James Ellroy
Encyclopedia
Lee Earle "James" Ellroy (born March 4, 1948) is an American
crime fiction writer
and essayist. Ellroy has become known for a so-called "telegraphic" prose style in his most recent work, wherein he frequently omits connecting words and uses only short, staccato
sentences, and in particular for the novels The Black Dahlia
(1987), The Big Nowhere
(1988), L.A. Confidential
(1990), White Jazz
(1992), American Tabloid
(1995), The Cold Six Thousand
(2001), and Blood's a Rover
(2009).
, the son of Geneva Odelia (née Hilliker) Ellroy, a nurse, and Armand Ellroy, an accountant and, according to Ellroy, onetime business manager of Rita Hayworth
. After his parents' divorce, Ellroy and his mother relocated to El Monte, California
. In 1958, Ellroy's mother was murdered. The police never found the perpetrator, and the case remains unsolved. The murder, along with reading The Badge by Jack Webb
(a book composed of sensational cases from the files of the Los Angeles Police Department
, a birthday gift from his father), were important events of Ellroy's youth.
Ellroy's inability to come to terms with the emotions surrounding his mother's murder led him to transfer
them onto another murder victim, Elizabeth Short, the "Black Dahlia"; throughout his youth, Ellroy used Short as a surrogate for his conflicting emotions and desires. His confusion and trauma led to a period of intense clinical depression
, from which he recovered only gradually.
Ellroy dropped out of school without graduating. He joined the army for a short while. During his teens and twenties, he drank heavily and abused Benzedrex inhalers. He was engaged in minor crimes (especially shoplifting, house-breaking, and burglary) and was often homeless. After serving some time in jail and suffering a bout of pneumonia
, during which he developed an abscess on his lung "the size of a large man's fist," Ellroy stopped drinking and began working as a golf
caddy
while pursuing writing. He later said, "Caddying was good tax-free cash and allowed me to get home by 2 p.m. and write books.... I caddied right up to the sale of my fifth book."
After a second marriage in the mid 1990s to Helen Knode (author of the 2003 novel The Ticket Out), the couple moved from California to Kansas City
in 1995. In 2006, after their divorce, Ellroy returned to Los Angeles. He is a self-described hermit
who possesses very few technological amenities, including television, and claims never to read contemporary books by other authors, aside from Joseph Wambaugh
's The Onion Field
, for fear that they might influence his own. However, this does not mean that Ellroy does not read at all, as he claims in My Dark Places to have read at least two books a week growing up, eventually shoplifting more to satisfy his love of reading. He then goes on to say that he read works by Dashiell Hammett
and Raymond Chandler
accompanied by abuse of alcohol and Benzedrex inhalers.
, a detective story drawing on his experiences as a caddy. He then published Clandestine and Silent Terror (which was later published under the title Killer on the Road). Ellroy followed these three novels with the Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy
, three novels centered on Hopkins, a police officer.
Ellroy writes longhand on legal pads rather than on a computer and prepares elaborate outlines for his books, most of which are several hundred pages long.
Dialog and narration in Ellroy novels often consists of a "heightened pastiche of jazz slang, cop patois, creative profanity and drug vernacular" with a particular use of period-appropriate slang. He often employs stripped-down staccato sentence structures, a style that reaches its apex in The Cold Six Thousand and which Ellroy describes as a "direct, shorter-rather-than-longer sentence style that's declarative and ugly and right there, punching you in the nards." This signature style is not the result of a conscious experimentation but of chance and came about when he was asked by his editor to shorten his novel White Jazz from 900 pages to 350. Rather than removing any subplots, Ellroy achieved this by eliminating verbs, creating a unique style of prose. While each sentence on its own is simple, the cumulative effect is a dense, baroque
style.
While his early novels earned him a cult following, Ellroy earned much greater success and critical acclaim with the L.A. Quartet
—The Black Dahlia
, The Big Nowhere
, L.A. Confidential
, and White Jazz
. The four novels represent Ellroy's change of style from the tradition of classic modernist noir fiction of his earlier novels to so-called postmodern historiographic metafiction
. The Black Dahlia, for example, fused the real-life murder of Elizabeth Short with a fictional story of two police officers investigating the crime.
, the first novel in a series informally dubbed the "Underworld USA Trilogy" that Ellroy describes as a "secret history" of the mid-to-late 20th century. Tabloid was named TIME' s fiction book of year for 1995. Its follow-up, The Cold Six Thousand
, became a bestseller. The final novel, Blood's a Rover
, was released on September 22, 2009.
because the media were still fixated on Johnny Stompanato
's murder. Frank C. Girardot
, a reporter for The San Gabriel Valley Tribune, accessed files on Geneva Hilliker Ellroy's murder from detectives with Los Angeles Police Department. Based on the cold case file, Ellroy and investigator Bill Stoner worked the case but gave up after fifteen months, believing any suspects to be dead. In 2008, The Library of America selected the essay "My Mother's Killer" from My Dark Places for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American True Crime.
and self-reflexive subversiveness. He frequently begins public appearances with a monologue such as:
Another aspect of his public persona involves an almost comically grand assessment of his work and his place in literature. For example, he told the New York Times, "I am a master of fiction. I am also the greatest crime novelist who ever lived. I am to the crime novel in specific what Tolstoy
is to the Russian novel and what Beethoven is to music."
