Hollywood is an All Volunteer Army

by Steven Paul Leiva

  “Vanity productions, Lydia. Simple, silly vanity productions. Instead of swimming with the sharks, you just created your own safe little pond. Why should I respect you for that?”

  “Because the productions may have been vain, but they were not done in vain. I sold my own movies at the film markets, MIFED and AFM, always achieving at least twice my costs, often more. I would take that money, fund my next film with a 10% increase in the budget and pocket the rest. Then I would sell that movie, again getting at least double my costs. Again, the next movie, 10% increase in budget, the balance into my pocket. I did this over and over and over until I built up a substantial personal fortune. The bulk of that money did not come from America. I could never sell beyond direct-to-video here in America. I was locked out of theatrical distribution in this country.”

  “You weren’t locked out, Lydia. Your movies just weren’t good enough. No stars, simple plots. You had okay production value, but otherwise—”

  “Aaa, you head towards my point. If I did not make my money in America, where did I make it? In what you call the foreign market. Europe, Asia, South America. My films sold well there. You see I made my films for the teaming masses, and Europe and Asia and South America especially, are where the teaming masses team. This is something Hollywood did not get back then. They did not understand the power that a simple, yet visceral, diversion had on the minds of the mundane poor bastards that most people are. Your snotty, well-fed American teenagers of the time liked to act oh so blasé and say, ‘Life’s a bitch, and then you die.’ Remember? They had no idea how much life, for most of humanity, really is a bitch, and they are all looking for a little something to take their minds away from that. The mundane masses. There are billions of them out there, that’s a lot of demand allowing us to keep the ticket prices low, making our product completely inclusive. It was a simple formula.

  “Then the world changed, as it too often does. Hollywood got it! Started to understand and exploit the international market that it used to look down its nose at, and it started profiting by that understanding. Profit Hollywood never invited me to share. So when Greece privatized television I said, to hell with Hollywood, I will go home where I’m appreciated. Where I’m a star. But the world has become so fucking small. Watching Hollywood grow on a formula I developed never ceased to gall me. Watching Hollywood make my kind of movies, but with the big stars only it could afford, and with expensive special effects and production values, pissed me off. Are the stories any more complex than the simple ones you accused me of telling? If you answer yes, then you are either a liar or completely self-deluded. So I’m back. With financial wherewithal, and if you think I was good at kicking groin—just wait till you see me kick ass.”

  Sara, who had sat blank faced through much of this, threw her arms up and said, “Wow!” and laughed and then continued, “What a performance! From the heart, though, I can tell, and I like people who are pissed, who feel there are several pounds of flesh owed them. It’s a solid motivation. All right. Maybe we can be in business together. I guess I will just have to get over the embarrassment of an alignment with an ex-producer of schlock B-movies. But, what the hell, that’s all Sam Arkoff and Roger Corman have ever made and now they do tributes to them. Okay, so, talk to me. What are the deal points?”

  Roee and I, dry, boring, and precise, laid out the deal as we saw it. It couldn’t help but appeal to Sara Hutton, as she remained the nominal power. As to dancing on occasion to Lydia’s tune, she saw quickly that that would become music made by her personal relationship with Lydia. You could see the plan forming behind her eyes to form that relationship—in any way necessary. Still, Sara Hutton was Sara Hutton.

  “I suppose if we align with you,” she said, “we will be producing and distributing epics starring Lydia Corfu.”

  “Of course! Why not! I want to see if a major studio’s marketing department can make me an American star. As to Foreign, I still have a following.”

  “And you have a love for your audience.”

  “Aaa, they don’t even satisfy me every other Tuesday.”

  “A respect then?”

  “No! What respect? I respect the jingle in their pockets that should be in mine. Aaa, let’s do this deal and do the world a favor. We’ll anesthetize the teaming masses with good solid simple entertainment. Ha! If nothing else, it will keep them off the streets!” Lydia laughed at her good joke.

  “An admirable goal,” Sara said, the slit splitting into a smile.

