I originally requested a copy of Dorothy Arzner:
Interviews with the intention of interviewing its editor, film professor and
author Martin F. Norden for the Watching Classic Movies podcast. To my dismay,
when I received the book I realized he had passed in 2023. While I will not
have the pleasure of speaking with Mr. Norden, I’m happy to say that this
well-curated collection of interviews is a fine closing act to a busy and
productive career.
I’ve long admired the thoughtful eye of Dorothy Arzner as
a filmmaker and found her intriguing as the only major female director at the studios
in her era. In fact, she was one of very few women who directed at all from the
rise of the talkies through the studio age. This collection presents a
cool-headed, intelligent, and empathetic professional who found her way in a
brutal industry. She rose in the ranks with the help of great privilege
bolstered by her profound talent in several aspects of filmmaking that studio
heads recognized as being excellent for their bottom line.
The bulk of the book consists of mid-career interviews,
which seem to for the most part to capture the truth about Arzner, as they
contain many similarities, but enough variation to suggest that she wasn’t retelling
the same fabrication through the years. She spoke freely of her efficient, but
emotionally resonant approach to her work.
Arzner is less revealing when it comes to her personal
life and her views on being a female director. While any person is justified in
desiring some privacy, the former is especially understandable, as her
decades-long relationship with screenwriter Marion Morgan would have been up
for unpleasant scrutiny at the time. As for the latter, Arzner was more
forthcoming about the challenges of being a female director when she was
retired, as can be seen in the post-career interviews that make up a smaller
portion of the book, but even in these conversations, there is a feeling she’s
still withholding, whether out of the desire to focus on her work or simply not
wanting to deal with the issue.
The appendix contains Arzner’s unfinished memoirs, which
she wrote in 1955, but abandoned in the midst of her descriptions of the early
twenties. While much like in her interviews, she often seems reluctant to discuss
her most personal views and details, she paints a fascinating picture of the times
in which she lived.
Overall, it is easy to see why gender could never have kept
Arzner from the director’s chair. After the great assist of having industry
connections, she was simply too much of a force as a talent to be ignored, and
brilliant at understanding how to navigate a man’s world. It’s clear that she
was well-liked on the set, partly because of a collaborative spirit in which
she felt that cast and crew at all levels should feel free to offer ideas. For
the most part though, it seems to have been her calm demeanor, combined with
the kind of artistic and technical ability that come from a steady rise to the
top through several jobs in the field from typist and scenario writer to
editor.
On more than one occasion Arzner makes it clear that she
felt the mellow manner on the set was necessary as a woman, and that she could
not get away with the megaphone toting antics of her male peers. However, her
way of working mirrors many modern female directors, such as Ava du Vernay, and
that method has proven to be popular with cast and crew members alike as the
industry gradually evolves.
Dorothy Arzner: Interviews is of great importance for what it
documents, despite the occasional reticence of its subject. It reveals an
underrated film artist and innovator worthy of praise in those ways alone and
only more remarkable because of her unique position as a female director.
Many thanks to University Press of Mississippi for
providing a copy of the book for review.
Rest in Peace Martin F. Norden
