Charles MacArthur's life was a grand feast, and he never shied away from indulging in its abundance. Born in Scranton, Pennsylvania, in November 1895, Charlie was the second-youngest of seven children to stern evangelist William Telfer MacArthur and Georgiana Welsted MacArthur. His early life was marked by his father's ministry, which led the family on a cross-country journey wherever the elder MacArthur's calling took them. Charlie spent much of his time hiding in the bathroom, the only place offering a modicum of privacy for a member of such a large family, where he developed a passion for the written word that would last him to his dying day.
Resisting his father's urging to follow him into the ministry, young Charlie left the family's rural New York home soon after finishing high school. He headed off to the Midwest, taking a reporter's job at The Oak Leaves, a suburban Chicago newspaper owned by two of his older brothers and run by his older sister. His first professional taste of crafting something for others to read whetted his appetite for even more. Intently determined to pursue a calling that was as strong as his father's, Charlie went to the City News Bureau of Chicago as the first step in his journey toward life as a journalist.
Though only 19, the irreverent sense of humor and dislike for mindless authoritarianism for which he would later be so well known were already quite evident in the application he filled out for the job. In the space entitled "Tell us in exactly seventy-five words why you wish to become a reporter," Charlie wrote: "I want to become a reporter more because I like the work than for any other reason. I feel that even if I should branch off in another profession, the experience obtained in getting up on your toes after news would be valuable. These are my reasons. More words would be useless."
The excitement of working in brash and brawling pre-1920s Chicago didn't quite satisfy Charlie's hunger for something more, however, and he soon hooked up with General "Black Jack" Pershing, galloping off to Mexico to join in the hunt for the infamous Pancho Villa. When World War I broke out, Charlie joined the Army's 149th Field Artillery, part of the Rainbow Division. During his time in France, he and his battery mate shot down a German plane with nothing more than a machine gun. Later in the war, Charlie sustained a mild shrapnel wound.
In 1919, he penned his only book, A Bug's Eye View of the War, about his unit's adventures and misadventures during some of the most brutal and bloody fighting in history. Returning to Chicago just in time for Prohibition, the Roaring 20s, and Al Capone, Charlie became one of Chicago's most well-known and widely read reporters. He authored some of the most enduring pieces ever printed in the pages of the Chicago Tribune and Daily News. His style was inventive, charming, and witty. Readers couldn't get enough.
Once, when writing about a dentist accused of sexually molesting his female patients, Charlie chose the headline "Dentist Fills Wrong Cavity". He also wrote several short stories, two of which, "Hang It All" (1921) and "Rope" (1923),were published in H.L. Mencken's The Smart Set magazine. His star continued to rise, and he eventually headed off to the greener pastures of New York City. Once settled in the Big Apple, he began to shift his efforts toward playwrighting. His first true Broadway success was in 1926 with the play "Lulu Belle", written in collaboration with Edward Sheldon.
His next play, "Salvation", written in collaboration with Sidney Howard, enjoyed a moderate Broadway run. During the summer of 1927, Charlie and long-time friend and collaborator, Ben Hecht, rented the premises of the Nyack Girl's Academy as a haven from which they could create their own special brand of playwrighting. Helen Hayes (the future Mrs. Charles MacArthur) would tell friends of times when she or Rose Hecht would visit to bring in food or other supplies for their men, and the building would be positively filled with shouts of laughter and merriment.
The result of this seclusion was the 1928 Broadway debut of "The Front Page". The phenomenal stage success of "The Front Page" prompted Charlie to head to Hollywood and screenplay work. Having already developed such works as The Girl Said No (1930),Billy the Kid (1930),and The Unholy Garden (1931),he hit the jackpot in 1931, first with the movie version of The Front Page (1931),which won Academy Award nominations for Best Picture, Best Director (Lewis Milestone),and Best Actor (Adolphe Menjou),and then, with the release of The Sin of Madelon Claudet (1931),which netted