Ellroy frequently has espoused conservative political views, which have ranged from a vague antiliberalism
to authoritarianism
. In an October 15, 2009, Rolling Stone
interview, Ellroy said that in the 1960s and 1970s "I was never a peacemaker; I was a fuck-you right-winger." He has also been an outspoken and unquestioning admirer of the Los Angeles Police Department, and he dismisses the department's flaws as aberrations, telling the National Review
that the coverage of the Rodney King
beating and Rampart police scandals
were overblown by a biased media. Nevertheless, like other aspects of his persona, he often deliberately obscures where his public persona ends and his actual views begin. When asked about his "right-wing tendencies," he told an interviewer, "Right-wing tendencies? I do that to fuck with people." Similarly, in the film Feast of Death, his (now ex-) wife describes his politics as "bullshit," an assessment to which Ellroy responds only with a knowing smile. Privately, Ellroy opposes the death penalty and favors gun control
. Of the current political environment, Ellroy told Rolling Stone in 2009:
Structurally, several of Ellroy's books, such as The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, American Tabloid, and The Cold Six Thousand, have three disparate points of view
through different characters, with chapters alternating between them. Starting with The Black Dahlia, Ellroy's novels have mostly been historical dramas about the relationship between corruption and law enforcement.
A predominant theme of Ellroy's work is the myth of "closure." "Closure is bullshit," Ellroy often remarks, "and I would love to find the man who invented closure and shove a giant closure plaque up his ass."
Ellroy has claimed that he is done with noir crime novels. "I write big political books now," he says. "I want to write about LA exclusively for the rest of my career. I don't know where and when."
(adapted as Cop), L.A. Confidential
, Brown's Requiem, Killer on the Road
/Silent Terror (adapted as Stay Clean), and The Black Dahlia
. In each instance, screenplays based on Ellroy's work have been penned by other screenwriters.
While he has frequently been disappointed by these adaptations (such as Cop), he was very complimentary of Curtis Hanson
and Brian Helgeland
's screenplay for L.A. Confidential at the time of its release. In succeeding years, however, his comments have been more reserved:
Shortly after viewing three hours of unedited footage for Brian De Palma
's adaptation of The Black Dahlia
, Ellroy wrote an essay, "Hillikers," praising De Palma and his film. Ultimately, nearly an hour was removed from the final cut, and the film was a commercial and critical disappointment. Of the released film, Ellroy told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
, "Look, you’re not going to get me to say anything negative about the movie, so you might as well give up." He had, however, mocked the film's director, cast, and production design before it was filmed.
In 2008, Daily Variety reported that HBO, along with Tom Hanks
's production company, Playtone
, was developing American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand for either a miniseries or ongoing series.
Ellroy co-wrote the original screenplay
for the 2008 film Street Kings but refused to do any publicity for the finished film.
In a 2009 interview, Ellroy himself stated, "All movie adaptations of my books are dead."
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
crime fiction writer
Crime fiction
Crime fiction is the literary genre that fictionalizes crimes, their detection, criminals and their motives. It is usually distinguished from mainstream fiction and other genres such as science fiction or historical fiction, but boundaries can be, and indeed are, blurred...
and essayist. Ellroy has become known for a so-called "telegraphic" prose style in his most recent work, wherein he frequently omits connecting words and uses only short, staccato
Staccato
Staccato is a form of musical articulation. In modern notation it signifies a note of shortened duration and separated from the note that may follow by silence...
sentences, and in particular for the novels The Black Dahlia
The Black Dahlia (novel)
The Black Dahlia is a neo-noir crime novel by American author James Ellroy, taking inspiration from the true story of the murder of Elizabeth Short. It is widely considered to be the book that elevated Ellroy out of typical genre fiction status, and with which he started to garner critical...
(1987), The Big Nowhere
The Big Nowhere
The Big Nowhere is a 1988 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy, the second of the L.A. Quartet, a series of novels set in 1940s and 1950s Los Angeles.-Plot:...
(1988), L.A. Confidential
L.A. Confidential
L.A. Confidential is a 1997 American film based on James Ellroy's 1990 novel of the same title, the third book in his L.A. Quartet. Both the book and the film tell the story of a group of LAPD officers in the 1950s, and the intersection of police corruption and Hollywood celebrity...
(1990), White Jazz
White Jazz
White Jazz is a 1992 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy. It is the fourth in his L.A. Quartet, preceded by The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, and L.A. Confidential....
