“What are you talking about? I always give you credit.”
“No. This was before PJ Productions. My best movie, Demonic Possession. I took over the directing for Max Argas after he got sick with cancer. But we kept his name on it. He was dying. It wouldn’t have been right.”
“You’re a noble man, Harry.”
“The Denver Post called Demonic Possession one of the best horror films of the 1980s, and a new standard. They called Max brilliant.”
“Your turn will come.”
“Not with direct-to-video.”
Paul sighed. “What can I do to cheer you up, my friend? What is it you want?”
Harry thought hard. “I’m tired of the minor leagues. I’d sell my soul for some respect in this town. I want to be part of the big time, Paul.”
Two days later, Paul phoned Harry at his Eagle Rock bungalow, interrupting his morning meditation.
“Remember, you told me you wanted to be part of the big time?”
“Yeah.”
“Your wish has been granted. I have been invited to a big-time party, and I want you to come with me.”
“A party?” Harry’s tone fell flat.
“Richard Metherell, industry legend. He’s been a top dog at Warner Brothers and New Line. He’s won Oscars and launched a thousand careers. He’s turning 70, and there is a mega-bash at his mansion in Brentwood. Everybody who matters is going to be there. I have an ‘in’, and now I’m going to be your ‘in’.”
“I don’t know...” said Harry.
“Knock it off, sad sack! This is a place to be seen. You gotta check out the house, it’s in the hills, it’s bigger than a country club.”
“With my luck, I’ll run into my ex-wife,” said Harry. “She’ll probably be there with Nigel, her new and improved husband. He’s got an Academy Award.”
“It’s a British Academy Award,” said Paul. “Doesn’t count. So, are you going to the party or not? Otherwise, I’ll invite one of our investors. I’ll bet Jimmy Nancarrow would love to go stalk a few starlets.”
“I’ll go,” said Harry.
“Attaboy.”
“But you can’t force me to have a good time.”
“Harry,” sighed Paul. “Lighten up. I think our next horror movie should be about you: The Mope from Hell.”
Harry said nothing. Paul was right. He was in a miserable funk. He needed something—anything—to get his career back on track.
He was starved for a hit, and it was killing him.
4
Harry tried not to get lost as he traveled the meandering streets around and over the foothills of the Santa Monica Mountains. Large, plentiful trees and lush planting established an almost rural feeling for the rich and famous who lived here.
Metherell’s Mediterranean-style mansion was situated behind gates on a sprawling property decorated with exotic gardens that must have required a full-time landscaper. Harry joined the line of vehicles filling a long, winding driveway. A valet showed up at his window and asked for the keys.
Yes, thought Harry, this is the big time.
As Harry entered the home’s two-story foyer, he immediately felt self-conscious. He didn’t belong. He stepped through several rooms, recognizing a jarring mix of celebrities. Sitcom stars mingled with rock musicians. Famous athletes interacted with movie icons.
Metherell’s mansion was tastefully luxurious at every turn, with grand-scale rooms, crown moldings and limestone floors. Under the high ceilings, Harry felt shrunken. He heard classical music—a Strauss waltz—and went looking for the entertainment system. He found a string quartet.
Who am I going to talk to? Where’s Paul?
Paul was probably trolling for investors. Surely he smelled the green.
Harry wandered, got a bit lost, and wound up in the maid’s quarters, which at least more accurately reflected the dimensions of his own home.
He finally found Paul in an elaborate media room equipped with recessed, built-in projection equipment.
Paul’s back was turned to him. As Harry approached, he heard Paul’s loud and proud voice rising above the rest of the chatter.
“I’ll tell you what sells, it’s the poster art and DVD cover. Everything else is secondary. We call it disposable entertainment. You put something gross on the cover, a title that’s a grabber, a high concept that anybody can describe in one sentence, and you’re good to go. Most of our sales come from abroad. They eat them up over there, doesn’t matter what’s inside the packaging. Our strategy is to sell the sizzle, not the steak.”
