Posts Tagged ‘Awards’

Quarry Up for an Award, Mike Hammer’s Big Announcement

Tuesday, June 17th, 2025

Things have been popping around here. First came news that Quarry’s Return has been nominated for the Best Paperback Novel “Shamus.” The Shamus is an award that means a lot to me, because my late friend Bob Randisi and I, and a few others, were grousing to each other about the Mystery Writers of America ignoring private eye novels in their Edgar awards. Bob was not one to let the grass grow under his feet and very soon he’d created the Private Eye Writers of America and the Shamus awards.

Arguably, the Shamus awards became the second most-prominent and prestigious honor of its kind in mystery fiction. Others have come and gone, and some may lay claim to being more important now; but I know and remember what it meant to me.

In 1983 my novel True Detective was published and got quite a bit of attention in its approach to merging the PI story with historical crime, and for being the longest private eye novel ever written (later my novel Stolen Away would eclipse it). I was, predictably, ignored by the Edgars but got a Shamus nomination. I was a long shot to say the least, because I was up against a Murderer’s Row of mystery writers: James Crumley, Stanley Ellin, Loren Estleman and Robert B. Parker. But my book won, and I was boosted considerably in the business…and both Nate Heller and I are still around. Stolen Away won the Best Novel in 1992. The series went on to be the most-nominated in the history of the organization.

Anyone who says awards don’t matter (like me, when I lose) are full of it. If Bob Randisi hadn’t started up the PWA, I wonder if Heller and I would still be around.

Nate Heller and True Detective are the basis, of course, of True Noir: The Assassination of Anton Cermak, director Robert Meyer Burnett’s ten-episode audio drama from my adaptation. (truenoir.co)

Quarry has been nominated for the Shamus several times (my hitman even got an Edgar nomination last year for Quarry’s Blood) but I don’t recall him ever winning. Kind of makes sense in the PWA, because to make a private eye out of Quarry, you have to squint and look sideways. But the books are very much built on the private eye novel paradigm.

In other private eye news…

Matthew McConaughey is serious talks with Skydance about reuniting with True Detective writer Nic Pizzolatto in the Mike Hammer movie that has been threatening to happen for a decade or so.

Matthew McConaughey and Nic Pizzolatto

The film is based not just on Mickey’s work but draws upon the entire series (including the collaborative novels and short stories that share a Spillane/Collins byline). I have read the script and it’s solid; as an executive producer, I was able to provide notes, to get the characters and concepts in line with Mickey’s and my work.

This news exploded all over the Internet. I lost count at 21 articles. Here’s a typical one from Deadline.

It was everywhere, from Variety to the Hollywood Reporter. I am optimistic but I never believe this kind of thing till I’m on set and the cameras are rolling. But it has a real feel to it.

You will note a certain irony here: the title of my novel True Detective is of course the title of the (later) HBO series that brought together actor McConaughey and writer Pizzolatto – a highly rated and regarded series that I have never seen, since the use of the title irked me. On the other hand, I plucked the title from the vintage true-crime magazines that were on the newsstands when Heller was starting out in the other True Detective.

* * *

Here’s a cool review of The Last Quarry.

My band the Daybreakers has a Wikipedia page! And I didn’t submit it much less write it (a few inaccuracies, but hey).

M.A.C.

Pee-Wee Herman, Death by Fruitcake & San Diego Comic-Con

Tuesday, June 3rd, 2025

The two-part HBO documentary, Pee-Wee as Himself (directed by Matt Wolf) hit me hard. It was, in many respects, delightful; but to revisit the unfair attacks on Paul Reubens, due to one ill-judged moment and a subsequent witch hunt, was a painful experience.

The Paul Reubens interviewed by Wolf (a great job by Wolf on this) was the Paul I knew – a pleasant, quietly witty soul who could be frank and guarded, all at once. He’s very funny in the doc, but Wolf wisely included Paul struggling with how deep to dive into himself. He dove pretty damn deep, actually.

The one thing that struck me most was how Paul and Pee-Wee had, on some level – again, a deep level – merged into one for these final trips in front of the camera. The playful Paul, and the private one, seemed to struggle with each other throughout – but the very sweetly funny man he was prevailed.

