Return Of The Thin Man Part 1

RETURN.

OF THE.

THIN MAN.

DAs.h.i.+ELL HAMMETT.

Introduction.

Das.h.i.+ell Hammett's original screen stories for After the Thin Man and Another Thin Man, the second and third of the six movies in the Thin Man series starring William Powell and Myrna Loy, are the last long pieces of fiction Hammett ever wrote. He completed those stories in 1935 and 1938, respectively, when he was at the peak of his power as a writer and his authority as a literary figure. By 1934, in the s.p.a.ce of four years, he had completed The Maltese Falcon, The Gla.s.s Key, and The Thin Man. He was hailed internationally as a literary celebrity and, while he responded with a celebrity's flamboyance, he was regarded by his peers as among the most accomplished American writers of his generation. He had the wit to be entertaining, the confidence to be irreverent, and the talent to satisfy not only the book-buying but the moviegoing audiences. He was a valuable commodity to MGM, which had an unexpected hit with its more or less faithful movie adaptation of The Thin Man in 1934, and it allowed him the extraordinary leeway afforded a stylish moneymaker. Hunt Stromberg may have been the producer, but he needed Hammett to make the particular kind of films the early Thin Man movies were. In a November 11, 1934, interview movie critic Philip K. Scheuer asked Hammett what the formula was for a successful mystery comedy. Hammett replied, "There is no formula." So he created one.

By 1934 Hammett was well known in Hollywood. He excelled at the tight, intriguing plots and sharp dialogue that moviemakers desperately sought in the early days of talkies. He had written original stories for Republic Studios, Paramount, Warner Brothers, and Howard Hughes's Caddo Company, and four of his novels had been optioned by major studios. He was prized for his ability to write authentic, witty dialogue and for his talent as a scenarist. He was able to command top dollar as a screenwriter, the only caveat being that he was unreliable and personally undisciplined. He was an alcoholic: when he applied himself, he was first-rate; when he was drinking, he was lazy and uncooperative. Beginning with The Thin Man Hammett took a pioneering approach to the crime novel by mixing comedy with intrigue, social fiction with crime fiction, and a hedonistic hero with a disciplined professional detective. That formula paid off handsomely for him even as the financial fortunes of the nation were crumbling. Hammett got a star's billing at the beginning-in important respects, he was Nick Charles-and MGM made him a rich man. It took Hammett to capture that character, and William Powell acted the part flawlessly.

Hammett's fifth, last, and most commercially successful novel, The Thin Man, was published on January 8, 1934. Two weeks later, he wrote his wife: "The book is going swell. It got very fine reviews-as you can see from the enclosed clippings-and last week sold better than any other book in New York, Philadelphia, and San Francisco, besides being near the top of the list in most other cities.

"Second, MGM is buying the movie rights for $21,000, which is $4,000 less than Paramount paid for The Gla.s.s Key, but a pretty good price this year at that."

Indeed. It was the worst year of the Depression, and $21,000 was the equivalent of some $350,000 in present-day money.

In fact the Los Angeles Times reported that MGM, acting on the advice offered by Alexander Woollcott on his radio program, purchased movie rights eight days after the book was published. The studio set a budget of $250,000 for the first movie and a.s.signed it to director W. S. Van d.y.k.e, known as "one-shot Woody" for his efficiency in managing production budgets, suggesting that the studio had moderate expectations for the movie's success. They were wrong. The Thin Man, starring William Powell, Myrna Loy, and the wire fox terrier Asta, was released on May 25, 1934, to rave reviews (having been shot in sixteen days, according to The Hollywood Reporter). The National Board of Review named it one of the top ten movies of the year. More important, it was also one of the top ten moneymakers of 1934 and won four Academy Award nominations: Best Picture, Best Adapted Screenplay (Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich), Best Director (Van d.y.k.e), and Best Actor (William Powell). The Thin Man was regarded as the prototype for a new type of crime movie, softening the subject matter with witty comedy and romance. Van d.y.k.e thought its success came from the depiction of a happily married couple, a strange oversimplification of Hammett's achievement in creating Nick and Nora Charles. Hammett commented: "They made a pretty funny picture out of it and it seems to be doing good business wherever it is shown." The Thin Man begged for a sequel.

