Historia de Truman Capote
Category
😹
FunTranscript
00:00What's in me is my own gift.
00:03Truman Capote, he was one of the most gifted
00:05and self-destructive writers of the post-war generation.
00:08Capote's lyrical prose is best illustrated
00:11in the classics, Breakfast at Tiffany's and In Cold Blood.
00:14His weapon was his wit, which he could use
00:18in a very friendly way, or he could use
00:20in a very, very nasty way.
00:22Truman Capote's writing made him famous,
00:24but it was his flamboyant personality
00:26and flair for the dramatic that made him unforgettable.
00:29On this episode of Mysteries and Scandals,
00:31we'll explore Truman Capote's rise to celebrity stardom
00:34and his reign as court jester to the rich and famous.
00:37He really literally did know everybody.
00:40He gave a very famous black and white ball in New York.
00:43He was really in with the in crowd.
00:47We'll also examine the mystery of the still missing chapters
00:50of Capote's final novel.
00:52Could be in Palm Springs, it could be in Chicago,
00:55could be a lot of places.
00:57And we'll reveal the fatal mistake
00:58that made Capote an outcast.
01:01He was a pariah.
01:02He became, to the whole social set,
01:06someone you never talked about and you never saw.
01:10I'm AJ Benza.
01:11Join me as we take a look at the private demons that
01:13destroyed a fragile genius, the tiny terror, Truman Capote.
01:18["STAR WARS THEME"]
01:38Like many great artists, Truman Capote
01:40came from humble beginnings.
01:41He was born Truman Streckfus Persons on September 30,
01:45of 1924 in New Orleans.
01:47Gerald Clark is the author of the biography, Capote.
01:51His parents came from Alabama.
01:54His mother came from a little town called Monroeville.
01:57Her name was Lily May Falk, and his father,
02:00whose name was Arch Persons.
02:02His father was a charmer.
02:03Truman's mother soon discovered, was that Arch Persons
02:06was a con man.
02:08Truman's father, Arch, was frequently
02:09in trouble with the law.
02:11He found it difficult to support a small family.
02:13Lily May didn't want to waste her youth saddled
02:16with a deadbeat husband and kid.
02:17So in 1930, Lily May left six-year-old Truman
02:21in the care of some relatives back in Monroeville
02:23while she hit the road from New York City.
02:25Celebrated author George Plimpton
02:27wrote a biography of Truman Capote.
02:29I think she was one of those very beautiful young women who
02:32simply felt burdened by having a child,
02:35left them, and went to New York to try to live
02:39a much more social life.
02:41Joanne Carson was one of Truman's closest friends.
02:44She would come and visit and then leave.
02:46She wasn't really motherly in that way.
02:50So she was always leaving Truman,
02:51and Truman was always feeling abandoned.
02:54Capote's attorney and friend, Alan Schwartz.
02:57His mother was a woman who really didn't raise him at all.
03:01And his father was someone who he had been in jail,
03:05and he hardly ever knew.
03:07And so he was brought up by these strange cousins, which
03:10are reflected in Christmas Memory and Thanksgiving
03:14Visitor, two of the short novels he wrote.
03:17A Christmas Memory is the most autobiographical
03:20of all of Truman's pieces.
03:21It's a story of his relationship with his aunt
03:23Sook in the South.
03:25It's the story of the togetherness of the two of them.
03:29Young Truman also developed a close relationship
03:31with the girl next door, Harper Lee,
03:33who would later rise to fame as the author of To Kill
03:36a Mockingbird.
03:37There wasn't much for Truman and Harper to do in Monroeville,
03:39but pass the time inventing stories.
03:42He kept a little book with which he
03:45wrote words he hadn't heard.
03:48He was always looking in the dictionary.
03:50He wasn't interested in sports or any of the normal games
03:55the kids played.
03:56He wanted to become a writer almost from the time
04:00he could talk.
04:01In 1933, Truman's mother, who changed her first name to Nina,
04:05remarried.
