12 YEARS ONLINE

JIM BAWDEN With us since 2000.

EDWARD DMYTRYK At left, a dramatic scene from Dmutryk's classic noir "Crossfire" with, from left, Robert Ryan, Robert Mitchum and Robert Young. At right, Edward Dmytryk at his peak as a Hollywood filmmaker.

Blacklisted director created memorable film classics

By JIM BAWDEN
of TheColumnists.com

Edward Dmytryk is probably best remembered today as the talented movie director who helped create the film noir genre before his career was rudely curtailed by the Hollywood blacklist.

Still, Dmytryk was able to fight his way back to productivity after his lean years and left behind many classic films that remind us of his impressive cinematic legacy--even though he actually went to jail when he joined other members of the notorious "Hollywood Ten" writers and directors who defied the anti-commnist witch hunts of the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC).

I first met up with Dmytryk on a sunny July day in 1984 at the Garden Room restaurant at the Century Plaza hotel in L.A. Our talk lasted most of that afternoon and was supplemented by several long telephone conversations over the next few years.

Here are highlights of the conversations:

BAWDEN: You say you don’t like interviews, but here we are seated in the Garden Room of the Century Plaza hotel, doing an interview. So what gives?

DMYTRYK: Well, you’re Canadian. And I’m Canadian. So there you have it. I was born in 1908 in Grand Forks, British Columbia. My parents had emigrated from the Ukraine before the Russian Revolution. But times were tough and the family finally moved to San Francisco where dad could get work. My mother died when I was six and things got rough. He loved to beat me. Eventually the juvenile authorities tired of me running away and allowed me, at 15, to live alone, provided I had a steady job, which I did.

(Later, in Los Angeles,) I started out as a messenger at the studio (Paramount) and rose quickly to junior film cutter. I didn’t actually become an American citizen until I was 31–in 1939. Part of me has always yearned to make a movie in Canada, in essence to come home. And when I see something spectacular like "The Grey Fox" or "Going Down the Road," I ache even harder because, until very recently, there was no indigenous Canadian cinema. Didn’t exist. The U.S. giants controlled the theater chains and had block booking. Now it’s flowering and I want to get aboard this Canadian express.

BAWDEN: What was Paramount like in the Silent Era?

DMYTRYK: The studio was riding high in those days. Paramount had the biggest stars, like Gloria Swanson and Rudolph Valentino. And more of the Continental directors than any other studio. I learned from the ground up. We always cut with razor blades in those days. I worked closely with (director Joseph) von Sternberg to create his moody scenes. He knew exactly what he wanted.

And with (W.C.) "Bill" Fields on his silent comedies. He’d bring in the material and in medium shot it just wasn’t funny. Then he’d give precise instructions where to insert the close up reaction shot and, presto, it would get audience guffaws. I was getting on- the-job training and working 10 hours a day. Knowing the craft of editing is the biggest prerequisite for a directing career. Robert Wise has it and so does David Lean and that makes their pictures more impressive. I’ll be watching a badly cut movie and I get all antsy.

BAWDEN: What happened when sound came in?

DMYTRYK: It was turmoil. We were told we couldn’t cut into a scene when people were talking into the flower pots (where microphones were concealed) so scenes dragged and the audience would become restless. Talkies up to 1931 did not move at all. Then, all of a sudden, we were told we could cut again as in silents and finally talkies moved.

I remember working with George Cukor on "The Royal Family Of Broadway "(1930) and he didn’t know anything about cutting, close ups, reaction shots. He determined to learn and there I was teaching him. But I learned in turn mostly from Leo McCarey. His background was Laurel and Hardy two reelers. He knew about building comedy tension, where to dawdle and when to roar in with the sight gags. It was George who liked to have the cutter right on the set and Leo took that idea and ran with it. On George’s first few pictures, I even chose the set ups because he was from the theater and wasn’t sure what to do. He’d rehearse the actors and I’d work with the cameramen.

BAWDEN: Any specific examples?

