Which Lie Did I Tell?

by William Goldman

  LUTHER? No.

  JACK? No.

  SETH? No.

  If you happened to be walking near Seventy-seventh Street and Madison Avenue during the early fall of 1995, that sound you heard was me screaming.

  Finally, blessedly, I remembered Mr. Abbott.

  One of the great breaks of my career came in 1960, when I was among those called in to doctor a musical in very deep trouble, Tenderloin. The show eventually was not a success. But the experience was profound.

  George Abbott, the legitimately legendary Broadway figure, was the director of the show—he was closing in on seventy-five during our months together and hotter than ever. All in all, Mr. Abbott was connected with more famous and successful shows than anyone else in history, as producer, director, writer, or star. (We are talking about one of those careers—if you are a sports fan, think of the Babe or Wilt.)

  Mr. Abbott was a big man, six-two maybe, ramrod straight. Someone once wrote of him: “If he’s ever late, you figure there’s been an accident.” The most totally professional man that ever walked the earth.

  And as I was going through my second draft of Absolute Power madness, I remembered a Mr. Abbott moment. He was coming from backstage during rehearsals, and as he crossed the stage into the auditorium he noticed a dozen dancers were just standing there. The choreographer sat in the audience alone, his head in his hands.

  “What’s going on?” Mr. Abbott asked him.

  The choreographer looked at Mr. Abbott, shook his head. “I can’t figure out what they should do next.”

  Mr. Abbott never stopped moving. He jumped the three feet from the stage to the aisle. “Well, have them do something!” Mr. Abbott said. “That way we’ll have something to change.”

  The choreographer got off his ass, started moving the dancers.

  As I remembered Mr. Abbott, I got off my ass, too. We were not going to shoot the second draft, I reminded myself. So just write something so we’ll have something to change.

  LUTHER could not be my guy for reasons of death.

  JACK could have been—his love affair with LUTHER’s daughter made that appealing. Except for this: in the novel and in the first draft, too, LUTHER and KATE never once talked to each other. She betrays him, arranges for his capture; but that moment when she serves as decoy is their only contact in the Baldacci story. (They are estranged and have been for years when the story begins and stay that way after the murder; LUTHER is terrified to ever talk to her, for fear the Secret Service might kill her on the theory that she might know something.)

  I didn’t want to mess with that.

  No to JACK.

  So SETH, by elimination, became my star.

  There was still the problem of his not solving all that much. But I figured I could help that by having him do stuff that had belonged to other characters in the novel and the first draft.

  One of the ways I did this was by giving him a family. I have two daughters, Jenny and Susanna, who loved Nancy Drew when they were kids. Guess what? SETH now had twin daughters with those names who were fifteen, had outgrown Nancy but not the notion of being detectives.

  The family was a way to keep SETH around, and also to get rid of exposition that other characters carried earlier. And it made SETH vulnerable, so that, near the end, when he is closing in on RICHMOND, the PRESIDENT has BURTON and COLLIN “send him a message” by instructing them to hurt his family. Which they do, driving them off the road, putting ELAINE and the TWINS in the hospital. So SETH has a huge emotional score to settle when, in the last scene, he visits the White House and brings RICHMOND down.

  Not Shakespearean. But maybe an improvement over the first draft. And SETH was now at the center of pretty much everything possible. I had certainly written a star part, which was primarily what I meant to do.

  I sent it out. Fingers very much crossed.

  Because this draft was going to Clint Eastwood.

  His agent had called while I was writing this draft and indicated he wouldn’t mind taking a look at it when it was done. And I was desperate to work with Eastwood, had been for decades. He is quietly having one of the very greatest careers. He and John Wayne are the two most durable acting stars in the history of sound. Plus plus plus the directing.

  Eastwood as SETH set the blood racing.

  I had given them something. So at least we had something to change.

  Little did he know …

  Third Draft

  December, 1995.

  The second draft got out to Castle Rock around the twentieth of October. Their reaction was good—not terrific, but certainly good—and they were very appreciative about the amount of work that had gone into changing it.

  Now, nothing to do but wait for Eastwood.

  On the first of November Martin Shafer called to report that Eastwood definitely was reading it.

  Then he called later that day and this is what he said: Eastwood had already read it. He thought it was absolutely okay.

  But—

  —big but—

  —he had already played detectives like SETH before, and didn’t want to play that character again—

  —now Shafer dropped the shoe—

  —Eastwood was interested in playing LUTHER. He thought LUTHER was a terrific character but—

  —amazingly huge but—

  —but Eastwood wanted LUTHER to live and bring down the PRESIDENT.

  I was rocked.

  During these days of waiting, my fantasies of writing a movie for Clint Eastwood grew out of control. I grew even more desperate to work with him—

  —but I simply didn’t know if I could write what he wanted.

  I asked Shafer if he would commit in advance. I was terrified of changing everything so totally—always assuming I could figure out how—only to have him say no.

  The answer was he would not. He would have to read it first. (I knew that, of course. I was just frightened and floundering.)

  One other problem—it was now November, I was literally starting from scratch again and I knew this: I had to get it in before Christmas. His agent had indicated as much, because Eastwood had taken time off after The Bridges of Madison County and was ready to go to work again. After Christmas he would be gone to something else, leaving me dead in the water.