04:06Joe Capote was a New York businessman
04:08who satisfied Nina's social and financial requirements.
04:12Eight-year-old Truman was summoned to the Big Apple
04:14to live with his mother and new father.
04:16Joe Capote, his stepfather, adopted him.
04:18They adopted him.
04:19And Truman changed his name to Capote at that time.
04:22As a boy, Truman paid little attention to his studies.
04:25However, as he grew older, Capote did pay attention to,
04:28well, to the other boys.
04:31He discovered that he was gay only because other boys
04:35were attracted to him.
04:36I don't think it was something that happened in the South
04:39as much as it was it blossomed when he was in New York.
04:43Truman was blessed or cursed with this little high voice.
04:49I don't know.
04:50I think people really enjoyed him.
04:52Anybody that met him for the first time
04:55bespoke the fact that he was a raving homosexual.
04:59Homosexual is a gentleman who just left the room.
05:03No.
05:04Truman was always a 12-year-old boy.
05:08His voice never grew past that.
05:10In 1942, fresh out of high school,
05:1218-year-old Truman landed his first job
05:14at the prestigious New Yorker magazine.
05:17When I was 16, 17, I just decided
05:20I wasn't going to go to college.
05:21I went to work at the New Yorker.
05:23The New Yorker was the place to be
05:25for a kid who was interested in writing.
05:26And Truman was desperate to get that.
05:29He was hired as a copy boy.
05:31Capote's bold personality combined
05:33with this tiny frame and gentlemanly Southern charm
05:36endeared him to many, including a guy named Jack Dunphy.
05:40Truman met Jack in 1948.
05:42He and Truman had a very intense relationship
05:46and lived together for many years.
05:48Truman seduced him just as he did everybody else.
05:50Jack was a very attractive man, very athletic.
05:53In 1948, 24-year-old Truman also experienced his first taste
05:57of success with a novel titled Other Voices, Other Rooms.
06:01Gothic novel, mostly about a young boy's, 13-year-old boy's
06:08coming to grips with his sexuality.
06:11On the back cover of Other Voices, Other Rooms
06:14was a portrait taken of Truman lying on a sofa
06:18with a sort of come-ither look.
06:21And I think probably most people began
06:23to think of Truman as a self-promoter
06:28and rather suspicious of the work itself.
06:30Sounds to me like Truman knew exactly what he was doing.
06:33By his mid-20s, Capote had already
06:34established himself as a new breed of writer,
06:37and the little guy was just getting started.
06:39Coming up, hot-blooded killers and cold-blooded socialites.
06:44Four-year-old Truman Capote grabbed attention
06:46with his first novel, Other Voices, Other Rooms,
06:49an autobiographical coming-of-age story.
06:51Capote followed it up with several short stories,
06:53a screenplay, and his second novel, The Grass Harp.
06:56Then in the early days of 1954, tragedy struck.
07:00Truman had always had a difficult relationship
07:03with his mother.
07:05In later years, she was an alcoholic.
07:08She would make fun of him for being homosexual.
07:11Things had got tougher for her.
07:15Joe Capote had really spent over his head.
07:18He was embezzling.
07:19He was going to go to Sing Sing.
07:22They were about to catch him, and she couldn't accept it.
07:25She couldn't accept the fact that this
07:26is where she would be in poverty.
07:28So she committed suicide.
07:30Truman was devastated, but Capote
07:32continued writing, mostly short stories,
07:35as well as his classic novella, Breakfast at Tiffany's.
07:38The story about Holly Golightly was published in 1958
07:41and immediately turned into a Hollywood film
07:43starring Audrey Hepburn.
07:45The following year, 35-year-old Truman
07:47found the inspiration for what is
07:48considered his greatest work.
07:50Truman had seen this item in the New York Times
07:52about these murders in Kansas.
07:58In November of 1959, a wealthy wheat farmer, his wife,
08:01and two teenage children were tied up and shot to death
08:04at their home in Holcomb, Kansas.