DMYTRYK: Let’s take "Ruggles of Red Gap" (1935), a marvelous comedy western with Charles Laughton giving a great performance. But at the first preview the audience tittered in embarrassment when Charles began reciting the Gettysburg address. It was supposed to be the picture’s high point and Leo was downcast at the rude comments on the cards submitted by the (preview) crowd. We’d used close-ups of Charles going full force with blubbering, so Leo suggested I substitute shots of him from the back and over his shoulder so you never actually saw his tears. Luckily Leo had ordered multiple angles during shooting. This way you never saw Laughton, only the reaction of the people he was addressing. The second preview was a smash. It made Leo a hot director. The cutting or rather re-cutting had saved the picture.

BAWDEN: What are other films did you edit?

DMYTRYK: "Only Saps Work" (1930) I remember. And "College Rhythm" (1934). And "Too Many Parents" (1936), "Murder Goes To College"(1937), "Hold ‘Em Navy" (1937), "Prison Farm" (1938), "Zaza" (1939). These are off the top of my head.

BAWDEN: According to the credits, your first film as a director was "Television Spy," but I see you shaking your head.

DMYTRYK: No, I made a lousy little movie in 1935 called "The Hawk," 55 minutes and very bad, Dickie Jones was the kid star and I’ve never met anybody who has actually seen it. Then at Paramount the director Nick Grinde got sick with the last reel of "Million Dollar Legs" (1939) to be completed and I stepped in and proved to the bosses I could handle the scenes. Then I was loaned out as a cutter for "Love Affair" (1939) over at UA, where Leo McCarey was then working. He’d asked for me especially. And he had the two best actors in the business, Irene Dunne and Charles Boyer.

BAWDEN: But "Television Spy" (1939) was your first solo directing job at Paramount?

DMYTRYK: It starred William Henry, Judith Barrett, William Collier Sr., Richard Denning. No big stars. Shot in 12 days. Television was very new and exciting and it was all about foreign agents trying to steal an Iconoscope to take out of the country. Ran 58 minutes, Played bottom of the bills.

BAWDEN: And then?

DMYTRYK: I made five more B flicks in 1940–a few week shooting for each. Then a few weeks editing. In "Emergency Squad" (1940) I had Bill Henry and Richard Denning again and Louise Campbell as leading lady and a young punk named Tony Quinn. It ran 58 minutes as a second feature. In "Golden Gloves" (1940) I had Denning and Jimmy Cagney’s kid sister, Jeanne, plus a guy new to movies, Bob Ryan. "Mystery Sea Raider"(1940) had Carole Landis on her way up and Henry Wilcoxon on his way down—all about a ship sunk by a German submarine. And "Her First Romance" (1941) had Edith Fellows and Julie Bishop as sisters competing for Wilbur Evans on campus. But I didn’t complain, I was learning this strange trade of directing and it was on work experience for me. But that one was for Monogram. I got fired from Paramount, you see.

BAWDEN: What happened?

DMYTRYK: Paramount decided to disband its "B" unit entirely. A lot of talent was just let go. The war’s coming meant more people than ever were seeking solace in the movie palaces. Attendance reached record numbers. And that meant pictures stayed over longer and longer. Paramount had more product than was needed. The studio actually sold off some first class product to United Artists–like "I Married A Witch." And there was no need for Bs any more. I was offered my old editing job back, but I balked and was fired and I went right over to Columbia.

At left, the poster for "The Devil Commands," one of the "mad doctor" movies made by Boris Karloff at Columbia Pictures in the early 1940s. Dmytryk went from that to RKO's "Murder, My Sweet" (at right), the acclaimed film noir that cast singer Dick Powell as Raymond Chandler's gumshoe Philip Marlowe--shown here with Claire Trevor--and changed Powell's career forever.

BAWDEN: In 1941 you made six more.

DMYTRYK: And I edited them, too. "The Devil Commands" (1941) was bigger stuff, I had Boris Karloff, the most wonderful, gentle man. The rest of the cast was so-so: Anne Revere, Richard Fiske. It was about a scientist trying to reconnect with his dead wife through brain waves. I never had to really direct Karloff. He always underplayed, worked long hours without any muttering. I made sure the lighting and camera work was up to par, but Columbia didn’t quite know what to do with this one. It needed exploitation, but quickly disappeared.

