Rex Stout

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**Rex Stout**
Rex Stout in 1975 (Jill Krementz)
Born:	December 11, 1886 Noblesville, Indiana
Died:	October 27, 1975 Danbury, Connecticut
Occupation:	Writer
Genres:	Detective fiction

Rex Stout, full name Rex Todhunter Stout, (December 1, 1886 - October 27, 1975) was an American writer best known as the creator of the larger-than-life fictional detective Nero Wolfe.

1 Biography
2 Writings
3 Bibliography
4 Adaptations
5 Of further interest
- 5.1 Rex Stout Archive at Boston College
- 5.2 Omnibus, "The Fine Art of Murder" (ABC)
6 External links

[edit] Biography

Stout was born in Noblesville, Indiana, but shortly after that his Quaker parents John Wallace Stout and Lucetta Elizabeth Todhunter Stout moved their family (nine children in all) to Kansas.

His father was a teacher who encouraged his son to read, and Rex had read the entire Bible twice by the time he was 4 years old. He was the state spelling bee champion at age thirteen. Stout was educated at Topeka High School, Kansas, and later at University of Kansas, Lawrence.

He served from 1906 to 1908 in the U.S. Navy (as a yeoman on President Teddy Roosevelt's official yacht) and then spent about the next four years working at about thirty different jobs (in six states), including cigar store clerk, while he sold poems, stories, and articles to various magazines.

It was not his writing but his invention of a school banking system in about 1916 that gave him enough money to travel in Europe extensively. About 400 U.S. schools adopted his system for keeping track of the money school children saved in accounts at school, and he was paid royalties. Also in 1916, Stout married Fay Kennedy of Topeka, Kansas. They separated in 1933 and Stout married in the same year Pola Hoffman of Vienna, Austria.

Raised with a powerful social conscience, he served on the original board of the American Civil Liberties Union & helped start the radical magazine "New Masses" in the 1920s. During the Great Depression, he was an enthusiastic supporter of the New Deal, & lobbied hard for Franklin Roosevelt to accept a fourth term as president. During WWII, he worked with the advocacy group Friends of Democracy, figured prominently on the Writers War Board, particularly in support of the embryonic United Nations. When the war ended, Stout became active in the United World Federalists.

Stout was active in liberal causes. When the anti-Communist hysteria of the late 1940s & 1950s began, Stout found himself targeted by members of the American Legion. He ignored a subpoena from the House Un-American Activities Committee at the height of the McCarthy era.

Stout was one of many writers on Hoover's private enemies list, as found by journalist Herbert Mitgang when he obtained access to Stout's FBI files for his book Dangerous Dossiers (1988). Stout's FBI file ran 300 pages (though the FBI would only release 183 heavily blacked-out pages to Mitgang). But Stout wasn't afraid, knowing that he could rely on both independent means & the love of the public. In 1965, Stout fought back with his novel The Doorbell Rang, in which Nero Wolfe found himself locked in a duel of wits with the FBI.

In later years Stout alienated many with his hawkish stance on Vietnam, and the contempt for communism in his works was denounced frequently.

[edit] Writings

Stout started his literary career in the 1910s writing for the pulps, publishing romance, adventure, and some borderline detective stories. Rex Stout's first stories appeared among others in All-Story Magazine. He sold articles and stories to a variety of magazines, and became a full-time writer in 1927. Stout lost the money he had made as a businessman in 1929.

In Paris in 1929 he wrote his first book, How Like a God, an unusual psychological story written in the second person. During the course of his career Stout mastered a variety of literary forms, including the short story, the novel, and science fiction, among them a pioneering political thriller, The President Vanishes (1934).

After he returned to the U.S. Stout turned to writing detective fiction. The first was Fer-de-Lance, which introduced Nero Wolfe and his assistant Archie Goodwin. The novel was published by Farrar & Rinehart in October 1934, and in abridged form as Point of Death in The American Magazine (November 1934). In 1937, Stout created Dol Bonner, a female private detective who would reappear in his Nero Wolfe stories. After 1938 Stout focused solely on the mystery field. Stout continued writing the Wolfe series -- at least one adventure per year -- until his death in 1975.

