Golden Age Hollywood screenwriter Charles Brackett was an extremely observant and perceptive chronicler of the entertainment industry during its most exciting years. He is best remembered as the writing partner of director Billy Wilder, who once referred to the pair as "the happiest couple in Hollywood," collaborating on such classics as The Lost Weekend (1945) and Sunset Blvd (1950). In this annotated collection of writings taken from dozens of Brackett's unpublished diaries, leading film historian Anthony Slide clarifies Brackett's critical contribution to Wilder's films and Hollywood history while enriching our knowledge of Wilder's achievements in writing, direction, and style. Brackett's diaries re-create the initial meetings of the talent responsible for Ninotchka (1939), Hold Back the Dawn (1941), Ball of Fir e (1941), The Major and the Minor (1942), Five Graves to Cairo (1943), The Lost Weekend , and Sunset Blvd , recounting the breakthrough and breakdowns that ultimately forced these collaborators to part ways. Brackett was also a producer, served as president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the Screen Writers Guild, was a drama critic for the New Yorker , and became a member of the exclusive literary club, the Algonquin Round Table. Slide provides a rare, front row seat to the Golden Age dealings of Paramount, Universal, MGM, and RKO and the innovations of legendary theater and literary figures, such as Alfred Lunt, Lynn Fontanne, Edna Ferber, and Dorothy Parker. Through Brackett's keen, witty perspective, the political and creative intrigue at the heart of Hollywood's most significant films comes alive, and readers will recognize their reach in the Hollywood industry today. Charles Brackett was an outstanding writer and producer of his era. Like him, I have served as the president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, and also like him, I had had a long association with Billy Wilder. I am therefore delighted that Charlie's diaries are being published, providing us with his unique insight into Billy and Hollywood's golden age. -- Walter Mirisch Reading Charles Brackett's diary entries is like stepping into a time machine. It provides a vivid and valuable account of day-to-day life in the heyday of Hollywood's studio system―and a bittersweet chronicle of his volatile relationship with Billy Wilder. I couldn't put the book down. -- Leonard Maltin Charlie would often talk about his diaries as I worked with him and Billy Wilder on the screenplay of. I am thrilled that those diaries are now published and gratified to be a part of them. -- Donald M. Marshman Jr. Charlie was always very kind and friendly to me and I very much look forward to the publication of his diaries. -- Don Bachardy This is a book I was literally unable to put down once I began reading it, and I suspect everyone with a reverence for Hollywood in its glory days will feel the same. Here is a rare chance to read what was going on in Charles Brackett's mind and his world while he made so many of the movies we revere so highly today. -- Robert Osborne, Primetime host of Turner Classic Movies Anyone interested in the golden age of film should enjoy this very entertaining and illustrative look at the film industry of the 1930s and 1940s. ― Library Journal Above all, "It's the Pictures That Got Small" is an indispensable guide to the complex, increasingly awkward relationship between two men who had next to nothing in common and yet contrived to make a fair number of the studio system's finest films. ― Commentary Brackett's 1932-49 dispatches from Hollywood's front line, are crammed with sugar-free, often salty observations. The author's honesty is certified by the fact that he can admire a man one minute and put him down the next. When that man is Billy Wilder, which it often is, the result is a day-by-day, year-on-year, pointilliste portrait of a sacred monster, warts and all. -- Frederic Raphael ― Wall Street Journal Charles Brackett has always lived in the shadow of his high-profile writing partner, Billy Wilder. This valuable compendium of diary entries from 1933 to 1950, painstakingly edited by Anthony Slide, not only sheds light on that renowned collaboration but evokes the reality of daily life in the heyday of the Hollywood studio system. -- Leonard Maltin ― Indiewire What we see in this volume is a writer much like Joe Gillis in Sunset Boulevard . At the end of a long day spent negotiating titanic egos, he simply wants to sit down and write the thoughts that race through his head like a dozen locomotives. -- James Hughes ― Film Comment "It's the Pictures That Got Small": Charles Brackett on Billy Wilder and Hollywood's Golden Age edited by Anthony Slide, offers not only rare insight into their often-stormy partnership but also an insider's view of Hollywood during that era. -- Susan King ― Los Angeles Times [ "It's the Pictures That Got Small" ]