  As we stood up to say our good-byes, I coughed a few raspy coughs and quickly poured a little more orange juice in my glass to moisten my dry throat. As Sara had her attention on Lydia, I slipped the sound cube I had palmed into the near full glass of orange juice. I sipped, then set the glass back down on the tray, feeling much better.

  Sara saw us out saying that one of her lawyers would be in touch with us at the Bel-Air on Monday. She closed the door to Tara, excited, I hoped about tomorrow.

  Back in the limo, as we pulled out of the driveway, I turned to Lydia and remarked, “You didn’t drink much of your orange juice.”

  “Oh, do you think she noticed?” She said displaying quick professional concern, “but I told you, I hate orange juice—and that coffee!” She closed her eyes in a moment’s appreciation of the idea if not the fact of the coffee.

  “Yes, I know. Sorry, but it was necessary.”

  “Why?”

  “I needed an amplifier for the microphone.”

  “Nico, I know you will eventually make sense out of this, but if you must play your games—”

  “I needed a glass of orange juice, well iced, to slip a bug into.”

  “A bug?”

  “Yes.”

  “You mean, of course, a concealed listening device and not an insect.”

  “Of course. Look.”

  I pulled out of my pocket one of Petey’s sound cubes. It looked exactly like an ice cube, clear except for the frosted fractured area in the center. I handed it to Lydia.

  “A plastic ice cube? I don’t understand.”

  “It’s a microphone and transmitter built by a friend of ours. The clear encasement is made out of a special slow dissolving polymer. The guts of the piece are disguised as the opaque section in the center including a micro plastic battery, a small sliver of plastic made up of an electrolyte sandwiched by positive and negative electrodes. It has just enough juice to power the transmitter. The mic is at the tip of the fracture you can see extending from the center to the surface of the cube. As it sits in your hand, the mic is not very good, but submerged in liquid, with the liquid amplifying sound waves the mic is perfectly adequate.

  “It was designed to be used for a short time only, and to leave absolutely no trace of itself. When the polymer encasement completely dissolves, the center guts breaks up into little pieces of plastic that look exactly like orange or lemon pulp, and get, we assume, washed down the drain. Total security.”

  By this time Roee had instructed the driver to pull over and stop the limo behind a parked van on Baroda, a street not far from Sara Hutton’s house.

  “But why bug her now?” asked Lydia.

  “Come on let’s get out.”

  We exited and dismissed the limo. Then Roee opened the rear door of the van. Newsstand Mike, in a pair of headphones, was sitting in there at a set of instruments. We jumped in with him and Roee closed the door.

  “We are bugging her to catch any quick conversations that may happen before Josephina clears away the tray,” I said, now answering Lydia’s question.

  “A conversation among who? Sara and her servant?”

  “No. Sara and Maxwellton James.”

  “I’ve got something,” Mike said as he hit a switch.

  “So, what do you think?” Sara Hutton was saying.

  “An exciting prospect, obviously.”

  It was the voice of a man. It was a voice right down the middle. Neither too high, stretched, wispy, wimpy or an itchy irritant. Nor a too
deep, malevolently macho slug to your ears. It was a smooth, clam, calming, slide of a voice, textured just enough to be interesting. It was a crooner’s voice. A voice that made love. All forms of love. Especially the kind that blinds—and binds.

  “We’ve done well placing you at Olympic, Sara, but that placement is under threat. This could give us exactly what we need.”

  “Still, she’s going to want to call the shots.”

  “Oh, Sara, I think you’re man enough to deal with that.”

  “I’m not so sure. My contract has to be rock solid.”

  “Of course, but you’ve got lawyers who will see to that. We should concern ourselves with the expansion Lydia Corfu could buy us. Think of the spread of our influence.”

  “Yes, it’s tempting.”

  “Plus….”

  “What?”

  “I think we ought to invite her to the Castle for the next get together.”

  “Are you kidding? If she is totally against it, it will kill the deal completely.”

  “I don’t think so. Did you hear the things she said?”

