Library Privileges

When I produced the re-edit of “Touch of Evil” a few years ago, I had the privilege of using the research library at Universal (“A Collection Gets Shelved,” by Amy Wallace, March 5). This wonderful resource was able to give me invaluable help in my research. Their help in putting together material in regard to Orson Welles and “Touch of Evil” led me to some major discoveries that greatly aided the academic accuracy that I needed. The staff that helped me was as professional and educated as any I have ever encountered.

I am greatly saddened by the loss of this historic and deeply important asset to our film community.

RICK SCHMIDLIN

Los Angeles

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The Universal Studios Research Library’s importance to filmmakers outweighs its position on the corporate bottom line. In “The Hollywood History of the World,” George MacDonald Fraser commends studio research departments for the accuracy with which they have depicted the past, when filmmakers followed the research. Did any Seagram bottom-liner stop to calculate the additional production costs in time and effort as well as phone and fax charges of doing that kind of research for each individual project?

No doubt some computer nerd will wonder why all this information can’t be digitized and placed in a database. While it is being done for information sharing, digital techniques for archival purposes are still questionable because of constant changes in hardware and media stability. Digitizing material means converting it into streams of zeros and ones that may not be reconvertible by future technology. Thus, unless the original material is also preserved, it risks being lost for all time.

RICK MITCHELL

Los Angeles

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In 1979, I was working at Universal as a makeup artist. In typical fashion of the time, I was told I was being sent to Hawaii in two days to do a TV movie. The program had a sequence that included a flashback to the 1940s and a famous rape-murder trial with Clarence Darrow as defense attorney. The producers were adamant that we get the right look for him and the period.

Since I was already working on another show at the studio, I did not have time to run to the local library and spend hours doing research. On my lunch hour, I went to Universal’s research library and told them what I needed. Later that day, I had Xeroxes of pictures from the trial and of Darrow. The producers thought I was a genius. But it was those hard-working folks in the library that made me (and others over the years) look so good.

Why doesn’t the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences try to buy the library and charge a fee to anyone to use the services? Or better yet, why doesn’t Universal donate it to them? They can get a tax write-off and be serving the industry as a whole. Guess that only happens in Frank Capra films.

MICHAEL F. BLAKE

Studio City