MOONLIGHT BLONDE by Richard Alfieri tears away the veil of glamour and romance in Hollywood of the 1930’s to reveal the world of violence and corruption hidden within. It's the story that Hollywood has been afraid to tell for almost a century.

 

One of the period’s most popular stars was the beautiful THELMA TODD, dubbed the “Moonlight Blonde” by studio publicists.  Thelma’s phenomenal success had earned her all the trappings of Hollywood fame:  cash, cars, jewels, furs, and several lovers.  She was a woman living far ahead of the mores of her era–and she paid the ultimate price for her freedom.  When her body was found behind the wheel of her car in a garage above The Sidewalk Café, her Malibu restaurant on the Coast Highway, everyone assumed she had been murdered.  But by whom?

Through flashbacks and out-of-sequence storytelling, this narrative will keep the viewer guessing all the way until the end about which of the following suspects might have committed the murder of the decade.

 

• ROLAND WEST, her lover, business partner, and former film director.  Roland had directed several Hollywood mysteries, including The Corsaire, in which Thelma had starred.  Although married, Roland became obsessed with Thelma.  Once the heat of their affair had cooled and Thelma had moved on to another lover, Roland was able to retain some control over Thelma’s life through their business partnership in The Sidewalk Café.  He seemed like the understanding older lover, but did his jealousy over Thelma’s new, younger flame motivate him to kill her?  Many believe he confronted Thelma in the garage as she was about to leave to meet her new lover, struck her, then left her to die in the garage with the car engine running.  As Roland ran angrily back down the steps to his apartment over The Sidewalk Café, Thelma, the love of his life, was dying of carbon-monoxide poisoning just steps away.  Days later, at the coroner’s inquest, Roland West wept openly as he swore under oath that the last time he saw Thelma was when he said his final goodbye to her as she departed for a party at the Trocadero earlier that evening.  Heartfelt tears–but of grief, or guilt, or both? 

 

• PAT DI CICCO, Thelma’s ex-husband and former agent.  Thelma had married the dapper, attractive Di Cicco on an impulse and lived to regret it.  He dallied with other women and knocked her around for amusement.  After their divorce, they continued to run into one another–in fact, he was at the Trocadero party that same evening.  Could he have met Thelma afterward, argued with her, and inflicted the final abuse that resulted in her death?
   

• LUCKY LUCIANO had wanted Thelma to open a gambling casino with him on the top floor of the Sidewalk Café, but Thelma had refused.  People whispered that her refusal had prompted Luciano to send one of his thugs to follow her to the garage, strangle her, and leave her in the closed garage with the engine running to mask the murder.  It would have been business-as-usual for the Mafia kingpin.

 

• RICARDO CORDOVA, fading film star and Thelma’s former flame.  The screen Latin-lover had continued an on-again, off-again affair with Thelma for several years.  Like Roland, he tried, but was unable, to accept the other men in Thelma’s life–including Roland.  Could he, like Roland, have choked her in a jealous rage and left her to die in the garage?

 

MOONLIGHT BLONDE probes the possible scenarios surrounding Hollywood’s most intriguing unsolved murder.  As it examines her death, this daring film illuminates Thelma’s life and the lives of the men she loved.  The dark corners and long shadows thrown by fame’s glaring spotlight create an unconventional Hollywood mystery that continues to fascinate decades after Thelma’s untimely death.