He made some enemies in his time here on earth. He was driven and that drive at times left people behind. I’ve spoken to several Groundlings (the Second City-style comedy troupe of which Paul was a part in L.A. at the start of Pee-Wee) who resented his success. You don’t reach the heights of show business without a certain coldness – asked about this in the doc, Paul shrugs and says, “It is show business.”

It’s tough to have the kind of large ego that leads to success without alienating some of those you meet along the way. I can only say that Paul’s generous, sweet nature that I encountered reminds me we were all lucky to know Pee-Wee Herman.

This is what I wrote about Paul and Pee-Wee before Christmas 2013. I’ve reprinted this before, but it seemed appropriate – even necessary – to share it again.

For me, Christmas begins when I receive my yearly Christmas card from Paul Reubens. Sometimes Paul writes a personal note. The cards are always charming and even hilarious, and we have easily two dozen of them. This year Barb made a wreath out of some our favorites.

I went crazy over Pee-Wee with his HBO Special, The Pee-Wee Herman Show in 1981. I was doing the DICK TRACY strip at the time, and I put Pee-Wee in the strip – he was on television saying, “My name’s Pee-Wee – what’s yours?” And a TV-obsessed villain of mine replied, “Splitscreen!”

Paul Reubens phoned me shortly after that, delighted by the TRACY appearance, and we chatted. Shortly after that, taking time out from a San Diego con, Terry Beatty and I visited Paul in LA – he was in a small one-story brick house filled with funky toys and oddball memorabilia. We watched a version of The Pee-Wee Herman Show that the cast had looped with blue improv material. The Pee-Wee Herman suit was on a coat tree. I asked Paul how many of those he had, and he said, “Just the one.” Then, noting my surprised reaction, he added, “Sometimes Pee-Wee doesn’t smell so good up close.”

Paul knew that I was a movie buff, and he was working on getting a Pee-Wee film going. Late at night, we would talk on the phone and (at his request) I would send him Betamax copies of offbeat films like Eddie Cantor’s Roman Scandals and Russ Meyer’s Faster Pussycat, Kill Kill! He called once every month or two for a couple of years, sometimes when he was off shooting a movie. (One was a Meatballs sequel, and I asked him what it was about. He said, “A virgin sees her first dick.” I thought he was kidding till I saw the movie.) Barb and I (and sometimes Terry) would go to live shows of Paul’s, and we’d see him after – we did this in New York and Chicago.

When the Pee-Wee movies and TV show kicked in, Paul changed his phone number and I haven’t heard from him since…except at Christmas. Always a wonderful card, and sometimes a warm personal note. I still love Pee-Wee Herman, and it’s been a nice perk of my minor celebrity that I got to know Paul Reubens a little. It’s very thoughtful and generous of him to send me these fantastic cards every year.

After this blog entry of mine appeared, I heard from Paul, as follows:

Max, is this you?! I recently ran across this (the above Update): I’d love to catch up with you. I now (maybe, if this is indeed you) have an email address but don’t have a phone for you anymore. It sure has been a long time!

I hope you’re reading this!

Paul

I was obviously thrilled by this re-communication, and on occasion would hear from him via e-mail, though we never spoke on the phone or in person again. Those Christmas cards kept coming. That’s stopped now, of course.

The last time I heard from Paul was when he thanked me for writing a tribute (here at the Update) about his friend and collaborator John Paragon, Jambi on Pee-Wee’s Playhouse and in the original HBO The Pee-Wee Herman Show. John had just passed away and Paul liked what I had to say about the man who’d perhaps been his most important collaborator. Here’s that tribute.

* * *

The important news this week is that I will be a Guest of Honor at the San Diego Comic-con.

I have attended many times, and of course I performed with my bandmates in Seduction of the Innocent on numerous occasions at the con. I have only attended once since my 2016 heart surgery; the con that time around was an experience that was hard enough to have me staying home after that, reluctantly. That was 2018.

So this return visit is going to be somewhat physically tough, but I am delighted to be making this one-stop farewell tour. As it stands now, Andrew Sumner will be interviewing me about all my Titan/Hard Case Crime projects (over the last twenty years!) and Robert Meyer Burnett will interview me about Nate Heller (among other things) with an emphasis on True Noir: The Assassination of Mayor Anton Cermak.

When I say “farewell tour,” don’t panic (I’m not). I generally feel fine, but a-fib has its travails. Nonetheless, please know I will be writing novels and screenplays until they carry me out in a body bag. And they better zip it, or I’ll crawl the hell out.

