The Man Who Died Laughing

by David Handler

  Hoag: That’s a pretty big admission from you.

  Day: It’s the truth. We just clicked, that’s all. I was very hyper, very New York, you know? Go go go. He was very calm and collected. Midwestern. Innocent. Handsome, too, though I always thought his Adam’s apple was kind of prominent. … We had great timing together. Gabe had this instinct for knowing just when to push the right button to make me funnier. And he knew just the right moment to rein me in and move on to the next bit. Not a second too soon. Not a second too late. He could feel the moment.

  Hoag: Did the two of you talk about the future? About sticking together?

  Day: We dreamed about becoming big stars the same way the other guys dreamed about fucking Betty Grable. It was wartime. You took it one step at a time. Ours was to get up on a stage. They used to have these dances Saturday nights on the base. A band. Local girls. Nice girls. So one Saturday night when the band took ten, some of the guys egged us into going up there. First couple minutes, everybody thought we was whackos. But once we got rolling, making fun of the sergeants, the officers, the food—they dug us. We performed at the dances every week. We was the highlight of the show. It so happens that one of the guys who sees us one weekend—now we don’t know this, mind you—is a recruiting officer who had been a talent scout at Warner Brothers. Al Lufkin. Went on to become a vice president there. Anyway, for every showbiz success story there’s some kind of cockeyed, crazy coincidence. Here’s mine—Al Lufkin is about to get married in New York to Len Fine’s sister.

  Hoag: Len Fine from the Pine Tree?

  Day: The same. So Al happens to mention to Len about seeing these two funny soldiers down in Mississippi, and Len says, Sonny Day, sure, he’s a real talent. I discovered him.

  Hoag: You don’t know this is going on.

  Day: I don’t know a thing. All I know is we finish basic training, we take the train up to Fort Dix, New Jersey, and our unit is shipped out to Europe. Only, Gabe and me aren’t on the boat. We’re ordered to report to some special recruiting unit.

  Hoag: What kind of recruiting unit?

  Day: We don’t know. All we’re told is to report to a theater on West Fifty-third Street in New York City. So we find the theater. Gabe’s getting a stiff neck looking at the tall buildings. We show the soldier at the door our papers, we walk in, and we’re in the middle of some big-time show being rehearsed. There’s chorus girls, musicians, a band leader who looks a helluva lot like Kay Kyser, and these three girl singers who I’d swear are the Andrews Sisters. But what the hell are the Andrews Sisters doing there? What the hell are we doing there? Turns out they’re putting together a revue called You’re in the Army Now, which is gonna travel around the country and put on benefit performances to help with recruiting and morale. They want us to do our act in the show—you know, a couple of genuine recruits showing the humorous side of army life. And that’s how we broke into showbiz—courtesy of Uncle Sam. They assigned us to work with a writer who’d written for Edgar Bergen’s radio show. A soldier, like us. He helped us polish our routines and he gave us a couple of new lines. Two weeks later we hit the road. The night before we left, I went out to Brooklyn and visited the old man in the hospital. My mom made me. Last time I saw him. (silence) He was really out of it, didn’t even know me. I had so much hatred for him and anger, and it didn’t go away just because he was dying there in front of me. I felt … I felt tremendous pain about that.

  Hoag: Were you on the road when your father died?

  Day: I came back from Cleveland for the funeral. It was just me, the old lady, a couple relatives. We went back to the apartment when it was over, had some schnapps, and I caught the next train. It was … well, I guess you could say it was an end for me, Hoagy. And a beginning. (end tape)

  (Tape #5 with Sonny Day. Recorded in his study, February 21.)

  Day: You know what I could really go for? A Baby Ruth candy bar. Used to eat ’em by the dozen when I was zonked.

  Hoag: Does that mean I can have the last piece of pineapple?

  Day: Hell no.

  Hoag: So tell me about being on tour with You’re in the Army Now.

