“Ciao,” said Archer, practically breaking into a run now as Perry, waving his good-byes, scurried along behind him.
“Cars!” Harry Flanders called after the departing visitors. “Don’t forget lots of cars—the people love ’em.”
“Pack,” Perry said, kicking off his loafers and flinging himself on the bed. “We’re getting out of here.”
“Was it that bad?”
Jane came and sat beside him, instinctively putting her hands on his neck and beginning to knead.
“You wouldn’t believe it,” he groaned. “I wish I had it on tape.”
“Didn’t they like your short story? Hadn’t they read it?”
“I doubt it, but that has nothing to do with it. The whole thing is bullshit. Archer spooned it out to them, and they ate it up.”
“But if they liked what he said, don’t they want you to go ahead with it?”
Perry sat upright and placed his hands on Jane’s shoulders, as if at the time trying to steady himself and convey to his wife the bizarre quality of what he had just experienced.
“You don’t understand,” he said. “They probably do want me to go ahead.”
“So what’s the problem?”
“I’ll regret it. I’ll wish I’d never got involved with it. I already do. It’s impossible. We’ve got to go home.”
Jane kissed him on the forehead, and got up and went to the little kitchenette.
“How about some orange juice?” she asked. “I picked some up next door at that liquor place. It’s like a little market.”
“I’m serious! I can’t deal with these people. They aren’t like people we know.”
“Who?”
“The network people. And Archer. He’s like them too, at least when he’s with them. They talk the same game. I think they’re all on some kind of dope. Uppers and downers, mixed together.”
Jane brought him the glass of orange juice, with a couple of ice cubes in it.
“Darling, you’ve got an awful hangover, and jet lag thrown in. No wonder everything seems weird.”
“It is weird! Dammit, you’ve got to believe me!”
Perry slugged down the orange juice and got up and started yanking the drawers of the dresser open and tossing clothes on the bed.
“Call American Airlines,” he said. “Find out what’s the next flight to Boston.”
“Darling. Slow down.”
Jane put her arms around him and guided him back down to the bed, where she started massaging his neck again.
“You don’t believe me,” he said.
“I do believe you. I always believe you. I just want you to think this thing out.
“I already have. And you know what I think? I think all the faculty jerks back at Haviland were right about television and Hollywood. I’m the one who’s misguided, imagining I could waltz out here and do something classy and ‘literary.’ Oh, what a chump!”
Perry clutched his forehead, and fell back on the bed.
“You’re not a chump,” Jane assured him, “you’re a wonderful man and a sensitive writer.”
“All the more reason I should get the hell out of here.”
“All the more reason you should stay.”
Jane took Perry’s chin and tilted his face toward her so he was looking at her.
“Darling, these people sound like wonderful material,” she told him. “This meeting you went to this morning, I bet you remember a lot of good dialogue from it, even though you didn’t have a tape recorder.”
Perry lifted himself up on his elbows, smiling slightly.
“You mean like—” he said, then squinted his face into the hip attitude of Todd Robbie and went on with a nasal inflection, “‘For sure—it really does sing.’”
“You see?” Jane said brightly. “You’re going to get some terrific stories out of this.”
Perry dropped back onto the bed with a sigh.
“It’s a nice rationalization, anyway.”
“It’s the truth. Look at it as material—almost like anthropology. And you’re in the field, observing the weird rites of the Dippy-dos at work and play.”
“What if I turn into a Dippy-do myself?”
“No way. The first time anything or anyone violates your own sense of taste, or ethics, or whatever, that’s when you pack it in. And if you don’t know when it happens, I’ll know, just from looking at you.”
Perry sat up again.
“It would be a shame to turn right around and slink back home, I guess. Before we even got the vacation out of it.”
“And before I had a chance to do some of the California coast with my camera. Like you promised me.”
“I forgot. Honest.”
“You also forgot this whole thing was supposed to be a lark.”
Perry smiled.
“Thanks for reminding me.”
He pulled Jane against him, hugging hard, happy again to have her good sense keep him on the right course.
More champagne!
Why not?
The network had commissioned the hour pilot script of Perry’s show, which was surely a foregone conclusion after Archer’s brilliant hype at the meeting, but anyway the official word provided an excuse to celebrate. Archer seized the opportunity to take Perry and Jane, along with a charming date of his own (an elegant UCLA grad student out of Westport, Connecticut, and Wellesley named Phyllis Clare), to dinner at Spoleto, the hot new celebrity restaurant in Beverly Hills.
Mel Brooks was across the room, simply having dinner. Digesting it, no doubt, much like everyone else. There was a woman—what was her name?—who used to play a detective’s girlfriend on one of those nighttime series a couple of years ago. Every face was teasingly familiar. The sense that you either knew or ought to know who everyone was from having seen them in movies or TV or the pages of magazines or newspapers gave an interesting edge to the occasion, a sense of inherent drama, the illusion of being on the other side—the in side—of the screen or page or camera.
