Volume 56, Number 5 · March 26, 2009
The Hollywood Kennedy
By David Ansen
In response to Norman Mailer: 'Deer Park' Letters (February 26, 2009)
To the Editors:
In Norman Mailer's letter to Vance Bourjaily [NYR, February 26] he writes, "That's why I envied [Irving] Schulman and Kennedy" and a footnote next to Kennedy's name says "unknown."
I'm quite certain he's referring to Jay Richard Kennedy, whose best-selling inside Hollywood novel Prince Bart: A Novel of Our Times was published in 1953. Kennedy (not his real name: he was a New York Jew of Maileresque pretentions who was quite active in politics among other things) was a novelist, screenwriter (I'll Cry Tomorrow is his best-known work), and producer, and it makes sense that his insider's knowledge would be what Mailer was referencing in this letter. They may well have known each other, but this I don't know for sure.
David Ansen
Los Angeles, California