During WWII Stout cut back on his detective writing, joined the Fight for Freedom organization, and wrote propaganda. He hosted three weekly radio shows, and coordinated the volunteer services of American writers to help the war effort. After the war Stout returned to writing Nero Wolfe novels, and took up the role of gentleman farmer on his estate at High Meadows in Brewster, north of New York City. He served as President of the Authors Guild and of the Mystery Writers of America. In 1959 he received the Grand Master Award from the latter organization.

Stout was a longtime friend of the British humorist P. G. Wodehouse, writer of the Jeeves novels and short stories. Each was a fan of the other's work, and there are evident parallels between their characters and techniques. Wodehouse contributed the introduction to Rex Stout: A Majesty's Life, the Edgar Award-winning biography by John McAleer.

The Wolfe Pack, an organization of Stout and Wolfe aficionados, holds events for readers of the series including bimonthly book discussions and an annual Assembly and Banquet in New York, and publishes the biennial Gazette.

[edit] Bibliography

[edit] Nero Wolfe books by Rex Stout

Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe books are listed below in order of publication. Novels are also browsable by title at the Nero Wolfe novels by Rex Stout page. Titles of the novella collections are listed alphabetically on the Nero Wolfe books by Rex Stout page.

Fer-de-Lance (1934) — The first Nero Wolfe mystery and the basis for the 1936 movie Meet Nero Wolfe. The story involves the death of a college president while playing golf in Westchester County, New York. Although the characters are not as fully developed as they would become later in the series, the essential characteristics of Wolfe, Archie, and several other regulars already are clearly present.
The League of Frightened Men (1935) — Author Paul Chapin is on trial for obscenity in his popular novel. Wolfe reads the book, then tells Archie that a potential client had asked Wolfe to arrange to protect him from Chapin. The potential client, along with some classmates at Harvard, had taken part in a hazing incident years before, in which Chapin was crippled. Now some of the "League of Frightened Men" — who chipped in to help Chapin after the accident — have begun dying. It is unclear whether that is through malice or by chance, but the surviving members of the League wish to hire Wolfe to find out. (The prominent American man of letters Edmund Wilson wrote in a review in The New Yorker that the book "makes use of a clever psychological idea.") The book was adapted for the 1937 movie The League of Frightened Men.
The Rubber Band (1936) — Archie books two new clients on the same day, and before the day is over Wolfe has to choose which to keep and there are more than two crimes to untangle. The client he keeps in the end is a beautiful young woman, but it's Wolfe who reads her Hungarian poetry, not Archie. In the course of this novel, Lieutenant Rowcliffe, not one of the NYPD's finest (in the opinion not only of Wolfe but Cramer), earns Wolfe's enmity that lasts until the final Wolfe novel in 1975.
The Red Box (1937) — In the midst of a murder investigation, one of the suspects visits Wolfe and begs Wolfe to handle his estate and especially the contents of a certain red box. Wolfe is at first concerned about a possible conflict of interest, but feels unable to refuse when the man then dies in his office before telling Wolfe where to find the red box. The police naturally think that he told Wolfe somewhat more before dying.
Too Many Cooks (1938) — Wolfe, a knowledgeable gourmet as well as a detective, attends a meeting of great chefs, The Fifteen Masters, at a resort in West Virginia, and jealousies among them soon lead to death. Wolfe sustains his own injury in the course of finding the culprit but also obtains the secret recipe for saucisse minuit.
Some Buried Caesar (1939) — On the way to an agricultural fair north of Manhattan, Wolfe's car runs into a tree, stranding Wolfe and Archie at the home of the owner of a chain of fast-food cafés. A neighbor is later found gored to death; the authorities rule the death an accident but Wolfe deduces that it was murder. Lily Rowan, Archie's longtime girlfriend, makes her first appearance.
Over My Dead Body (1940) — This novel and its much later sequel The Black Mountain, have as a background Montenegrin (Yugoslavian) politics.
Where There's a Will (1940) — Wolfe is initially retained to assist in a will contest, only soon to find himself engaged in investigating a murder.
Black Orchids (1942) — Novella collection that includes "Black Orchids" and "Cordially Invited to Meet Death"
Not Quite Dead Enough (1944) — Novella collection that includes "Not Quite Dead Enough" and "Booby Trap"
The Silent Speaker (1946)
Too Many Women (1947) — A malcontent at the Naylor-Kerr corporation charges that one of its employees, thought to have been killed in a hit-and-run accident, was actually murdered. The president of the colossal company hires Archie to look into the matter in the guise of a personnel consultant working in Naylor-Kerr's executive offices — where 500 beautiful woman have been gathered under one roof.