"Under Age" (1941) took a lot of cute young performers in a story about juvenile delinquents: Mary Anderson, Tom Neal, Nan Grey from those Deanna Durbin movies. It again was for Columbia.

"Sweetheart of the Campus" (1941) was an attempt to resuscitate Ruby Keeler’s failing career and it didn’t work. Ozzie Nelson was also in it and so was his wife, Harriet Hilliard. The sight of Ruby tapping to swing is something to behold. "The Blonde From Shanghai" (1941) had Florence Rice, a discarded MGM starlet, Leif Erickson, Gordon Jones. It was dog awful.

In "Secrets of the Lone Wolf" (1942), I had Warren William, who drank too much, but was amiable. His nickname was “the half profile” because he was a pseudo John Barrymore. Then I did "Confessions of Boston Blackie" (1941) with Chester Morris, who was a top actor, and Harriet Hilliard in a rare dramatic lead.

BAWDEN: In 1942, there were “only” two Bs.

DMYTRYK: "Counter Espionage" (1942) was another "Lone Wolfer" but the series was sagging. The Lone Wolf was never mentioned anymore in the credits. The story of "Seven Miles From Alcatraz" (1942) was weird–the convicts were restless they’d be bombed by the Japs! It had Jimmy Craig and Bonita Granville and was my first for RKO.

The very next year I delivered the most profitable movie of the year–"Hitler’s Children." It didn’t make the most money, but it was made so inexpensively most of the earnings were pure profit. I had Bonita back plus Tim Holt, Kent Smith and my only German in the cast, Otto Kruger. Boy, did the censors let us have great leeway. It looked at all the sadistic practices of the Nazis, the use of procreation centers to produce babies for Hitler. It really was boy Nazi meets girl Nazi. I grin when I see Hans Conreid as Dr. Graf. Now that was weird casting! Hans also spoke Hitler’s words in the montage of the rise of the Nazis. When we did the book burning scene the key book you can plainly see is by Gregor Ziener. He authored this story, so he deserved this insider salute. People flocked to it because of the romance of Tim and Bonita. It cost $205,000 and made $3.35 million–over $3 million pure profit.

BAWDEN: "Tender Comrades" (1943) has this reputation as a leftist film.

DMYTRYK: Because I directed it and Dalton Trumbo (later another member of the Hollywood Ten) wrote it. But it’s pure Americana. Ginger Rogers’ mother claimed it was Communist drivel because in one key scene Ginger tells her maid they’ll have to share and share alike. It’s a quite cute little item about the home front. I mean Hollywood was preaching one thing but the girls here wear fresh frocks, look like they just came from makeup, which they had, and they never want for food. I just think we got the atmosphere way better than "Since You Went Away".

BAWDEN: Some people call you one of the founding fathers of film noir.

DMYTRYK: Here I’m guilty as charged. We took the Raymond Chandler novel "Farewell My Lovely" and turned it into "Murder, My Sweet." Whole swathes of the original dialogue were used by John Paxton, who fashioned a great screenplay. RKO front office reasoned people might think it was just another Dick Powell musical and demanded the title change. By the way, the book had just been used by RKO as a "Falcon" movie the year before called "The Falcon Takes Over." So ours was the fastest remake in movie history. And getting Dick was no piece of cake . His career was gently flailing and he desperately needed a new image. He turned 40 on the picture and whereas he always looked like a Boy Scout, he now looked like a jowly Boy Scout, complete with wrinkles. RKO remained skeptical and gave me a budget of only $400,000.

I happen to think Dick the definitive Philip Marlowe–sorry about that, you Bogie fans. Dick caught the cynicism for sure but also had a certain vulnerability. Claire Trevor dove into the part of the second wife, Velma, and she deliberately used greasy makeup to highlight the character’s basic hardness. I introduced Mike Mazurki as a silent, menacing hulk, Moose Malloy, and that stuck through the picture. We shot a lot on locations because we had to; the budget just wasn’t there for elaborate sets.

