Once Upon a Time in Hollywood: A Novel

“Besides, it was Rick who asked to meet Marvin. It’s Rick who wants to extend his leading-man career in feature films rather than playing bad guy du jour on television. And it’s Marvin’s job to explain to him the realities and the possible opportunities of a film industry he doesn’t know shit about. An industry that Marvin is an acknowledged expert in. And in Marvin’s expert opinion, Rick Dalton being like one of the biggest movie stars in the whole wide world is a wonderful opportunity for an agent who places name American talent in Italian motion pictures.”

From Marvin’s perspective, Rick’s marketability as an actor is good news because it means that he has a good chance of being successful in Italian films. However, Marvin doesn’t understand that this news shatters Rick’s dream of becoming a Hollywood movie star.

“Rick composes himself and then says after a gulp of oxygen, ‘It’s just I’ve been doing this over ten years, Mr. Schwarz. And it’s a little hard to sit here after all that time and come face-to-face with what a failure I’ve become. Coming face-to-face with how I ran my career in the ground.’”

Rick confesses to Marvin that he sees his life as a failure. However, Rick knows that he must take responsibility for the way that he burned bridges with executives who may have been able to help him. He let his arrogance get the best of him in his younger days as an actor, and now he realizes that he must face the consequences of these actions.

“‘Mr. Dalton, you’re not the first young actor to land a series and fall under the spell of hubris. In fact, it’s a common ailment out here. And […] [i]t’s forgivable […] But,’ the agent adds, ‘it does require a bit of reinvention.’ ‘What do I hafta reinvent myself as?’ Rick asks. Marvin answers, ‘Somebody humble.’”

Although Marvin doesn’t see Rick’s career as a failure, he understands the irresistible pull of fame for young actors. Rick’s self-hatred preoccupies him for most of the novel, but this interaction foreshadows Rick’s internal conflict and development toward humbling himself enough to accept roles in Italian films.

“While in America—and when I say ‘America’ I mean ‘Hollywood’—a country where its home-front civilians were shielded from the gruesome details of the conflict, their movies remained stubbornly immature and frustratingly committed to the concept of entertainment for the whole family.”

Cliff conflates the country of “America” with the city of “Hollywood” because Hollywood’s projection of the American dream centers on celebrity culture. Cliff feels that Hollywood produces family-friendly films for the sake of its own ratings, not because it has a higher sense of morals.

“To Cliff, who had borne witness to the stark extremities of humanity (like the heads of his Filipino guerrilla brothers stuck on spikes by the occupying Japanese), even the most entertaining actors of his era […] always sounded like actors and reacted to events the way only characters in movies did. There was always a level of artifice to the character that stopped it from being convincing.”

Cliff’s trauma surrounding the war manifests in extreme bitterness and cynicism. However, Cliff doesn’t realize that there are different ways to cope with trauma. Hollywood’s way of coping is to supply comfort to its audiences so that they’ll feel less out of control.

“They always sentimentalized these pieces of shit in Hollywood movies, and it was the phoniest thing Hollywood did. In the real world, these mercenary fuck faces didn’t have a sentimental bone in their body.”

In the context of the quote, Cliff thinks about how Hollywood portrays villains on screen. Its films humanize even the worst villains so that the audience can relate to them. Although Hollywood might over-sentimentalize at times, Cliff doesn’t enjoy seeing that in films because in his experience the only way to rationalize the harm that he saw was to dehumanize his enemy.

“Foreign films, Cliff thought, were more like novels. They didn’t care if you liked the lead characters or not. And Cliff found that intriguing.”

This quote reminds readers that they’re reading a novel and that its lead characters are flawed and may even be unlikeable. Cliff reflects on how he enjoys watching foreign films specifically because the lead characters, in some ways like himself, aren’t likeable. However, they’re compelling because their flaws make them more relatable, more real.

“‘I don’t go to movies to read,’ Rick would tease Cliff about his cinephilia. Cliff would just smile at his boss’s teasing, but he always felt proud of himself for reading subtitles. He felt smarter. He liked expanding his mind.”

This quote presents Rick and Cliff in opposition to each other despite their close friendship. Cliff is a cinephile, or lover of films, and likes to watch movies with subtitles because it exercises his brain, while Rick watches films for enjoyment and relaxation.

