“What else, Doctor?” Jack asked grimly.
“Cable,” said Dr. Loewenstein ominously. “Right now cable television is almost exclusively for small towns so distant from any station that they can’t get good-quality reception. But it won’t always be that way.”
“Why not?” asked l’Enfant. “Why will people pay money to be wired up to a system when they can get good reception on rabbit ears or small rooftop antennas for free?”
“Because,” said Dr. Loewenstein, “a cable television provider will be able to offer twenty-five or thirty channels, maybe more. Broadcasters will beam their programs up to satellites, which will relay the signal back to big dish antennas aimed by the cable operators. All reception will be equally good.”
“How soon?” Jack asked.
“The color, immediately. The cable system, fifteen or twenty years. But we must plan for it.”
Jack grimaced. “Doctor, I’m sure you’re right. But it’s depressing.”
TWO
1959
ANNE AND JACK FOUND THAT LINDA WAS A JOY TO HAVE IN the house. Gradually she recovered her cheerful, positive personality. She decided she should finish the education she had interrupted when she married John, and in the fall of 1958 she enrolled at Fordham University.
A Floridian, she spent as much time as she could in the sun. She would lie on a chaise longue by the greenhouse-enclosed pool, wearing a bikini and sunglasses, and study for her exams. Jack could not help but notice that she was a voluptuous young woman. Whereas Anne was elegantly slender, Linda was generously endowed with big, soft breasts, jiggly buns, and a convex little belly.
Nelly, too, was a joy. The towheaded toddler ambled about the house, often laughing, sometimes crying when she fell and bumped her head.
Jack and Anne decided to invest in a vacation home, where they could go in the depth of winter and bask in the sun on a beautiful beach. They found such a place on the island of St. Croix, where they bought a house large enough for the whole family, including Linda, Nelly, and Joni, in the hope that all of them would go there together.
They went for five days, between Christmas and New Year’s. Joni, however, pleaded to be excused. She had acquired an agent in Hollywood, and he was telling her she had a good chance of winning a starring role in a picture. She’d had three small roles with MGM, but now her contract was expiring. Her agent was advising her not to renew if they offered. He could do better for her.
Three
1960
“I’D SAY IT’S NOW OR NEVER, KIDDO,” JONI’S AGENT, MO Morris, told her.
He was the agent who had turned Consetta Lazzara into Connie Lane twenty-six years ago. When Joni told her father she was going to be represented by the Mo Morris Agency, Jack had laughed and told her Mo was an old friend of his and an effective agent but that she should be careful of him. He did not tell her he had sent Consetta to Mo after she—had given him an afternoon he would never forget.
Mo was sixty-six years old, a veteran agent who had represented some of the biggest names in Hollywood. He had always been a small man, and he was wizened now, with dark-brown liver spots on his tanned bald pate. Ever a flashy dresser, he was wearing a blue-and-white checked jacket over a black golf shirt. He made a point of telling people that his wristwatch had been given to him by Spencer Tracy. He was a jolly man who seemed to take nothing seriously—until a producer made what he considered a skimpy offer for a client’s services, at which point Mo could become very sharp and sarcastic.
“Meaning?” Joni asked.
“You’re twenty-six, right? You need a breakout picture. You’re not a starlet anymore. MGM built you up, but they never broke you out of the pack. What’s more, television didn’t do it for you either. What I’m talking about is making you a star.”
“Okay. What’s holding us up?”
“Question: are you willing to play the game? It’s not played as much as it used to be, but there are powerful guys in town who still play it.”
“What do I get if I play—besides screwed?” she asked.
“Nobody can ever guarantee these things, but I can almost promise you a starring role in an important dramatic picture.”
“Who do I have to . . . service?”
Four
THE PRODUCER WAS HARRY KLEIN. JONI KNEW THE NAME very well—and she knew his reputation. The director was Benjamin Lang. The male lead was Trent Ambler. The three of them were in Klein’s office when she arrived.
