I’m Losing You

by Bruce Wagner

  You’ll love this: after I’m off the phone, Katherine tells me she got this call from the police because some psycho impersonated her (why hasn’t anyone impersonated me, E? That hurts). This crazy girl went and saw Calliope, pretending she was Katherine—and assaulted her, physically! The motherfucker assaults my shrink! Definitely a new wrinkle in the stalking game. I instantly phone Calliope back to commiserate and she said she was fine, just bruised. I don’t know why she didn’t tell me—guess it’s too pervy a thing to start talking about, therapist-to-patient especially. Plus, Calliope never talks about her life. It made me feel so shitty and weak, this stoic brilliant woman in her sixties actually getting fucking attacked and there I am calling from planes, trains and automobiles, whining. I literally puked when we hung up, hard knees on those hip cold green Spanish tiles. Thought of my father the whole time. Nice, huh?

  Cat came in, very sweet, to hold my clammy brow—I’m not even sure if his friends know we’re doing it. We’re not demonstrative, we’re furtive. Hotter that way. Here’s a little bonus for you, E, ‘cause you’ve been such a good dog: he likes it when I lick his butt. It tastes like Equal!::::::::::Katherine was loaded and flirting heavily with Pargita—seems they’re about to have a scene (if they haven’t already). I think K’s actually pissed Vidra never phoned congrats for the Spirit Award, though K denies. Unfortunately, her award won’t help a rat’s ass if the Gisela pyramid goes all-fall-down. First Gucci, now Gisela…is the Vatican behind it or what?

  Hello, Columbus

  TO: SHARKEE@CLS.OHIO-STATE.EDU (STOCKER VIDRA)

  FROM: DOLPH@AOL.COM (KATHERINE GROSSECK)

  Tupac Sharkee…

  Never got the flowers—did you send them to the Studio or the house? We were very drunk, me and Buck and Becky and Parg, trolling Cat’s garden in the moonlight, and Phylliss wasn’t in the best shape, either—I couldn’t believe she called and woke you up like that. Worse, that she didn’t come find me posthaste. Oh, did I tell you? When I walked to the podium at the Spirits, the plug gave a tiny tug and I thought it was you, calling long-distance. I’ll show you the tape and you’ll see the funny smile on my face.

  A week of deaths. First, Phylliss’s father—as you know, there was no love lost. The piece of shit molested her until she was nineteen; I’m sure it’ll be in the book. She told me how he took her to see La Strada when she was twelve—I thought that was pretty intense. How she related (natch) to the Giulietta Masina character, Gelsomina. Right when Anthony Quinn’s killing the acrobat (I always thought it was so weird it was Richard Basehart), Phylliss’s dad is feeling her up! She told me this after I got her drunk at Club Bayonet. The irony being, La Strada is the reason she wanted to make movies (her production company is Gelsomina Films). Did you know she hung with Fellini during Don Juan? That’s how she met Sutherland—Donald’s been in three of her movies. Then one of the Gisela “principals” was murdered, in Rome; we’re not yet sure if this is a problem vis-à-vis Teorema. (Aren’t I compassionate?) Still think Penumbra is something we could step into, worst case scenario. Phyll will find a way. Lastly, Pargita’s dog got run over by a unicyclist on the Boardwalk. Cindy Sherman gave it to her and Parg sobbed for three days, inconsolable. Finally dragged her to Jones, where Rosanna Arquette soothed, her own mutt having been eaten several years before by coyotes the night she broke up with Peter Gabriel.

  Doing production rewrite for a Jodie movie (she’s acting only); it’s fast and will put major loaves on the table. If Teorema gets pushed back, I’m looking through the trunk to see if there’s something I can do for cable. Maybe direct. It’s shoot or be shot.

