As an author, you never know where or how inspiration is going to hit, but in my experience, you do know when. Back in July 2017, a friend and fellow golden-era-Hollywood fan, Debra Fryd, said to me in an email, “Someone should write a novel about Irving Thalberg. From what I understand he was a complex man and I’d love to read a book that digs into who he was and what he was about.” A little bell inside me went ting! and I thought, Debra’s right. Irving would make a great subject.
Irving Thalberg, head of production at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studios
If you’re not sure who he was but his name sounds familiar, it’s probably because of the Irving G. Thalberg Memorial Award, which is an honorary Oscar given to “creative producers, whose bodies of work reflect a consistently high quality of motion picture production.” (See here for a list of recipients.)
He was also held in such esteem that when, in 1938, MGM opened a new executive administration building, they called it the Thalberg Building, which is still on the studio lot in Culver City.
The Thalberg Building on the MGM studio lot, 1942
As MGM’s head of production, Thalberg shepherded 90 movies to the screen, many of which are now considered to be among the finest that Hollywood has ever produced. Check out his credits on IMDB and you’ll see what I mean.
My next thought was, But a novel about Thalberg has been done already. Back in 1940, F. Scott Fitzgerald was working on a novel about Thalberg called The Last Tycoon, but he died before finishing it. It was published posthumously in 1941.
First edition cover of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s
The Last Tycoon, 1941
I figured if Fitzgerald had already written the definitive Thalberg novel, what was the point of my even trying? But I’d never read The Last Tycoon, so I got a copy at my local library.
Yes.
Well.
I lasted about 30 pages.
I had little idea what was going on. Or who these characters were. Or what the point was to any of the scenes. To be fair, Fitzgerald hadn’t finished the novel, but still. It wasn’t readable—at least not to my eyeballs. More importantly, it wasn’t anything like the novel I had in mind. So on I forged, determined to tell Irving Thalberg’s remarkable story my way.
And now, here we are, 32 months later, and I’m ready to reveal some details of my upcoming novel about M.G.M.’s “Boy Wonder,” who was only 24 when he became head of production at an also-ran outfit that would soon become “the Tiffany of studios” where there were “more stars than there are in heaven.”
THE HEART OF THE LION
A novel of Irving Thalberg’s Hollywood
by
Martin Turnbull
The idea behind this cover is that Thalberg preferred to remain in the background. Seeking the spotlight wasn’t his style so he never claimed screen credit because, to quote the man himself, “Credit you give yourself is not worth having.” That’s why the cover portrays him as a hazy silhouette. However, his influence was so great that during his lifetime, he cast a long shadow over Hollywood, which is why his shadow reaches from him into the soundstage, pointing to a movie camera with “MGM” stenciled on the side.
Thalberg is in silhouette because he kept largely to himself. Consequently, he was an enigma, even to the people he worked closely with. It’s one of the reasons I was inspired to write this novel: so that readers would feel they’ve become more familiar with a man whose influence on the Hollywood motion picture industry was unparalleled during his lifetime—and for years afterward.
(If you’re curious about the cover art process, you can see a “before” (aka my not-very-good pencil sketch) and “after” side-by-side comparison here.)
~oOo~
Congratulations on the book. It sounds like a terrific work.
Thanks Gordon. The novel is a balancing act, tracing his personal relationship with Norma Shearer on the one hand and his professional relationship with Mayer on the other. It covers a nearly 12-year span so it’s my most ambitious novel to date. I’m looking forward to releasing it out into the world!
Good luck! Thalberg was certainly a major influence in his era and deserves the attention you will give him.
Your intro here doesn’t mention LB Mayer. Why?
Re the cover. It looks to me like you had the sketch concept and found an Adobe artist to render it as you imagined. My honest take is that it lacks uniqueness or a contemporary look, but then it does suggest the 30s but maybe not as accurately as could be.
I look forward to reading it in June.
The novel is about Thalberg’s life from Thalberg’s perspective. And so with only around 200 words to spend, I kept the focus there. But in fact, the novel is a balancing act, tracing his personal relationship with Norma Shearer on the one hand and his professional relationship with L.B. Mayer on the other. It covers a nearly 12-year span so it’s my most ambitious novel to date.
As for the cover…the job of a book’s cover is to give a potential reader a feel for what the novel is about. And in reality, you get about one second to make your impression. I wanted a cover that says “1930s Hollywood” at a glance, which I believe this does.
I like the cover design.
Thanks, Gordon. I went with a new designer for this one and am very pleased with the results.
Martin,
I always think, when watching ” Goodbye Mr. Chips” (the 1939 version, of course) that the ‘dedication’ signed by virtually every producer and director then at MGM, says more than anyone has ever written about IT.
That some of the most important, most influential, most creative men of classic Hollywood could write something almost like a ‘gushing fan letter’ says a great deal that even L.B. Mayer couldn’t erase.
I look forward to reading your book.
Most sincerely,
Bill Ray
Thank you Bill. Irving Thalberg really was like nobody else operating at this level at the time. Outliers like that usually have interesting stories to tell and I didn’t need to dig for too long before I could see that Irving’s life was extraordinary enough to fill a whole novel.
He’s a little-known figure in the “classic” Hollywood era. There’s a lot of Hollywood history that needs a second (or first) look. Now look at his fingers in the one picture. I have a theory that people with large hands literally have a better “grasp” on life/in life. Call me crazy, but look at the hands of very successful people, particularly artists. It bears my theory out.
My feeling is that he’s better known than Alla Nazimova, the subject of my previous novel – “Chasing Salome” – if only for the Thalberg honorary Oscar, but that people who are likely to be interested in reading a novel like this will know the movies he produced. To my mind, he lived a life worth writing about but at the same time isn’t so well-known that his life story hasn’t already been done to death.
I’d like to read this.
I think what needs stating is the complexity of Thalberg, yes he was boyish, doe-eyed, soft-looking, but he was also a bastard; he had to to be to put up with the other bastards playing the game at his level and succeeding against them.
Another side of Thalberg is best seen here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HxNeuvf2yxk
Good luck with the novel.
Actually, Alistair, I’d argue the opposite. I’d say that what made Irving unique among his contemporaries (at least, the ones operating at his level of the highest rungs of Hollywood) is that he wasn’t a bastard. He found away to navigate the treacherous waters of studio-era Hollywood without succumbing to that sort of behavior. Sure, he had to be tough, and firm, and make some difficult and sometimes unpopular decisions but I don’t think it was in his nature to take the shortcuts, or the easy way, or to make decisions with parts of his anatomy other than his brain, if you know what I mean.
As for that video – what a find! Thanks for posting it. I think it shows what a playful friendship he had with Gilbert. And as for Irving Thalberg in bad drag. Now I’ve seen everything!