Frederica Sagor Maas
Encyclopedia
Frederica Alexandrina Sagor Maas (born July 6, 1900) is an American
playwright
, screenwriter
, memoirist and author
, the youngest daughter of Russian immigrants. Maas is best known for a detailed, tell-all memoir of her time spent in early Hollywood. She is one of the rare supercentenarians known for reasons other than longevity. At age , she is currently the 49th-oldest verified living person in the world and the 18th-oldest verified living person in the United States.,and the third-oldest person in California.
, Russia
and anglicized their surname to Sagor. Her mother supported the family as a very successful midwife. One of four daughters, Frederica Alexandrina Sagor was born on July 6, 1900 in a cold-water, railroad flat on 101st Street near Madison Avenue in Manhattan
.
She studied journalism at Columbia University
and held a summer job as a copy- or errand-girl at the New York Globe. She dropped out before graduation in 1918 and took a job as an assistant story editor at Universal Pictures
' New York office at $100 a week. By 1923 Maas was story editor for Universal and head of the department. A year later in 1924, Maas had become dissatisfied with her position and left Universal to move to Hollywood.
for film. Based on this, she was signed to a three-year contract with MGM for $350 per week, though in her words: "I had the peculiar feeling that wily Louis B. [Mayer
] was less interested in my writing ability than in signing someone who had worked for Ben Schulberg
and Al Lichtman
." It was in this period that she wrote Dance Madness
and The Waning Sex
.
Her recollections of that period:Thus Maas' introduction to studio politics did not go well and her MGM contract was not renewed. During 1925–1926 she wrote treatments and screenplays for Tiffany Productions, including the well-received flapper
comedies That Model from Paris and The First Night.
In 1927 she married Ernest Maas
, a producer at Fox Studios. Almost immediately they began to write as a team, selling story ideas such as Silk Legs to studios. Many of these would never get produced; "swell fish" was their term for scripts that never saw the light of day. Hired once again by Ben Schulberg, this time with Paramount Pictures
, she worked on scripts such as Clara Bow
's It
, Red Hair
and Hula
; and Louise Brooks
' lost film Rolled Stockings.
An unusually long European vacation in the summer of 1928 made finding steady studio work difficult upon her return. Ernest remained with Paramount Short Subjects division in New York. When a story by the Maas couple was misappropriated and filmed as The Way of All Flesh
he left the studio; their original script had been called, Beefsteak Joe. The couple returned to unsteady work on the west coast in October 1929. According to her memoirs: "By the fall of 1934, it was plain that we were not a success in Hollywood. In these five years we only found work doing short studio assignments – cleaning up other people's scripts – and had failed to sell our own stories."
The couple had lost $10,000 in the stock market crash and moved back to New York. From 1934 to 1937, they reviewed plays for the Hollywood Reporter. Another relocation back to Hollywood had Maas representing writers and selling story material for the Edward Small Agency; Maas plied every studio every day with her wares. After a year as an agent, the Maas couple secured writing contracts at Paramount to cull previously purchased material.
. Bad representation caused the story to sell for a pittance, and it would not be produced until 1947 when it was rendered almost unrecognizable in an adaptation by Darryl F. Zanuck
's 20th Century Fox
for Betty Grable
.
The Maas couple continued to live a hand-to-mouth existence struggling in Hollywood. During this time they were even interrogated by the FBI for having subscribed to two allegedly Communist publications. "I'm something of a Bolshevik. I'm always for the underdog … I remember when I was 17 or 18, marching in a New York parade, right before women got the vote. I marched in the schoolteacher segment, because my sister was a schoolteacher. I remember we held hands, and I remember how I felt. My God, I thought I was revolutionizing the world."
Having had enough "swell fish", Frederica Sagor Maas took a job as a policy typist with an insurance agency in 1950, quickly working her way up to insurance broker. Ernest took up ghost writing professional business articles and freelance story editing. Ernest succumbed to Parkinson's disease
in 1986 at 94.
, Maas published her autobiography, The Shocking Miss Pilgrim: A Writer in Early Hollywood. The book was well received and is still a standard reference for early Hollywood history.
From the Library Journal:
From Kevin Brownlow:
There are also her detractors:
In her own defense:
. In July 2010 there were inaccurate reports of her death. On February 18, 2011, Mollye Marcus died and Maas aged 110 years, 229 days, became the second oldest living person in California. As of November 29, 2011, Frederica Sagor Maas is the third oldest person in California after Soledad Mexia and Avice Clarke.