  I wasn’t comparing you and Proust, Vidra. I thought you’d love the quote. It honestly did remind me of the way you metaphorize. Thought we were moving out from underneath our “moon of misunderstanding” but there still seems to be a sliver hanging over our heads, by just a thread. Be gone, foul silvery strand—can’t wait till morning comes. In the meantime, may God praise little girls and Molière, and dolphins with big ol’ toothaches…

  P.S. I think Phylliss and Cat Basquiat are actually fucking. (But you probably already know this. Don’t editors know everything?)

  Sight Unseen

  Baby Boy Blue…

  Casting begins next week for Teorema…

  Holly and Phylliss took us to a “Church of Religious Science” called Agape. They pronounce it uh-gah-pay—I think it’s Greek but don’t know what it means. The “tent meeting” is in a big warehouse on Olympic, across from that restaurant, the L.A. Farm. It was fabulous! It’s non-denominational, though one can’t help notice the preponderance of beautiful, upscale blacks and folks from the Business too, like Dyan Cannon and Ben Vereen (both live in Malibu; he looks very well). Services opened with a half-hour meditation, which we missed. Then there were announcements and music, and everyone sang a song like it was summer camp and there was such refreshing politesse: special ushers made sure there were seats for all. A handsome Reverend Michael came onstage to speak and the words rushed out so fast he sometimes got them wrong but no one seemed to care. He’s black and one of the founders. He’d just returned from India and spoke in such a charming manner, I was instantly taken in—serenely disentangled. The Reverend said people were always asking if there was life after death but what they should be asking was, Is there life before death? I liked that! I could tell that you liked it too, precious ‘shroom, and so did your soft Lily the lion-girl cub; she purred while you smiled through her whiskers. And yes, you listened very intently to the sermon—I had an eye on you while we recited the affirmation, now pasted to your crib:

  I AM A RADIANT CENTER OF DIVINE PEACE!

  I EMANATE ONLY VIBRATIONS OF PURE LOVE AND INFINITE JOY!

  I LIVE TO CO-CREATE WITH PURE SPIRIT ALL THAT IS BEAUTIFUL!

  I AM HERE TO EXPRESS ORDER AND HARMONY IN A MOST UNIQUE WAY!

  THIS DAY I ELIMINATE ALL THAT WOULD ENCUMBER MY EXPRESSION!

  I LET GO OF ALL FEAR, DOUBT, AND RESTLESSNESS!

  I DECLARE THAT I AM WONDROUSLY SUPPORTED BY PURE SPIRIT!

  EVERYTHING ALWAYS WORKS TOGETHER FOR MY GOOD!

  I LIVE FOR GOD IN EVERY AREA OF MY LIFE!

  I NOW GIVE THANKS AND LET IT BE!

  AND SO IT IS! AMEN!

  Saw Hassan and Rubie there as we were leaving and promised to have brunch. Hassan is kind of a minister there; Agape has its own school and you can learn to become a Practitioner—a kind of reverend, yourself—in what they call the Science of Mind. There’s an entry-level class: “Core Concepts and Meditation in Universal Principles.” It’s a fifteen-week course (forty-five hours), and Mom just might do it!

  *** The THIEF of ENERGY

  Jeremy took me to the Ivy, then to the Peninsula. I waited in the bar while he arranged a room and a cute old man said he wanted to put me in the movies. His energy was brittle and spongy; desperate like the old sometimes are, and used. He introduced himself as Bernard Ribkin, quickly adding that his son was ‘the ICM chief‘—with this, I just about fell off my chair. I revealed nothing, of course, playing it close to my gorgeous Mi$$oni vest. Then Jeremy appeared and curtly nodded in such a way I couldn’t linger; his peremptory fashion brooked no protest or rejoinder. I had wanted to bring grandpapa into my web, for future usage, but was forced to regard the encounter as a fleeting energetic omen rather than something immediately exploitable, in any kind of pragmatic utilization.

