Filming The Great Dethriffe, 1974

In early 1972, these two men approached my dad about making a movie out of his second novel, The Great Dethriffe.

It's the story of two young men who cling to the long vanished life-style of the 1920's. The men , George Dethriffe and Alred Moulton, try to model themselves on the myth of a Scott Fitzgerald hero. But their pursuit of nostalgia alienates their other friends and Dethriffe's marriage literally goes up in smoke.
The book did not sell well so Dad has some surprising news for his friend Peter Neill:

There is a man who seems determined to make a movie out of The Great Dethriffe. Someone named James Ivory who did Shakespeare Wallah and the more recent "Savages" ...It got very strange reviews--rather like the Peter O'Toole "The Ruling Class" which I saw and loathed. I never saw "Savages" but the reviewers, too, either loved it or left it. Ivory wants to make a movie only about the Dethriffe part, leaving out Alfred, Rome, the model, Hawaii, the brother etc. which distresses me since that part is the part I liked least, or at least felt least interesting (Rome bored my ass off, but I liked Alfred and what was going on in parts of it)


The money would be 3% of the operating budget which seems to be set at around $500,000 meaning I would get $15,000, plus 5% of the producers' profits after the film...which will be nonexistent...He wants Sam Waterston to play Dethriffe which makes for interesting circles within circles.




(That's because Dad had known Waterston for years)

I know that Sam liked the book, mentioned wanting to play the part, but he's a very big star now particularly since the TV production of Much Ado About Nothing was such a smashing success and he may price himself out of it. If only I could get Candice Bergen to play "Alice"...if only I could get "Candice Bergen.. if only...if


So I went back to read Dethriffe yesterday and hated every minute of it. Why is it so difficult to reread something after it has been published.

Two weeks later, Dad received some incredible news:

For God's sake they do want, they really honest-to God no -kidding-scout's honor do want CANDICE BERGEN to play Alice...and (Ivory) told me that he wants his writers to spend considerable amount of time with actors and actresses to get speech patterns and pace as well as sentiment *sigh*

In May and June, Dad began writing the dialogue for The Great Dethriffe. James Ivory wrote the rest of the sceenplay. Ismail Merchant apparently already had backers at hand when news came that Waterston had signed on to play Nick Carraway in The Great Gatsby.

Dad's reaction:

"Echoes within echoes within echoes. I cannot see how it can do anything but exactly what I had intended.

In fact Dad, his wife Sam and James Ivory went to Newport to see them filming The Great Gatsby. Sam Waterston showed them around the set. They were up all night filming the party sequences with extras taken from the cream of Newport society.
At one point a woman caught Dad's eye.

A beautiful tiny blond with porcelain complexion came down the stairs with two tiny children...and she kept looking at me as though she wanted to ask me something ( Did I have any pacifiers? Could I cure diarrhea? What do you do when a child vomits on your beaded purse?) but then she went away I and asked Sam who it was. He said "Daisy Buchanan."


(Mia Farrow to those who don't remember.)
Though shooting was scheduled to begin in the fall, Ivory had not found a leading lady and the movie just vanished. Nothing came of it.

 As Dad wrote in 1976:

The timing was bad. The Fitzgerald resurgence occurred about two years after the book

But the postscript is interesting. Merchant and Ivory went on produce and direct two Oscar nominated films, A Room With a View and Howard's End.
And Sam Waterston would play his friend, my dad, in the ABC TV movie "Friendly Fire" .
Finally Dad would use his screenplay experience when he wrote Beautiful Woman, Ugly Scenes.

Echoes Within Echoes ...Within Echoes... Within Echoes.

Lost at Sea: Saint Bryan II September 1969

In late September, 1969, Dad learned that his brother Saint was missing from a catamaran he and a friend had been sailing off the coast of Maui. He and Aunt Joan flew out to Honolulu to do what they could. Notes from those frantic days include lists of people to contact.
The Coast Guard, Boat Yard, Newspapers, Radio & TV, Wailuku Police, Friends.
But there was no hope. Dad always said he lost not just an older brother that day but his best friend.
Among the letters of condolence Dad received is this one from family friend Finis Farr.

8 November 1969
Dear Courty:
It must have been an ordeal for you and Joan, going to Hawaii. I have thought of you often since I got the news about Saint. Losing a brother or sister must give one an especially desolate feeling, all the more poignant, I should suppose, when the one who died was still young. Saint was someone I always held in particularly high affection, because he was himself, gentle, responsive and bright.

It occurs to me now that he was ahead of his times--one of the first do-your-own thing people, and as such not fully understood by many But I think I had an inkling of what he was getting at. Perhaps I am patting myself on the back; if so, I should add that I spent one of the saddest afternoons I can recall a few weeks ago when I walked over to the post office around noon and picked up your father's note telling me that Saint and been lost and there was no more hope.

I telephoned your mother and father right away, and they were,of course, so brave and "good" about it that I found it heartbreaking, I say to you in confidence. The telephone to the voice is like the camera to the face, is it not?
Since then, in thinking of Saint, it occured to me that you'd told me, not long ago, that he was happy in Hawaii. So that part is all right. I just wish he could have gone on being happy in Hawaii.

