The Garden on Sunset

by Martin Turnbull

  “Yes,” Kathryn replied, “everything’s fine.”

  He blinked slowly, deliberately. “I mean everything . . . healthwise . . .”

  Kathryn felt a blush spread up from her cream collar like a grease fire; she was relieved when he looked away. “Everything is fine,” she repeated evenly.

  “I just want you to know that I’d choose practicality over dogma every damned day of the week. You can come to me with any problem, of any sort.”

  Kathryn nodded and fumed.

  “Good,” he said, returning to his desk. “Enjoy your lunch.”

  The taxi pulled away from the curb and entered the traffic heading east on Hollywood Boulevard. Laura stared out at the pedestrians with a stone jaw.

  “Laura?” Kathryn asked.

  “Mmmm?” Laura didn’t shift her gaze.

  “Did you mention anything to Mr. Wilkerson about my appointment?”

  “Appointment?”

  “With Hettie’s doctor.”

  “No, of course not. What a thing to ask me. How would Bill even know?”

  Kathryn glanced at Laura. Oh, so it’s ‘Bill,’ is it? “He asked after my health.”

  Laura turned to look at Kathryn. “One’s boss asking after one’s health does not mean he knows about your so-called appointment.”

  “General inquiries into one’s health do not usually make mention of choosing practicality over dogma.” Laura snorted and turned back to watch the sidewalks.

  So much for linking arms in solidarity.

  A large table had been set for twenty on the left side of the Vine Street Brown Derby. Not yet half the seats were filled, but there was no mistaking the woman around whom the Hollywood Women’s Press Club orbited.

  Louella Parsons wasn’t plump, but she was headed in that direction. Her bosom was starting to swell in that matronly sort of way. She had a horsey face, heavy and jowly with a vacant but permanent smile, which was unfortunate because her teeth were brown and ragged. As Kathryn and Laura approached, Louella stuck out her hand rather like the Queen Mother expecting it to be kissed. Laura shook it like a man.

  “How lovely to see you,” Parsons said. “Mr. Wilkerson has been rattling the cups of anti-communism, I see.” That week, the front page of the Hollywood Reporter had screamed that Hollywood was rife with Reds. “Worked himself into quite a rage over those submissives — no, no, that’s not the word I meant, is it?”

  “Subversives?” Kathryn suggested.

  “Yes, of course. Subversives. Thank you, my dear.” Louella frowned at Kathryn. “I don’t believe we’ve had the pleasure.”

  Louella thrust forward her Queen Mother hand. It felt to Kathryn as clammy as last week’s cod. When Laura introduced them, Louella’s eyebrows flew up. “Ah, yes, I heard that the Hollywood Reporter was starting a new column. The title . . . something about a window?”

  “Window on Hollywood,” Kathryn said.

  “Ah, yes. When does it start?”

  “Last week,” Laura put in with a smile that Kathryn couldn’t decipher. Their exchange in the taxi had rattled Kathryn. She thought she knew where she stood with the only other female in the Reporter’s newsroom but now it appeared she didn’t.

  “I must make an effort to read it,” Louella said, as though the thought of reading Kathryn’s column required more exertion than she was prepared to expend.

  At one o’clock, Louella called the women to the table. All twenty seats were filled with indistinguishable variations of Laura Pettiford, plus or minus ten years. Every one of them was color-coordinated — hat, suit, gloves, handbag, and shoes all exactly the same shade from head to toe. Each hairdo was every bit as complicated as Laura’s. Kathryn and Louella were the most cheaply dressed women at the table; Kathryn’s dimestore hat felt like a rhinestone brooch at Tiffany’s.

  Everyone around the table quickly settled into chatting with her neighbor. Laura seated herself on the other side from Kathryn and down five places, and launched herself into a conversation with the heavily freckled woman next to her. Kathryn didn’t mind being left alone; she needed to think. What did Laura hope to gain from making the Hollywood Reporter’s new columnist look like an immoral slut who got caught with a bun in the oven? Did Laura want her job? Or was it the boss Laura had her eye on? How would Bill even know? Kathryn decided she’d be damned if she was going to let Laura Pettiford get her job, but she would let her know that as far as Mr. Wilkerson was concerned, the field was wide open.

