Wed 4 Feb 2009
Inquiry: Peter Stone, Marc Behm and a possible Charade.
Posted by Steve under Authors , Inquiries , Mystery movies[3] Comments
In one of the comments that he left following my recent review of a Jessica Fletcher novel, David Vineyard asked the following question:
“I know in many cases when a book is dedicated to another writer it’s the ghostwriter signing his work (William Shatner’s Tek World books being dedicated to Ron Goulart being a good example).
“Since Stone wrote no other novels I was curious if the book is his work or Behm’s. Anyone know? I believe Hubin lists it as Stone’s work.”
Here’s the present entry for the book as it appears in the Revised Crime Fiction IV:
Charade (Gold Medal, 1963, pb) [Paris] Fontana, 1964. Novelization of film: Universal, 1964 (scw: Peter H. Stone; dir: Stanley Donen).
I sent David’s question on to Al Hubin, and here’s his reply. While it’s certainly not conclusive, it is informative:
Interesting question.
I’ve checked the Contemporary Authors entry on Behm, which has an incomplete listing of his works, but does say ‘also author with Peter Stone of “The Unsuspecting Wife.”’
This appears to be the story upon which the film Charade is based (and IMDB gives both Stone and Behm as authors of the story). It’s not clear that “Unsuspecting Wife” was published separately anywhere. But the co-authorship of the story could explain why the novelization is dedicated to Behm. The novelization is not listed in Behm’s entry, but it is listed in Stone’s CA entry as written by Stone.
Al
[PostScript.] Lee Goldberg recently left two or three additional comments about TV and movie adaptations and tie-in’s following that Murder, She Wrote review. Since he’s the man in the know, if you haven’t already read what he has to say, then by all means do.
February 9th, 2009 at 3:37 am
My thanks for clearing this up. The book differs sigificantly from the movie is some respects, and it seemed odd if Stone had written both, but if it was based on an unpublished (?) story by Stone and Behm then the differences between novel and screenplay are understandable.
Of course a great many changes happen to any script between page and screen (small or large), and aren’t always available to the writer doing an adaptation of the original screenplay. A good example is the Ernest Lehman screenplay of North By Northwest, which was written closely with Hitchcock, but differs from the final cut of the film in many ways. If the original screenplay and the final film version don’t always match what chance does the writer doing a novelization before the film is completed have?
May 5th, 2009 at 8:50 am
The biography by Nancy Nelson, “Evenings with Cary Grant,” relates the sequence by which “The Unsuspecting Wife” became the Grant film “Charade”:
“[Peter] Stone and Marc Behm had tailored an original screenplay called ‘The Unsuspecting Wife’ for [Cary] Grant and Audrey Hepburn. Unable to sell it, Stone had turned it into a novel and renamed it ‘Charade.’ After it appeared in ‘Redbook’ magazine [in June 1961], Stanley Donen bought it [as a film property]…”
Grant agreed to be in the film, and shooting started in October 1962.
February 15th, 2012 at 7:27 pm
The story of the large sum of money “concealed” in the form of valuable stamps stuck on an old envelope dates back to an Agatha Chrsitie story first published in This Week magazine in 1941 as “A Case of Buried Treasure” and in book form in 1950 (with the title changed to “Strange Jest”) in the collection “Three Blind Mice and Other Stories”. But this is the idea in a very basic, undeveloped form — just three people walking around the dead man’s house and garden and wondering where he has hidden his vast wealth. Full credit to Stone, either on his own or in collaboration with Behm, for turning this very simple basic notion into a complex and highly watchable story of multiple murders and shifting identities.