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
playwright
Playwright
A playwright, also called a dramatist, is a person who writes plays.The term is not a variant spelling of "playwrite", but something quite distinct: the word wright is an archaic English term for a craftsman or builder...
, screenwriter
Screenwriter
Screenwriters or scriptwriters or scenario writers are people who write/create the short or feature-length screenplays from which mass media such as films, television programs, Comics or video games are based.-Profession:...
, memoirist and author
Author
An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...
, the youngest daughter of Russian immigrants. Maas is best known for a detailed, tell-all memoir of her time spent in early Hollywood. She is one of the rare supercentenarians known for reasons other than longevity. At age , she is currently the 49th-oldest verified living person in the world and the 18th-oldest verified living person in the United States.,and the third-oldest person in California.
Biography
Maas's parents, Arnold and Agnessa Zagorsky, emigrated from MoscowMoscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, Russia
Russia
Russia or , officially known as both Russia and the Russian Federation , is a country in northern Eurasia. It is a federal semi-presidential republic, comprising 83 federal subjects...
and anglicized their surname to Sagor. Her mother supported the family as a very successful midwife. One of four daughters, Frederica Alexandrina Sagor was born on July 6, 1900 in a cold-water, railroad flat on 101st Street near Madison Avenue in Manhattan
Manhattan
Manhattan is the oldest and the most densely populated of the five boroughs of New York City. Located primarily on the island of Manhattan at the mouth of the Hudson River, the boundaries of the borough are identical to those of New York County, an original county of the state of New York...
.
She studied journalism at Columbia University
Columbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
and held a summer job as a copy- or errand-girl at the New York Globe. She dropped out before graduation in 1918 and took a job as an assistant story editor at Universal Pictures
Universal Pictures
-1920:* White Youth* The Flaming Disc* Am I Dreaming?* The Dragon's Net* The Adorable Savage* Putting It Over* The Line Runners-1921:* The Fire Eater* A Battle of Wits* Dream Girl* The Millionaire...
' New York office at $100 a week. By 1923 Maas was story editor for Universal and head of the department. A year later in 1924, Maas had become dissatisfied with her position and left Universal to move to Hollywood.
Hollywood years
Once in Hollywood, Maas negotiated a contract with Preferred Pictures to adapt Percy Marks's novel The Plastic AgeThe Plastic Age (film)
The Plastic Age is a black-and-white silent film starring Clara Bow and Gilbert Roland. The film survives today not only on 16 mm film, but also on video and DVD. The film was based on the best-selling 1924 novel The Plastic Age by Percy Marks...
for film. Based on this, she was signed to a three-year contract with MGM for $350 per week, though in her words: "I had the peculiar feeling that wily Louis B. [Mayer
Louis B. Mayer
Louis Burt Mayer born Lazar Meir was an American film producer. He is generally cited as the creator of the "star system" within Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in its golden years. Known always as Louis B...
] was less interested in my writing ability than in signing someone who had worked for Ben Schulberg
B. P. Schulberg
B.P. Schulberg was a pioneer film producer and movie studio executive.Born Percival Schulberg in Bridgeport, Connecticut, he took the name Benjamin from the boy in front of him when registering for school to avoid mockery for his British name...
and Al Lichtman
Al Lichtman
Alexander "Al" Lichtman was a businessman working in the motion picture industry. He also occasionally worked as a film producer. Born in Monok, Hungary. His parents were Joseph Lichtman and Pepe Zuckermandel. Lichtman has a "Star" on the Hollywood Walk of Fame...
." It was in this period that she wrote Dance Madness
Dance Madness
Dance Madness is a 1926 silent comedy film directed by Robert Z. Leonard based upon a script by Frederica Sagor. The film stars Claire Windsor, Conrad Nagel and Hedda Hopper. The film is lost.-Plot:...
and The Waning Sex
The Waning Sex
The Waning Sex is a 1926 film directed by Robert Z. Leonard. The film stars Norma Shearer and Conrad Nagel. The film is considered lost.-Plot:...
.
Her recollections of that period:Thus Maas' introduction to studio politics did not go well and her MGM contract was not renewed. During 1925–1926 she wrote treatments and screenplays for Tiffany Productions, including the well-received flapper
Flapper
Flapper in the 1920s was a term applied to a "new breed" of young Western women who wore short skirts, bobbed their hair, listened to jazz, and flaunted their disdain for what was then considered acceptable behavior...
comedies That Model from Paris and The First Night.
