Hollywood Story (1951): Loosely Based on Director William Desmond Taylor’s Murder 100 Years Ago Today

Hollywood Story is loosely based on the real-life murder of William Desmond Taylor, which remains an unsolved case to this day. Taylor was a silent film director who was found shot inside his Los Angeles bungalow on February 2, 1922—exactly 100 years ago. Hollywood Story is a fictionalized account released in 1951, but it incorporates some details of Taylor’s murder. The film’s release was just under thirty years after Taylor’s death, so many in the film industry would likely have had some memory of the murder and the subsequent investigation, too. Hollywood Story also features several actors from the silent film era who would have been aware of the story and resulting scandals. The film was Universal’s answer to Paramount’s release of Sunset Boulevard, a noir story starring silent film star Gloria Swanson (and featuring better production values). Sunset Boulevard was released a little less than a year prior to the release of Hollywood Story.

For more information on the real-life murder of William Desmond Taylor, click on any one of the following sources:

◊ Photo Friends (of the Los Angeles Public Library)

◊ Wikipedia

◊ Classic Hollywood Bios (by Dina Di Mambro)

Several details about Hollywood Story were intriguing enough to induce me to see it—and I mean besides the fact that it is a film noir based on true events. Richard Conte stars in the leading role of Larry O’Brien, and Conte is another one of my noir favorites. He is in several great films noir, including House of Strangers and New York Confidential. In Hollywood Story, he plays a film director, one of the few characters without any direct connection to the murder of another film director in the story, Frank Ferrara. So Richard Conte’s character isn’t the murderer or a criminal: These are the types of characters I’m used to seeing Conte play. But he is just as convincing as a film director investigating the facts of the story he hopes to put on film.

(This article about Hollywood Story contains spoilers.)

Hollywood Story starts with murder: a shot of a bungalow on a movie set. A piano plays without a pianist, an eerie sight until its piano music roll is revealed. Then a gun held by a gloved hand aims right for the camera, that is, the audience. The gun fires and the camera cuts to a man, Franklin Ferrara, slumping to the floor of the bungalow. On the big screens that were the norm in movie theaters in 1951, the shot of the gun firing must have been an impressive opening for the film. Mitch Davis then introduces himself in voice-over narration, which continues on and off throughout the film. Davis’s narration adds to the mystery on first viewing because he isn’t the main protagonist and it isn’t clear until the end how he could have known so many of the details of what was really Larry O’Brien’s story.

Richard Conte is Larry O’Brien, who wants to come to Los Angeles for his next film. With the help of his friend Mitch Davis, he sets up operation at National Artists Studio, the same studio lot where Franklin Ferrara worked and was killed on January 5, 1929. The studio lot had been vacant since Ferrara’s death, until O’Brien sets up his own office in the very same bungalow where Ferrara was shot. When O’Brien hears about Ferrara’s murder, he decides that his next film will be about the murder. Mitch Davis tries to talk him out of it, but O’Brien cannot be dissuaded.

O’Brien’s research, preparation, and hiring for his film and the research of the events leading up to Ferrara’s murder make an interesting premise for Hollywood Story, especially because O’Brien never gets around to starting the film. He solves Ferrara’s murder, but viewers never learn if he starts production and completes a film for release. During the film’s narrative, O’Brien researches the Ferrara family and Franklin Ferrara in particular. He goes to the archives at the Los Angeles Times; the police department; and Ferrara’s home, which has been empty since his death, like his studio offices. O’Brien decides to hire Vincent St. Clair, the very same writer who wrote many of the screenplays for Ferrara’s films.

One night, when Larry O’Brien is working late, Sally Rousseau drops by to convince him not to produce a movie about Ferrara’s death. Her mother, Amanda, worked with Ferrara, and she doesn’t want her mother’s name to be dragged through the mud once again. Sally Rousseau leaves when Larry gets a phone call; she can already see that he won’t change his mind about his plans. While Larry is on the phone, someone takes a shot at him through the same bungalow window that the murderer used to shoot Ferrara. Even attempted murder won’t discourage O’Brien; in fact, he runs out of the bungalow to see if he can find the shooter himself.

This same kind of determination keeps O’Brien motivated to research his film and continue investigating Ferrara’s murder. Many of the people who agree to work on his film knew Frank Ferrara, and it isn’t hard for O’Brien to mix film production work and murder investigation. He decides that he needs to know who shot Ferrara in order to have a satisfying conclusion to his own film. One of the people he questions is his own business partner, Sam Collyer. Collyer admits that it was his gun that killed Ferrara, but he wasn’t the one that fired it. He also admits that he was the one who found Ferrara’s body, and he found the medallion that was in Ferrara’s hand, which turns out to be a vital clue. Collyer decided not to report it because he thought there was too much evidence incriminating him. Collyer shows the medallion to O’Brien, and the medallion is what solves the case for O’Brien.

Film work and murder investigation aren’t the only things on O’Brien’s mind. He manages to fall in love with Sally Rousseau, too. Hollywood Story comes to a satisfying conclusion on the murder and romance fronts. Larry O’Brien solves Frank Ferrara’s murder because of all his hard work researching his film. Sally Rousseau returns his affections after overcoming her original opposition to his plans to dredge up the past on a scandalous murder that involves her mother.

Richard Conte’s leading role of Larry O’Brien is a bit different for the actor, but his role is not that different for a film noir. Larry O’Brien may be a film director researching the story for his next film, but because that film is based on a murder from the silent era, his research becomes more and more like detective work. O’Brien may not take on the label of detective; no one calls him that in the film, and the police have no intention of letting him take over a murder case. In fact, Police Lieutenant Bud Lennox appears from time to time to follow up on his own leads and to make sure O’Brien knows who is boss, so to speak. But Larry O’Brien certainly acts like a detective.

I have read several online articles about the circumstances surrounding William Desmond Taylor’s murder and the subsequent investigation, and it seems to me that the opening of Hollywood Story is really the only part that bears a strong similarity to historical fact. Viewers don’t get to see on-screen much of Larry O’Brien’s investigation, but they do learn that he finds a lot of answers once he starts digging into Ferrara’s life. Because Taylor’s murder has not been solved, viewers know that there remain more questions than answers in the real-life historical murder.

While it’s important not to expect any historical accuracy for Hollywood Story, that shouldn’t detract from enjoyment of the narrative. It is still fun to see Richard Conte in one of his most sympathetic roles. The film ends on a satisfying and positive note for a film noir: The fictional murder is solved; the two leads are in love. But the ending is not based on fact. As I already mentioned, William Desmond Taylor’s murder has never been solved.

June 1, 1951, release date  •  Directed by William Castle  •  Screenplay by Frederick Brady, Frederick Kohner  •  Based on a story by Frederick Brady, Frederick Kohner  •  Music by Joseph Gershenson  •  Edited by Virgil Vogel  •  Cinematography by Carl E. Guthrie

Richard Conte as Larry O’Brien  •  Julie Adams as Sally Rousseau/Amanda Rousseau  •  Richard Egan as Police Lieutenant Bud Lennox  •  Henry Hull as Vincent St. Clair  •  Fred Clark as Sam Collyer  •  Jim Backus as Mitch Davis  •  Houseley Stevenson as John Miller  •  Paul Cavanagh as Roland Paul  •  Katherine Meskill as Mary  •  Louis Lettieri as Jimmy Davis  •  Francis X. Bushman as himself  •  Betty Blythe as herself  •  William Farnum as himself  •  Helen Gibson as herself  •  Joel McCrea as himself

Distributed by Universal-International  •  Produced by Universal-International