Thomas Tryon: CROWNED HEADS

Crowned Heads, which dates from the 1970s, was one of the major inspirations for my own Hollywood novels Soap Stud & Blue-Movie Girl (published this year under my other pen-name David Godolphin) and Howl and the Pussy-Kat (still editing with a view to publishing next year). Re-reading Crowned Heads after forty-plus years, it’s still one of the great Tinseltown tales, if perhaps not as exquisite as I remembered it.

Fedora, the first of four linked novella-length stories, is the best and was memorably filmed by Billy Wilder (his last movie in 1978). Fedora is a Garboesque Hollywood legend who comes back from a period of seclusion more beautiful – and a better actress – than before. The explanation, narrated to an interviewer like one of Anne Rice’s vampire sagas, is a bit too slow.

Lorna is Lorna Doone (that name is unforgivable!) is a burnt-out star whose life falls into a haze of booze and sex on holiday in a second-rate hotel in a third-rate resort in Mexico. Lots of candidates for the inspiration here whom it would be ungentlemanly to name – she may be an “amalgam”. This too takes a long time to reach its gloomy climax.

Bobbitt is the former child-star forever trapped in the role he outgrew. Mickey Rooney and even Shirley Temple could be sources here. Repetition spoils this one.

Willie (another unfortunate name to an English ear) is Willie Marsh, an elderly movie legend, clearly inspired by Ramon Novarro, whose home, a shrine to his dead but still dominating mother, is invaded by a trio of creepy hippies. This takes Thomas Tryon back into the horror territory where he first made his mark as actor-turned-writer. The invasion scene is far too protracted and its inevitable conclusion goes way over the top.

Four distinct tales, richly original and yet echoing true events in the life of Movieland. They constitute four ‘obituaries’ from Hollywood’s Golden Era. The writing is a long way from the brisk blunt prose of Jackie Collins and becomes over-ripe in parts, but this is quintessential Tinseltown: art imitating life imitating art. A must-read for La-La Land buffs if you’ve missed it; it’s on Kindle but the print edition is only available second-hand.

You can read the first chapters of David Godolphin’s Hollywood novellas Soap-Stud & Blue-Movie Girl on my website: www.davidgeebooks.com