Leslie Flint was the beloved President of the London based Valentino Memorial Guild that was the longest running Valentino Guild in history. The Valentino world has long lauded Leslie Flint for his activist work in preserving Valentino films. His biggest legacy was to acquire and preserve the surviving footage of The Young Rajah. He was also a well known spiritualist and author. He was a champion of, and attended many times, the Valentino Memorial Service.
Several years ago I was able to acquire the Valentino Memorial Guild's vast files and correspondence. One entire binder contained the decades of correspondence from Los Angeles Valentino fan Tony Altamirano.
Naturally when I saw Evelyn Zumaya had a chapter called "The Tony Altamirano Contributions" my interest was piqued. This is where she mentioned a hear-say conversation between Altamirano and Leslie Flint. Then, there in the Footnote #11 she mistakenly lists his name as Larry Flint the Porn Mogul! How in the world could a legit book called The Rudolph Valentino Case Files mistake the identity of the President of the Valentino Memorial Guild as the Pornography King?
It wasn't a typo because she repeats the same error on the very next page, and Footnote #13 again refers to Leslie Flint as Porn King Larry Flint. It doesn't end there. Evelyn Zumaya even lists the famed "Filth Peddler" in the books index.
This is yet another example of the absence of research and, needless to say, proof-reading for this book.
Leslie Flint, the beloved Valentino Memorial Guild President deserves better.
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| Larry Flint - Headlines when he died called him "Pervert Who Changed America" |
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| Leslie Flint - Valentino Memorial Guild President |
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| Porn Mogul Larry Flint is mis-identified in place of Leslie Flint Source: Footnote #11 Page 135 |
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| Porn Mogul Larry Flint is mis-identified a second time. Source: Footnote #13 Page 136 |
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| The Rudolph Valentino Case Files 'Index" Lists Porn Mogul Larry Flint |
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| Masthead of Valentino Memorial Guild stationary listing Leslie Flint as President |
ReplyDelete“IN LIKE FLINT!”
PART ONE
The Madwoman of Turin – The Pervert Who Changed Valentino!
She says in her blog, when speaking of Natacha Rambova being known as “Mrs Valentino”, and I paraphrase:
She always finds it offensive when women are referred to by their husband’s names, and in this case an ex-husband. It negates their identity.
How interesting, seeing as The Madwoman writes under the name of HER first husband, whom she divorced…a name she used when trying to pursue me through the courts here until told that she could not so so, whence she changed the name in the papers to that of her current husband—not that it did her any good.
I have read and digested (aided by two large bottles of Maalox, and a large bucket purchased at Poundland) my free copy of “The Valentino Nut-Case Files”.
I acquired this for legal reasons—adhering to the author’s theory that I am insane, and my own theory that no sane person would want to pay £30.99 (UK price) for a 345pp book whose recommended retail price, as dictated by The Publishing Association, should be no more than £20.00, HARDBACK. The fact that she charges this for a poorly cobbled together PAPERBACK—well, I will say no more.
I make the following observations in this first posting:
Firstly, I am proud that she devotes EIGHT pages to me—along with many pages to others she has never stopped attacking for nigh on TWENTY years. I am yet to see ANY Valentino biography, traditionally or self-published, which makes a single mention of her or her work. I am yet to see her on television, hear her on the radio, or read any press review. In fact, this will NEVER happen, because every aspect of the media, worldwide, has blacklisted her on account of her vexatious behaviour.
THIS IS A FACT. THERE IS NOT ONE SINGLE PERSON IN THE VALENTINO WORLD THAT EVELYN ZUMAYA HAS NOT VICIOUSLY ATTACKED.
And for the record, I have NOT been forbidden to ever mention her name. As long as she mentions my name, I will do the same. If she wants to pursue me for “defamation and sullying her wonderful reputation” (the bucket’s starting to fill up), then let me remind readers how she has variously described me as a porn fiction writer, depicted me as a monkey, accused me of crimes I will not repeat here, and posted pictured of my books being pissed on by a cat and blown to bits at a shooting-range.
