'San Remo Drive' in the 1940s and '50s

San Remo Drive, the latest novel by Leslie Epstein, gets its name from the affluent street in Pacific Palisades where he grew up with Liz Taylor in his pool and with neighbors like Thomas Mann and Gregory Peck. Dinitia Smith in the New York Times talks with Epstein, whose father and uncle wrote the scripts for Casablanca and The Man Who Came to Dinner. Among Epstein's nine books are the novels King of the Jews and Pandaemonium.