In 1927 she married Ernest Maas
Ernest Maas
Ernest Maas was a silent-era screenwriter.Maas first worked on silent films in 1920 when he created the scenario for Uncle Sam of Freedom Ridge, a pro-League of Nations film in the aftermath of World War I. He also was the first to film the almost unbelievable crush of commuters during the rush...
, a producer at Fox Studios. Almost immediately they began to write as a team, selling story ideas such as Silk Legs to studios. Many of these would never get produced; "swell fish" was their term for scripts that never saw the light of day. Hired once again by Ben Schulberg, this time with Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures
Paramount Pictures Corporation is an American film production and distribution company, located at 5555 Melrose Avenue in Hollywood. Founded in 1912 and currently owned by media conglomerate Viacom, it is America's oldest existing film studio; it is also the last major film studio still...
, she worked on scripts such as Clara Bow
Clara Bow
Clara Gordon Bow was an American actress who rose to stardom in the silent film era of the 1920s. It was her appearance as a spunky shopgirl in the film It that brought her global fame and the nickname "The It Girl." Bow came to personify the roaring twenties and is described as its leading sex...
's It
It (1927 film)
It is a 1927 silent romantic comedy film which tells the story of a shop girl who sets her sights on the handsome and wealthy boss of the department store where she works. Because of this film, actress Clara Bow became known as the "It girl"...
, Red Hair
Red Hair (1928 film)
Red Hair is a 1928 silent film starring Clara Bow and Lane Chandler, directed by Clarence G. Badger, based on a novel by Elinor Glyn, and released by Paramount Pictures....
and Hula
Hula (film)
Hula is a silent film by Victor Fleming, based on the novel Hula, a Romance of Hawaii by Armine von Tempski, directed by Victor Fleming, starring Clara Bow, and released by Paramount Pictures. It was one of the top 10 grossing movies of 1927....
; and Louise Brooks
Louise Brooks
Mary Louise Brooks , generally known by her stage name Louise Brooks, was an American dancer, model, showgirl and silent film actress, noted for popularizing the bobbed haircut. Brooks is best known for her three feature roles including two G. W...
' lost film Rolled Stockings.
An unusually long European vacation in the summer of 1928 made finding steady studio work difficult upon her return. Ernest remained with Paramount Short Subjects division in New York. When a story by the Maas couple was misappropriated and filmed as The Way of All Flesh
The Way of All Flesh (film)
The Way of All Flesh is a drama film directed by Victor Fleming, written by Lajos Biró, Jules Furthman and Julian Johnson from a story by Perley Poore Sheehan. The film is unrelated to Samuel Butler's novel The Way of All Flesh, and is now considered a lost film.-Cast:*Emil Jannings - August...
he left the studio; their original script had been called, Beefsteak Joe. The couple returned to unsteady work on the west coast in October 1929. According to her memoirs: "By the fall of 1934, it was plain that we were not a success in Hollywood. In these five years we only found work doing short studio assignments – cleaning up other people's scripts – and had failed to sell our own stories."
The couple had lost $10,000 in the stock market crash and moved back to New York. From 1934 to 1937, they reviewed plays for the Hollywood Reporter. Another relocation back to Hollywood had Maas representing writers and selling story material for the Edward Small Agency; Maas plied every studio every day with her wares. After a year as an agent, the Maas couple secured writing contracts at Paramount to cull previously purchased material.
Post-Hollywood
The war years found the couple back seeking unsteady work and writing for political campaigns. It was in 1941 that they wrote Miss Pilgrim's Progress, the story that would become The Shocking Miss PilgrimThe Shocking Miss Pilgrim
The Shocking Miss Pilgrim is a 1947 American musical comedy film written and directed by George Seaton, starring Betty Grable and Dick Haymes...
. Bad representation caused the story to sell for a pittance, and it would not be produced until 1947 when it was rendered almost unrecognizable in an adaptation by Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl F. Zanuck
Darryl Francis Zanuck was an American producer, writer, actor, director and studio executive who played a major part in the Hollywood studio system as one of its longest survivors...
's 20th Century Fox
20th Century Fox
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation — also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox — is one of the six major American film studios...
for Betty Grable
Betty Grable
Elizabeth Ruth "Betty" Grable was an American actress, dancer and singer.Her iconic bathing suit photo made her the number-one pin-up girl of the World War II era. It was later included in the LIFE magazine project "100 Photos that Changed the World"...
.
