The whole town runs on book reports.”īut THR, suspecting that’s painting with too broad a brush, and aware that many usually busy people had some time on their hands during the first simultaneous strike of actors and writers in 63 years, reached out to hundreds of distinguished members of the global film community and asked them to share their picks for the greatest books related to film - autobiographies, biographies, novels, how-to, making-of and every other sort - factoring in quality, impact and influence. They get their assistants to read things and then summarize them. Meanwhile, 2023 awards contender American Fiction includes the laugh line, “Nobody in Hollywood reads. “Millions to be grabbed out here and your only competition is idiots,” Herman Mankiewicz telegrammed Ben Hecht upon his arrival out West in 1926.
There has long been an assumption that people in the movie business - and Hollywood specifically - aren’t exactly well read.
