Hollywood: Swifty the Great

Swifty Lazar (rhymes with the czar) stands 5 ft. 3 in. in his elevator shoes, and he never picks on anybody his own size. Instead, as a literary agent representing playwrights, novelists and short-story writers in deals with movie producers, he competes with such titanic agencies as M.C.A., William Morris and General Artists. But year after year, when the dust jackets settle, Irving Paul Lazar walks away the winner.

From Edna Ferber to Vladimir Nabokov, Romain Gary, Howard Lindsay and Russel Crouse, his list of clients reads like the world's best-kept book...