And Be a Villain (1948) (British title More Deaths Than One) — The first of three novels (The Second Confession, In the Best Families) that concern Nero Wolfe's struggle with Arnold Zeck, an organized crime kingpin.
Trouble in Triplicate (1949) — Novella collection that includes "Help Wanted, Male," "Before I Die" and "Instead of Evidence"
The Second Confession (1949)
Three Doors to Death (1950) — Novella collection that includes "Man Alive," "Omit Flowers" and "Door to Death"
In the Best Families (1950)
Curtains for Three (1951) — Novella collection that includes "The Gun with Wings," "Bullet for One" and "Disguise for Murder"
Murder by the Book (1951) — Because the New York police have written the case off as an accident, a Peoria businessman asks Wolfe to investigate the hit-and-run death of his daughter, a reader for a book publishing company, in Van Cortlandt Park. Wolfe connects her death to a list of names he was recently shown by Inspector Cramer, related to a stalled homicide investigation — and concludes there is a second murder. A third murder validates Wolfe's conclusion, and Archie follows the trail of an unpublished novel to California and back.
Triple Jeopardy (1952) — Novella collection that includes "Home to Roost," "The Cop-Killer" and "The Squirt and the Monkey"
Prisoner's Base (1952) (British title Out Goes She)
The Golden Spiders (1953) — A squeegie kid, Pete Drossos, tells his neighbor and hero, Nero Wolfe, how he saw a woman being held at gunpoint at a nearby intersection. It isn't long before Pete is murdered and Wolfe investigates his death for a fee of $4.30 that Pete had managed to save from washing windshields.
Three Men Out (1954) — Novella collection that includes "Invitation to Murder," "The Zero Clue" and "This Won't Kill You"
The Black Mountain (1954) — Wolfe and Archie clandestinely go to Yugoslavia in order to avenge the death of Wolfe's oldest friend and bring the murderer to justice
Before Midnight (1955) — A national literary contest to promote a new brand of perfume leads to murder and more.
Three Witnesses (1956) — Novella collection that includes "The Next Witness," "When a Man Murders" and "Die Like a Dog"
Might As Well Be Dead (1956) — Wolfe is hired to find a missing person, who soon turns up — under a new name — as a newly convicted murderer in a sensational crime.
Three for the Chair (1957) — Novella collection that includes "A Window for Death," "Immune to Murder" and "Too Many Detectives"
If Death Ever Slept (1957) — Millionaire Otis Jarrell retains Nero Wolfe to get a snake out of his house — the snake being his daughter-in-law, whom he believes is ruining his business deals by leaking information to his competitors. Since Archie and Wolfe are in the midst of one of their periodic squabbles, it is decided that Archie will move into Jarrell's Fifth Avenue penthouse apartment, posing as his new secretary, While he's away, Orrie tests out Archie's desk.
And Four to Go (1958) — Novella collection that includes "Christmas Party," "Easter Parade" "Fourth of July Picnic" and "Murder Is No Joke"
Champagne for One (1958) — Archie sits in for a friend at a charity dinner dance for unwed mothers, and one of the guests drops dead on the dance floor.
Plot It Yourself (1959) (British title Murder in Style) — The National Association of Authors and Dramatists joins forces with the Book Publishers of America in hiring Wolfe to investigate an ingenious series of plagiarism claims against highly regarded authors. The extortion leads to murder.
Three at Wolfe's Door (1960) — Novella collection that includes "Poison a la Carte," "Method Three for Murder" and "The Rodeo Murder"
Too Many Clients (1960) — A man who identifies himself as Thomas Yeager, head of Continental Plastics, asks Archie to ascertain whether he is being followed when he visits a certain address in one of New York's worst neighborhoods. When Yeager's body is found at an excavation site in the vicinity of that address, Archie crosses the threshold and finds a fantastically appointed love nest where Yeager secretly entertained many women.
The Final Deduction (1961) — In a departure from most other Wolfe books, Wolfe is initially hired to solve a kidnapping, but deaths soon crop up.
Homicide Trinity (1962) — Novella collection that includes "Eeny Meeny Murder Mo," "Death of a Demon" and "Counterfeit for Murder"
Gambit (1962)
The Mother Hunt (1963)
Trio for Blunt Instruments (1964) — Novella collection that includes "Kill Now — Pay Later," "Murder Is Corny" and "Blood Will Tell"
A Right To Die (1964)
The Doorbell Rang (1965)
Death of a Doxy (1966) — Orrie Cather, one of Wolfe's operatives, has been secretly seeing a wealthy man's kept mistress at her secret lovenest, but is arrested when she turns up dead.
The Father Hunt (1968)
Death of a Dude (1969)
Please Pass the Guilt (1973)
A Family Affair (1975) — Rex Stout's final Nero Wolfe novel
Death Times Three (1985) — Posthumous novella collection that includes "Bitter End," "Frame-Up for Murder" and "Assault on a Brownstone"