Klein stood, grabbing the hand she had extended to shake hands with him, and used it to draw her close to him. He kissed her on the cheek and patted her on the rump. “Joni Lear!” he rumbled. “We’re gonna do great things together!”
He was an exceptionally big man with a great strong face. His hair was black and wavy, and he wore horn-rimmed glasses. The other two men were casually dressed, but Klein wore a dark-blue suit, a white shirt, and a blue polka-dot bow tie.
“You prob’ly recognize Trent. And Ben Lang will be director.”
Ambler was a handsome, well-built man. He was not just a body, not just a screen presence; he was an actor, whose status was only a little lower than Humphrey Bogart’s. One reason Joni had accepted this challenge was that Mo had told her she would be playing opposite Trent Ambler.
Benjamin Lang was a small bald man about fifty years old whose eyes swam behind thick steel-rimmed eyeglasses. His directorial credentials were outstanding.
“Mo tells us you know how to play the game,” said Klein.
She nodded.
“Well, we would like for you to take your clothes off, Joni. Do you understand why?”
“So you can look at my bod.”
“That, too. But it is essential that an actress not lose her professionalism and aplomb in—how shall we say?—in stressful situations. You’ve read the script. You know a degree of nudity is part of the role. We need to know you will not break down when you must do your lines in front of camera and crew and you are the only naked person on the set. All right?”
“I was a Playmate of the Month,” she said.
“This is a little different. Will you accommodate us, please?”
It was a little different. More than a little different. But it was, as Mo had said, now or never. For a brief moment she reminded herself that she would inherit a lot of money and didn’t have to do this, didn’t have to do what they were going to ask for next, either. But what she was doing here would be an achievement of her own, and this was how it was done.
She took off her clothes and put them aside on a chair. Naked, she sat down and faced Klein.
“Have you reviewed the contract?”
“Mo has. I will accept his judgment.”
“We’re going to make you a star, Joni. If you’re as good a girl as we think you are, you will be a big star. We’re going to do a fine picture. A year from now you come in here and I’ll take off my clothes to get you on another contract.”
“I won’t ask you to, Mr. Klein.”
“Hey! I’m only forty-two. The sight of me wouldn’t make you sick.”
Joni smiled. That was a sufficiently ambiguous response.
“Ben—”
“Okay,” said Lang. “We asked you to memorize pages sixty-three through sixty-five of the script. You’ve done?”
“Yessir.”
“Okay. Sit down on the floor, which is how you’ll be positioned when the cameras are rolling. Trent picks up with line four on page sixty-three, and you join in from there.”
Ambler moved to stand facing her, and she looked up into his face. They acted out the scene, about two dozen lines.
“Good enough!” said Lang. “More than good enough. I’m satisfied. She can act. She is emotionally stable.”
Joni smiled wanly.
Ambler reached down and gave her his hand to help her stand. “Sign her, Harry,” he said. “I want to work with her.”
Klein grinned. “Now . . . One more thing. Mo told you what. We, uh . . .”
&
nbsp; She glanced back and forth. “All three of you?” she asked.
He nodded. “All three of us.”
Joni flushed. She raised her eyebrows and drew a deep breath. “All right,” she whispered.
Trent Ambler unzipped his pants and pulled out his penis. Joni knelt and took it in her hands. He reached for a box of tissues and put them beside her on the floor. With her lips and tongue she worked on him for three or four minutes, and he came strongly and copiously. She spit his ejaculate into a wad of tissues.
Lang was next. He was so excited from what he had seen that he almost experienced premature ejaculation. She hardly got him into her mouth before he went into his spasms.
Then Klein. It took twenty minutes of licking and sucking and vigorously pumping her head up and down before he finally came. Her lips and cheeks ached, and her body gleamed with sweat. He generated little fluid, and she suspected he’d already been sucked off by some other hopeful, not long before.
Trent Ambler offered her a snifter of brandy, which she gratefully accepted. She sat on a chair and lowered her head a little, until her hair hid her face.
