The Studio

by John Gregory Dunne

In 1967, John Gregory Dunne asked for unlimited access to the inner workings of Twentieth Century Fox. Miraculously, he got it. For one year Dunne went everywhere there was to go and talked to everyone worth talking to within the studio. He tracked every step of the creation of pictures like "Dr. Dolittle," "Planet of the Apes," and "The Boston Strangler." The result is a work of reportage that, thirty years later, may still be our most minutely observed and therefore most uproariously funny portrait of the motion picture business.

Whether he is recounting a showdown between Fox's studio head and two suave shark-like agents, watching a producer's girlfriend steal a silver plate from a restaurant, or shielding his eyes against the glare of a Hollywood premiere where the guests include a chimp in a white tie and tails, Dunne captures his subject in all its showmanship, savvy, vulgarity, and hype. Not since F. Scott Fitzgerald and Nathanael West has anyone done Hollywood better.

"Reads as racily as a novel...(Dunne) has a novelist's ear for speech and eye for revealing detail...Anyone who has tiptoed along those corridors of power is bound to say that Dunne's impressionism rings true."--Los Angeles Times

Genres: Film, Nonfiction, Media Tie In, History, Business, Biography, Journalism

253 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1969

About the author

John Gregory Dunne was an American novelist, screenwriter and literary critic.

He was born in Hartford, Connecticut, and was a younger brother of author Dominick Dunne. He suffered from a severe stutter and took up writing to express himself. Eventually he learned to speak normally by observing others. He graduated from Princeton University in 1954 and worked as a journalist for Time magazine. He married novelist Joan Didion on 30 January 1964, and they became collaborators on a series of screenplays, including Panic in Needle Park (1971), A Star Is Born (1976) and True Confessions (1981), an adaptation of his own novel. He is the author of two non-fiction books about Hollywood, The Studio and Monster.

As a literary critic and essayist, he was a frequent contributor to The New York Review of Books. His essays were collected in two books, Quintana & Friends and Crooning.

He wrote several novels, among them True Confessions, based loosely on the Black Dahlia murder, and Dutch Shea, Jr.

He was the writer and narrator of the 1990 PBS documentary L.A. is It with John Gregory Dunne, in which he guided viewers through the cultural landscape of Los Angeles.

He died in Manhattan of a heart attack, in December 2003. His final novel, Nothing Lost, which was in galleys at the time of his death, was published in 2004.

He was father to Quintana Roo Dunne, who died in 2005 after a series of illnesses, and uncle to actors Griffin Dunne (who co-starred in An American Werewolf in London) and Dominique Dunne (who co-starred in Poltergeist).

His wife, Joan Didion, published The Year of Magical Thinking in October 2005 to great critical acclaim, a memoir of the year following his death, during which their daughter, Quintana Roo Dunne, was seriously ill. It won the National Book Award.

Reviews

[Moira · Rating 4 out of 5]

There is an episode here (the book is mainly episodes, not chapters, altho the stories about the Boston Strangler and Dr Doolittle pictures are throughlines) detailing Henry Zoster pitching a story to Richard Zanuck ("Will our conductor use the youth symphony, or will he use his own orchestra...") which is one of the funniest things I have ever read. But to call it funny, yuk-yuk-yuk, or even satiric, is to do a real disservice to Dunne, because it's great straight reportage, and he just gets out of the way and reports it. This kind of trick looks easy until you try to do it yourself and find it's nearly fucking impossible, like those piano runs in Mozart sonatas. This isn't as hilarious as Monster, but Dunne sets it alongside Ross's Picture and Salomon's Devil's Candy in his twenty-years-on introduction, and he's right to do so -- only his book is so much better-written than both those, that's insulting too. Dunne is one of the most terribly neglected American writers I can think of. (One hilarious moment in the recent squishy memoir of Didion -- putting in all the sentiment Didion so methodically cuts out -- is when a reporter gets Dunne on the phone (("He always answered the phone")) and gushes to him about his wife, only to awkwardly say, "Oh, I like your stuff, too....") Maybe he didn't mind it. He seemed okay with it. When you can write like this, I bet you're okay with a lot of things. He saw it clearly, and he got it down right. That was what mattered to him.


ETA I also think it might be modeled a little on the Last Tycoon, but not slavishly. I'd have to check.