This was Anne Shirley’s last ever film. Her marriage to (producer) Adrien Scott was breaking up and she was having a nervous breakdown on set but as Ann she’s just lovely with a twinge of nervousness that’s detectable. You just called it a film noir masterpiece. May I agree with you on that. Bookings were tremendous and Dick never again had to sing in a movie.

NAWDEN: I like your next Dick Powell noir film, 1945’s "Cornered."

DMYTRYK:: That’s because Dick plays a Canadian ace flyer in it, right? It was one of a number of movies to point to South America as a possible haven for fleeing Nazis. But I think we needed a bigger female name to bring in the ladies. That part of the story got lost.

Shooting on actual locations was, of course, too costly--plus it’s dubious the Argentine authorities would let us in anyway. We shot in L.A., in Griffith Park for some scenes, in Bronson Canyon, specifically. We shot on standing sets. It wasn’t a costly production at all. As a joke I put up a poster of "Cornered" in one of my next hits, "Crossfire." Paxton wrote it and got a lot out of the story and we had Walter Slezak as the arch enemy and he was always effective. I got to know Dick very well and even then he was interested in acting and producing both of which he tried a decade later. I went out with him to some base camp where he entertained returning soldiers and they gave him a watch. Back in his apartment he opens a drawer and tosses in the watch. The drawer was filled with these watches they’d give celebrities for donating time to the vets. Dick never turned down one of those invites, you see.

BAWDEN: I happen to think "Crossfire (1947) a better movie than "Gentleman’s Agreement," which won the best picture Oscar.

ED: You just happen to be right. As we started making our movie, we heard about the Fox picture which had bigger stars and a higher budget. What I didn’t want to make was a preachy message movie. With my noir background, I asked photographer Roy Hunt to light it as a deliberately dark film with shadows everywhere. As the investigating detective I had Bob Young, who was under contract to RKO, and he had that ability to project decency throughout. Don’t forget, at this time Young was the biggest of our three Robert stars. Audiences naturally turned to Bob as the voice of reason. Bob Mitchum hated his part as the sergeant, but his character was what we now call cool, I should have used him more. I just happen to think Bob Ryan one of the best all time meanies and, boy, did he deliver as did Gloria Grahame as a very sleazy chanteusy.

The novel, as you know, concerned the killing of a negro, but 1947 audiences might have actually cheered that because racist incidents increased after war’s end. I agree we made the Jewish victim too much of a great guy but Sam Levene really put it over. The criticism is made that Paxton’s script never mentions the contemporary problems of Americans but we didn’t want to make an anti-American movie. This one simply says America can be better and will be with people like Bob Young in charge.

BAWDEN: That was your last big one for more than five years.

DMYTRYK: Here we go! Another discussion of The Blacklist. I can’t explain it. It came from left field. It wasn’t about who is or is not a Communist. It was pay back time. Back in the Dirty Thirties I and a lot of others had been involved in left wing politics. Not to overthrow democracy, but to bring back the economy. The so-called Hollywood Ten. We played it all wrong. Too haughty, condescending. The committee members yelled and screamed in Stalinist fashion. We should have hit them with all we had, but we underestimated the flowing stream of hatred. I served a year in jail. How my family survived is beyond me. To get work, I then named names, but only those who had already confessed.

BAWDEN: Your first batch of new pictures were double billers.

DMYTRYK: I’d been there already, I knew all the tricks. First I directed "Mutiny" (1952) for the King Brothers. We shot it in 18 days and the cast had Angela Lansbury, Patric Knowles, Mark Stevens and it made a bit of change. "The Sniper" (1952) got great reviews. It was Karen Sharpe’s first movie. She later married the producer, Stanley Kramer. Arthur Franz was the psychotic killer and we shot everything on location in San Francisco. It really was noticed by the critics. We had a critical success with "Eight Iron Men" (1953) from a play about American soldiers in wartime Italy. It was Lee Marvin’s first big break. I was almost back in "A" pictures with "The Juggler" (1953), which I also made for Kramer, although reigning in Kirk Douglas was always a problem. Many years later Kirk told me it was among his favorite performances. But few people have heard about it. let alone seen it.

