We learn of her relationship with Chinese American actor Eddie Lu, friendship with an Italian immigrant with ties to her father, and a German emigree hired by the studio. Artie must travel to Washington DC to be questioned by the Senate Investigation into Motion Picture War Propaganda. Themes include the abuses of authoritarianism, the biases introduced through propaganda (and how readily it is believed), and how innocent people are harmed in the process. It is about human connections, figuring out one’s path in the face of systemic discrimination, and the power of forgiveness. When Anthony Marra was a college student studying in Russia, he traveled through the Chechnya region. That experience would inspire the 28-year-old Marra, a Whiting Writers’ Continue reading » Artie looked at Maria and across that long stare the musculature conjoining their intuitions flexed. Mercury’s films run afoul of isolationist America, and Artie is hauled in front of the Senate Investigation into Motion Picture War Propaganda. The premiere of Maria’s film, “Devil’s Bargain,” which retells Faust through the lens of Nazi collaboration, causes a riot; fortunately for Mercury, the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor the next day, and Artie is hailed as a visionary.

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Funny, verbally inventive and, ultimately, very moving, Mercury Pictures Presents is a wonderful novel. She was Rubenesque, and, like both painter and deli sandwich, irrefutable proof of Creation’s genius. So, what of that antic voice that seems so non-Marra? Particularly early on, the narration is rife with extended, sardonic descriptions, no more so that when we’re spending time with Maria’s great aunts, who serve as a kind of comic chorus. Characters banter in sharpened one-liners, which is perhaps fitting in the Hollywood studio, but it’s there among the Old-World Italians, too. At times, it feels like we’ve stumbled into an Aaron Sorkin script. This gave me my first glimpse into what was transpiring on the US West coast right after Pearl Harbor, not to mention how the film industry was used by the government. As the story goes on, at times there’s almost a hallucinatory quality to the story. As an adult Maria works for a film studio where she meets many European refugees trying to sell their skills to make a living while suffering discrimination and often under suspicion as ‘enemy aliens’.

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Mercury is a story of fascism abroad and at home; of Faustian bargains accepted or rejected but always regretted; of the hierarchy of racism, and of marginalized people forced to hide their true selves — though where better than in Hollywood? — who seek only the warmth of home; and of the basic difficulty of allowing ourselves to connect with those we care for most. Whomever. The point is, that Sistine Chapel is something, isn’t it? You want to know what I think?” She didn’t, but Artie’s opinions moved with the tottery insistence of a drunk barging past the maître d’. “I think this Michael Angelo character must’ve been the Preston Sturges of his time.” How does the novel treat its bit players? What do you think Marra was trying to say about whose stories matter? Is there a minor character that really appealed to you? Neatly illustrating all of these themes is Maria’s beloved: the third-generation American actor Eddie Lu, who can recite Shakespeare and Chekhov but is only ever allowed to play nefarious Asians with caricature accents, and who always wears his “I’m Chinese American” button in public to keep from getting beaten up. He is prevented by California law from marrying the woman he loves.

Mercury Pictures Presents by Anthony Marra | Goodreads

The epic tale of a brilliant woman who must reinvent herself to survive, moving from Mussolini’s Italy to 1940s Los Angeles-a timeless story of love, deceit, and sacrifice from the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of A Constellation of Vital Phenomena How do you feel different characters experience exile, both at home and abroad? How do invisible prisons differ from real ones? Marra’s sobering, complex debut intertwines the stories of a handful of characters at the end of the second war in bleak, apocalyptic Chechnya. Though the novel spans 11 years, the story traces five Continue reading »All told, there are about twenty characters in the novel, each one connected in some way. An interesting figure is Anna Weber, who has emigrated from Berlin, Germany and is the studio's miniaturist. Anna purposely left Germany before the war started, due to its politics. Fifteen years later, on the eve of America’s entry into World War II, Maria is an associate producer at Mercury Pictures, trying to keep her personal and professional lives from falling apart. Her mother won’t speak to her. Her boss, a man of many toupees, has been summoned to Washington by congressional investigators. Her boyfriend, a virtuoso Chinese American actor, can’t escape the studio’s narrow typecasting. And the studio itself, Maria’s only home in exile, teeters on the verge of bankruptcy. Mercury Pictures Presents features a vast cast of characters—some stars, some supporting actors. Which character did you identify with the most? Why? Artie may appear cynical and sleazy, but he maintains carefully hidden morals that keep him up at night. His studio becomes a haven for those driven from their homelands. (“You could map the march of fascism across Europe based on Mercury’s employment rolls.”) One of those, eventually, is Nino Picone, now known as Vincent Cortese.

Mercury Pictures Presents: A Novel: Marra, Anthony Mercury Pictures Presents: A Novel: Marra, Anthony

A must-read debut! Meet Elizabeth Zott: a "formidable, unapologetic and inspiring" (Parade) scientist in 1960s California whose career takes a detour when she becomes the unlikely star of a beloved TV cooking show in this novel that is "irresistible, satisfying and full of fuel. It reminds you that change takes time and always requires heat" (The ... In a business where friendship had a high turnover rate, the Feldman brothers’ animosity was a stabilizing force. Artie would give Ned an organ, but wouldn’t lend him a five-spot, handkerchief, or kind word.” In the early years of the 20th century, as motion pictures were becoming increasingly available to the American public, some segments of the population expressed the opinion they were promoting depravity. In 1915, the Supreme Court ruled that the First Amendment (protecting freedom of expression) didn't apply to movies, and individual cities began to ban films they deemed immoral. During the 1920s, the Catholic church considered banning films entirely (meaning prohibiting adherents of the faith from attending any movie). We have 4 read-alikes for Mercury Pictures Presents, but non-members are limited to two results. To see the complete list of this book's read-alikes, you need to be a member. MERCURY PICTURES PRESENTS (Hogarth) by Anthony Marra is brilliant on so many levels. It's hilarious one moment, then turns serious, all the while presenting multi-dimensional, complex characters within a complicated novel. .

Marra's sublime dexterity brings [the settings] into a natural-seeming alignment, but it also sets up a tonal disparity the novel never fully resolves: I kept thinking, as I read, of Elsa Morante's great, grim, chronicle of life under Italian Fascism, History: A Novel, but also of García Márquez's One Hundred Years of Solitude, with which Mercury Pictures Presents shares its fleet, often funny, narrative omniscience, an effervescent mood that remains even in its bleakest moments and settings. Then again, this indeterminacy may be the point. All these elements were present in his latest book about the film industry during WW2. The story highlights the absurdity of war through a constellation of connected characters. In Anthony Marra's novel Mercury Pictures Presents, the main characters struggle to ensure their movies adhere to the Motion Picture Production Code. Maria Lagana, 28, is the underpaid, overworked associate producer at second-rate Hollywood studio Mercury Pictures in the early 1940s, the gal Friday to head of production Artie Feldman. She is also the daughter of Giuseppe Lagana, formerly Rome’s most successful defense attorney until he ran afoul of Mussolini’s fascist government and was sentenced to confino, deportment to the hinterlands of San Lorenzo, in the toe of Italy’s boot. With no way to support the family, 9-year-old Maria’s mother, Annunziata, takes the girl to Los Angeles to live with her three ancient, widowed aunts.