-We are also introduced to Queen Latifah as Hattie McDaniel… and she’s in a three way with a man and woman?! This is based on speculation and rumors that she was part of the alleged Hollywood Sewing Circle where stars in “lavender marriages” (married to gay men) secretly had lesbian and/or bisexual trysts. McDaniel was married four times but none of them stuck. Other alleged Sewing Circle members include Greta Garbo, Joan Crawford, Marlene Dietrich, Tallulah Bankhead, and Myrna Loy.
-In a sign of Meg’s importance, we learn that George Hurrell agrees to photograph both Camille and Jack in glamour photos. Hurrell is responsible for most of the iconic glamour stills of the Hollywood Golden Age. Hired by Irving Thalberg (him again) at MGM in the 1930s, Hurrell helped build the visual mythology around Clark Gable, Joan Crawford, Rosalind Russell, Carole Lombard, Anna Mae Wong, and Vivien Leigh. He moved in the ‘40s to Warner Bros. and then Columbia, giving the same treatment to Bette Davis, Errol Flynn, Olivia de Havilland, James Cagney, Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall, Rita Hayworth, and more.
-During the photoshoot, we hear Larry Clinton & His Orchestra’s “I Double Dare You.”
-Jack Castello having his vice record almost show up on the pages of Tattle Tale is obviously a riff on the terror most stars harbored for Confidential magazine. The first major tabloid read by millions around the country, Confidential printed the most salacious (and often inaccurate, but not always) gossip about celebrities, seeking to ruin careers. Think Danny DeVito in L.A. Confidential.
-Henry Willson agreeing to fix Jack Castello’s problem is reminiscent of how he needed to squash a Confidential exposé that would’ve proven Rock Hudson was gay in the 1950s. However, Willson didn’t turn to gangsters (studios had their own fixers for that, like Eddie Mannix at MGM). Instead he offered dirt, including arrest records, on two other clients he had.