  Jeremy likes that my cunt is pierced. He’s so horny, and demands I recount sex stories. The old man Bernie put me in mind of one. I waited for Beluga to arrive before setting the stage—I ate scoops while JS smoked the crack. Then I began to relay. I told him how when I was seven months pregnant, I was meeting my husband in Costa Rica. An American sat next to me on the plane. It was night and everyone slept. I let him feel my belly. He was a little drunk. He said he was fifty but I suspect closer to sixty or more. He was a pilot himself, for TWA, on vacation. I let him rub the belly and feel for kickings. He had grown children o
f his own. When he saw the ring (on my finger! not below), he made a big thing about it tho it was a simple band. We talked awhile about being married, him with the predictable divorces and romantic longitudes and latitudes for someone his age. He focused on the ring some more and I let him take it off me. He tried it on his pinky but it wouldn’t fit, joking that now I was a single woman, and he took the same pinky with my ring on part of the way and rubbed my belly some more, then under the blanket and further until he was high on my thigh, then under the panty, then on the hairs and in my pussy. (I, of course, was not yet pierced and suspect few were. This was, notably, some years in the past.) He slid the ring in and I had my eyes shut, and further until teasing the anus, fat nail-bitten finger wet from my juices, he put the ring in rear and front ends alternatively, all the time talking about my kid and what I was going to name it and that I was going to make the best mom. Normal coffee-counter talk. I was afraid the ring might come off in there. Then he asked about my husband and how we met, how long we’d been together, our hope and dreams and I told him he (my husband) was meeting the plane and more fingers went in and he asked again who was meeting me and I told him my husband—he made me say it more, ‘my husband, my husband,’ and I did, and the old pilot sighed and shook, cumming heartily. Jeremy liked that story. He’d done beaucoup coke but still came a gallon, me masturbating him only. Larry Sanders was on, in muted tone. His mood changed without warning and he told me about his blind baby boy and cried. He has asked for another girl to be there. I will call Jabba—I heard she is out of jail, and clean; her energy will be containable. I know I cannot give him the HIV, because I do not give energy, I only take.

  Sight Unseen

  Oh, Hol. He’s seeing someone…

  Samson and I are with Joi for a few days, at her house in Hermosa. (I plan on calling you after I write this; need to set some thoughts down before I hear your voice and fall apart.) Joi is involved with the Agape Educational Ministries, Sacred Order of Agape Practitioners. Her husband’s a film editor—lanky, loopy Cedric—and they have about a hundred cats, mostly strays. Turns out we have lots of friends in common. (The long arm of Blue Matrix.) We met that time you and Phylliss first took me to Sunday services. Joi teaches Meditation/Breath Awareness and is getting me into the choir, which I know will be therapeutic. Though just now, I’m feeling beyond therapy. (Wasn’t that the name of a play? And weren’t you in it?) And, Hol, please don’t tell Phylliss what’s going on—I know you wouldn’t. I’m just so paranoid and shaken. Humiliated! Not so much by the affair but—oh, Holly, I’m crying…He’s been sleeping with someone from his show, that’s all I know. When he told me, it was like hearing gossip about a distant cousin. Not the man I married, Hol—he doesn’t even look like Jeremy, he’s venomous and distorted, and the baby knows: Samson is, as all children, a fine and delicate receptor.

  I really think his behavior is at this point pathological, exacerbated by a steadily growing drug intake. He’ll have to find his own bottom, but I won’t be joining him. Interesting too he now refuses conjoints; did I tell you he’ll only see Mitch alone? At least he’s still going, but I can’t imagine that will last. Though, it is, I think, the only thing between him and a total loss of control. Mitch has made it clear that Jeremy’s lollapallooza of a mid-life crack-up would have come with or without baby, sightless or not—but I don’t believe it, Holly! I will not submit to it! He is the worst coward, and I will not move back into that house, under any circumstances! We will stay in a hotel and be perfectly fine, Samson and Lily and me. There’s more than enough money, God knows. I always made sure of that.