  The waiter cleared his throat as he lowered a glass of iced water in front of her. “Thank you,” she said, absently.

  “You’re welcome, Kathryn. It’s nice to see you again.”

  She looked up to see the skinny fellow who helped Gwendolyn get in front of the camera that day of the Graf Zeppelin. “Oh, hello! Ritchie, isn’t it?”

  “Yes, that’s right,” Ritchie smiled warmly. “How’s Gwendolyn? Did anything come of that day down at Mine’s Field?”

  “No.” Kathryn smiled. “Not for want of trying, though.”

  “Please tell her I said hello.”

  Louella rose at the head of the table and announced that they were honored to welcome the latest female addition to the Hollywood press, Miss Kathleen Massey from the Hollywood Reporter, whose new column, Hollywood Window, would begin next week. A round of applause, more rote than welcoming, followed. Parsons invited the women to ask Kathryn any questions they liked. “It’s sort of our getting-to-know-you initiation,” Louella explained, and sat down.

  “I have a question.” It was the freckled lady next to Laura. There was something unsettling and smug about her smile. “Where do you stand on your boss’ accusations that Communists have infiltrated the studios?”

  Kathryn took a moment to organize her thoughts. Wilkerson’s recent editorial had caused an uproar in the industry. The studio bosses worked up a rabid froth thinking he was accusing them of personally allowing Communists to take over the movie business. They got him all wrong, though. Wilkerson’s point was that if these alleged Communists actually did manage to work their message into Hollywood films, then the ninety million Americans who went to the movies each week were being subtly brainwashed. But his point sunk under the torrents of abuse the bosses had poured into print. Wilkerson was uncharacteristically floored by the backlash; he played high-stakes poker with these guys every week, and claimed he hadn’t seen it coming. Kathryn had to wonder if this was all just some silly brouhaha they’d concocted around the card table to give themselves more column space.

  She looked around the table and tried to read the women’s faces. Would they respect loyalty over personal feelings? Or moral conviction, regardless of the company line? But this was an unreadable crowd of pleasant smiles and perfect make up.

  “I’ve only been with the Reporter a short while,” she said, “but I’m no stranger to the ways of Hollywood. Mr. Wilkerson hasn’t told me where he got his information.” She said the name of her boss deliberately for Laura’s sake. “I don’t enjoy the strictest confidence of my boss, nor do I ever expect to. You’ll have to ask him about his editorial.”

  Laura’s shoulders relaxed.

  “Yes, but do you believe him when he says the studios are rife with Communists and they ought to be routed out?” Freckles persisted.

  “I don’t know that ‘rife’ would be the word I’d use.”

  “So you disagree with your own boss?”

  Kathryn glanced around the table again, desperate to discern what they expected of her, but nobody gave an inch. All right then, she decided, I might as well just be myself and hang the consequences. “I think Hollywood is in the business of making all kinds of pictures about all kinds of stories for all kinds of people. The greater the range of perspectives contributing to the output, the better it is for the industry as a whole.”

  The women sucked in a quiet collective gasp.

  An older woman with wispy gray hair said, “Personally, I’m not convinced that Communists have infiltrated our
industry. But if they have, it almost sounds as though you don’t mind.”

  “It’s not illegal to be a member of the Communist party,” Kathryn pointed out.

  “Are you a Communist, Kathleen?” Louella Parsons asked.

  “No, I am not. But the last time I looked at the Constitution, it said that people are entitled to their opinions. It’s called freedom of speech. All I’m saying is that a variety of opinions and viewpoints can only make motion pictures more interesting. And surely, more interesting pictures can only be good for the industry.”

  Kathryn looked around for someone willing to take up the argument for or against, but nobody would look her in the eye. She mumbled, “Thank you,” and sat down.

  The conversation around the table resuscitated in fits and starts, but Kathryn was left to stare into space. By the time the main course was served –a filet of Colorado rainbow trout in Amandine sauce, with French fried eggplant–she wished she’d never come. She ate her fish in silence and focused on the caricatures on the walls. They were becoming as famous as the Brown Derby itself; you knew you’d made it when you were asked to sit for your portrait. Something told Kathryn that “Kathleen Massey” wasn’t likely to attend any more of these dreadful affairs. Oh well, she decided, at the very least, I hope I’ve let Laura know that if she wants “Bill” in her claws, she’ll get no competition from me.

