The Brothers Mankiewicz: Hope, Heartbreak, and Hollywood Classics by Sydney Ladensohn Stern

The Brothers Mankiewicz: Hope, Heartbreak, and Hollywood Classics – Sydney Ladensohn Stern- 9781617032677 – University Press of Mississippi – 480 pages – 88 b&w illustrations – October 2019 – Hardcover – $35 – ebook version available at lower prices

There are any number of characters and influencers in the history of modern American film-making, but among the many greats who contributed to its evolution into the dominant form of our popular culture, the Mankiewicz brothers stand out. Between them, they played critical roles in an incredible array of films that comprise our film canon today. Herman (1897–1953) and Joe (1909–1993) either wrote, produced, or directed (sometimes both or all) more than 150 films, from late era silents to almost modern era big budget productions.

Herman is credited with writing the screenplay for Citizen Kane with Orson Welles (though the amount of work done by each of them has long been disputed) and shared the picture’s only Academy Award. Joe won four Oscars altogether, including two for writing and directing All About Eve, which also was awarded Best Picture in 1950.

Both the older Herman and the much younger Joe started as writers and then became successful as producers and in Joe’s case as a director as well. They came to Hollywood as upwardly mobile children of immigrants, brilliant intellectually and wildly witty, and feeling extremely ambiguous throughout their careers about the value and importance of their work in film – concerned it seems, to not be recognized as serious artists, as their novelist and playwright friends had been. The conflict between art and popular culture defined their lives and caused them each great suffering.

Herman was an early member of the renowned Algonquin Round Table group of wits, and in his unhappiness and self destructiveness, frequently lost all his money gambling. He alienated all the major film studios, and was dead by the age of 55. At the same time that Herman was ruining his career, Joe found significant success as writer, producer, and director, although he was almost addicted to deeply felt romances with the stars he worked with, including Judy Garland, and Joan Crawford, causing terrible suffering to his wife and family.

Biographer Sydney Ladensohn Stern spent ten years in researching and writing this comprehensive portrait of twentieth century American film through the lens of two of its most important and compelling figures. She’s written a thorough and highly readable narrative that gives us a chance to understand the complexities of her characters, and for anyone with an interest in modern film history, this book will be irresistible. The Mankiewicz brothers are among the titans upon which the movie business was built – their writing helped to define the language we see now as emblematic of an entire era in American history. This was a very fun book for me to read and I very much enjoyed talking to Sydney about her book. I think you will enjoy hearing our conversation and you should read this book (now available as an audiobook too).

“one of the best of the recent biographies of screenwriters … One thing I love about her book are the footnotes that trace the lineage of some of the great Mank stories (“The white wine came up with the fish” and “Imagine that, the whole world wired to Harry Cohn’s ass”…) ” –Tom Stempel

Sydney Ladensohn Stern worked as a reporter for Fortune and Money magazines and as an editor and award-winning columnist for the Scarsdale Inquirer before she started freelance writing. Her column, “Suburban Exposure,” covered politics and contemporary culture as well as her family and community, but she discontinued it after her sons left home and stopped providing her with material. She has freelanced for numerous publications including the New York Times. Her first biography is Gloria Steinem: Her Passions, Politics, and Mystique.

Author website here.

Buy the book here.

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Publishing Talks: Interview with Arthur Attwell

Publishing Talks began as a series of conversations with book industry professionals and others involved in media and technology, mostly talking about the future of publishing, books, and culture. I’ve spent time talking with people in the book industry about how publishing is evolving in the context of technology, culture, and economics.

Some time back, this series broadened to include conversations that go beyond the future of publishing. In an effort to document the literary world, I’ve talked with a variety of editors, publishers and others who have been innovators and leaders in independent publishing in the past and into the present.

These conversations have been inspirational to me on many levels. I have gotten to speak with visionaries and entrepreneurs, as well as editors and publishers who have influenced and changed contemporary literature and culture.

Today’s guest is another such special individual. Arthur Attwell, who lives in Capetown, South Africa, got his start in publishing working for Oxford University Press as an editor. Impatient with the inefficiencies of publishing, he left to start up his current venture with some collaborators, Electric Book Works, which has been building books since 2006 that are active in multiple formats and versions, from beautifully produced print books to well fashioned ebooks to websites that express the book form in new ways.

In addition to the work he has done with Electric Book Works, this energetic entrepreneur has co-created an impactful health care information project, Bettercare, which has created and distributed healthcare learning materials to thousands of practitioners and consumers all over Africa. Although this project, entirely volunteer run, has had to cut back on its activities because of the pandemic, its impact continues with part timers and reduced capabilities.

Perhaps the most exciting efforts I have learned about recently is yet another Attwell project, Book Dash. Arthur and his partners created (and have since carefully refined) a process that assembles teams of book professionals to create and publish children’s books, and which also the raises money and support needed for the printing and distribution of thousands of books across Africa, with the stated goal that every child should own 100 books by the time they are five years old! The Book Dash process was built as an intensive one day effort, gathering teams in person, but has quickly adapted to a virtual model, enabling contributors to participate from multiple physical locations. They have made some really terrific books using this process and Book Dash has now distributed over one million books to children in Africa.

With the time difference between us, arranging this talk required bit of organizing, but we were able to speak recently by Skype. My original goal was simply to give Arthur an opportunity to talk about Book Dash. But we ended up having a much wider conversation on a range of topics, including distributed print on demand printing, a dream concept we both have explored, and much more. I suspect we will talk further in the necessary follow up conversation I hope to have with him as there are so many exciting ideas to discuss.

For now, I hope you will enjoy listening to Arthur Attwell as much as I did.

Arthur’s “On Transit” Talk

Arthur’s website

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