(1992), American Tabloid
American Tabloid
American Tabloid is a 1995 novel by James Ellroy. The novel chronicles three rogue American law enforcement officers from November 22, 1958 through November 22, 1963. Each becomes entangled in a web of interconnecting associations between the FBI, CIA, and the Mafia, which eventually leads to their...
(1995), The Cold Six Thousand
The Cold Six Thousand
The Cold Six Thousand is a 2001 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy. It is the first sequel to American Tabloid in the Underworld USA Trilogy and continues many of the earlier novel's characters and plotlines...
(2001), and Blood's a Rover
Blood's a Rover
Blood's a Rover is a 2009 crime fiction novel by American author James Ellroy. It follows American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand as the final volume of Ellroy's Underworld USA Trilogy. A 10,000-word excerpt was published in the December 2008 issue of Playboy...
(2009).
Life and career
Ellroy was born in Los Angeles, CaliforniaLos Angeles, California
Los Angeles , with a population at the 2010 United States Census of 3,792,621, is the most populous city in California, USA and the second most populous in the United States, after New York City. It has an area of , and is located in Southern California...
, the son of Geneva Odelia (née Hilliker) Ellroy, a nurse, and Armand Ellroy, an accountant and, according to Ellroy, onetime business manager of Rita Hayworth
Rita Hayworth
Rita Hayworth was an American film actress and dancer who attained fame during the 1940s as one of the era's top stars...
. After his parents' divorce, Ellroy and his mother relocated to El Monte, California
El Monte, California
El Monte is a residential, industrial, and commercial city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. The city's slogan is "Welcome to Friendly El Monte," and historically is known as "The End of the Santa Fe Trail." As of the 2010 census, the city had a total population of 113,475,...
. In 1958, Ellroy's mother was murdered. The police never found the perpetrator, and the case remains unsolved. The murder, along with reading The Badge by Jack Webb
Jack Webb
John Randolph "Jack" Webb , also known by the pseudonym John Randolph, was an American actor, television producer, director and screenwriter, who is most famous for his role as Sergeant Joe Friday in the radio and television series Dragnet...
(a book composed of sensational cases from the files of the Los Angeles Police Department
Los Angeles Police Department
The Los Angeles Police Department is the police department of the city of Los Angeles, California. With just under 10,000 officers and more than 3,000 civilian staff, covering an area of with a population of more than 4.1 million people, it is the third largest local law enforcement agency in...
, a birthday gift from his father), were important events of Ellroy's youth.
Ellroy's inability to come to terms with the emotions surrounding his mother's murder led him to transfer
Transference
Transference is a phenomenon in psychoanalysis characterized by unconscious redirection of feelings from one person to another. One definition of transference is "the inappropriate repetition in the present of a relationship that was important in a person's childhood." Another definition is "the...
them onto another murder victim, Elizabeth Short, the "Black Dahlia"; throughout his youth, Ellroy used Short as a surrogate for his conflicting emotions and desires. His confusion and trauma led to a period of intense clinical depression
Clinical depression
Major depressive disorder is a mental disorder characterized by an all-encompassing low mood accompanied by low self-esteem, and by loss of interest or pleasure in normally enjoyable activities...
, from which he recovered only gradually.
Ellroy dropped out of school without graduating. He joined the army for a short while. During his teens and twenties, he drank heavily and abused Benzedrex inhalers. He was engaged in minor crimes (especially shoplifting, house-breaking, and burglary) and was often homeless. After serving some time in jail and suffering a bout of pneumonia
Pneumonia
Pneumonia is an inflammatory condition of the lung—especially affecting the microscopic air sacs —associated with fever, chest symptoms, and a lack of air space on a chest X-ray. Pneumonia is typically caused by an infection but there are a number of other causes...
, during which he developed an abscess on his lung "the size of a large man's fist," Ellroy stopped drinking and began working as a golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....
caddy
Caddy
In golf, a caddy is the person who carries a player's bag and clubs, and gives insightful advice and moral support. A good caddy is aware of the challenges and obstacles of the golf course being played, along with the best strategy in playing it. This includes knowing overall yardage, pin...
while pursuing writing. He later said, "Caddying was good tax-free cash and allowed me to get home by 2 p.m. and write books.... I caddied right up to the sale of my fifth book."
After a second marriage in the mid 1990s to Helen Knode (author of the 2003 novel The Ticket Out), the couple moved from California to Kansas City
Kansas City, Missouri
Kansas City, Missouri is the largest city in the U.S. state of Missouri and is the anchor city of the Kansas City Metropolitan Area, the second largest metropolitan area in Missouri. It encompasses in parts of Jackson, Clay, Cass, and Platte counties...
in 1995. In 2006, after their divorce, Ellroy returned to Los Angeles. He is a self-described hermit
Hermit
A hermit is a person who lives, to some degree, in seclusion from society.In Christianity, the term was originally applied to a Christian who lives the eremitic life out of a religious conviction, namely the Desert Theology of the Old Testament .In the...
who possesses very few technological amenities, including television, and claims never to read contemporary books by other authors, aside from Joseph Wambaugh
Joseph Wambaugh
Joseph Aloysius Wambaugh, Jr. is a bestselling American writer known for his fictional and non-fictional accounts of police work in the United States...
