Irving Thalberg: Boy Wonder to Producer Prince. Mark A. Vieira. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010.

Irving Thalberg: Boy Wonder to Producer Prince. Mark A. Vieira. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2010.Author of Greta Garbo: A Cinematic Legacy (2005), Sin in Soft Focus: Pre-Code Hollywood (1999), and Hurrell's Hollywood Portraits: The Chapman Collection (1997), Hollywood historian/photographer Mark A. Vieira has written an important book on a pivotal figure in Hollywood history. In 1918, Irving Grant Thalberg (1899-1936) was hired by the Universal Film Manufacturing Company to work as a secretary to Carl Laemmle's assistant. Shortly thereafter, he became Laemmle's secretary, and then studio manager, in which he was responsible for supervising day-today operations. During his employment at Universal (1918-1923), Thalberg earned the moniker "Boy Wonder of Hollywood." He also established the precedent of the omnipotent producer when he fired Erich von Stroheim, who was in the process of filming Merry-Go-Round (1923). According to Vieira, Stroheim's termination was the first time a director had been fired.Thalberg left Universal to take a position as vice president in charge of production with Louis B. Mayer Productions. The next year, 1924, Metro-Goldwyn was founded, and Thalberg again served as vice president in charge of production. (Metro-Goldwyn became Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1926.) He later became a producer of big-budget quality films in 1933 when his position as vice president in charge of production was eliminated. That same year, Thalberg began contemplating his departure from M-G-M to become an independent producer and start the I. G. Thalberg Corporation. However, he continued to serve as a producer at M-G-M until his death from lobar pneumonia in 1936.During his tenure at M-G-M, Thalberg molded the careers and made stars of luminaries such as Lon Chaney, John Gilbert, Joan Crawford, Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, Wallace Beery, and Greta Garbo. He produced many films, including the silent blockbusters Ben-Hur (1925), The Merry Widow (1925), and The Big Parade (1925), and the sound films The Broadway Melody (1929), Mutiny on the Bounty (1935), and A Night at the Opera (1935). Vieira notes that almost all the features made by M-G-M between 1924 and 1936 had Thalberg's imprint, yet he "declined to affix his name to any film, simply saying: 'Credit you give yourself isn't worth having' " (xiii-xiv).He also envisioned the first all-star picture, Grand Hotel (1932), and was instrumental in utilizing story conferences, sneak previews, and extensive retakes to improve the overall quality of M-G-M films. During the filmmaking process, Thalberg would not settle for second best and would respond to his colleagues' suggestions for improving a picture with one of his most frequently used phrases, "What you have is good; here's how you can make it better" (360).Irving Thalberg: Boy Wonder to Producer Prince offers a balanced, chronological account of his personal and professional lives. Vieira focuses on Thalberg's health issues (he had a congenital heart defect); his marriage to Norma Shearer and his shaping of her film career; his philosophy of filmmaking; his battles with Louis B. …