—Photoplay, November 1940
“I lost my parents,” Madge said.
“That’s terrible.”
“I mean they’re lost, not dead.”
“I’m trying to drive here,” I said. “I’m trying to lose this cop.”
“That’s what I mean. I lost my parents like that.”
“You drove and they followed you?”
“No, that’s not what I mean.” Madge was drunk. Her head rolled back and forth against her seat. “I mean I lost them.”
“Okay,” I said. “Tell me.”
“Aw, you don’t want to hear it.”
“You’re right. I don’t. You’re drunk and you’re making stuff up.”
“Probably.”
“Okay,” I said. “Tell me.”
“If you turn this corner you can lose the cop by Bing Crosby’s house. I spent the night in his bushes once. See it? You can lose anyone at Bing Crosby’s house, it’s a fact.”
“And that’s your story? Bing Crosby’s house?”
“I’m trying to help,” she said. “Let’s hide in those bushes.”
“Sure, he’ll never see your car.”
“Let me know if you need my help. Otherwise I’m just talking here. So, my parents,” she said. “My mom and dad. A few months ago my dad says to my mom, Honey, I’ve got a surprise. And out pop these tickets for the Queen Mary. It’s stupid, really. He never takes her anywhere. He waits for a war and then says, Let’s go. He says, We’ve got to see Paris. Who doesn’t, if you think like that. So they go.”
“I can’t lose him,” I said. “He’s right behind us.”
“That’s okay,” Madge said. “My story’s done. That’s my story.”
It wasn’t exactly her story, just part of it. Her dad had said, Honey, we’ve got to see Paris, because Hitler had just crossed Belgium to France, and when troops reached Paris, nobody would see Paris ever again. Not even Americans. Sounds stupid, run to see Paris before Hitler bombs the Eiffel Tower. Most people would stay clear of Europe in wartime, but consider this is Madge’s dad speaking. Plus the boats were still running, from New York to London to Marseille. Consider also that Madge’s mom said, Yes, honey, let’s go right now.
They left Madge in Riverside with plenty of money to last six months. Madge got beautiful postcards: Hello from Westminster Abbey! Greetings from the fish markets of Marseille! Toasting you from the vineyards of Burgundy! From the world’s most beautiful boulevard, the Champs-Élysées!
Then nothing. Not a thing, no letter or postcard. German troops reached Paris in April. Americans were told to get out, and most did. But not Madge’s parents.
Their ship docked in Long Beach in early July, and Madge was there waiting. She saw Charles Laughton get off the ship, she swears it was him with his ugly wife. But where were her parents? Lots of crying and hugs, other moms and dads home at last, glad to be home, thank God for America, have you read the papers? Poor souls, and those evil Germans! What will happen now?
Madge said the worst part was listening—all those parents telling their kids how they’d nearly died, they’d heard jackboots behind them, it had been that close, and their kids crying because Mom and Dad were back safe, fuck those people in Paris and Dunkirk and Versailles, at least they had Mom and Dad, and let’s go home now, let’s get your trunks and go home.
Madge went home, to hot Riverside, where it hadn’t rained since December. She let her maid go because the money had run out. Then she locked the house and moved to Hollywood, because who had more power than studios? Not the bank, where a guy told her the house was her father’s, sorry, no loan. Not the State Department, where a guy told her that maybe her parents would cable. The studios, though, they had power. Nazis watched movies, didn’t they? Jews ran the studios, but after a long day of war, didn’t Nazis say, Let’s catch that Cagney show at the Bijou? That Laurel and Hardy, that Mickey Rooney comedy? What a kick, that Mickey Rooney.
Madge went to the oldest, wisest studio head: Adolph Zukor at Paramount. He could do anything. He was the Wizard of Oz.
“He promised to help,” Madge said to me.
“When did he promise? How long ago?”
“He says it takes time. He gave me a job, see? He’s the Wizard. I work for him, and he’ll help me. You know what I really want to do? Here’s what I really, really want to do. I want to get on a highway and keep driving and driving until I get there.”
“Where?”
“What are you talking about? I want to throw up now.”
