Tinseltown: Murder, Morphine, and Madness at the Dawn of Hollywood by William J. Mann

Book Reviewed: Tinseltown: Murder, Morphine, and Madness at the Dawn of Hollywood by William J. Mann

William J. Mann is a well-known Hollywood historian with many books to his credits. He has researched in this field widely and written several books about the role of gays and lesbians in Hollywood during golden era. In this book he focusses on the well-known murder mystery of director and actor Desmond Taylor during 1922 that has been discussed and opined upon by numerous authors, investigators and close associates of Taylor himself. This homicide has all the intrigues of a typical Hollywood film that makes the reading this book even more fun. The murder occurred around the time of another celebrity Roscoe Arbuckle who was on trial for the murder of a young actress named Virginia Rappe. A spate of newspaper-driven Hollywood scandals included the death of Olive Thomas, the mysterious death of Thomas H. Ince and the drug-related deaths of Wallace Reid, Barbara La Marr, and Jeanne Eagels was bad for the image of Hollywood studios which were struggling to establish themselves as the leading players in the world of movie industry. Studios were too powerful, Los Angeles Police Department was too corrupt and the newspapers were too scandalizing and in some cases fabricating the circumstances of murder. This did not help to solve the homicide and hence Tayler's case went cold. Several suspects were named in this mysterious killing, the leading names were Desmond Taylor's much younger girlfriend, Mary Miles Minter and her mother Charlotte Shelby. Shelby was the chief suspect for a long time. She was consumed by the greed and the career her daughter in a highly competitive world of movie business. Learning that Taylor had no interest in marrying her daughter or helping her career, Shelby took matters into her own hands. The most compelling evidence was her rare .38 caliber pistol with unusual bullets that were similar to the kind which killed Desmond Taylor. The author discusses in light of many recently acquired FBI files and police records. This is certainly a good book to read in light of author's own investigation but does little to solve this 1922 case where all witnesses have passed on. I recommend this book to anyone interested in the history of Hollywood and murder mysteries of the golden era.