Immediately after The Thin Man was released, producer Hunt Stromberg began thinking about a second Nick and Nora Charles movie. On August 29, 1934, he dictated his thoughts: "The treatment that we can give Nick and Nora is so plentiful that it will be comparatively easy to write the intimate story as soon as we get the crime element. Maybe we would want Nick to be dragged into a case that happens in San Francisco. I personally favor the New York idea, however, because it would give us the opportunity to bring back all those swell characters of the original-and there would be a large amount of humor in any idea that would demand Nick's presence back in New York. . . . The main object of this second crime element is to make it even more mysterious and ingenious than the first, for the millions who have seen The Thin Man will be smarter now in spotting suspects or guilty ones than they were in the first picture. . . . I'm not being any too clear, but we will discuss it later." It is clear enough that Stromberg needed help.

Late in September the Culver City office of MGM wrote to the New York office asking that they contact Hammett, who was on the East Coast at the time, to negotiate a contract for a sequel to The Thin Man. On October 1, New York replied that Hammett was inaccessible-he was moving between Florida and various stopping places in Manhattan-and that in any event it would not be possible to get any work from him. On October 19, Louis B. Mayer wrote from New York warning that Hammett suffered from "irregular habits." Nonetheless, on October 23, 1934, Hammett signed an agreement with MGM that stipulated, in part: You are to leave for our Studios at Culver City, California, either October 24th or 25th, 1934. We will furnish you railroad transportation and compartment.

On arrival at our Studios you will begin writing for us, under our supervision and in accordance with our suggestions, a full and complete original story, which will be a sequel to The Thin Man and its characters and action previously written by you, and of substantially the same length, and will continue your services to us until such story is fully completed by you and accepted by us. You will comply with reasonable studio regulations while so employed by us.

For these services we will pay you at the rate of two thousand dollars ($2,000) weekly for each week (but not in excess of ten weeks) you so fully perform such services for us.

Hammett left the next day for Los Angeles, where he took a suite at the Beverly Wils.h.i.+re Hotel and began work the following Monday, the twenty-eighth. That evening he wrote to his confidante Lillian h.e.l.lman: "And so pa.s.sed the first day laboring in the picture-galleries. I think it's going to be all right. I like the people thus far, and I have a comfortable office."

Two days later he wrote h.e.l.lman again: "After the party [at Herbert Asbury's house] broke up Mrs. Joel Sayre and I did a little town roaming until nearly 5 this a.m., but I was up at 10 and so to work on my Thin Man sequel, but still without the exact murder hookup I want." And so it went. Writing on November 1: "I took Thyra [Samter Winslow, a Hollywood writer] to dinner last night and so I got very-not to say disgracefully-drunk . . . and so home at what hour I don't know and too hungovery to go to the studio today." Four days later: I went back on the booze pretty heavily until Sat.u.r.day night-neglecting studio, dignity, and so on. And I was sick Sunday and today! This morning I showed up at M.G.M. for the first time since last Tuesday and squared myself, but didn't get much work done, since the publicity department took up most of my time, what with photographs, interviews and the like.

"I'm still surprised at the fuss The Thin Man made out here. People bring the Joan Crawfords and Gables over to meet me instead of the usual vice versa. Hot-cha!

On November 26: "I'm off for another crack at the thinmansequel, on which I'm pretty cold at the time, but will probably be highpressured by Hunt Stromberg into the wildest enthusiasm before long."

Despite the drinking and carousing, Hammett managed to complete the first draft for After the Thin Man: Thin Man Sequel on January 8, 1935, on time-ten weeks after he had signed his contract. He promptly left Hollywood for New York. He had impressed his bosses with a first-rate screen story and his punctuality.

On June 19, 1935, MGM called him back into service, this time with the t.i.tle of "motion picture executive." His contract stipulated: "Your services hereunder shall include, but not be limited to, such services as we may require of you as a general editorial aide and/or as an a.s.sistant and/or advisor not only in connection with the preparation of stories and/or continuities, but as well in connection with the actual production of photoplays. You agree to attend conferences and a.s.sist in the preparation and/or developing of ideas which may be submitted or contributed by us or others." The new agreement further stipulated that if Hammett was required to "write the complete continuity including dialogue for any photoplay" then during that period he would earn $1,750 per week. That was Depression money, the present-day equivalent of some $29,000 (using the scale of increase in the consumer price index). The next week Hammett wrote to his publisher Alfred Knopf (whom, by contract, he owed a sixth novel): "If you've anything coming out that looks like picture stuff, you might shoot it to me, as we are hunting for some material." In November Hammett signed a contract to adapt the proletarian novel The Foundry by Albert Halper for the screen for $5,000. That interest is the earliest indication of Hammett's active pursuit of the political agenda of the Communist Party USA.

