I love the writing by F. Scott Fitzgerald’s, ‘The Great Gatsby’. I did not know much about his bio. When I was reviewing my next drama to watch on Amazon, ‘The Last Tycoon’ showed up and I recognized many of the cast. This 9 episode drama was based on Fitgerald’s novel that had only 5 and a half completed chapters. This unfinished novel was about glamour, sex, dominance, labor disputes, murder and the American dream in glamorous Hollywood during the Depression.
In a 1940 letter Fitzgerald called Hollywood “a dump…a hideous town full of the human spirit at a new low of debasement.” Before he died of a heart attack at age 44 in his apartment his progress on the novel was going very well. Now I have not read the unfinished book, but I do know that Amazon chose to not to do a Season 2. Every episode was filled with realistic scenery and lovely fashions. From those who were dirt poor to those who had means. There was a revolving door of characters that really was surprisingly much more than what I had anticipated.
The Rewrite Man
Fitzgerald’s biographers agree that once he was hired as a rewrite man he stopped drinking and did the best work he could, even though the scripts were for forgettable films such as “A Yank at Oxford.” His only credit was for the 1938 film “Three Comrades,” and that honor was shared with another writer. He worked for a few weeks on “Gone with the Wind,” driven crazy by instructions that he could not use any words that were not in author Margaret Mitchell’s text.
The television drama series that is based on F. Scott Fitzgerald’s unfinished novel. It’s the story of golden boy studio head Monroe Stahr, played by Matt Bomer and loosely based on producer Irving Thalberg, for whom Fitzgerald briefly worked. Stahr battles his boss, Pat Brady, played by Kelsey Grammer. Stahr is inventing modern movie-making, but Brady doesn’t care about art. He just wants the money and he lacks Stahr’s instinct for creating magic in films. Between them is Brady’s daughter Cecilia, played by Lily Collins, a college student in love with Stahr who dreams of making pictures herself. Stahr falls in love with an Irish woman with secrets.
What is interesting is that in the 1941 edition of “The Last Tycoon,” it was edited by Fitzgerald’s Princeton classmate. A literary critic named Edmund Wilson, who assembled a tentative outline of the rest of the story as Fitzgerald intended to develop it and was used as a source for this filmed drama. It originally premiered on July 28, 2017 on Amazon Original Television Series with executive producers Christopher Keyser, Billy Ray and A. Scott Berg.
Aside from the entangled weave of the runaway actress story it was so good to see something that was not only seductive, but seeing the struggles of some hardships. It shared a glimpse of the dirty side of hollwoodland that most heard rumors about. There was a lot of raw nasty sexual moments, but it revealed Fitzgerald’s disdain of how immoral people would go in exchange for something. It was a bit ironic with some of the plots or concerns of production being shut down that it became a reality. There were so many unanswered questions and emotions that I am left with. The story was well written and like the unfinished novel I’m wanting to know what happened next.
If you are looking for something to watch next I would recommend watching this one or make it a girl’s movie weekend. Don’t write off Pat Brady’s daughter or the wife. There are some unexpected turns for them. It seemed when I read parts of the Fitzgerald’s bio I could see some characters here or how he imagined them. Either way, I’m glad I watched it and wish there were more original dramas.