A great story. Completely new to me. Thank you for sharing. If I may add a little context -- $350 in 1953 would be worth about $3500 in buying power today. Daniels certainly wasn't paid what he was worth, but MGM wasn't quite as cheap as suggested either. Gustave.
To put that further in context, he was paid about the same as an adjunct professor gets paid for teaching an entire semester's worth of one college class.