Much of history leads one to the invariable musings of what ifs—a queried playground for writers to slip and slide down in its endless jungle gym of imaginings. This is no easy feat. Writers tend to magnify contexts, characters and relationships in order to best tell their story, sometimes, regardless of its truthfulness. But too little embellishment leads to didacticism.
Screenwriter and TV writer Tom Lazarus tackles a rare gem of L.A. lore between a pair of architectural giants, Rudolph Schindler and Richard Neutra, whose contributions can still be seen throughout the city, their modernist preeminence peeking out among the mishmash of stucco, siding, or gabled gaffes, let alone the industrial heave of 1970s featureless utilitarianism. Rising to prominence, both men were born and educated within miles of each other in Vienna, before coming to America—Schindler working under the famed Frank Lloyd Wright, and Neutra invited by his then friend Schindler to join him and his wife in their new home on Kings Road in West Hollywood. Both became naturalized citizens, and both took Los Angeles by storm with their forward-thinking structures created with both function and aesthetics to work in harmony...