  Mother wants us home in Minnesota (Jeremy in Hazelden!) but I like the gypsy life with my Oceanspray and platinum AmEx—what more could I need? I’m growing stronger each day, Hol. I really do believe you see what you’re made of in the midst of great challenge. Jeremy’s learning what he’s made of; that’s his own private hell. I will not let him drag me down….“Practice Random Kindness and Senseless Acts of Beauty”—the un-chic bumper sticker Joi has on her Saab. I’ve heard it for years, haven’t you? I used to scoff at its saccharine poetics. But now I see the sensefulness through the whimsy—and that’s what I’m going to do: praise and celebrate. I am here to express order and harmony in a most unique way. That’s what they say at Agape. Ain’t no lie! Long live positive anarchy and sweet disturbances!

  I’m glad you like the Sight Unseen title (I like it too, though I still think it may have been used once too often. What are Vidra’s thoughts?), with Letters to Samson and Holly going right under. I know you object, but that’s Author’s Prerogative, no? You are now an officially titled person and as such, eligible for your very own ISBN. And this you shall have, with great pomp!

  Maps to the Stars

  This was the first movie audition I have been on and my stomach was in TOTAL eclipse. I prepared as much as humanly possible, including a session in Malibu with my acting coach {seventy-five dollars that I didn’t really have}. We painstakingly went over motivation, sense memory, breathing, etalia. As it turned out, the monologue was different from that on the “sides,” having been taken from the wrong “draft” {I’ll get the hang of these terms one day!}—“sides” are what they call the scenes they hand out to the actors beforehand the audition, because of the impracticality {not to mention the producers would never allow it} of giving out complete scripts during the casting process—although they probably DO give you a full script if they like your reading and have you on callback. As I said, the monologue I prepared was from the wrong “draft” (to my dismay) but the casting person let me read it anyway. She was friendly and accommodating. Little did anyone know that Donny Ribkin has been a PRINCE, having leaked me the ENTIRE KATHERINE GROSSECK script BEFOREHAND.

  The casting offices are on the Twentieth Century–Fox lot, in makeshift bungalows. I have been on that lot only once before, as part of the catering corps for a Children with AIDS gala. On that day, I met AARON and TORI SPELLING and much of the cast, crew and executives of MELROSE PLACE. Sara Radisson-Stein, the TEOREMA casting person, told me the bungalow is just temporary, “until we get all our money.” I suspected as much from the start because they seemed to be actively casting other things while I was there, such as PICKET FENCES. {I was hoping to see DAVID KELLEY and MICHELLE but that they would even be there was naive on my part. Guess I’m still the majorly starstruck Vancouver girl.} Sara put me at ease. I expected the director and producer etalia would be there {naive me again} but that is apparently not the way it works. Even Sara isn’t the main casting lady; SHELBY BURKE is—and she wasn’t there at all! There’s a very important pecking order: it seems the lowlier, more unlikely people to be cast {little me} come in to read for Sara. If Sara sees someone she likes, you’re invited back to read for her again. At that point, you may even be asked to read for Shelby Burke and you may read for Shelby three or four times before she asks you to emote for producer and director. That’s the way they do it—like salmons flopping upstream are we, we poor actors. Anyway, I read the sides she gave me several times {I’d rate my performance a solid B, which isn’t bad} and Sara was patient and helpful, having me read a bunch of different ways. The first time, I was way over the top and she made me pull back and modulate. Her baby was there and wouldn’t stop crying. Finally, she just brought it in and I really didn’t mind. I think I may have earned a few points there but haven’t a clue I’ll be called back. On the way out, I asked if CAT BASQUIAT was still starring and she smiled and said, “We hope!”

  Made love with Donny last night…O Diary, I don’t know whether it was a mistake—SIGH. I didn’t want him to think sleeping together was the “prize” for getting me the audition—that would be SOOOO Hollywood. He told me how JACK NICHOLSON once told him the difference between him {JACK} and WARREN BEATTY was that JACK would fuck warm mud and WARREN would fuck cold. I wasn’t sure why this bit of wisdom was relayed at that moment in time. I wanted him to stay the night but he couldn’t because he had to be
on a plane for PARIS in the morning. I wish he would have asked me to go with him, as HARRISON FORD did SABRINA {CIRCA 1995}.