  Once the main course was cleared, Ritchie circled the table with dessert menus. Kathryn shook her head. The last thing she wanted to force down her throat was a slice of black bottom pie.

  “You’re going to want to see this menu,” he told her.

  “Thank you, Ritchie, but coffee will be fine.”

  Ritchie set the menu down in front of her. “No,” he said. “Really.”

  She opened the menu and found a handwritten note inside.

  Kathryn,

  We have a friend in common.

  Kathryn looked around and spotted a portly man in glasses sipping coffee in the corner, watching her read the note. He shot her a shy smile and nodded subtly.

  WRH & LP hate Commies. LP thinks you’re Red now. The man in gray is Clark Gable’s agent. MGM wants CG to wait ‘til after Call of the Wild is released to announce his divorce. This is gold — tell LP & you’ll be o.k.

  Kathryn looked over to see a stern gentleman in a gun metal suit with a permanent squint and a wide moustache. He pulled his wallet from his jacket pocket and thumbed through the wad of bills inside. He looked up and met Kathryn’s eyes, hesitated and smiled. Kathryn returned his smile. It would have been rude to brush off the guy whose big mouth was going to save her ass.

  As it turned out, the black bottom pie was delicious. It was a shame to gulp it down but she wanted to get the whole luncheon over and done with. She left the table without saying goodbye and headed straight to George Cukor’s booth. His companion was a rigid woman with porcelain skin even paler than her ivory muslin dress. Her smile was genuine, though, and she studied Kathryn with intelligent eyes. “Thank you so much,” Kathryn said to George. “I don’t know how to repay you.”

  George waved away the rest of her speech. “Don’t mention it,” he told her. “Kathryn, may I introduce you to Mercedes de Acosta?”

  “Ah!” Kathryn said. “Nice to meet you.”

  “Marcus wondered if Mercedes might know where Alla is.”

  Kathryn sought the woman’s eyes. “Do you?” Kathryn asked Mercedes. “We all miss her at the Garden.”

  The woman’s smile widened. “You should have stuck closer to home.”

  “To home?” Kathryn was puzzled.

  “The best person to ask that sort of thing is the one who knows everything about everyone: Tallulah Bankhead.”

  CHAPTER 41

  The collar of Marcus’ shirt rubbed against his neck. A quarter to nine in the morning, and it had to be at least ninety degrees. He pulled at his purple necktie and wiped away the dribble of sweat rolling over his Adam’s apple. You’re not sweating because it’s hot out, he told himself. You’re sweating because you’re afraid Buttface Hoolihan isn’t going to let you in.

  He pulled an envelope from his jacket pocket and extracted a single sheet of paper, which he unfolded and held so that Leo the Lion and the Ars Gratis Artis motto embossed at the top was clearly visible. Let Buttface Hoolihan accuse him of forgery now. He took a breath and rounded the corner. Hoolihan stood in the middle of the driveway, staring straight at him.

  “Mr. Adler,” Hoolihan said. “Welcome to MGM.”

  Marcus blinked. “Thank you.”

  Hoolihan raised his clipboard and turned the New Arrivals page toward Marcus. “See? You’re on the list . . . today. You understand, last time we met I was only doing my job, right?” Marcus nodded. “Do you know which building to report to?”

  “Scenario building,” Marcus said, “same as last time.”

  Hoolihan ignored the jab. “I hope your time here is fruitful.” He sounded genuine.

  “Thank you, Mr. Hoolihan.”

  “Everyone calls me Hooley.”

  Hooley’s voice was still ringing in Marcus’ ears when he reached reception in the scenario department. Dierdre didn’t recognize him.

  “Adler . . . Adler . . .” She rifled through the papers on her desk. “Ah yes, Marcus Adler. You’ve been assigned to building twenty-three.” She pulled out a map of the studio lot. “It’s right near the reservoir. Just take that main street under the big Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer sign and keep going until you see a giant pool with a pier and a pirate ship. Just look for the big numbers painted on the doors.”

