Screenland (Nov 1945-Oct 1946)

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If cash accompanies order, we pay postage. Rush coupon today. r -i I Scon-Nelson Co., Box 1T3-E 116 S. Michigan Ave., Chicago 3, HI. j Please send me a CARESS Home Treatment for j superfluous hair. I'll pay postman $1.49 plus ' postage. If I am not satisfied after 7 days, I'll I return it for refund of double my purchase price. i (If you send cash we pay postage.) I Name .... t ... . ! I Address I | City State | i. : j 80 How I Produced "The Postman Always Rings Twice" Continued from page 43 the bookcase labeled "FICTION— A-L" a slim little volume bound in orange and black. I constantly read and reread and ponder Jim Cain's incredibly economic and potent writing. One night, I suddenly became aware that there was, sometimes almost imperceptibly concealed within the outer garment of vivid lust and brutality, a melodrama of extraodinary power, a revelation of human behavior and relations which, in my humble opinion, was much more important a factor in making the book memorable than the occasional purple pages describing the heroine's nubile charms in a prostrate position. And then, just as suddenly, I realized something else of importance. I realized that there are certain things that no one with an iota of good sense or good taste would try to put on the screen — would want to put on the screen — if there were no MPPDA, no political or moral censorship of any kind anywhere. These are things which are implied on the screen. All right, I could imply them — and I knew — I know that when such matters are implied on the screen, and well implied, they can be more dramatically convincing, more shockingly real to any casual customer other than a Peeping Tom or what the French call so happily a voyeur. So I went to work and prepared a mental treatment of the story. I had a long conference with Mr. Joseph I. Breen. Mr. Breen said, in intent, that if I would put that treatment on paper for the record, he would approve it for the record. I did. He did. We got a script out, the shooting script actually, in an almost ridiculously short space of time. And in an equally short space of time, with almost unbeliveably few corrections by Mr. Breen, we got that script approved, and we started to shoot the picture. Why? Because I was a very smart fellow? Yes, I answer ' surprisingly. I was smart enough not to try and do that which I knew was violation of good taste according to the dictates of the average person. I claim no credit for any astuteness, merely for a certain amount of common decency. Whether it turns out to be a fine picture or not, it's the story of the book. Yes, I did have it in mind for Lana Turner. In fact — and this is a secret only now revealed — I spoke privately to Lana long before I took the matter up officially. Oh, sure! I'll say all the usual things! I did think, and for years, that Lana was a great actress— yes, I said great. I thought this was the thing that would enable her to prove it. Brother, am I sticking out my chin! I mean, sister. Lana fell for the idea like a ton of brick. So I was inspired and encouraged by the knowledge that she was on my side — and that ain't hay. I decided to place the story, on film, in exactly the places and during the times that the book specified. This meant Southern California in the Summer. And that's where I got the now rather famous SdtEENLAND hot flash about putting Lana in white clothes exclusively. In this year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and forty-six, in this Southern California, you can go from highway to byway and find young women operating in a minimum of clothing and a maximum of exposed epidermis. And, from a thorough study of eastern fashion magazines, I find that throughout the nation the fair female is thinking sartorially on the basis of "them that has 'em, shows 'em!" It was a brief step then to the idea that the shorts and bras, the scanty little dresses, the bathing suits, would be white because I sensed a growing tendency to white — I think it has something to do with the war — and then I remembered a vision which is purely imaginary, the vision of a slim shapely young blonde, wearing a couple of hunks of pristine fabric and sunburned a nice velvety tan everywhere else. So I sneaked off in a dark corner with our makeup and photography experts and lo! there emerged a new face and body makeup now briefly and colloquially known as "The Carey Wilson-Lana Turner Technicolor in Black and White Suntan Makeup, No Patent Applied For." And on her it looks good, if you know what I mean, and if you don't, you'll be sorry! The next aspect of reality comes from the staging of all exteriors in the exact out-of-door locations where they might — and who knows, did — take place. Now I have an interesting angle about locations. The fantastic magic of studio production can produce within the confines of a huge sound stage a street, or a building, or a desert, or a volcano which is not only as good as the real thing but a darn sight more manageable, and it's often better than the real thing. But for the "Postman" I wanted the accidental and inevitable crudity of reality. That's why, when you see the Twin Oaks Tavern, you'll see a real building a dozen miles outside Los Angeles which we leased because it was a real building located on a side road, and when John Myrna Loy is asked for her autograph by two eager movie fans outside Giro's.