's The Onion Field
The Onion Field
The Onion Field is a 1973 nonfiction book by Joseph Wambaugh, a sergeant for the Los Angeles Police Department, chronicling the kidnapping of two plainclothes LAPD officers by a pair of criminals during an evening traffic stop and the subsequent murder of Officer Ian James Campbell.- Crime :On the...
, for fear that they might influence his own. However, this does not mean that Ellroy does not read at all, as he claims in My Dark Places to have read at least two books a week growing up, eventually shoplifting more to satisfy his love of reading. He then goes on to say that he read works by Dashiell Hammett
Dashiell Hammett
Samuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories, and political activist. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade , Nick and Nora Charles , and the Continental Op .In addition to the significant influence his novels and stories had on...
and Raymond Chandler
Raymond Chandler
Raymond Thornton Chandler was an American novelist and screenwriter.In 1932, at age forty-five, Raymond Chandler decided to become a detective fiction writer after losing his job as an oil company executive during the Depression. His first short story, "Blackmailers Don't Shoot", was published in...
accompanied by abuse of alcohol and Benzedrex inhalers.
Literary career
In 1981, Ellroy published his first novel, Brown's RequiemBrown's Requiem (novel)
Brown's Requiem is a 1981 crime novel, the first novel by American author James Ellroy....
, a detective story drawing on his experiences as a caddy. He then published Clandestine and Silent Terror (which was later published under the title Killer on the Road). Ellroy followed these three novels with the Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy
Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy
The Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy is the phrase used to refer collectively to three crime fiction novels written by James Ellroy. The three novels are:*1984 Blood on the Moon*1984 Because the Night*1985 Suicide Hill-Characters:...
, three novels centered on Hopkins, a police officer.
Writing style
Hallmarks of his work include dense plotting and a relentlessly pessimistic—albeit moral—worldview. His work has earned Ellroy the nickname "Demon dog of American crime fiction."Ellroy writes longhand on legal pads rather than on a computer and prepares elaborate outlines for his books, most of which are several hundred pages long.
Dialog and narration in Ellroy novels often consists of a "heightened pastiche of jazz slang, cop patois, creative profanity and drug vernacular" with a particular use of period-appropriate slang. He often employs stripped-down staccato sentence structures, a style that reaches its apex in The Cold Six Thousand and which Ellroy describes as a "direct, shorter-rather-than-longer sentence style that's declarative and ugly and right there, punching you in the nards." This signature style is not the result of a conscious experimentation but of chance and came about when he was asked by his editor to shorten his novel White Jazz from 900 pages to 350. Rather than removing any subplots, Ellroy achieved this by eliminating verbs, creating a unique style of prose. While each sentence on its own is simple, the cumulative effect is a dense, baroque
Baroque
The Baroque is a period and the style that used exaggerated motion and clear, easily interpreted detail to produce drama, tension, exuberance, and grandeur in sculpture, painting, literature, dance, and music...
style.
The L.A. Quartet
While his early novels earned him a cult following, Ellroy earned much greater success and critical acclaim with the L.A. Quartet
L.A. Quartet
The L.A. Quartet is a sequence of four crime fiction novels by James Ellroy. The novels, set in the late 1940s through the late 1950s in Los Angeles, are:* The Black Dahlia* The Big Nowhere* L.A. Confidential...
—The Black Dahlia
The Black Dahlia (novel)
The Black Dahlia is a neo-noir crime novel by American author James Ellroy, taking inspiration from the true story of the murder of Elizabeth Short. It is widely considered to be the book that elevated Ellroy out of typical genre fiction status, and with which he started to garner critical...
, The Big Nowhere
The Big Nowhere
The Big Nowhere is a 1988 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy, the second of the L.A. Quartet, a series of novels set in 1940s and 1950s Los Angeles.-Plot:...
, L.A. Confidential
L.A. Confidential
L.A. Confidential is a 1997 American film based on James Ellroy's 1990 novel of the same title, the third book in his L.A. Quartet. Both the book and the film tell the story of a group of LAPD officers in the 1950s, and the intersection of police corruption and Hollywood celebrity...
, and White Jazz
White Jazz
White Jazz is a 1992 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy. It is the fourth in his L.A. Quartet, preceded by The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, and L.A. Confidential....
. The four novels represent Ellroy's change of style from the tradition of classic modernist noir fiction of his earlier novels to so-called postmodern historiographic metafiction
Metafiction
Metafiction, also known as Romantic irony in the context of Romantic works of literature, is a type of fiction that self-consciously addresses the devices of fiction, exposing the fictional illusion...