  Day: It was the most fun I’d ever had. We started in Buffalo. Stayed a couple weeks. Then did Detroit, Cleveland, Chicago, St. Louis. Had our own train. Stayed in the best hotels. It turned out that Warners was financing the whole thing. They had plans to film it somewhere down the line. They’d send different contract players out to join us for six or eight weeks—Jack Carson, Joanie Blondell. They’d emcee the show, do sketches. The whole thing was like a dream. Gabe and me went on in the middle of the show for about ten minutes. Rest of the time it was one big party. The girls, Hoagy. We was traveling with two dozen fun-loving, man-hungry chorus girls. We had wild times, especially on those trains. PJ parties. Singalongs. Drinking. But they were nice girls. All they were looking for was some affection. They thought we were cute. I was twenty-one. Gabe was twenty-three. What can I tell ya, there was a shortage of men.

  Hoag: Didn’t Gabe have a problem with that, being so square?

  Day: Gabe Knight turned out to be one of those guys who says he likes vanilla—because it’s the only flavor he ever tasted. Once he started getting a little action, he had a permanent hard-on. I mean, girls coming and going twenty-four hours a day. He was always kicking me out of our room. I’d go find the girl’s roommate. Didn’t do too bad that way, either.

  Hoag: Did you and Gabe get along?

  Day: He snored. Whistled off key. Tasted food off my plate. I hate that. Ask anybody. But we were buddies. And we were going over real well. Audiences loved our stuff. They even wrote a new routine for us. Gabe is sitting on the steps of the barracks in the moonlight, playing his uke and singing “By the Light of the Silvery Moon.” I come out and join him. I’m a dogface from Brooklyn, he’s a dogface from Nebraska, and we’re both homesick as hell and frightened. So we share a smoke and talk about home and Mom and our best girl. And then we finish the song together. Scared the shit out of me the first time we tried it. I kept saying, where’s the laughs? We gotta have laughs. But the people loved it. Seemed genuine to them.

  Hoag: Did you guys sense that you were about to become big stars?

  Day: Mostly, I think we felt we were being swept along by something that was much bigger then we were, you know? Then we hit L.A. in—what was it?—winter of ’43. Warners was ready to make a movie of the show. Me and Gabe, we were ordered to report there for a screen test. We met Jack Warner, we—

  Hoag: Remember what he said to you?

  Day: I remember I was so frightened I didn’t know my own name. He asked us which one of us was Knight and we both said, “I am, sir.” They filmed us doing our routines in front of a backdrop. We went back to the hotel. Next day they pulled us aside and told us we weren’t being included in the movie. We were crushed. We figured that was it. End of party. But that wasn’t it at all. See, Jack Warner had decided to give us our very own movie, At Ease. He loved us. It was a dream, Hoagy. I kept waiting to wake up. I didn’t wake up for thirty-five years.

  Hoag: What was it like being out here then?

  Day: This was a great town in those days. Pretty. Weather was beautiful. And the studio was huge—not like now. Blocks and blocks of streets on the backlot. Castles. Jungles. Lakes. Extras walking around dressed like Bengal lancers, like Robin’s merry men. And we were part of it. But on the other hand we weren’t. Technically, we were still attached to the army. At Ease was considered a recruiting picture. It came off like Jack Warner was doing a great thing for his country. In reality he was making a low-budget comedy with two stars and a bunch of army training footage that he got all for free. But they put us up in a nice apartment building in Encino. Gave us per diem money. A car. Whatever we needed.

  Hoag: Who thought up At Ease?

  Day: It was concocted on the run. Warner handed us to Hal Wallis, who sent a couple of writers down to see us perform with the company at the Pantages Theater. They talked to us for about fifteen mi
nutes backstage. A week later they’d built a standard plot around five of our routines. Gabes a rich-kid momma’s boy, used to the soft life. I’m a two-bit con man, used to being on my own. We take an instant dislike to each other at the induction center, then turn out to be bunkmates, then rivals for the same USO girl. In the end we become great soldiers and great buddies. Strictly formula. But they gave us a great cast of pros to work with. Bart MacLane was the drill sergeant. Ward Bond was the camp boxing champ. Priscilla Lane was the girl. Lucille Ball was the friend. We learned a lot about screen acting from those folks. It’s all repetition. Start. Stop. Stand over here. Do it again. And the scenes are shot out of order. Hard to keep your level up. We worked our asses off fourteen hours a day on At Ease. Did what we were told. Conked out every night. We weren’t having any fun at all until guess who comes up to me on the set one day and says hello—Heshie Roth.

  Hoag: Of Seetags fame?

