Mary C. McCall Jr.
The Rise and Fall of Hollywood's Most Powerful Screenwriter
-
- $38.99
-
- $38.99
Publisher Description
Finalist, 2024 Richard Wall Memorial Award, Theatre Library Association
A screenwriter, novelist, labor leader, Hollywood insider, and feminist, Mary C. McCall Jr. was one of the film industry’s most powerful figures in the 1940s and early 1950s. She was elected the first woman president of the Screen Writers Guild after leading the fight to unionize the industry’s writers and secured the first contract guaranteeing a minimum wage, credit protection, and pay raises. Her advocacy was not welcomed by all: To screenwriters McCall was an “avenging goddess,” but to studio heads she was, in the words of one Hollywood executive, “the meanest bitch in town.” And after a clash with the mogul Howard Hughes in the blacklist-era 1950s, she disappeared from the pages of Hollywood history.
J. E. Smyth tells McCall’s remarkable story for the first time, putting the spotlight on her trailblazing career and crucial influence. She explores McCall’s life and work, from her friendships with stars such as Bette Davis, Humphrey Bogart, and James Cagney to her authorship of the hit Maisie series about a working-class showgirl’s adventures. Analyzing McCall’s deft political maneuvering, Smyth offers new insight on screenwriters’ struggle for equality and recognition. She also examines why McCall’s legacy is unrecognized, showing how the Hollywood blacklist and entrenched sexism obscured her accomplishments. Colorful and compelling, this biography provides a powerful account of how one extraordinary woman shaped golden age Hollywood.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
In this lively biography of Mary C. McCall (1904–1986), Smyth (Nobody's Girl Friday), a history professor at the University of Warwick, recounts the screenwriter's pursuit of gender equity in Hollywood. McCall elbowed her way into the film industry after Warner Bros. agreed to let her write dialogue for their adaptation of her 1932 debut novel, The Goldfish Bowl. Once in the business, she put a feminist spin on the B movies she was assigned to write. Smyth points out that for the Maisie film series, McCall reimagined the "alluring, sexualized" protagonist of Wilson Collison's 1935 novel Dark Dame as a working-class everywoman. Smyth notes that McCall frequently endured crass comments from producers and received less pay than her male colleagues. These industry-wide problems motivated McCall's organizing efforts on behalf of the fledgling Screen Writers Guild, and she served as president of the organization in the '40s and '50s. Though McCall is likely unfamiliar to most readers, her wit and swagger will grab their attention (during a labor relations meeting with Paramount executive Y. Frank Freeman, she blew cigarette smoke in his face and asked if his name was a rhetorical question), and Smyth makes a strong case that McCall's contributions to the film industry have been unjustly overlooked. It's a commanding reconsideration of a largely forgotten Hollywood power player.
