Stars Over Sunset Boulevard

by Susan Meissner

  “Miss Myrick?”

  “Susan Myrick is a Georgia native and journalist as well as a personal friend of Peggy Marsh. She’s the official technical advisor, so it’s important to Mr. Selznick that she have whatever she needs.”

  Peggy Marsh? Another name Violet did not know. She would ask later who this woman was. Surely Audrey would know. “I see,” she said.

  “The secretary who assists her will be following her around with a notepad and taking down all her dictation, and then typing and sending out her memoranda and correspondence. There will be some long days ahead; maybe some late nights and surely some weekends. Do you think can you manage that? You will be compensated for your overtime.”

  The other secretaries in the room had all raised their heads from their typewriters. Violet felt their envy as easy as a breeze through an open window. “Uh, yes. Yes, of course.”

  “Good. Very good.” Miss Rabwin seemed very relieved. “Tomorrow morning you will report to the office Miss Myrick will be using. Mrs. Pope can show you where it is later. At the end of every day you will ask Miss Myrick where she wants you to go the following morning. If she leaves the studio for a meeting or for dialogue coaching, you come back here. That will be your time to get her dictation done and her correspondence out. If you are unsure of anything, don’t hesitate to ask someone, all right? Miss Myrick’s being here is very important to Mr. Selznick and to Mr. Cukor, the director. We don’t want there to be any problems that we could have warded off if we’d known about them. Do you have any questions, Miss Mayfield?”

  “No, I don’t think so. Thank you very much. I . . . I am honored.”

  “Remember what I said. If you have a question, ask.”

  “I will.”

  Miss Rabwin turned to head back out. Mrs. Pope nodded toward Violet’s stack of dictation. “Finish what you’re working on and then come find me. I’ll show you where Miss Myrick will be.”

  “Thank you for thinking of me, Mrs. Pope.”

  The supervisor tipped her head to let the compliment slide off. “You should thank Audrey Duvall. She’s the one who recommended you.”

  Violet spun around to face the far wall. Audrey was sitting at her typewriter, clacking away, but a wide smile curved her lips.

  Violet waited until Mrs. Pope returned to her little office and then she hurried over to Audrey’s desk.

  “Congratulations on your new job, Miss Mayfield,” Audrey said softly, mindful of the others in the room.

  “Audrey! Why did you put my name forward? You should have asked for this job,” Violet replied in a hushed tone.

  “Because you’re perfect for it. You are the fastest typist in the room. You take the best dictation. You’re from the South, for Pete’s sake. You were meant for this job. And I will be remembered as the one who knew you were. Don’t you worry about me.”

  “I don’t know how to thank you.”

  “Well, you might want to save your thanks until you find out how busy you’re going to be. It can get pretty crazy around here during filming.”

  Violet looked to see if Mrs. Pope was still inside her office and then she grabbed a chair from an unclaimed desk. “So who’s Peggy Marsh?”

  Audrey pulled out the typed letter she had been working on and inserted a fresh piece of paper. “Peggy Marsh is Margaret Mitchell. Your Susan Myrick is chums with the author of the book, Vi.”

  “Oh my goodness.”

  “I hear Miss Myrick is nice, though. Funny, but doesn’t take nonsense. She’s probably in her forties and single.”

  “Single?” The notion filled Violet with a strange mix of sadness and admiration.

  “Good thing, probably, because if you ask me, she’s got her work cut out for her. I typed up her contract. She’s going to have to go over every line of the script—which you and I both know is nowhere near being done—plus every prop, every set piece, every word of dialogue to make sure it rings true. She’s also going to be coaching the actors on how to sound like they’re from the South. You probably read in Variety that Mr. Gable has refused to fake a Southern accent. Flat-out refused. So she won’t be coaching him much, but Leslie Howard and Vivien Leigh—whom I told you back on the night of the fire was going to play Scarlett—and Olivia de Havilland will all need hours and hours of coaching to scrub their voices of their British accents. They’re going to keep Susan Myrick hopping. Which means you will be hopping, too.”