Dmytryk directed the great Humphrey Bogart as Capt. Queeg in the blockbuster hit "The Caine Mutiny" in 1954, earning Bogart an Oscar nomination.

BAWDEN: You were back to "A" picture making for sure with "The Caine Mutiny" (1954).

DMYTRYK: Stanley Kramer pressed me on (Columbia Pictures boss) Harry Cohn by saying I’d made "The Sniper" fast and I’d do the same here. Cohn agreed, with no mention of the blacklisting. It already was ancient history. Cohn wanted more females in the cast to attract the ladies, but Stanley shot that down. I’d seen the play version ("The Caine Mutiny Court Martial") and loved Lloyd Nolan as Queeg, but Lloyd was a supporting movie name. We virtually dared Humphrey Bogart to do it. I couldn’t really think of anybody else. I mean, he has to go through every emotion, a true heavy. For Keefer, I got Fred MacMurray after he said he didn’t like unsympathetic parts –-but I’d seen "Double Idemnity" (1944). I knew he could deliver. Then I got Van Johnson, who had a reputation as a lightweight. Not here. Stan had a bright new star in Robert Francis, but he died tragically in a plane crash shortly after. I almost forgot Jose Ferrer was Greenwald--and he leaped at the opportunity.

Bogie got the Oscar nomination I promised him and Cohn was in seventh heaven with two best actor nominations. When he shows rage, preview audiences gasped in fear. The other guy, Brando, won for another Columbia picture, "On the Waterfront," much to Bogie’s disgust. I think Bogie was never better, but Fred reached deep to play a real conniving S.O.B. The young love subplot was completely extraneous, I agree.

A theater owner I knew had a great double bill: "Caine Mutiny" and "Mr. Roberts" –two sea faring pictures but, oh, so different. The cut I turned in ran over three hours. Cohn starts watching in a preview room and says, “My bum is itching.” Meaning he thinks it is too long. Couldn’t see it as a special presentation. Told us it had to be around two hours to increase the number of runs an exhibitor could get out of it daily. I’m told the three hour version still exists somewhere in the vaults. It’s a far better picture, believe me.

BAWDEN: Then you went to Fox for "Broken Lance" (1954).

DMYTRYK: It was the start of a deal with Fox. (Studio head Darryl F.) Zanuck saw a rough cut of "Caine Mutiny," signed me and I left Columbia for a second time, much to Cohn’s fury. It was one of the quickest remakes in Hollywood history–of "House of Strangers" (1949), which was a Joe Mankiewicz picture. But if you say it reminds you of a western "King Lear," that’s quite all right with me.

Dmytryk directed the box office hit western "Broken Lance" (at left) with Spencer Tracy, Richard Widmark, Robert Wagner and Jean Peters. His big budget film "Raintree County" (at right) with Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor was complicated by Clift's serious injury in an auto crash during filming and the severe damage to his facial features.

(The film's star, Spencer) Tracy was a skittish guy. One had to constantly praise him or he’d sulk. It was Fox’s first western in CinemaScope, which gave me all kinds of problems. Close ups were out because they resulted in a blurred image. And I had to figure out how to keep all that screen busy. Bob Wagner and Dick Widmark were the sons. Dick as Spence’s son? That made me laugh a bit. Katy Jurado got a supporting Oscar bid. She’s very tough here. We shot in Arizona. Conditions were often very hot at times. We fudged that by doing some stuff at the Fox Ranch and at Cakabasas. Pictorially, it’s quite good and I think I kept Tracy so busy and nasty he was satisfied.

BAWDEN: Then you did another star vehicle, "Soldier of Fortune" (1955).

DMYTRYK: Clark Gable was so out of it he professed not to know who Susie Hayward was when they first met. She got quite miffed. We did some exteriors in Hong Kong with Gable. Matching them with studio stuff was hasty. In one shot Gable is seen peering through binoculars–the wrong way! Susie couldn’t travel because she was in a bitter custody battle with her ex. There are far too many transparencies used and on the big screen one can spot them a mile off. I thought it rather lackluster, but it did make a bundle based on the Gable charisma.

