Frederica Sagor Maas turned 110 yesterday. Yes 110. The woman is an inspiration! Apparently she asked for chocolate cake...which if I ever make 110 I shall eat every day.
The woman is pretty much what you can certifiably call a legend. Despite being gorgeous beyond all reproach; she shunned a career ON screen and became a screenwriter instead. Her hero was June Mathis, who in a stomach turning memory (as I am a vegetarian and hater of onions), she recalled there one meeting at the Ambassador where Mathis ordered a raw burger with onions. Maas ordered the same though even in 1999 she couldn't stomach the idea.
She wrote a lot of screenplays; but didn't always get the credit. A lot of her better known work was for Clara Bow (though again she didn't get credit.) She was a screenwriter from 1918 to 1950. Her biography "The Shocking Miss Pilgrim" is just so much awesomeness you must buy it now.
Maas endured a lot of harassment as both a woman and a thinker during her time in the movie business. I think this is more than apt enough today, "I know I've been hard on the motion picture industry [in 'The Shocking Miss Pilgrim'] ... [T]he facts and the stories I tell -- about the plagiarism and the way I was handled and the way other writers were handled -- are true. If anybody wants to take offense at the fact that I tell the truth and I'm writing this book ... [I] can get my payback now. I'm alive and thriving and, well, you SOBs are all below, because I've lived to 99. And I quit the business at 50."
And at 110 she can point and laugh while eating her chocolate cake. Apparently she is in good health, though she 'sleeps a lot'. I've yet to find a working fanmail address; though I've tried two. If anyone knows of one please let me know.
0 comments:
Post a Comment