08:06Capote decided to chronicle the story in a nonfiction novel
08:09and headed for the Midwest to begin his research.
08:12He took Harper Lee with him to help him with the relations
08:16with the townsfolk.
08:18First day, they got to the FBI headquarters in Kansas.
08:22Truman walked in.
08:24He said, all these guys started to titter.
08:28It was this little guy.
08:29And Truman walked up to the biggest guy
08:31and grabbed him by the tie and said, listen, I'm here,
08:36and I'm Truman Capote, and I'm better than all you guys.
08:38And if you want to do something about it,
08:39let's go out and do it right now.
08:42When 35-year-old Truman wasn't busy making new friends,
08:45he was working with Harper Lee to piece together
08:47the story of the Clutter family murders.
08:49On December 30, 1959, two suspects were arrested.
08:54Their names were Dick Hickok and Perry Smith,
08:57former inmates from Kansas State Penitentiary.
08:59The pair were tried, convicted, and sentenced to death.
09:02Capote befriended the killers in jail.
09:04They were very suspicious of him.
09:06Eventually, they started corresponding on death row.
09:10And Truman became a mentor, in a way, to Perry.
09:13Perry was more disturbed of the two, I think.
09:16And Truman identified with him and had a crush on him
09:20as well.
09:20The most chilling remark Perry made
09:22I really admired Mr. Clutter right up until the moment
09:25I cut his throat.
09:28He's a real swell guy.
09:29Capote spent the next five years writing the book,
09:31which he called In Cold Blood.
09:33I think he probably thought it was the best work he ever
09:38wrote as a big work.
09:40He knew fairly quickly that it would be a great success.
09:44And that's what made it so frustrating,
09:46because he couldn't publish until after the execution
09:50of these two killers, who became his friends, in a way.
09:54Smith and Hickok were put to death on April 14, 1965.
09:58Truman was finally able to complete the last chapter
10:00of his nonfiction novel.
10:02In Cold Blood was published in late 1965.
10:05The book was a bestseller and became an instant classic.
10:08After spending five long years writing the book,
10:10Capote was ready to kick back and celebrate.
10:13And Truman decided to throw a party for his good friend,
10:15Washington Post editor, Catherine Graham.
10:17The exclusive black and white ball
10:19became the social event of the decade.
10:221966, Truman gave this black and white ball.
10:28The invitation said that you had to wear a mask.
10:34It was in the Plaza Hotel.
10:35I think one of the more astonishing things
10:37about the ball was it was the sort of cross-section
10:39of society that was there.
10:41I think the reason was it was such a wide variety of people
10:44from all over the world.
10:46It was an extraordinary thing in its way.
10:51I mean, as far as I'm concerned, it
10:54was just a private party in my business
10:56and nobody else's business.
10:58The party was a major hit and launched a playful chapter
11:01of Capote's life, syndicated columnist Liz Smith.
11:04His talent just paved the way for him,
11:08and his personality, too.
11:09He was very engaging and playful and full of gossip and fun,
11:14and he was smart.
11:16Very sophisticated group of people
11:19in the international set embraced him.
11:21I think he was like a pet to them.
11:23He was amusing and cute and beguiling.
11:28And of course, his great friendships
11:31were with these high society women,
11:34these women he called the swans.
11:36They were Babe Paley, who was the wife of William Paley,
11:39the head of CBS.
11:41I think they treated him rather as a toy, perhaps.
11:45They liked him because they could tell him
11:47their confidences, how dismayed they
11:50were with their own private lives.
11:52He was a wonderful listener, wonderful storyteller.
11:54He would always tell them to tell me about your life,
11:57and they would make the mistake of doing this.
11:59By the late 60s, Truman Capote became a national celebrity
12:02with a growing passion for party drugs.
12:04He enjoyed the high life with his jet set friends,
12:06but not for long.
12:08Just ahead, Truman dishes the dirt
12:10and gets buried by his society friends.