BAWDEN: What did you think of "The End of the Affair" (1955)?.

DMYTRYK: Well, the Catholic theology was all airbrushed out of it. So it didn’t make the sense it should have. I mean we were dealing with some of the big immoral issues and the censors who still ruled were very skittish about everything. I like Van Johnson, but he was befuddled by his part and the character of Maurice should not have been Americanized. Deb Kerr was stronger, deeper. She understood the roots of adultery and it showed. She nailed Sarah and made the movie watchable. Peter Cushing, John Mills, both excellent. The theme of redemption after sin? How the hell could we portray that in the climate of 1955 when we could barely mention adultery and certainly never show it.

BAWDEN: 1955 was one of your busiest years. You were back with Bogie in "The Left Hand of God" (1955).

DMYTRYK: He asked Fox to get me. What I remember so vividly is the terribly wracking cough he had throughout filming. He’d just shake and then light up again A year before on "Caine," he still seemed in fine physical form. Here he moved slowly, forgot lines, was terribly frail and Agnes Moorehead told me she was constantly in tears as he visibly faded. And on top of that Gene Tierney was beginning her mental breakdown that led her to years of confinement. She was catatonic many days. Bogie had to plead with her to stay awake and remember lines. Oh, she was in a real mess. We shot it entirely on the backlot and it shows, but audiences lapped up the saga of Bogie as the sinner turned bogus cleric. It made a pile of cash. And two years later we lost him. It was a slow, agonizing death.

BAWDEN: "Raintree County" (1957) was a blockbuster.

DMYTRYK: It gave me a blockbuster of headaches. You know the story. Early on during shooting at MGM, Monty Clift, driving home, hits a pole and his car wraps around it and his face is shattered. An eye popped out of the socket, jaw and nose broken, teeth all over the place. We had to suspend production. Liz Taylor refused to work with anybody else. But, you see, in the old days MGM would have had other actors available. But with the business shrinking, the few genuine stars left had the studios over a barrel.

When Monty returned after months in hospital and rehab he was different inside and out. He carried a valise chock full of uppers, downers, pain medications, all highly addictive. Matching shots with the way he used to look was tough. He now had a sort of potato face. Everything was lumpy. All the spark had gone from him. Liz coached him, tried to keep him going. Some days it was of no use.

I also don’t think the story was strong enough for this epic presentation. But all I can say is, we tried. The budget was over $5 million at the end. I’m not sure when, if ever, it made back that huge amount. We shot in Technirama 65, MGM planned a roadshow presentation. Then doubts entered and it was released with considerable footage shorn and in CinemaScope and a lot of the compositions got cropped out.

Dmytryk directed Marlon Brando as a Nazi officer in "The Young Lions."

BAWDEN: But you immediately worked with Clift again on "The Young Lions" (1958), a film I like a lot.

DMYTRYK: Marlon Brando was the key player. Said he’d only do it with Clift as the American soldier. Fox had to give in and Monty promised me he’d quit drugs cold turkey. He lied. But for the first few weeks, he was on good behavior. His basic problem was his narcissism> He’d been the most amazing looking young guy and now, facing middle age, he had an immobile, reconstructed face. An actor lives by his face and Monty could barely move his. He slurred his speech. He ached inside all the time. Marlon at first was a darling, He named his son Christian after his character’s name. The fan mags always say it was after his character in "Mutiny On the Bounty," but that was years ahead. One day Clift was so jittery Marlon strode into the scene and just shook him with everything he had, just shook him like a rag doll, he was so frustrated. Monty was in tears. He knew he was no longer a competitive actor with Marlon. And he never was ever again.

Ed Anhalt did a great screenplay that captured a lot of the book’s texture. It was actually critical of the whole war machinery of both sides. I wanted the Germans played as multi-faceted people, not louts. That’s what made their capitulation even more important. They knew they were fighting for the wrong values. Clift was always uneasy in love scenes. With Hope Lange, she was thrust into a strange mother-son relationship with him. With Mai Britt as his lover, Brando’s character was able to see the falseness of the Nazi ideology. I accept the crirtcism that the U.S. military ideology was softened for home consumption. We just had to. But there was enough meat left there to suggest war does not make heroes, that everyone becomes its victim. Fox let me go very far with this anti-war stance. It was as if my status as a HUAC survivor was completely forgotten.