Meanwhile, he completed his screen story for After the Thin Man, dated September 17, 1935, and promptly called, then wrote, Lillian h.e.l.lman: "After I called you I took a drink of Scotch, the first I've had since when was it?" It was a drunken letter, marking another long alcoholic binge. That fall Hammett was back and forth between Los Angeles and New York, partying and womanizing as if he were enjoying his last pleasures. Very nearly he was. Early in January 1936, he collapsed while traveling to New York and on January 17 he entered a private pavilion at Lenox Hill Hospital in Manhattan to be treated for gonorrhea, alcoholism, and exhaustion. He stayed on the East Coast, in Manhattan, Tavern Island, and Princeton, recuperating for the rest of the year, and so was not present at story conferences as Stromberg and the respected married team of Albert Hackett and Frances Goodrich, who had written the first Thin Man movie script, developed the screenplay for After the Thin Man.

After the Thin Man was produced between late September and October 31, 1936. Van d.y.k.e directed, and William Powell and Myrna Loy starred again, as they did in all of the Thin Man movies; the tyro Jimmy Stewart was a featured actor. (Stewart appeared in nine movies made in 1936, his first full year as a movie actor.) The Hollywood Reporter revealed that the studio planned to feature Hammett in a small role in After the Thin Man, but he was recovering in New York during the filming and thus unavailable.

Hammett's screen story, punctuated with drinking and packed with s.e.xual innuendo, was guaranteed to annoy Joseph I. Breen, head of the Production Code Administration, an arm of the Motion Picture Producers and Distributors of America, established in 1934 to enforce the industry's code of moral decency for movies. Breen was a prig, and it is not hard to imagine that Hammett's stories were often calculated to irritate him and other censors. Despite Breen's objection that "Throughout the story, there is an excessive amount of drinking, sufficient to const.i.tute a violation of the special regulation governing drinking," booze remained integral to Nick and Nora Charles's characters, and there is plenty of playful s.e.xuality. But it was up to Stromberg and the Hacketts to sanitize Hammett's story. He had little interest in the final script.

After the Thin Man was released on Christmas Day, 1936, and reviews were excellent. Writing in The New York Times on Christmas Day, Frank Nugent said, "If After the Thin Man is not quite the delight The Thin Man was, it is, at the very least, one of the most urbane comedies of the season. . . . Sequels commonly are disappointing and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer was borrowing trouble when it dared advance a companion piece to one of the best pictures of 1934. But Das.h.i.+ell Hammett's sense of humor has endured." Louella Parsons in the Los Angeles Examiner called it "a great feather in Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer's cap." When the movie opened, Hammett was in Princeton, New Jersey. He wrote h.e.l.lman five days later: "Powell I hear is fighting with MGM over a new contract, holding out for $200,000 a picture. MGM's recent statement that there will be no more sequels to The Thin Man, no matter how well this one does, is, I suppose, just a piece of iron pipe to slug him with."

"This one" did very well, almost as well as the first, bringing MGM a seven-figure profit in a Depression economy, and MGM needed Hammett as much as it needed Powell, Loy, and Asta for another sequel. Hammett stayed in Princeton until March 15, 1937, and when he left, he went on the wagon. He wrote h.e.l.lman that Bea Kaufmann, Goldwyn's East Coast story editor, had asked him to do an original movie story, "which as you know I have no intention of doing. . . . By this time everybody ought to know that if I want to work in pictures I'll work with Hunt Stromberg, but even Leland Hayward [Hammett's agent] agrees with me-against his pocketbook-that I've got no business working in pictures at all." Hammett seems to have decided to leave Hollywood behind in February 1937 when he sold MGM all rights in perpetuity to Nick and Nora Charles and Asta for $40,000 (about $625,000 in 2011 dollars). He later wrote: "Maybe there are better writers in the world but n.o.body ever invented a more insufferably smug pair of characters. They can't take that away from me, even for $40,000."