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dunne should have stayed around FOX for another year to document the reaction of the Zanucks to the bombs that were Dolittle, Star! and Hello Dolly.

[Júlia · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ha sigut interessant, però a la vegada no ho ha sigut gens.
El final se centrava més en l'estrena d'una pel·lícula i hi havia drama, un fil conductor i un objectiu. L'inici ha sigut presenciar reunions de feina amb només homes.
Com feien pel·lícules a Hollywood als anys 60? Exactament com t'imagines. No he après res.

[L. · Rating 4 out of 5]

W zeszłym tygodniu zupełnie nie było mnie w Warszawie, bo byłam w Twentieth Century Fox w latach sześćdziesiątych. Zdolność obserwacji Dunne'a jest nie z tego świata, a liczba celnych uwag wydaje się nie kończyć. Kino nie jest moją pasją, ale Dunne był w stanie mnie zaczarować i opowiedzieć historie wszystkich wspomnianych w The Studio filmów tak, że obejrzę każdy - nawet Dr. Dolittle.

[Beckett’s bad reviews · Rating 5 out of 5]

Fantastic book, maybe I’m just a sucker for the subject matter. But I thought the writing was top notch, and very funny at times. As an avid enjoyer or of Joan dideon, I figured I’d check out her husband’s work. There were quite a few similarities in their style; and often times I imagined it was her book. However this book felt a little more approachable and took itself a little less seriously than she. All in all. If your interest in the inner workings picture business or just a fan of movies in general, this one is definitely worth your time.

[Dana · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good reporting that didn’t really go anywhere. Favorite passages had fun details: “In the past 12 months there were 19,692 animal jobs in films…the animal most frequently cast was the horse, with 12,464 jobs for them. In a significant first, sheep topped cattle with 2,593 of the woolies facing the shutters and only 2,181 cows working.”

[Richard · Rating 5 out of 5]

The origin story of the Westfield Century City mall

[Smiley III · Rating 5 out of 5]

John Gregory Dunne's memorized eyewitness account of a year behind the scenes of Twentieth Century Fox reads like the most interesting boring office job you've ever heard of, involving: lobster costume problems; negotiations with actors' agents over contracts, during which time no-one's really willing to put all their cards on the table; all hands on decks' patience required while the shot needs lining up ... again!; and other assorted mini-nightmares. Somehow it's a hoot and a holler and weirder and more normal than you'd've expected. (Put that in your pipe and smoke it!)

Still, though: for all the "trenchant criticism" plaudits plastered on this work, one can't help coming away, in these days, with a lingering sense of sweetness, of naïveté, of less-than-utterly-ruthless calculation — compared to the excesses spawned by the studios in the '80s and beyond — as the working joes in (doubtless) Leave-it-to-Beaver-and-Dragnet suits try to convince themselves and each other that: with Rex Harrison as Dr. Doolittle (say), and with LPs send hand-over-fist to record stores to promote the soundtrack (say), and with the right Joey Bishop show premiere (say), butts will be gotten in seats!

Come, either way, as cynic or as gleeful-gawker: You'll get an eyeful! Dunne's prose style is so pared-down and unobtrusive you'll feel like you've got a front-row seat: the working definition of "he makes it look easy."

[Alex · Rating 3 out of 5]

Really a 3.5, because he is an amusing writer, but in general the book fails because when you're constructing something by presenting snippets of events, written down as they happened with no overt editorial commentary and very minimal surreptitious commentary (you know, pointed word choices and all that) to really make something special you need to construct them so that the reader is guided somewhere, to some feeling or idea. That just didn't happen for me with The Studio. I enjoyed all the little pieces but never saw them build to something.

[Mike McAdam · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is rather dated now. I work at a movie studio so I found it fascinating how things were run 50 years ago. Boy have times changed! Things are in some ways exactly the same but in more ways totally different. It is an interesting chronicle on life on the Fox lot. The only drawback, in my opinion, is that the author would touch on something interesting and then move on to something else and never come back to it. I wanted to know what happened in a few instances and never found out. Other than that, I found most of it riveting!

[Hank Stuever · Rating 3 out of 5]

Something of a forgotten classic for people who like to read inside stuff about movie making, especially in the way-back-when.

