It is rather well known that the 1956 film Giant remains one of the most beloved narratives in American cinema, yet the woman behind this popular story, author Edna Ferber, has not always received her deserving moment in the sun.
Starring Rock Hudson as Bick Benedict, Elizabeth Taylor as Leslie Benedict and James Dean as Jett Rink, Giant is an epic tale about competitive wealth, the dynamics of marriage and examining the underbelly of systemic racism in America during the earlier parts of the twentieth century. Ferber published the book in 1952 before its film adaptation, which would go on to garner 10 Academy Award nominations, including Best Picture.
Even though Ferber died in 1968 at the age of 82, her story and her overall legacy have continued on, largely due to the efforts of her great niece, Julie Gilbert. Over the years, Gilbert has written multiple books about her great aunt’s achievements, while also providing literary and cinema enthusiasts with an intimate glimpse into the late writer’s personal life.
In her latest book titled Giant Love, Gilbert takes an interesting look at Ferber’s elaborate experiences in turning her novel into a major motion picture, working alongside the film’s director George Stevens and her unsuccessful efforts in saving Dean’s life, who died at the age of 24 in a tragic car accident in September 1955, before the Giant production had even wrapped.
I sat down with Gilbert to discuss the new book, her relationship with Ferber and the lasting impact that the iconic writer has had on Hollywood ever since.
Jeff Conway: I’m curious, Julie, with Edna Ferber being your great aunt, what was it about her journey of bringing the Giant story to the screen that made you feel like it was a process worth telling here in your Giant Love book?
Julie Gilbert: Well, I know a lot of people have told this story, but I had access to kind of particular memories and inroads that I wanted to explore. The real answer is that years ago, I wrote a biography of her for Doubleday and when I went to Wisconsin to do my research at the archive, they were very apologetic and they were really kind of panicky because the entire collection of Giant had gone missing. So, about 15 years later, it was discovered – it had been misfiled under Judge Felix Frankfurter – and so, I vowed back then, when I was really quite young, but I said – Someday, if I ever get my hands on that stuff, I’m going to do it right. So, that was kind of the modus vivendi to that.
Conway: I love that. So Julie, how do you gather your facts and sources best, to ensure that you are being as factual as possible? Do you have family recordings, journals? What is your main route with your pursuits?
Gilbert: Well, I had every and any diaries that she had. They weren’t the kind of confessional diaries – more like date books – but sometimes, she would put little sharp comments in about people that were very amusing. So, I had everything at my fingertips, and because I’m the trustee/executor of her estate, I have mobility with with everything that could be.
And letters, lots of family letters. She was very prolific, as you can imagine, and a big letter writer, and that’s what people did back then anyway. So, I have personal correspondence. Then, when I did my original research and interviewed Katharine Hepburn and Rock Hudson, I was able to get them and get as much of the story as I could. I did spend quite a bit of time with George Stevens Jr. So, I figured because my original biography was so long ago, I did use – not a lot because I wanted fresh snow – but I did use some things that I thought were just so valuable and so pertinent to this book.
Conway: Absolutely. You bring up in your book, you use the word “wrenching” when it comes to James Dean and Edna’s relationship and him finally becoming cast as Jett Rink for Giant. From what you know, what was it about James and Edna’s interactions, in and around Giant, that had the biggest impact?
Gilbert: I think that maybe she helped him. I wasn’t there, but they probably did talk about Jett Rink because in her novel, Giant, Jett Rink was not his characterization. Jett Rink was a really malevolent varmint, and kind of swarthy and dark. She very much wanted Robert Mitchum – she thought he would be perfect. [Giant director] Stevens said, “Well, just have lunch with James Dean, this young kid. Just do it for me.”
Dean just charmed her. He was, he could be very magical. I mean, he had the gift of, just this romantic charm about him when he wanted to. I think that he maybe, and this is a projection, listened to her ideas about the character. She would almost interview you and want to get everything possible out of you in a very charming way – and you would do it, you would just spill. So, that could have been because they did have a connection, a really strong one.
Conway: And Julie, you were able to have some interactions with your great aunt. What moments have been the most memorable to you? What do you remember most about the woman she was and how she lived her life?
