The Incredible True Story of the Making of the Eve of Destruction

by Amy Brashear

  NOTICE OF FILMING

  This area is being used to photograph and record video and film footage in connection with the promotional and publicity campaign of the movie Eve of Destruction. By your presence in this area, you acknowledge that you have been informed that you may be photographed and recorded as part of the release in home video and/or any media now known or hereafter devised, in perpetuity throughout the universe and the advertising and publicity thereof. Further, by your presence here, you grant your permission for your likeness and voice to be included therein without compensation, credit, or other consideration. If you do not wish to be photographed or recorded, or appear under these conditions, you should leave this area immediately. You will be reminded of this on each day of shooting. Thank you for your cooperation.

  EXT.CITY—AFTERNOON

  It is a bright, crisp southern day in June 1954, and the small-town Miss Atomic Bomb parade could be something out of a Norman Rockwell painting. Main Street is lined with townspeople applauding as the Miss Atomic Bomb, HELEN ALLEN, and runner-up, MARTHA WELLS, are driven in a bright cherry-red 1954 Chevrolet convertible. They wave to the crowd, smiling, laughing, and having a great time.

  HELEN sees HANK. HELEN smiles.

  HELEN

  (mouths)

  Hi.

  FADE OUT.

  No one knew her. Helen Allen wasn’t popular and certainly did not have the eye of the boys at Jefferson High. But she saw one boy with a twinkle in his eye. The way he smiled. The way he said her name when she would accidentally on purpose rush pass him in the hall. “Excuse me. I apologize,” she would say.

  He would counter with, “No problem, Helen.”

  Helen’s heart skipped a beat. She would do anything for him.

  That night as she sat with a mushroom cloud on her head, as she was crowned Miss Atomic Bomb in the back of a convertible, waving to an adoring crowd that barely knew her name, she saw him. Hank. She was in love. And it took an atom bomb for him to realize the lengths she would go to for him.

  Eve of Destruction, Book, page 5.

  Chapter Twenty

  It was a lot different from what I thought it would be. Confined to one central location, doing the same part over and over again, repeating the one line over and over again. “Let’s do it one more time . . . One final take . . . Just like that . . . Okay one last time . . . That will do . . . Cut.”

  Exhausting. Boring. It was drudgery, not glamour.

  We started filming that one scene at 3 p.m., and by 6:30, I couldn’t stop yawning. They got enough crowd shots, so Terrence was allowed to leave. He fell asleep in Freddy’s trailer. Raymond took back the dress, and Kitty helped take down my mushroom-cloud crown hair but not before taking a Polaroid and giving it to me as a memento.

  I said good-bye to Kitty, then went looking for Terrence so we could go home. I was so tired. But when I turned a corner around a trailer, I saw Mr. Edman talking with Mr. Paige, the cinematographer. They were deep in conversation, but not too quiet. I heard every single word. They were standing below a light post, as if they were playing a scene in some film noir involving an illicit conversation.

  “My guy didn’t come through, so we’re going to get creative. Trust me, it will work out. The footage will be absolutely fantastic,” Mr. Edman said.

  Mr. Paige didn’t agree. He used his index finger as a weapon, stabbing Mr. Edman in the chest. “If we get caught, my ass is on the line, and I’m sure as hell not going to prison over this movie,” he said.

  “We won’t,” Mr. Edman said. “Trust me.”

  A coyote howled in the distance. The two of them scurried away. I did, too—not because of the coyote but because I didn’t want Mr. Edman or Mr. Paige to catch me eavesdropping. Coyotes didn’t scare me at all. The only people who were scared of them were outsiders.

  I found Terrence in Freddy’s trailer sitting on a couch playing Mario Bros. on Atari. I climbed over Terrence’s feet and sat between them.

  “Score!” Terrence said, leaning over me to high-five Freddy.

  “I’ve got winner,” I said.

  “Okay,” Terrence said.

  “Fine by me,” Freddy said, giving me a nudge with his shoulder.

  We played for another hour and a half. Freddy went to dinner. I had homework to finish, so.

