A little late to negotiate

IN Hollywood, even the greats can fall victim to a bad agent.

An undisclosed bidder recently paid $15,000 for a 1943 letter in which future Nobelist William Faulkner complained to a potential Hollywood agent about the current “dope” of one who had committed him to a seven-year contract with Warner Bros. studio paying $400 a week -- less than Faulkner made when he first tested the Hollywood waters in 1932.

The letter was part of a small passel auctioned off by the estate of H.N. “Swannie” Swanson, one of Hollywood’s earliest agents for screenwriters.

The auction, conducted by Bonhams & Butterfields, also sold off a letter from F. Scott Fitzgerald, another novelist-turned-screenwriter, apologizing for “a lot of swearing & shouting” in a telephone call the day after MGM Studios fired him in 1939, and letters from James M. Cain and Raymond Chandler.

But the tone of the Faulkner was particularly striking as the Mississippi writer, who had already written “The Sound and the Fury,” “As I Lay Dying” and “Go Down, Moses,” was still struggling to make a living as a writer, and like many before and after, turned to Hollywood for economic salvation.

“It’s funny that Faulkner, who went on to win the Nobel prize, made the same mistake as every other screenwriter who comes to Hollywood and says yes to everybody and gets into a pickle,” said Catherine Williamson, Bonhams & Butterfields’ director of fine books and manuscripts in Los Angeles. “Unlike everybody else, he tries to stand by his word. He stays with the lousy agent who got him the lousy gig.”

The series of Faulkner and Fitzgerald letters sold for a combined $100,000, Williamson said.