[edit] Nero Wolfe novellas by Rex Stout

Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe novellas are listed below in order of first appearance.

"Bitter End" (1940) — Rex Stout's rewrite of what was originally a novel that featured Tecumseh Fox, not Nero Wolfe. Originally printed in the November 1940 issue of The American Magazine, "Bitter End" saw its first book publication in Corsage: A Bouquet of Rex Stout and Nero Wolfe (James A. Rock & Co., 1977), a posthumous collection edited by Michael Bourne. Corsage was produced in a numbered limited edition of 276 hardcovers and 1,500 softcovers.
"Black Orchids" (1941) — Curiosity about the black orchids grown by millionaire Lewis Hewitt compels an envious Nero Wolfe to attend New York's annual flower show.
"Cordially Invited to Meet Death" (1942) — High-society party arranger Bess Huddleston comes to Nero Wolfe with two anonymous letters threatening her.
"Not Quite Dead Enough" (1942) — How Archie joined Army Intelligence in WWII and got Wolfe involved in it.
"Booby Trap" (1944) — Another story about Archie in uniform, this time involving attempts by the munitions industry to bribe Congress in order to steal industrial secrets for use after the war.
"Help Wanted, Male" (1945) — An anonymous threat leads Wolfe to take unusual steps to prevent his own murder.
"Instead of Evidence" (1946) — Certain that his partner is about to murder him, the owner of a novelty company retains Wolfe to keep him from getting away with it.
"Before I Die" (1947) — Mobster Dazy Perrit comes to Wolfe for help in stopping a blackmailer.
"Man Alive" (1947) — A high-fashion designer consults Wolfe after she sees her uncle — believed to have committed suicide a year before — in disguise and in the audience at one of her shows.
"Bullet for One" (1948) — An industrial designer is shot to death while riding horseback in Central Park.
"Omit Flowers" (1948) — As a favor for his oldest friend Marko Vukcic, Wolfe takes the case of Virgil Pompa, a chef who traded his genius for a high-paying job as the supervisor of a restaurant chain. He is in jail, charged with murder. Archie begins the story with the statement, "In my opinion it was one of Nero Wolfe's neatest jobs, and he never got a nickel for it."
"Door to Death" (1949) — When orchid nurse Theodore Horstmann leaves the brownstone indefinitely to tend to his sick mother, Nero Wolfe goes out — in the snow and on foot — into the raging wilds of Westchester to find a replacement. He and Archie find a corpse in the greenhouse, as well.
"The Gun with Wings" (1949) — The police are satisfied that a top tenor at the Metropolitan Opera shot himself, but his widow and the man she hopes to marry know it was murder.
"Disguise for Murder" (1950) — The garden editor of the Gazette persuades Nero Wolfe to play host to the Manhattan Flower Club. While a couple of hundred people are upstairs in the plant rooms looking at Wolfe's orchids, a woman is strangled in his office.
"The Cop-Killer" (1951) — Tina and Carl Vardas, employees at the barbershop Archie patronizes, are questioned by a policeman after a hit-and-run. When the Vardases flee to the brownstone and desperately ask Archie for help, their overreaction proves to be justified.
"The Squirt and the Monkey" (1951) — Archie becomes involved with gunplay at the unconventional and uncomfortably warm home of a syndicated cartoonist.
"Home to Roost" (1952) — A young man is poisoned shortly after confiding to his aunt that his objectionable advocacy of the Communist party is a front for his undercover work for the FBI.
"This Won't Kill You" (1952) — Wolfe honors a guest's request by taking him to a World Series game at the Polo Grounds. After the Giants are trounced by the Red Sox, members of the team are found to have been drugged — and a body is discovered in the locker room. Wolfe solves the crime without leaving the ball park.
"Invitation to Murder" (1953) — A client hires Archie to assess the matrimonial intentions of his wealthy invalid brother-in-law. When Archie finds the client dead, he tricks Wolfe into leaving the brownstone and identifying the killer before the police are called in.