Perry was acutely aware of all this and was able to appreciate and enjoy it without being snowed by it. He had that light, buoyant feeling of being on top of things, of seeing and hearing everything around him with the special clarity that is the gift of an author. He was taking mental notes of his own reactions to what other people were doing and saying, and the realization of what a different scene this was from his usual academic and small-town Vermont milieus made it especially absorbing. What a ripe new setting for what Jane called his field anthropology! Yet part of the trick of being a good observer was not sticking out from the scene, not letting the natives know you had your eye on them, but rather, trying to relax and blend in. That was what Perry was doing as he listened in genuine fascination to the evening’s host regaling his guests.
“Don’t forget the cars, the people always love cars!” Archer said, doing his imitation of the old executive who had called out that exhortation to him and Perry as they left the network meeting. The women were delightedly amused at the comic rendition Archer was giving of the now historic meeting at which “The First Year’s the Hardest” was pitched and sold.
“And then what?” Archer’s date asked eagerly.
“And then,” Perry said, adding his bit to the entertaining account, “I held my breath, terrified that Archer was going to tell me in the elevator that I had to write a couple of car chases into my script.”
Everyone laughed at Perry’s self-confessed naivete, and the misconception that Archer might be so gross.
“Perry didn’t realize the car-chase man is simply one of those characters who’s been around the business forever and has no power,” Archer explained.
“That’s right—I thought because he was the oldest man present, and was wearing a suit, he must be the head honcho,” Perry admitted, to everyone’s amusement.
“So who is he, really?” Jane asked with interest.
“Harry someone?” Perry asked.
“Harry Flanders,” Archer affirmed wit
h a nod. “Worked on the old ‘Highway Patrol,’ got a rep as a programming genius, and kept getting kicked upstairs at the network. He’s part of the furniture now.”
“And I guess he keeps suggesting putting cars into every program, no matter what it is,” Perry said, displaying his new insider’s knowledge.
“‘The people love ’em,’” Archer intoned, imitating the powerless old exec.
“That’s him to a T,” Perry laughed.
“I wish I could have been a fly on the wall at that meeting!” said Phyllis Clare.
“You should have seen Archer’s performance,” he told her. “The man is a true artist.”
“That’s what he keeps saying all the time about you,” Phyllis purred.
“Hey, I’m going to expose you now,” Archer told his beautiful date, then pouring more champagne into all the glasses he spoke confidingly to Jane with the same sort of wink he had given Amanda LeMay at the network meeting. “It just so happens that Phyllis here is Perry’s biggest fan.”
“Next to me, you mean,” Jane said. “And I have seniority—and tenure!”
Perry nudged her under the table. The adulation was getting a bit thick, he felt, even for a literary man from the boonies who privately believed he wasn’t appreciated as much as he might be by the world at large.
“It’s you who deserve the kudos tonight,” Perry said, raising his glass to Archer, and telling the women with a wink of his own, “His performance at the network meeting should have won him an Oscar—or should it be an Emmy, for television?”
“Better get that right, amigo,” Archer said. “That’s the one you’ll be collecting for your trophy case a year from now. The Emmy, for best original screenplay.”
“I’ll drink to that,” said Phyllis Clare, beaming as she lifted her glass.
Perry shifted uneasily in his seat.
“I think we’re getting ahead of the game,” he said. “I haven’t put a word on paper yet.”
“Not to worry,” Archer assured him. “We’ll get you under way first thing in the morning.”
“With that in mind, I think we better order now,” Perry said.
“What do you recommend here, Archer?” Jane asked.
“Let’s find out what Dom is up to with the veal tonight,” the suave young host said, raising a finger that immediately drew a waiter, captain, and sommelier at the same time. The sommelier poured the last of the champagne from the bottle at the table and Archer gave him a brisk nod and snapped out a single-syllable directive:
“More.”
“So what did you think of the amazing Archer Mellis, boy wonder?” Perry asked, as he stumbled out of his pants later that evening and aimed for bed.
“Amazing,” said Jane.
“That’s my adjective. Be original.”
Jane stopped rolling down her panty hose and pondered for a moment.
“Smooth,” she said.
“Smooth? I’d have bet you’d say ‘slick.’”
“I don’t know,” Jane said, tossing her panty hose away, “I’m trying to convey his ‘operator’ quality. I kind of like ‘smooth.’ As in ‘a real smoothie.’”
Perry started to laugh, but a hiccup interrupted.
“‘Smoothie?’ That’s an oldie but goodie, all right. I like it.”
“It’s closer to the mark than ‘slick,’” Jane said, snuggling into bed next to Perry. “That sounds a little too ‘oily,’ too conniving.”
“Well, I’ll find out for sure tomorrow. When we really get down to the script. The nitty-gritty. That’s when we find out just how much of a con artist this character really is.”
“The only thing that matters is he can’t con you.”
“Nope. I come equipped with what good ole Papa Hemingway said all real writers got—my built-in shit detector.”
“Mmm,” Jane said. “Lucky you. That way you’re able to tell the difference between a sincere fan like me and a snippy little fake like Phyllis Clare.”
Perry smiled, turning out the light and pulling Jane close against him.
“Mmmm. I love you.”