. The Black Dahlia, for example, fused the real-life murder of Elizabeth Short with a fictional story of two police officers investigating the crime.
Underworld USA Trilogy
In 1995, Ellroy published American TabloidAmerican Tabloid
American Tabloid is a 1995 novel by James Ellroy. The novel chronicles three rogue American law enforcement officers from November 22, 1958 through November 22, 1963. Each becomes entangled in a web of interconnecting associations between the FBI, CIA, and the Mafia, which eventually leads to their...
, the first novel in a series informally dubbed the "Underworld USA Trilogy" that Ellroy describes as a "secret history" of the mid-to-late 20th century. Tabloid was named TIME
The Cold Six Thousand
The Cold Six Thousand is a 2001 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy. It is the first sequel to American Tabloid in the Underworld USA Trilogy and continues many of the earlier novel's characters and plotlines...
, became a bestseller. The final novel, Blood's a Rover
Blood's a Rover
Blood's a Rover is a 2009 crime fiction novel by American author James Ellroy. It follows American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand as the final volume of Ellroy's Underworld USA Trilogy. A 10,000-word excerpt was published in the December 2008 issue of Playboy...
, was released on September 22, 2009.
My Dark Places
After publishing American Tabloid, Ellroy began a memoir, My Dark Places, based on his memories of his mother's murder and his investigation of the crime. In the memoir, Ellroy mentions that his mother's murder received little news coverageNews media (United States)
Mass media are the means through which information is transmitted to a large audience. This includes newspapers, television, radio, and more recently the Internet. Those who provide news and information, and the outlets for which they work, are known as the news media.Some high-quality news media...
because the media were still fixated on Johnny Stompanato
Johnny Stompanato
John "Johnny" Stompanato , also known as "Handsome Harry", "Johnny Stomp", "John Steele", and "Oscar", was a former United States Marine who became a bodyguard/enforcer for gangster Mickey Cohen...
's murder. Frank C. Girardot
Frank C. Girardot
Frank C. Girardot, Jr. is metro editor of the Pasadena Star-News and the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, two newspapers owned by Colorado-based newspaper chain MediaNews Group...
, a reporter for The San Gabriel Valley Tribune, accessed files on Geneva Hilliker Ellroy's murder from detectives with Los Angeles Police Department. Based on the cold case file, Ellroy and investigator Bill Stoner worked the case but gave up after fifteen months, believing any suspects to be dead. In 2008, The Library of America selected the essay "My Mother's Killer" from My Dark Places for inclusion in its two-century retrospective of American True Crime.
Public life and views
In media appearances, Ellroy has adopted an outsized, stylized public persona of hard-boiled nihilismNihilism
Nihilism is the philosophical doctrine suggesting the negation of one or more putatively meaningful aspects of life. Most commonly, nihilism is presented in the form of existential nihilism which argues that life is without objective meaning, purpose, or intrinsic value...
and self-reflexive subversiveness. He frequently begins public appearances with a monologue such as:
Good evening peepers, prowlers, pederasts, panty-sniffers, punks and pimps. I'm James Ellroy, the demon dog, the foul owl with the death growl, the white knight of the far right, and the slick trick with the donkey dick. I'm the author of 16 books, masterpieces all; they precede all my future masterpieces. These books will leave you reamed, steamed and drycleaned, tie-dyed, swept to the side, true-blued, tattooed and bah fongooed. These are books for the whole fuckin' family, if the name of your family is Manson.
Another aspect of his public persona involves an almost comically grand assessment of his work and his place in literature. For example, he told the New York Times, "I am a master of fiction. I am also the greatest crime novelist who ever lived. I am to the crime novel in specific what Tolstoy
Tolstoy
Tolstoy, or Tolstoi is a prominent family of Russian nobility, descending from Andrey Kharitonovich Tolstoy who served under Vasily II of Moscow...
is to the Russian novel and what Beethoven is to music."
Ellroy frequently has espoused conservative political views, which have ranged from a vague antiliberalism
Liberalism
Liberalism is the belief in the importance of liberty and equal rights. Liberals espouse a wide array of views depending on their understanding of these principles, but generally, liberals support ideas such as constitutionalism, liberal democracy, free and fair elections, human rights,...
to authoritarianism
Authoritarianism
Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
. In an October 15, 2009, Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone
Rolling Stone is a US-based magazine devoted to music, liberal politics, and popular culture that is published every two weeks. Rolling Stone was founded in San Francisco in 1967 by Jann Wenner and music critic Ralph J...
interview, Ellroy said that in the 1960s and 1970s "I was never a peacemaker; I was a fuck-you right-winger." He has also been an outspoken and unquestioning admirer of the Los Angeles Police Department, and he dismisses the department's flaws as aberrations, telling the National Review
National Review
National Review is a biweekly magazine founded by the late author William F. Buckley, Jr., in 1955 and based in New York City. It describes itself as "America's most widely read and influential magazine and web site for conservative news, commentary, and opinion."Although the print version of the...