Harry stopped advancing on Paul. He backed up.
He felt stingers in his heart. He had always assumed that this was Paul’s true sentiment, but somehow it was much more painful to hear it aloud...in a gathering of Hollywood’s heavy-hitters.
Screw PJ Productions, I’m going to quit, thought Harry.
He drank some wine to build up his courage and began approaching strangers. He mingled. He networked. He sniffed for new opportunities.
He introduced himself as a writer-director and name-dropped some of his earlier, successful pictures. Unfortunately, even those accomplishments failed to register with most of the people. Occasionally someone had heard of Max Argas, “that B picture guy.”
Harry was willing to get his foot in the door anywhere. He talked to a few TV network people, and then several indie producers with modest budgets that still represented a step up from PJ Productions. Some of them feigned interest, but he could see their eyes roam the room for more compelling connections. Every conversation seemed to end with “I’ll give you a call,” but he doubted any of them would ever pick up the phone. In particular, there was the woman from Disney who accepted his business card with nods and smiles. Two minutes later, Harry saw her deposit the card on a passing tray of drinks.
He couldn’t blame her. When she asked for the names of his latest pictures, he felt embarrassed to even speak them aloud. Titles like I’ll Skin You Alive were never his idea —it was Paul’s marketing strategy. Harry’s working title for I’ll Skin You Alive had been Night of Fog, which Paul found “too understated for the target market.”
Harry’s conversation with an executive from Sony proved to be the shortest one yet — just under three minutes — before the executive broke it off with “Pardon me! I just saw my old friend Joe from CBS!”
Harry then watched the Sony executive get a slice of birthday cake, and stand alone in another corner of the room.
Just when it looked like it couldn’t get worse, it did.
Julie, Harry’s ex-wife, appeared at the party with Nigel, her second husband. Julie looked great, Nigel looked great, and Harry was gone from the room.
He pushed a few people aside and earned dirty looks, but this was an emergency. He stepped through narrow doors that took him to a terrace. The terrace offered a stunning ocean and canyon view. He could be alone here with his glass of wine, and that was good.
Not too far below, party guests circled a large swimming pool. Shimmering blue, the pool consisted of different connected sections, with a waterfall tumbling on one end. Nearby, he could see an illuminated tennis court and workout facility.
I’m finishing this glass of wine, and then I am out of here.
That’s when he noticed he wasn’t alone.
She was in a corner of the terrace, under shadows. A stunning young woman with straight blonde hair and a simple, thin white dress. She held a glass of wine.
She looked at him.
“Hi,” she said.
“Hello,” said Harry.
“Pretty out here.”
“It is.”
The conversation ended there. Harry wanted to keep it going, but didn’t know what to say. Her focus returned to the view, while his attention remained on her face.
She had soft, open features, like a child. She had a certain delicate, porcelain look to her. She also looked somehow familiar. He tried to dismiss it, but the curiosity grew. He knew her. It started to gnaw at
him.
Harry kept staring and then blurted, “You’re the whore.”
Startled, she looked at him. “Pardon?”
“I’m sorry—you were on Crime Busters last week. Am I right? You played the girlfriend of the pimp—you wore the big fur, spiked boots, all that makeup —but that was you, wasn’t it? Or am I out of my mind?”
She broke out in a shy grin. “You’re right, that was me. I’m flattered. I can’t believe you remember that. It was such a small part.”
“I guess you made an impression.”
“Because I was so bad?” She laughed with self-deprecation.
“Not at all.”
“Nobody watches that show. I think it gets beat in the ratings by the Home Shopping Network.”
He moved closer and she did the same, stepping out of the shadows.
Her eyes were a striking shade of blue. She was altogether beautiful in a common way for L.A. Yet she would stop traffic in Cleveland.
“You do a lot of TV?” Harry asked.
