# Screenwriter Beheaded ("No comment," says Norma Desmond) **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [June 15, 2004, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456 "2004-06-15T12:48:55Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/1 "2004-06-15T12:48:55Z")
[Robert Lees](http://imdb.com/name/nm0498738/), a 91-year-old Hollywood writer, who wrote episodes of _Alfred Hitchcock Presents_ (as well as the movies _The Black Cat, The Invisible Woman_ and _Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein_), was beheaded by a crazed homeless person—yikes! Story [here](http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBBHJMUHVD.html). ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 12:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/2 "2004-06-15T12:57:40Z")
Someone lives to 91 years old and then is beheaded? Ick. Enlighten me, **Eve** –What’s the Norma Desmond reference? ---
**Author:** ![bienville](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@bienville](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bienville)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/3 "2004-06-15T13:12:15Z")
> [@Annie-Xmas](#): > > Enlighten me, **Eve** –What’s the Norma Desmond reference? I’m not **Eve** but am considering it for Halloween. In Sunset Boulevard Norma Desmond initiates what turns into a very unhealthy relationship with her screenwriter, whom she ultimately murders (not by beheading, however). ---
**Author:** ![Menocchio](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/9de053/32.png) [@Menocchio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Menocchio)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 1:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/4 "2004-06-15T13:12:43Z")
Norma Desmond killed a screenwriter in “Sunset Boulevard”. You know, it’s a terrible thing to say, but if I get to 91, I hope I get to go out so memorably. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 1:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/5 "2004-06-15T13:15:05Z")
Oh. I thought I was missing a Sunset Boulevard reference, something which would be disheartening for this Andrew Lloyd Webber fanatic. ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 1:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/6 "2004-06-15T13:20:40Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > [Robert Lees](http://imdb.com/name/nm0498738/), a 91-year-old Hollywood writer, who wrote episodes of _Alfred Hitchcock Presents_ (as well as the movies _The Black Cat, The Invisible Woman_ and _Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein_), was beheaded by a crazed homeless person—yikes! Story [here](http://ap.tbo.com/ap/breaking/MGBBHJMUHVD.html). He wrote Abbott and Costello Meets Frankenstein? Beheading seems … fair. ---
**Author:** ![Zebra](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/c0e974/32.png) [@Zebra](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Zebra)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 1:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/7 "2004-06-15T13:26:18Z")
Norma Desmond asks the writer to polish her own screenplay of Salome. She helped John the Baptist get his head cut off. ---
**Author:** ![lissener](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/lissener/32/6139_2.png) [@lissener](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/lissener)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/8 "2004-06-15T14:43:12Z")
> [@Evil Captor](#): > > He wrote Abbott and Costello Meets Frankenstein? Beheading seems … fair. Yeah, but he also wrote _The Black Cat_. So beheading seems vastly unfair, though somehow apt . . . ---
**Author:** ![Eve](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/9e8a1a/32.png) [@Eve](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Eve)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 3:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/9 "2004-06-15T15:14:52Z")
Jesus, all of his film credits seem weirdly prescient: _How to Start the Day . . . The Story of Doctor Carver . . . Hold That Ghost . . . Crazy House . . ._ (okay, maybe not _Juke Box Jenny_ or _Holiday in Havana_) ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/10 "2004-06-15T15:38:28Z")
Oh, great. So now beheading is this season’s fashion for murders. What next, an arsenic revival? ---
**Author:** ![MovieMogul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f08c70/32.png) [@MovieMogul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MovieMogul)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/11 "2004-06-15T15:41:30Z")
> [@Eve](#): > > (okay, maybe not _Juke Box Jenny_ or _Holiday in Havana_) You’ve obviously never been to Havana. The question is, did it happen when he was exiting a screening of _The Bicycle Thief_? ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/12 "2004-06-15T17:03:31Z")
**Evil Captor** , you don’t like _Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein_? Maybe you don’t like Abbott and Costello, period? **lissener** the _Black Cat_ that Robert Lees wrote isn’t the bizarre, fascinating Karloff-Lugosi film of 1934, but a forgettable old dark house pic from 1941. ---
**Author:** ![Papermache\_Prince](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/f05b48/32.png) [@Papermache\_Prince](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Papermache_Prince)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/13 "2004-06-15T17:15:01Z")
The LA police have picked up a suspect. The guards at Paramont Studios had turned away a man who was acting strangely, then saw his photo on the televised press conference re: the murders. See [CNN](http://www.cnn.com/2004/US/West/06/15/hollywood.homicides.ap/index.html). ---
**Author:** ![Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/3d9bf3/32.png) [@Tapioca\_Dextrin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tapioca_Dextrin)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/14 "2004-06-15T17:23:09Z")
I guess he’ll be joining [Jayne Mansfield](http://www.snopes.com/movies/actors/jayne.htm) in heaven. ---
**Author:** ![Walloon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/fbc32d/32.png) [@Walloon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Walloon)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/15 "2004-06-15T17:48:11Z")
But the point of that Snopes article was that Jayne Mansfield _wasn’t_ decapitated. She was, er, scalped. ---
**Author:** ![Mal\_Adroit](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/df788c/32.png) [@Mal\_Adroit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mal_Adroit)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/16 "2004-06-15T17:50:48Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > **Evil Captor** , you don’t like _Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein_? Maybe you don’t like Abbott and Costello, period? Can’t speak for **Evil Captor,** but I’m an A + C nut. _. . .Meet Frankenstein,_ like several others they did in the late 40s/early 50s, was blatant commercial schtick, made to capitalize on the hugely popular monster movies of the period. Hardly A + C’s most inspired comic work. Give me anything up until about 1946 with those guys. After that they were just cashing checks. ---
**Author:** ![Sampiro](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/2acd7d/32.png) [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/17 "2004-06-15T17:51:39Z")
> [@Zebra](#): > > Norma Desmond asks the writer to polish her own screenplay of Salome. She helped John the Baptist get his head cut off. From the musical version: Norma (to her own doomed screenwriter): \* Have you got to the scene where she asks for his head? If she can’t have him living, she’ll take him dead. They bring in his head on a silver tray. She kisses his mouth, it’s a great screenplay!\* ---
**Author:** ![Evil\_Captor](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/f17d59/32.png) [@Evil\_Captor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Evil_Captor)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 5:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/18 "2004-06-15T17:57:24Z")
> [@Walloon](#): > > **Evil Captor** , you don’t like _Abbott and Costello Meet Frankenstein_? Maybe you don’t like Abbott and Costello, period? I’m kinda neutral on Abbott & Costello – most of their stuff seems to be schtick. But I have seen Abott & Costello Meet Frankenstein and the Wolfman and it’s kinda stupid and dull. ---
**Author:** ![Larry\_Mudd](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/f14d63/32.png) [@Larry\_Mudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Larry_Mudd)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2004, 6:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/screenwriter-beheaded-no-comment-says-norma-desmond/250456/19 "2004-06-15T18:25:33Z")
> [@ArchiveGuy](#): > > The question is, did it happen when he was exiting a screening of _The Bicycle Thief_? Heh. I love the Dope – we get the Billy Wilder and Robert Altman references. CNN sticks to last year’s rehash of the “buddy cop” crapfest for _their_ film reference for the story. Plebians.