that the coverage of the Rodney King
Rodney King
Rodney Glen King is an American best known for his involvement in a police brutality case involving the Los Angeles Police Department on March 3, 1991...
beating and Rampart police scandals
LAPD Rampart Division
The Rampart Division of the Los Angeles Police Department serves communities to the west and northwest of Downtown Los Angeles including Echo Park, Pico-Union and Westlake, all together designated as the Rampart patrol area. Its name is derived from Rampart Boulevard, one of the principal...
were overblown by a biased media. Nevertheless, like other aspects of his persona, he often deliberately obscures where his public persona ends and his actual views begin. When asked about his "right-wing tendencies," he told an interviewer, "Right-wing tendencies? I do that to fuck with people." Similarly, in the film Feast of Death, his (now ex-) wife describes his politics as "bullshit," an assessment to which Ellroy responds only with a knowing smile. Privately, Ellroy opposes the death penalty and favors gun control
Gun control
Gun control is any law, policy, practice, or proposal designed to restrict or limit the possession, production, importation, shipment, sale, and/or use of guns or other firearms by private citizens...
. Of the current political environment, Ellroy told Rolling Stone in 2009:
I thought BushGeorge W. BushGeorge Walker Bush is an American politician who served as the 43rd President of the United States, from 2001 to 2009. Before that, he was the 46th Governor of Texas, having served from 1995 to 2000....
was a slimeball and the most disastrous American president in recent times. I voted for ObamaBarack ObamaBarack Hussein Obama II is the 44th and current President of the United States. He is the first African American to hold the office. Obama previously served as a United States Senator from Illinois, from January 2005 until he resigned following his victory in the 2008 presidential election.Born in...
. He's a lot like Jack KennedyJohn F. KennedyJohn Fitzgerald "Jack" Kennedy , often referred to by his initials JFK, was the 35th President of the United States, serving from 1961 until his assassination in 1963....
—they both have big ears and infectious smiles. But Obama is a deeper guy. Kennedy was an appetite guy. He wanted pussy, hamburgers, booze. Jack did a lot of dope.
Structurally, several of Ellroy's books, such as The Big Nowhere, L.A. Confidential, American Tabloid, and The Cold Six Thousand, have three disparate points of view
Point of view (literature)
The narrative mode is the set of methods the author of a literary, theatrical, cinematic, or musical story uses to convey the plot to the audience. Narration, the process of presenting the narrative, occurs because of the narrative mode...
through different characters, with chapters alternating between them. Starting with The Black Dahlia, Ellroy's novels have mostly been historical dramas about the relationship between corruption and law enforcement.
A predominant theme of Ellroy's work is the myth of "closure." "Closure is bullshit," Ellroy often remarks, "and I would love to find the man who invented closure and shove a giant closure plaque up his ass."
Ellroy has claimed that he is done with noir crime novels. "I write big political books now," he says. "I want to write about LA exclusively for the rest of my career. I don't know where and when."
Film adaptations and screenplays
Several of Ellroy's works have been adapted to film, including Blood on the MoonBlood on the Moon (novel)
Blood on the Moon is a crime novel by James Ellroy. It is the first installment of the Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy. It was followed by Because the Night and Suicide Hill...
(adapted as Cop), L.A. Confidential
L.A. Confidential (film)
L.A. Confidential is a 1997 American film based on James Ellroy's 1990 novel of the same title, the third book in his L.A. Quartet. Both the book and the film tell the story of a group of LAPD officers in the 1950s, and the intersection of police corruption and Hollywood celebrity...
, Brown's Requiem, Killer on the Road
Killer on the Road
Killer on the Road is a crime novel by James Ellroy. First published in 1986, it is a non-series book between the Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy and the L.A. Quartet. It was first released by Avon as a mass-market paperback original under the title Silent Terror. But the title intended by Ellroy is Killer...
/Silent Terror (adapted as Stay Clean), and The Black Dahlia
The Black Dahlia (film)
The Black Dahlia is a 2006 neo noir crime film directed by Brian De Palma. It is based on the novel of the same name by James Ellroy, writer of L.A. Confidential and starred Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart and Hilary Swank. The story is based on the murder of Elizabeth Short...
. In each instance, screenplays based on Ellroy's work have been penned by other screenwriters.
While he has frequently been disappointed by these adaptations (such as Cop), he was very complimentary of Curtis Hanson
Curtis Hanson
Curtis Lee Hanson is an American film director, film producer and screenwriter. His directing work includes The Hand That Rocks the Cradle , L.A...
and Brian Helgeland
Brian Helgeland
Brian Thomas Helgeland is an American screenwriter, film producer and director. He is most known for writing the screenplays for L.A...
's screenplay for L.A. Confidential at the time of its release. In succeeding years, however, his comments have been more reserved:
L.A. Confidential, the movie, is the best thing that happened to me in my career that I had absolutely nothing to do with. It was a fluke—and a wonderful one—and it is never going to happen again—a movie of that quality.
