As I mentioned in my blogathon update post last week, prolific Pulitzer-nominated author David Menefee has generously offered to send a signed copy of his book, Sweet Memories to a lucky winner during the event.
The book is an entertaining fictional retelling of Pickford's early life and career as told by her mother Charlotte. I should add that the fiction is only in the dramatization. Having just read several Pickford books, I can say that this story is deeply rooted in fact. Call it a biopic instead of a documentary.
I thought it would be fun to learn a little more about David and his wonderful book. Here's what I learned from our brief exchange:
What inspired you to write about this period in Mary Pickford's
life?
The first decade of
American filmmaking was filled with exciting and explosive developments. At
first, no one thought they were forging a new art form; they were merely
supplying cheap entertainment for the masses. Nevertheless, an art form did
develop, one that drew elements from theater, ballet, literature,
painting, music, and sculpture, and merged them into an altogether new
experience.
By around 1910, this
fact had become clear to certain filmmakers, and Mary Pickford was one of those
accidentally pioneering in the new art. They fully realized that they were onto
something unique when The New York Times began
reviewing films, bestowing onto them the same
respect previously reserved for theater, ballet, literature,
painting, music, and sculpture.
Why did you decide to tell the story through (Mary's mother)
Charlotte Pickford's eyes?
By the written accounts
left by those who knew Charlotte Pickford, she was the
unheralded mover and shaker behind Mary's unique and phenomenal
success, involved in nearly every detail of Mary, Jack, and Lottie's
careers, but someone who has remained outside the spotlight, standing
silently in their shadows. Although her influence resonates through Mary's
autobiography and those of others, she never wrote her memoirs,
unlike Margaret L. Talmadge, who wrote The Talmadge Sisters, a
memoir about Norma, Constance, and Natalie Talmadge.
Charlotte probably would
have written a memoir had she lived longer, so I wanted to give her a voice,
but I desired that the voice ring true, as if Sweet Memories sprang
from her and solidly reflected the facts. With Mary, any writer will be
vilified if he or she strays from the facts, so I had to perform due diligence
and research every written account on record and stay on a straight and narrow
course with those facts. This task was difficult to accomplish, but there
were enough clues in the writings of others to light the path
clearly.
Fortunately, those 1909-1913 years were so full of turbulent drama that the fictionalization required was only minimal. I pieced together Charlotte's personality into a mosaic-like filter, and then channeled each incident through that screen so that the details were accurately retold from her point of view. Sweet Memories also was written to be a film, and so the story flows neatly and swiftly in a way that lends to one sitting, as it will be when the film version is made.
Fortunately, those 1909-1913 years were so full of turbulent drama that the fictionalization required was only minimal. I pieced together Charlotte's personality into a mosaic-like filter, and then channeled each incident through that screen so that the details were accurately retold from her point of view. Sweet Memories also was written to be a film, and so the story flows neatly and swiftly in a way that lends to one sitting, as it will be when the film version is made.
Would you ever consider writing a sequel to cover Pickford's
Hollywood career and later life?
Yes, if I can put my
thumb on the core drama around which the story will fall. There is a recurring
problem with fashioning a scenario from the long life of a famous person. Most
take the approach of telescoping their entire life down to about two hours, and
the result always disappoints. (Think of other silent film bioflicks, such
as Chaplin, The Buster Keaton Story, Valentino, The Man of a
Thousand Faces.)
A better approach is
just the opposite: to pluck a single segment from their life and expand and
amplify that, which is exactly what I accomplished with Sweet Memories. One
of the questions I would most like to pose to participants in the Mary Pickford
Blogathon is: what do you think is the single most dramatic turn of events in
Mary's later career? I already imagine it may be her struggle to play little
girls while ever advancing in age, but I'd like to know what other people think.
You mentioned that you fell in love with Mary when you saw a
showing of one of her films in a theater. Which movie was that? What about it,
and her, appealed to you?

Do you have a favorite Pickford movie?
Sparrows (1926), which seems to possess a timeless quality, perhaps because the movie features so many scenes with children who were captured being themselves, not acting. That one element bestows the movie with a realism not always found in movies.
In my opinion, straying
too far into theatricality contributed to the overall demise of her
popularity in the 1930s, not advancing age, the transition to talking
pictures, or her personal life. I also still enjoy watching the gripping
one-reeler The Lonely Villa (1909), because the movie still
packs a punch, and because the movie features one her very first film
appearances. Those film firsts, like Lillian and Dorothy Gish in An
Unseen Enemy, are moments in which we get to glimpse what we now
know are the births of legends.
Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions David.
Stay tuned! I'll keep you all updated as to how you can win your own
copy of Sweet Memories.
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