I’m working on an essay in which I intend to insert that famous Charles Beaumont quote about achieving success in Hollywood, a quote I’ve had reason to paraphrase many times before. This time, though, since I’ll be sharing it in a major national newspaper, I’ve decided that paraphrasing just won’t cut it. But nailing down Beaumont’s exact wording, even with the Internet, has proven difficult.

For example, one version, as passed along by Harlan Ellison in his introduction to Shatterday, goes—

Attaining success in Hollywood is like climbing a gigantic mountain of cow flop, in order to pluck one perfect rose from the summit. And you find when you’ve made that hideous climb … you’ve lost the sense of smell.

While another site replaces the cow flop with cow shit like so—

Achieving success in Hollywood is like climbing an enormous a mountain of cow shit so that you can pluck that one perfect rose from the top. And you find after you’ve made that hideous ascent, you’ve lost the sense of smell.

Still another misattributes the quote to Henry Slesar, while changing the make-up of that mountain—

Success in Hollywood is like climbing to the top of a mountain of manure to pluck one perfect rose– only to discover that you’ve lost your sense of smell.

So … which is it?

Climb? Ascent?

Achieving? Attaining?

Cow flop? Cow shit? Manure?

Do any of you know of a primary source for this quote? Should that first Ellison source be considered the most accurate?