  “Should . . . should I have said no?’

  Audrey looked up from the typewriter. “Absolutely not! You are going to be working on the sets of Gone With the Wind, Vi! You are going to be right there watching it come to life. You wanted something exciting to happen to you when you came here, didn’t you?”

  Violet smiled and nodded.

  “Well, then. Welcome to the real Hollywood.”

  • • •

  Violet stood a few yards from Selznick’s Tara, a house that in the pages of Gone With the Wind was nearly a character unto itself but was now merely a corner on the back lot—just two walls that met at right angles. At first glance, it appeared to offer all that a house should: a wide front door to welcome visitors, windows to watch the sun rise or set, and four sides as a defense against the heat, the damp, the cold, and the enemy. But the other side of the facade was completely open, with nothing beyond the front door but Culver City dirt.

  The fragmented outside of Tara stood apart from its disjointed inside. Violet had already seen what should be behind the walls—the stairway that Scarlett would descend on her way to evening prayers and also when she shot a Yankee deserter, and the parlor with the green velvet curtains that would one day make a dress—but those interiors had been constructed inside Soundstage Number 3, which she and Miss Myrick had toured earlier that day.

  Violet had settled into her new job with relative ease. Miss Myrick was all that she had been rumored to be. Capable, kind, funny, and smart. She was about the same height as Violet at five foot five, neither fat nor skinny, with short curly hair just starting to turn silver. The woman had seemed amused that she’d been given a young Southerner to take down her dictation, as if to ward off homesickness. Miss Myrick had been on the job only a few days and already it seemed she chased the sun one minute and the moon the next.

  As Miss Myrick now observed the look and feel of Tara’s exterior, Violet dutifully recorded her comments on a steno pad so that she could later send those comments in a memo to David Selznick and the director, George Cukor.

  There shouldn’t be quite so many dogs on the opening scene on the porch.

  Prissy ought not to go barefoot inside the house.

  The dirt around the house needs to be redder.

  Cotton isn’t chopped while dogwoods are in bloom.

  Minutes later, as she and Miss Myrick headed toward the minibus that would take them back to the Mansion, a props man with a question stopped them. This had happened at least once an hour that day and also the day before. Everyone had been told they needed to get Miss Myrick’s insights on nearly everything they did. Violet waited to see if Miss Myrick wanted her to make a notation of what was being discussed on the fly.

  “You can go on back to the office, Violet, and I’ll see you tomorrow. I’ve a coaching session with Mr. Howard after this.” Miss Myrick walked away with the props man, their heads bent over his clipboard.

  Violet returned to the Mansion and spent the rest of the afternoon typing notes from the two previous days, sending out several memos, and then monitoring Miss Myrick’s phone and answering what questions she could. A few minutes before five she went in search of Audrey for the commute home together.

  She found her roommate sitting at her typewriter with an ample pile of dictation in front of her. Most of the other secretaries had finished for the day and were already gone. An understated, steady staccato echoed in the room as the typewriter keys hit their tar
gets.

  “Selznick is writing his own damn book on the hell of love and war,” Audrey grumbled, nodding toward the thick stack of pages.

  “Want to give me some of those?” Violet took a seat at the unoccupied desk next to her.

  Audrey handed over a handful of her notes. “Your Miss Myrick went home early?”

  “She’s off teaching Leslie Howard how to talk like a proper Georgian.”

  Audrey looked up from her work, regarded Violet for a moment, and then continued tapping away. “You should offer to go with her when she does that so they can get to know you,” Audrey said quietly, mindful of the two remaining secretaries in the room. “You could coach on the Southern voice. Doesn’t Miss Myrick have more important things to do?”

  Violet couldn’t imagine asking Miss Myrick such a thing. “The coaching is important. Mr. Cukor and Mr. Selznick trust Miss Myrick. I don’t think they want anyone else coaching the cast.”

