A (Black) Gat in the Hand: Elliot Gould’s Better Philip Marlowe
“You’re the second guy I’ve met within hours who seems to think a gat in the hand means a world by the tail.”
– Phillip Marlowe in Raymond Chandler’s The Big Sleep
Back in the Summer of 2020, A (Black) Gat in the Hand looked at some screen and radio productions for Raymond Chandler’s private eye, Philip Marlowe. Two months before, I had done a separate post on Powers Boothe’s terrific series for HBO. That series was really the impetus to move me from not liking Raymond Chandler, to being a fan.
There was a second thing which brought me all the way in to being a Chandler guy. Now, I cannot abide Elliott Gould’s The Long Goodbye. My attempts to ‘try again’ inevitably lead to me quitting the re-watch. I don’t like my Marlowe in 1973, and it’s my least favorite Marlowe on screen.
However, as with Powers Boothe, I wouldn’t be a fan of Raymond Chandler if not for Gould. He recorded all the Marlowe novels, as well as several of Chandler’s non-Marlowe short stories, as audiobooks. This was way back in cassette days, and I was smart enough to pick up several of the CDs, even though I wasn’t into Chandler then.
I have five of the seven novels (he also narrated Poodle Springs, an unfinished Chandler novel, which Robert B. Parker completed), and three short story CDs:
The Big Sleep
The High Window
The Lady in the Lake
The Little Sister
Playback
Killer in the Rain and Other Stories
Mandarin’s Jade and Other Stories
Trouble is My Business
Gould is spot on. I have no complaints whatsoever about these audiobooks, other than that almost all of them are abridgements (at least The Big Sleep is unabridged).
Early on, Chandler wrote about a very Marlowe-like PI named Carmady, for Black Mask. Gould’s Killer in the Rain is all Carmady stories, as are two of the stories in Mandarin’s Jade.
After Cap Shaw was fired by Black Mask, Chandler left the magazine for Dime Detective and essentially turned Carmady into John Dalmas. And Dalmas was basically Marlowe before he was called Marlowe. There’s not much difference between the latter two.
John Dalmas is in “Mandarin’s Jade,” and the short novella, Trouble is My Business.
Dalmas was also in “Red Wind” (which I wish I’d bought), and the short story version of “The Lady in the Lake,” which Chandler turned into the Marlowe novel of the same name.
Chandler was pretty much done with short stories by 1942, and he would cannibalize some of these for his novels, starting with The Big Sleep. I like Chandler’s short stories, and fans of Marlowe should enjoy Dalmas. The Carmady stories are a little less polished, but he was just starting out as a writer. They’re still very Chandler.
I would have liked to see Gould in a period-appropriate Marlowe movie or two. Based on his readings, they would have been good.
Gould conveys the cynicism and world-weariness which is characteristic of Chandler’s detectives This is vital to a believable Marlowe. Chandler’s PI is different from Dashiell Hammett’s Sam Spade, or The Continental Op. Gould sounds like Chandler reads.
I can absolutely picture the scene as Gould narrates. The hard dames, the corrupt cops, the tough guys, the arrogant clients: Gould is excellent at ‘showing’ all the emotions and attitudes which Marlowe has to deal with. Prospective clients like to ‘put him in his place, and he rolls with it, often ignoring, rather than arguing back. Part of it is Chandler’s tremendous facility with words. But Gould isn’t just a good narrator. He’s a good Marlowe.
My feelings about Gould on screen vs in audio, reminds me of Alfred Molina. His modern-day Murder on the Orient Express was an unpopular movie. But a few years ago he did a radio play of “The Murder on the Links.” He is very good as Poirot.
Gould pronounces coupe ‘coop-ay.’ which feels kind of classy. And I like the way he says porte-cochere (Chandler really liked that French word). His voice is smooth. I like listening to him read. And he totally vibes the Marlowe of the written page.
Some of Gould’s audiobooks are on Youtube, and a few can be found via the Libby library app, and also on Audible. I’m fortunate that I bought most on CD. I listen to them at least every year or two when I get in a Marlowe mood. Though I really like the BBC radio plays with Toby Stephens (Vexed) as Marlowe. They’re tough to beat, and readily available to buy for phone listening.
But I often recommend Gould’s audiobooks. I think that the fact I can’t stand the movie,
It’s mid-May, and I’ve been in something of a hardboiled mood lately. So with Summer looming, here’s a Black (Gat) in the Hand. More Pulp is coming, like a gumshoe with a gasper and a rod.
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More Weird Menace from Robert E. Howard – Conrad and Kirowan
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Paul Cain’s Fast One (my intro)
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John Bullard on REH’s Rough and Ready Clowns of the West – Part I (Breckenridge Elkins)
John Bullard on REH’s Rough and Ready Clowns of the West – Part II
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Erle Stanley Gardner’s ‘Getting Away With Murder (And ‘A Black (Gat)’ turns 100!)