  Day: The one and only. Very interesting life story, Heshie. If he wanted to tell it, he’d make a helluva best-seller. I mean, he knows where all the bodies are buried. But I guess he’d just as soon forget. He’s a very upstanding guy now. A lot of the people he moves with now, they don’t even know how he ended up out here.

  Hoag: How did he?

  Day: Bugsy Siegel brought him out. Remember I mentioned how Heshie ran around with the Jewish mob when we was in Bed-Sty? Well, Benny Siegel was the idol of every punk in New York in those days. Lived like a king in the Waldorf. Moved in the fanciest circles. Anyway, he took a liking to Heshie when Heshie was a kid. It was his idea to put Heshie through law school. So now it’s 1944 and Benny Siegel—nobody called him Bugsy to his face—has moved out to L.A. to take control of the mob action out here. Know who his right-hand man is?

  Hoag: Allow me to guess—a bright young attorney by the name of Harmon Wright?

  Day: Correct, pally. There was a lot of independent action out here then—racetracks, nightclubs, offshore gambling. Bugsy came out here to take all of it over. Bumped off anybody who got in his way. Heshie concocted the controlling partnerships and shit like that to make it legal. And this was just for starters. The main reason Bugsy was out here, according to Heshie, was that the Mexican border was practically in L.A.’s backyard and the guys in the East wanted to set up a drug pipeline. Heshie, he was the juice man. He spread it around—police department, DA’s office, attorney general. In the meantime, Bugsy Siegel became the toast of Hollywood. Screwed every starlet in town. Hung around with Cary Grant, George Raft, Jack Warner. Show people love gangsters. They excite ’em. So when Heshie comes up to me on the set, well, he’s in a position to show a couple of soldiers a pretty good time. Gabe and I got very little sleep after that. We met starlets. We even got to meet Benny Siegel.

  Hoag: What was he like?

  Day: A movie star. Handsome, charismatic, and a real dandy, right down to his monogrammed silk shorts. And what a temper. He threw a big bash at George Raft’s house one night, and Heshie brought us and introduced us. Benny said to us, “It’s a fine thing you’re doing for our country.” I said, “Coming from you, Mr. Siegel, that’s a real compliment.” Suddenly, the man’s eyes turned into hot coals. Lips got white. And he said, “What the fuck is that supposed to mean?!” I started stammering. I see my life pass before my eyes. Then all of a sudden he relaxes, throws an arm around me, and we were pals. Scary guy. Right on the edge. (silence) That was my first Hollywood party. Half the guests were upstairs with somebody they didn’t come with. I made it with my first Oscar winner that night. On the diving board. (silence) Yeah, we had a good time after we met up with Heshie. Only, Gabe, he started feeling guilty for his sins. So he and Lorraine got hitched when we were in his hometown for the opening of At Ease. Made a great story for the papers. We went all over the country to promote it. Before we left L.A., Heshie pulled us aside and said, “Listen, I wanna handle you when the war’s over—movie contracts, nightclubs, Vegas.” I said what the hell’s in Vegas. He said Benny’s gonna make it into the biggest, most glamorous gambling resort in America, with top entertainers. Strictly legit. We said to Heshie, sure, sure, we’ll talk. See, deep down, we believed this whole thing was some kind of happy accident of wartime. You know, that it wouldn’t last. Until the numbers started coming. At Ease turned out to be Warners’ second-biggest grossing picture of the war, right behind Casablanca. A smash. Right away, Warners was interested in putting us under contract. Lorraine, she wanted Gabe to finish college. She wanted kids and a white picket fence. Plus, she thought I was a bad influence. But Gabe, he’d gotten a taste. He wanted it. So when we was discharged in ’45 we signed a personal services contract with Heshie and set him loose.

  Hoag: Did you have any qualms about being hooked up with a gangster?

  Day: None. I always believe in sticking with people you know. And Heshie, he had a personal stake in us. He was anxious to get out from under Bugsy’s wing. Start his own business. For a couple of years he’d been tucking away a little juice money on the sly. A nip here, a tuck there.

  Hoag: Are you telling me HWA was started with mob money?

  Day: Mob money the mob didn’t exactly know from. They thought the cops pocketed it after a raid, or Heshie paid it to some independent who ended up getting bumped off. The stuff disappears, who knows where.

  Hoag: How much are we talking about?

