Mary Jennifer at the Beach

"He [David O. Selznick] would engage me in conversations: “So you want to make films? What kind of films?” Jennifer gave me a kind of legal pad for Christmas, and I’d write notes and notes. He gave me my first chance to direct. He gave me around five hundred dollars to do a little film of Mary Jennifer. We went down to the beach, as I remember, probably Malibu. It was about twenty minutes, maybe a half hour long, a film of Mary Jennifer at the beach, making a sand castle, playing in the water, somebody reading a story to Mary Jennifer. It was the first time I directed anything.” - DH, West of Eden: An American Place by Jean Stein