Here’s my final comment on L.A. Confidential, the movie: I go to a video store in Prairie Village, Kansas. The youngsters who work there know me as the guy who wrote L.A. Confidential. They tell all the little old ladies who come in there to get their G-rated family flick. They come up to me, they say, “OOOO… you wrote L.A. Confidential.... Oh, what a wonderful, wonderful movie. I saw it four times. You don’t see storytelling like that on the screen anymore.” I smile, I say, “Yes, it’s a wonderful movie, and a salutary adaptation of my wonderful novel. But listen, granny: You love the movie. Did you go out and buy the book?” And granny invariably says, “Well, no, I didn’t.” And I say to granny, “Then what the fuck good are you to me?”
Shortly after viewing three hours of unedited footage for Brian De Palma
Brian De Palma
Brian Russell De Palma is an American film director and writer. In a career spanning over 40 years, he is probably best known for his suspense and crime thriller films, including such box office successes as the horror film Carrie, Dressed to Kill, Scarface, The Untouchables, and Mission:...
's adaptation of The Black Dahlia
The Black Dahlia (film)
The Black Dahlia is a 2006 neo noir crime film directed by Brian De Palma. It is based on the novel of the same name by James Ellroy, writer of L.A. Confidential and starred Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart and Hilary Swank. The story is based on the murder of Elizabeth Short...
, Ellroy wrote an essay, "Hillikers," praising De Palma and his film. Ultimately, nearly an hour was removed from the final cut, and the film was a commercial and critical disappointment. Of the released film, Ellroy told the Seattle Post-Intelligencer
Seattle Post-Intelligencer
The Seattle Post-Intelligencer is an online newspaper and former print newspaper covering Seattle, Washington, United States, and the surrounding metropolitan area...
, "Look, you’re not going to get me to say anything negative about the movie, so you might as well give up." He had, however, mocked the film's director, cast, and production design before it was filmed.
In 2008, Daily Variety reported that HBO, along with Tom Hanks
Tom Hanks
Thomas Jeffrey "Tom" Hanks is an American actor, producer, writer, and director. Hanks worked in television and family-friendly comedies, gaining wide notice in 1988's Big, before achieving success as a dramatic actor in several notable roles, including Andrew Beckett in Philadelphia, the title...
's production company, Playtone
Playtone
The Playtone Company is an American film and television production company and record label established in 1996 by actor Tom Hanks and producer Gary Goetzman....
, was developing American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand for either a miniseries or ongoing series.
Ellroy co-wrote the original screenplay
Screenplay
A screenplay or script is a written work that is made especially for a film or television program. Screenplays can be original works or adaptations from existing pieces of writing. In them, the movement, actions, expression, and dialogues of the characters are also narrated...
for the 2008 film Street Kings but refused to do any publicity for the finished film.
In a 2009 interview, Ellroy himself stated, "All movie adaptations of my books are dead."
Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy
- Blood on the MoonBlood on the Moon (novel)Blood on the Moon is a crime novel by James Ellroy. It is the first installment of the Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy. It was followed by Because the Night and Suicide Hill...
(1984) - Because the NightBecause the Night (novel)Because the Night is a crime fiction novel written by James Ellroy.Released in 1984, it is the second installment of a three book trilogy often titled Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy, after its main character or "L.A Noir," after the hard-book copy that was released containing all three books in the...
(1984) - Suicide HillSuicide Hill (novel)Suicide Hill is a crime fiction novel written by James Ellroy.Released in 1985, it is the third and final installment of the Lloyd Hopkins Trilogy.-Plot summary:...
(1985) - L.A. Noir (omnibus edition) (1998)
L.A. Quartet
- The Black DahliaThe Black Dahlia (novel)The Black Dahlia is a neo-noir crime novel by American author James Ellroy, taking inspiration from the true story of the murder of Elizabeth Short. It is widely considered to be the book that elevated Ellroy out of typical genre fiction status, and with which he started to garner critical...
(1987) - The Big NowhereThe Big NowhereThe Big Nowhere is a 1988 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy, the second of the L.A. Quartet, a series of novels set in 1940s and 1950s Los Angeles.-Plot:...
(1988) - L.A. ConfidentialL.A. ConfidentialL.A. Confidential is a 1997 American film based on James Ellroy's 1990 novel of the same title, the third book in his L.A. Quartet. Both the book and the film tell the story of a group of LAPD officers in the 1950s, and the intersection of police corruption and Hollywood celebrity...
(1990) - White JazzWhite JazzWhite Jazz is a 1992 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy. It is the fourth in his L.A. Quartet, preceded by The Black Dahlia, The Big Nowhere, and L.A. Confidential....
