Subscribe | UPI Odd Newsletter Subscribe HOLLYWOOD, Feb. 13 (UPI) -- Few industries enjoy an inside joke more than Jollywood where the cognoscenti smirk at references that baffle "civilians." The civilians, or course, are the great-unwashed masses that pay billions of dollars to see movies and enjoy TV from time to time. Advertisement This town likes nothing more than to put one over on we clueless dolts led around by the nose in our innocence while the wise guys chortle over inside fun and games. There was, for instance, a non-existent Broadway producer named Ned Farrington, the invention of a crafty Hollywood press agent who made his living from trade paper announcements of clients starring for Mr. Farrington. Who would know Farrington was a total fiction? He was the ploy of flack Dave Epstein, built up in the minds of Hollywood's rich and powerful as a showman who employed some of Hollywood's biggest stars "back east" in theatrical extravaganzas or long-running plays. Advertisement For years, Farrington's name popped up in Hollywood columns and in Daily Variety and Hollywood Reporter stories about, say, Sonny Tufts starring in "Palooka," a hilarious Broadway comedy. Reflecting Hollywood's misbegotten social standards, Farrington became a pal of respected filmmakers and stars who had fictional meetings with good-old Ned on trips to the Big Apple. Insiders knew better and giggled over the naiveté of the cattle who passed for Hollywood's sacred-cow arbiters, whackos who truly believed there WAS a Farrington. However, a Variety editor, researching a Farrington story one day, discovered no such impresario existed. The bemused editor, seeking vengeance for years of phony items, ran a black-bordered front-page Farrington obituary, listing his many hit shows. Press agent Epstein read the story and collapsed. He was hospitalized in Los Angeles for several days suffering severe shock and grief-stricken instability. No one knew then or to this day whether Epstein was truly undone by the death of his longtime fabrication or if he were simply terrified he would be revealed as a fraud. Nothing loath, Epstein continued to publicize his clients, many of who shared his sorrow at the passing of Ned Farrington, a show business giant. On March 5, another fraud will be unveiled on cable's AMC (American Movie Classics) as a wraith or invisible man who many Hollywoodians also claimed to know personally. Advertisement His name is Alan Smithee and he was every bit as much an invention as the late, lamented Farrington. AMC's one-hour production is titled "Who is Alan Smithee?" and features such flesh-and-blood directors as Martha Coolidge, John Singleton, Tony Kaye and Arthur Hiller, an Oscar-winner and former directors guild president. Unlike, Farrington, Smithee wasn't killed off in Variety. But he's unveiled in this AMC special. The Smithee name has been a pseudonym for disgruntled film directors used on credits after they distanced themselves from any connection with a movie. Smithee's name originated with "Death of a Gunfighter" (1969) starring Richard Widmark, directed by Robert Totten. Widmark demanded Totten be replaced and the studio hired Donald Siegel, who spent only nine days on the picture. Neither Totten nor Siegel wanted director's credit. The studio appealed to the Directors Guild of America, which invented the name Alan Smithee. Once established, Smithee became a viable subterfuge for directors seeking to escape blame for a bomb. Thus, Smithee became as well known in Hollywood as good old Ned Farrington. In all, Smithee's name appeared as director of 47 feature motion pictures, sometimes only in airline versions of a film or in movies edited down for TV. Advertisement In any case, legitimate directors were willing to see Smithee's name on their mistakes rather than face ridicule from peers and pals. Smithee was a handy guy who spared flesh-and-blood directors the humiliation of seeing their names on some really dreadful -- perhaps career-ending -- motion pictures. Among directors escaping that humility were Stuart Rosenberg, Richard C. Sarafian, Michael Apted, William Friedkin, Michael Gottlieb, Arthur Hiller, Kirk Wong, Michael Mann and Dennis Hopper. The non-existent Smithee will be remembered for taking the rap for some of the worst movies ever made. Smithee covered for little-known directors Paul Aaron and Terry Windsor as the director of "Morgan Stewart's Coming Home" (1987). So bad was "Morgan Stewart's Coming Home" (starring Lynn Redgrave and Jon Cryer) that Leonard Maltin -- usually a benevolent critic -- dismissed it saying: "Plays like an unsold sitcom pilot." Alas, Maltin and other critics will no longer have Alan Smithee to kick around for his deplorable movies. Following a major director's guild brouhaha in 1997 over the appallingly terrible movie "Burn Hollywood Burn" -- a satire about the misadventures of a director named Alan Smithee -- the DGA abolished the name. Advertisement Now disenchanted directors must submit five possible pseudonyms to the guild. Maybe they could use Ned Farrington and Dave Epstein.