12:13In 1965, 41-year-old Truman Capote
12:16was anxious to write another masterpiece.
12:18Capote spent the next decade collecting material
12:20for a novel he planned to write, chronicling the exploits
12:23of his uptown friends.
12:24He called the project Answered Prayers.
12:27He wrote Answered Prayers because he
12:30wanted to document the life of the beautiful people.
12:33Even with all the money and all the cars and the homes
12:36and the beauty and the intelligence,
12:39they were still as sad as everybody else.
12:42They didn't have anything that special outside of the money.
12:46Cote Basque is a chapter which takes place
12:49in the restaurant, the Cote Basque in New York.
12:52And it is where eavesdropping on these women
12:56and their various conversations about their husbands,
13:00their lovers, the people in their lives
13:02who are all famous people.
13:04And it's extremely funny, very gossipy, very bitchy.
13:09And unfortunately, very much identifiable.
13:15I recall saying to him, you know, Truman,
13:18they're not going to be happy when they read this.
13:21And he said, nah, they're too dumb.
13:24They won't know who they are.
13:26But they did.
13:28The first chapters of Answered Prayers
13:29were published in Esquire magazine in 1975.
13:33Truman Capote's socialite friends were furious.
13:35They felt betrayed.
13:37Liz Smith covered the story for New York magazine.
13:40He felt that his talent, his great talent
13:43in repeating this stuff would override anybody's objection
13:48to it being about them.
13:49Well, they didn't.
13:50I mean, even the harmless parts of it,
13:52people took exception to.
13:54Society luminaries like William and Babe Paley, Slim Keith,
13:57and Lee Radswell completely snubbed Capote.
14:00Joanne Carson was one of the few friends who stood by Truman.
14:03First of all, Truman never wrote about,
14:07anything that wasn't already common knowledge.
14:10In other words, LeColte Basque was something that everybody
14:13in New York knew about.
14:14And it had been talked about for a long time.
14:17Truman just took it and lifted it
14:19and put it into a framework of a beautiful piece.
14:22Had a huge impact on all these people in this story.
14:24And they reacted very violently towards it.
14:27And that was the end of Truman with them.
14:30He paid a heavy price because he was ostracized in a way that
14:35is hard to imagine anybody now.
14:37It couldn't be done now.
14:39Nobody would care now.
14:40But in 1975, people did care.
14:43Babe Paley, who was his best friend, dropped him entirely.
14:48Truman was crushed.
14:49Only four chapters of Answered Prayers were ever published.
14:52By the late 1970s, Capote, now in his 50s and deeply depressed,
14:56was writing less, partying more, and drifting away
15:00from longtime companion Jack Dunphy.
15:03Truman had a great deal of dependency
15:08on these people for his social life,
15:10for his sort of general feeling of well-being,
15:14because he was a kind of a weird looking guy and a weird guy.
15:18And these people were his whole social support.
15:21And they were pretty high up in the world.
15:23So I think fear and panic became a factor in the equation
15:28and led to an increase in the drugs and the drink
15:31and things like that.
15:32He drank a lot.
15:33He took drugs.
15:35And at that point in his life, he
15:38started going to Studio 54 like a mad fiend.
15:41And you'd go in Studio 54, and he'd
15:43be there like a whirling dervish.
15:45I mean, it's totally integrated, both sexually and ethnically.
15:52And I was once in his house when he came to me
15:55with a big bowl of white powder and said,
15:58this is the greatest cocaine in the world,
16:00and we're going to have it.
16:01And I'm like just sitting there stunned.
16:04Truman's nonstop carousing began to destroy his small body.
16:07Well, I've been in practically every hospital in America
16:15you can think of.
16:17In 1982, Truman's doctor called Alan Schwartz
16:20to relay some tragic news.
16:22We have found that his brain has shrunk
16:25a certain number of millimeters.
16:27And I said, well, what does that mean?
16:28That means that if he doesn't stop drinking,
16:31he will be dead in six months.