  “Yeah, yeah, fine. Put down the masses. We all do it in casual conversation. The masses are asses, the leaders are peters, and there’s a whole lot of sodomy going on. So what?”

  “I’m willing to take the chance she’s not being frivolous. That there’s some deep thinking going on there. If you really want control of Olympic and all our other ambitions, invite Lydia Corfu to become a member of the Communion. Then there will always be higher objectives we can call on if we come to a dispute.”

  “I’m not so sure.”

  “Sara, just do it. Do it for me. Call them up and invite them.”

  “Okay, but I’m going to want a lot from you if this blows my chance to buy out Olympic.”

  “That’s no problem, Sara. You know I’m a giver.”

  “Josephina! Come and clear this tray!”

  I nodded to Mike and he turned the receiver off.

  “We’re in.” Lydia seemed pleased.

  “Yes,” I said. “So it seems.” I quickly looked to Roee. His eyes told me he agreed with me. We were definitely in, but if Maxwellton James had expected us to leave a bug behind, which he was now possibly—and fruitlessly—looking for, then what we had just heard may well have been nothing but playacting to snare us in. Which was a whole different quality of “In.” Outside of precautions, though, what could I do?

  It was not so much that the game was afoot—as that it was just unfinished.

  Chapter Sixteen

  Labor Intensive

  Sleep was not my friend that night. I had expected to spend most of the next day giving some thought to the kind and quality of precautions I could take, but sometimes the brain has a more demanding work ethic than the essentially lazy body. It’s one of the drawbacks of sentience. Around 12:30 I almost went into the library to sit down to some music and a view of the twinkles from the windows of Bel-Air mansions, but somehow I knew that was too sedentary for this assignment. So I quickly dressed, went downstairs, grabbed the Porsche, and drove up to Sunset Boulevard, turning left to take it to the beach. The curves of Sunset, which, taken at a certain speed, causes one to metronome to a particular rhythm, which sets up a useful meditative state.

  Bea. Her desires. Her naiveté. Her controlled beauty. Her outrage. Her death. Mike and his devotion. The arrogance of Sam Farber. The arrogance of Sara Hutton. The murderous pilot. The murderous banker. George.

  Max.

  Maxwellton.

  Maxwellton James.

  Warbirds and the Battle of Britain.

  Never has so much been owed by so many to so few.

  At the end of Sunset I turned right onto Pacific Coast Highway and started moving up the coast, past Malibu, to a little restaurant I know hidden in a cove. Hidden except for its reputation and the huge sign on PCH that pointed the way. The Sailfish Bar and Grill has been a well-known coastline eating and drinking establishment since the Nineteen-forties. Patrick Dumphy, one of the classic Hollywood supporting players of the Thirties and Forties founded it. Its patrons for its first years were mainly the Hollywood crowd, especially those with homes in Malibu. The place saw many interesting evenings packed with the faces and personalities of the oversize big screen best buddies, sweetest gals, sexiest vamps and toughest guys, who were all near daily “acquaintances” of every man, woman and child in America, but who really were known by none of them. There was no sign on PCH pointing the way in those days, and the restaurant was an effective hideaway for these people. Patrick Dumphy was one of them. Every night it was like inviting his friends home for dinner. The stars could be real here, relax and enjoy themselves, have fights and have affairs, drink too much and practice an honesty that was not allowed them at other times and in other places. It was the Clubhouse, unofficially members only, and so, very exclusive.

  Once Patrick Dumphy’s crowd passed from the scene, by death or death of career, he was forced to open up the restaurant to the plebes. His own acting career was gone and this was now the sole source of his income. Luckily newspaper columnists had made the place legendary, so once the sign went up on PCH it wasn’t hard to get the crowds to flock. Occasionally some of the old crowd did pop in during the late 50s and early 60s, but they were now just stars of nostalgia going there to be nostalgic. None of the “New Brats,”— Dean and Hudson; Brando and Wood —as Patrick Dumphy called them, would ever actually deign to go there. So the tourist trade paid the bills and Patrick Dumphy drank up the profits.