“I’m just getting started. I just got a small part in a miniseries about Hollywood scandals in the 1920s. But I don’t have any lines; I’m doing background. Crime Busters was my first role with any dialogue.”
“You were outstanding. I really thought so.”
“I had two lines. ‘Hit ‘im, Bruce!’ ‘Bruce get up!’”
“Well, you stole the scene. Really.” Harry realized he was fawning and told himself to rein it in.
“Thank you,” she said. “Are you an actor?”
“Actor? No. I’m a director.” Harry chose his words carefully. “I write and direct...suspense films.”
“I love mysteries.”
“Well, these are more like horror.” Harry couldn’t help a self-conscious cringe.
“That sounds cool. Anything I would have heard of?”
Harry ran some possible titles through his mind and finally said, “The Beastly is my new one. In fact, we just held the premiere. It went over...pretty good.”
“How exciting. I’ll look for it.” Then she glanced at the ground, looked back up at him, and half-smiled. “I know you must hear this all the time, but...if you’re looking for an up-and-coming actress, I know of someone I can recommend. Fresh out of UCLA. Got her SAG card. Can play a great whore.”
Harry reacted quickly. “Great, I’m always looking for actresses. We make a lot of movies. I just finished the script for my next one, and we’ve started casting. It’s a vampire picture.”
“I can do vampires, I can do horror. I’ve got a good set of pipes. I can scream, I can shriek, squeal, whatever you need. Let me give you my number.”
She reached into her purse and pulled out a business card. He gave her one of his PJ Productions cards, and she promised to send a headshot and full list of credits.
Harry told her, “I just have to let you know...the budgets aren’t real big. It’s independent. So the pay is modest.”
“The money’s not important. The exposure is. I’m open to low-budget.”
Harry swallowed, then admitted, “When I say low-budget, I mean really low-budget. Under one million dollars for the whole picture.”
She nodded. He saw her interest sag slightly. “Well,” she said, “why don’t you send me the script and a couple of your films, so I can see what you’re all about.”
“It’s a deal.”
She examined his card. “Harry Tuttle.” She looked up and shook his hand. “Thanks, Harry. I’m Rachel. Let’s keep in touch.”
He promised he would, and she left the terrace to return inside the house. He watched her disappear into a sea of people and called out, quietly enough that she couldn’t hear him but loud enough to get it off his chest, “If you’re interested, I’m single.”
5
George Grubbis sat in his Toyota Camry, parked curbside on Del Marino, watching the ramshackle ranch house across the street. A few minutes ago, two young men he had never seen before had answered the door. They told him that Marcus had gone out to grab lunch. He should be back soon.
Then the tall one with the red beard and deep voice asked, “Who are you?”
Grubbis didn’t answer. He merely said good day, returned to his car, sat and waited.
He wanted Marcus.
Looking at the ranch house, Grubbis felt sick about how unsightly it had become. Like many others in the neighborhood, it was a simple, single-floor home, long and narrow, sitting low to the ground on a concrete slab, dominated by a big picture window.
But it had become decidedly unkempt, with shingles missing, chipped paint, and a front lawn of brown grass, weeds, and garbage. An old sofa, lamp, and other furniture had been dumped in a heap at the foot of the sidewalk. Several of the sofa cushions had strayed across the yard.
Two Asian kids on bicycles approached the discarded furniture. They stopped for a moment to poke through the clutter, but found nothing of interest and left.
Five minutes later, a Latino couple examined the sofa. The woman shook her head no, and they moved on.
San Gabriel was a city of ethnic diversity and integration, even as many of its citizens surrounded their homes with gates and chain-link fences. Grubbis figured that fewer than half of his renters these days were whites. And the whites typically gave him the most trouble. People like Marcus Stegman who knew nothing about responsibility and obligation. Everything was an entitlement.
Grubbis flexed his fingers. His hands were stiff and arthritic. His back was sore from a herniated disc that sometimes caused him to sleep on the hardwood floor.
