Feb. 4, 2025

Books to movies

Show Notes
Transcript

After a multimedia overview of the Hollywood industry by A. Scott Berg, Washington Post film critic Ann Hornaday moderated a panel on making books into movies with Lawrence Wright, Anne-Marie O'Connor & Berg at the 2015 Library of Congress National Book Festival in Washington, D.C.
Regards and Enjoy
Dr.Afshan Hashmi
www.afshanhashmi.com
www.drafshanhashmi.com
http//www.afshanhashmisradio.com

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This program is designed to provide general information with regards

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to the subject matters covered. This information is given with

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the understanding that neither the hosts, guests, sponsors or station

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are engaged in rendering any specific and personal medical, financial, legal, counseling,

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professional service, or any advice. You should seek the services

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of competent professionals before applying or trying any suggested ideas.

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Books, pdproducts, science, fashion and glam talk From Bollywood to Hollywood.

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It's Meet and greet with doctor Afshan Hashmi right here

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on KURHD Radio and Talk for TV. And here's your host,

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international speaker, educator, award winning entrepreneur and best selling author,

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doctor Afshan Hashmi.

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Hello everyone, this is your loving host and best selling

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author and radio and TV plus doctor Rafshan Hashmi live

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from her studio in Rockville, Maryland, and today, folks, before

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I start my program, I want to remind you that

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these are my two books. The first one is The

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Modern Mogle Mentality Strategies to Succeed in India and the

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Global Marketplace, and the second one is the Outbreak of

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a Monstrous Infection. So I just wanted to remind you

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that please go and buy the books because these two

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books bring food to the table. And also I want

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a movie to be made of this book. This one

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the Outbreak of a Monstrous Infection and the script is ready.

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And the first one is The Modern Mogle Mentality and

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it was Amazon bestseller and hot number one new release

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in USA, and it was also Amazon bestseller in India.

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And this one was Amazon bestseller in USA. So having

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said that, folks, I want a movie or a documentary

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to be made of this and a movie or a

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web site is made of it. So all those Hollywood,

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Bollywood and whoever you know wants to contact me, Netflix

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and Amazon, whoever wants to contact me, please contact me

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at a chan at dr rachanhash me dot com. Having

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said that, folks, now we are going to talk about

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a movie from how the movie is made from books

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to move that what is the procedure and all? And

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it was discussed in Library of Congress Book Festival a

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couple of years back. And so today we will watch

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that movie. And please give me sponsorship because this show

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is syndicated worldwide to three hundred million listeners. So I

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just want you know, these uh these books, you know,

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uh my books to go into movies and see the procedure.

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It's a very interesting procedure and a very interesting movie.

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And it is one hour long, but there be couple

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of a sponsor ship breaks and so we will watch

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the movie and for now then, and I am going

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to say geos and bye bye.

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From the Library of Congress in Washington, DC.

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Welcome to the second annual Books to Movies presentation.

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My name is Mike Mashan.

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I'm head of the Moving Image Sectary of Congress. I'm

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very proud to represent my colleagues who work at the

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Packard Campus for Audio Visual Conservation in Culpeper, Virginia. It

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is a purpose built facilities funded by David Woodley Packard

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expressly for the purpose of acquiring, cataloging, housing, preserving, and

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making accessible the world's largest collection of film, video and

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sound records for a lot of people who are not

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even aware that the library even has film and video collections,

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but they're the largest in the world. We have roughly

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one for million moving image item in our collection, with

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film dating back to eighteen ninety one, very camera test

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up to all the current releases coming out today. So

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if you're worried about minions being preserved for future generation.

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Got you covered, and we're especially delighted to be a

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part of this program. There's one little I was debating

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whether or not it's about this, but I'm I'm gonna

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use my opportunity here, my minute or two for a

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little And we're the Copyright Library, and so when film producers,

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television producers want to register the work for copyright, they

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have to submit a copy to the library. And you're

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familiar with this with and all, but they do this

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for movies, television shows, documentary, poodle grooming with Debbie, you know,

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those sorts of video.

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It's a real topic.