"The Zero Clue" (1953) — Leo Heller, a probability expert who has parlayed his math skills into celebrity, tries to consult Wolfe after he calculates that one of his clients has committed a serious crime. Wolfe refuses the case, but Archie — "who is subordinate only when it suits his temperament and convenience," Wolfe later complains — agrees to explore on his own.
"When a Man Murders..." (1954) — Caroline and Paul Aubry ask Wolfe's help after her first husband — reportedly killed in action in Korea — turns up alive in New York. Their marriage is at stake, along with a million-dollar inheritance.
"Die Like a Dog" (1954) — A Labrador retriever follows Archie home from a murder scene, and a volatile demirep is at the center of the crime.
"The Next Witness" (1955) — When their would-be client Leonard Ashe is on trial for murder, Wolfe and Archie are subpoenaed to testify as witnesses for the prosecution. Wolfe bolts from the courtroom when he realizes his testimony will convict an innocent man. He and Archie elude arrest for contempt — even spending the night at Saul Panzer's apartment — as they investigate the crime themselves.
"Immune to Murder" (1955) — Wolfe is invited by the State Department, at the behest of an ambassador from an oil-rich country, to cook a special meal for him at an oil baron's private retreat in the Adirondacks. This naturally results in a death to investigate.
"A Window for Death" (1956)
"Too Many Detectives" (1956) — Wolfe and Archie are called to Albany, along with other licensed private detectives in New York, when there are complaints about how lax the licensing of detectives in the state is and how the detectives violate the rights of private citizens by tapping their phones.
"Christmas Party" (1957) — Archie goes to a holiday gathering where the host toasts the season with a poisoned glass of Pernod.
"Easter Parade" (1957) — When Wolfe sends him to photograph the uniquely colored orchid that will be worn in the Easter Parade, Archie snaps a murder scene.
"Fourth of July Picnic" (1957) — One of a set of fine knives is put to use at a restaurant workers union picnic where Wolfe has agreed to speak. The story is notable for the autobiographical sketches Wolfe and Archie share with the principal suspects gathered at Saul Panzer's apartment.
"Murder Is No Joke" (1958, expanded and serialized as "Frame-Up for Murder") — The sister of a fashionable designer asks Wolfe to ascertain what mysterious hold a woman from her brother's past has over him. When she arranges for Wolfe to speak to the woman by telephone, he and Archie hear a murder on the other end of the line.
"Method Three for Murder" (1960) — After discovering a body in the back seat, Mina Holt drives the taxi she has borrowed for the evening to 918 West 35th Street. She walks up the front steps of the brownstone just as Archie is walking down — having just told Nero Wolfe that he's quit.
"Poison à la Carte" (1960) — Wolfe reluctantly agrees to let Fritz prepare the annual dinner for the Ten for Aristology — "a group of ten men pursuing the ideal of perfection in food and drink" — at the home of millionaire orchid fancier Lewis Hewitt. He and Archie are guests at the table where one of the ten becomes acutely ill during the meal and soon dies of arsenic poisoning. Wolfe resolves to clear any suspicion that Fritz is responsible by discovering which of the actresses serving the meal is the guilty party.
"The Rodeo Murder" (1960) — A party at Lily Rowan's Park Avenue penthouse includes a roping contest between some cowboy friends, with a silver-trimmed saddle as the prize. One of the contestants is at a disadvantage when his rope is missing. When it is found wound more than a dozen times around the neck of the chief backer of the World Series Rodeo, Lily asks Wolfe to sort out the murder.
"Counterfeit for Murder" (1961)
"Death of a Demon" (1961)
"Kill Now — Pay Later" (1961) — Wolfe's aging Greek bootblack is accused of murder.
"Eeny Meeny Murder Mo" (1962)
"Blood Will Tell" (1963) — Archie receives a blood-stained tie in the mail from the owner of a small walk-up apartment building in lower Manhattan, who also lives on the top floor. Archie investigates, only to find yet another dead body.
"Murder Is Corny" (1964) — A female acquaintance of Archie's implicates him in a murder but seeks his assistance in getting herself out of the mess.
"Assault on a Brownstone" (1959, published 1985, posthumous)

