To Mary Inloes [Letter 17]

Mary Inloes was AR’s agent for Night of January 16th, which opened on Broadway on September 16, 1935, and closed in April 1936.

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122 East 62nd Street,
New York, N.Y.

December 10, 1934.

Dear Miss Inloes,

I owe you many apologies for my long silence. I hope you will excuse me, when you hear of all the troubles I’ve had—on my way here. Everything went wrong with our car—from the license plate getting loose to the breaks burning out three times. To top it all, you came very near to having on your hands a crippled Russian writer—if any. We had an accident in Virginia and the car almost overturned. Fortunately, we were not hurt, but we left the car there and finished the trip by bus. The Auto-Courts [motels] are awful. You may use me as reference to discourage ambitious authors from motoring across the continent.

To make up for it, everything seems to be going very nicely here, in New York. I found Mr. [Sidney] Satenstein thoroughly charming and he seems to be a very good

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businessman. As to Mr. Woods, he is perfectly lovely and very easy to work with. I do not believe that I will have any trouble with him about the play. The suggestions he had to make so far were mostly the same cuts that we did in Hollywood, and also some grand things about the presentation of the play, which will improve it a great deal and are only details of production that do not affect the play itself. He plans to produce it on a grand scale which Hollywood could never approach. I do hope that you will be able to come here for the opening.

I have been very busy making the changes in the script, which he wanted to have as soon as possible. That is why I have not written to you sooner. I have not even actually unpacked, as yet. I have just delivered the script to him today.

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New York is grand. I love it. I am very happy to be here. Of course, I haven’t even begun to see it. It is quite cold, but I don’t mind, and I do not miss California sunshine.

I have not called on Miss Watkins as yet, for I did not want to delay Mr. Woods with the script.

My address is: 122 East 62nd Street, New York City. Please drop me a line when you have the time. I would appreciate it very much if you could send me any clippings you may have from the Hollywood papers—if they haven’t forgotten me entirely.

Thanking you again for all your splendid work in behalf of my play, with best personal wishes,

Sincerely yours,

Ayn Rand