Sid, despite his professed, indeed almost professional, cynicism, was somewhat shocked when he first learned of the matter-of-fact disposition of this part of Angie’s estate, indeed of Angie herself. Mort Kanowitz, however, was quick to reassure him. “Okay, Sid, so she was a great star—one thing is sure, no matter how you slice it, nobody makes money on a stiff, Right?”
Other than the aforementioned members of the audience, also in attendance was the almost legendary Tina Marie Holt—known to most as “Teeny Marie,” she who had jetted in from the film capital that very day, and was now squealing with unbridled delight as she watched the exquisite Arabella writhing beneath the rude hunching embrace of big Sid Krassman.
“Put the wood to her, Sid!” she screeched. “The uppity frog dyke!”
It was at just about this moment that the first “Hey, Rube!” reverberated through the vaulted corridors from the direction of the cutting room, scene of the initial strike of the assault party’s lead-element flying wedge. Sid, Morty, and Lips—in each of whose past was a phase of carnival life—were quick to harken to the alert, mouths dropping agape, eyes rolling back, “What the fuck!?!” muttered almost in unison. Sid and Morty bolted from the projection room and into the corridor, while Lips, heeding the beat of a different drummer now, clocked C.D. once, then stepped into the shadow near the door, loosened his jacket, and allowed his fingers to trial lightly over the contour of the heat-piece beneath.
In the corridor outside, pandemonium was rife, and the passageway echoed with strident shouts in German and Italian.
Two men from the cutting room, clothes torn and awry, looking very much under duress, suddenly rounded the corner.
Sid grabbed one of them as he tried to rush past. “Eddie, what the hell’s going on?” he demanded.
“Run for it!” the other shouted, “it’s the goons!” He wrenched free from Sid’s grasp and bolted away.
Sid wheeled and forcibly detained the second man. “Harry, what’s he talking about? What goons, for Chrissake?”
“Beats me,” said Harry, breathing hard and looking over his shoulder. “Eddie thinks it’s a union beef . . . thinks they sent a goon-squad to break up the joint . . . I don’t know, look like straight hoods to me . . . Mafia types . . . some kind of shakedown operation, I guess.”
Sid couldn’t believe it. “You mean they . . . broke into the cutting room?”
Harry nodded, “They grabbed the out-takes and the second dupe . . . I think they’re after the negative.”
The last word hit Sid like a twisting knife. “Holy Christ!” He turned to Morty in panic, “Morty, quick, get the gorillas!”
“Right!” said Mort, and disappeared into the maze, with Harry close behind.
At that instant, from the opposite direction, appeared an advance echelon of the raiding party, intent upon storming the projection room, with Card at the fore.
“Holy Christ,” Sid muttered, “I should of guessed it!” And he rushed out to confront him. “Hold it, buster,” he said firmly, “where do you think you’re going?”
“We have come for the film,” the Cardinal replied, equally firm, and in an accent reminiscent of Eric von Stroheim.
Sid looked uneasily over his antagonist’s shoulder to the ruffian band behind him, many of them dressed in what appeared to be the cloth of the Church.
“Now, step aside,” the Cardinal ordered, and he pointed a huge golden cross at Sid, flourishing it the way one might to banish a vampire—but because of its size, it was not without a threat of a more tangible nature.
“Wait a minute,” said Sid, “you mean that you . . . you would take the law into your own hands like that?”
“Ha!” the Cardinal bellowed, “and why not? You did it with Eichmann!”
“Huh?”
“Now get out of the way!” And he brandished his cross again.
‘Go fuck yourself, buster!” Sid roared, gave him a straight shot to the snoz, whirled around, and darted into the projection room and up to the stage, switching on the lights as he did and yelling at the top of his voice, Paul Revere style: “IT’S THE FUCKING WOPS! THEY’RE AFTER THE NEGATIVE!”
The “audience” poured out into the corridor, just as the marauders finished ransacking the projection booth and emerged, carrying six cans of film, and trailing it behind them like a Les Harrison bandage.
