The Company She Keeps

by Georgia Durante

  “Jim, I can’t believe you felt like this all these years and I never knew it.”

  “Well, you know it now.”

  “I’m flattered that I had something to do with you reaching your goals,” I said, “but it’s not money that attracts me. I’ve learned to run the other way from people who place too much value on wealth. Don’t let your success go to your head. You’re too nice a person to let it destroy you. Aren’t you still married, Jim?”

  “Yes, but we’re getting a divorce soon.”

  “Does it have anything to do with your being so driven to be successful?” I asked.

  “No, not really,” he said. “You know how this business is. We’re always on the road. It’s tough on relationships. If you’re not in the business it’s hard to understand.”

  “What a great birthday,” I said, wanting to change the subject. “Where are we going, anyway?”

  “Lake Tahoe. Do you want to sit in the cockpit for the landing?”

  “That would be fantastic. I’d love to learn to fly this thing.”

  The plane landed and we drove to a nice little restaurant and continued the celebration.

  “Why don’t you leave Motion Research?” Jim asked. “You don’t need Wally Crowder. Christ, all the clients you have you’ve gotten on your own anyway. If you left, they’d all follow you.”

  “You really think so?”

  “Hell, yes. I’ve been telling you that for years. You’ve got a good reputation in the business. They know when they call Georgia Durante for the job it’s going to get done professionally. They never know when they call Wally what kind of bimbo they’ll end up with. It astonishes me how he stays in business with all the crap he’s pulled.”

  I said, “You know what I found out last week? I ran into a producer from Detroit. He said he called me for a job and Wally told him I was booked. So Wally sent him this girl he’d just started dating. She’d never driven for camera in her life. If she hadn’t ended up crashing the car I probably would never have found out about it. I wonder how many clients I’ve lost because of Wally’s little games?”

  “Plenty. I think it’s time for you to move on.”

  “You know what really aggravates me? I spend my money flying to Detroit. I take the clients out to dinner on my tab, promoting Wally’s company, and when a job does come in, because of my efforts, he gives it to a fly-by-night he’s trying to bed down.

  “So what are you going to do about it?”

  “Well, I’ve been thinking. An all-women driving team would really be unique. There’s a need for good women drivers. If I did some research and came up with six or seven dynamite-looking girls who could drive the hell out of a car, and trained them in precision driving, I think it could be a winner.”

  “If you need an office, you can have a space in my building.” He paused. “You know, that’s not a bad idea. If you moved into my building we could be a full-service company. We would be separate entities, but we could use each other’s services when we needed to.”

  “Hmm, let me think about it,” I replied. “This could be very interesting.”

  “Your clients and my clients are the same. If you’re there, you’ll see everyone coming in and out of the building on different projects, but more important, they’ll see you. You’ll have the opportunity to land a job before a production company even starts the bidding process.”

  My fingers began tapping a drum solo on my knee. “Good point,” I said. “If you’re really serious about this, I’ll start moving on it right away.”

  That night I called Tony Santoro, Wally’s partner in Motion Research. I told him I was planning to leave the team.

  “I’d like to join you,” he said. “I’m fed up with Wally’s bullshit, too.”

  “Well, I was thinking of an all-girl team. You don’t quite fit into my plan,” I answered, surprised he felt the same way.

  “So, you can have a women’s division. You know there’s a lot more demand for men. I think you’d be better off having both. You and I would make a dynamic team. They always pair us up on shoots. This could really work, and if Harkess is serious about what he’s saying, this could be big, Georgia. I’d really like to be your partner. What do you say?”

  “It sounds good,” I said, “but we have to work fast. We’re in the middle of the busy season. The timing couldn’t be better. We have to think of a name so I can design a logo, order the stationery, business cards, T-shirts—”

  “Slow down, George, we can do all that in time.”

  “Tony, it has to be done immediately. We need to send all our clients a letter to let them know we’ve formed a new company. We can’t do it on plain white paper. It has to make a statement.”

  “What do you think it’ll cost?”

  “About five thousand each.”

  “That’s a lot of money.”

  “It’s not a lot of money to start up a business. If you want to make money, you have to be prepared to spend some.”

  “Guess you’re right.”

  “I think the name should have the word ‘perfor mance’ in it.”

  “Yeah, that sounds good. What about Performance Two, since the company consists of you and me?” Tony said.

  “Yeah . . . and it works into the Two’s Company thing that way, too, in case we end up in business with them down the road. I’ll get working on the logo right away. You think of some good drivers we can bring in. Plan to have a drivers’ meeting at my house two weeks from today, so we can weed them out and see what we’ve got. I’ll find the women. You’re not much better than Wally in that department,” I said, laughing, but he knew I wasn’t kidding.

  “I don’t think we should say anything to Wally until we’re ready to make the transition, Georgia. No sense in losing any work that may come through in the meantime.”

  “I’ve already got my summer booked with my own clients,” I said, “but in your case, you’re probably right.”

  A week later, Tony and I left for Moab, Utah, on a six-million dollar project for Chevrolet. We worked well together. We looked good together, which was the reason agencies paired us off. Tony stood about six-one. Salt-and-pepper hair didn’t seem to keep him from getting work—his strong, chiseled face compensated. Tony was a man’s man, but women, too, were taken by his unique charisma. His phone never stopped ringing.