  “What they don’t want are details getting lost in the maelstrom because they’ve given that woman too much to do. If they trust her, then they would trust her judgment if she told them you can coach as well as she can.”

  “I’ve never coached dialogue before!” Violet exclaimed under her breath.

  “And you think she has? How hard can it be? The actors read off a line of dialog; you show them how a Southerner would say it. They practice mimicking you. Simple as that.”

  “I suppose.”

  “I just think you have a lot to offer, Violet,” Audrey said. “That’s all. You should do what you’re already good at.”

  Another ten minutes had passed when Audrey suddenly yanked out the memo she had been working on and slapped it onto her desk. “Let’s get out of here and do something fun. I’m tired of this.”

  “But your dictation . . .”

  “I’ll come in early tomorrow. No one wants to read his memos, anyway. Come on. Let’s go see what Bert’s up to. I hear Scarlett’s dress for the opening scene is finished. I want to see it.”

  Violet handed the dictation sheets back to Audrey, who tossed them into the wire basket on her desk.

  “Are you sure you want to leave those undone?” Violet asked as they both rose from their chairs.

  “Absolutely.” Audrey reached for her purse off the back of her chair and smoothed the peplum of her jacket over her skirt. She looked especially pretty in the shade of rose that she was wearing, and Violet wished she had on something more colorful than a featureless gray skirt and white blouse.

  They exited the back door of the Mansion and passed a few soundstages and people heading for home after the long workday. They stepped inside the expansive building where the costumes were kept, and Violet marveled at the rows upon rows of waiting racks and shelves. From the many memos she had typed she knew five thousand separate pieces of clothing would be housed there when all the costumes were complete. She also knew that at the moment few were done. Two workers on their way out smiled at Audrey and greeted her by name.

  “Bert’s in the back,” one of the men said.

  They found Bert in a staging area, cataloging a load of Confederate uniforms that had just come in but that still needed to be altered to look weathered and worn. His eyes lit up when he saw Audrey.

  “Well, hello there,” he said, smiling wide. “What brings you two down here?”

  “May we see the dress for the opening scene on the porch?” Audrey looked about the room for the gown. “I heard two of the wardrobe girls in the commissary today, talking about how beautiful it is.”

  Bert was alone in the room, but he looked around, anyway. When he turned back to face the women, he told them to follow him. He took them to a long rack and accompanying shelves tagged with a placard that read Scarlett. The dress slated for the opening shot hung on a padded hanger and was covered in cotton sheeting. It was the sole wardrobe piece hanging on the rack. Bert lifted the billowing white dress out of its protective drape. Even without its hoop, it looked like a cloud. Green sprigs danced across the voluminous skirt, and a velvet, emerald-hued ribbon hung from both sides of the tiny waistband, to be tied in the back. Ruffles of white and green fluffed about the bodice.

  “It’s gorgeous!” Audrey breathed, her face radiant. She took a step toward Bert and touched his arm.

  “There’s going to be a hat and a parasol, too,” Bert said.

  Audrey leaned in close to him. “You’re so lucky to be surrounded by such loveliness all day long, Bert,” she said. “You really are.”

  Bert looked down at Audrey’s manicured hand on his arm and smiled. “Lucky? I spend my days in a never-ending clothes closet. I’d rather be behind one of the cameras. You know that.”

  “Well, this is better than being a janitor. You know that.”

  They seemed to be recalling a conversation between the two of them that had taken place long before Violet had moved to California. In those few seconds, Violet felt invisible. “It’s such a pretty dress,” she chimed in, wanting her companions to remember she was in the room with them.

  Audrey let go of Bert’s arm to run her fingertips through the yards of fabric. “Miss Leigh will look stunning in it,” she said dreamily, almost as if she was imagining herself wrapped in the folds of the dress Vivien Leigh would wear.

  Bert cocked his head and smiled, as if he, too, was imagining Audrey in the gown.

