The Hollywood Trilogy

by Don Carpenter

  “Of course,” she said. “Is it time to go? Is the picnic over with?”

  “Let’s see,” he said. “We ate, we drank, I made my speech about America, God bless ’er, yes, it’s over. As far as I am personally concerned.”

  Without saying goodbye to anybody (why give Richard a chance to say something stupid?) they walked up the path under the trees toward the parking lot. It was too uphill to hold hands or touch comfortably, so they just trudged along. At one place they broke out into the open to see below them on an open meadow a boisterous game of touch football, which they stopped to watch while Jerry caught his breath. It was the usual Americana football game, except that it seemed to be played between a gang of motorcyclists and a band of homosexuals, and what had probably begun in a challenge of humor and mischief was now being played grimly, and for blood. Everyone was dirty and tight-lipped, and the couple of plays that Jerry and Barbara watched, between kisses, ended in sharp grunts of pain and pileups that had nothing to do with sex or fun. It was no longer motorcyclists and homosexuals, it was football.

  Barbara’s eyes glittered as she watched. Jerry wanted to suggest they leave, and was about to tug on her hand, when there was a long pass and then a heavy three-man tackle, and a loud snapping sound, really loud, as the three motorcyclists slowly got up from the ground and the homosexual didn’t, but lay there broken and still. Others began running over toward the accident, and still others began drifting away.

  “Let’s get the hell out of here,” Jerry said, and pulled her away. It took some pulling. What was this?

  She admired his old black Porsche and loved the red leather interior and the comfort of the bucket seats, as they rode slowly in the dusty caravan of cars leaving the park. It was terribly hot in the car. Jerry had parked in the shade of a tree, but the shade had moved long ago and left it locked up tight in the burning sun for hours. Jerry was immediately sweat soaked and dizzy, and for a few minutes as they crawled along and Barbara talked about how nice his car was, he thought he was going to throw up. It became unbearable, and he knew he must pull the car over to one side and get out, under the shade of a tree, into a pond, anything to get out of this oven. But there was no place to pull out of the string of equally baking automobiles. Jerry was stuck.

  Then there came a wide spot on the road, but in it was a car, pulled over, with the driver hanging red-faced out the open door.

  “Oh, the poor man,” Barbara said.

  “Couldn’t take the heat,” Jerry said grimly. Now he was goddamned if he was going to stop or pull over and collapse; it was not the manly thing to do.

  Barbara was sweating, but she did not have the red face Jerry knew he had; she was not as affected by the heat. That was good. Horns started blaring up in front of them, and Jerry forced a grin. “That’s a big help,” he said.

  “We should have brought along a couple of cold cans of beer,” Barbara said, as the caravan stopped again. Kids raced by on bicycles, throwing firecrackers into cars. Desperate redfaced men chased them. Jerry and Barbara were lucky: no firecrackers fell into the Porsche. While they waited, Jerry explained to an uninterested Barbara why he had not had air conditioning installed in his car, pointing out that the strain placed on the engine by adding the unit could make an already oversensitive machine even more cranky, and that Porsches did not come with factory air, as they called it.

  “Factory air,” he said. “Sounds a lot like L.A., huh?”

  At last (at last!) they were out of Griffith Park, and moving fast enough to buffet a little cooling air into the car.

  “Where do you live?” Jerry asked. “Or do you feel like going home yet? We could stop for a tall cold one somewhere . .”

  “On the Fourth? Let’s go to my place. I’ve got a fridge full of beer and wine, and I want to take a shower.”

  “Okay, where is this garden of paradise?”

  She gave him instructions. She lived in a large apartment house in Studio City, a block off Ventura Boulevard. When Jerry pulled up in front, he managed to find a parking place in the shade of a big tree, just in case.

  Her apartment was large and cool, Spanish-looking and a bit formal for Jerry’s tastes, but he was grateful to be out of his car. Barbara breezed through to the kitchen and he could hear the percussive snap of a couple of cans of beer. She came out with his tall cold glass of beer on a little tray, with a folded napkin.

