Earlier we complained when Salon staff writer Daniel D'Addario, as the saying goes, "made shit up" about Harvey Weinstein and P.T. Anderson.
Now let's slap a Salon headline writer for fact-mangling.
From Jon Weiner's 2000 interview with the late, great Elmore Leonard:
JW: Three terrific movies have been made based on your work: Get Shorty in 1995, which I read made 200 million dollars; Jackie Brown in 1996 and Out of Sight with George Clooney in 1998. What was your role — did you write the screenplays?
EL: No. They would ask me what actors I saw in the roles. I would tell them, and they’d say “Oh that’s interesting.” And that would be the end of it. Writing screenplays is not my business. I’ve written half a dozen, and maybe half of those were made. But it was never a satisfying experience. It was just work. You’re an employee. You would be told what to do. Studio execs would cross out my dialogue and put in their dialogue.
JW: And you didn’t like this? They were just trying to help.
EL: Those movies were terrible. They put in the obvious things you had thrown out right away when you were writing.
It's pretty clear Leonard is saying he didn't like the movies made from his three or so screenplays.*
Salon's headline, of course, is Elmore Leonard: I hated the film adaptations of my books.
Sure grabs the attention, though.
When the interview first appeared in the LA Review of Books the headline was "Elmore Leonard’s Secret: 'Clean Living, and a Fast Outfield.'"
*Per IMDb: 52 Pickup, Cat Chaser, Stick, Mr. Majestyk and The Moonshine War had Leonard-written scripts. Plus a made-for-TV movie or two. Mr. Majestyk is majestic despite what Leonard might have thought. Charles Bronson really, really wants to get in that melon crop.