[edit] Other works by Rex Stout

Her Forbidden Knight (1913)
Under the Andes (1914)
A Prize for Princes (1914)
The Great Legend (1916)
How Like a God (1929)
Seed on the Wind (1930)
Golden Remedy (1931)
Forest Fire (1933)
The President Vanishes (1934)
O Careless Love! (1935)
The Hand in the Glove (1937) — featuring Dol Bonner
Mr. Cinderella (1938)
Red Threads (1939) — featuring Inspector Cramer
Mountain Cat (1939)
Double for Death (1939) — featuring Tecumseh Fox
Bad for Business (1940) — featuring Tecumseh Fox
The Broken Vase (1941) — featuring Tecumseh Fox
Alphabet Hicks (1941)
The Illustrious Dunderheads (1942, editor)
Rue Morgue No. 1 (1946; editor, with Louis Greenfield) — Anthology of 19 mystery stories
Eat, Drink, and Be Buried (1956; editor) — Anthology of mystery stories. British edition titled For Tomorrow We Die(1958) omitted three stories.
The Nero Wolfe Cook Book (1973; with the editors of the Viking Press)
Justice Ends at Home (1977; edited by John McAleer) — posthumous collection of 16 short stories written between 1914 and 1917

[edit] Books about Rex Stout

Rex Stout: A Biography (1977) by John McAleer. Winner of the Mystery Writers of America's Edgar Award for Best Critical/Biographical Work in 1978. Reissued as Rex Stout: A Majesty's Life (2002), with a foreword by P.G. Wodehouse. Hardcover: ISBN 0-918736-43-9 Paperback: ISBN 0-918736-44-7
Royal Decree: Conversations with Rex Stout (1983) by John McAleer. Published in a numbered limited edition of 1,000 copies by Pontes Press, Ashton, Maryland.
Rex Stout: An Annotated Primary and Secondary Bibliography (1980) by Guy M. Townsend, with John McAleer, Judson Sapp and Arriean Schemer. ISBN 0-8240-9479-4
At Wolfe's Door: The Nero Wolfe Novels of Rex Stout (1991; revised 2003) by J. Kenneth Van Dover. Bibliography, reviews and essays. Hardcover: ISBN 0-918736-51-X Paperback: ISBN 0-918736-52-8

[edit] Adaptations

[edit] Nero Wolfe adaptations

Detailed information about the various film, radio and television adaptations of Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe stories can be found in the adaptations section of the article on Nero Wolfe, and in the article about the A&E TV series A Nero Wolfe Mystery (2001–2002)..

[edit] Lady Against the Odds (NBC)

Stout's 1937 novel The Hand in the Glove was adapted for an NBC TV movie titled Lady Against the Odds, which aired April 20, 1992. Crystal Bernard starred as Dol Bonner; Annabeth Gish costarred as Sylvia Raffray. Bradford May, who also directed, received an Emmy Award for outstanding individual achievement in cinematography. The telefilm was previewed by Rick Sherwood of The Hollywood Reporter (April 20, 1992):

It's wonderfully scripted, well-acted and thoroughly enjoyable to watch. It features some terrific costumes, great cars, realistic backdrops and stunning photography. Unfortunately, Lady Against the Odds is constructed around a rather standard-issue plot line, and that keeps it from being quite as great as it otherwise might have been.