Denials aside, Hammett was back in Hollywood at the Beverly Wils.h.i.+re by September 1937, partying heavily, though, by his own testimony, soberly. He energetically served on the board of directors for the Screen Writers Guild (SWG), the writers' collective bargaining organization-vigorously opposed by the studios, particularly MGM-which sought to strengthen the rights of screenwriters in the movie business. Hammett's work for the SWG, combined with his erratic personal behavior, infuriated those in the front office at MGM. But The Thin Man movies were making MGM millions, and Hammett had strong advocates in Stromberg and his friends the Hacketts. (Oddly, MGM maintained interest in The Foundry, a Marxist novel about labor disputes among the workers at a Chicago electrotype foundry that ends with the workers realizing "the dumb thick wonder of their labor," and gave the screenplay a.s.signment to Noel Langley, who two years later collaborated on the screenplay for The Wizard of Oz. Presumably no one in the front office at MGM had read Halper.) On December 26, Hammett wrote h.e.l.lman that he was "in the middle of the usual so-the-script-is-done battles with my own dear producer, who insists that it's all right, but it's not exactly like the two previous scripts. The Hacketts sit on the sidelines and tremble while Hunt and I pace the floor and yell at one another. My latest line of attack is to point out that since he doesn't seem to know what was good and what bad in the two previous pictures they were so far as he is concerned just lucky flukes. It's good clean fun and can't lead to anything more serious than blows." On January 15, 1938 he wrote h.e.l.lman that it was his "tenth month without a drink."

By May, Hammett had a screen story and he had come to a parting of the ways with MGM. On May 12, he wrote to h.e.l.lman, "MGM and I are still at odds over the price of the new story. So I told my agent to say goodbye to Hunt for me and begin talking to Dave Selznick and maybe Sam the Good [both independent producers, at Selznick International and Samuel Goldwyn Productions, respectively]. Some little technicality about $5,000 I owe the studio on the Foundry deal a couple of years ago is holding up my check, but I dare say that will be straightened out in a day or two." Presumably the matter was resolved the next day, the date on the typescript for his Another Thin Man screen story. Hammett was paid a total of $35,000 for the job-$5,000 for the synopsis, $10,000 for the story idea, and $20,000 for the complete story. And the day after that, Hammett fell off the wagon hard. He had been growing progressively sicker and weaker since he had been in Hollywood last, and by late spring he became reclusive. He took to his bed, fearing he was losing his sanity. The Hacketts, alarmed at his insularity, visited him at the Beverly Wils.h.i.+re and called h.e.l.lman for advice. She promised to care for him. On May 23, bottle in hand, Hammett flew to New York, where he was met by h.e.l.lman, who had arranged for an ambulance to take him to Lenox Hill Hospital. He weighed 125 pounds; the diagnosis was neurosis and pituitary hypofunction. He was in the hospital for twenty-two days, after which he went to Tavern Island, a private island off the coast of Connecticut where Lillian h.e.l.lman was writing The Little Foxes, to recuperate.

The day Hammett flew to the hospital Stromberg complained that the Hacketts were at a standstill on the script "owing to lack of knowledge of that last situation with its needed motivation for the whole treatment." When Hammett had recovered sufficiently to begin work again, MGM tried to re-sign him to a contract, but Hammett resisted. He was insulted by what he called "the tiny piece of bait on Hunt's hook" and he planned to resume work on an unfinished novel called My Brother Felix.

After further negotiation, Hammett and MGM came to reluctant terms. On July 15, 1938, he sold MGM a one-year option on all his writings for $5,000, a deal that seems to have included canceling the $5,000 he owed for nondelivery of The Foundry. He cleared up "that last situation" in Another Thin Man and produced an eight-page story idea, hard to take seriously, for a third Thin Man sequel on December 7, 1938, but continuation of the Thin Man series seemed uncertain then. William Powell was on leave, suffering from colon cancer and mourning the death of his lover, Jean Harlow. It was unclear whether he could continue the series, and Myrna Loy was reluctant to tackle another sequel. With the future of the Thin Man series in doubt, the studio rejected Hammett's eight-page story idea for a fourth Nick and Nora Charles movie and canceled his contract for the last time on Christmas Day. He was done with MGM, and they had had their fill of him. His "irregular habits" combined with his political opposition to the studio in his work for the Screen Writers Guild created a gulf too wide to bridge. Evidence of the studio's annoyance with their star writer is provided in the trailer for Another Thin Man. Hammett's name does not appear, though he was given credit for the original story in the credits for the full movie-as required by the contract SWG had forced on the studios.

Another Thin Man was released on November 17, 1939, to respectful but qualified reviews. Frank Nugent in The New York Times wrote: Some of the bloom is off the rose. A few of the running gags are beginning to show signs of pulling up lame. All this is bound to happen when a Thin Man leads to After the Thin Man and develops Another Thin Man. The law of diminis.h.i.+ng returns tends to put any comedy on a reducing diet and it may, unless his next script is considerably brighter, confound us with a Thin Man thinned to emaciation. It hasn't happened yet, mark! We're merely getting in our warning early, notifying Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer that there's a limit to everything-including the charm of the delightful Mr. and Mrs. Charles.

