Below, novelist John Fante (channeling, it would seem, his fictional alter-ego, Arturo Bandini), writes to his mother, discussing his struggle to launch himself as a screenwriter in 1930s Los Angeles and prospects of future fortune.
19th December, 1933
Dear Mother:
[. . .] Well, things are beginning to look pretty good. Last week I had a surprise from Benny Medford, a scenario agent in Hollywood. He is in pretty close relationship with the Warner Brothers Studio, and from what he says, after I get my novel finished I may sign up with them to write dialogue. It means ninety-five dollars a week for ten weeks. I’ll have to pay Medford a ten per cent cut. But that’s all right. Also, once I get this book off my hands, I intend to do a movie story. This time, I’ll sell it. I have excellent backing now. Medford is a very good man, and he’s out there selling me to every studio in Hollywood. I intend to spend one week on this scenario, and I’d like to bet all I have now (which is nothing at all!!) that by March or April I’ll have close to 3000 dollars in cash in my pocket. I don’t know though. I just feel that way. Each year seems to get better for me, and last year was my biggest and best year. This New Year is going to be a whale of a success for all of us, and I’m pretty darn sure of what I’m saying.
I agree with you about this girl Eleanore Capuzzi in Pennsylvania. The situation seems to be getting out of control. Last week I got a very strange letter from her, telling me she was madly in love with me. Of course, I’m not even faintly in love with her. Indeed, I get a great kick out of her letters, not because of their feeling, but because the situation amuses me. However, I don’t want her to pack her grips and come West, and from the tone of her letter she’s liable to do so any minute. If I ever find out that she is on her way here, I’m going to start running. I am enclosing her picture. As you can see, she’s rather a sweet girl. She’s twenty-three or four, I think. I am not going to write her so often. I want to discourage her affections. Be sure to return that picture. [. . .]
There is an article about me—this is, I am mentioned—in an article in the December issue of The Writer’s Digest. It is entitled “These Here Highbrows,” and is reprinted from another magazine. I suppose you read all about that amusing episode in Baltimore, where Mencken, Knopf and some others go into a brawl. I have already told you about my sale of a short story to the magazine Touring Tropics.
I was lucky to sell that story. It happened that the editor, Phil Hanna, rejected it once. Well, I have a girl-friend in Hollywood, and when I told her that I had submitted Touring Topics a story, she replied that her sister was the editor’s secretary, and that Hanna, the editor, was madly in love her sister. It was easy after that. My friend called her sister, told her who I was, and then the secretary went to Hanna. He bought the story. That’s the way it goes. It’s the first time I ever had any luck in that way, and I’m sure that it’s going to help me out a lot with the Touring Topics. I have it on good authority that I can peddle from six to eight short stories a year to that one magazine. That in itself ought to mean close to a thousand dollars a year. But then again, you never can tell. I refuse to believe anything anymore. Promises mean nothing. It’s money money money in this town. And without it, you’ve got to bluff your way. They’re not interested in hard luck stories.
Something else happened. This same girl is also a very good friend of Lewis Milestone, who is the greatest director in Hollywood. I am to meet him soon. Milestone is really an important man. What he says goes. If I get a break with him, I’m set for life. I said IF. It may never happen. But then again, it MIGHT.
I haven’t seen any of the relatives. Furthermore I don’t intend to. Most of them are ignoramuses, and all of them give me a slight pain in the neck. They are settled in life, and their miserable existences appall me.
It may interest you to know that tonight I have a stenographer. A charming young lady, red headed, from St. Louis, is here, and doing this letter as I dictate it. She asks to be excused from minor typing errors. Having been away from her work for a long time, she is out of practice, and her fingers are not yet accustomed to the keys. But I think you will agree with me that she has done a rather nice job. Certainly far better than my own typing.
Love to all of you.
Your son,
Johnnie
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