The Crack of Dawn

Volume #127

10/14/22

Newsletter127

The Crack of Dawn

William Goldman was a terrific novelist and screenwriter.  Because he was a reasonably successful author before going into the movie business, he never moved from NY to L.A., and always had a fallback position, which gave him an outsider’s perspective.  His book, Adventures in the Screen Trade, is one of the best books about working in Hollywood.  One of Goldman’s first screenwriting gigs was Paul Newman’s Harper (1966).  Goldman adapted the script from a Ross MacDonald book.  A year later William Goldman gets a call from the film’s producer who explains that they have Paul Newman for one more day of shooting, they’ve shot the whole script, but wouldn’t it be great if there was a title sequence?  Goldman said, “Sure, what is it?”  The producer said, “I don’t know, but we’re shooting it tomorrow.  You need to write it, call it in to my secretary, she’ll type it, copy it, and get it to everybody so we can start shooting at 7:00 AM.”  So, Goldman sat down at his typewriter and came up with the best scene in the movie.  Harper is a low-end detective.  Goldman has him wake up, go to his coffee machine, fill it with water, dump yesterday’s filter and coffee grounds in the trashcan, then open the can of coffee.  It’s empty.  Harper stands there for a second looking pained, then steps on the pedal of the trashcan revealing yesterday’s filter and grounds.  It then cuts to him dressed, he takes a sip of coffee and winces because the coffee is so bad.  Giant laugh.  Great title scene.

The best title sequence, no question, is in The Magnificent Ambersons (1942), one of my favorite movies.  Orson Welles narrates and says, “The Magnificent Ambersons was photographed by Stanley Cortez (we see a camera), edited by Robert Wise (we see a Moviola) . . .” it moves quickly through the rest of the crew, then we see an empty sound stage with one beam of light.  A microphone on a boom swings through the light, right up to the lens, and Welles says, “The film was written and directed by me.  My name is Orson Welles, and this is a Mercury Theater production.”  Every time I see it I’m awestruck.  It’s so simple and so beautiful.

This would have been 1949.  My mother was 18 and worked at her family’s little corner laundry (I still have a pencil that reads, “Metropolitan Cleaners, 4230 Grand River, Detroit 8, Mich.,” which was a block from Tiger Stadium).  All my mother wanted to do was to go to college, but she, her brother, and my grandma ran the business.  My mother somehow managed to convince my grandma to hire someone to replace her.  They hired a young black woman – while my uncle wasn’t there – and the woman had two requests: 1. She would not work at the counter, only in the back, and 2. If anyone came in and asked for her, she wasn’t there and they’d never heard of her (I believe her name was Louise).  She was hired and my mom started at Wayne State University.  One day when my uncle was working, an angry black man came into the store and asked, “Is Louise here?”  Knowing no better, my uncle said, “Yeah, she’s in the back.”  A few minutes later there was a shotgun blast.  My uncle ran to the back ally to find the man standing there holding a smoking shotgun and Louise dead on the ground.  Subsequently, my mother had to quit college and go back to work.  And that was the end of my mother’s college career.

On that cheery note, have a lovely day.