In the summer 1947 Edward Dmytryk, known as Mr. RKO, was riding high on the wave of the recent success of his latest picture Crossfire. That film noir, starring Robert Ryan and Robert Mitchum, sealed his reputation as a maverick director of B pictures. And then, that October, his life was derailed. “I received a subpoena commanding me to appear before the House Un-American Activities Committee.” The reason? Sometime in late 1944 or early 1945, he had joined the Communist Party. Even though that was a fact, he was now adamant “the honeymoon was short” and that he had quit soon after joining. Nevertheless, as one of the Hollywood Ten, he refused to cooperate and was convicted of contempt of Congress. Fired from the studio and blacklisted, he fled to England.

Later he came back to America and after serving a six months jail sentence, he agreed to name names at his second appearance in front of the HUAC in April 1951. His career was soon back on track, thanks to Stanley Kramer whom he gratefully called “a noted second chance taker and progressive filmmaker who approached me with a four-picture deal after four years of famine.”

Dmytryk (1908-1999) sums up that scarring episode rather convincingly in It’s a Hell of a Life but Not a Bad Living, his autobiography published in 1978 in which he tries to justify his motives. For starters, as he candidly admits, his life had been quite a long roller-coaster ride, with “more ups and downs that a two-bit whore in a lumber camp.”

At 15, to escape hardships and beatings at home, he worked as a studio messenger for Famous Players-Lasky. His first-star encounter happened when he helped Lillian Gish take out a large box of flowers from her car. “But the studio held no glamour to me, and I gave no thought to making films my life work.” Still, he had to earn a living. He soon found a job as a projectionist, then moved up to the editing department, and by 1935 he had directed his first feature, The Hawk, a low budget western shot in five days!

After a stint at Paramount and Columbia, he was hired by RKO where he made eleven movies, including Murder My Sweet in 1944, casting Dick Powell against type as Raymond Chandler’s hard-boiled detective Philip Marlowe. It was the heyday of the B pictures as Dmytryk explains. “To the young and hopeful, they were a school, a laboratory, a stepping-stone, and they were a living. To the older and more tired, they were soul-eroding tripe, dreams turned to nightmares, and they were a living. To the studios, they were grist for their mill, they helped pay the overhead, furnished steady work for the crews and occasionally served as a proving ground for young writers, directors, and especially players.”

Anecdotes abound on most of the films he directed. He recalls having to delay the filming of Raintree County, in May 1956, to give Montgomery Clift enough time to heal after a car accident had left him badly disfigured. “It’s true that he showed signs of physical disintegration over the next few months,” Dmytryk remembers, “but I thought it was due to his excessive drinking and drug indulgence. But he was damaged psychologically too, and he fell apart after we resumed production.” They would collaborate again a year later on The Young Lions. “In his work, he was a genius, the most quickly creative actor I’ve ever met.” On that movie, Marlon Brando proved to be “a great practical joker with an unquenchable penchant for boyish horsing around, his way of testing my own strength and dedication to the picture.”

Initially worried about working with Humphrey Bogart on The Caine Mutiny, because of “his reputation as a drunk and unpleasant character”, Dmytryk was relieved to find someone who “couldn’t have worked harder, stayed more sober or been more cooperative.” Clark Gable was “a director’s dream. Never a moment late, always well-prepared, whose only condition was to stop filming at 5:30 PM.”. Gregory Peck is described as “a conscientious, honest, and hard-working fine talent behind the doggedness he could sometimes project.”  Spencer Tracy, with whom he made two pictures, was “usually a one-take man.” A temperamental Kirk Douglas appeared to “be activated by a tightly coiled spring.” Many more are mentioned: William Holden, Anthony Quinn, John Wayne, Richard Widmark…

Dmytryk initially wondered why Sean Connery agreed to appear in the 1968 western Shalako. “The part did not really seem to suit him as a person or an actor. When I learned that he was getting one million dollars and 100% of the profits from Spain, where he wanted to establish a winter home, I understood.” As for his co-star Brigitte Bardot, “while a pleasant surprise, she had no feel for acting and seemed to take no particular interest in it.” But one day, she told him that “her French directors shot more close-ups of her than I did.” A bit annoyed, he didn’t bother to explain why he opted not to do the same. She never brought up the issue again.

Dealing with Richard Burton on the set of Bluebeard in Budapest proved another trying experience. That February in 1972, “he was often drunk when he arrived at the studio in the morning and always when he left in the afternoon. I was lucky to get in three or four hours with him any given day and the quality was never near his standard.” If that was not enough, the producer Alexander Salkind “demanded to shoot some retakes with more sex and more violence.” Dmytryk obliged, commenting philosophically, “in a film, compromise is a way of life.”

There are many more equally juicy stories in the book, which make for an entertaining page-turner as he details his trials and successes, the challenges of shooting in exotic locations. Describing himself “a journeyman director”, he lucidly assesses his craft and achievements, all in the context of the underpinnings of Tinseltown, capturing the exhilaration and sweep of a long career with flair, humor, and refreshing honesty. “Reminiscence is a habit I am not anxious to acquire,” he concludes, “but as I forced myself to look back over fifty-five years of work in the glamour capital of the world, I found I have few regrets. A career in the movies is a high-risk life. The risk of humiliating failure is too great, and even success brings heartbreak more often than not.” 

Many filmmakers today would certainly agree…