Take One (Jul 15, 1979)

Continued from page 28 me. “Now, why do you want to be a director?” I said, “I want to be a director because I’ve always wanted to be one...” What did Mayer say? He asked me, “Why do you want to do a little picture? Why don’t you want to do a big picture?” I said, “Because I think there’s a mistake being made by assuming that a little cheap picture has to be a bad picture. . .” He said, ‘Have you seen our B pictures? What do you think is wrong with them?” I said, “Well, sir, I think they could be better, I think they ought to be used for young directors and young writers and young actors. You can gamble. You don’t have to worry about finding a big audience because I understand if you just get the cost of your picture back, you're happy. These pictures are made for $250,000, and if you gross $350,000, you've got your money back. Why can’t these pictures go out and do $1 million if they're important?” Mayer said, “You have anything else to say?” I had some other things to say. Then he said, “I'll let you know tomorrow,” and he stood up which meant, you know, out! So I went out with Considine and Considine said, “You never learn to keep your fuckin’ mouth shut.” He was furious at me. He said, “You blew it!” I was sure I had. So the next morning I got a call from Mayer's office to be in front of the MGM building at 2 o'clock. I got the odd feeling that it was going to be some sort of ceremony—that the writers would be lined up and I'd be booed or something and they'd break my pencils. When I got there, his car was waiting, he came out promptly at two, we got in, and we went to the Hollywood race track. On the way there, he talked about horse racing; he had a horse running. We saw the race. His horse lost. He said, “That's all right, he ran a good race.” Then we went back to the studio, taking about horses. I had no idea what the hell I was doing, but I knew I wasn’t going to get fired! What I figured was that he was going to let me direct a picture and give me some sort of caveats. So we got to the studio and he told me to come up to his office. He told his secretary he didn’t want any calls. We went in, he sat down and said, “Now, did you mean everything you said yesterday about B pictures?” I said, “Yes sir, every word.” He said, “All right, you're in charge of all the B pictures in the studio.” Exactly like that. I said, “I don’t know if I can do it.” He said, “You can do it.” Literally, I didn’t know what to say. So I was very candid; I said, “I have to talk about this with my wife.” So he said, “I like that, go ahead, let me know tomorrow.” Do you think he had all this in mind before you went to the race track? SCHARY Oh, sure. What he was doing was giving me a sense of, isn’t it great to be riding with the head of a studio in his car? What he was saying was, I like to bet on horses I believe in; and even if they don’t win, it’s worth it if they run a good race. Very metaphorical. Sure. So I went home and got hold of Miriam and I sent for a couple of my dear friends and I said, “What should I do?” They all said, “For Chrissake, do it. Jesus, we've all been sittin’ on our tails here wondering when will a writer be in charge of production!” One of my other friends said, “Great, we can all go to work!” The next day, I called in. We went over it again and I said “Mr. Mayer, I just want to know how this would work.” He said, “You select the stories, you pick the cast, the director, you can pick anybody you want at the studio except the big star, and you run it. I want to find out whether you know what you're talking about. Why don’t you buy “Joe Smith” and do it? Pick whoever you want from the lot— do you know some of the young people?” I said, “You got a lot of wonderful young people who aren't working.” They had’ Fred Zinnemann doing shorts, Jules Dassin doing shorts and so on. He said, “I just want to put one man with you whg'll be in charge of the money, merely to check the budget; but he will have nothing to say, you are the final word.” I said, “Who is it?” He said, “Harry Rapf.” I said, “Oh, no! I don’t believe it!” Did he respect Harry Rapf? No. He said, “Dore, he’s sitting in his office, he hasn't done anything there for two years, poor man, but he knows cost. He'll be a value to you, and you'll be doing a ‘mitzvah’, a good deed.” He added, “I'll send for him.” I said, “No, I'll go and see him. He’s an older man, and I should go.” He said, “Well, he'll be very grateful.” So I want out into this guy's office; here’s this former monster sitting there and as soon as I come in he gets up. He says, “Hello, Dore,” and I start to tell him, and he starts to cry. I said, “Harry, One Lassie could “grrr,” one could jump, one could do tricks please don’t do that.” He said, “Oh, Dore, whatever you want, I'll do, you just give me the orders, I'm just going to be the office boy.” I said, “All right.” What was your new job like? I went to work, that’s all—word spread and writers were crowding my office. I told them, “I can’t pay you guys what you're used to getting. My writer's budget for a picture can be at most maybe 5% of my total budget, so you guys gotta turn it out quick. But bring me stories that you like.” So they brought me Lassie Come Home and one guy brought me Journey for Margaret; we went to work and we made pictures. Joe Smith, by the way, was made for $230,000, and it grossed about a million eight. Lassie, we made for $400,000, we went way over budget, | had to get approval for that—and we grossed over $4 million. How did you get the first Lassie? We went to Weatherwax, the guy who trains dogs, said we needed a collie, and he said, “I got a lot of collies.” He picked the one he thought would be best, trained it, and then got doubles for it. We had one Lassie that could “grrr ... growl” and one Lassie that could jump, one Lassie that could do other tricks and then one Lassie who had the soulful face. Then there was the Lassie, the quiet, welltrained Lassie, the beautiful Lassie. You have to remember that when we announced Lassie, it wasn’t considered much, a B picture; and it was a new director who hadn’t done anything before, Fred Wilcox. It was just such a big surprise when we went out to preview it and when the New York people saw it, the New York office, they said wow! Then we made Joe Smith American, which had a good point of view, very pro FDR-administration. But MGM was a Republican studio. . . Well, the picture was pro-American and the villains were villains . . . Then we made Pilot Number Five in 1943 which dealt with American native fascism. Beautiful, wonderful picture. James Agee gave that one its start with his review in The Nation. That was one of the first pictures made by George Sidney (Kiss Me Kate, Pal Joey). Then we made The War Against Mrs Hadley, Bataan; _all these pictures had content. Could you tell us about your collaboration on Storm in the West with Sinclair Lewis? I had a notion for a film which I sort of visualized as taking place in the area known as the old Middle West, what later became the states of Wisconsin and Montana, etc. I was trying to think of a writer and I said to myself, “Well, I don’t want to get a Western writer.” I wanted someone of real distinction. Inevitably, it occurred to me that Sinclair Lewis might be a marvelous choice. So I called him up. We had never met, but he knew of me and he was very nice; TAKE ONE 45