The Maas couple continued to live a hand-to-mouth existence struggling in Hollywood. During this time they were even interrogated by the FBI for having subscribed to two allegedly Communist publications. "I'm something of a Bolshevik. I'm always for the underdog … I remember when I was 17 or 18, marching in a New York parade, right before women got the vote. I marched in the schoolteacher segment, because my sister was a schoolteacher. I remember we held hands, and I remember how I felt. My God, I thought I was revolutionizing the world."
Having had enough "swell fish", Frederica Sagor Maas took a job as a policy typist with an insurance agency in 1950, quickly working her way up to insurance broker. Ernest took up ghost writing professional business articles and freelance story editing. Ernest succumbed to Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease
Parkinson's disease is a degenerative disorder of the central nervous system...
in 1986 at 94.
Autobiography
In 1999, at age 99, and at the urging of film historian Kevin BrownlowKevin Brownlow
Kevin Brownlow is a filmmaker, film historian, television documentary-maker, author, and Academy Award recipient. Brownlow is best known for his work documenting the history of the silent era. Brownlow became interested in silent film at the age of eleven. This interest grew into a career spent...
, Maas published her autobiography, The Shocking Miss Pilgrim: A Writer in Early Hollywood. The book was well received and is still a standard reference for early Hollywood history.
From the Library Journal:
From Kevin Brownlow:
There are also her detractors:
In her own defense:
Longevity
On October 1, 2009, Maas, aged 109, became the third oldest living person in CaliforniaCalifornia
California is a state located on the West Coast of the United States. It is by far the most populous U.S. state, and the third-largest by land area...
. In July 2010 there were inaccurate reports of her death. On February 18, 2011, Mollye Marcus died and Maas aged 110 years, 229 days, became the second oldest living person in California. As of November 29, 2011, Frederica Sagor Maas is the third oldest person in California after Soledad Mexia and Avice Clarke.
Filmography
- The Shocking Miss PilgrimThe Shocking Miss PilgrimThe Shocking Miss Pilgrim is a 1947 American musical comedy film written and directed by George Seaton, starring Betty Grable and Dick Haymes...
(1947) (story) - Piernas de Seda (1935) (story 'Silk Legs')
- The Farmer's Daughter (1928)
- Red Hair (1928)
- HulaHula (film)Hula is a silent film by Victor Fleming, based on the novel Hula, a Romance of Hawaii by Armine von Tempski, directed by Victor Fleming, starring Clara Bow, and released by Paramount Pictures. It was one of the top 10 grossing movies of 1927....
(1927) (uncredited) - Silk Legs (1927)
- The Way of All FleshThe Way of All Flesh (film)The Way of All Flesh is a drama film directed by Victor Fleming, written by Lajos Biró, Jules Furthman and Julian Johnson from a story by Perley Poore Sheehan. The film is unrelated to Samuel Butler's novel The Way of All Flesh, and is now considered a lost film.-Cast:*Emil Jannings - August...
(1927) - Rolled Stockings (1927)
- The First Night (1927)
- Flesh and the DevilFlesh and the DevilFlesh and the Devil is an MGM romantic drama silent film. It stars Greta Garbo, John Gilbert, Lars Hanson, and Barbara Kent, directed by Clarence Brown, and based on the play The Undying Past by Hermann Sudermann....
(1926) - That Model from Paris (1926)
- The Waning SexThe Waning SexThe Waning Sex is a 1926 film directed by Robert Z. Leonard. The film stars Norma Shearer and Conrad Nagel. The film is considered lost.-Plot:...
(1926) - Dance MadnessDance MadnessDance Madness is a 1926 silent comedy film directed by Robert Z. Leonard based upon a script by Frederica Sagor. The film stars Claire Windsor, Conrad Nagel and Hedda Hopper. The film is lost.-Plot:...
(1926) - The Plastic AgeThe Plastic Age (film)The Plastic Age is a black-and-white silent film starring Clara Bow and Gilbert Roland. The film survives today not only on 16 mm film, but also on video and DVD. The film was based on the best-selling 1924 novel The Plastic Age by Percy Marks...
(1925) - His SecretaryHis SecretaryHis Secretary is a 1925 comedy film directed by Hobart Henley. The film stars Norma Shearer and Lew Cody. It is now a lost film.-Plot:Comedy about an ugly duckling who overhears her boss saying he wouldn't kiss her for a thousand dollars...
(1925) - The Goose WomanThe Goose WomanThe Goose Woman is a 1925 silent film drama directed by Clarence Brown and starring Louise Dresser with Jack Pickford as her son. The film was released by Universal Pictures...
(1925)
See also
External links
- Video of Frederica Sagor Maas at 100 from Reverie Productions