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You're familiar with that, But we are sort of in

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we're in the end day of thirty five mils. Very

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hard to see thirty five millimeter these days. We still

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operate a film preservation laboratory when we preserve film, we

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make new film. We have a lot of digital tools

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in the toolbox as well. But when I was asked

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to put together some clips for the second half of

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the program, I had to get clips from the HBO

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documentary Going Clear and from The Woman in Gold, a

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film with Helen and I will tell you neither one

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of those clips looked particularly good. I had to rip

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them from now Woman in Gold. You know, it is

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a major theatric release, but the studios simply aren't making

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very many thirty five millimeter prints, and they're making digital

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cinema become cryptied to prevent piracy. Well, we can't preserve

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the library. I have to get them unencrypted. So we

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actually need a change to the copyright. So when you

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see clipped from the Woman in Gold, you're going to

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see at the top it says something like property of TWC.

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That's the wines that released it. In another little bug

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in the lower right hand corner that says us copier.

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So instead of getting a nice thirty five millimeters print

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of that film, we're now getting a watermarked DVD or

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so sad, but I figured I would at very least

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give you a little teachable moment so we'd understand, so

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you wouldn't look at that and say, why couldn't that

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guy come up? But we're going to have a really

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terrific program tonight. I'm glad to see we have, says

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my very introduced to the start tonight's program, the chief

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film critic of.

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The Washington Thank you, Mike, think all of you being

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here this how many we had fun? We're going to

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have you know A. Scott Berg is the author of

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the Pulitzer biographer Charles.

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You know A.

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Scott Berg is the aud of Willson biographer. But for

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our purposer tonight, we're going to focus on his other

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work that includes books about Katherine, Hepburg and Wiler. It

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includes a screenplay that he wrote for a pivotal film

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called Making History in the Fame Knowledge that of which

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Emperor That's most important? His book Max Editor of Genius.

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Soon to be sure, after a long and winding mood,

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I might add, and I can't, but he has a

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lot of wisdom and is very generous. Air a special

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part of it with us first part of the with

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the presentation film. I can't wait to see Scott.

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Burke, thank you well. That was a real over promise

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of wisdom. I'll give you a lot of talk. I

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don't know how much of it will be wisdom, but

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it will all be heartfelt. Books to movies is the

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main theme of all this. I means the National Festival.

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So what I was going to do with my break

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in a panel in the next session is to talk

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about not just books to movie, but about a book

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I wrote about the movies. A biographer Samuel Goldwyn, and

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to talk about these themselves, and you might even start

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to something. I am a biographer. I spent my life

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telling life, and I have now written five biographies. If

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you have heard the first I did, it was based

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on my scene in college a biograph. You have a

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man named Will Perkin, a book editor by trade, most

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famous for basically discovering developing the talents of F. Scottzgerald,

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Ernest Hemingway, Thoms, Jones, or Caldwell, Ergan Caldwell, and then

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mentioned another two dozen authors who literally changed the course

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of the American river that we call American literature. I

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then did another, my book on Goldwynd, which I'll get

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back to it. I then did a book Charles Lindberg.

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So I do my books because I decided very early

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on that I wanted to try to capture twentieth century

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American in a shelf full of books. So after doing

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the story of Perkin, who was an East Coast ninth

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generation white Anglo Saxon protest, my third book, and as

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I said, I'll jump back to number two, was Lindberg,

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who was a Midwesterner that became a book about aviation,

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but also about modern celebrity. My next book that I

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was about to do was about who was a Southerner.

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As many of you know, it was a book obviously

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about politics, about government. It was also a book about

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higher education in this country, having been a professors president

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for most of his career. Before I started that book,

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my publisher said, Scott, before you get into that will

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it occurs to me, although you don't talk about much,

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that you sneak off on weekends with Catherine Hepburn, is

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that true? As it is true, would you ever think

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about writing a book about her? And I said, well, yes,

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it's funny you should mention that because she has asked

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me on more than one occasion to write a book

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about and in fact, at one point when I asked

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why it was so important I should write a book

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about her, she explained, quite simply because I'm fascinating, and

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of course she was, and of course I did. And

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what happened is for twenty years in which we were friends.

