanly shaped.” -Truman Capote, In Cold Blood (1966)  Photographer: Phil Stern

Robert Blake, John Forsythe, and Scott Wilson in In Cold Blood (1967, dir. Richard Brooks)

“Although none of the journalists anticipated violence, several had predicted shouted abuse. But when the crowd caught sight of the murderers, with their escort of blue-coated highway patrolmen, it fell silent, as though amazed to find them humanly shaped.”

-Truman Capote, In Cold Blood (1966)

 Photographer: Phil Stern

Rita Hayworth & Orson Welles in publicity still for The Lady From Shanghai (1947, dir. Orson Welles) (via) Q. What was the Hollywood reaction generally to [The Lady From Shanghai]? Welles: Friends avoided me. Whenever it was mentioned, people would clear their throats and change the subject very quickly out of consideration for my feelings. I only found out that it was considered a good picture when I got to Europe. The first nice thing I ever heard about it from an American was from Truman Capote. One night in Sicily, he quoted whole pages of dialogue word for word. Q. I guess that’s called being ahead of your time. Welles: It’s called being in trouble. -excerpted from This Is Orson Welles

Rita Hayworth & Orson Welles in publicity still for The Lady From Shanghai (1947, dir. Orson Welles) (via)

Q. What was the Hollywood reaction generally to [The Lady From Shanghai]?

Welles: Friends avoided me. Whenever it was mentioned, people would clear their throats and change the subject very quickly out of consideration for my feelings. I only found out that it was considered a good picture when I got to Europe. The first nice thing I ever heard about it from an American was from Truman Capote. One night in Sicily, he quoted whole pages of dialogue word for word.

Q. I guess that’s called being ahead of your time.

Welles: It’s called being in trouble.

-excerpted from This Is Orson Welles

Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961, dir. Blake Edwards) (via) “The ragbag colors of her boy’s hair, tawny streaks, strands of albino-blonde and yellow, caught the light. It was a warm evening, nearly summer, and she wore a slim cool black dress, black sandals, a pearl choker. For all her chic thinness, she had an almost breakfast-cereal air of health, a soap and lemon cleanliness, a rough pink darkening the cheeks. Her mouth was large, her nose upturned. A pair of dark glasses blotted out her eyes. It was a face beyond childhood, yet this side of belonging to a woman. I thought her anywhere between sixteen and thirty.” -Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1958)

Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1961, dir. Blake Edwards) (via)

“The ragbag colors of her boy’s hair, tawny streaks, strands of albino-blonde and yellow, caught the light. It was a warm evening, nearly summer, and she wore a slim cool black dress, black sandals, a pearl choker. For all her chic thinness, she had an almost breakfast-cereal air of health, a soap and lemon cleanliness, a rough pink darkening the cheeks. Her mouth was large, her nose upturned. A pair of dark glasses blotted out her eyes. It was a face beyond childhood, yet this side of belonging to a woman. I thought her anywhere between sixteen and thirty.”

-Truman Capote, Breakfast at Tiffany’s (1958)