What ensued was one of the most extraordinary occurrences in the history of group conflict. The maze of corridors was choked with scenes of strangeness as the Hollywood weirdies joined in pitched battle with the freaks from the Holy See, and the halls rang with a conglomeration of earthy obscenities and curious biblical anathema.
The tide of battle seemed to shift almost momentarily, usually related to the arrival of reinforcements for one faction or the other. First, it was the timely appearance of the grips and gaffers, led by Freddie the First and stout Morty himself, plunging into the melee to set the churchmen reeling. But this was soon more than counterbalanced by the advent of another of their own fanatic contingents, black robes flying.
Meanwhile, on the individual level, instances of prowess and valor were not uncommon. Nicky Sanchez and Teeny Marie worked together as a hard-hitting little team, confounding the adversary with their pesky windmill flurries of scratches and bites.
Sid and Most used their street-fighting heritage to good advantage, laying about them with great gusto, constantly looking for some heavy object to wield. “Where is Lips and that fucking gun?!?” Sid kept shouting. But Lips remained aloof, content to do his own thing, which now consisted of protecting old C.D.—one of the first to fall—and he managed this by dragging him to one side of the raging fray, and then merely waving the gun about—a smart .38 Police Special—whenever anyone ventured too near.
“Use the gun, Lips!” Sid had shouted once when things seemed at their most dire, “For Chrissake, use the gun!”
“Fuck you, Krassman!” was the reply. “I ain’t risking no capital-punishment rap just to save your fat ass!”
Boris and Lazlo had immediately begun trying to film the sensational fracas, shooting with hand-held Arries while perched on pinnacles and turrets, or crouched in wall niches which used to accommodate great oil lamps and torches. Tony and Dave were also in one of the niches—but they weren’t shooting, they were smoking pot and observing the scene.
“Beautiful,” Dave kept murmuring, nodding his head and beaming, “beautiful.”
Les Harrison, meanwhile, was in the midst of the action, behaving like a maniac. Fancying himself something of a karate expert, he was leaping about, attempting to deliver deadly chops and kicks all around him, to friend and foe alike—but his coordination had been so undone, to say nothing of his head, by the big M, that he consistently missed his target, and simply went flying about, more often than not doing certain injury to himself.
Lynx Letterman, acting half on hunch and half on cunning, had abandoned the rumble in its earliest stages, but did have the savvy to do so under the guise of “getting Debbie and Helen Vrobel out of here!”
As for editor Philip Fraser, he was acquitting himself decently enough, in a straightforward Marquis of Queensberry manner, when suddenly his eye caught a series of very familiar blue-striped film cans being lugged through the crowd.
“Oh my God,” he said, “they’ve got the negative!”
The word ran through the film company like a lighted fuse. “They’ve got the negative!”
This served to rally them terrifically, with even Boris, Laz, and Tony joining the struggle, but the odds were hopeless. Just as Tony was going down under a torrent of blows, his glance chanced on Dave, still sitting where he had left him. “You little cocksucker,” he yelled, “get your ass down here and help us!”
But Dave only nodded and smiled beatifically. “Everything’s cool, baby,” and he pointed, in the distance, over their heads, where, lo and behold, there appeared a vast procession like Caesar’s legions, banners aloft, colors flying, “FREE KIM AGNEW!”
“OEDIPUS SUCKS!” etc.
Thus, the balance of power had abruptly changed once more, as Sid saw all too clearly, when the fighting slowed to a stop. “Okay, you ass-hole,” he shouted at the Cardinal, “you’re finished! Those kids are with us!”
The Card appeared confounded indeed and muttered something to a man with a lean and hungry look nearby—his head-honcho, as it were—who, in turn, frowned his angry consternation, and spoke in rapid Italian to a young, bearded acolyte beside him; the latter nodded tersely and doffed his priestly raiment, leaving him in snug jockey shorts and T-shirt, whereupon they conferred again before the young man abruptly departed.