“Cliff never wondered what Americans would do if the Russians, or the Nazis […] ever occupied America by force. He knew what Americans would do. They’d shit their pants and call the fucking cops. And when they realized the police not only couldn’t help them but were working on behalf of the occupation, after a brief period of despair, they’d fall in line.”

Cliff’s cynicism has gone so far that he believes that if any conflict took place on US soil, Americans wouldn’t be able to protect themselves. This reveals how Cliff’s individualism has taken hold of him since he doesn’t trust the police or any other authority figure to help anyone.

“The implications of what’s real and what’s a movie interested Cliff. Especially when Cliff thought about it later and realized the implications of Lena’s father’s involvement in the movie.

Wait a minute, so the whole story of Lena’s father isn’t real? Is he her father, or is he just an actor playing the role of her father? And that’s acknowledging that in real life he is an actor playing her father. But is he the movie Lena’s father, or is he an actor playing her father in Vilgot’s movie?”

Cliff loves the idea of deciphering the difference between reality and imagination in movies. This quote ties in with the theme of Reality Versus Fiction because the film Cliff is watching, a Swedish film called I Am Curious (Yellow), incorporates elements from reality so perfectly that he has trouble deciphering what he should be focusing on.

“Now, of course, Rick never did it. There were enough moving parts to this experiment that it was easy for Rick to lose momentum. Where do I buy a pig? How do I clean up all that blood on my pool patio? How do I get that dead pig outta my backyard—she probably weighs a ton? What if the fucking thing bites me? But even though Rick never actually did it, he absolutely contemplated doing it. Which was its own form of calculated cold-blooded murder.”

Rick tries to gain insight into what it’s like to kill a person by talking with Cliff, who suggests that he kill a pig. Rick agrees to this but never follows through with it. Cliff’s extremism regarding authenticity sharply contrasts with Rick’s inability to commit to an extreme act even if it would give him some insight into his character.

“This wasn’t the first time Cliff committed murder and got away with it. The first time was in Cleveland in the fifties. The second time was when Cliff killed his wife two years earlier. This was his third time, and Cliff got away with this one too.”

The text outlines Cliff’s murderous strain to reveal another reason that Cliff has a sense of superiority. Despite his obvious murder of his wife, the authorities didn’t hold him accountable for her death, and he uses this to justify other actions.

“‘Ninety-seven percent of everybody you’ve ever met in your life, and ninety-seven percent of everybody you’ll ever meet in your life, have spent ninety-seven percent of their lives running away from fear. But not you, pretty girl,’ he whispers. ‘You’re walking toward fear. Fear is the point. Without fear, there is no point.’”

Charlie’s words to Debra Jo before she breaks into the Hirshberg house illustrate how Manson brainwashed his followers. By preying on Debra Jo’s desire to be brave, Charlie manipulates her into believing that she must overcome her fear in order to reach spiritual enlightenment.

“She can hear Charlie’s grin in her brain. Then he enters her soul to co-pilot her through the next phase of the kreepy krawl. Now, before you enter the house, squash your ego. Cease to exist. Keep on all fours like the pussycat you are. You ain’t got no more energy than a neighborhood cat exploring’ a house that left a back door open.”

The text further highlights Charlie’s influence over his “Family.” Debra Jo’s brainwashing by Charlie manifests in her hallucination that he can take over her brain and operate her body with his mind.

“Something about Jake Cahill killing three long-haired hippie bad guys with his flamethrower from The Fourteen Fists of McCluskey just seized the imagination. Till pretty soon the whole ghastly night of violence became heavy with symbolic weight—turning Rick, the former TV cowboy, into a folkloric hero of Nixon’s ‘silent majority.’”

This passage highlights the theme of Reality Versus Fiction by revealing how the world tends to equate Rick’s real life with the character he plays on television. The mention of President Nixon’s “silent majority” refers to Nixon’s phrase to describe the portions of America that didn’t align with the hippie subculture. Just as Rick hates the hippie subculture, the “silent majority” gravitate toward the version of Hollywood that celebrates Westerns as symbolic of their own fight against the subculture.