“Mmmm. You top …”
The earthenware mugs of black coffee in Archer’s office were so hot that steam came off of them. The strands of gray steam curled upward in the lemon-tinted light of the cool morning, making Perry think of Indian smoke signals, secret communications among conspirators. Archer told his secretary to hold all calls. There was a sense of purpose and subdued excitement like that feeling in college when a couple of like-minded friends get together and decide to start a magazine.
Was it all planned, a deluding illusion?
Archer was quiet, concentrating. He had taken off his combat boots and was pacing the room in stockinged feet, wearing a one-piece orange jumpsuit that seemed to be made of parachute silk. Occasionally he blew on his mug of coffee or took a quick sip of it, speaking in low serious tones of “essences,” of “values,” nodding approval of the few suggestions Perry made.
Still, there was not exactly a story.
Yet.
Archer suddenly pointed at Perry.
“What if—” he said.
“Yes?”
“What if—Jack and Laurie are, like many newly married couples, broke.”
“Yes? They would be. Sure.”
“And what if—to solve some of their financial problems, they decided to move in with their in-laws.”
“Which ones? His or hers?”
“Which would be more interesting? Create more problems?”
“Hers—because her father’s a professor. He and Jack are kind of in competition.”
“Perfect.”
“Yeah—I mean, all kinds of things would happen. Funny. Sad. Real.”
“You got it.”
“Hey—this is not bad.”
There was a buzz, and Archer grunted into the phone and said, “All right, if it’s urgent—I’ll get back to him in two minutes.”
Archer turned and stared at Perry, seeming to look straight into him.
“This is your show,” he said. “I have total confidence.”
Perry stood up, feeling dizzy with panic.
“Listen, thanks, but—well, isn’t there something more I should know? Some basic rules or something? About writing for television?”
Archer walked slowly up to Perry, coming so close their noses were almost touching. He uttered one word, like a command.
“Don’t,” he said.
“What?” Perry asked, confused. “Don’t what?”
“Don’t try to ‘write for television.’ Write the best damn thing you can. Don’t think about ratings or networks or any other bullshit. Just write the finest script that’s in you.”
Perry looked directly into Archer’s eyes, trying to detect any sign of falseness, but the young executive gazed relentlessly back at him, back into him, it felt like.
“I hope you mean that,” Perry said.
“Try me.”
“I will.”
Archer stepped back and gave Perry a quick squeeze on the shoulder.
“Go for it,” he said, then turned away.
Perry walked out of the room, a slight smile playing on his lips as he savored the situation. All right, he’d been given free rein and he was going to take it. He was going to give Archer Mellis the classiest, most intelligent script that was in him. Then he’d find out just how much this character actually meant what he said about raising the quality of prime-time television.
III
Everything was new.
It was really the same old stuff, of course, the tools and totems Perry Moss had used on thousands of days over years and years. There was the beat-up old manual Royal portable typewriter with the beige body and green keys (including the “k” that always stuck), the solid ream-size package of plain white typing paper, the yellow pencils arrayed with sharpened points sticking up from the chipped souvenir Red Sox mug, the tiny steel toy locomotive whose smokestack was actually a pencil sharpen
er, the plug-in electric percolator brewing the black coffee that was strong enough to “corrode nails,” according to Jane, and, of most recent vintage, the color photo of Perry and Jane in the autumn flare of the mountains of Vermont that was taken by Al Cohen and given to Perry for a birthday gift in a plastic frame-stand. Perry had only planned to bring out the faithful Royal portable for this month-long stint but Jane had also prudently packed what she called “the essential toys” to insure his psychic ease and comfort.
The rituals were the same, also: the lighting of the pipe, sharpening of pencils, folding paper into halves to make notes and scribbles on, pacing back and forth across the room, moving in closer, then taking a deep breath and planting himself in the chair, down to business.
The words were the same, too. They were the ones he had always used, the ones that had served him so well. He had not had to learn some new vocabulary. Archer had even brushed aside his concern over mastering technical terms to put in the kind of stuff he had seen in some scripts like “pan to” and “dolly” and “angle on.” Directors liked to put those things in themselves, Archer explained, and writers didn’t really have to worry about it.
Just write.
Perry wrote, using the old familiar words, but—and this was an exciting difference that made the whole process he was undertaking seem more exotic—he was putting the words on paper in a new and different way.
They looked like this:
INTERIOR—JACK AND LAURIE’S BEDROOM—DAY
LAURIE stirs, wakes, and yawns. She looks around the room, looks next to her in the bed, sees JACK, her husband. She smiles, and rubs her hand soothingly along his back.
LAURIE
Jack?
JACK groans, and moves away from LAURIE.
JACK
Huh?
Perry looked at the page and felt an odd tingle of excitement. These were his first words—at least the first words he had written that would actually be spoken, by real actors, in front of a camera, for an audience of millions. Suddenly he started to laugh, at himself, at the foolishness of pride in getting a couple of gruntlike sounds on paper, yet he sensed that something important had occurred.
He was doing it. He was writing a script. Stoking his pipe, he returned to the work with a feeling of heightened energy and elation.
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