From the Secret Lives Archives, here are some more strange and fascinating facts about another one of the world’s greatest filmmakers, brought to you by Robert Schnakenberg:
Peter Bogdanovich
July 30, 1939-
Nationality: American
Astrological Sign: Leo
Major Films: The Last Picture Show (1971), Paper Moon (1973)
Words of Wisdom: “They’re all so jealous in Hollywood. It’s not enough to have a hit. Your best friend should also have a failure.”
Queer Old Dad
Bogdanovich’s father Borislav was a mercurial Serbian artist with a long list of eccentric affectations. He almost never spoke, refused to let anyone touch his hair, and padded around the family’s New York City apartment in paint-spattered pajamas and a hat from which he had cut off the top half “for ventilation.”
Giddy Up!
Bogdanovich had an inflated opinion of his place in movie history. He insisted on directing many of the scenes in his 1976 stinker Nickelodeon on horseback. When asked why, he responded “Because that’s the way John Ford did it.” The film’s producer Irwin Winkler later called Bogdanovich “easily the most arrogant person I’d ever met in the business, before or since.”
His Angel in the Centerfold
Welsh actor Roger Rees played a thinly-veiled Bogdanovich—renamed “Aram Nicholas” for legal reasons—in the 1983 film Star 80. The film chronicles the short life and brutal murder of 20-year-old Playboy Playmate Dorothy Stratten, with whom Bogdanovich conducted a torrid extramarital affair. “I don’t want her for her tits and ass. I want someone who can act!” the horny 40-year-old director exulted shortly after meeting Stratten at a roller disco party in October of 1979. But the movie that Bogdanovich cast Stratten in—1981’s They All Laughed—bombed at the box office, in part due to the bad publicity surrounding Stratten’s death at the hand of her jealous husband and the lingering odor of Bogdanovich’s involvement.
My Bad
They All Laughed wasn’t even Bogdanovich’s biggest turkey. His misbegotten 1975 musical At Long Last Love so appalled audiences it was actually yanked from theaters due to anemic ticket sales. A mortified Bogdanovich felt compelled to write an open letter to America’s moviegoers apologizing for the poor quality of the film.
Visit Schnakworld for more intriguing and at times disturbing info about famous filmmakers.
