Adventures in the Screen Trade

it’s crucial for a screenwriter to remember this: Never underestimate the insecurity of a star. Look, we’re all insecure, we know that. Even brain surgeons probably get the shakes when no one’s watching. But movie stars? It’s all but inconceivable. They are so blessed, and not just with physical beauty. They have talent and intelligence and command

Therefore, there will be salaries paid for double (or triple) makeup personnel, many of whom end up with nothing to do. Why production managers bother to engage in these little wars I can’t say—because the studio rarely backs them up. Day after day, the production manager gets pasted. I suppose they hang in because they care. And maybe someday, som

As Mr. Fitzgerald said to Mr. Hemingway about the rich, stars are different from you and me. Yes, they get up in the morning, just like we do. And sure, they go to bed like we do too. But—big but—if they are hot, their day differs from ours in one simple way: From morning till, they live in a world in which no one disagrees with them.

1916: $10,000.00 per week—that was Charlie Chaplin’s stipend. Plus $150,000.00 in bonus money for signing. 1919: Fatty Arbuckle became the first star in history to be guaranteed a salary of one million dollars per year. Minimum.

And so, in 1910, a beautiful young girl with the mellifluous name of Florence Lawrence initiated the star system in America.

It’s important to remember that movies began as a fad—not unlike the Atari games today. No one knew what the future might bring—or if, indeed, there would even be a future—but the present was plenty lucrative enough for even the greediest executive.

Perhaps the largest percentage of the “one-third” that makes up “the shit” is star behavior.

George Segal may have put it best. I had watched him be terrific on a talk show, playing his banjo or whatever the hell instrument he plays, and joking it up. I asked him if he had always been able to enjoy himself that way. He said, “That’s like class: I prepare myself—I do an acting exercise. I tell myself I’m playing a character who’s enjoying h

A star is someone who opens. (When a movie begins its run and no one comes, people in the business will say this of the movie, “It didn’t open.”) A star may not guarantee you a profit—budgets can grow wildly for reasons totally out of their control—but they will absolutely be a hedge against disaster.