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After almost every meal we had together, after every weekend,

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after every trip, whatever it was, she would say the

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same thing to me, go upstairs and write down everything,

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I said, why you got it? So that has been

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how I've spent most of the last forty forty five

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years now to go to book two. Right after my

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Max Perkins I began, that's when I began to think

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of putting this apple pie take, of trying to tell

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the story of the twentieth century half of American dral figures.

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So after writing about the quintessential wasp Harvard educated Coast

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book person, I began to think, what's the opposite of that?

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And I immediately thought of that remarkable first generation, half

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dozen Jewish immigrants who had come to this country, all

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within a few years of each other at the turn

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of the century, all within They all were born within

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five hundred miles of each back in Middle Europe, and

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none of them was educated. They all migrated to the

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West Coast and they started something something we now call

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And of all the mogul, the early moguls, there was

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one who really stood out as the quintessential mogul, the

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most interesting, and that was Samuel Goldwin.

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Have a life for her radio show at K four

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SHB and talk for a TV show, And I just

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wanted to request you that please give me a sponsorship

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if you want to.

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Want this show to continue.

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Having said that, I will see you in another episode

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of K four HDRATI.

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Plus talk for TV show. And if you give me

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a sponsorship, I will give you a very resonal price.

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And they're also you will get a lot of promotion

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as this show is syndicated your right to meet them

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through this last years and bye bye.

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And so he is the one I selected to become

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the subject of my second book. Now there was one

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other really good reason for me to write about it,

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and that as I received a phone call just as

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I was going through this thought process from Samuel Goldwyn Junior,

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I mean, out of the blue came this call asking

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if I wanted to write a biography of his father,

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and he explained to me that before his father had died,

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he had promised that he would get a biographer to

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write about him. And the old man, Old sam Goldwyn said,

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that's great. I want a biographer, but I want to

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be dead before it's published, because I want the book

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to tell the truth. And this has always been a

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problem in writing about Hollywood figure because Hollywood itself is

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great invention. These six moguls were self inventor they were

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all self invented character in point of fact, and the

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problem we're trying to dig up act hard facts on

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the In the case of Samuel Goldwyn, fortunately for me,

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he had kept all his archive, every one of his papers,

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and sam Goldwyn Junior was making them available. So when

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he approached and asked if I want to write of

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his famous father, Samah Goldwyn, he said, you have act

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says that indefinitely. I said, but you know, i'd take

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your word for it, but you're the son of Samuel

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Goldwan junior. I'd like to see what I will be dealing.

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And he lived in Beverly Hills, and I went to

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visit him there, and there he said, look, here is

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a key, and here's an address of lions moving and

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stored in the middle of Hollywood. Go down there is

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key when you get first the first family vault. And

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I went over and well, I'll never forget driving over.

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It's a six story building. You took the elevator up

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to the top, got out, climbed up a fire escape,

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went across the roof, and then down another stairwell into

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00:13:32.799 --> 00:13:36.159
a whole other part of a building you couldn't normally access.

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And then down two long dark halls and there at

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00:13:39.320 --> 00:13:41.879
the end was a huge door with a padlock, and

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there was the key. So put the key in, turned

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on a light switch. One bolb hanging down in the

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middle of a room that I would say was probably

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twenty It was completely surrounded. I went the first filecat

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00:13:57.039 --> 00:14:01.320
and I found papers going back relating to a man

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named Schmool Gilbert who was a teenage runaway from Warsaw,

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Poland who came to this country. I would later learn

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he stole the money, did not come through the border normally.

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He's an illegal alien. Jumped ship in Canada, having come

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over steer it, walked across the border somewhere in Maine,

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made his way by foot to New York City. Once

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he got there, he went to the Jewish sector of Manhattan,

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realized it was a Jewish ghetto just like the one

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he had run away from Warsaw. Wanted to get out

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00:14:34.720 --> 00:14:38.320
of the city. Heard about a place upstate called Gloversville,

252
00:14:38.480 --> 00:14:42.519
New York, where schmool Geldfish changed his name to Samuel

253
00:14:42.919 --> 00:14:46.639
Samuel Goldfish, became a glove maker and then a glove salesman,

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and then he moved to New York City, where he

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became the greatest glove salesman, and one day in nineteen thirteen,

256
00:14:54.200 --> 00:14:57.320
felt the something was happening, the glovebit it was about,

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00:14:57.639 --> 00:15:00.559
and he walked one very hot August day for the

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first time into a movie Times Square, and as he

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00:15:04.039 --> 00:15:08.200
walked in, Bronco Billy, who was the biggest Western star

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of the silent screen at that moment, riding along on

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00:15:11.559 --> 00:15:15.039
a horse, and he made a leap onto a moving train.