I pulled her car to the curb. Behind us, Joe braked his squad car and we both watched Madge open her door and vomit shrimp and mushroom caps on Bing Crosby’s grass. Then we drove back to the dorms, the three of us, me and Madge in her squeaky Dodge and Joe behind us, braking close at red lights.
Once I’d heard Madge’s story, Joe didn’t bother me. Joe wasn’t nearly as scary as Nazis. I waited for my asthma to rise and drown me, I waited for my lungs to suck in on themselves, my panic to take over. I couldn’t shake Joe, but I didn’t care. I waited—and I breathed. Madge cried and wiped her mouth. Joe followed all the way to the Gardens, and my throat never swelled. I saw his windshield in my rearview mirror, his red bubble light on the hood, and still I kept talking to Madge and breathing. I never got asthma. It was my favorite thing that happened all day.
* * *
I didn’t always hate cops. I never baked cookies for the squad or sat cold hours waiting for cop parades, but I thought cops were okay. I still do. Conejos called me a murderess, but he was okay. He dressed like a normal guy. He didn’t wear one uniform in the morning and another at night, like Joe Flores.
Or Teddy, my old friend, who never took off his uniform. He’d worn trousers and old shirts in high school because then he worked with his dad fixing cars. But the minute he joined the sheriff’s department, he put on that uniform and hasn’t taken it off, not even to wash. He wore it the day flood waters sank in the ground around Buena Park, and rolled back to Coyote Creek, Brea Creek, wherever they came from. He stood with Daisy and me at a sinkhole to the far right of our orange trees. Far, far right, past the orchard, almost to Orangethorpe Avenue. The rain had stopped. Daisy’s boots slid in mud, and if I hadn’t held her hand, then her arm, she’d have fallen. I could hear her make little throat noises, like a kid does when he’s sick. Teddy stood on my other side at the sinkhole. It was almost night. Teddy said, “Is this him?” and I said yes, and he threw his coat over the drowned face of my father.
CHAPTER 19
Irene advises: “All brides should remember that half the beauty of the gown lies in the way it is worn. Don’t slump. Learn to walk well and stand as if you were proud of yourself.”
—Photoplay, November 1940
The skirt and blouse worked so well at Stany’s party that I wore them to Paramount Monday morning. When I arrived on set, Miles Abbott yelled at me.
“You look like fucking Daisy Mae,” he said. “You could plow a field in that skirt.”
“I’m a Farm Girl.”
“You know what I mean. We’ll have to hide you in back.” He wore a brown wool jacket with huge shoulder pads and a tie that had little Paramount mountains on it, each mountain surrounded by twinkly gold stars. He was as short as me, and he never smiled at the extras or crew. He only smiled at Preston and Stany and Hank. “I ought to send you home. Do you know what ship dinner dress means?”
Then, swooping in like a bird, Stany said, “Here you are, Pen. I brought that gown I told you about. I’m not too late, am I? Hello, Miles, just outfitting our girl for the day. Won’t take half a minute. Is Preston on set? Good. We have time. Penny, let’s go. The gown’s in my dressing room.” Abbott smiled at Stany, frowned at me, and walked across the set to yell at Madge. Stany pulled my arm.
“How did you know?”
“Sshh,” she said. “Let’s get outside. We don’t want anyone to notice.”
No notice, except the extras wandering the ship’s big dinin
g room. If Stany were a bird today, then these were the mean birdwatchers, all in ship dinner dress with fox stoles, fingertip veils, gowns from J.C. Penney or Woolworth’s. Then there was Madge in blue bias-cut satin with a dimity overskirt fresh from the stash in our closet, but she wasn’t watching us. She argued with Miles Abbott and leaned against a ship rail, back arched so her breasts stuck out. She waved around one arm.
Stany passed a long buffet table set with real food, dinner on the ship. She stole some grapes and tossed them into her mouth. “I didn’t eat breakfast. Might as well eat this stuff today, because tomorrow it’s going to turn and we’ll smell old meat all day and never want to eat again. Hurry up.”
She’d already left by the stage door. It’s not that she could move faster than me. People moved out of Stany’s way. They let her eat grapes and gave her a path without feet or equipment. Then came me, and the path closed behind Stany, so I had to squeeze between a wheeled boom mike and a Wallflower who spit on my skirt.
“Did you steal my shoes? Those look like my shoes.”