  Day: Fifty thousand. A hundred, maybe.

  Hoag: Pretty gutsy, wasn’t he?

  Day: (laughs) Better Heshie should be my agent than somebody else’s. Bugsy, he was too volatile. He wasn’t gonna be around for long. Heshie knew that. As it turned out, Bugsy Siegel got shot in the eyeball one year later. By which time the Harmon Wright Agency was doing pretty damned well for itself.

  (end tape)

  CHAPTER SIX

  SONNY WASN’T WRONG. BY the end of the week the newspapers did have it that he’d gotten drunk and slugged that reporter himself in the restaurant in Vegas.

  There were lots of phone calls that week. It made me notice how seldom the phone had been ringing before. The Enquirer called. People called. Liz Smith and Marilyn Beck called. Sonny refused to talk to them. He tried to act as if the negative publicity wasn’t bothering him, but it was. He paced a lot now when we worked, baring his teeth, chewing a lot of Sen-Sens, and on occasion, his expensively manicured fingernails.

  I was putting in a lot of time at the typewriter now—shaping, fleshing out, and polishing the transcripts of our tapes. I was up to Sonny’s first summer in the Catskills. I was enjoying the writing. It felt good to be back in the saddle again. And I was doing a helluva job of convincing myself that my effort was leading to more than another junky celebrity memoir. Here, I told myself, was emerging a rare insightful study of a showbiz legend.

  I definitely needed a dose of reality. I didn’t get one.

  What I got, I discovered one evening after dinner, was another visit. This time I could be sure it wasn’t my imagination. I came in to find my room trashed—selectively trashed. The tapes that had been on my desk were ripped from their cartridges and strewn all over the bed, spilling onto the floor. They were ruined, of course.

  Fortunately they were blank tape—not that whoever did it knew that. I had gotten careful, Sonny’s death threat and the rising interest of the oilier tabloids had made me aware that the original tapes of my sessions with him might be precious to somebody besides me and the publisher’s lawyers. So I had numbered and dated a batch of blanks and left those piled on my desk. The real ones were snug and secure under my winter clothes in my Il Bisonte bag in the closet. The transcripts I kept sandwiched between my mattress and box spring when I wasn’t working on them. And the typing service that did the transcribing was not one of the usual Hollywood typing factories, where bribery and thievery are always possible. The publisher’s sister, a retired geography teacher who lived in Santa Monica, was doing the job.

  I had also asked Vic for a key to the guesthouse and had taken to locking it, though clearly the
re was no point in doing that. Whoever had trashed the tapes had a key, too, or a real flair with locks. There was no sign of forced entry.

  Sonny and Vic exchanged poker faces when I presented them with this, the latest evidence of less-than-positive vibes.

  Then Sonny fingered the mined tapes, grinned, and quipped, “Don’t make ’em like they used to, huh?”

  “This is not funny, Sonny,” I told him. “The police should be brought in.”

  “No cops,” Sonny snapped.

  I turned to Vic. “Do you agree?”

  Vic stared at me, tight-lipped. He didn’t answer.

  I turned back to Sonny. “Why? Is it really because you’re afraid of leaks?”

  “I got reasons.”

  “What reasons?”

  “My reasons.”

  “Now who’s shutting whom out?” I demanded.

  Sonny softened, jabbed at a tape with a stubby finger. “This fuck us over?”

  “No, we’re fine,” I replied, not disclosing how or why this was so. “We’re just fine and dandy.”

  The day Sonny turned sixty-three was a damp, drizzly one. He announced at breakfast that he felt like driving himself to his therapist’s appointment. This didn’t thrill Vic—he didn’t want Sonny out of his sight for that long. But The One insisted.

  “I’m the goddamned birthday boy,” he pointed out. “All I really want is to pretend I’m a normal person for two lousy hours. I’ll be fine.”

  He took the limo. Vic, it seemed, wanted to be my pally now. After Sonny left, he asked me if I felt like taking a ride in his Buick down to Drake Stadium at UCLA. I said why not. Vic still knew the coaches there, and they let us take some javelins out to the field to fool around.

  A lot of people think spear chucking is a dull, one-dimensional sport. But when you train hard for it, learn the fine points of technique and form and timing, you begin to appreciate just how dull and one-dimensional it really is.