Sid, feeling no pain now, had watched this odd skit with curious bemusement—until he suddenly realized what was afoot. “Look out!” he shouted, as he saw the young man emerge from his own group, and cautiously slip into the ranks of the unsuspecting Hippies, where he immediately seized a placard (“NIXON LIVES!?!”), and smashed it over the head of one of the rival Crazies—thereby instigating a full-scale fratricidal riot.
“No, no,” Sid kept crying, “he’s one of them!”
Tony had also seen it, and joined to sound the alarm: “Provocateur! Provocateur!”
But it was to no avail and, as the fighting grew heavier, the blue-striped cans were obscured from view, and Sid slumped to the floor with a heavy heart indeed.
2
“WELL,” BORIS WAS SAYING over one last drink on the veranda at the Imperial, “at least now we know it can be done.”
“Ha,” Tone laughed bitterly, “that’s some fucking consolation.”
“We’ll get our film back,” said Sid, toneless.
“Forget it,” said Boris, “there are plenty of other things to do. I mean we did it, that’s the important thing—now, let’s do something that hasn’t been done.”
Tony nodded understanding—at the same time shaking his head, unable to accept it. “I don’t know,” he said wistfully, “I really would have dug seeing the Dave and Debbie thing—” he broke off, laughed, as at himself. Then he sighed, and added, almost sadly: “No, they had to destroy the film—it would have put too many people out of work.”
“I been over it a hundred times,” said Sid, possessed by total morbidity since their loss. “He practically told me what they done with the film. He said to me: ‘You did it to Eichmann!’ So I ask myself, ‘Did what?’ Kidnap, right? Eichmann was kidnapped and taken to Israel! Right? Okay, so where were those guys from? Rome, that’s where! And that’s where they got the film right now! Jeez,” he shook his head sadly, “I still can’t get over it—those guys being from Rome, and to do something so . . . tricky, and then that whole provocateur bit . . . well, that’s pretty sneaky . . . and there I was all along thinking about Rome as being someplace where everything was on the up and up . . . and where guys like Saint Peter . . . Saint Paul, guys like that, come from—am I right, Tone?”
“Right, Sid,” said Tone, having a drink. “Not to mention the late great Nick Machiavelli.”
“Yeah?” said Sid, with only sullen interest, “who is that?”
“Oh . . .” Tony shrugged, “one of the boys. Right B.?”
Boris nodded. “Yep,” and he looked over with a sad and weary smile. “Just like the rest of us . . . right, Tone?”
“Dig it, B.” And Tone even toasted it.
New Protocol Mystery at Vatican
By JAMES H. MILLER Special to The New York Gazette
VATICAN CITY, Dec. 13—In recent weeks, a number of “privileged visitors” to the Vatican—i.e., persons granted official access to, among other things, the balustrade overlooking the celebrated “inner-court”—have reported observing processions moving both toward and from the lower vault (sanctum sanctorum), also known as “Saint Anthony’s Vault.” A surprising number of such reports have originated with persons who are recognized authorities on Vatican protocol and processional observances, and who say that these “processions” do not correspond to any previously known or existing practices, as officially prescribed (in accordance with the Dictus Regis Omnium, etc.). None have felt it within their prerogative to speculate as to the meaning or purpose of these “processions” and they are unable to add much, if anything, of objective value to their descriptions of them. Having observed the phenomenon from a distance, little or nothing can be deduced from the demeanor of the processionals themselves—moving slowly, almost contemplatively, faces shadowed by their ceremonial hoods, expressions shrouded in a somber obscurity, pierced only on occasion by the glitter of their eyes.
