Paradise Alley [Stars in the Backyard] (Original screenplay for the 1958 film)

N.p.: Hugo Haas Productions, 1957. Draft script for the 1958 film, here under the original release title "Stars in the Backyard." The title would be changed to "Paradise Alley" in 1961, before a limited release in 1962. Includes extensive 10 day shooting schedule over 16 pages, as well as 2 Set Construction Estimates bookending a two page "Rough Set Breakdown." Notations in manuscript pencil and pen throughout, checking sets and entering costs on "Rough Set Breakdown" and Set Construction Estimates, and throughout the script marking out props and dialogue. A curious notation of the name "Billy Bitzer," adjacent to the dialogue of character Mr. Gregory, (truncated) when he says he was D.W. Griffith's first cameraman, Billy Bitzer being Griffith's groundbreaking cinematographer.

Czech-born director Hugo Haas wrote, produced, and directed his own swan song, quite the Hollywood movie, an autobiographical homage to the cinema he knew. The cast featured film veterans from old Hollywood such as silent film star Corinne Griffith, vaudeville star Billy Gilbert, Keystone Cop Chester Conklin and Wicked Witch of the West herself, Margaret Hamilton.

Aging European director Rudolph Agnus (Haas) moves to the seedy Los Angeles neighborhood known as Paradise Alley, a crowded home of bickering tenants. Finding a friend in Mr. Gregory (Chester Conklin,) a retired cameraman, Agnus proposes making a movie with the residents as actors, to unite them and stop their petty bickering. Using a camera with no film and a cucumber made up to look like a microphone, Agnus plan succeeds. When a studio hears of the project, they offer to bankroll it, enabling Agnus to actually make his film.

Blue titled wrappers. Title page present, with credits for screenwriter Hugo Haas. 156 leaves, with last page of text numbered 134. Mimeograph duplication, rectos only. Pages Near Fine, wrapper Very Good plus, bound with three gold brads. (Inventory #: 146337)