“I really came in for some cigarettes.”
“Name it, I got it.”
“Rothman’s?”
“Rothman’s? What is that—a Jewish cigarette? When did that happen?”
“Oh, Sy—it’s an English cigarette.”
“Pip-pip—an English cigarette. Well, I’m fresh out. You’re such a big shot you can’t smoke Lucky Strike?”
“I’d love a pack of Lucky Strike.”
“So what’s wrong with Old Gold? You’re wearing it—why can’t you smoke it?”
“Sy—I’ll smoke whatever you say.”
“Here. Lucky Strike. And I don’t want to hear anymore about it. How come you’re not on The Stan Arlen Show anymore? Can’t hold a job, Miss Ritzy Rothman?”
“Sy—will you take me to dinner?”
“Yes. But we’ll rule out Maxim’s, okay?”
“Anywhere you say.”
“Charmed. I’ll be down to get you in a taxi, honey. But first I’ll clear it with my wife as she’s a killer at heart.”
“I live in the Delmonico.”
“Of course, you do. Where should you live—in the Hotel Dixie?”
“Penthouse B.”
“I didn’t think it would be behind the boiler.”
“Sy, cut it out.”
“Better be ready ’bout half past eight.”
“I’ll be ready.”
“And dress like a human being because all I got is a sport jacket from 1938.”
“I’ll be expecting you.”
“Hey, Blondie?”
“Yes?”
“You have made my whole day. Keep the cigarettes.”
“Oh—I didn’t pay you!”
“It’s all right. I just wanted you to know you didn’t slip a fast one over on me. Also—it’s a thrill to see you again and looking like you do. I only hope it’s on the up-and-up.”
“I’ll tell you all about it.”
“And I’ll tell you mine.”
I knew Sy wouldn’t let me pay for the dinner so I let him pick the restaurant. He picked a very quiet place way over on Second Avenue in the Fifties—Sendetti’s. And I brought him as up to date on my life as I could without going into too many details because I didn’t think he was ready for it. But he was very good at filling in the blank spaces, and though he didn’t get heavily paternal, he did kind of intimate that Johnny Farrar was “no one you should hang your hat on.”
I invited him up to my suite for a nightcap but he was afraid that people might talk, that he had a clientele that frequented the Delmonico and he didn’t want to be seen with a blonde chippie because “even the Wohls have ears.”
I stopped by Sy’s place almost every day. And every day it was the same. “Have a bubble gum.” “Do you need an aspirin?” “What do you hear from the playboy of the western world?” If Johnny and I ever got married, I’d want Sy Fein to give me away. And I can hear him now—“Give you away? Maybe I’d give a forty percent discount, but away? Never!”
Johnny called from Lisbon. He’d be in New York the next evening. It had been a successful trip, and they’d worked something out with the Russians—he and IBM. We’d celebrate when he got in. Maybe the Russian Tea Room and I laughed long distance.
The night he called I invited Don and Candy up to my suite for dinner and had it all sent up via room service. Over coffee they gave me the news. The producer had committed himself to Arnie’s play and Don would direct. The producer was Daniel Van Sumner, an old pro and very active of late, having brought in three new plays over the last two seasons. One of them, The Widow’s Mattress, was a smash and still running or, as Arnie put it, “still layin’ ’em in the aisles.”
Arnie came up later, followed a step behind by his Marilyn. So we were five in all when Johnny walked in. The louse had called from Idlewild Airport, already in from Lisbon. Though he was very civil, it was obvious to all that he wasn’t delirious about seeing four strangers eating up a storm in his mistress’s suite. Needless to say, they all hustled out as quickly as they could without looking even ruder than Johnny.
Johnny was short with me as he unpacked. “I thought we had an understanding?”
“Johnny, they’re my friends.”
“They’re not my friends.”
“We were celebrating. Arnie’s play is being produced and—”
“And you know how I feel about show business.”
“I’m not show biz, they are.”
“I don’t want to see them here again. Is that understood?”
“It is understood but I don’t understand.”
“I’m seeing the vice-consul of the Russian embassy tomorrow morning—early. So I don’t want to discuss it now. Right now all I want to do is take a shower and go to sleep.”