BAWDEN: You got away with an awful lot in "Warlock" (1959). It’s am insidious anti-western.

DMYTRYK: I got out of my system all the horrors of naming others. Dick Widmark is a guy who changes and changes sides. Why? To survive. I knew what that felt like. Hank Fonda is a sheriff come to clean up the town. Tony Quinn is his partner in every sense of the word, Tony just made us understand what was going on and there was no way the censors could balk. It was Tony who insisted he be blonde—for the only time in his career, I imagine. That final clash between Tony and Hank, you could see it coming. Tony gasps “I won” as he expires but I’m not quite sure now what he meant by that. Dick demanded and got first billing but "Warlock" is Hank’s movie. I asked Leigh Harline to score it because he’d done such a tremendous job for me on "Broken Lance."

(I wonder what Dmytryk would think of this one being described by one recent critic as a 1959 "Brokeback Mountain?" Vehemently disagree, I hope!)

Dmytryk was impressed by foxy Jane Fonda in his film of Nelson Algren's steamy novel "A Walk on the Wild Side," but he thought Laurence Harvey (shown with Fonda) was terribly miscast.

BAWDEN What the heck was "Walk On the Wild Side" (1962) all about?

DMYTRYK: It was about life! Any resemblance to reality? No! It was supposedly set in 1930s Texas but you’d never know it. The actresses sported contemporary hairdos and clothes. Columbia insisted on Laurence Harvey in the lead but he was a Lithuanian and was awful. One day he came back late from lunch and Barbara Stanwyck tore into him and he ran off sobbing. Jane Fonda was pretty good as the amoral Kitty Twist and she had an incredible animal sensuality at that time, very raw, you could understand what she was thinking. Anne Baxter was an Italian cafe owner. At 39 she joked she was an oldster in such company. I personally phoned Barbara Stanwyck and asked her to play the madam. But you know her character is never openly identified as a lesbian. That could not be done in 1962. Barbara joked she’d wear suits and that would show them! I don’t know what movie Capucine thought she was in but she certainly did not seem right in Depression Texas. I concentrated on dialogue and got some good performances from these broads and it made a lot of coin. Was it a good movie? Come on now!

BAWDEN: But you turned right around and made the pretty wonderful "The Reluctant Saint" (1962).

DMYTRYK: Oh, you’re the one who saw it. Max Schell, who worked for me in "The Reluctant Saint," did it for scale. So did Ricardo Montalban and Akim Tamiroff. It was the true story of an idiotic boy who became Saint Joseph of Cupertino. It never got a full release, has never been on video, I’ve never seen it on TV. But this is a film I still get letters about so it must be out there somewhere.

BAWDEN: Did friends kid you about "The Carpetbaggers" (1964)?

DMYTRYK: Only the envious ones. It made all who worked on it very rich. The cost was $3 million and the initial gross was $40 million. It’s very enjoyable to watch. Not deep. The Harold Robbins book was the same way. But in 1964 there were still taboos. No nudity, just hints. Of course, Howard Hughes was the prototype for Jonas Cord. George Peppard wasn’t my choice but he delivered. Carroll Baker was the Jean Harlow type. Bob Cummings was wonderful as an actor’s agent. I personally contacted Alan Ladd and he played the confidant Nevada Smith. Had he lived he would have had a new career in character parts. It’s so sad he didn’t get to read the rare reviews for his acting. Elizabeth Ashley and George were an item in real life. They bickered before the cameras and between set ups. I called in Audrey Totter for one day’s shooting and she delivered a blazing bit as a washed up trollop. Today it would all be a miniseries. There’s an awful lot of plot in there.

Dmytryk said Bette Davis (left) and Susan Hayward literally despised each other while playing mother and daughter in his "Where Love Has Gone" and hissed at each other when filming finally was completed.

BAWDEN: You acted as a sort of referee to Bette Davis and Susie Hayward on the set of "Where Love Has Gone" (1964)?