  Terrence drove us home. We were both so exhausted. Mom and Dennis were just setting the table, so perfect timing. Mom asked about our day while scooping mashed potatoes out of a bowl. But neither Terrence nor I took any. We both fell asleep at the dinner table. I woke up for a moment when Dennis tried to remove the fork I held in my hand.

  “Eve of Destruction” Films in Griffin Flat

  by Troy Martin

  Staff writer

  Little Rock—The production of Eve of Destruction continued in the small town this week.

  More than 500 extras lined the sidewalks of the small town in the hopes of being one of the chosen few selected for pivotal scenes.

  “I want them to look like people from the South,” said Anthony Dillard, one half of the famous duo BC-AD Productions.

  “I think the word he’s looking for is fat,” Bruce Coleman said. “But real is probably better.”

  “I guess the Jane Fonda videos are working,” Anthony said with a laugh.

  Extras have been lining the streets each and every day to have their one shot at fame.

  “This is the closest I want to get to a bomb,” said Otis Wilson, a resident of West Memphis, Arkansas.

  People from as far away as Oklahoma have come to get their one shot at stardom. Some are camping out at the fairgrounds in Russellville in order to be here for the biggest shot of all, on December 6. The day when the bomb is set to drop.

  The crew, with the help of some locals, have been rigging up some explosives.

  “The bomb will drop. We’re preparing everyone to not freak out,” said Margaret Meadows, local deputy.

  Filming began on November 26, and plans are to conclude on December 6.

  “Everyone has been so nice,” said Astrid Ogilvie, British actress. “I’ll be sad to miss them when I get to go home.”

  A local girl, Laura Ratliff, 16, has already made her film debut thanks to being lucky caller number nine in DJ Crazy Bob’s 95.6 radio contest. “It has been so surreal to be here. It’s been fun but a lot of work,” she said.

  As far as the plot of the movie, it stays close to the source material of the novella by Boudreaux Beauchamp. In the film as well as the novella, it is June 14, 1954, and a Civil Defense drill will take place on the same day at the same time as major cities across the nation. However, instead of a drill with the sirens blaring and people seeking shelter, and instead of leaflets printed with, This Might Have Been A Bomb! being dropped from planes, a 15-megaton hydrogen bomb drops on the citizens of Pikesville.

  Much of the movie is filmed in Griffin Flat, with one scene filmed at the state capitol.

  “Arkansas has a lot to offer the film industry,” said Mr. Edman. “I will be back to film again.”

  Eve of Destruction is set to hit theaters in the summer of 1985, putting Griffin Flat on the map and giving many locals a debut in a major motion picture.

  Chapter Twenty-One

  I’d be lying if I didn’t say I missed doing experiments with the athlete flavor of the week. But that didn’t make me want Mr. Truitt to reconsider my punishment.

  “Nonononono—I’ll do it,” Max said, grabbing the beaker out of Rodney’s hand.

  Max sighed and looked longingly at the safety shower. He desperately wanted to pull that string. But he didn’t. Unlike me, he had self-control as well as unrelenting fear of his mother.

  I was on question number four and just about to pull out my calculator from my bag when I saw Mr. Truitt slam his grade book down on the table, and throw his glasses down too, and stomp
his feet like the child I babysat once. (I retired right after.) A grown man throwing a temper tantrum was a sight to see.

  “Laura, I need to see you at my desk,” Mr. Truitt said.

  The class oohed.

  “Mr. Truitt, did I do something?” I asked.

  “Why is it that everyone thinks they are in trouble when I call them to my desk?”

  “Well—”

  “No.”

  He sat down and nodded for me to take a seat. He scooted his chair closer to his desk and I did the same with the chair.

  “I’m going to have to lift your punishment,” he said.

  “You’re what now?”

  “Grades haven’t been good, and Coach Brooks is on the verge of having to play with five players, with no one on the bench academically eligible.”

  “I don’t see how that’s my fault.”

  “Laura—”

  “I pulled the safety shower. I have to be punished.”

  “And you have.”

