Not that it makes me unique, but I’m a huge fan of these old letters. They’re such a neat little snapshot of place and time and people, and I wonder if the next generation will have any equivalent (“Ooh look, it’s the original emoticon Brett Ratner Blackberry messaged Nick Cannon on the set of Party Barge!”). Anyway, last time we posted a Marlon Brando letter, he was the sender, of a

You can see the full-sized letter at LettersofNote, but here’s the transcript:

Monday

Dear Marlon,

I heard you were back from the South Pacific; but I didn’t want to call you because I always feel stupid bringing up the matter of the Godfather. I know you return my calls on a personal and friendly basis, and so I can’t bring myself to misuse that and bring up what is bothering me.

My problem is simply that I am stalling and stalling because I have the inkling that it may be possible that you will play the young Vito Corleone. I’ve seen in the past, that even a slight possibility may blossom into a fact, and so I’ve tried to kindle this as best I could. I’ve become a real behind-the-scenes monster playing Yablans and Evans and Bludhorn; trying to get them to do what I want. I tell Yablans that he’s the only one who can do it. Then I tell Evans the same thing.

I tell them the movie cannot be made without you; I tell Yablans he has to apologize to you. Now Yablans says that he’s trying to do this, and get together on the money and stuff, but you don’t return his call.

Evans wants to approach you; but Yablans is terrified that Evans might make it work, where he failed…so he keeps preventing that.

But what it really comes down to is me. Marlon I respect you enormously; and if you told me that you did not want to do it under any circumstances, whatsoever…of course I would accept that, and never mention it again. And if you liked, I wouldn’t tell anyone else.

I learned a lot from you…one thing being that it’s only a movie, and what’s that compared to everything else there is in the world.

At times, I try really hard to imagine what you’re like in your thoughts. I realized that you’ve been in the strange state of adoration and exhibition for 25 years now, intensely…and I think that would have driven me crazy. And the fact that you’re really a good man, and warm, and love people is a tremendous achievement considering that you’ve been in a glass box for half your life.

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I doubt any of us were under the impression that Marlon Brando wasn’t a super eccentric dude, but even with that knowledge, reading his creepy, 1966 pick-up letter to a stewardess is still enough to send douche chills through the ages.  Here’s the transcript, and keep in mind, in 1966, Brando still looked like the banner picture, and hadn’t yet turned into this.

When he wrote the following letter in 1966, Marlon Brando was above the Atlantic Ocean flying from New York to London. Also on that plane was the letter’s recipient: a senior air stewardess who, due to her taking care of another passenger following a sudden downturn in health mid-flight, had spent much of the journey sitting directly in front of the enigmatic actor. He was clearly enamoured by her, and handed over the note as he left the aircraft.

Dear Lady —

There is something not quite definable in your face — something lovely, not pretty in a conventionally thought of way. You have something graceful and tender and feminine (sp). You seem to be a woman who has been loved in her childhood, or else, somehow by the mystery of genetic phenomena you have been visited by the gifts of refinement, dignity and poise. Perhaps you cannot be accredited with all that.

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Hollywood people always die in threes, so after Heath Ledger and Brad Renfro both passed away, I spent much of last week with my fingers crossed chanting Clint Howard, Clint Howard, Clint Howard…

Tragically, Christian Brando, Marlon Brando’s son with Welsh actress Anna Kashfi, succumbed to pneumonia at the age of 49.

Born May 11, 1958, the younger Brando had small roles in a handful of movies, including 1968′s "I Love You, Alice B. Toklas!" but he was better known for his brushes with the law.

In 1990, his then pregnant half sister Cheyenne told Christian her boyfriend Dag Drollet was abusive, so Christian shot him in the head with a .45.  It was a reaction Dirty Harry called “tough, but fair.” 

In related news, I once watched a ruffian accost on old lady.  When they asked me which way he went, I sorta shrugged and gestured in his direction with the drumstick I was eating. 

He had been hospitalised at Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center since January 11 with pneumonia and his ex-wife, Deborah, told People magazine in a story for their website that he had been comatose and on a respirator.

"His body was totally compromised," she said. "He’d lived so hard … this is just so sad."

He told the Los Angeles Times in a 1991 interview that he never intended to kill Drollet, but that the gun went off accidentally while the two struggled.

"I just sat there and watched the life go out of this guy," Brando told the newspaper.

Cheyenne Brando committed suicide in 1995, at the age of 25, by hanging herself at her mother’s home in Tahiti.

Brando also figured in the murder trial of actor Robert Blake, who was acquitted in the May 4, 2001 shooting death of his wife, Bonny Lee Bakley.

Christian Brando had briefly dated Bakley, and defense lawyers suggested that he could have been the killer, but he was never arrested or charged in her death and police cleared him of any involvement.

Brando was called as a witness during Blake’s subsequent civil trial but refused to testify and was fined for contempt of court. [source]

Cheyenne’s son with Drollet, Tuki Brando, lives in Tahiti and works as a model for Versace.

Christian Brando married artist Deborah Presley on October 16, 2004 in Las Vegas. Presley, two years Brando’s senior, claims to be the illegitimate daughter of Elvis Presley. On January 10, 2005, Brando was charged with two counts of spousal abuse. He plead guilty and was sentenced to three years probation and two months of drug and alcohol treatment. He was also ordered to complete a spousal abuse prevention program. The couple divorced in June 2005.

In December 2005, Presley sued Brando in Los Angeles County Superior Court seeking financial damages for multiple counts of violence and threats of violence and murder against her and her 13-year-old daughter. Presley claimed that Brando repeatedly forced her into sex by threatening to smother her with a pillow or to cut her daughter "into a million pieces". Both parties reached a settlement in February, 2007. [Wikipedia]

Jesus, this guy’s life reads like one of the vignettes in Magnolia.  And without the scene where it starts raining frogs, which was the only cool part.