“You never know what’s in a person’s heart until they are tested. Don’t give up before the miracle.”                              Fannie Flagg

1980 – New York City: At the height of her acting career, 36-year-old Fannie Flag left Hollywood and moved to New York City to pursue her dream of being a writer. Her Hollywood friends were flabbergasted by her decision. However, after three months of having trouble completing her first novel, Fannie was discouraged and ready to return to Los Angeles.

During a doctor’s visit, she met Jay Sawyer, a young man from Monroeville, Alabama, who was working in the office. Recognizing each other’s southern drawl, they struck up a conversation. They discovered both were from Alabama and had dreams of being writers. Jay had an extra ticket to a Mississippi Writer’s Forum event that night and invited Fannie to go with him.

Patricia Neal (alias Fannie Flagg) grew up in Birmingham. Her parents divorced when she was a baby, leaving her grandparents to raise her. From age six, when she won a writing contest with her story ‘Why I Want to be Bald,’ she wanted to be a writer. After graduating from Ramsay High School, hoping to win a much-needed scholarship, Neal entered six Miss Alabama Pageants before landing a two-year scholarship to the Pittsburg Playhouse acting school in Pennsylvania.

After acting school, she returned to Birmingham and joined WBRC-TV, where she became a news anchor and co-host of the Good Day Alabama morning show. In 1965, Neal moved to New York City and became a junior staff writer for the popular TV show Candid Camera. She wrote short comedy sketches for the show but would memorize the scripts and share them orally with her boss for fear he would notice that she couldn’t spell.

Neal eventually became the weekly show co-host with show founder Allen Funt. She starred on Broadway in several plays, including The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas. In the late 1960s, Neal’s success in New York led her to Hollywood to pursue an acting career.

Because there was already an Oscar-winning actress named Patricia Neal in Hollywood, Neal changed her name to Fannie Flagg to avoid confusion. She appeared in several movies, including Five Easy Pieces, Grease, and Crazy in Alabama.

In 1978 Fannie entered a short story at the Santa Barbara California Writer’s Conference. She wrote the story in longhand through the eyes of an 11-year-old girl and submitted it, hoping that the judges would overlook her poor spelling. Fannie’s story won first place, and the success sparked a long, dormant dream.

At the Mississippi writer’s forum event in 1980, Jay Sawyer introduced Fannie to his friend from Monroeville, Nelle Harper Lee. Fannie was speechless to meet the distinguished Pulitzer Prize-winning author of To Kill a Mockingbird. Jay and Miss Lee invited Fannie to accompany them to dinner that evening. They talked about Fannie’s book and Miss Lee encouraged her not to quit, but to give her unfinished book another try.

Encouraged by the chance encounter of one of her literary idols, Fannie finished the book. She struggled to find a publisher until eventually, Random House agreed to take on the project. Unbeknownst to Fannie, a friend of Miss Lee at Random House got her to endorse Fannie’s book. With Lee’s encouragement, Coming Attractions was published in 1981.

Although the book only enjoyed nominal success, Fannie refused to be discouraged. Her breakthrough came in 1987 when her book Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Café made the New York Times bestseller list and remained there for 36 weeks. The script for Fried Green Tomatoes, which Universal Pictures produced as a movie, was nominated for an Academy Award and won the Scripter’s Award for screenplay.

In April 2012, Fannie Flagg received the Nelle Harper Lee Award at the Monroeville, Alabama Literary Festival, recognizing distinguished Alabama writers. “I have never received, nor will I ever receive, an award that means this much to me,” Fannie shared during her acceptance speech.  “If not for Harper Lee’s encouragement and generosity, I would never have become a writer.” With tears in her eyes, she continued, “To receive this award in Monroeville with Miss Lee present is an extraordinary honor. This award is not about me. It is about Nelle Harper Lee.”

Today, at 80, Fannie is still writing and spends her time between Alabama and California. According to Fannie, “I always wanted to be a writer. I am dyslexic and I can’t spell, so I was often embarrassed and discouraged about writing. Being a successful writer is not necessarily defined by what you have achieved, but what you have overcome.”