META REBNER'S WORKING SCRIPT OF THE LOVED ONE. Mimeographed Manuscrip...

Women in Film
META REBNER'S WORKING SCRIPT OF THE LOVED ONE.
Mimeographed Manuscript with Annotations, "The Loved One," 155 pp, 4to, n.p., July 28, 1964, bound in gray wrappers with brads (upper cover lacking), heavily thumbed, smudged, and chipped throughout.

Meta Carpenter Rebner Wilde (1907-1994) is best remembered for her 18 year on-and-off affair with William Faulkner that began in the 1930s when both were Mississippi transplants to Los Angeles. A classically trained pianist, Carpenter found success in Hollywood as a script supervisor, or, as they were called in those days, a "script girl." The script supervisor's responsibilities are many, and it takes a thorough and careful person to do the job correctly: during pre-production, the script supervisor breaks down the script in terms of cast, action, wardrobe and props, estimating the ultimate onscreen time of the action. Once filming begins, the script supervisor is on set every day making sure there is complete coverage of dialogue and action, and recording which takes are preferred, among other details. Rebner's resume includes The Maltese Falcon, Now, Voyager; To Have and Have Not (with screenplay by William Faulkner); The Corn is Green; In the Heat of the Night; To Kill a Mockingbird; The Graduate; and the present example, Tony Richardson's adaptation of Evelyn Waugh's comic novel, The Loved One.

The Loved One is a very dark comedy, featuring a young English poet who arrives in Hollywood hoping to write for pictures, but instead lands a job at a funeral home for pets. Waugh's depiction of the inanity and depravity of LA is merciless, and the novel is justly celebrated as a comedy classic. The screenplay by Terry Southern and Christopher Isherwood also incorporates elements of Jessica Mitford's work, The American Way of Death. The film stars Robert Morse, Jonathan Winters and Rod Steiger, and is remembered by The Observer as "one of the strangest mainstream American movies, and one of its most entertaining disasters."

If the film was a mess, it wasn't Rebner's fault. Her notetaking is meticulous: every dialogue change, every shot, every scene number is carefully recorded, with notes for the editor often listed on the verso of the preceding page.