  Tony was Sicilian, so our Italian heritages gave us a connection right from the beginning. He had the kind of physical look which attracted me, but I wasn’t looking. Our relationship was strictly a professional one. I couldn’t believe, after having had two Sicilian husbands, that I was actually considering one as a partner. And having a partner is nearly the same thing as a marriage.

  After Moab, we continued the shoot in Pikes Peak, Colorado. Tony and I were flown down a day ahead of the rest of the crew so we could test the road before we started filming. We made the mistake of getting off the plane and driving directly to the top of Pikes Peak before acclimating ourselves to the altitude. The peak rose to fourteen thousand feet. We had reached twelve thousand feet when Tony pulled over, his handsome face absent of color.

  “You take it from here. I can’t breathe. I feel like I’m gonna have a heart attack. I don’t know if I can do this, George.”

  He walked around to the passenger side. I watched him with amusement, even though I felt light-headed as well.

  “You’re lucky; all you had to do is slide over,” he said as he fell into the passenger seat, totally out of breath. “I know a driver who lives in Colorado Springs. I’m gonna have him replace me on this portion of the job.”

  “Tony, get a grip. You can do it. We shouldn’t have driven straight up here without getting used to the altitude first. They said they would have oxygen in the cars for us tomorrow. It won’t be so bad with the oxygen. You’ll be fine.”

  “Don’t you feel light-headed?”

  “Yes, but you’re panicking. Just calm down and breathe slowly.”

  “I don’t thin
k I can do it,” he insisted.

  “Tony, come on; get a handle on it. I suggested you for this job. If you wimp out, I’ll look like a jerk. This is one of my biggest accounts. Don’t screw it up.”

  “They’re not paying us enough for this.”

  “On the contrary, Tony, they’re paying us more than double what the contract calls for.”

  “Those narrow dirt roads with the three-hundred-foot sheer drop-offs we just drove in Moab make the job worth more than that.”

  I had lived on the edge most of my life. The edge of a road couldn’t put the same kind of fear into me as dying the kind of violent death I had come close to so many times.

  “Just lie back and relax,” I urged. “I’ll take it to the top and it’ll be over with for today. When we get to the hotel you’ll see it’s not all that bad.”

  “I don’t know. . . .” he said as he lowered the seat back and concentrated on breathing normally.

  A tough shoot, even with the oxygen. The thin air made our reaction time slow as Tony and I raced up the mountain, he in a 1986 Beretta, and I in a 1955 Chevy. My foot took forever to go from the gas pedal to the brake. The sensation felt strange, as if I were moving in slow motion.

  An Audi commercial was filming in Pikes Peak at the same time. During the day, we sometimes had to give way to the other film company for the use of the road. Tony was quite happy about that. It gave him a chance to breathe. The two separate crews broke for lunch at the same time.

  Bobby Unser, Sr., was the driver for the Audi commercial. He set his food tray next to mine and sat down. My business sense, which I wasn’t even aware that I had, took over. A name such as Unser, which had been associated with racing for years, would make the industry take note of Performance Two right from the start—cutting in half the time it would take to build a company such as mine.

  I told Bobby a few of my ideas and captured his interest. He invited me to fly to the Phoenix Raceway, where he was going to be a commentator for an Indy race the following week. He was interested in hearing more about my ideas.

  I flew into the Phoenix airport, where Bobby Unser, Sr., was waiting for my arrival at the gate. We had dinner and discussed the business opportunities his involvement might bring to his career as well as to Performance Two. The next day he picked me up at my hotel and we drove to the track. In all the years of being in the stunt business, I had never had a ride quite like that. I was in the hands of one of the best drivers in the world, but this was real traffic. There were no cops holding vehicles, allowing us to go beyond the limits of safety, and I wasn’t being paid to put my life on the line. When we got to the track he introduced me to his son, Bobby Unser, Jr.

  “I’ll meet you back here after the race. I’ll take you back to Los Angeles in my private plane,” Bobby Sr. said.

  “Uh, no, thanks, Bobby. If you fly anything like you drive, I’d rather take my scheduled commercial flight.”

  “Are you sure? I have to go to L.A. anyway.”

  “I’m positive.”

  “I’ll give you a call from L.A.,” he said, and rushed off.

  “You made a good choice,” said Bobby Jr. “Even I won’t fly with him. If you think he’s bad on the road you haven’t seen anything until you’ve experienced the stunts he pulls in that plane.”

  Bobby Unser, Jr., took a great interest in the business I was there to discuss with his father.

  “This sounds like something I’d like to do,” he said.

  “It is an interesting business, for sure. There’s a lot of people who’d like to do it, but there aren’t many who qualify.”

  “Do I qualify?”

  “If you drive as well as your father does—on the track, that is—you do, but precision driving takes practice, Bobby. It’s a different kind of driving from what you’re used to. It takes a lot of discipline as well as concentration, which I’m sure would come naturally to you once you got the hang of it. I’d expect you to fly into Los Angeles once a month to practice with the rest of the team. Just because your last name is Unser you won’t be treated any differently from the rest of the drivers. It’s going to take a lot of work on the part of all the drivers to achieve the kind of team I’m striving for.”

