Badass Writer of the Week: Frances Marion

Frances Marion

By Sean Tuohy

Have you ever encountered someone who has done so much in such a short time that you feel lazy and useless? That’s how I felt once I found about Frances Marion, one of the most successful screenwriters of all time. Marion was also a combat journalist, author, and playwright. She is credited with more than 130 scripts during the 1920s and 1930s. It takes a village to produce the Badass Writer of the Week post. Think about that.

Marion, born as Marion Benson Owners in California to a divorced couple, was known as a kid who did her own thing. At 10 years old, she was kicked out of school for drawing a “mean” cartoon strip about her teacher. At 16 years old, she went to art school and did, well, art school stuff. Marion became a combat reporter after the outbreak of World War I. You read that correctly, folks. She charged into battle armed with a notepad. As bombs fell from the sky and machine gun fire sliced through the air, Marion was reporting about the war.

After the war, Marion found herself in Los Angeles and was approached by a director to be an actress. Marion was a looker, so she became a hot-item actress for the booming film industry. However, she felt more at easy behind the camera. Hang on a second. If I were told I was good looking by someone in the field I wanted to pursue, my response wouldn’t be, “Eh, thanks, but I’ll just chill back here.” Just saying.

Anyway, Hollywood never won Marion over. She could really care less about the glitz and glamour of the city. For her, the city was just a place to earn a paycheck. Marion became the most in-demand screenwriter in Hollywood during the 1920s and 1930s. Every producer, actor, and director wanted to get her to pen a movie for them. “Anna Christie” was one of her most well-known works and was the highest grossing feature of 1930. The film also introduced Greta Garbo's voice to the world, so there’s that.

Nearly every movie Marion wrote became a blockbuster hit. In 1930, Marion was the first woman to win Best Original Screenplay at the Academy Awards for her script for “The Big House.” We all assume that Marion, with her distain for Hollywood, simply looked at the Oscar and then tossed it in the trash with a weak shrug of the shoulders. Marion ended up winning two Oscars in her career, another first in Hollywood.

By the 1940s, Marion grew bored with Hollywood and decided to leave. Also, she had made a ton of money and no longer needed the city. At the height of her career, Marion was pulling in $3,000 a week. Sounds good, right? Well, if you adjust for inflation, that total skyrockets to $40,648.08 in 2014. That’s nearly $2 million a year. That’s a lot of cabbage to walk away from.

Marion went on to work on stage plays and books. She passed away in 1972, a year after publishing her tell-all book about her time in Hollywood.

Throughout her life, Marion did what she wanted to do. She didn’t really care about anything else. Money, fame, respect, whatever. She just wanted to tell a damn good story and folks, that is what she did.

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Badass Writer of the Week: Nora Ephron

"Above all, be the heroine of your life, not the victim." Nora Ephron 1941-2012

By Stephanie Schaefer

Yes, you read that headline right. If you think all badasses have to shoot guns, frequent boot camps, and stab people in prison, think again. Feminist, humorist, and the first lady of romantic comedies Nora Ephron didn't need to do any of that to be legendary—all she had to do was smash through a few glass ceilings with her high heels.

What makes Nora Ephron badass, you ask? For starters, without her men wouldn’t know what it sounds like when women fake an orgasm, Tom Hanks may have never been such a successful actor, and, most of all, countless hopeless romantics worldwide wouldn’t believe in happily ever afters. Not to mention, when she was an intern for the White House during the Kennedy Era, Ephron once saved Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn from a men’s room in which he had accidentally locked himself in. Now that’s badass (and so anti “damsel-in-distress”)!

Fresh off her stint in D.C., Wellesley-educated Ephron began her longstanding career in New York City in the 1960s. Although her first job was as a mail girl at Newsweek, she eventually rose to become a literary Renaissance woman, finding success in journalism, screenwriting, directing, producing and beyond, in spite of the fact these realms were male-dominated. After publishing a series of well-read essays, Ephron gained fame with her Academy Award-nominated screenplays “Silkwood” and the legendary romantic comedy “When Harry Met Sally.”

In the early 90’s Ephron stepped up to the director’s chair for the hit romance “Sleepless in Seattle,” which garnered $120 million at the box office and once again proved her feminine power. Success continued later in the decade when she reunited Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks for my personal favorite chick-flick, “You’ve Got Mail,” a heartwarming take on dating in the digital age (Ask Daniel Ford about how much he loves this movie. He’ll talk your ear off and do lousy Tom Hanks impressions). Even in her late 60s she continued to produce high-quality work, writing and directing "Julie & Julia,” a light-hearted film that depicts the life of another fierce female: culinary master Julia Child.

“To state the obvious, romantic comedies have to be funny and they have to be romantic,” Ephron said in an interview. “But one of the most important things, for me anyway, is that they be about two strong people finding their way to love.”

We can credit Ephron with transforming the way females are portrayed on film. During her reign, attractive women were no longer confined to play the quintessential over-sexed “Bond Girl,” but grew into multi-dimensional characters attempting to navigate their careers and love lives with honesty and humor. Essentially, her works challenged industry executives who, according to Cate Blanchett’s recent Academy Award acceptance speech, “foolishly cling to the idea that female films with women at the center are niche experiences.”

Her films were romantic, but Ephron stayed away from clichés and depicted heroines who were not only independent and hardworking but also sensitive and capable of expressing an array of emotions—anger, love, sensuality, and everything in between. “I try to write parts for women that are as complicated and interesting as women actually are,” she said. Ultimately, she proved that women don’t have to abandon their true selves to be “badass.”

From “I’ll have what she’s having,” to “I wanted it to be you,” Ephron’s famous lines remain etched in pop-culture stone, unable to be erased with each passing year and every male-dominated superhero blockbuster that has followed her 2012 death. Although female screenwriters that walk in her footsteps may have big shoes to fill, Ephron’s legacy proves that you can still be successful—in Hollywood and beyond—even if your footwear choice is high heels.

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