Sun 24 Apr 2022
PI Stories I’m Reading: MICHAEL COLLINS “Dan Fortune and the Hollywood Caper.â€
Posted by Steve under Stories I'm Reading[2] Comments
MICHAEL COLLINS “Dan Fortune and the Hollywood Caper.†PI Dan Fortune. Short story. First published in Alfred Hitchcock’s Mystery Magazine, November 1983. Collected in Crime, Punishment and Resurrection (Donald I. Fine, 1992) as “The Woman Who Ruined John Ireland.†Reprinted in Silver Screams: Murder Goes Hollywood, edited by Cynthia Manson & Adam Stern (Longmeadow, paperback, 1994).
Dan Fortune is hired by a young woman, a file clerk for a company in midtown Manhattan, who lives a life on the borderline between real life and movieland fantasy. She looks like Gloria Grahame, and there are times when she thinks she is. She is having an affair with the manager of a small used bookstore whom at times she believes he is John Ireland. When she is shot at, she comes to Dan, convinced that her lover’s wife, Grace Kelly, is the one responsible.
Before he has solved the case, she even has Dan doing it. Here below is a list of the movie stars who play a part in the investigation, even briefly. I hope I haven’t missed any. It would make one hell of of a movie, wouldn’t it?
John Ireland
Grace Kelly
Alan Ladd
Elliott Gould
Ingrid Bergman
Bonita Granville
Dick Powell
Robert Mitchum
Robert Ryan
Burt Lancaster
Jack Nicholson
Robert Montgomery
Dan Duryea
April 25th, 2022 at 10:15 pm
Sounds as if this is unusually playful for the usually pretty earnest Dan Fortune series. No question Collins/Lynd could pull it off, just not what I usually think of in terms of Dan Fortune.
April 25th, 2022 at 11:10 pm
Quite right. This was a nice surprise when I came across it, and for anyone who loves good movies, a lot of fun to read.