DMYTRYK: That’s it. I was the referee. The book was one of those potboilers everyone had to read. Paramount requested a movie potboiler and that’s what I delivered. The sets were gaudy, the fashions all a bit too much. Susan Hayward was our heroine and Bette Davis, much to her disgust, was her mother, although Bette would tell anyone who’d listen she was only 10 years older.

These two hated each other from first sight. They’re so different in their approaches to moviemaking. Bette is highly disciplined. She sits on set absorbing the atmosphere. She keeps the door to her dressing room open at all times so she can listen in. Susan is tightly controlled. She does a scene and then retreats to her room and shuts the door. Bette insisted she did the part to be able to give her daughter a huge wedding. Tension built week after week. Finally Bette asked me loudly if she was through filming and I said yes and kissed her goodbye whereupon she took off her wig and threw it at Susan shouting, “Thank God I don’t have to act with you anymore!"

Susie turned and threw her own wig at her shouting, “You disgusting old bitch!”

So you are right. There never will be a Bette Davis-Susan Hayward reunion. That you can count on.

BAWDEN: You’re telling me your last batch of movies never really interested you.

DMYTRYK: The business changed so much. I was getting older. I had to choose between fewer and fewer offers. Oh, "Mirage" (1965) is OK: Gregory Peck, Walter Matthau, Diane Baker. We put a lot of polish into it. We did it in black and white which got my noir side all excited, and it’s a very smooth job. Then I did "Alvarez Kelly" (1966): Bill Holden, Dick Widmark, a John Ford western without John Ford. Lots of location fun around Baton Rouge, loosely based on history is right. Both Bill and Dick were not aging gracefully. But the film was pretty profitable and nobody remembers it these days. On "Anzio" (1968) Bob Mitchum and Bob Ryan and I would sit around swapping war stories about "Crossfire." We never guessed the business would come to these lousy co-prods.

On "Shalako," I started with a good Louis L'amour western story and added Sean Connery, Brigitte Bardot, Stephen Boyd, Jack Hawkins, a motley stew of a co-prod that didn’t work at all. We filmed in Surrey, England, go figure that out.

Four years later and many failed projects later I lowered myself to spend a winter in Budapest on the monster of all co-prods, "Bluebeard" The producer told me he wanted bums and boobs and go for it. I had a very wasted Richard Burton, who staggered around and couldn’t remember lines, plus Raquel Welch, Virna Lisi, Nathalie Delon, Sybil Danning, Joey Heatherton. We deserved those scathing reviews. It wasn’t even camp. I checked with my accountant and simply walked away. After 30 years of directing I was making my worst ever flick which says a lot.

BAWDEN: But you’re still working?

DMYTRYK: Garson Kanin told me to write and I’ve a couple of books out that still sell. And from 1976 to 1981 I taught film theory at the University of Texas in Austin. In 1981 I was appointed to a chair at USC and I’m still going strong although well above retirement age. I just showed "Murder, My Sweet" and the kids went wild, although few actually knew who Dick Powell was. Never once have I been asked about the Hollywood 10. They don’t care about history, which I find shocking.

Driving here to see you today I went through Beverly Hills and had to grind my teeth. I hate that hotbed of conspicuous consumption as much as ever. At heart I’m an unreformed liberal and I admit that. I’m still in contact with a few of those greats I worked with. Bob Mitchum will go on being Bob Mitchum, Bette Davis says I’m one of the few directors of hers she still talks to. The Hollywood that made me and once tried to destroy me has in turn been destroyed. We now live in the Age of Television. But I still have ambitions. One day I’d like to make a great film in my native Canada. It might never happen. But old men have dreams, too.

NOTE: I kept in occasional phone contact with Dmytryk and, a year before his death, he sent me an autographed picture of him skating with wife Jean Porter on the set of "Till The End of Time," where he wrote: “With memories of better days.”

Edward Dmytryk died of heart and kidney failure on July 1, 1999, in Encino, California. He was 90.

 

©2011 by Jim Bawden. This column first posted Dec. 5, 2011.

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