A Biography of Terry Southern
Terry Southern (1924–1995) was an American satirist, author, journalist, screenwriter, and educator and is considered one of the great literary minds of the second half of the twentieth century. His bestselling novels—Candy (1958), a spoof on pornography based on Voltaire’s Candide, and The Magic Christian (1959), a satire of the grossly rich also made into a movie starring Peter Sellers and Ringo Starr—established Southern as a literary and pop culture icon. Literary achievement evolved into a successful film career, with the Academy Award–nominated screenplays for Dr. Strangelove, Or How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), which he wrote with Stanley Kubrick and Peter George, and Easy Rider (1969), which he wrote with Peter Fonda and Dennis Hopper.
Born in Alvarado, Texas, Southern was educated at Southern Methodist University, the University of Chicago, and Northwestern, where he earned his bachelor’s degree. He served in the Army during World War II, and was part of the expatriate American café society of 1950s Paris, where he attended the Sorbonne on the GI Bill. In Paris, he befriended writers James Baldwin, James Jones, Mordecai Richler, and Christopher Logue, among others, and met the prominent French intellectuals Jean Cocteau, Jean-Paul Sartre, and Albert Camus. His short story “The Accident” was published in the inaugural issue of the Paris Review in 1953, and he became closely identified with the magazine’s founders, Harold L. Humes, Peter Matthiessen and George Plimpton, who became his lifelong friends. It was in Paris that Southern wrote his first novel, Flash and Filigree (1958), a satire of 1950s Los Angeles.
When he returned to the States, Southern moved to Greenwich Village, where he took an apartment with Aram Avakian (whom he’d met in Paris) and quickly became a major part of the artistic, literary, and music scene populated by Larry Rivers, David Amram, Bruce Conner, Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, and Jack Kerouac, among others. After marrying Carol Kauffman in 1956, he settled in Geneva until 1959. There he wrote Candy with friend and poet Mason Hoffenberg, and The Magic Christian. Carol and Terry’s son, Nile, was born in 1960 after the couple moved to Connecticut, near the novelist William Styron, another lifelong friend.
Three years later, Southern was invited by Stanley Kubrick to work on his new film starring Peter Sellers, which became, Dr. Strangelove. Candy, initially banned in France and England, pushed all of America’s post-war puritanical buttons and became a bestseller. Southern’s short pieces have appeared in the Paris Review, Esquire, the Realist, Harper’s Bazaar, Glamour, Argosy, Playboy, and the Nation, among others. His journalism for Esquire, particularly his 1962 piece “Twirling at Ole Miss,” was credited by Tom Wolfe for beginning the New Journalism style. In 1964 Southern was one of the most famous writers in the United States, with a successful career in journalism, his novel Candy at number one on the New York Times bestseller list, and Dr. Strangelove a hit at the box office.
After his success with Strangelove, Southern worked on a series of films, including the hugely successful Easy Rider. Other film credits include The Loved One, The Cincinnati Kid, Barbarella, and The End of the Road. He achieved pop-culture immortality when he was featured on the famous album cover of the Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band. However, despite working with some of the biggest names in film, music, and television, and a period in which he was making quite a lot of money (1964–1969), by 1970, Southern was plagued by financial troubles.
He published two more b
ooks: Red-Dirt Marijuana and Other Tastes (1967), a collection of stories and other short pieces, and Blue Movie (1970), a bawdy satire of Hollywood. In the 1980s, Southern wrote for Saturday Night Live, and his final novel, Texas Summer, was published in 1992. In his final years, Southern lectured on screenwriting at New York University and Columbia University. He collapsed on his way to class at Columbia on October 25, 1995, and died four days later.
The Southern home in Alvarado, Texas, seen here in the 1880s.
A young Southern with a dog in Alvarado, his hometown, around 1929.
Terry Southern Sr. with his son in Dallas, around 1930.
Southern’s yearbook photo from his senior year at Sunset High in 1941.
Southern before World War II. He was able to use the GI Bill to spend four years studying in Paris.
Southern’s 1949 student ID card from the Sorbonne. While abroad, he met many of the people with whom he would collaborate, including Henry Green, Richard Seaver, Alex Trocchi, William Burroughs, Ted Kotcheff, George Plimpton, and Mason Hoffenberg, with whom he wrote Candy (1958).
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