* * *
Death by Fruitcake poster

We haven’t taken Death By Fruitcake out on the festival circuit, concentrating on getting it on a streamer(s). Right now there’s no DVD or Blu-ray scheduled, as that market has (except for some niche stuff) pretty much dried up.

But we did enter the Iowa Motion Picture Awards. We were nominated in five categories and won five awards. Barb and I did not attend the event, because we’d decided instead to be in Des Moines for an evening screening of Death By Fruitcake (as part of the festival). Two trips to Des Moines from Muscatine in four days was a little much. So our leading man, Rob Merritt, attended for us and picked up the hardware after.

We received awards in all five categories in which we’d been nominated – Director: Award of Excellence: Max Allan Collins; Award of Achievement Long-form Narrative: Death By Fruitcake; Actor: Award of Achievement: Rob Merritt; Actress: Award of Achievement: Paula Sands; and Supporting Actress: Award of Achievement: Alisabeth Von Presley.

We are obviously pleased.

And I will tip my cap to all of those mentioned above, and the rest of my cast and crew, who pulled off something special in a limited amount of time and budget. Particularly I will salute my buddy Chad Bishop, who shot the film, edited it and co-produced it.

Death by Fruitcake IMPA Awards
* * *

At the suggestion of a potential distributer, we have added a subtitle to Death By Fruitcake. Now it’s DEATH BY FRUITCAKE: An Antiques Christmas Mystery. We think this was a good suggestion, because “Christmas” is a helpful thing as is tying the movie to its source, namely the Antiques series of cozy/crazy mysteries by Barb and me, writing as “Barbara Allan.” A novella of ours, Antiques Fruitcake, is the specific source.

* * *

I got a big kick out of being part of the 200th episode of Let’s Get PHYSICAL MEDIA on YouTube this past Sunday.

Most Sunday afternoons, new episodes of this fun show with Robert Meyer Burnett and Dieter Bastian will air with segments from me talking about film noir and crime/mystery movies in general, specifically titles that have recently appeared on physical media. I’ll also be talking about True Noir, which Rob Burnett directed and I wrote from my first Nathan Heller novel, True Detective. True Noir: The Assassination of Anton Cermak is available now at truenoir.co.

M.A.C.

True Noir Presents Star-Studded Panel at San Diego Comic Con…And I’m Not Here (But Sort of Am)

Tuesday, July 30th, 2024

Regular visitors to these update/blog entries will already know that I was unable to attend the San Diego Comic Con, where a True Noir panel was a major part of our launch.

My health issues make it difficult to attend the very crowded and spread-out con, not to mention air travel, plus Barb and I are wrapped up in pre-production of our indie film production, Death by Fruitcake (based on the Antiques series she and I write as “Barbara Allan”) with shooting to begin less than a month from now.

My longtime collaborator, Phil Dingeldein, shot a video of me so I could greet the attendees at the panel, and here it is:

My terrific director, Robert Meyer Burnett, interviewed me last October (literally the day after we wrapped Blue Christmas), and Phil shot it and edited this piece into the first of what will be a number of Behind the Mystery episodes.

If you are thinking of backing our KickStarter effort, here’s the web address.

Unlike a lot of KickStarters, we are deep into production and you can order the finished product now, which will be available at the end of the Kickstarter campaign (no endless wait as is the case so often in these crowd-funding offerings).

The panel created some real interest, as in this WBOY coverage.

Here’s some press room interviews with producer Mike Bawden (of Imagination Conisseurs Unlimited, his company with Rob Burnett) and actor Anthony LaPaglia, among others.

And more here:

Some nice pre-panel attention here.

A good one here.

I’ll be posting more video shot by Phil of me discussing Nate Heller, this project, and my fiction generally, in the coming weeks. Also more excerpts of the interview Rob Burnett made with me.

Again, if you’re interested in my work at all, you’re going to love True Noir: The Assassination of Anton Cermak.

Your support will allow us to do more – we have big plans, but we need your help.

* * *

Here’s a nice write-up on this year’s Strand Magazine Critics Awards, in which I won a Lifetime Achievement award.

There’s a nice if brief write-up about my Batman graphic novel (adapted from the Kia Asamiya original, Child of Dreams.)