  I told Shafer I would have to let him know.

  These were the words I wrote in my journal that night:

  HOW, GOD?

  I spent the next days trying to come up with anything at all that might spark me, give me the confidence (always the greatest enemy) to plunge ahead.

  A few days later I wrote this thought down: “LUTHER could use his street contacts—beggars who work the streets—to find out where CHRISTY SULLIVAN spent the day before she was murdered.”

  Baldacci is kind of vague on what CHRISTY, the billionaire’s wife who gets murdered, did earlier that day of her tryst. I figured maybe if I could think of something exciting, it would be a way LUTHER could get incriminating evidence on PRESIDENT RICHMOND.

  Snooze.

  Andy Scheinman, one of the heads of Castle Rock, came to spend a couple of days with me. We got some stuff, but not a lot, and none of it splendid.

  On the tenth of November I told Andy that one of three things would happen: (1) I would figure out how to do it and write it, or (2) I would realize I couldn’t write it and bow out and they could bring in someone fast to replace me, or (3) we bring in someone now to help me figure out a way to make it work.

  I was floundering terribly.

  The Ghost and the Darkness was going and I had to get to South Africa, and part of the remains of my brain was trying to deal with changes for that.

  I knew, generically, my problem: I simply was too familiar with ABSOLUTE POWER—I could not free my imagination.

  And I was going nuts—every empty day meant Christmas was that much closer and I had to get it to Eastwood before then or lose him. Here is something most people don’t understand: you never get the fucking actor you
want.

  I had a chance for Clint Eastwood in the Clint Eastwood part. And I wanted that.

  November 15 and good news—maybe Frank Darabont would spitball with me. (Darabond had one of the great directing debuts with The Shawshank Redemption and wrote that remarkable script.)

  Close—but he had other commitments.

  November 25 and I haven’t started.

  And I am drowning.

  That night the Knicks beat Houston. (I am—not even arguably—one of the four all-time great Knicks fans.) But even better than the victory was this: I took Tony Gilroy to the game.

  Tony (Dolores Claiborne, Extreme Measures) is someone I have known for thirty years, since he was ten, which was when I met and interviewed his father, Frank, the Pulitzer Prize–winning playwright (The Subject Was Roses) for a book I was writing about Broadway, The Season.

  “So what’s with Absolute Power?” he asked politely; Tony had read the first draft months and months before.

  I know Tony well, so I unloaded. I told him I was panicked. I told him of the impossibility of my ever sleeping again. I told him it was doubtful I would live beyond the weekend. And all because this, you should pardon the expression, actor had come up with the idea of having Luther live and bring down the President.

  “That’s great,” Tony said.

  At the moment, death by thumbscrew would have been letting him off easy. “Why?”

  “It’s so obvious why—Luther’s the best character. He’s always been the best character—and when he dies, he takes the movie down with him.”

  Kind of casually I asked, “You think you could figure out how to do what Eastwood wants?”

  He was intent on the game. “Haven’t thought about it,” he shrugged. Then this: “But it shouldn’t be hard.”

  That night I called Shafer and Tony was hired for a week.

  The next morning he came blasting in—“I know where Luther goes right after the robbery—he goes to see his daughter.”

  “Can’t.”

  “Why do you say that?”

  “They never talk. Baldacci is very clear on that in the novel. They don’t talk before the murder because they are estranged, and they can’t after because he’s afraid the President will kill her—”

  “Forget about the novel—I haven’t read the novel—my main strength is that I haven’t read the novel—the novel is killing you.”

  “They can’t talk and that’s that!”

  “Think about it, for chrissakes.”

  Later that day, I not only thought about it, I wrote it. Here’s the first LUTHER-KATE scene:

  CUT TO

  A YOUNG WOMAN PARKING HER CAR--a high rocky area above the Potomac. Below, a jogging path is visible, full of runners.

  THE YOUNG WOMAN gets out, locks her car, starts down a narrow walk toward the joggers.

  SHE’S IN HER MID-THIRTIES. Pretty. And there’s something familiar about her.

  CUT TO

  LUTHER, standing by the edge of the jogging path, studying the runners. Now he registers something: and smiles.

  CUT TO

  THE WOMAN IN HER MID-THIRTIES as she comes jogging along. She runs well.

  CUT TO

  LUTHER. An imperceptible straightening of his clothes.

  CUT TO

  THE JOGGER. Now we realize who she is: the little girl in the photo on LUTHER’s dining room table. His daughter, all grown up. Now her face registers something: his presence. And the instant she realizes this, her eyes go down to the path, she increases her speed, and runs right past him.

  CUT TO

  LUTHER.

  LUTHER

  Kate.

  (she runs on)

  Kate.

  (she slows, hesitates, stops.)

  CUT TO

  KATE, hands on hips, breathing deeply, moving to the edge of the path as he approaches. The river flows behind them. Runners pass by.

  Beat.

  LUTHER

  Probably too late for me to take it up.

  (she says nothing--he gestures toward the path)

  The jogging.

  KATE

  Ahh.