“[I]t wasn’t like anybody was gonna miss Billie Booth […] Did she deserve to be ripped in two? Maybe not. But to say without Billie Booth on this earth the sweet life goes on unabated would be an understatement. Really, only her sister Natalie was upset […] So Cliff carried the guilt, Cliff carried the remorse, and Cliff vowed to do better. What more does society want? The countless numbers of American soldiers he saved by killing Japs were definitely worth one Billie Booth.”

Cliff tries to persuade himself that killing his wife was an accident. He covers his guilt by rationalizing all that he has done for America based on his achievements in the war. The only way Cliff lives with his guilt is by considering the lives of the many American soldiers he saved in the war more valuable than that of his wife.

“They thought Charlie was on a spiritual path to enlightenment. They thought Charlie’s true desire was to pass on that enlightenment […] They believed Charlie had a higher purpose, because he told them he did, and they believed him. It never would have occurred to them that he’d ditch all that horseshit in a minute to put on a Revolutionary war outfit and made places with Mark Lindsay.”

This quote reveals the complete faith and trust that the Manson Family has in Charlie. They believe that he speaks for God and that he has come to bring world peace. However, their trust in him falters when they suspect that his actions may have stemmed from his failed attempt to launch a career in music rather than from a true desire to become a spiritual leader.

“‘Well, he’s not the best anymore […] [i]n fact, far from it. And he’s coming to terms with…’ Rick thinks what’s the right word to describe Easy Breezy’s conundrum. ‘What it’s like to become…uh…slightly more …uh—’ He opens his mouth to say the word ‘useless,’ but the only thing that comes out of his mouth is a loud sob. The sob catches Rick by surprise and gets Mirabella’s attention. He opens his mouth and tries again to say ‘useless,’ but the word sticks in his throat. On his third attempt, he croaks out, ‘Useless—each day,’ followed by a stream of tears that leak out of his eyes and run down his hairy face, folding him up like a jackknife.”

As Rick describes the plot of the novel he’s reading to Trudi, he chokes on the word “useless” because he suddenly realizes how much he relates to Easy Breezy’s situation. Rick doesn’t want to become useless and forgotten, yet his life’s trajectory leaves him feeling worthless in the eyes of Hollywood.

“A year later, the answer to that question would be: because that hitchhiker could murder you. But in February 1969, even people who have something to steal, like Sharon in her cool black Porsche, don’t feel that way.”

The text analyzes the theme of Reality Versus Fiction as the novel explores how different Hollywood could have been had the Manson murders never happened. However, this quote implies a level of fiction too, because Hollywood wasn’t necessarily a blissful utopia before Manson arrived.

“‘It’s only by embracing fear that one conquers one’s self. To conquer fear is to render one unconquerable,’ she says with a satisfied smile on her pretty face.”

Throughout the novel, fear is a subject of exploration. Although the real-life Manson eventually convinced his followers to pointlessly murder people, Debra Jo’s words are a reminder of how easily those followers fell under Charlie’s spell, especially when he offered advice on how to overcome fear.

“But professionals don’t usually drink eight whiskey sours till they pass out drunk, not remembering how they got to bed. Now, some acting professionals do do that. But over the years they’ve learned how to handle it. But those actors (Richard Burton and Richard Harris) are professional drunks. Rick’s still an amateur.”

Rick’s shame surrounding alcohol addiction reveals why he continues to relapse: In his mind, he’s still just an “amateur” drinker, just as he feels that he’s an amateur actor.

“Rick Dalton has no such excuses. His drinking is caused by a three-way combination of self-loathing, self-pity, and boredom.”

The pages surrounding this quote describe how several actors before Rick’s time self-medicated to alleviate post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) by drinking alcohol; alcohol was their only outlet. However, since Rick never fought in the war, he doesn’t have the same “excuse,” which deepens his self-hatred because he thinks his drinking shows internal weakness.

“Then the great Marvin Schwarz goes in for the close: ‘So Rick, here’s the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question. Where do you wanna be this time next year? In Burbank, getting your ass kicked […] on Mod Squad? Or in Rome […] starring in westerns?’”

Marvin’s final pitch to Rick about taking the Italian film jobs finally strikes home at the novel’s end. The question comes full circle from the beginning of the novel, when Marvin asks Rick if he can play the humble actor, to the end of the novel, when Rick swallows his pride and chooses to star in Westerns in Rome instead of staying in Hollywood.