“Forgotten Hollywood”- Women Lose an Important Voice!

Posted on June 27, 2012 by raideoman1 | No Comments

Manny P. here…

   Nora Ephron was a prolific scribe of insightful essays, and producer-director of smart films  emphasizing wonderfully comedic romantic analysis and stories. An early influence was her parents, who were both screenwriters. Phoebe and Henry Ephron wrote classic screenplays, such as There’s No Business Like Show Business, the remake of What Price Glory, and Desk Set. Ephron’s folks based a character in the Jimmy Stewart / Sandra Dee movie Take Her, She’s Mine on 22-year-old Nora, and letters she sent home from college.

   Early on, Ephron wrote articles for the New York Post, Esquire, and the New York Times Magazine. Prior to that, she had been an intern in President Kennedy’s White House. In 1976, she married Carl Bernstein (who I met on Sunday).  Her husband and Bob Woodward encouraged her to re-write William Goldman’s screenplay to All the President’s Men. Though it was eventually discarded, the effort led her to Hollywood. Ephron claimed to be among only a few people who knew the identity of Deep Throat, the secret source for stories written by the Washington Post team during Watergate.             NORA EPHRON–>

   Ephron was nominated three times for an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay: Silkwood, When Harry Met Sally, and Sleepless in Seattle (a homage to An Affair to Remember).  Other work included Heartburn (which was based on her volatile marriage to Carl Bernstein), Mixed Nuts, You’ve Got Mail (re-working of The Shop Around the Corner),  the film version of Bewitched, and Julie & Julia. Ephron also produced New York Tribute; a collage of celluloid from Big Apple cinema for the 2002 Academy Awards ceremony. Nora directed many of her own projects brought to the big screen.

   Ephron married Nicholas Pileggi in 1987, a journalist and screenwriter. He wrote Wiseguys. Goodfellas was the movie project based on the book. Pileggi also penned Casino.

   In 1994, she was awarded the Women in Film Crystal Award. Her words provided great characterizations played by Cher, Meg Ryan, Meryl Streep, Amy Adams, and Nicole Kidman. Steve Martin, Tom Hanks, and Billy Crystal were also delighted to work in her productions.

   Recently, she spent much of her day writing a women-related blog for the Huffington Post. On a personal note, the blogger in Julie & Julia was my personal inspiration on the reason why  I currently blog. Yes, she had a sincere impact on guys. Nora once famously surmised:

 So many of the conscious and unconscious ways men and women treat each other have to do with romantic and sexual fantasies that are deeply ingrained, not just in society but in literature. The women’s movement may manage to clean up the mess in society, but I don’t know whether it can ever clean up the mess in our minds.

   Nora Ephron was 71.

~  ~  ~

I’d like to personally thank RED ROOM for selecting this blog I wrote as a recent editor’s pick. RED ROOM is a national writer’s blog site. I’m honored they recognized this most personal of stories I shared… 

It’s my initial accolade from this website! Here’s a link:

http://redroom.com/blogs/all

Until next time>                               “never forget”

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 27th, 2012 at 1:29 am and is filed under Blog by Manny Pacheco. You can follow any comments to this post through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.


Bookmark this post:
Digg Del.icio.us Reddit Furl Google Bookmarks StumbleUpon Windows Live Technorati Yahoo MyWeb



Comments are closed.