[Nathan Phillips · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kind of in the vein of The Devil's Candy and Picture, this is a firsthand chronicle of a cinematic catastrophe in slow motion, except that in this case it's an entire studio (20th Century Fox) rather than a single movie, although one particular financial disaster (Doctor Dolittle) understandably takes up a lot of the attention. Dunne was invited to spend a year (1966-67) observing how a big film studio worked; at the end of the book, no one is aware of the fact that all three of the major roadshow productions currently in various stages of development are destined not only to flop but to basically end the entire release strategy they exemplify. Ironically Dunne came onto the lot to chronicle a studio that had turned a long period of tumult into massive success via Richard Zanuck's takeover of production and his shepherding of The Sound of Music, the biggest hit since Gone with the Wind. But while future successes like Patton still lay ahead, you get the feeling there's little understanding of how much the entirety of culture is changing under these people, Zanuck being a second-generation mogul who's approaching movies the way his father did. Fox is clinging to the old ideas of what a studio was by this point, despite the preponderance of independent producers, and the funneling of resources into Dolittle as well as Star! and Hello Dolly showcase an out-of-touch, geriatric institution. What makes the book valuable is that we have so few direct reports of any substance from this period, after the Golden Age had died out but before New Hollywood and the Movie Brats shook up the industry. (Fox would manage a minor role in this narrative with movies like MASH, at least.)

Dunne's humor is extremely restrained, but he does spot the excesses and the hubris, and his commentary on the premiere of Dolittle is especially good. The book is probably best if you're familiar with some or most of these movies and with the strange crisis the film world found itself in during the late '60s with the end of the Code and the sudden dominance of youth culture and such, but if not, some of the stories are still pretty fun. It reminded me a bit of The Longest Cocktail Party, Richard DiLello's remarkable book about Apple Records. Except they had hippies, so at least it was ostentatious and indulgent in a fun way.

[Ernest Schaal · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a book that I read decades ago, and I just reread it. I had forgotten how good a book it was.

The book is a nonfiction study Twenty Century Fox, as seen from the inside. The author spent a year with the head of the studio, and the people who made the movie. There are no heroes here, and no villains, although some are more pleasant than others. There is one common bond within all the characters of this drama. and that is they want their movies to make money. They disagree sometimes on the best way of doing that. A lot of egos are on display, which makes for fascinating reading.

Much of the book is about the movie Dr. Dolittle starring Rex Harrison, Anthony Newley, Richard Attenborough. The studio heads thought that Dr. Dolittle was going to be a super hit, and the book shows the different ways they tried to make it a hit. It turned out to get bad review, which having seen the movie, I think the reviews were justified. While, the movie did get oscars for best song and best special visual effects, the movie lost over eleven million dollars.

Another movie discussed was Hello Dolly, with Barbra Streisand. That movie performed well at the box office, but it still lost money (because of high production costs).

Other movies were disgusted, but over all it was not a good year.

[David Fulmer · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is heralded as a classic book about Hollywood and for me it really lived up to this reputation. John Gregory Dunne wanted to write about the Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation because of what movies meant to America and he was let in to all the Studio’s shareholder meetings, soundstages, studio bosses’ offices, location shoots, marketing meetings, film premieres, and much, much more for about a year, in 1967. He was a fly on the wall and he describes all sorts of directing decisions, costume changes, and dance routines involving the Studio. It’s a lot like watching a documentary but there’s also a lot of humour and unexpectedly revealing scenes and characters that suss out the essence of Tinseltown. Dunne has a really charming ironic view of things and he describes concepts like “failing upward”, gambling millions of dollars on crazy ideas, and the way the industry changes course based on gossip and rumour. It is these ideas, among others, that he highlights as key myths and superstitions underlying Hollywood and that result in the violent up and down swings for the business of The Studio.

[Steven Voorhees · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dunne’s uber-insidery account of 20th Century Fox in 1967 is as timely today as it was when first published. Then as now, Hollywood comes down to one thing: Money. It’s the theme lingering throughout Dunne’s narrative, as it winds from the office of Richard Zanuck, the studio’s production chief & son of founder Darryl F. Zanuck, through staff meetings, film sets to sneak previews. Another theme’s the age old battle between art and commerce (Dunne doesn’t shy away from this). In this deeply-reported book, Dunne captures “the state of mind called Hollywood.” It’s a wonderful picture!