Gilbert: There are people in a young person’s life that just know how to talk to them. I saw her when somebody irritated her or something, and that was not good. Apparently, I didn’t irritate her and she just got me – she just liked me, loved me, and I knew it.
Aunt Edna was one of my favorite people ever and she had a very good way with me, and she was funny. She also gave me my personhood – I mean, she made me feel that I could do anything I wanted, and that I was smart – and for a child, that’s pretty much everything.
Conway: So then, Julie, in what ways do you feel that your great aunt Edna was perhaps ahead of her time, not only as a writer, but as a woman, in and around the entertainment industry during that time period?
Gilbert: Well, first of all, she had gotten fame early, so she wasn’t afraid of anybody, and she felt she was holding a lot of cards, which she was, which is a terrific feeling, especially for a woman. She wasn’t conventionally beautiful. She was sort of the aunt-type, rather than – she was never quite a girl. I mean, she was, but she had this older quality about her. She was able to make demands because she was very articulate and she exuded a certain power, but she also – this is something a lot of people don’t know – she had the charm of the devil. I mean, she was so charming. She cut a swath wherever she went and she did have very, very committed and good friends, who put up with occasional tempers and feuds and that, because she had an artistic temperament.
Conway: Julie, do you feel that Edna somewhat changed the face of Hollywood with her standout writing and her work ethic, aspects that we may still see in place today?
Gilbert: Well, I think women are producing today, who might have a little Ferber-esque thing in them. She walked with the giants, you know? She certainly knew [Samuel] Goldwyn very well and he produced – turned her novels into films. It gets to be a small world of the powerful people and she was considered one of them.
That’s why it’s so odd today that she’s pretty much forgotten and I don’t really understand it, but I’m trying to fight that.
Conway: These nearly 70 years after filming Giant – from what you’ve learned about this production and heard from stories about your great aunt, what makes this film such a staple and a story that continues to be studied within American cinema today?
Gilbert: I think it hits every marker of certainly American life, marriage. It’s very penetrating on the sociologically look at marriage and who gives and who takes, and how you get that seesaw just right. Obviously, this was a loving marriage but not necessarily a good marriage and they really did duke it out, Bick and Leslie. It’s also that the underdog lords, you know, finally rules the roost and that story never grows old – that the Jett Rinks of the world – once they get power, watch out.
Also, the interracial [on-screen relationship] when Jordan brings Juana home – I mean, that still is difficult for some people today. So, it kind of gets under the skin of the American way, sure, and what constitutes being an American.
Conway: So Julie, in what ways do you feel that Edna Ferber benefited in living during the era that she did, compared to now? Then, on the flip side, in what ways do you feel maybe Edna would have excelled further, had she lived during this time, instead?
Gilbert: Look, she led the life that she really wanted to lead, I’m almost positive. She was sort of like the chosen one – that’s what she felt she was, to be a woman in the world and to dictate your own passages.
I think that she might have regretted, actually, maybe unrequited love along the way. I think today, she would have done the same thing, been the same person. I think that she would have even gotten more because she had so many skills, and today, we understand – no, we don’t have a woman president yet, but we kind of understand the capabilities of women more. So, I think she would have enjoyed that.
Conway: So my last question is, and I think you’ll appreciate this one, Julie – after seeing Giant be made and hearing about Edna’s many experiences around that film set, if you could pop into that production and provide your great aunt with a helpful tip, a warning or a comforting message, knowing all that you know now, what would that be, Julie?
Gilbert: Let me think of it. You asked these penetrating questions – really good questions.
I think that she would have probably – I know that the thing that she would have wanted more than anything would have been to have reached James Dean in some way and said, “Don’t go [on that racing trip that killed him].” Yeah, just a warning. Like – “Please don’t.” And she tried. I don’t want to spoil it for you, if you haven’t got to that place in the book, but she did try, but it was too late. She would have wanted him around for much longer for his own benefit because this guy was like nothing else. 70 years later, no one’s ever touched him. You want people to live their full time, but maybe that was his full time.
I think that she enjoyed his company and he was special to her, like maybe a son she never had. It’s ineffable – relationships are hard to describe and it was a relationship of the heart, I do believe that.