“Does that mean I sleep alone tonight? In the Tower of London? Or how about Devil’s Island? I hear it’s very nice this time of year.”
He turned, smiled, and pulled me to him. “You can get away with just about anything with me, can’t you?”
“Can I? I hadn’t noticed.”
“All I ask is that you show me a little mercy.”
“Why should I? You’re unreasonable, ridiculous, stupid, and prejudiced.”
“Ginnie—”
“And you didn’t even notice my hair. We might just as well be married.”
“I did notice but I thought it was an accident.”
“What?”
“It’s beautiful.”
“It ought to be. You paid enough for it.”
“Good. What else is money for?” He headed for the shower, and from inside the bathroom, he continued to speak to me. “Met some interesting people in Lisbon on the way back. Thought you might enjoy meeting them.”
“Who?”
“The Barringers. He’s in oil. Up to his ass in it.”
“Who did you say?”
“Kevin and Maggie Barringer. You’ll love ’em.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
Ben
1953
They were as dense at MGM as they had been at Warners, and I marveled at how those companies could remain in business and still turn a profit. I assumed that at Columbia, Paramount, Universal, and United Artists—and good old 20th Century-Fox—it was no different. Lunatics and con men were at the various helms. And only creative bookkeeping could get those companies to show any moneys on the credit side at the end of a fiscal year.
It had gotten grim. Months had passed and I had no friends other than Harriet Horner, and she was beginning to grind me down like an old stone mill. The woman had the intellect of a thimbleful of cornflakes, and on two occasions I actually did step in dog shit upon leaving her place. And, in my then state of mind, that’s what the lady began to smell like in the midst of our amours.
The MGM deal had been simple enough—a small rewrite of a script that two previous writers had worked very hard at mangling into oblivion. One look at what they had done and I knew instantly what the problem was—the hero was never in jeopardy. As a result, no matter what kind of predicament he was in, we always knew that he’d get out of it. It was a dramatic lack that the screenplay could not tolerate. I fixed the whole thing up in under five weeks—and don’t you think those mini-minds were unable to comprehend what I’d done?
They thought that I’d rushed it, that I owed it more time, that “fast” was bad and “slow” was good, and that it was the tortoise who always won the race. They said “haste makes waste,” and I said “a stitch in time saves nine.” They said “anything worth doing is worth doing well.” And I said “shove it up your ass” and got into my Porsche and drove out Sunset to the Pacific.
A little white Mercedes passed me going in the opposite direction. A blonde girl was driving. She looked so much like Ginnie that I found myself turning around and following her. The traffic was gummy and she was driving fast, as if intent on shaking me off. I stayed with the white Mercedes for as long as I could, even running a couple of red lights to stay on its
tail. But it rid itself of me by the simple expedient of turning invisible. So I continued on back to Hollywood, to my house, where I called Harriet. I went to see her. We chatted. We balled. And I went home, not liking myself much but not knowing what I could do about it.
Jack Rush called. He had been nagging me for having blown the MGM assignment and wanted to drive over to see me. I told him that I didn’t feel up to it, but he said that it was important and that he was on his way.
I heard his car pull into my most limited driveway. It was a Porsche driveway, not a Cadillac driveway, and my garage door complained when nudged by Jack’s Coupe de Ville.
He came in, saw I was at work on a can of beer, and went inexplicably for my jugular. “You’re screwing up a beautiful career. Laying around, drinking beer—that proves nothing.”
That took me aback, and whenever I’m that way, I get smart-assy. “Well—I’m fresh out of champagne.”
“I’m trying to be helpful.”
“Then don’t come here in a Cadillac. Come in a Studebaker. You guys can’t even write your names, and you’re driving boats I couldn’t even pay the insurance on.”
“Ben, please, I know it’s upsetting. You come out here and all you get for your efforts are agents and producers who give you platitudes and criticisms—and you’re right. Nobody knows what he’s talking about. No argument on that. All I’m asking you to do is acknowledge the fact that certain people out here have the clout to make things happen, and even if they’re imbeciles, you can’t tell them that and expect to work for them. I’m sorry, but that’s the way it is.”
“No, I’m sorry that’s the way it is.”
“Then you accept my point?”
