The Hollywood That Once Was

While reading Hollywood Samizdat: Notes from Below the Line, an autobiography from an author writing under the nom de plume Rambo Van Halen, I was haunted by a vision of a video depicting the legendary film director David Lynch in a studio directing an episode of Twin Peaks: The Return. Every member associated with the production, including its financial sponsors, was present to witness Lynch bringing his craft to bear. Later, during a discussion, one of the team members pointedly addressed Lynch to emphasize time was limited to exactly two days before they had to complete the production of a particular scene. Lynch, visibly irate, launched into a passionate monologue championing the artist’s inviolable right to creative autonomy and lamenting how little time the studio allowed him to “go dreamy” and “experiment.” According to protocol, such a vehement outcry had to be reported to the studio and crew members dispatched to assuage Lynch’s sense of aggrievement.

What drives one to write an autobiography? Ulysses S. Grant’s autobiography was composed during his retirement when, impoverished and lacking a pension, he turned to Mark Twain to support his writing venture. Soon after its publication in 1885, salesmen, dressed as Union army soldiers, ventured across the country to promote the book and, as a result, Grant’s finances were set aright again. In our time, however, the paradigm of an accomplished older man reflecting back on his life has been replaced by something else; now, a successful autobiography precedes worldly success. This paradigmatic shift was best exemplified by Barack Obama in his autobiography, Dreams from My Father, published in 1995 when he was thirty-four and preparing to run for a state senate seat. In his early thirties, J.D. Vance also wrote an autobiography which, like Obama’s memoir, delved into the challenges of his upbringing. In both instances, the autobiography served as their “thesis statement” of the character of ambitious men who were intending to run for president at an early age.