Background

So much of old Hollywood history depends on die traps and coils of family. There were three Selznick bovs Howard (1897-1980), Myron, and David (1902-65). Howard was born with some kind of brain damage or retardation: the family variously ignored or finessed the problem so that it is impossible to be sure about it medically. David w'as the apple of his fathers eye, and his own favorite genius. He w'as inept in many ways, indecisive, neurotic, vet he had charm, need, energy, and a daft kind of radiance. The good and the bad all came together in Gone With the Wind and that crusade called Jennifer Jones. Myron was the smart one: brilliant, shrewd, decisive, and an enormous influence on the picture business he invented agenting.

Education

As a young man, Myron Selznick learned the film production business from his father and worked for his father's film company as a production supervisor.

Career

After his father's company closed in 1925, Selznick worked for other studios, primarily as a production adviser. However, with his industry connections, and aided by his brother's rise as one of the most powerful film producers in Hollywood, he saw a business opportunity and set himself up as a talent agent. Partnered with Frank Coleman Joyce, the brother of actress Alice Joyce, they formed Joyce-Selznick, Ltd., the first Los Angeles talent agency.

The agency became so successful that 20th Century Fox wound up banning him from their lot out of a concern that he was inflating too many actors' salaries.

Myron Selznick died in 1944, aged 45, and was buried at Hollywood Memorial Park Cemetery (now the Hollywood Forever Cemetery) in Hollywood near the Paramount and R.K.O. studios. The pallbearers at his funeral included Walter Wanger and actor William Powell, who read the funeral oration. Later that year he was disinterred and buried in a crypt at Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery, Glendale, California, where he was later joined by his brother, David.

Works

More photos

• movie

  • The Movie | An Illustrated History of the Cinema | no 14 | Bette Davis, Robert Donat, Myron Selznick, Harry Cohn, Poverty Row (Magazine) [Paperback] [Jan 01, 1950]

    (The Movie | An Illustrated History of the Cinema | no 14 ...)

Connections

Selznick married Marjorie Daw in 1925; the couple divorced in 1942. He owned the Thoroughbred racehorse "Can't Wait", which finished third in the 1938 Kentucky Derby.

Father:

Lewis J. Selznick

Spouse:

Marjorie Daw