Brought up among the famous guests in his mother's Hollywood salon, German-born Peter Viertel became acquainted with a European literary circle as well as film stars like Greta Garbo and Charlie Chaplin. From there he launched his own successful career as a screenwriter and novelist. Throughout the golden years of Hollywood, the larger-than-life figures of Ernest Hemingway, Orson Welles and John Huston - Viertel's dangerous friends - provide both outlet and inspiration for his talent. From the new dawn of the talkies to his own screen triumphs with Clint Eastwood in the 1980s, this star-studded memoir is the unforgettable story of one man's life among the legendary giants of the American film industry.