Here’s an appreciation of Wild Dog, the homemade costumed hero Terry Beatty and I cooked up once upon a time.

This article talks about seven movie novelizations that are worth reading, and Road to Perdition is one of them. Unfortunately, they don’t mention that the later Brash Books edition is my entire novelization (originally cut from around 90,000 words to 40,000 for the paperback tie-in edition at DreamWorks’ demand).

The Brash Books edition of the full Perdition novel is here.

Finally, here’s one of several recent write-ups about the film version of Road to Perdition and how Tom Hanks ranks it among his favorite film roles.

M.A.C.

Let’s Kick True Noir in the Starter and Another Recognition Plus the End of Mike Hammer!

Tuesday, July 23rd, 2024

The Kickstarter for True Noir: The Assassination of Anton Cermak is live right now.

It’s important, if you’re a devoted reader of mine – a Nate Heller fan – that you participate in some way.

What differs about this effort is that when the Kickstarter time is up (less than two months from now) the final product will be ready to deliver to you, immediately. Some of the physical media versions will take longer to produce, but if you are buying a download, you will not face the usual (and sometimes interminable) Kickstarter wait to receive it.

I have written this adaptation of True Detective, the first Nate Heller novel (Private Eye Writers of America “Best Novel” Shamus, 1984) myself – a 350-page script that will be ten thirty-to-thirty-five minutes each. Much of it has already been recorded. Our casting director/co-producer Christine Sheaks has assembled an incredible cast. And I’ve been able to attend many of the impressive recording sessions via Zoom.

We have two key roles we haven’t announced the actors for as yet – Heller himself and Frank Nitti. Watch this space, and the Kickstarter page, and you’ll know soon.

Anyone who has enjoyed (or is right now in the process of enjoying) the Nathan Heller novels will be…what’s the most evocative, graceful term?…a pig in shit listening to this ten-part adaptation.

I try not to do a hard sell here. We’re friends in this space and I don’t want my friends battered with that kind of thing. But this is key, in my opinion, to my legacy as a crime/mystery author and to Heller’s ability to thrive in the popular culture. I wish I had Jerry Lewis to plead my case and wind up singing “You’ll Never Walk Alone.”

But Jerry is dead, and I’m 76.

So if you’re a fan – and I know you’re out there, I can hear you aging – contribute to this Kickstarter effort. And tell others about it, please. How serious about this am I? Well, the next Nate Heller novel – One-Way Ride – will be the last. And Heller’s future thereafter will be tied up with how well True Noir does. The plan is for three or four more audio adaptations of various novels (probably, next, The Million-Dollar Wound) and three seasons of live action thereafter. I will do all the scripts myself. This is an ambitious plan but doable…with your support.

In other words, if enough of you guys and gals (that phrase alone dates me, doesn’t it?) step up, NATE HELLER LIVES.

If you stop by here regularly, you know that I am about to direct Death by Fruitcake, an adaptation of the Antiques series, a micro production Barb and I are funding ourselves. For Blue Christmas, we ran a Kickstarter. For Death by Fruitcake, we plundered our savings to make our film because I don’t want to get in the way of this Kickstarter for True Noir.

True Noir in a weird way is a co-Hollywood/Iowa production. Our gifted director, Robert Meyer Burnett, is operating out of California. The executive producer, Mike Bawden, is in the Iowa/Illinois Quad Cities. And I of course have written that 350-page adaptation here in Muscatine, Iowa.

Also key is my longtime collaborator and pal Phil Dingeldein of dphilms in Moline, Illinois, who has been recording behind-the-scenes and promo footage from the very beginning. You’ll be seeing of some his work for the project right here soon.

The team is a strong one and I’m proud to be part of it. Again, forgive the hard sell. Just try to picture me looking up at you with big Margaret Keane eyes.

If you are going to the San Diego Comic Con, Rob and Mike and a bunch of the cast members will have a panel THIS WEEK on Thursday July 25 at 5:30 p.m., Room 6A. I am not attending because the travel, and the crowds and difficulty of attending this event (at which I was long a regular attendee – Seduction of the Innocent, anyone?), make it impossible for me to take part in what is a major part of the launch by Imagination Connoisseurs Unlimited, Rob and Mike’s company. Also, I began fulltime pre-production Fruitcake yesterday (Monday July 22…less than a month out of first day of shoot!).