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Samuel Goldfish, exciting, decided by the time he walked out

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of that theater and going, and that's what he did.

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He talked his brother in law, who was a vaudevillian

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named Jesse Lask, into going into business with him. The

266
00:15:27.879 --> 00:15:31.120
two of them they decided to opt play together, which

267
00:15:31.159 --> 00:15:34.840
they did call The Squawman. Sam Goldfish thought this was

268
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perfect vehicle for a movie because it was a Western

269
00:15:38.159 --> 00:15:40.120
and it was a love so he thought it would

270
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appeal to men. He put it together, they decided to

271
00:15:43.000 --> 00:15:45.759
find a director. As one man they wanted to go

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00:15:45.879 --> 00:15:49.039
to William de Mill and so they went to William

273
00:15:49.120 --> 00:15:52.200
de Mill's agent, who happened. They said, missus de Mill,

274
00:15:52.320 --> 00:15:55.000
we'd like to hire your son William to direct our

275
00:15:55.039 --> 00:15:57.960
first movie, and she said, well, he's very busy. He's

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a very busy man. But I happened to have another

277
00:16:00.200 --> 00:16:05.240
son named Cecil. Now, yes, Cecil b uh Well, has

278
00:16:05.279 --> 00:16:07.639
he ever directed it? No, but he's a very good actor,

279
00:16:07.720 --> 00:16:10.000
and we're sure he could direct a movie. Well, she

280
00:16:10.200 --> 00:16:14.879
was a damn good agent, Mama de Mill, because they

281
00:16:14.919 --> 00:16:18.000
took a flyer on this guy, Cecil to Mill. They

282
00:16:18.080 --> 00:16:20.799
got on a train in New York City with a

283
00:16:20.840 --> 00:16:23.519
small crew and a small cast. They went to the

284
00:16:23.679 --> 00:16:27.559
end of the line, which was Flagstaff Arizona film in

285
00:16:27.600 --> 00:16:31.679
the Western. Then Cecil de Mill and crew walked outside,

286
00:16:31.919 --> 00:16:34.879
looked around. It didn't look at all the way. Cecil

287
00:16:34.919 --> 00:16:37.320
to Mill thought the West. So they got back on

288
00:16:37.559 --> 00:16:40.240
another train which was then going to go to the

289
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end of that line, which landed and after a few

290
00:16:43.399 --> 00:16:46.559
days in Los Angeles, Goldfish he's still back in New

291
00:16:46.639 --> 00:16:50.200
York mine he's minding the store while Jesse Laski de

292
00:16:50.320 --> 00:16:52.759
Mill are out there now in Los Angeles and they

293
00:16:52.799 --> 00:16:55.639
find a barn middle of some orange gus where they

294
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decided to film their movie. Reputedly, Lasky swears the so

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00:17:00.679 --> 00:17:04.000
I'm sure it's fall Hollywood, but He said that he

296
00:17:04.079 --> 00:17:07.799
sent a telegram back to sam Goldfish saying have rented

297
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a barn, a place called Hall, and there they made

298
00:17:11.839 --> 00:17:16.000
the first feature film ever made. So I'm finding all

299
00:17:16.079 --> 00:17:19.079
this just going through files. This is awf the exciting.

300
00:17:19.279 --> 00:17:22.640
So now I'm really revved up about all this. So

301
00:17:22.720 --> 00:17:26.119
I decide just to start opening drawers whatever I can.