[Ed · Rating 3 out of 5]

I’m a little on the fence here between two and three stars but there’s just enough more good than bad to recommend this. A year long chronicle of a major studio in 1967 is fascinating as much for how much as changed as what’s stayed the same. That’s what makes this mostly worth a look for film history buffs. I feel like this had to be a source for Mark Harris for the Dr. Dolittle stuff alone. What doesn’t work is the clear editorial influence the studio had on the final result. Also, there are these interstitial quotes and passages that are fucking nonsensical. But on balance, worth a look.

[Terry · Rating 4 out of 5]

John Gregory Dunne was given unlimited access to the offices and studios of Twentieth Century Fox in 1967. The Studio describes the goings on there during executive meetings, on sets and on location, at premieres and more--an inside look at the workings of a big studio just as the era of big studios was coming to an end. He's a great writer but he embellishes nothing here--it's straight forward reporting, including some deadpan humor.

[Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

A breezy read. It is dishy without being mean. Reading it 55 years after it took place caused me to constantly check in with IMDB to see the outcome of projects with which I was unfamiliar -- which usually meant they did not live up to potential.

It is interesting that this project on Hollywood overlapped with William Goldman's THE SEASON on Broadway by a few months. It may not be as insightful as Goldman's book, but it is definitely a delight to read.

[Burt · Rating 4 out of 5]

The Studio is John Gregory Dunne's inside look at 20th Century Fox in 1967. It's a well-written book that captures a bygone era in Hollywood. Dunne does a good job of explaining what day-to-day life was like in a glamorous industry. The book spends a lot of time focusing on the films Dr. Dolittle and Planet of the Apes.

My only gripe is that Dunne is mean as a snake to the people he meets. They give him access and he repays them with his venom.

Still, I enjoyed reading The Studio.

[Dave Morris · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting enough historical document, but rather perfunctory and journalistic and therefore not nearly as entertaining a read as (to name a few) Adventures in the Screen Trade, The Kid Stays In The Picture, What Just Happened?, Conversations with My Agent, Fun in a Chinese Laundry or Making Movies .

[RebL · Rating 4 out of 5]

Dated, but not in an annoying way. It's more like, how exactly DID movies get made in 1967 anyway? Peek inside the inner workings at Twentieth Century Fox during the making of "Dr. Dolittle", "Planet of the Apes", and "The Sweet Ride". I don't remember how I stumbled across this book but I found it utterly fascinating. A perfect summertime nonfiction read.

[Doc Pastor · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesante libro con un subtítulo muy inadecuado, además de varios momentos en que la traducción y corrección colean mucho.

Dicho esto, es muy recomendable. John Gregory Dunne estuvo un año dentro de Fox viendo proyectos nacer y morir.

Si os gusta el cine, y más el de los años sesenta, dadle un vistazo.

[Zoe Mason · Rating 4 out of 5]

Really a fantastic read if you're at all interested in movies or literary reportage. John writes like his wife (although not quite as good, if this were the marker). Nonetheless a fantastic writer. Even approximating Joan is an accomplishment. A fascinating look behind the studio curtain at a time when studios ruled the world. Great read.

[Harry Remer · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very rare five stars from me. Short, punchy as hell, characterizations sharp as a razor, hilarious and full of pathos by turns, and—to my knowledge—as accurate a portrayal of the patriarchal, chest-beating world of the studios that was already beginning to fade by 1966. If you enjoy inside stories of creatives, power brokers, of another era—run, don’t walk, to get this book.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

I wanted to read a book by Joan Didion's husband, and this one stood out to me among everything that he'd written. The idea - one year behind the scenes at 20th Century Fox Studios - was intriguing, and it really delivered.

[Carol Ann · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is an older book I discovered, and I really liked it. The actors and many of the movies were those that were familiar to me, so it was fun to read. The workings of a Hollywood studio were fascinating.

[Richard Notaro · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good read even though the book is over 30 years old. Worth the investment if you have an interest in how movies were made back then.

[Sandra · Rating 1 out of 5]

DNF

[Chris · Rating 4 out of 5]

It's the books about pictures that got small!

[Alex Thompson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fascinating in a mid-season Mad Men sort of way, though not nearly as incisive as Monster.