|
The Thomas Cooper Library has acquired 2,000 pages of F. Scott Fitzgerald's manuscripts, revised typescripts, and working drafts for the screenplays he wrote for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer from 1937 to 1938.
The previously unknown archive, the largest assemblage of Fitzgerald manuscripts offered for sale at one time, clarifies the distorted record of his Hollywood work and provides evidence for his seriousness as a screenwriter.
During his 18 months on the MGM payroll, Fitzgerald worked on three major screenplay assignments: Three Comrades, for which he received his only screen credit; Infidelity, intended for Joan Crawford but cancelled because the subject of adultery was considered inappropriate in 1938; and The Women, which was rewritten by Anita Loos and Jane Murfin before production.
Budd Schulberg, the last writer to have collaborated with Fitzgerald on a movie assignment, remembers Fitzgerald's determination to develop his screen-writing skills.
Schulberg, who later wrote the Academy Award–winning screenplay for On the Waterfront, said, "Unlike all the famous Eastern writers who came to Hollywood to replenish lost fortunes and 'take the money and run,' Fitzgerald regarded the motion pictures a unique 20th-century art form that demanded as serious attention as their novels and plays."
Patrick Scott, university librarian for rare books and special collections, said reading these manuscripts is like discovering a new Fitzgerald novel.
"You can see him putting his mind to the story and characters as a novelist and then thinking cinematically about them," Scott said.
Matthew J. Bruccoli, a leading Fitzgerald authority, said the new documentary evidence "fills the largest gap in our knowledge of Fitzgerald's career and his professionalism. It will yield long-term benefits for teaching and research."
The USC acquisition required 18 months of negotiations. In late 2002, Bruccoli was contacted by rare-book dealers Bart Auerbach and Terry Halliday, who represented a former MGM employee who was selling the Fitzgerald material. Bruccoli obtained the right of first refusal. The USC legal staff worked with the lawyers for Time-Warner, the successor to MGM, who waived claims to ownership of the manuscripts, which were written by Fitzgerald as a studio employee. The waiver applied to purchase by USC only.
After independent professional appraisal and recent auction results, the collection was purchased for $475,000 from private funds, $100,000 of which has been anonymously provided by a USC alumnus. The remainder was loaned to the library by the USC Research Foundation and the USC Educational Foundation and is expected to be paid back to the two foundations in seven years.
4/04
|
