Brilliant biography of the playwright and screenwriter Bolt which I finished in only a few days, it was so enjoyable. I thought it made a slight mistake starting the book with the story of Bolt going to Tahiti in 1977 to work with David Lean on a new Bounty film, then having a stroke: this section felt as though it went on a bit too long, and involved too many story strands and relationships tht you probably would have been better knowing more about. But that's it's only real flaw. Turner is a skilled writer, has done some superb research (including rare access to MGM legal files), and has enthusiasm and sympathy for his subject.
I was aware of the big hits of Bolt's career - A Man for All Seasons, the Lean films - but not aware his first hit was in fact something called A Flowering Cherry (a mid life crisis drama similar to Death of a Salesman), and before Seasons he wrote another play, Tiger and the Horse, which was an even bigger hit. Before then he had a substantial reputation as a BBC dramatist.
Despite that he was often held up as a sell out - how can it be a sell out to write for David Lean, but that was the mood of the times. Also it was his agent, Peg Ramsey, (whose reputation Bolt made) who most frequently called him a sell out (John Mortimer wrote a brilliant sketch of Ramsey in his memoirs). To be fair he did kind of sell out when he was arrested for a CND protest in the 1960s - Bolt agreed to promise not to do any more protests so he could get out of gaol and work on Lawrence of Arabia - a compromise (one he needn't have done) he always regretted.
Bolt's life was fascinating: early life in Manchester, war service, joining the Communist Party, discovering his gift for learning and becoming a teacher, shot gun marriage, being an inspirational teacher, the early writing (he knew he wanted to write then stumbled upon play writing).
His life was marked by some tragedies and scandals: in the early 60s his wife left him for a handyman (he was obsessed with his work so it wasn't such a surprise - he came home and his new house was full of cupboards because the wife kept getting the handyman around), he married Sara Miles but they got divorced after the scandal where her personal assistant (and occasional lover) became obsessed with her killed himself - with Miles whispered as his possible murderer; his eldest daughter died in a possible suicide; he had a crippling stroke which permanently debilitated him (people blamed it on David Lean but a 60 cigs a day habit may also have had something to do with it). He married a third time, unsuccessfully - but then blow us all down if he and Miles didn't get remarried, surprising many people who thought it was only a glam match.
What of Bolt the writer? In the 60s he was the leading one in the world, though his final credit list isn't too long - he worked too long on projects. His main credits post stroke, The Bounty and The Mission, were based on scripts written in the 70s before his stroke. Up until the end he remained busy and in demand - you might wonder why as his credits grew increasingly sparse, but the Lean films and Seasons were classics, so why not?
Its a great shame his Bounty scripts were never filmed in the way they were intended, though one can understands studios being wary of them; ditto some of his other scripts such as one on Gandhi. Its a shame some of his unproduced scripts can't be published in some form or another; it's also a shame Bolt didn't write a little more for the stage, though he always tackled decent projects on screen - it's just that the stage stuff would have had more chance of being produced.
It's a marvellous read and highly recommended.
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