"Pat Hobby and Orson Welles" on BBC Radio 4

[tadao]

Never heard of these before, but BBC Radio 4 is broadcasting five of F. Scott Fitzgerald's "Pat Hobby" stories in 15 minute slots this week (12th-16th June 2006). Alfred Molina plays Hobby, a "Hollywood hack desperately hanging on to his dignity and screenwriting career after the advent of the 'talkies'" (Radio Times magazine listing). On Wednesday, the episode is "Pat Hobby and Orson Welles", apparently dealing with Hobby's jealousy of Welles' contract, and Hobby's sporting a false beard to make him look like his rival...!

'I wouldn't be surprised if Orson Welles is the biggest menace that's come to Hollywood for years. He gets a hundred and fifty grand a picture and I wouldn't be surprised if he was so radical that you had to have all new equipment and start all over again like you did with sound in 1928.'

(from Wikipedia site at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Pat_Hobby_Stories

The readings are at 1530 BST on BBC Radio 4, and as usual, each will be available for a week after broadcast online (ie, Wednesday's show will be available for one week from Wednesday).

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/arts/afternoon_reading.shtml

[Glenn Anders]

Thank you, tadao, for these links.

F. Scott Fitzgerald wrote the Pat Hobby stories for the then prestigious Saturday Evening Post, partly to show that he understood Hollywood well enough to deserve more screenwriting assignments, and partly to prove that he was commercial enough to support himself by writing in the new climate of the 1930's. He used the money, better than $500 a shot (big money then), to give himself time to write The Last Tycoon, the novel he was working on when he died in 1940.

Glenn