16:33It looked like the writing was on the wall for Truman Capote.
16:36Just ahead, Truman's final chapter
16:38and the search for the missing manuscript.
16:41Author Truman Capote made a lot of people
16:43very angry when he revealed their secrets
16:45in a piece called Answered Prayers.
16:47After being dumped by his jet-set pals,
16:49Capote began to slowly unravel.
16:51By 1980, 56-year-old Truman was in a dark depression.
16:55Despite desperate attempts by friends
16:57to get Capote clean and sober, he
16:58was hell-bent on self-destruction.
17:01The reason that he drank was because he
17:04felt like a blue search suit that just picked up
17:06everything that came by.
17:08And sometimes he just had to shut down.
17:10At the end of his life, he went on talk shows
17:15where he was incoherent and clearly drunk.
17:19His physical appearance deteriorated
17:22so he was slovenly.
17:23All right.
17:25But the obvious answer is that eventually, I mean,
17:29I'll kill myself without meaning to.
17:34I remember once saying to him, in seeing him take sleeping
17:39pills with a glass of wine, I said, Truman,
17:43those would put you in oblivion.
17:44And he said, sometimes oblivion is a nice place to be.
17:48By the summer of 1984, Truman lost the will to live.
17:52He woke up in the morning.
17:53We were supposed to go for a swim.
17:54And he didn't feel good.
17:56And he looked very pale.
17:57As he was holding my hand, I had my hand on his pulse.
18:01And it was fluttering.
18:03And I said to him, Truman, I think
18:04there's some problems here.
18:06And he said, no, no more hospitals, no more IVs,
18:10no more doctors.
18:12If you love me, let me go.
18:15And I don't know at what point it was that he left.
18:19But all of a sudden, he was gone.
18:22Truman Capote died in the home of Joanne Carson
18:24on August 25, 1984.
18:26Capote was one month shy of his 60th birthday.
18:30Before Truman died, Joanne Carson
18:31asked him about the final chapters of Answered Prayers.
18:35The morning that he was dying, I said, you can't die, Truman.
18:38You haven't finished Answered Prayers.
18:39He said, oh, yes, I have.
18:40You've read all the chapters.
18:42I said, well, where are they?
18:43He said, they're in a safety deposit box,
18:45safely in a safety deposit box, with some money
18:48and some instructions.
18:50I've paid for in advance.
18:51And they'll be there for some time.
18:53And when the time is up, they'll be sent to Random House.
18:57And we looked everywhere we could think of for this book.
18:59And all I can tell you is we never found it.
19:02I believe they do exist.
19:04I believe at some point, they will show up.
19:07But I don't know how many years he paid
19:09for the safety deposit box.
19:10He did say to me that he picked a bank that will
19:13be there for quite some time.
19:16Capote wasn't exactly thinking logically in his final years.
19:19The missing chapters could be anywhere.
19:21But Truman left behind much more
19:22than a few unpublished pages.
19:24His writing is his legacy.
19:26And that's what will remain.
19:29And eventually, the rest of it will be forgotten.
19:35He's taken his place as one of the great American writers.
19:37And nothing's going to change that.
19:40He had an ear for the music of the English language
19:45that no writer of his generation had.
19:48Truman taught me total acceptance.
19:52I'm a much better person for having known him.
19:54Because if you love Truman, you accepted him.
19:57And that's a great gift to be able to learn to be
20:01totally accepting of other people.
20:03Most people don't know the difference between good,
20:07very good, and superb.
20:09And he was superb.
20:11Truman Capote was quite a character.
20:13He wrote some good books and lived his life to the fullest.
20:16If those missing chapters from Answered Prayers
20:18ever show up, Truman will be a celebrity all over again.
20:21In a way, his prayers will be answered.
20:23I'm AJ Benzer.
20:24Join me the next time we take a look
20:25at the men behind the myths on Mysteries and Scandals.
20:27Mysteries and Scandals.