  “If you’ll excuse me,” she said, “I’m going to plunge into the shower.”

  “I’ll just take off my shoes, if you don’t mind,” Jerry said.

  “If you’d like to shower off,” she said, “I’ll be out in just a minute.”

  “Sounds good to me,” he said, and drained off half his beer. It was awfully good. He burped, tapped his chest, made a face, and drank some more. He could hear the shower going faintly from the direction of the bedroom. Her bedroom. He got up and went over and peeked in the door. Dark, cool, neat as a pin. The bathroom door was shut. Jerry decided not to undress and try to join her in the shower. Too pushy. And he did not feel the need to push.

  When she came out she was in shorts and a tee shirt, her hair pulled back. She had very good legs, legs like a ballet dancer, long and muscled with full calves and unrippled thighs. Jerry had been afraid her thighs would be heavy, but no. He rose. “My turn,” he said.

  “There’s fresh towels for you on the toilet,” she called after him. The bathroom was damp and cozy, and the shower most refreshing, almost sobering Jerry up. He was really beginning to be interested in sex now, and she must be feeling the same way. This was wonderful, no fuss, no strain, two adults who desired each other and were civilized enough to be able to handle it without a lot of bullshit and social nonsense. He was amazed that Richard’s sister should be so much more sophisticated than he was. The apartment alone showed that much. And her attitude. And the kissing and the intimacy.

  Jerry looked at himself critically as he toweled off. Too bad his own body was not at its best. He resolved to get himself into shape before it was too late. He would have to begin exercising again, and restrain himself with food and drink. Especially drink. But not today. His mouth was dry again, and he wanted another beer. They would sip their beers, listen to music (he could hear music coming from the living room, classical music) and let the night gently fall.

  But when he went to kiss her, as they sat on the couch side by side, he felt a restraint that had not been there before, and he pulled back, looking at her. Her eyes were downcast.

  “What’s the matter?” he asked.

  “Nothing,” she said.

  He kissed her again. More restraint. He kissed harder, and the restraint became refusal, as she pulled away.

  “I think I should tell you,” she said.

  His heart sank.

  “I don’t think we should make love,” she said.

  His heart sank further.

  “On this, you know, first time we’ve met . .”

  “I understand,” he heard himself saying.

  “I’m glad you do,” she said, brightening and looking at him again. “So many men don’t.”

  “I’m not that kind of a guy,” he said.

  “It’s not you,” she said, and took his clammy hand. “It’s just the situation, you know?”

  He patted her hand and looked at her miserably. They always did it to you, didn’t they? No matter how or why, they always did it to you, and you were left holding the sack.

  “Oh, hell,” he said. “It’s not the most important thing in my life. You’re a human being, you have rights, you should be able to kiss a guy without taking him to bed. I guess.”

  “Do you think we shouldn’t have kissed at all?” she asked.

  “Yes,” he said miserably. “I mean, no. I mean, we should have kissed.”

  He turned to face her and took both her hands in his. “You don’t know me well enough to know this, but if we had, I mean, if we did make love, it wouldn’t be something that would upset our relationship .
. .”

  She smiled. “You mean, you’d still respect me?”

  That puckish sense of humor. Jerry smiled, getting the joke. He was a pretty funny guy, too.

  “Well, I wouldn’t respect you,” he said, “But I wouldn’t hate you, either . . .”

  “Are you hungry? Can I fix us a snack?”

  “That sounds swell,” Jerry said, and she leaned toward him and kissed him inquisitively on the lips. Jerry didn’t push it, he kissed her back but did not try for a big clinch. She got comfortable and kept on with the kiss, and Jerry touched her shoulder and then let his fingertips brush her breast under the tee shirt. With a thrill he felt her nipple rise immediately under his touch. He cupped her breast and felt her tongue slip inquisitively into his mouth.