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Hardboiled May on TCM
Some Hardboiled streaming options
Johnny O’Clock (Dick Powell)
Hardboiled June on TCM
Bullets or Ballots (Humphrey Bogart)
Phililp Marlowe – Private Eye (Powers Boothe)
Cool and Lam
All Through the Night (Bogart)
Dick Powell as Yours Truly, Johnny Dollar
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YTJD – The Emily Braddock Matter (John Lund)
Richard Diamond – The Betty Moran Case (Dick Powell)
Bold Venture (Bogart & Bacall)
Hardboiled August on TCM
Norbert Davis – ‘Have one on the House’
with Steven H Silver: C.M. Kornbluth’s Pulp
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MORE Cool & Lam!!!!
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Joe Bonadonna’s ‘Hardboiled Film Noir’ (Part Two)
William Patrick Maynard’s ‘The Yellow Peril’
Andrew P Salmon’s ‘Frederick C. Davis’
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Bob Byrne’s ‘A (Black) Gat in the Hand’ made its Black Gate debut in 2018 and has returned every Summer since.
His ‘The Public Life of Sherlock Holmes’ column ran every Monday morning at Black Gate from March, 2014 through March, 2017. And he irregularly posts on Rex Stout’s gargantuan detective in ‘Nero Wolfe’s Brownstone.’ He is a member of the Praed Street Irregulars, and founded www.SolarPons.com (the only website dedicated to the ‘Sherlock Holmes of Praed Street’).
He organized Black Gate’s award-nominated ‘Discovering Robert E. Howard’ series, as well as the award-winning ‘Hither Came Conan’ series. Which is now part of THE Definitive guide to Conan. He also organized 2023’s ‘Talking Tolkien.’
He has contributed stories to The MX Book of New Sherlock Holmes Stories — Parts III, IV, V, VI, XXI, and XXXIII.
He has written introductions for Steeger Books, and appeared in several magazines, including Black Mask, Sherlock Holmes Mystery Magazine, The Strand Magazine, and Sherlock Magazine.
You can definitely ‘experience the Bobness’ at Jason Waltz’s ’24? in 42′ podcast.
…Yet another reminder that I need to try reading some Chandler, thank you, world…. Guess I’ll go see what’s on the shelves of my local sticks&bricks bookshop, tomorrow.
Let me know what you get. For Chandler, I enjoy the audio more than the reading. Same with Mike Hammer stuff.
Others, like Hammett, and Nebel, I like to read.
A little appalled– none of the local book stores stock any Chandler. The employees are startled to realize that, too. Looks like I’ll have to order something.
What quality is it, between Chandler and Hammett, that makes the latter readable rather than listenable, to you?
Utterly shameful that the spectacular HBO series starring Powers Boothe that you covered earlier on Black Gate is not available for streaming stateside. Would think given the current rend for nostalgia, Max would chuck it into their catalog… might be a tricky ownership status or some other technicality…
Yeah, I’m assuming it’s a rights issue somewhere. Both streaming and DVD.
I’d buy the DVDs if they reissued them at a decent price.
Well, here’s my take…but you already know what it is, don’t you, Bob? Ha! Right you are!
I quite like the Robert Altman Long Goodbye, but I think it’s because I don’t really think of this film as Chandler’s story or of Gould as Philip Marlowe. (It’s the same way I manage to like the Matthew Broderick Godzilla movie by just not thinking of it as Godzilla – which it isn’t.) I think of the Altman movie as just a loose and funky riff on the fundamental absurdity of a “Shining Knight” PI operating in the free-fall of the 70’s. That was pretty much Leigh Brackett’s view when she wrote the script.
I just reread The Big Sleep for the first time in almost fifty years, and it was even better than I remembered. Next, I’ll reread Farewell My Lovely, which was my first Chandler and is still my favorite. The book I’ll be most interested in rereading is The High Window; I remember not liking it nearly as much as the other classic Marlowe novels. The wisecracking dialogue and narration are so extreme as to make it read almost like a parody, or at least that’s how it hit me in 1977. Maybe it’ll strike me differently now.
Chandler’s plots are barely coherent – sometimes not even that – but with all that wit and style and acid intelligence, who cares about tight plotting?
I think it’s Joshua Dinges, and you, who are huge fans of Altman’s movie.
I get your ’70’s take ‘ on it. I just can’t do that. It’s a Marlowe movie.
I can’t take him out of the equation.
Even James Garner worked for me as Marlowe. But The Long Goodbye….
I’ll stick with Gould reading it. Which I like.
I’m pondering some kind of BG post on his ‘The Simple Art of Murder’ essay. Seems like a good fit for the Pulp; series. I also like several of the short stories in the Black Lizard edition of that one. I think about all of them were adapted for the Powers Boothe series.
And waaaaay too many people are sleeping on Toby Stephens’ radio plays. Those are solid.