Back to her £30.99 “Here We Go Gathering Nuts In May” fiction tome:
In this, Evelyn Zumaya (ex-wife of Armando, current wife of Renato Floris, who says he loves her dearly but for some reason doesn’t want her using his name) states that my biography of Valentino is filled with “factual errors” and “in need of an editor”.
Ahem… “Larry Flint”…
Ahem…My publisher for many years employed an efficient editor with a university degree, not a fourth-rater who cannot even speak English properly, let alone edit it.
In HER various blogs Evelyn Zumaya portrays Valentino as a hard-drinking alcoholic sex-pest, riddled with syphillis, a man who beat his dogs, who smelled, who forced himself upon women, and who had sex with his sister-in-law, passing his venereal disease on to her and their love-child, resulting in him being born with stunted growth. A man who, on his deathbed, had rotted from the inside out and expired in the arms of Frank Menillo (wife-beater and aficionado of button-boys) with cables from his divorced wife under his pillow, AND managing to whisper that someone was about to nick his money. Kind, isn’t she? A totally fictitious story. There was to be NO reunion with Rambova, NO death-bed confession. All INVENTION.
“IN LIKE FLINT”
ReplyDeletePART TWO
Evelyn Zumaya is SO obsessed with Valentino’s sexuality—heterosexualising him to such an extent that anyone reading what she writes would probably swear that, in realisty, he was two shades to the left of Liberace—the pianist, I add, and not the so-called mealy-mouthed holy man whose memory she constantly betrays by posting communications from his which I am sure Michael Morris did not want the world to see. Yes, even her “friends” get stabbed in the back. If anyone believes that Michael Morris wanted her to “co-author” his legacy book, then they will also believe the story that Mickey Mouse and Lucille Ball were lovers.
Evelyn Zumaya states how I wrote that Valentino had sex with Luther Mahoney, George Ullman…and Will Hays. I DID NOT!
She says (twice in the same sentence—bad editing, Mumbles!) how I wrote that Jacques Hérbertot had a one-night stand with Roger Normand. I did not. Roger was my godfather, and Hébertot was his. Maybe she should go to Specsavers with that one!
Her lies about André Daven are legion. Had I or anyone else written that Rudy had bonked Daven’s WIFE senseless, she would have placed him on a pedestal. In fact, he did not meet his future wife until AFTER Rudy’s death. (Similarly, the “erection” story, told by Paul Ivano. This is the ONLY part of Ivano’s long story that Evelyn Zumaya accepts, dismissing everything else he recalled as “invention”. Of course, had he said that the recipient of Rudy’s priapism had been another man, Ivano would have received the Bret treatment). She DOES go on about Rudy “keeping it in the family” by bonking his sister-in-law. And for the record, Daven was NOT a newspaper reporter. He was a theatrical agent and manager of three of France’s top entertainers, he was wealthy, he had made a number of films before meeting Rudy, and he was GUEST writer for a magazine which hired a celebrity columnist each month to cover important events.
When writing about Jeanne de Recqueville, the author gets the date (and the year!) of her TV appearance WRONG—the whole of that week’s programmes were taken up by Claude Francois. Neither does her stooge translate correctly the interview with the young model on the beach, when de Recqueville states how she believes that Rudy WAS gay, repeating a quote she has already made to a press-conference early on in the film.
In the footnote at the bottom of Page 277, the author (who has spent several pages trashing him) gets the name of the translator of “My Private Diary” WRONG. To her credit, I guess, she may not have had porn on her brain when doing this.
Her statement of how I wrote that Rudy was involved with Ramon Novarro’s death is as ludicrous as it gets. They died 43 years apart!
I am pleased that she includes quotes from other books about my Valentino biography. You will NEVER see any mention of her in other biographer’s books.
In conclusion, Evelyn Zumaya has worked tirelessly for twenty years to be where she is and where she will stay—at the bottom of the heap—an accolade she truly deserves!
Rather amusing, imo, that she complains when we point out this glaring error, claiming that everyone makes mistakes...forgetting that for almost two decades she has fashioned a career out of pointing out everyone else's!
ReplyDeleteThere is more to come, for all to see, on this Valentino Book Critique page. The truth will be known.
ReplyDeleteFor a published "writer" who doesn't fact-check and churns out lies they deserve to be called out.
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