Brain Snacks: Tasty Tidbits of Knowledge
Norman Mailer had more beefs than every West Coast rapper combined. One of his more famous conflicts took place on the Dick Cavett Show, when he got into an altercation with writer Gore Vidal. Apparently Mailer head-butted Vidal before the show went live, prompting them to spend the entire episode arguing among themselves. That's cringe-worthy television at its finest. (Source.)
File this one under "Fun Facts That Aren't All That Fun." In the early 1980s, Mailer played a big role in securing the freedom of Henry Abbott, a writer imprisoned for violent crime. Unfortunately for everyone involved, Abbott killed a man just months after his release and was brought back to prison. To be honest, the whole story sounds straight out of a Mailer novel. (Source.)
Interested in learning about another legendary Mailer beef? During the filming of Mailer's 1970 film Maidstone, actor Rip Torn got the brilliant idea to add some realism to a fight scene by actually hitting Mailer (who starred in the movie as the President—it's a long story) in the head with a hammer. The resulting curse-filled scuffle was caught on video and became the film's most famous scene. (Source.)