  When Patrick Dumphy died in the late 60s his son, Patrick, Jr., took over. He liked the tourists, and he milked them and bilked them offering not very palatable food and a dusty proximity to a glamour gone but not allowed to be forgotten. The Sailfish Bar and Grill became a bit of a joke—but never to Patrick Dumphy the Third who was essentially raised there, revered the memory of his grandfather and hated what his father did to the place. As sons often do, he rebelled against his father, leaving home young to become an adventurer, to become the kind of character his grandfather had portrayed in the movies.

  I met Pat3, as almost everyone called him, in South Africa where he had put together a group of mercenaries to storm Robben Island and break Nelson Mandela out of jail. This was completely Pat3’s idea and Pat3’s adventure. No one else really wanted him to do it. Not even, we knew, Mandela, who had great doubts for their eventual success, and some concern for his own health, if the operation were to take place. Pat3, though, is a big-hearted Irishman who hates injustice and so took it upon himself. It was a stupid idea. I was charged with stopping it and getting Pat3 out of the country, which I did with extreme efficiency. He hated me at first, but once things were explained to him, especially after he had read a personal letter to him from Mandela, thanking him for his concern, but expressing the belief that there would eventually be a political solution to his problem and any rash action now could jeopardize that, he came around and we became friends. As a friend I suggested that he should stop trying to turn movies into reality and go back home. The idea was abhorrent to him, but he said he would think about it.

  Later, upon the death of his father, which he heard about while trying to ferret a politically minded Buddhist monk out of Tibet, he inherited the Sailfish Bar and Grill. He returned to it to find it in a desolate state serving horrible food to more than horrible customers. Because of his left leaning, big-hearted, liberal attitude he quickly made friends with the New Hollywood. He shut down the Sailfish, completely restored it to its Forties seedy grandeur, got an incredible chef from the Carlyle Hotel in Manhattan, and reopened with a flare of fanfare. It quickly became the place for all the power players in Hollywood: Stars, directors, executives, lawyers and agents, as well as the high priced hairdressers, physical trainers, yoga gurus and nattily attired sailor-Scientologists that were now so much a part of the landscape.

  I turned left off PCH onto the steep little road that led you down to Heaven’s Cove and the Sailfish Bar and Grill. The
one story building sat right on the beach, backed by a large parking lot that had been extended to the left to accommodate daytime beach goers. To the right was a sheer rocky cliff, on top of which was a mobile home park. Moonlight bathed the cove, assisted by the incandescence of the restaurant and parking lot lights. There were only a few cars left. The last of the bar crowd was just leaving. The sound of them—loud drunk voices informing the world of their presence—and the sound of the ocean were all there was to be heard.

  I pulled up close to the back of the building, by the kitchen door. Pat3 was standing there having a smoke. He greeted me as I got out of the car.

  “Hey, Fixxer! How’s tricks? And I do mean that literally.”

  I came up and shook his offered hand. “Tricks in general are fine, Pat3. It’s certain tricks in particular I’m having a problem with.”

  “Well, I’d give you a good meal, but we’ve shut down the kitchen. Got plenty of vodka though.”

  “Don’t need food; don’t need drink. What I need is some good honest labor.”

  “Ah. Well, we’ve still got a load of the dishes from the last shift.”

  “Send your crew home. I’ll get them done.”

  “You sure?”

  “I need the work. I need the solitude. Send them all home and don’t dock their pay. I’ll leave a little bonus for them, make sure they get that as well.”

  “Okay Fixx, whatever you want, but do a complete and good job, will ya? I got a hell of lot of Sunday Brunch reservations.”

  Pat3 went into the kitchen and I went to the car to retrieve a CD boom box and some CDs. When I reached the kitchen door, three Latino men came out and clasped me around the shoulders with cheers and thanks. I had been this strange benefactor to them on several previous occasions. They never understood it, but they loved me for it, and if they had known my name I’m sure they each would have had a child who answered to it.