Amazon Tries To Complete F.Scott Fitzgerald's Unfinished Novel

THE LAST TYCOON, AN UNFINISHED novel by F. Scott Fitzgerald published in 1941, a year after his death, is a nervy piece of work.

- Daniel D'Addario

The draft jitters with desperation, as if Fitzgerald were trying to craft, sentence by sentence and aphorism by aphorism, a hit. The perspective shifts almost at random and the plot, about a movie executive with barely hidden vices, skitters away from its author’s control. It’s plainly unfinished but full of neuroses and passion. That is to say, full of life.

In adapting it for the screen, Amazon has made a show that feels the opposite. The first season of The Last Tycoon unfolds slowly, taking time to nod at every aspect of the movie making industry and Los Angeles society in the 1930s. It’s beautiful—and damned if you compare it to its source material.