Pete Bogdonavich has taken the play, "The Cat’s Meow" by playwright Steven Peros , to go back in time to add flesh to the bare bones of a rumor that newspaper magnate, William Randolph Hearst shot film pioneer - Thomas Ince - during an offshore party aboard his yacht. The facts state that Ince left Hearst’s yacht under a doctor’s care and died shortly thereafter at home in bed. The official cause of death was attributed to heart failure. There was no investigation and nothing appeared in the newspapers about an incident. Ince was believed to be having an affair with Hearst’s mistress, actress Marion Davies. This supposedly fueled Hearst’s jealousy giving rise to the rumor. What is fact and what is fiction remains as much a mystery today as it was in 1924, but there are those who believe the part about Hearst shooting Ince.

Peter Bogdonavich wanted to make a movie about this piece of Hollywood lore ever since he heard about it from Orson Welles while interviewing him for a book. When he heard about a playwright who had not been sued for libel by the descendants of William Randolph Hearst for dramatizing the rumor as fact, Bogdonavich’s interest took root resulting in Steven Peros adapting his own play for the screen.

Bogdonavich uses this incident to do what he does best - evoke a bygone era with the sights and sounds of the period. Al Jolson’s voice and the music of the Roaring Twenties fill the airwaves. The clothes, the setting, and idle Hollywood gossip are the trimmings that decorate this tale of jealousy, lust, ambition and murder among the rich and famous.

The story starts at the end with Ince’s funeral shot in black and white to give the texture of a newsreel. The cynical remarks of novelist Elinor Glyn (Joanna Lumley) set the tone before flashing back to Hearst’s yacht drenched in the saturated sunlight of the hot California sun.

Guests arrive one by one for a weekend of fun, frolic and Thomas Ince’s birthday - All under the watchful eye of William Randolph Hearst. He peers at them though a looking glass and traces their movements through the peepholes of his cabin. Edward Hermann is an absolute delight turning Hearst into a combination of megalomaniac, party animal and lovesick puppy. He is a control freak running a publishing empire, yet uncontrollable in his passion for Marion. Kirsten Dunst plays the twenty seven year old Marion Davies with enough grace and charm to make you forget that she herself is quite younger. (The real Marion Davies met Hearst around 1917 when she was twenty. She never married anyone until Hearst died in 1951. ) Her Marion is a sympathetic character totally loyal to the man who has given her everything, but not above flirting with other men. She must constantly assure Hearst that she is his and his alone. This does not stop Charlie Chaplin from making advances toward her. Eddie Izzard plays Chaplin as the great womanizer history makes him out to be. He can never take ‘no’ for an answer. Chaplin tells Marion he can give her the one thing Hearst can’t - the chance to be a real star. He wants her in his next picture, "The Gold Rush." It is not to be. Charlie has a reputation for falling in love with his leading ladies and Hearst knows it. Thomas Ince, played with selfless abandon by Cary Elwes, tries to ingratiate himself to Hearst by appealing to his jealous streak. He offers to keep an eye on Chaplin and Marion in the hope of reeling Hearst into a plan to save his sagging career. None of this is lost on the ears of Elinor Glyn and Hearst’s Hollywood columnist, Louella Parsons (Jennifer Tilly). Each has a chance to serve up their own delicious witticisms for the situation. Together, they provide some comedy relief especially during a riotous game of ping pong that neither knows how to play.

Much of the tension in "The Cat’s Meow" is expressed in the dialogue and the reactions of the actors. As Hearst’s jealousy heats up, he stops being fun and Ince becomes more desperate. It’s as if cabin fever made their blood rise to a boil. Yet with all the goings on and all that "The Cat’s Meow" has to offer, the movie feels as distant as the past it attempts to recreate. The documented facts issued in the film’s epilogue following Ince’s funeral make a strong case for the rumor that Hearst did indeed shoot Ince but not necessarily for the imagined events that lead to Ince’s death. Taken at arm’s length, "The Cat’s Meow" may engage the mind but it fails to stir the senses.

Copyright 2002

The one picture that came immediately to mind while watching "The Cat’s Meow"

"The Last of Sheila" (1973) - Directed by Herb Ross and written by Anthony Perkins and Stephen Sondheim, this murder mystery bears a striking similarity to the structure of "The Cat’s Meow." Some of the rich and famous act out a dangerous game of ‘who dunnit’ and why’ on a remote island where one of their own is murdered during the fun. Great brain twister with a killer who gets off (if my memory serves me correctly). The question is ‘Who did do it?’ The all star cast includes James Coburn, James Mason, Richard Benjamin, Raquel Welch, and Dyan Cannon.

A real gem from Peter Bogdonavich that evokes the cinema of the past.

"Nickelodeon" (1976) - This snapshot of the silent era draws its inspiration from the reminisces of some Hollywood’s pioneering directors as told to Peter Bogdonavich before he became a director. Direct quotes from such luminaries as Fritz Lang are turned into dialogue for the likes of Burt Reynolds and Allan Dwan’s tales of the patent wars over the Edison Camera become part of the action. Dwan is most famous for "The Sands of Iwo Jima" with John Wayne. Besides John Ford, Dwan has probably made more movies than other director. With Ryan O’Neal, Tatum O’Neal, John Ritter, Stella Stevens and Brian Keith. Great fun!

Two films that might be of interest after seeing "The Cat’s Meow"

"Chaplin" (1992) - Dir. Richard Attenborough: Robert Downey Jr. gives the best performance of his career as Charlie Chaplin. This is an epic chronicle that traces Chaplin’s life from abject poverty, through his days in the English Music Hall, to international stardom in motion pictures as The Little Tramp. His episodic life is strung together by vignettes with the women who waltz in and out of his life until he marries Oona O’Neil, the daughter of Eugene O’Neil. Geraldine Chaplin, Charlie’s real life daughter by Oona, plays his mother.

"Citizen Kane" (1941) - The Orson Welles masterpiece inspired by the life of William Randolph Hearst about the rise of a newspaper giant, his loves and his obsessions. The building of an opera house for Kane’s mistress parallels Hearst’s creation of Cosmopolitan Pictures to produce star vehicles for his mistress, Marion Davies.