  CHAPTER NINE

  NONE OF the doctors and dentists who formed the syndicate that paid for the making of The Endless Unicorn wanted to take their profits out, and so Richard Heidelberg was left in control of not only their original investments plus profits, but also the money being waved under his nose by the investors’ friends. This gave Rick an immense pool of capital. He did not know how much. Most of the money had been filtered through a Dutch Antilles bank, and indeed, The Endless Unicorn Company was a Dutch Antilles corporation. The lawyers had their way of explaining what was going on, but to Rick it was just a case of pouring the money here and there to keep the IRS and everybody else from knowing just how much there was.

  Plenty to make movies with, but Rick didn’t want to just make movies. He had done that. He laughed with embarrassment (to himself) when he thought about his cocaine fantasy of toppling Alexander Hellstrom, but really, what was left to him? The idea of waking up in the morning with nothing to do genuinely frightened him. He was not a simple soul, he could not engage himself deeply in making breakfast eggs, like Elektra, or even in debauchery, like many of his friends. He had to be climbing.

  So it was with high energy and a deeply concealed anxiety that he mounted his offensive against Hellstrom, hardly admitting to himself what he was doing.

  Naturally every studio in town wanted Rick and the capital he controlled. They needed product, and Rick could provide it. The arrangement, after lunches and lawyers, was to be a negative pickup deal, with back-and-forth approvals. Rick would borrow money from banks, based on his company’s assets, and produce his motion pictures, falling within a budget approved by the studio. The studio would provide facilities at a cost overhead of thirteen percent, make available to Rick their options and availabilities of properties, stars and directors and, when the negative was finished, pay Rick’s costs to date plus a healthy fee. The studio would then distribute the film, adding to its share of the expense the cost of prints and advertising campaigns. The studio, through its overseas distributing company, also had the option of distributing the picture overseas itself or licensing another distributor, with a share of the profits to Rick’s company.

  It was a sweet deal, if everything worked. And if everything didn’t work, Uncle Sam would take a screwing from all concerned. Rick’s lawyers told him that by using money that would otherwise go into the government’s purse they could make pictures for something like fifty cents on the dollar.

  “So a ten-million-dollar picture, which used to cost about three million, would now only cost us five million,” Rick said.

  “Now you’re catching on,” said Lewis Corning, his main attorney. “But that’s if the picture is a disaster. If it’s a hit, everything is twice as expensive, strictly for the purposes of tax avoidance.”

  The property Rick had chosen, almost casually, was not particularly geared to these immense sums of money. In fact, when first submitted it had been an obvious candidate for a “little” picture, a personal effort by some director to show his stuff, a European picture. Daffy young man tries to attract sophisticated woman by daffy means. Ha ha, cute, but where are the mobs three thick around the block? Where were the repeat business and the newspapers full of free columns of chatter?

  Rick intended to supply those himself. The world market for films, in his analysis, was most interested in two things: American Movie Stars and American Popular Culture. Rick would jam his project with plenty of both.

  As he explained it to Alexander Hellstrom, “It’s John Travolta, falling in love with the fifteen-year-old mistress of Paul Newman, with songs. It’s the tortoise and the hare.”

  “What’s the gimmick?” asked Hellstrom. They sat in his executive dining room at the studio; white tablecloths, white napkins, dull food from the commissary.

  “The gimmick is,” Rick said with a smile, “the tortoise wins.”

  “Newman gets the girl?”

  “Maybe getting the girl isn’t winning,” Rick said. “Look at Roman Holiday.”

  “Who’s directing this picture?” Hellstrom wanted to know. “Haven’t thought that much about it. There are half a dozen guys who could do it. I’m sure they’re all on the list.”

  “What kind of budget do you see, above the line?”

  Rick grinned shyly. “Well, this is one of the reasons we’d like to come to you. You’re the best maker of budgets in the business. I don’t see us flinging money around, but on the other hand, this has to be the kind of picture that goes full-race. Top stars, constant promotion, worldwide interest. It’s going to cost some bucks.”