  “I’ll fly in. I’ll do whatever needs to be done,” he answered anxiously.

  Bobby Jr. drove me back to the Phoenix airport, and the experience was almost as bad as it had been with his father. I chalked it up to his age, but then, that didn’t give his father much of an excuse. If Bobby wanted to make it on my driving team, he’d have to learn fast.

  “I’ll give you a call in a week or so to let you know when to come in for the first practice. You’ll need to rent a car at the airport, and don’t forget to take out insurance.”

  “Oh . . . that may be a problem.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “They won’t rent cars to an Unser.”

  “I can’t say I’m surprised.” I laughed. “We’ll work it out. I’ll give you a call.”

  Mission accomplished. I returned to Los Angeles with an Unser on the driving team. The world’s greatest stuntman, Dar Robinson, also signed up at the drivers’ meeting. After reading automobile magazines, I contacted the best-looking female race car drivers with good performance records. They joined us. Now all we had to do was train them to work together to form the best driving team in the country.

  In August 1986, one year after Dennis’s death, Performance Two Inc. was born, and once the flag was dropped we were out in front. We started with sixteen drivers, both men and women, and for a while we didn’t think we would have enough drivers to meet the demand.

  It took a lot of work on my part to get the business off to a good start. Tony always seemed to be too busy to help with all the tedious chores. Women occupied most of his time, so I was pretty much the driving force behind the business. He wasn’t happy with Bobby Unser, Jr. Bobby took the wheel in practice as if he were born for the business, and Tony saw him as a threat. I had to fight him all the way to keep Bobby on the team. Eventually, Tony began to like Bobby. They had a lot in common. Tony was in his late forties, but he hadn’t quite grown up either. Before long, they were prowling around together outside the job.

  The business was doing well, but when we started to make some money, Tony wanted to pocket it all. I wanted to put it back into the business. The only time he made an appearance at the office was when he came to complain. I loved him dearly, but he had no concept of business. He was never around to see for himself what it took to run a company.

  I did all the scheduling of the drivers, ordered all the business supplies, and took the clients to dinner. I answered the phones and ironed out the problems that occurred on the set. Tony was just another one of my drivers out in the field, having no idea how much effort it took to maintain the momentum. I didn’t mind doing all the work, but being criticized was tiresome, especially when I deserved a pat on the back. The bickering between us began to get ugly. Neither of us would back off. We almost came to blows a few times.

  One day he came to the office to be part of a meeting I’d set up with clients from Detroit. The purpose was to discuss an exclusive contract to do all of the driving for their commercials. I got there early to prepare for the meeting. The guard opened the gate when he saw me approach.

  As I pulled in, I glanced in my rearview mirror and saw Tony behind me. The guard closed the gate before he could enter. I poked my head out the window and yelled to the guard, “It’s okay; he’s my partner.”

  The gate swung open and the guard motioned him inside. I opened the office door thinking that if the meeting went well I’d need to find more drivers to fill the demand. Tony followed me, complaining about the guard.

  “Tony, since the guard didn’t even recognize you, wouldn’t it be wise to start thinking about dissolving this partnership?”

  “I want fifty thousand to get out.”

  “Get serious, Tony. I’ll give you what you’ve put into it.”

>   “It’s worth more than that.”

  “If it is, it’s because of my efforts, not yours. I’m trying to be fair with you, Tony. If you don’t accept it, I’ll just dissolve the corporation and start another one and you’ll end up with nothing.”

  “You’ll have to give up the name that way. What about all the promotional stuff you just spent a small fortune on?”

  “Performance Two will only be One now. It would only make sense to change the name anyway. Don’t be stupid, Tony; take what I’m offering you.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  “I don’t like what this has done to our friendship, Tony. We argue worse than if we were married. I know you’re worried about what will happen to you without a team to call your home. You can stay on as a driver. In fact, no one even has to know you’re not a part of the company. I just have to be free to make business decisions the way I see it, without a constant battle.”

  I don’t know if Tony purposely sabotaged the meeting, or if his lack of business sense got in the way, but we didn’t get the contract. Knowing the curtain was coming down, he didn’t make any positive action to clinch the deal. We had one last job to do together for Oldsmobile, and then we were in the lawyer’s office. The partnership had lasted only a year. Tony signed over his stock in the company. I kept the original name and signed a check for what he had put in.

  Tony’s Sicilian pride didn’t want me to succeed without him. He filled Bobby Unser’s head with lies, saying that I was telling everyone in the business that Bobby was an alcoholic. Tony was an excellent driver, but he just didn’t know how to do it on his own. Unfortunately for Tony, neither did Bobby.

  Wally joined the bandwagon to try to obliterate Performance Two, even though he had to swallow his pride and become friends with Tony again. I was the force that needed to be destroyed for them to hang on to what accounts they had left. They were all determined to put me out of business. My other competitors were doing their part to chip away at me, too. I was a woman in a man’s world, fighting alone through this treacherous jungle.