It wasn't Hammett's story that concerned Nugent but rather the formula imposed by Stromberg and the Hacketts that was growing stale.

Another Thin Man marks a clear break in the development of the series. Without Hammett and without the Hacketts, who had grown tired of the Thin Man formula, too, Stromberg was severely handicapped. He produced three more Thin Man movies-Shadow of the Thin Man (1941), The Thin Man Goes Home (1944), and Song of the Thin Man (1947)-but the screenplays written by new writers lacked the Hammett spark and attracted less and less favorable attention. Production on The Thin Man Goes Home was delayed when Myrna Loy refused to play Nora, instead doing Red Cross work at the beginning of World War II. She ultimately changed her mind, but regretted her decision. Song of the Thin Man was Myrna Loy's last movie for MGM. She said she hated the movie; it was a "lackl.u.s.ter finish to a great series."

Hammett never looked back. There is no record of his having even viewed the late Thin Man movies. He had more compelling interests by the end of 1938.

R. L.

AFTER THE THIN MAN.

Headnote.

Hammett submitted his initial screen story for The Thin Man's first sequel on January 8, 1935, and straight away left Hollywood for New York. The thirty-four-page tale he entrusted to producer Hunt Stromberg and screenwriters Albert Hackett and his wife Frances Goodrich was markedly different from his ultimate story, which he completed nine months later. In the first version, Nora sneaked out to play sleuth and was knocked cold, drugged, and kidnapped by Chinese hoodlums. Pedro the ex-gardener was not present to be shot to death on the Charleses' doorstep. David was not Selma's jilted suitor, but her younger brother. And Nick discovered that Polly's husband, Phil, was the murderer. There are enough similarities in scenes and characters to tie together the two proposed stories, but the plots differ dramatically.

During the spring of 1935, with Hammett absent from Hollywood and the Thin Man sequel's story conferences, MGM's development team foundered. Stromberg and the Hacketts toyed with alternative and additional plot points-narcotics and forgery rings, Oriental gangs, even a machine-gun ma.s.sacre. In March, Stromberg boasted that the team was "purposefully complicating things" and he speculated on the possibility of running two or three plots, "tracks on this highway of crime," which would converge on Nick, who would solve them in "a single frame of story development and construction." By April the group knew that motives were a key problem, especially since, as Stromberg said, "the motive for the killing was FAR DIFFERENT than any motive previously credited to the case by anyone, including myself." Shortly after, director W. S. Van d.y.k.e added more confusion to the mix with his own screenplay attempt, most notable for Nick's lackl.u.s.ter dialogue.

Amid and despite the maelstrom, the Hacketts produced a seventy-two-page temporary screenplay, dated April 29, 1935. But they still needed help. MGM rehired Hammett in June and by mid-July he crafted a new partial draft, twenty-nine pages that mark the beginnings of his final screen story for After the Thin Man. Hammett brought Nick and Nora back into focus and eliminated Stromberg's more fanciful digressions. He salvaged both the Hacketts' and his own best elements, then recombined and leavened them with new scenes and conflicts.

Hammett began his final screen story for After the Thin Man, dated September 17, 1935, on page 1, at scene 30, by stipulating a doorbell in place of what had been a telephone bell. The film's opening sequence is absent. The action picks up in midstream with the bell's ring and the sound of gunfire. There, and in five additional pa.s.sages over the next twenty-two pages, Hammett calls for cuts or dissolves to particular scenes, with returns to his text afterward. He was operating, of course, without modern cut-and-paste conveniences. Hammett clearly intended his screen story to integrate specific pa.s.sages from the Hacketts' April 29 screenplay. Their work was both appropriate to the revised narrative and in keeping with Hammett's own vision of Nick, Nora, and their supporting cast. Das.h.i.+ell Hammett's screen story for After the Thin Man is presented here as he intended it, with the Hacketts' work incorporated according to his own instructions.

J. M. R.

AFTER THE THIN MAN.

Das.h.i.+ell Hammett.

September 17, 1935.