  At the end of the meal Rick had severe heartburn and a deal, although it would take the lawyers and agents several months to iron out the procedural matters. The two men who counted had shaken hands.

  And the funny part was, Rick liked Alexander Hellstrom and felt relaxed around him. He felt almost as if Hellstrom would protect him, if things got rough. And at these prices, things could get very very rough. This deal would be scrutinized by large numbers of coldblooded men who knew nothing about movies, only about money, and these men would have to be convinced, layer after layer, all the way to answer print, that Rick Heidelberg could pull it off. Even though Rick and his company stood to lose the most, the studio’s owners would look amiss at pouring several million dollars into a losing venture.

  Rick drove the long winding drive back to the beach in his 1968 Mustang, listening to a cassette of Miles Davis. He could have a hit picture on his hands, another Unicorn, if everything went well. Yet many tried what he was trying, and most of them failed. The first picture makes it big because it somehow hits a public chord, people go because the picture is friendly and invites them in. Then, the guy who forced the picture through against all odds changes. No longer does he meet resistance everywhere—now it is obsequiousness, agreement, open doors. It becomes nearly impossible for him to get an honest opinion.

  “Gosh, that’s a great idea, Rick!” would be mild praise.

  So the second picture is covered with insurance. The biggest stars, never mind, pay what it costs; a director who can work with stars, come in near budget and still grease his own ego. A script that works. The best songs, written by the hottest songwriters. A topflight advertising agency to carry the promotion. The works. Can’t lose. The number is covered six ways from the middle.

  The wheel rolls, and it turns out there are thirty-five more numbers out there waiting to catch the little ball.

  But Rick trusted his instincts. He was not a middle-aged banker trying to psyche out the young, he was a young man who was setting out to make a movie he would want to see himself, would go see again and take his friends. That was the only kind of picture to make.

  “And then what?” said a little voice.

  He thought about Hellstrom, that calm likable man. If Rick was a general, leading his troops into battle, then Hellstrom was a general of generals, overseeing not the battle but the war itself, a man who must be able to commit to disaster here in order to reach victory there, a man to whom the death of a single picture is not the crucial matter, a man who knows that he can win a few and lose a few, just as long as profits continue to go up.

  So in spite of all the cooperation, and the niceness o
f the man, Rick knew he could not count on Alexander Hellstrom in a last-ditch battle. He could only count on himself.

  Getting home after the long drive, without even the rush-hour traffic to deal with, Rick once again asked himself why he lived at the beach. The answer was simple, of course. This had always been his vision of himself as a Hollywood big shot. The house at Malibu.

  So he was living in a worn-out dream.

  “Honey,” he said to Elektra. “We have to move into town. This thing’s going into high gear.”

  “Do I get a part?” she asked.

  “No-you-don’t-get-a-part,” he said. “What’s for snacks?”

  “Eat this,” she said, giving him the finger.

  “No, thanks. Where’s the coke?”

  “All gone. I wouldn’t tell you, anyway.”

  “You know anybody who’s got any?”

  “Nope.”

  Rick got out his address book, and felt a twinge of fear. To get busted in a dope deal now would be fatal. They would jail him. There was only one kind of millionaire they jailed, and Rick was it. But he wanted some coke.

  After he had found somebody who would deal to him, he said to Elektra, “You better be nice to me when I get back, or I won’t cut you in.”

  “I’ll be nice,” she said, and gave him a kiss to prove it.

  RICK DROVE up the winding empty road through the Malibu hills, past the heavily gated entrance to the Enrique estate—now, in the post-Manson era, always double padlocked and chained—winding up and around a couple more of the brush-covered hillocks until he came to a cattle gate, held in place by a loop of plastic line. He got out of the car, opened the long gate, drove through, got out again and closed it, and then drove down the rutty dirt road until he could see the yellow lights coming from Tommy Cone’s shack. He parked next to Tommy’s beatup pickup truck and was about to get out of his car again when he heard a low warning growl. Rick could just see the dog’s eyes in the light from the building.