Ernest Hemingway and Hollywood Essay example -- Biography Biographies

Hemingway and Hollywood "I try, when I'm writing a screenplay from somebody's original work, to be as faithful to it as I can be, within the limitations of a screenplay and remembering that the novel medium and the screen medium are entirely different" -Screenwriter, Casey Robinson, (Laurence 12). Hollywood attempted twice, but it still could not produce a film adaptation of A Farewell to Arms that Hemingway considered to do literary justice to his classic novel. The first effort was in 1932 when Paramount producer Frank Borzage used ridiculous publicity stunts to lure audiences, such as sending letters to women stamped REJECTED BY CENSORS. They read: Dear Madam: War-time! Suppose you were alone in a dark, drab, Swiss hotel room! In a few weeks you were to become a mother-and the man you loved was miles away-on the shell-torn Italian front. You write letter after letter to him-twenty one of them-and they are all returned stamped REJECTED BY CENSOR: This is just one of the dramatic situations in Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, which comes to the _____ Theater on ___ (date). As you read in the novel, you'll see A Farewell to Arms on the screen! (Laurence 42-3). This was just one of the many shameless ploys Hollywood used over the years to exploit the celebrity status of the revered author; however "the effectiveness of such a publicity piece depended on the recipient's not having read the book-else they would recognize that no such situation exists in the novel" (43). Studios knew what they had to do get the ratings they sought; it was gratifying for the public "to believe that going to a movie was as good as reading a book" (43). By the time devoted Hemingway readers saw the film ... ... Arms he once said "(they did not ) also get the right to my sanction of the picture version" (Laurence 44). Despite the sum of money he made, Hemingway suggested "that the best way for a writer to deal with Hollywood was to meet the producers at the California state line: 'You throw them your book, they throw you the money. Then you jump into your car and drive like hell back the way you came" (Oliver "A Hemingway Retrospective") Works Cited: Laurence, Frank. Hemingway and the Movies. Jackson: University Press, 1981. Oliver, Charles ed. A Moving Picture Feast: The Filmgoers Hemingway. New York: Praeger 1989. Oliver, Charles. "A Hemingway Retrospective: Hemingway and Hollywood." http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/books/1999/hemingway/stories/hollywood/ http://mason-west.com/Hemingway/films.php: Films based on the works of Ernest Hemingway. Ernest Hemingway and Hollywood Essay example -- Biography Biographies Hemingway and Hollywood "I try, when I'm writing a screenplay from somebody's original work, to be as faithful to it as I can be, within the limitations of a screenplay and remembering that the novel medium and the screen medium are entirely different" -Screenwriter, Casey Robinson, (Laurence 12). Hollywood attempted twice, but it still could not produce a film adaptation of A Farewell to Arms that Hemingway considered to do literary justice to his classic novel. The first effort was in 1932 when Paramount producer Frank Borzage used ridiculous publicity stunts to lure audiences, such as sending letters to women stamped REJECTED BY CENSORS. They read: Dear Madam: War-time! Suppose you were alone in a dark, drab, Swiss hotel room! In a few weeks you were to become a mother-and the man you loved was miles away-on the shell-torn Italian front. You write letter after letter to him-twenty one of them-and they are all returned stamped REJECTED BY CENSOR: This is just one of the dramatic situations in Ernest Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms, which comes to the _____ Theater on ___ (date). As you read in the novel, you'll see A Farewell to Arms on the screen! (Laurence 42-3). This was just one of the many shameless ploys Hollywood used over the years to exploit the celebrity status of the revered author; however "the effectiveness of such a publicity piece depended on the recipient's not having read the book-else they would recognize that no such situation exists in the novel" (43). Studios knew what they had to do get the ratings they sought; it was gratifying for the public "to believe that going to a movie was as good as reading a book" (43). By the time devoted Hemingway readers saw the film ... ... Arms he once said "(they did not ) also get the right to my sanction of the picture version" (Laurence 44). Despite the sum of money he made, Hemingway suggested "that the best way for a writer to deal with Hollywood was to meet the producers at the California state line: 'You throw them your book, they throw you the money. Then you jump into your car and drive like hell back the way you came" (Oliver "A Hemingway Retrospective") Works Cited: Laurence, Frank. Hemingway and the Movies. Jackson: University Press, 1981. Oliver, Charles ed. A Moving Picture Feast: The Filmgoers Hemingway. New York: Praeger 1989. Oliver, Charles. "A Hemingway Retrospective: Hemingway and Hollywood." http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/books/1999/hemingway/stories/hollywood/ http://mason-west.com/Hemingway/films.php: Films based on the works of Ernest Hemingway.