302
00:17:26.359 --> 00:17:30.160
I find that. Indeed, when Goldfish decided to go into

303
00:17:30.200 --> 00:17:32.480
this and then Cecil de mill on this train, the

304
00:17:32.640 --> 00:17:35.480
first person talked to about how to make a movie

305
00:17:35.599 --> 00:17:39.559
Thomas Edison. Imagine all right Edison? Who better how to

306
00:17:39.559 --> 00:17:42.319
make a movie? The guy who invented it? Okay, Now

307
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I went to the very last and the very last

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drawer had the fungshet that Samuel Goldwyn secretary kept every

309
00:17:51.559 --> 00:17:54.440
time he had had a stroke in his late eighty

310
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the last call to come in before he had his

311
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from Warren, and I realized everything in between these files

312
00:18:01.920 --> 00:18:05.079
would allow me to docum a story of Holly's edis

313
00:18:05.279 --> 00:18:08.319
that was a story. So not only did I spend

314
00:18:08.359 --> 00:18:10.680
the next year and a half going through hundreds of

315
00:18:10.720 --> 00:18:14.720
thousands of documents, I spent much of the interviewing about

316
00:18:14.759 --> 00:18:17.200
one hundred and fifty, most of whom were from the

317
00:18:17.279 --> 00:18:21.799
Golden I was able to interview Olivia de Hali Davis,

318
00:18:21.920 --> 00:18:26.279
Catherine Hepberg, Myrna Lloys, Sidney, Joel McCrae, the Great Director,

319
00:18:26.359 --> 00:18:32.400
William Wyler, Gedoor, Henry King, Henry Hathaway. Virtually any actor, writer,

320
00:18:32.559 --> 00:18:35.759
directors alive from the Golden Era had worked with. I

321
00:18:35.920 --> 00:18:39.119
was one hundred and fifty. Hasten to add that about

322
00:18:39.119 --> 00:18:42.480
one hundred and ten of them die before I was published. Now,

323
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Hollywood a small town, and word began to spread that

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when you get a call from Scott Byrd for your interview,

325
00:18:49.359 --> 00:18:53.359
don't say yes, oh no, it's your time. It's time

326
00:18:53.400 --> 00:18:57.119
for the interview. Oh yeah, come quietly, come gently, you'll

327
00:18:57.680 --> 00:19:01.279
be well anyway, interview I'd now I want to get

328
00:19:01.279 --> 00:19:05.079
into some film clear. I was also fortunate enough because

329
00:19:05.119 --> 00:19:08.920
Samuel Goldw later changed his name from Goldfish to Goldwin

330
00:19:09.079 --> 00:19:12.160
when he went into business Celwin Brothers. So they could

331
00:19:12.200 --> 00:19:16.000
have either formed Goldwin Pictures or sell Fit far more apt,

332
00:19:16.160 --> 00:19:18.880
but they went with Goldwyn, which sounded like a winner,

333
00:19:19.000 --> 00:19:21.880
a gold Win, so that was kind of great. Now,

334
00:19:22.240 --> 00:19:27.880
Samuel Goldwyn got kicked out of what initially became Paramount Picture.

335
00:19:28.079 --> 00:19:30.319
That's when he went into business. The cel Wins formed

336
00:19:30.319 --> 00:19:32.720
the Goldwyn Company, which went into business with Louis B.

337
00:19:32.839 --> 00:19:35.400
Mayer and the Metro Company. He got kicked out of

338
00:19:35.440 --> 00:19:38.759
what became Metro Goldwyn Mayor. He's gone from that one.

339
00:19:38.799 --> 00:19:42.440
He finally realizes, maybe I should work alone. Maybe I

340
00:19:42.519 --> 00:19:46.319
have a personality problem. And indeed Samuel Goldwyn started his

341
00:19:46.440 --> 00:19:51.720
own independent film call. He made eighty motion picture as

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00:19:51.839 --> 00:19:56.480
produced by Samuel Goldwyn. That is a say, every one

343
00:19:56.519 --> 00:20:01.559
of these he financed himself. He owned himself, selected which

344
00:20:01.680 --> 00:20:06.039
movies of they ten thousands of alternative of option across

345
00:20:06.200 --> 00:20:09.720
a producer's desk in a lifetime. He selected which ones

346
00:20:11.079 --> 00:20:12.880
could be I don't.

347
00:20:15.079 --> 00:20:22.559
Out and they give it at DOT for few things.

348
00:20:22.640 --> 00:20:26.839
I am like thered in a country club and just

349
00:20:27.039 --> 00:20:35.960
means a sy that he's giving a go on the pot.

350
00:20:38.319 --> 00:20:44.440
Here's having said he's given bodyship.

