Stewart Stern was the screenwriter of legendary 50’s Hollywood movies such as ‘Revolt Without Rebellion’. He was also very close friends with Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward. He wrote the screenplay for Newman’s feature film debut, ‘Rachel, Rachel’ (1968), and ‘Summer Wishes, Winter Dreams’ (1973) starring Woodward. There was such confidence that around 1986, Newman offered Stern to interview his partner, his first wife, their children, the psychiatrist, his friends, and co-workers.. From these interviews, a multiple and third-person version of Newman will emerge. After the material is ordered, Newman would dictate his own version of the event to Sternin the first person.
It’s a unique way of thinking about an autobiography. As singular as Newman, he was one of the male icons of rebellious Hollywood in the 50s, along with James Dean, who died very early, and Marlon Brando, who was involved in many wars and controversies. A star who never wanted to be and who wanted to challenge and question the myth through this autobiography. An ordinary man who can’t escape the pressure of being the biggest movie star of his generation. The ‘coolest’ with Steve McQueenThe tortured protagonist of adaptations of Tennessee Williams and William Faulkner. A man who doesn’t want to age like everyone else and assures that he won’t age in style. I would also confess Drink a lotnot knowing how to define herself well, and that at some point in her life she had become a sexual creature that left a trail of lust behind her.
All this unfolds in the book that is not about to exist. In five years of the daunting mission, Stern and Newman found themselves completely overwhelmed, overwhelmed by the material at hand. Newman got fed up and In 1998, he burned the tapes on which the interviews were recorded. The actor and director passed away in 2008. Stern died in 2015. Woodward survived them. Until a friend took an inventory of one of the family’s properties in 2019, nothing was known about the project, and more than 15,000 pages were found containing transcripts of these conversations. The couple’s daughter, Melissa Newman, and David Rosenthal, who was tasked with editing the final text, shaped it two years later. authoritative memories It also forms the basis of the series. ‘Hollywood’s last stars’, It was directed by Ethan Hawke and aired on HBO Max last November.
A book so ‘extraordinarily’ produced cannot have a better name than ‘The extraordinary life of an extraordinary man’ published by Libros Cúpula. The text perfectly explains how Newman built a kind of shell ‘Marcado por el odio’, ‘El zurdo’, ‘Long and hot summer’, ‘The cat on a tin roof’, ‘Scammer’, ‘Sweet bird of youth’‘The Legend of Yilmaz’ or ‘Two men and one destiny’.
By sprinkling the comments of others on Newman’s story, he also reveals sections of his private life and the way he understands cinema. For example, Eliza Kazan claims that: Newman has always been a very honest actor.“He has nothing but a mask inside him, but he has a pure soul underneath and he wants to do many things.” Another director, Richard Brooks, said he was very pragmatic. They met in 1973 and Newman told him he was working on ‘The Colossus on Fire’. “Oh, that’s about it,” Brooks said, and Newman simply said, “Yeah, and I don’t think it’s that bad. It’s possible that it will do well at the box office, maybe even successful.
His older brother, Arthur Newman Jr., believes the actor can succeed as a businessman because he has “a great talent for pleasing everyone.” Particularly relevant is how his relationship with Woodward began while he was still married to his first wife, Jackie White. Newman writes: “Joanne and I have not stopped questioning the morality of what we do. Ours was based on passion”. Months of indecision and questioning passed, but “yeah, we did all that movie star crap, lust and hanging out all over the place. Jackie didn’t get any warning, didn’t get a chance to empower or defend herself.” Woodward adds that that period was like a long movie script.
By contrast, Woodward describes the painful experience of his first son, Scott’s death of an overdose at the age of 28: “Paul went straight to the morgue and reassured me that it was quite an experience. It was enough for her to come in and be with him and suddenly she could cry and see him and love him”.