  “But—”

  “Laura, please, take one for the team,” he said.

  “I don’t like this one bit.” I slid down in my chair. “What dumbass needs my help this week?” I asked.

  He motioned toward Kevin Barnes. I groaned silently. I’d forgotten he even attended classes. I just thought he played games and went to parties. Maybe that wasn’t fair. Actually, it was. Not all athletes were stupid, but the ones in Mr. Truitt’s fourth-period chemistry class were. I found my apelike new lab partner (who reeked of cigarettes) sitting across from Max and Rodney. Max started snickering.

  “Hush,” I said. “It was worth it even though it didn’t last long.”

  “Sure.”

  Kevin slid the lab manual over and smiled. I hated him at that moment. Why did Kevin have to be stupid? He was a senior and still in chemistry. But he was a star Shiner athlete who needed a grade boost. And needed me to get him there.

  “We’re helping the dummies one A at a time,” Max said.

  “Who you calling a dummy?” Rodney said.

  “Um. You?”

  “At least I’m street smart,” Rodney said.

  “I’m street smart,” Max said.

  “Sesame Street smart,” said Rodney as he tried to light a Bunsen burner.

  “Oh no, you just got owned,” Kevin said, perking up.

  “I did, didn’t I?” Max said. He reached out for Rodney to shake his hand, which he did. (Max is a worthy opponent.) Max used his other hand to turn off the Bunsen burner before the entire school went kaboom. “Maybe I’ll join the basketball team and then Laura can do my work too.”

  “Ha-ha. Not a chance,” I said.

  “Don’t worry,” Rodney said. “The only way you’ll play basketball is if Governor Clinton enacted segregation again.”

  “Wow. That was a pretty good comeback. Well done,” Max said. He clapped.

  “Nothing to it.” Rodney smiled.

  “I’d say burn, but with you and all these chemicals together, that joke could go very wrong.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  In Griffin Flat, the art supply shop, bookstore, and comic book emporium are one and the same. Dewayne Smith’s, named after the owner, Dewayne Smith. As mentioned, he fed my X-Men and Flash habits, among others. But he also fed my Judy Blume habit. Max and I hit up the store as often as we could if time allowed and we had the money. In today’s case it was an emergency; Max needed a new ruler. He’d broken the other one lunging for the TV set. I still wasn’t sure on the details, even after Max’s long and convoluted story.

  Apparently, he’d heard the garage door open because his mom got home early from Bible study, and he couldn’t use the TV remote control—because his dad had taken the batteries out and put them into the radio, just like it said to in the FEMA pamphlet—so Max had to turn the channel on the TV manually since he was watching Top 20 Countdown instead of PBS, and needed to switch to Nova before his mom caught him. How exactly that series of events resulted in the breaking of his ruler was unclear. But here we were.

  Terrence tagged along. Before taking care of the ruler, Max darted behind the cash register to watch Dewayne Smith’s TV. He had to work the set, slap it a couple of times and adjust the antennas, but here Max was allowed to watch as much TV as he wanted before he had to go home. I don’t even really think he cared what was on, as long as it wasn’t PBS. He was one of the few kids I knew who had cable TV, and his parents wouldn’t let him watch any of it. (There were porn channels, or so I’d heard.)

  “Our shipment will be late this week,” said Dewayne Smith. He was talking about the comic books.

  “Noooooooo,” I said, a little too loudly.

  A few people in the store turned and stared. But only for a second. They understood. Most of the people who came here weren’t of the Kevin Barnes variety.

  I went to the Judy Blume shelf. I needed my favorite author to tell me how to handle life right about now. She had gotten me through tough times before. Whenever I needed help, I’d go to my mom, and she’d gift me with enough to buy a Judy Blume paperback. Or she’d buy them herself. When she couldn’t find the right words, which was often, she’d let Judy Blume do the talking. When I got my period, I was handed Are You There God? It’s Me, Margaret. When Mom felt like I gawked at Christian Slater too long, she handed me Forever. I dog-eared the juicy parts for reference. When Mom and Dad were getting a divorce, she accidentally handed me Tiger Eyes instead of It’s Not the End of the World. I had to wonder why she had Tiger Eyes at the ready. I called Dad every day for a month, making sure he was okay. Mom gave Terrence Then Again, Maybe I Won’t, and gave me Deenie for another reason I’d rather not share.