  Back outside, the sunshine seemed a little harsher, the heat a little more concentrated. He walked past the commissary where the strong aroma of coffee filled the air, past the research building and the dance school, where a jaunty piano number wafted out with hand-claps and foot-stomps. He was passing under the huge studio sign at the middle of the lot when someone called his name.

  George Cukor was striding toward him with his hand extended. “Hello, dear boy! First day on the job! Pretty exciting, eh?”

  “This is going to take some getting used to.”

  “By day three you’ll be as jaded as the rest of us.”

  Marcus dropped his voice to a whisper. “Can I assume it’s thanks to you that I’m here at all?”

  Marcus had been feeling more dejected than an orphan on Christmas when George found him sitting on the steps of the scenario department, four lousy minutes too late. Worry not, Cukor had told him. There is always a remedy. When a miraculous letter emblazoned with MGM’s letterhead announced that his screenwriter’s contract would take effect at his earliest convenience, Marcus’ glum telegram delivery routine was a thing of the blessed past.

  Cukor smiled. “I owed you one.” He rubbed his hands together. “I’m due for a meeting with Thalberg. He’s all worked up over Romeo and Juliet. I fear he wants his wife for Juliet.”

  “But isn’t Norma Shearer a little . . . mature?”

  Cukor rolled his eyes. “Hence my trepidation. Can I walk you to your new home?”

  “You’re going my way?” Marcus pointed toward the reservoir.

  “No, no, Thalberg’s office is across from the scenario building. This way.”

  “I think twenty-three is across the pond.”

  Cukor frowned. “Twenty-three? Are you sure?”

  “That’s what the girl said.”

  “Hmmm,” Cukor said.

  Marcus fought a sinking feeling. “What’s wrong with building twenty-three?”

  “I thought my recommendation carried more weight. Twenty-three is the production office for Cosmopolitan Pictures.” He gave Marcus an encouraging slap on the shoulder. “I wish you lots and lots of the best luck,” he said, and walked away.

  Marcus stared at the reservoir and sighed. Cosmopolitan Pictures was a vanity production house established by William Randolph Hearst to satisfy his mistress, Marion Davies, and his libidinous ego. Marcus’ dreams of his family gazing
at his name on the screen credits of an MGM picture evaporated. So much for And don’t come back here until you’ve made it big in Hollywood.

  He checked his watch, composed himself, and hurried along the street to a brick building with a large 23 painted over the door. He opened it onto a long, comfortable room with desks spread throughout. Light poured through the windows onto potted ferns and philodendrons. The creamy white walls were hung with framed posters of Marion Davies in The Five O’Clock Girl, Not So Dumb, Polly of the Circus and Blondie of the Follies. Marcus, Kathryn and Gwendolyn had gone to see Billie Dove, Marion’s co-star in the last one. Billie had been floating around the Garden of Allah for years, and the inside story was that Hearst had ordered extensive editing after she outshone Marion. At least, that was how Billie told it.

  There was only one person in the whole place. He stopped pounding away at his typewriter when Marcus walked in. “You must be Adler.”

  “Yes. Marcus Adler, reporting for duty.”

  “Terrific,” the guy said flatly. “Welcome.” He waved a hand over the five empty desks. “Pick a desk, any desk.”

  Marcus chose one against the wall in the far corner. He hung his jacket and hat on the nearby coat rack and sat down as the guy approached with a thin stack of papers. “The name’s McNulty, you can call me Bub. I’m the script supervisor. I’m also in the middle of an emergency rewrite, because Hearst doesn’t like — ah, skip it. You’ll learn. I don’t have time to give you the full tour. I want you to read this and start sketching out a screenplay.”

  Marcus nodded and picked up a short story titled “Ursula Goes Underground.” It was about a girl called Ursula who spots an old flame — the one who got away — on the New York subway and follows him. It took all of four paragraphs before it dawned on Marcus that he was reading a version of his own story, “Subway People.” Roscoe the journalist had been changed to secretary Ursula, the L.A. subway had been changed to New York, and instead of discovering a whole community underground, Ursula discovered her one true love, a neighbor she’d never worked up the courage to talk to.