351
00:20:44.119 --> 00:20:50.079
A GNS and buy. And so of those I began

352
00:20:50.240 --> 00:20:52.079
to think, and this is what I would like you

353
00:20:52.200 --> 00:20:54.680
to consider tonight. When I run a few clips, do

354
00:20:54.799 --> 00:20:59.359
these clips reveal anything about Samuel Goldwyn the person? I'm

355
00:20:59.400 --> 00:21:03.240
a biograph I want to illuminate his life. Are there

356
00:21:03.359 --> 00:21:06.519
some little nuggets that tell me what made him to

357
00:21:06.680 --> 00:21:07.359
tell me? Who?

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00:21:07.799 --> 00:21:07.960
Then?

359
00:21:08.400 --> 00:21:10.319
You know, the job of a biographer is not just

360
00:21:10.440 --> 00:21:13.079
to tell a life, to tell about the world in

361
00:21:13.279 --> 00:21:16.839
which a subject. So do any of these clips in fact,

362
00:21:17.200 --> 00:21:22.200
reveal anything about Hollywood as Hollywood was developing over the

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00:21:22.319 --> 00:21:26.759
fifty Does it about the country in which Samuel goldwyin? Indeed,

364
00:21:26.880 --> 00:21:30.119
does it tell about the anything happens about the So

365
00:21:30.400 --> 00:21:33.079
that's what I wanted to do the book when I

366
00:21:33.240 --> 00:21:36.440
was watching the movies, and also I want tonight. So

367
00:21:36.640 --> 00:21:39.839
Samuel Goldwyn with his own company rolling along, he's a

368
00:21:40.039 --> 00:21:45.119
very successful producer silent films. He's doing extremely well, especially

369
00:21:45.279 --> 00:21:49.200
in the mid nineteen twenties. He has now developed two

370
00:21:49.680 --> 00:21:54.160
big silent screens. They are Ronald Coleman, Vilma Banking and

371
00:21:54.319 --> 00:21:56.599
you know, well, I'm going to show you a clip

372
00:21:56.720 --> 00:21:58.680
of the two of them in a movie called The

373
00:21:58.759 --> 00:22:01.599
Winning of Barbara Worth, which was based on a book

374
00:22:01.759 --> 00:22:04.480
by a very popular author of the day named Harold

375
00:22:04.559 --> 00:22:08.119
bell Wright, and you will see the great irony Goldwyn

376
00:22:08.240 --> 00:22:11.039
and about so many of the other moguls semi literate,

377
00:22:11.480 --> 00:22:14.839
how often and in fact less literate they were The more,

378
00:22:14.920 --> 00:22:18.519
they relied a more serious literary So here is a

379
00:22:18.599 --> 00:22:22.400
clip from a movie that came out in nineteen late

380
00:22:22.480 --> 00:22:25.799
twenty six, early twenty seven called The Winning of Barbara

381
00:22:25.880 --> 00:22:29.599
Worth God's Willing Here we go. Silent movies, by the way,

382
00:22:29.720 --> 00:22:32.759
were never silent. When you went to even a small

383
00:22:32.920 --> 00:22:35.079
theater in Iowa, or if you went to a big

384
00:22:35.200 --> 00:22:38.759
theater in New York City, there was always musical accompany.

385
00:22:38.839 --> 00:22:41.960
But there's Ronald Coleman and Vilma Banking, and you're about

386
00:22:42.000 --> 00:22:45.799
to meet after his first You're film, a man named

387
00:22:45.839 --> 00:22:48.759
Frank Cooper, whose agent said, why don't you name yourself

388
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after my little town in Indiana? And thus Munsey Cooper,

389
00:22:52.480 --> 00:22:55.359
no Gary Cooper. And watched the staging of the scene,

390
00:22:55.480 --> 00:22:58.079
which was by Henry King, a great director. He told

391
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me when he staged the scene, he wrecked recognize Gary

392
00:23:00.839 --> 00:23:03.599
Cooper was a new style of actor. And he said,

393
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when I did this scene, you can see the old

394
00:23:06.279 --> 00:23:12.119
style walking off. And you're left with that. Now, months

395
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after this movie came out, Goldwyn has these two stars.

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