Another thing--there's no doubt Saint had talent and I wonder if he was writing, and if you found material of interest among his papers. You understand I didn't think he was obliged to write or had to write, but I remember seeing some stories he wrote at college and they were good,
I do hope your work is shaping up as you want it, and that all goes well with you and yours
Yrs as ever,
Finis

When Dad called to tell us what happened (Lansing and I were both under 5 years old) he said Uncle Saint had dived off the boat to save a drowning friend but that the sea pulled both of them under. Recently, I was told the friend had suffered from "The Bends". He may have been partially paralyzed.

In The Great Dethriffe, Dad's second novel published in 1972, he writes that his brother had found happiness in Hawaii.

And I loved him because I knew for generations and generations back in all our other lives we had always been brothers, as we would be brothers in future lives as well...
"You know, pal" he said..."All these years I've been the older brother. I've always led and you've always followed. Well, I've just been thinking that I'd like to follow you for a while. You're my best friend and I want to be your best friend. I'd like you to lead."
"I know," I said, "but I like following you. I like you to lead. It's okay. And besides, farther on where the path gets wider, we can walk side by side."
"I'd really like that." he said.


Uncle Saint and Dad, 1938.

The Famous Family Friend May 10, 1974

My stepmother, Sam, once dated John Denver. At the time Peter Paul and Mary had recorded his "Leaving on a Jet Plane", John visited Sam and Dad in Iowa. We have home movies. He played some songs ( Leonard Cohen's "Sisters of Mercy", The Beatles's "When I'm 64", "Mr Bojangles" and an original or two). They had lunch. He rode his first horse --a shetland pony. It was 1967 and Dad was the more successful of Sam's men.
By 1974 that had all changed. Dad's latest novel, The Great Dethriffe, hadn't sold well and John Denver was at the peak of his fame. His 1974 tour would be recorded for the best selling "Evening With John Denver". John sent our family press box seats but only Sam went backstage to visit John.
With its comparisons to Nazi Germany, Dad's letter is a fun read. More fun, I think, with the back story filled in a little.





Dear John:
Your concert in New Haven was stupendous! My God, when you came on stage that first moment and the Coliseum roared...it must be an extraordinary sensation, rather frightening, rather pleasing, rather contemptible even. I mean how is it possible not to react with something approaching scorn at the animal that gets unleashed. There is that crowd aura, that same frenzied grip that politicians strive for, that Hitler achieved ( he, too, had at Nuremberg that astonishingly staged and managed show which created a crowd frenzy). I don't mean to compare you to Hitler, my friend, all I mean is you have achieved that same quality of having crowds react to you but that, unlike Hitler, of course you deserve it.






You gave the impression of being perfectly at ease, in control and professional all of which you are, but it came across. And I think your music--that is, the songs you write, are getting more and more beautiful and lyrical. I think "Sunshine on My Shoulder" (sic) is one of the loveliest songs I've heard in years. Very simple, very true like all good writing must be. And "Goodbye Again" is lovely too. Of course "Rocky Mountain High"--the title suddenly for the first time struck me as perfect for a high school in Denver. Wonderful idea, the little girl saying "I'm at Rocky Mountain High" and the other responding "I'll say..."--anyway , Rocky Mountain High is such a pleasing song and a nice thought.






I remember once being on acid at Vale (sic) and suddenly thinking I'd been dropped into a Nazi pre World War II training camp, getting nervous about it, knowing I was on acid, thinking if only I could piss it out of me I'd be all right. But every time I'd head for the can, I'd have to pass the wooden beamed staircase and all the ski boots clomping up and down would make me think I'd fallen into Gestapo Headquarters and I'd flee in a panic for the outside, terrified that someone would speak to me and find out I couldn't speak German. Which, of course, 50% of the people around me were speaking. It was German week or something. It was funny in retrospect and scary at the time.



The New Haven Coliseum->

Still, back to the concert, the children loved it. Little Amanda bobbed up and down, boogaloo'd, my 9 year old daughter, Lansing, ( who somehow managed to pass the word to her school that you were spending the weekend with us) is starstruck, smarmy with love for you and my 10 year old son thinks you sing okay.
Thank you for your kindness and especially for calling. As the man who led Sam back out to meet us said, "He's a star now." You earned it.
Affectionately,
Courty





Can't say I ever heard the Vail story before reading this letter.The next year John came through town we all went backstage. I saw his ping pong table. He'd play before a show to work out all the nervous energy. We shook hands.


Twenty years later , as a reporter/ photographer in Colorado, I had to shoot John walking into court for a drunk driving trial. He stopped to pick up litter on the side of the street.
He had no idea who I was of course. I said I was sorry I had to shoot this and he said that I should then put my camera down. Which, of course, I couldn't do. You don't have to sell millions of records to live near Aspen but you do have earn some money.
I always thought he should have recorded an album like the ones Johnny Cash did at the end of his life. Just John and his guitar. His "Sisters of Mercy" is truly something worth hearing.

By the way, the home movie and John's version of "When I'm 64" can be seen in an April 1, 2011 post.
Posted April 1st, 2011.