I kept walking and pushed her with my shoulder.
She yelled at me, “I’m limping. I’m wearing shoes that are too small.”
My feet slid inside the Wallflower’s shoes, comfortable, and I ran out, past the tin shed, past the high security wall that separated the back lot from Hollywood Cemetery next door. When I reached Avenue P, I saw the back of Stany turning into the alley. Her hair flashed coppery gold. I ran toward her with my skirt bunched in my hands. I followed her into her dressing room.
“Let’s see what I’ve got,” Stany said. “Polka dots. How do you look in dots?”
“That Wallflower’s feet hurt.”
“She’d better get new shoes, then.”
“I should feel terrible for her.”
“Oh, Penny.” She hit my shoulders with her hands. She made me look directly at her. “I know what this is. You’re feeling guilt about last night.”
“I’m not. I can feel bad for a Wallflower without feeling guilty about you.”
“I don’t believe you. Dissolve the guilt. Get rid of it. Although last night, you did hurt me deeply.”
“Okay.”
“Why don’t you buy that Wallflower new shoes? Wallflower, right? At least she’s not in England. Do you think they have shoes in England? We all have something to be thankful for. Here we are,” she said. Her hands lifted from me, and she turned. Behind her a wardrobe had both doors open; beside her a cream velvet couch and cream curtains made the room airy and cozy. Hanging in the wardrobe was a lovely embroidered black column dress with peplum and bodice in navy blue. Stany’s hand reached out, paused at the dress, a long pause with her fingernails scraping the hanger, then pushed that hanger to the side and lifted the next hanger off the closet rod. She let a gown fall off the hanger and handed the gown to me. “No time for gawking. You’re not a tourist, Penny. Try on the dress.”
I tried it on. Gray taffeta with a split skirt and a gray chiffon train that looked like a tail. The dress stopped four inches up my ankles. “I’m a tall squirrel,” I said.
“Nonsense. It’s perfect.” She wore a black crepe skirt with a beaded top that showed her tummy. Red beads clacked on her wrists. Any dress she held against her own outfit would look old. “Walk around a bit. Now turn toward me. Okay, you could use some inches at the hem, but otherwise, perfect. Let me see . . . let me see . . . I’ve got . . .” She pulled a purple chiffon driving scarf from the foot of the wardrobe. “Tack this on the bottom. I have thread somewhere, not me but my dresser, and she has pins, too. We’ll pin the scarf at the bottom, and you can sew during breaks. We’ll pretend it’s a flounce. You’ll look great on film.”
“What about your dresser? Can’t she sew?”
“Do you see her around? Is she hiding? Honestly, Pen, I wonder about you. Did you find needles? Look in that drawer.”
“I’m sorry about last night,” I said. “Sorry I upset you.”
“I asked for the truth, and I got it. What more can one friend give another? Don’t move, I need to pin the scarf.”
“I can’t move and not move at the same time.”
“First law of acting,” she said. “Make each move on purpose. That’s how you move and not move. Body stays perfectly still, and then your arms move. Just your arms. Yes, like that. Good. Now reach for the needles.”
Stany taught me the first law of acting: move and not move. She says she learned that more than one body part in motion means the audience follows your body and not your words. Fine, if you have no dialogue and want to be noticed. But if you’re speaking, Stany says, move and not move. She learned the trick on Broadway. I’d never noticed her moving and not moving in any of her pictures, that’s how well it worked.
“And you’ll sew during breaks,” she said, and on set, Abbott placed me at a table with two extras hired for this scene, an older mom and pop couple, my parents for the day. We all had to stare at one spot in the dining room. The most interesting invisible person stood at that spot, invisible to us, since we stared at an empty booth. Imagine the set: ship’s dining room with tables in tiered circles around a few booths and a buffet table heavy with roasts and ham and a waterfall of fruit, and we sit at tables and watch not the food but an empty booth. Not many extras eat breakfast, and ham has a powerful smell. Preston should have stuck that ham in the booth, then we wouldn’t have had so many retakes.
“Cut,” Preston said. “Vic, angle the shot to that corner table. I want the look on her face.” The ham look.
