Can You Ever Forgive Me? Trivia Quiz

Answer: Failing best-selling author

Lee Israel (1939-2014) is played by the Oscar-nominated Melissa McCarthy. Israel was a successful biographer, making the "New York Times" best-seller list, but now she can't get her agent to return her calls, she's behind on rent, and she owes the vet so they refuse to treat her sick cat. Lee is drinking to cope with writer's block, the failure of her last book, and her debts. Facing eviction, Israel sells a prized possession to bookstore owner Anna--a personal letter to Israel from Katharine Hepburn.

The movie mentions but does not go into the details of Israel's 30-year successful career or why she was now in decline. Real-life Israel profiled Katharine Hepburn in "Esquire" magazine in 1967, for instance, visiting Hepburn as well, which is why she had a personal letter from Hepburn in her possession. She made the best-seller list in 1980. But her last book, about Estee Lauder (1985) discredited the cosmetics giant, landing Israel in the doghouse with publishers and readers. Here begins the movie, with Israel bitter, in poverty, age 51, drinking too much, and ostracized from her former circles.

Answer: Fanny Brice

Lee Israel plans to write a biography about Fanny Brice (a singer, comedian and actress portrayed in 1964 by Barbra Streisand in "Funny Girl"). Israel's agent Marjorie (Jane Curtin) says with some disdain that no one cares about a biography on Brice. The agent is also upset that Israel is a mean person, who won't work the lecture circuits or author parties. Marjorie says she can't "get ten dollars" to advance to Israel for a Brice book.

"Can You Ever Forgive Me?" (2018) was directed by Marielle Heller, based on a screenplay by Nicole Holofcener and Jeff Whitty, based on the memoir by Lee Israel (2008). Julianne Moore was tapped to play the role of Lee Israel but was fired early on, Moore says.

Answer: Steals a winter coat

Invited yet unexpected, Lee Israel drops in on her agent Marjorie's party, where she is disgusted by a pompous author surrounded by adoring listeners. Dismissed by her agent, Israel smiles to herself as she stops at the coat check on her way out. She says she doesn't have her ticket, but "that coat is mine", pointing at someone else's fine winter garb.

She puts it on, and happily snuggles into it against the bitter cold.

Answer: Letters written by Fanny Brice

Sitting in the library among stacks of research on Fanny Brice, Lee Israel is startled to see an aged envelope in the pages of a book. She opens the envelope to see two authentic letters written by Brice, which Israel realizes as valuable. She looks around, and then steals them.

Finding these letters sets Israel out on the path of forgeries for which she'll later need forgiveness. In the meanwhile though, she can't believe her luck!

Answer: Sells her forged letters

Anna (played by Dolly Wells) has a genuine liking and interest in Lee Israel and her writing, the first person to do so in a while. They met after Israel was banned from her longtime bookstore for bad behavior. Israel brought in the authentic but stolen Fanny Brice letter, but when Anna says a less bland letter would have more value, Israel goes home, adds a spicy postscript to the 2nd Brice letter, and sells the forgery to Anna for $350.

We see how pained Israel is when she realizes this kind friend Anna will find out she's been deceived. It's perhaps the only time Israel shows guilty distress about her crimes.

Answer: Gets much better prices

Jack Hock (Richard E. Grant) is a gregarious, endearing and gay drifter, who was probably impossibly handsome and popular in his day, but like Lee Israel he's feeling his age and the wear and tear of bad choices. These two are kindred, drinking and sharing critical sarcasms, the only friend the other has.

Composing fake letters by famous authors such as Dorothy Parker and Noel Coward, Lee Israel is able to sell them to collectors for a few hundred dollars. After she is blacklisted by the collectors, her new friend Jack Hock, far better at scamming people than Lee, sells the letters for her, bringing in much higher prices.

For his incredible performance, Grant won as Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor in a number of Awards and Societies, and was nominated for Best Supporting Actor in both the British Academy Film Awards and US Academy Awards (2019).

Answer: Takes care of rent and her cat

Surprising perhaps, Lee doesn't splurge with her ill-gotten gains. Instead she seeks to re-establish her former stable life. She pays up her back owed rent, has her place fumigated, and gets her cat much-needed medical treatment.

Jack helps her clean up the disgusting mess her apartment had become, and after he is beaten up on the street, she lets him move in and sleep on her couch. They cook up a plan to steal authentic letters, since the collectors are on the alert now for forgeries.

Answer: The cat dies.

Lee Israel takes a day trip to attempt to steal an authentic letter from library archives. She's amazingly good at it, and slips away with the letter in her sock.

Meanwhile Jack Hock is using drugs, messing up Lee's apartment, and possibly overdosed Lee's sick cat. Lee comes home to discover her beloved cat is dead. "The one thing that truly loved me", she will say. She demands that Jack and his lover leave immediately. Jack feels he is wrongly accused, and they are irreparably distant after that, though Israel continues to use him to fence her letters. When the FBI later questions Jack, he tells them everything.

Answer: A court judge

Facing serious charges for theft and forgery, Lee Israel has an opportunity to say some words to the judge who is about to sentence her to five years' probation and six months' house arrest, taking into account her voluntary community service, attendance at AA and starting a job. To our surprise, Israel gives a beautifully self-aware, honest and moving confession, of sorts, confiding, "I can't say that I regret any of my actions.

In many ways this has been the best time of my life". It's here we learn the true reason she used her brilliance and writing skill to forge letters instead of writing a new book or following her agent's advice to work the lecture circuits.

Answer: Permission to write their story

We see Lee Israel waiting, and drinking. "I'm in an AA meeting right now", she tells Jack, who hobbles into the bar on a cane, looking very ill. He's not happy to see her, but he listens while she tells him she plans to write the story of their crimes. She wants permission to include him. He says she can, but wants her to pen him as young and not a stupid fool.

Ex-con Jack Hock was a real person, who did die of AIDS, and did help fence the forged letters for Israel. But the actor Richard E. Grant brings great depth and presence to Jack in the movie, absent in the memoir by Israel.