“What the hell is this, a fucking debate? No, I don’t accept your point! Not if it means my writing down to the level of those in charge! I can’t do that! All I can acknowledge is that the higher the man, the lower the intellect. That’s the great big Hollywood axiom. That’s ‘Zanuck’s Law,’ ‘Skouras’s Law,’ ‘Warner’s Law’—they’re all in it together.”
“Okay. Call it a law. You’re right. It is a law. Now, as a citizen of the filmmaking community, are you prepared to obey that law? Because if not—you’re not going to survive out here. You’re going to drop into a bottomless hole of self-righteousness, all the way—splat—so long and au revoir.”
“Shit. I think I may vomit.”
“You already have. All over yourself. That’s the sadness of it. You like my Cadillac? You know why I have one? Because I obey the law. I don’t try to change it. I don’t even question it.”
“Listen, Jack, you’re a nice guy and you mean well, but if you don’t get out of here, I’m going to have to throw you out.”
He took a long time before speaking, as if deliberating the fate of the condemned man—noose or garrote. Whichever—get on with it. “Okay, I’m leaving. But not until I tell you the real purpose of my visit. The real purpose of my visit is to present you with this bill. It’s all itemized. Read it over. Comes to a grand total of $11,990.62.”
“What the hell is this?”
“Read it.”
“One Porsche—$6,533.32. One down payment on house—$4,000. Gas, electricity, and telephone installation—$457.39. Miscellaneous, itemized on request—$1,000. What the hell is this?”
“$11,990.62. That’s what you owe the Morris office. If you were earning any money, we’d be happy to lay back and deduct it a little at a time, with no interest charges. But you’re not earning any money, and it doesn’t look as though you ever will—so the agency doesn’t want to be on the hook for it. We’ve deducted our regular ten percent on your $25,000 from Warners and your $15,000 from MGM. That came to $4,000—leaving you $36,000. From that we’re deducting the $11,990.62—plus what the governments of the US and California get, plus Social Security, which you’re going to be glad you have, one day—all of which leaves you a total of $19,226.09, which is the amount of this check that I now hand you. And which ends our relationship with you because we can’t afford to waste our time with clients who continually tell our customers to go fuck themselves. And don’t bother to throw me out because I’m going.”
“Vernon Stacey assured me that—”
“No, Ben, he didn’t. And if he did he was not empowered to. As your agents it was our responsibility to help you in every way possible. It was not our responsibility to pay for your dental work, or your foster children in Pakistan. If you want to get a lawyer on the thing—go ahead. Also, you should check it out with the Writers Guild. But, as a friend, I have to tell you you don’t have a leg to stand on. Good-bye, Ben. Believe it or not, I wish you luck.”
Hollywood was beginning to crowd me. It was ganging up on me. My agents had fired me. When those wily predators resign a client it’s only because they know they’ll never make a buck on him. They could be wrong, of course, and I was sure they’d been wrong with other people, but I still didn’t care for it. It was not a good omen. All was not right with the world. How could I get work if I had no screen credits and no agents? Who’d know I was alive? Still, I would not berate myself. All I had done was to act with some integrity. Yes, I had a short wick. Yes, I had been ill-advised to read out anyone and everyone who disagreed with my own evaluation of my writing. But if I didn’t establish my individuality and independence very early on, then there was no way in which I wouldn’t end up as a hack writer with some money in his kick but no pride in his vault.
Another disturbing aspect of my clash with Jack Rush was that he had arrived at my house with that check already in his pocket. Was he so certain of my reaction? What would have happened had I meekly agreed with him and promised to be a good boy? Would he still have resigned me? Had I been baited by Jack Rush so that the Morris office could resign me while making me feel that it was of my own doing? Had they so given up on me as a writer that they were willing to cut me loose no matter how well I played that scene with their emissary?