During breaks I tacked the scarf to my hem and watched the Wallflower limp in my shoes. Stany sat outside the ship and played five-card draw with Hank and some sound guys. On stage we were supposed to be staring at Hank, that’s who would sit at the empty booth, but why use the real Hank when we’ve got an invisible spot to stare at and a good ham to smell? Let Hank rest.
I’ve held back one part of the scene. Imagine again: We’re staring at an empty booth, and above the booth are more tiers with tables and extras, and they’re staring, too, so I can stare at the invisible Hank, and right above him is a table where Madge sits. I lift my eyes a little to stare at Madge, sitting across the set in her blue bias-cut.
It was a beautiful gown. Even Madge looked pretty inside it, though a little upset because she’d fought with Abbott and her parents were lost in Paris. My Rosemary would have looked stunning in sea blue. She’d have pinned white hibiscus in her gold hair to match the dimity’s trim at her hips, and the bias would swirl and settle over those hips when she walked. Rose would have shown me a gown like this as soon as she’d bought it. She’d come home and try the dress on, twirl in front of me to show off.
She didn’t, though. She didn’t show off the sea-blue gown or the pink one with yards of chiffon. She never showed me any of the clothes Madge had pulled from the closet, not the jacket with lace cuffs, not a blouse, nothing.
Why wouldn’t Rosemary show me her clothes?
She bought them with cash from robberies, that’s why. She’d have to explain how she got the money, and she couldn’t explain, not for all those clothes, a fortune hung in a closet.
No, that wasn’t right. Rose could have made up a story and I’d have believed her. A man bought me this dress, she might have said. I’ve decided to build a wardrobe. Each guy I meet, I’ll get him to buy me a dress. I’d have believed that story because it could have been true. I’d seen guys buy Rosemary all sorts of things. Never something from Bullocks, but expensive dresses meant she’d have to meet rich guys, that’s all. In Hollywood, rich guys jump up and down and wave their arms. They’re not hard to find.
“Cut,” Preston said. “Where’s my coffee? Eddie, track down the coffee. Add a slug of scotch if you find some. Do I look like I’m kidding? Would I kid about scotch? Take a slug for yourself. Ten minutes, everyone, we need coffee.”
I stuck a needle through the chiffon scarf into my taffeta hem. Every two inches I sewed a tacking stitch. Across the se
t, Madge stood and stretched her arms in Rosemary’s gown. She yawned and didn’t cover her mouth. A girl at the next table—Femme Fatale?—watched Madge’s dimity hips when she stretched. Jealous. Such a beautiful gown. Rosemary didn’t buy that gown. If Rose wanted to, she could have lied about the whole wardrobe—stacks of dresses—where they’d come from and who bought them. She didn’t lie. And she would have lied, if she bought them herself.
A gift? Someone gave Rose the clothes. You can have it all, someone told Rose, I’m buying new, this stuff must be six months old and besides, I’ve worn most of it once. But if someone did give Rose her wardrobe, a rich socialite maybe, a star, Rose would have told me right off. She’d gloat in an attractive way and tell me I could borrow whatever I wanted. We’d both be wearing the clothes.
I couldn’t see it. Women hated Rosemary, and a rich woman wouldn’t want her clothes worn by someone so beautiful. A rich woman would give her clothes to an ugly girl and then feel smug, like she’d fed the English.
Rosemary didn’t buy the clothes. No rich man or woman gave her the clothes. The only choice left was the one I hated.
Rose took those clothes from a house. She stole them, she snuck through each house with armfuls, she layered them over her own clothes, she stuck them in sacks and cases and baskets each time she robbed a Beverly Hills house.
“Find your marks,” Preston said. He held a huge coffee cup and smiled. “Vic, what do you think—shoot across the buffet table? All that ripe fruit and a girl staring beyond it. Doesn’t even notice the food with handsome Hank in the booth.”
Stany touched me on the shoulder. “Who are you watching? Isn’t she an Indian at your dorm? Tom-Tom Girl. Nice gown for an extra. I know someone who has a gown like that, but I can’t think who. Looks like an Irene. Claudette Colbert? Ah, well, it’ll come. Pen, you look fine. I told you the flounce would work. What’s happened to our little gray squirrel?”
“She’s now a squirrel with a purple flounce.”
The Glamorous Dead Page 10