On February 1, 1922, the distinguished silent-film director William
Desmond Taylor was shot to death in his Los Angeles bungalow by an
unknown assailant. Reports of strange activities at the scene of
the crime circulated soon after. When the police arrived, was the
head of Paramount Studios burning a bundle of papers in the
fireplace, and was a well-known actress searching the house for
letters she claimed were hers? Despite a full-scale investigation,
the case was never solved; for sixty years is has remained a
lingering Hollywood scandal. In 1967, more than forty years after
Taylor's death, the great King Vidor, whose directing credits
include Northwest Passage, The Fountainhead, Duel in the Sun, and
War and Peace, determined to solve the mystery, which had haunted
him throughout his career, in order to make a film about it.
Through his intimate knowledge of both the studios and the stars,
he succeeded, where dozens of professional detectives had failed,
in discovering the identity of the murderer. But because his
findings were so explosive, he decided he could never go public and
locked his evidence away. After Vidor's death in 1982, Sidney D.
Kirkpatrick, Vidor's authorized biographer, gained access to the
evidence and reconstructed the amazing story of Taylor's murder and
Vidor's investigation. With a cast of suspects that includes the
actress Mabel Normand, a reputed drug addict; the beautiful
ingenue, Mary Miles Minter; Mary's domineering mother, Charlotte
Shelby; Taylor's homosexual houseman; and Taylor's secretary, who
bore an uncanny resemblance to Taylor's mysteriously elusive
brother, this true crime story has all the elements of a classic
murder mystery. Covered up for more than half a century, the full
story can now be told in all its riveting, shocking detail.
General
Imprint: |
Book Surge Publishing Co.
|
Country of origin: |
United States |
Release date: |
March 2007 |
First published: |
March 2007 |
Authors: |
Sidney D Kirkpatrick
|
Dimensions: |
203 x 133 x 18mm (L x W x T) |
Format: |
Paperback - Trade
|
Pages: |
336 |
ISBN-13: |
978-1-4196-7746-5 |
Categories: |
Books >
Fiction >
True stories >
Crime
Promotions
|
LSN: |
1-4196-7746-2 |
Barcode: |
9781419677465 |
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