I am incredibly frustrated that I can’t be at the con panel, but Phil Dingeldein and I recorded a greeting video that will welcome attendees to this key event. If you are going to the con this year, don’t miss this panel.

A poster announcing the event will be given to the first 1000 attendees (well, 999…I asked Rob to save me one). You saw this image a few weeks ago, but here it is again – it’s a banger, as they say.

True Noir: The Nathan Heller Casebooks poster

This project is the big one.

Be part of it…and you’ll never walk alone.

* * *

Normally I would lead with this (but the Kickstarter trumps…pardon the expression…all else):

I am pleased and frankly proud that I’m receiving the 2024 Strand Critics Life Achievement Award.

My statement about this recognition, given by the Strand magazine to the media, is here:

“This is a lovely honor from the last magazine of its kind, much as I am part of a passing pulp breed,” said Collins. “My heroes included Chester Gould, Mickey Spillane, and Donald E. Westlake, later my mentors and friends. My love of movies culminated in the filming of my Road to Perdition. Nathan Heller, Quarry, and Ms. Tree are evidence of my love for detective fiction, much as the Antiques books written with my wife Barbara are of my love for her. I am lucky and blessed to make my living telling elaborate lies about humans at their best and worst.”
M.A.C. holding copies of Skim Deep and Bait Money
* * *

I have completed – and sent to my editor Andrew Sumner at Titan Books – the final Mike Hammer novel, the fifteenth collaborative entry by Mickey Spillane and me on that series (sixteen, if we count the short story collection, A Long Time Dead). That collaboration is posthumous on Mickey’s part, with me (at his request in the last week of his life), taking on the responsibility of completing his unfinished works, primarily Mike Hammer novels.

The novel, with a wraparound that takes place at a cemetery bracketing an early ‘70s yarn, is entitled Baby, It’s Murder, the resonance of which will become clear when you read the book. Despite the bulk of the novel taking place around 1973 (coincidentally the start of my professional writing career), it serves well, I think, as a concluding Hammer novel. You’ll see what I mean if…when…you read it.

The Mickey Spillane’s Mike Hammer Legacy Project has been a joy and a challenge. I’ve done a few non-Hammer collaborations, too – The Menace for Wolfpack from an unproduced Spillane horror screenplay and completing three novels, Dead Street, The Consummata and The Last Stand (the latter an edit job) all for the great Hard Case Crime.

I do have a few things left that I hope to do – another unproduced Spillane screenplay that could become a novel, two or three Hammer short stories from fragments, and most important, the Mike Danger novel Mickey wrote the first draft of, one of his last works. It’s likely that I’ll convert it into a Mike Hammer novel, but its science-fiction elements make finding the right publisher tricky.

Also, if Skydance actually makes the Mike Hammer movie it secured rights to do, I might offer to do the novelization, and perhaps get a new Hammer novel out there as well. For example, I have yet to novelize the radio-style play, Mickey Spillane’s Encore for Murder (seen on the VCI blu-ray of the revised, expanded Mike Hammer’s Mickey Spillane and as a standalone DVD with Gary Sandy as Hammer) and that’s a possibility.

My position has been – and I immodestly think it separates me from other “continuation” novelists of series, like those picking up after Robert B. Parker, for example – is that all of these books are stories Mickey set out to write. Every one of the Spillane/Collins-bylined books have real Spillane content. The only exception are the Caleb York novels – the first one, The Saga of Caleb York, reflects his unproduced screenplay (written for his pal John Wayne!), and the subsequent five are by me, utilizing his characters and some plot threads left by the screenplay.

The fifteen additional Hammer novels, and the short story collection, reflect the belief and enthusiasm of a handful of publishers…

Otto Penzler, who first published The Goliath Bone, The Big Bang and Kiss Her Goodbye, as well as the collection A Long Time Dead and the Collins/Spillane critical biography, Spillane: King of Pulp Fiction.

Nick Landau, Vivian Cheung and Andrew Sumner at Titan Books, who picked up reprint rights on the first three Spillane/Collins Hammer novels and published the next eleven novels. (Charles Ardai at Hardcase Crime stepped up for non-Hammer novels.)

These are people in publishing with a sense of history, with a grasp on the importance of Mickey Spillane in a pantheon of private eye writers that includes Dashiell Hammett and Raymond Chandler.

My sincere gratitude goes out to them all.

M.A.C.