Fortunately, it doesn't spoil the overall fun.

It's a period drama that manages to stay in character throughout, setting its murder-mystery theme in front of a society at war circa 1943. It centers around two young "dames" trying to do their part on the home front as Los Angeles private eyes despite a wary police department and disapproving family. ... What makes this project so interesting is how it plays like such a lighthearted romp despite its serious, murderous themes. It gives a nod in dialogue and visuals to those old gumshoe films of the '40s, then has fun with itself. The ending is a bit heavy-handed given the overall nature of this project and doesn't quite fit in terms of tone, but it does add some sobriety to an otherwise high-style production.

The film holds up in large part due to the solid ensemble cast ... led by Crystal Bernard and Annabeth Gish, who deliver absolutely delightful performances as the two lady gumshoes.

[edit] The President Vanishes (Paramount)

In an interview printed in Royal Decree (1983), Rex Stout's official biographer John McAleer asked the author if there were any chance of Hollywood ever making a good Nero Wolfe movie. "I don't know," Stout replied. "I suppose so. They made a movie of another story I wrote — The President Vanishes. I hate like hell to admit it but it was better than the book, I think."

The President Vanishes, Rex Stout's anonymous 1934 novel, was quickly transformed into a feature film by Paramount. Produced by Walter Wanger and directed by William Wellman, The President Vanishes (1934) is described in John Douglas Eames' The Paramount Story (1985):

It had an accomplished cast and an out-of-the-rut story, but The President Vanishes (British title Strange Conspiracy) couldn't buck moviegoers' apathy towards political subjects, and the critics were less impressed than they had been by a similar picture, Gabriel Over the White House, made the year before ... Its hero was an isolationist President of the U.S. (Arthur Byron) at loggerheads with his pro-war cabinet; he pretends to be kidnapped, to show by the ensuing media uproar how false propaganda can mislead the public. ... In the cast: Edward Arnold, Paul Kelly, Rosalind Russell (beginning her 37-year screen career), Charley Grapewin, Peggy Conklin, Osgood Perkins, Janet Beecher, Walter Kingsford, Sidney Blackmer and Edward Ellis.

Written after Fer-de-Lance but published immediately before the first Nero Wolfe novel, The President Vanishes was adapted for the screen by Lynn Starling, Carey Wilson and Cedric Worth, with uncredited contributions by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur.

[edit] Of further interest

[edit] Rex Stout Archive at Boston College

The Rex Stout Archive at Boston College represents the best collection in existence of the personal papers, literary manuscripts, and published works of Rex Stout, creator of the Nero Wolfe mysteries. Anchoring Boston College's collection of detective fiction, the Rex Stout Archive features materials donated by the Stout family — including manuscripts, correspondence, legal papers, publishing contracts, photographs and ephemera; first editions, international editions and archived reprints of Stout's books; and volumes from Stout's personal library, many of which found their way into Nero Wolfe's office. The comprehensive archive at Burns Library also includes the extensive personal collection of Stout's official biographer John McAleer, and the Rex Stout collection of bibliographer Judson C. Sapp.

[edit] Omnibus, "The Fine Art of Murder" (ABC)

Rex Stout appeared in the December 9, 1956, episode of Omnibus, a cultural anthology series that epitomized the golden age of television. Hosted by Alistair Cooke, "The Fine Art of Murder" was a 40-minute segment described by Time magazine as "a homicide as Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, Edgar Allan Poe [and] Rex Stout would variously present it." The author is credited as appearing along with Gene Reynolds (as Archie Goodwin), Robert Echols, James Daly, Jack Sydow and Dennis Hoey. Written by Sidney Carroll and directed by Paul Bogart, "The Fine Art of Murder" is in the collection of the Library of Congress (VBE 2397-2398) and screened in its Mary Pickford Theater February 15, 2000.