  Beat.

  LUTHER

  Dumb way to start this, I guess.

  KATE

  For a man of your charm.

  LUTHER

  Wanted to talk.

  KATE

  About?

  LUTHER

  Believe it or not, the weather.

  (she waits)

  Nights are starting to get cold.

  KATE

  That happens this time of year.

  CUT TO

  LUTHER. He speaks quickly now, his voice low.

  LUTHER

  I was thinking of maybe relocating. Someplace with a kinder climate.

  (nothing shows on her face)

  I just wanted to check it out with you first…

  (still nothing)

  …you’re the only family I’ve got.

  (and on that)

  CUT TO

  KATE. She speaks quickly now, her voice low.

  KATE

  Luther, you don’t have me.

  The last words he wanted to hear--

  --but you can’t tell from looking at him.

  KATE (CONT’D)

  You were never there. Remember? You’re talking to the only kid during show-and-tell who got to talk about visiting day.

  LUTHER

  I’m talking permanent, you understand.

  KATE

  We don’t see each other anyway--we haven’t seen each other since Mom died and that’s a year--

  (a step toward him)

  --look, you chose your life. You had that right. You were never around for me. Well, fine. But I have no plans to be around for you.

  And now she stops, turns away toward the path--

  --LUTHER can say nothing, watches her--

  --then she spins back--

  KATE

  (louder now)

  --wait a minute--have you done something?--

  LUTHER

  --no--

  KATE

  --is that why you’re here now?--are you active again?

  LUTHER

  --no--

  KATE moves in close now--

  KATE

  --I think you’re lying--

  (big)

  Christ, Father, what have you done?--

  (and on her words--)

  CUT TO

  CHRISTY SULLIVAN’S BODY in the bedroom of the mansion--

  I don’t think I can ever explain how freeing that scene was for me.

  These two characters, whom I had been thinking about for six months and who had never been allowed to talk to each other, were suddenly ripping at each other. And there’s all that emotional father-daughter stuff working under, because you know LUTHER knows if he doesn’t run, the PRESIDENT will kill him—but he’s willing to risk all that just to hear his only child ask him to stay.

  I am aware we are not talking about a scene that will change the course of film history. But I was grateful to be able to write it. I think what I was dealing with was this: I started as a novelist, was a novelist for a decade before I ever saw a screenplay, and in part of my head at least, even though I haven’t tried one in a dozen years now, I’m still a novelist. And I guess I never thought I would do that to another novelist, change everything. God knows it’s been done to me—the novel No Way to Treat a Lady, for example, was based on this notion: What if there were two Boston Stranglers, and what if one of them got jealous of the other?

  Guess what? In the movie, there’s only one strangler. And I hated that they had done that.

  Now here I was doing it.

  And thank the Good Lord.

  Tony came over for the next few days, always bringing ideas with him. LUTHER should have a safe house. If LUTHER is one of the great thieves of the world—and he is—there can’t be too many like him, and law enforcement agencies must keep track of him—which meant SETH and
LUTHER could meet without SETH doing a great deal of time-wasting detective work.

  Most of all, Tony solved the ending—because the only person in the story who has the right to take revenge against PRESIDENT RICHMOND is the wronged husband, WALTER SULLIVAN. SULLIVAN is the reason RICHMOND made it to the White House, after all. In earlier versions, as in the novel, SULLIVAN is murdered by the Secret Service.

  Guess what—not this time. He lives and he kills the PRESIDENT. SULLIVAN and LUTHER, two previously dead characters, bring down the most powerful man on earth. And JACK GRAHAM, the hero of the first draft?

  Gone. Totally out of the picture.

  On the fifteenth of December I was exhausted. But I was done. I sent the third draft of Absolute Power to California.

  On the twenty-eighth of December, Eastwood said “yes” to playing LUTHER.

  And right after that, I smashed my thumb.

  I was closing the refrigerator door and forgot to pull my thumb away in time and I creamed myself and a blood blister formed beneath the nail and it took six months for the blister to work its way up, to finally disappear.

  Every time I looked at it, I was glad—because it reminded me of two things: first, of my most difficult time as a screenwriter. Because I know if I don’t take Tony to the Houston game, or if he can’t come, maybe the movie of Absolute Power never happens. Certainly, I would no longer have been involved.

  And second, and most important of all: the fragility of writing careers.

  Working with Eastwood

  First Meeting

  Not entirely true. I had interviewed him nearly a decade earlier, for a book I was writing, Hype and Glory, about my experiences judging the Cannes Film Festival and the Miss America Contest. Eastwood’s flick that year, Bird, was the outstanding directing achievement of the fortnight and I tried to win that honor for him, was outvoted. (Bird, in case you don’t know, is one of the genuinely underrated films of the ’80s and as good a movie about music as any. Ever.)

  He was, as he is, gracious, gave me the time I needed. He was, as he approached sixty, very much a legend—

  —and then here’s what happened to him—

  —he got hot!

  In the Line of Fire, Unforgiven, A Perfect World, The Bridges of Madison County. Starred in all four, directed three, got a directing Oscar for one, all of them enormous successes, in America, yes, even more in the rest of the world.