(1992)
Underworld USA Trilogy
- American TabloidAmerican TabloidAmerican Tabloid is a 1995 novel by James Ellroy. The novel chronicles three rogue American law enforcement officers from November 22, 1958 through November 22, 1963. Each becomes entangled in a web of interconnecting associations between the FBI, CIA, and the Mafia, which eventually leads to their...
(1995) - The Cold Six ThousandThe Cold Six ThousandThe Cold Six Thousand is a 2001 crime fiction novel by James Ellroy. It is the first sequel to American Tabloid in the Underworld USA Trilogy and continues many of the earlier novel's characters and plotlines...
(2001) - Blood's a RoverBlood's a RoverBlood's a Rover is a 2009 crime fiction novel by American author James Ellroy. It follows American Tabloid and The Cold Six Thousand as the final volume of Ellroy's Underworld USA Trilogy. A 10,000-word excerpt was published in the December 2008 issue of Playboy...
(2009)
Short stories and essays
- Dick Contino's Blues (issue number 46 of GrantaGrantaGranta is a literary magazine and publisher in the United Kingdom whose mission centers on its "belief in the power and urgency of the story, both in fiction and non-fiction, and the story’s supreme ability to describe, illuminate and make real." In 2007, The Observer stated, "In its blend of...
magazine, Winter 1994) - Hollywood NocturnesHollywood NocturnesHollywood Nocturnes is a 1994 collection of short stories by James Ellroy. Like many of Ellroy's novels, the majority of the stories are set in 1940s and 1950s. The collection was inspired by Ellroy's having seen the film Daddy-O and finding cosmic significance in the image of Dick Contino, whom...
(1994; UK title: Dick ContinoDick ContinoDick Contino is an American accordionist and singer.Contino studied accordion primarily with San Francisco-based Angelo Cognazzo, and occasionally with Los Angeles-based Guido Deiro. Early on he exhibited great virtuosity on the instrument...
's Blues and Other Stories) - Crime WaveCrime Wave (book)Crime Wave is a 1999 collection of 11 short works of fiction and non-fiction, all originally published in GQ, by American crime fiction writer James Ellroy...
(1999) - Destination: Morgue!Destination: Morgue!Destination: Morgue! L.A. Tales is a 2004 collection of 12 short works by American crime fiction writer James Ellroy. Eight of the pieces are non-fiction crime reportage or essays that Ellroy originally wrote for GQ magazine, some of which are autobiographical...
(2004)
Autobiography
- My Dark Places (1996)
- The Hilliker Curse: My Pursuit of Women (2010)
Guest editor
- The Best American Mystery Stories 2002 (2002)
- The Best American Crime Writing 2005 (2005)
Documentaries
- 1993 James Ellroy: Demon Dog of American Crime Fiction
- 1995 White Jazz
- 2001 James Ellroy's Feast of Death
- 2006 Murder By The Book: James Ellroy
- 2010 Ellroy appeared on BBCBBCThe British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...
Radio 4's Desert Island DiscsDesert Island DiscsDesert Island Discs is a BBC Radio 4 programme first broadcast on 29 January 1942. It is the second longest-running radio programme , and is the longest-running factual programme in the history of radio...
, talking about his life and influences.
Films
- 1988 Cop
- 1997 L.A. ConfidentialL.A. Confidential (film)L.A. Confidential is a 1997 American film based on James Ellroy's 1990 novel of the same title, the third book in his L.A. Quartet. Both the book and the film tell the story of a group of LAPD officers in the 1950s, and the intersection of police corruption and Hollywood celebrity...
- 1998 Brown's Requiem
- 2002 Stay Clean
- 2002 Dark Blue
- 2006 The Black DahliaThe Black Dahlia (film)The Black Dahlia is a 2006 neo noir crime film directed by Brian De Palma. It is based on the novel of the same name by James Ellroy, writer of L.A. Confidential and starred Josh Hartnett, Scarlett Johansson, Aaron Eckhart and Hilary Swank. The story is based on the murder of Elizabeth Short...
- 2008 Street Kings
- 2008 Land of the Living
- 2011 RampartRampart (film)Rampart is a drama film released in 2011. Directed by Oren Moverman and co-written by Moverman and James Ellroy, the film stars Woody Harrelson and Ice Cube. In the midst of the fallout from the Rampart scandal of the 1990s, dirty LAPD veteran Dave Brown is forced to face up to the consequences of...
- 2012 White Jazz
Television
- 1992 "Since I Don't Have You" adapted by Steven A. KatzSteven A. KatzSteven Katz is the writer of the original screenplay Shadow of the Vampire . He was born in St. Louis, Missouri on October 8, 1959 and received a B.A. in English and Art History from Brown University in 1982 and an M.A. in English from Columbia University in 1984...
for Showtime's Fallen AngelsFallen Angels (TV series)Fallen Angels was an American neo-noir anthology television series that ran from 1993 to 1995 on the Showtime pay cable station and was produced by Propaganda Films. No first-run episodes were shown in 1994....
. - 2011 James Ellroy's L.A.: City of Demons