He was 68 years old and felt every bit his age. His bones ached. Sitting in this car all day wasn’t helping...
...but God damn it, he wanted his money.
After 15 minutes, Marcus Stegman arrived home. He pulled his rusted white van into the driveway and stopped short of the carport, which overflowed with junk.
Grubbis opened his car door and stepped into the street.
Stegman didn’t see him. He carried two white bags of fast food and headed for the house. He was dressed in jeans, gym shoes, and a black T-shirt with “Godzilla, King of the Monsters” on the front.
“Marcus!”
Grubbis stepped into Stegman’s path before he reached the front door. Stegman had a French fry hanging out of his mouth.
“You know why I’m here,” said Grubbis.
Stegman finished the French fry, nodding.
“I don’t like chasing you down like this every month,” said Grubbis. “It’s childish.”
“I lost track of the calendar. Am I late?”
Grubbis looked into Stegman’s face. He could see black bags under his eyes. He looked like he hadn’t slept in weeks. His hair was long and oily. His goatee was more poorly manicured than his front lawn.
“Come on,” said Grubbis. “I don’t need this. If you can’t pay your rent, go live someplace else. It’s as simple as that. The only reason I’ve been patient this long is out of respect for your mother. She was a good woman, and she wanted you to stay in this house; and I appreciated that. But it can’t go on like this.”
For eleven years, Audrey Stegman lived in the Del Marino house without giving him any problems. She worked six days a week as a cashier at a grocery store, always paid her rent on time, and still found the time to keep the property in good shape. Marcus was a shameless freeloader, a kid getting older but not more mature, sponging off his mother, avoiding any real work and spending all his time watching videos in his bedroom.
A succession of strokes, each more crippling than the last, finished off Audrey Stegman. One of the last times Grubbis saw her, she told him, speech slurred by paralysis, “Take care of my son. He means well.”
For the past year, Grubbis had tried hard to remain patient about the delinquent rent payments. But the house wasn’t going to go for free. Grubbis had limits.
Stegman said, “I’ll get the money to you next week. How about Monday? You want a French fry?”
“No and no,�
� said Grubbis.
Stegman sighed and made nervous noises with his lips. His eyes roamed. He clearly wanted to squirm back into the house, but Grubbis had positioned himself by the door.
“What’s all this crap on the lawn?” asked Grubbis.
“I cleaned out the den. I need the space. It’s for my editing equipment.”
“I see. You have plenty of money for editing equipment, but not rent.”
“It was my inheritance money from my mother. It’s an investment.”
“Investment? In what?”
Stegman said firmly, “My movie. I’ve been working night and day on this thing. I’ve been incredibly busy. But it’s all going to pay off. I’m almost done, and then I’m going to go out and get a deal; and everything is going to be a lot different. I’ll be able to buy this house.”
Grubbis frowned, both saddened and angered by this young man’s delusions. “I think you pissed away your mother’s inheritance, and pretty soon you and your editing equipment are going to be out on the street. Is that what you want?”
Stegman said, “I can get you some money on Monday.”
“I’ve heard this before, Marcus...”
“I mean it. On Monday, I’ll be getting my deposit back on some camera equipment. Call the rental company if you don’t believe me.”
“I will not subsidize your movie.”
“You aren’t. You’ll get paid. I have to juggle a lot of things right now. I’m just getting started...”
“Marcus, I’ve known you for a long time. I don’t like this anymore than you do, but it’s time to wake up and smell the coffee.” Then he muttered, “I wish you could have learned something from your mother.”
“I did,” responded Stegman. “She died without having ever fulfilled any of her dreams. I don’t want that to happen to me.”
Grubbis sighed through his nostrils. His hands hurt. He noticed two sloppy young men looking at him through the windowpane in the door. It was the tall redhead, joined by a dark-skinned young man with an earring.
“How many people you got living in there anyway?” asked Grubbis.
“Garon and Terrance. They’re helping me with the movie.”
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