  “I didn’t know filming was what you really wanted to do,” Violet said to Bert.

  A couple seconds passed before he turned his head to reply. “Doesn’t matter.” He shrugged. “It won’t ever happen, anyway. There’s probably a dozen or more people ahead of me, wanting to train on those cameras. I guess I should be glad I’m not still pushing a broom.”

  He returned his attention to Audrey, signaling as politely as he could that he really didn’t want to continue that conversation. Audrey was holding the gown up to her neck and swishing the fabric so that it sounded like muted applause.

  • • •

  The following morning when Violet reported to Miss Myrick’s little office, she learned they were to spend the first part of the day talking with Mr. Lambert, the wardrobe supervisor.

  Violet grabbed a pencil and her steno pad. “I thought Walter Plunkett was in charge of all the costumes for this movie,” she said, recalling the dozens of memos she had sent out in recent weeks related to the extensive clothing needs.

  “Mr. Plunkett designed the costumes, but it’s Mr. Lambert who has to see that all Mr. Plunkett’s designs get made, and made properly, and then are properly cared for. And it’s my job to make sure they’re right for the time period. Let’s be off.”

  They walked under gray skies that hinted of rain, past several soundstages to the wardrobe building, and Violet found herself hoping that she would run into Bert. She wondered if he would be pleased to see her.

  When indeed it was Bert who brought out the green-sprigged gown for Miss Myrick’s approval, his face registered mild surprise at seeing Violet, but then he cautiously winked at her. Violet knew he meant only to silently acknowledge that he had already shown her this dress in secret, but her face colored nonetheless. The wink felt personal, intimate, and suggestive. She could not remember the last time a man had winked at her.

  She replayed the gesture in her mind for the rest of the day.

  SIX

  Audrey swung open the bungalow’s front door, and Valentino, at the threshold, meowed a greeting from the edge of the dark living room.

  “Hello, kitty.” She stepped inside and reached for the wall switch, and kicked off her shoes as light spilled into the room. She tossed her purse and coat onto the sofa and walked barefoot into the kitchen, the cat at her heels.

  Moments later, with the cat munching on his food and a martini in her hand, Audrey contemplated making herself something to eat for dinner. She didn’t have much of an appetite, and her
skills in the kitchen paled miserably in comparison to Violet’s. Filming of Gone With the Wind had officially begun that day. She’d wait to see whether Violet arrived home feeling motivated to prepare something for the two of them to eat.

  She wandered into her bedroom to change into more comfortable clothes, but once there, she lowered herself to the armchair beside her bed. With Violet working late the past few days, Audrey had more hours for introspection—something that most of the time she was content to avoid.

  A month had passed since the holidays and the trip home, and her thoughts crept backward now.

  She had arisen early Christmas morning, leaving Violet to her dreams while she tiptoed from the room. The sun had been peeking over the eastern horizon, and Audrey expected to find the kitchen dark and empty. But a light was on and coffee had been brewed. Her father stood at the window, looking out over the orchard, a cup in his hand.

  He hadn’t heard her coming and she could have gone back to her room without him knowing she had seen him, but she’d remembered what Violet had said about making the horse thirsty so that he would have no choice but to drink.

  “Good morning,” she said softly, so as not to surprise him.

  Her father startled, anyway, and turned around abruptly. Coffee sloshed out of his cup and onto his hand and the floor.

  “I’m sorry.” She rushed forward to grab a dish towel.

  “It’s all right, it’s all right.” He set his cup down, took the towel, and blotted his hand with it, grimacing slightly.

  “Do you need some ice?”

  “I’m fine. Don’t worry.”

  He turned to the sink and ran the cold tap over his wrist for a few seconds. Audrey opened a drawer to get a clean dish towel for him but found hot pads and place mats instead.

  “She keeps them in the next drawer over,” her father said.

  Audrey located the towels, handed him one, and watched as he patted his skin dry.

  “You’re up early,” he said.