Comedy of errors

Literary writers in Hollywood! My oh my.

clipped from www.todayinliterature.com Faulkner in Hollywood On this day in 1932 William Faulkner reluctantly arrived in Hollywood to begin work as a screenwriter, a labor that would last, on and off, for twenty years. Faulkner was thirty-four years old at the time, and had already published four of his Yoknapatawpha County novels (including The Sound and the Fury and As I Lay Dying). Though far from a popular success, he was regarded by his peers as one of America's most talented young writers. As told by biographer Joseph Blotner, Faulkner's first days in Hollywood were portentous. He arrived on a Saturday, not long before quitting time. His boss, Sam Marx, noticed that he had been drinking, and that he had a bleeding cut on his head. Faulkner said he had been hit by a cab while changing trains -- in New Orleans -- but that he was fine and wanted to get right to work: "We're going to put you on a Wallace Beery picture," Marx told him. "Who's he?" asked Faulkner. "I've got an idea for Mickey Mouse."