“The part’s yours, Joni,” Klein said. “You’re a trooper, and you’re gonna be a star.”
Five
BOB LEAR TELEPHONED JACK. “GUESS WHO JONI’S MAKING A picture for.”
“I know. She called me.”
“Harry Klein. Five’ll get ya twenty she—”
“Bob! Mind your own business.”
“Don’t you care?” Bob yelled.
“Of course I care, but what can I do about it?”
“Talk to the money guys. Block the funding for the flick.”
“Oh, sure. If she did what you think she did to get the part, she’s already done it. So you want me to fix things up so she did it and then doesn’t get the part after all?”
“I’m just trying—”
“Keep out of it, brother. I got your certificates. The funds were transferred.”
“Congratulations,” Bob said bitterly. “You now own controlling interest in Carlton House.”
“And you’re the millionaire you always wanted to be.”
Six
1961
BRAVE MICHELLE HAD ITS PREMIERE AT GRAUMAN’S CHINESE Theatre.
Jack and Anne flew out on a chartered plane, bringing with them Little Jack and Liz, Linda, and the eighty-year-old Harrison Wolcott. Curt and Betsy came on a different plane with Cap and Naomi, Mickey and Catherine, and Herb and Esther. Douglas Humphrey flew in from Texas with Mary and Emily Carson. Billy Bob Cotton came, as did Ray l’Enfant and his wife. Sally Allen and Len also attended the premiere. Bob and Dorothy Lear did not.
The Los Angeles group included Mo Morris and his wife, Harry Klein and his wife, and Ben Lang and his wife.
The star of the picture, Trent Ambler, escorted his wife, a girl of nineteen who had been sewn into a spangled white dress.
Joni’s escort was David Breck. Mo had arranged that. David was told that he was not forgiven for his boorishness. He was asked to escort Joni only because as a pair they would attract extraordinary attention—which would probably be more to his benefit than hers. When he was alone with her in the limousine on the way to the premiere, he told her he was grateful to her for allowing him to be seen with her. He was attentive and deferential.
As they emerged from the limo, Joni was startled, then blinded, by the camera flashes. A crowd cheered. Joni could hardly see them but realized that bleachers had been put up on the sidewalk. She smiled and nodded to both sides, at people she could hardly make out.
Mo had also seen to her dress and hairdo.
Because her glossy brown hair was one of her most attractive features, Mo had sent around a stylist who had clipped it a little, exposing the back of her neck, combed it down over her forehead halfway to her eyebrows, and curled it smoothly under her ears. It was new style for her.
A designer who worked for many important stars had created her dress. Made of rose-colored silk embroidered with gold and silver thread, it was not tight but hung smoothly. The skirt was slit to the knee, and she wore no stockings on her tanned legs. Her décolletage was deep and wide. The designer had made her stride around, lift and swing her arms, and bend over deeply, until both of them were confident she would not fall out of it.
The picture was the star vehicle Mo Morris and Harry Klein had promised her. She had taken singing and dancing lessons, but no acting lessons. Nonetheless, she proved herself a talented actress—aided by Ben Lang’s patient and meticulous directing. She played an ingenuous girl abruptly forced to mature in the face of tragedy and betrayal.
In two scenes she appeared nude. In one her breasts were shown, in the other her backside. The script made it plain that she was naked unwillingly and was painfully embarrassed. Lang’s direction of the shots was such that she looked modest in spite of her nudity.
David’s whispered comments on the film and her acting were respectful but insightful. At the post-premiere dinner he told Jack that Joni was an emerging talent and might become one of Hollywood’s all-time greats. When Joni left him at the end of the evening, she kissed him in a sisterly way and told him he had redeemed himself.
The next morning Hollywood columnists described her as a major new star. Two of them said she would surely be nominated for an Academy Award.
Seven
JACK AND THE FAMILY STAYED IN LOS ANGELES FOR TWO DAYS after the premiere. He looked for an opportunity to talk with Joni alone, and found it.