A train whistle sounds as the Chief arrives slowly in the Santa Fe Station in San Francisco. A stateroom on the train is stacked high with hatboxes, and suitcases, books, flowers, magazines, half-empty baskets of fruit. Although it is afternoon the stateroom is not yet made up. The top berth is down, piled high with bed-covers and sheets. On the lower berth is an array of White Rock bottles, gla.s.ses, bowls of ice, and a gla.s.s c.o.c.ktail shaker propped against a pillow, almost full. There is also a half-packed bag open. Nick Charles standing before a mirror in the lavatory trying to shave. He is dressed except for his collar and coat. He has an old-fas.h.i.+oned open razor in his hand. He is swaying with the motion of the car, trying to balance himself on his widespread feet. Suddenly the car lurches, and he is thrown forward against the mirror, just missing by a fraction cutting off an ear. He looks reproachfully at the mirror, and then decides to go out into the stateroom to shave. Precariously he makes his way to the mirror behind the outer door, leading to the corridor. As he has the razor poised at his throat, the door is thrown open from the outside, pus.h.i.+ng him back behind it, out of sight. Nora Charles, his wife, bursts in. She is in a negligee and slippers, fresh from her shower, with her toilet things in her hand. She is excited. She looks for Nick in the stateroom as she comes in.

Nora: "Nickie! Nickie! Where are you?"

She shuts the door after her and sees Nick behind the door, jammed up against the wall, his razor still at his throat, his eyes fixed in a gla.s.sy stare.

Nick, with the sickly sweet grin of a man who has just escaped death: "h.e.l.lo, darling."

Nora, amazed at his position: "What are you trying to do?"

Nick: "Just having a little fun, darling."

Nora goes quickly to the lower berth, putting her toilet things in an open bag.

Nora: "You'd better hurry. We're getting into San Francisco in five minutes."

She takes a dress down from a hook. There is another hanging underneath it. Then she opens up a big hatbox, starting to pull a hat from it. She looks down, amazed and indignant.

Nora: "Asta!"

He is comfortably curled up in the hatbox on a large hat. He looks up and wiggles with delight.

Nora: "My best Sunday-go-to-meeting hat."

Asta jumps quickly out of the hatbox. Nora pulls out the hat and puts it on her head, making a very ridiculous appearance with her negligee, talking to Nick as she does so. Nick is leaning under the berth, pouring a drink from the c.o.c.ktail shaker.

Nora: "I thought you were going to pack."

Nick: "I am. I've been putting away this likker."

As he throws his head back to drink the c.o.c.ktail his skull cracks against the upper berth.

Nora: "You know, if you break that, they can sue you."

She goes quickly into the lavatory.

Nick: "I'm going to miss this little room of ours. It's left some lasting impressions on me."

He feels his head ruefully, then pours himself another drink.

Nora: "Pack these, will you, Nickie?"

Her filmy nightgown and negligee come flying at him from the bathroom. He extricates himself from them.

Nick: "Delighted."

He rolls them casually into a ball and stuffs them into the open bag. He picks up the c.o.c.ktail shaker, still three-quarters full, and looks at it lovingly.

Nick: "I hate to leave this."

Nora, anxiously, from the lavatory: "Oh, don't leave anything."

Nick puts the top of the c.o.c.ktail shaker on, and looks around for something to wrap it in. He catches sight of Nora's dress hanging on the wall. He puts his hand out toward it.

Nick: "Going to wear this dress?"

Nora's voice: "No. You can put that in."

Nick: "Fine."

He takes down the dress, wraps the c.o.c.ktail shaker lovingly in it, and stuffs it into the bag, enthusiastically viewing the result.

The photographers and reporters are standing on the station platform looking into the distance, watching for the train. One of the men, looking off-scene, calls: "Here she comes!"

In a body they all start to run toward the train.

Porters are hurrying out. Baggage men stand waiting. The train pulls in. The reporters and photographers who ran to meet it are now running back beside the train, trying to catch up with the Pullmans. The train comes to a stop, and a porter jumps off. The reporters rush up to him.

One of the reporters: "Nick Charles on this car?"

Porter: "Two cars back." The reporters and cameramen start to run back.

The porter puts down his little stepping block as Nick and Nora appear at the top of the steps. The reporters and photographers come running up. Asta is straining on the leash in Nick's hand.

1st Photographer: "Hold it there, Mr. Charles."

He snaps his picture and prepares to take another. Meanwhile the reporters are all talking at once, and the other photographers are taking pictures.

Reporters: "h.e.l.lo, Nick." "How does it feel to be home?"

"How are you, Mrs. Charles? I'm from the Chronicle."

"Going to stay with us for a while?"

"Got a story for the Examiner, Nick?"

Nick, as Asta pulls him in a frenzy of excitement: "Gangway, boys! Gangway!"

Asta pulls Nick down the stairs. Nora follows, clinging to her purse and a little jewel case.