  “Any new Blume today?” Terrence asked, wandering back to the book area.

  “No. It’s sad, really,” I said.

  He laughed.

  “No practice today?” I asked.

  “Canceled due to the movie,” he said. “So is this what you and Max like to do for fun?”

  “Yeah, it’s exciting,” I said, trying to sound as deadpan as humanly possible.

  “Dad and Edna are working late again,” he said, picking up Smart Women.

  “It’s still really weird hearing my mom’s first name,” I said.

  “The same goes for me when I hear you call my dad Dennis,” he said, walking over to the comic books. “So what’s good?”

  “I can’t believe you just asked what’s good,” Max called, still in a trance in front of the TV screen.

  “Don’t mind him,” I said.

  “I never do,” Terrence said with a laugh.

  “Ha-ha. Very funny,” Max said, not losing eye contact with the inanimate object. I shuffled over to the comic book section. Terrence hung over my shoulder, eyeing the comics curiously. Unlike Max, I was happy to give him a tutorial and tell him what was good.

  “This one is Peter Parker and the Amazing Spider-Man.50 It’s pretty good. I’m more of a Firestorm51 girl, okay, but the X-Men? I freaking love the X-Men.52 Are you into DC53 or Marvel?54 Because I like both. But DC has the best supervillains . . .” I broke off, looking at him looking at me as if I’d been speaking in Russian. “You have no idea what I’m talking about, do you?”

  “No. But it’s cool,” he said.

  I smiled.

  He turned and picked up a copy of Batman, near the bottom of the rack. “A lot of superheroes are orphans,” he said.

  “Batman, Superman, Spider-Man,” Max said, listing off the super orphanage.

  “Why?” Terrence asked.

  “Character development,” Max said. “It’s great to give them a tragic backstory.”

  “I’m not an orphan, but I feel like one,” I said, not thinking before speaking.

  Luckily Terrence never asked what I meant. He just listened to me talk.

&nbs
p; “I’m not an orphan in the traditional sense, like Annie, but my mom is newly married to your dad, and my dad is off—”

  “Saving the world from annihilation,” Terrence chimed in, finishing my thought.

  “Funny that we are dealing with the fallout,” I grumbled.

  “Survivors of the aftermath,” Terrence said in a dramatic doomsday voice. When I laughed, he added, “Sorry. It’s the comic books. They’re messing with me.” He glanced at the snowy image on the TV screen at the front of the store. It looked like the local news . . . sort of.

  “Now, what are your thoughts on Star Wars?” he asked.

  “Oh, I’ve got thoughts,” I said. “The first one was really, really good. The Empire Strikes Back was even better. But Return of the Jedi was . . . Honestly, I think they made it just to sell merchandise.”

  “Did you know that the movie was originally called Revenge of the Jedi?” Dewayne Smith asked from behind the register, eyes on the TV. “They made, like, only a hundred T-shirts. I got one. And when the time comes, I’m going to sell that merchandise and retire.”

  He might have been a grown-up, but Dewayne Smith was an even bigger nerd about movie and comic book trivia than we were.

  Max hopped off his stool and walked over.

  “Speaking of Star Wars, you two are like Luke and Leia,” he said. “You know, Return of the Jedi Luke and Leia, when they find out they are brother and sister and Leia can officially be with Han.”

  “Are you Han in this situation?” Terrence asked with a smirk.

  “Oh, goodness, no,” Max said. “I’m more like Chewbacca.”

  I shook my head. “You’re C3PO and you know it.”

  Max gave me a death glare.

  Terrence shrugged. “At least nobody here said I was Lando Calrissian.”55

  * * *

  50 Marvel. Vol.1 #259, December 1984. Contains the story of Mary Jane Watson.