It was a bum rap—like having your father throw you out of the house before you had a chance to run away. I knew not to lose confidence in my ability. Whatever their opinion of me, it was my opinion of me that counted. And I had a high opinion of me. Four original television dramas done network in a period of just months. Maybe it was a testimonial to the quality of my writing that I couldn’t make it in Hollywood. And that’s where I left it—at least for the time being. I had enough money not to go hysterically off the deep end. Something would happen. There were other agents. The word would get around that I was no longer with William Morris and someone would call. They were all birds of prey, flying the same feathers, circling the same territory. If a squirrel got away, another hawk would spot it and go after it. Someone would call and I’d present a more conciliatory ambience. Another assignment would come up and I’d try to be a better American, a gamer whore. It was too early in the game to accept a couple of minor setbacks as being anything but nothing. Fuck ’em—I’d outlast ’em and outfox ’em.
I pretty much pissed the time away. Months and months of it. Lying in the sun. Reading. Drinking. Driving around. A couple trips to Vegas. Christmas day in a movie house. New Year’s eve on my own. Dissipation. Corrosion. Nothing happening. No one calling.
When I went to sleep, I would seldom get there, odd things loose in my head. Vague suspicions. Violent shifts in direction. Road signs once clearly marked, fading. Weather vanes and wind socks, sedentary. No breeze on the tundra. Popeye becalmed. Achilles heeled.
The phone did not ring once in January. Nor did the doorbell. Nor did Redwood Horner prance by to drop a load. February and March came served up as four-beer nights and three-Scotch dawns, my colors still ahoist but not smartly, not straight out and flapping, but flaccid. And my music, once brassy, was Sousa displaced. Monkey on the flagpole jigging the danse macabre.
April and it had to be faced: things were not good in the West. It was then that lethargy left the house because anxiety was at the door. And the lad who had once played anthems on hi
s Smith-Corona was stirring again, goaded by the juices of spring.
I lay on my sun deck, framing strategy. It would be self-defeating to let many more days go by without making a positive move. Perhaps I could call the Writers Guild and ask if they knew where I might find employment. And I wondered—was the Guild a hiring hall? Should I arrive for the shape-up with my typewriter in my arms, like a longshoreman with a hook? Maybe I should take out an ad in the Yellow Pages:
East Coast writer in town.
Presentable and multi-faceted.
Screenplays and other odd jobs.
There is a terror to being alone in a city with no one to call. It is not new. It happens to many people. But it should be good for writers. An imposed solitude. No distractions. No intrusions. The trick is to have something to work on. A suicide note; a mash letter; a telegram to the White House demanding that Alaska, Hawaii, and Ventnor Avenue be admitted to the union. Or a novel. Unemployed writers are always working on a novel—ask ’em. Pap for the outside world. A euphemism for starvation.
I thought about getting a dog. Then a parakeet. I thought about Tony and Johnny. Then I stopped thinking about things that were over and done with and began writing a screenplay—an original. A love story.
Of all my plays, “The Lonely Look” had been the best written and the best received. The screenplay would be simple enough, with enough cinematics to please those who believed that a movie wasn’t a movie if a car did not hurtle over a cliff, or slaves did not revolt, or locusts did not devour the spaghetti crop. But it would also have two people with whom an audience could identify, whose dialogue would be a shade or two deeper than “Look out, Rusty, he’s got a shiv!” or, “You may have the gold in the morning, Don Sebastian, but tonight you will help us celebrate the fiesta.”
I stocked up on paper, typewriter ribbons, and beer and wine and Scotch—and went at my writing with the burning zeal of a Tom Paine. Sitting at the old Smith-Corona, I became aware of a little roll of fat that was hanging over my belt and hiding my buckle. It bothered me. I had never seen it there before. At first I laughed, telling myself that it was a money belt. But you can’t laugh at fat or hide from it, especially when it reproduces and overpopulates and drags down your whole abdominal society. I looked in the mirror to see what else had been going on with my anatomy that I had been too busy to take note of. There were a couple of small bananas under each eye, and some buzzard scratches at the corners. Maturity or dissipation? My hair, abused by the sun and shampooed with whatever soap was in the shower stall, had taken on the consistency of a dead broom. My cheeks were a little puffy, a couple of jowls blossoming below my jaw like embryonic barnacles. If I were to let my beard grow like untended ivy, and if I were to sit at my typewriter in a ragged undershirt, I would quickly look like Monte Cristo writing to Judge Crater, requesting a pardon on purely humanitarian grounds. For it would be obvious to all that I had terminal dry rot and would not last another six-pack.
There Should Have Been Castles Page 48