“I can’t tell you how pleased I am for you,” he said. “I could have helped you, but you didn’t ask me. You did it alone. I respect your reasons.”
“Thank you, Daddy,” she whispered.
“John wasn’t relying on me for anything, either. Both of you went out and found your places in life.”
“I don’t think you ever relied on my grandfather for much,” she said.
“No. We didn’t like each other. What I wanted to say to you—besides how happy I am for you—is that I know Harry Klein’s reputation and I can guess what he demanded of you. I don’t want to know if you met his demands.”
Joni shook her head. “He didn’t make the demand. I expected him to, but he didn’t. I can’t say what I would’ve done if he had.”
“Well, don’t. If it ever comes to that, let me help you.”
“I will, Daddy.”
THIRTY - ONE
One
1962
HAVING BOUGHT 25 PERCENT OF HIS BROTHER’S STOCK IN Carlton House Productions, Jack was firmly in control. In spite of Bob Lear’s defective character and occasional stupidity, Carlton House had made some fine films. Jack set these aside to be broadcast as “super specials,” meaning that they would be broadcast uninterrupted by commercials, except for a fifteen-minute intermission when all the commercials would be broadcast together. These shows earned very high ratings but lost money. Sponsors surmised that during fifteen minutes of commercials the audiences would depart in droves. Jack insisted, even so, that a few quality films be broadcast without interruptions and without cuts.
He tried a gimmick to prevent that loss of audience. At some time during the intermission a question based on the film would appear on the screen. The first viewer in each city to phone in the correct answer to the local station would win $1,000. It didn’t work.
He held back the great Civil War epic, Cameron Brothers, because it was in color and he was not willing to broadcast it in black and white. For months he ran teasers, promising that Cameron Brothers would be broadcast in color soon. Grateful set manufacturers estimated that Jack Lear’s campaign sold a hundred thousand color sets.
The Sally Allen Show, now in its thirteenth season, was broadcast in color. Sally was one of the most popular stars on television. Joni made two appearances a year on her show, and her success on the big screen brought those two Allen shows exceptionally high ratings.
Doin’ What Comes Natcherly had lasted six seasons, until the joke wore out
. Thirty-Eight Special remained one of the top twenty shows on television. The original heavy-breasted policewoman had been replaced by another, and the coming of miniskirts had put her legs on display as well. Blue Yonder, a semidocumentary drama based loosely on the Strategic Air Command began in 1960 and a year later was one of the top ten shows.
Though scandals had ruined the big quiz shows, Dick Painter judged that the public still loved them. He had always had a fascination with them and believed he could revive them. All he had to do was find a format. Jack told him to look into the idea but to be careful.
“Right,” said Painter. “The big networks thought they could get away with anything. We’ll be careful—and subtle.”
TWO
WITH JONI SPENDING MOST OF HER TIME IN CALIFORNIA, THE Manhattan town house was reclaimed by Jack and Anne. During Joni’s time in New York, they had become guests in what she had made her place—though she had never paid rent on it—but now when she came to New York she was the guest. Anne had the rooms repainted and the floors refinished and replaced some of the furniture.
She bought a Calder mobile and had it hung from the living room ceiling. In an obscure gallery in Lower Manhattan she came upon a collection of pre-Columbian pottery, much of it explicitly erotic. She was well aware of Jack’s appreciation of high-quality erotic art, so she bought a piece of Chimu pottery, from Peru. It depicted a female figure sucking off a male. The piece stood about five inches high, and she put it on the small Empire writing table that faced the window.
Their children were teenagers now, and Jack and Anne felt at liberty to stay in town two or three nights a week. Often they met for lunch.
One Wednesday in spring he met her at Lutèce. He was not entirely surprised to find someone with her; she often brought a guest to their lunches. Sometimes she called and told him who would be there, and sometimes she didn’t. Today she hadn’t.
Tycoon Page 31