A Lotus Grows in the Mud

by Goldie Hawn

  Some of our new friends wave from the rocky beach as we pick our way to our spot, carrying what we need for the entire day. They are mostly hippies who have come to Ibiza to play music, smoke pot and make love under the stars.

  We have frittatas for breakfast and fish for lunch, and the children eat an occasional hamburger. I drink cappuccinos all day. The fish is pulled fresh from the sea. Smoky and salty, it is some of the best I have ever eaten. All the food is cooked in our own special kitchen, a funky little lean-to bar right there on the rocks.

  Every full moon there is a celebration in honor of female energy. Huge driftwood fires are lit as musicians gather around to play bongos and drums. As the moon floats full and high among the stars, we sit around the fires and drink yerbas. Oh, how I love yerbas. It is a drink made from all the herbs on the island—and very potent, I might add. We watch bodies gyrating to the drumbeat, backlit by the moonlight on the waves. I am filled with such joy and contentment, without a care in the world.

  We love Wednesdays, the hippie market day, when I cram the kids in the back of the car and drag them to a busy corner of the island. Battered campers and painted psychedelic vans line up, from which people sell exotic wares from their travels to India, Asia and the Middle East. Clothes and fabrics and beads, saris and sarongs, which I buy and tie around my waist, or my hips, or my head. One size fits all.

  Coming home each night, we bump along little twisting roads lined with rock walls. We wend our way back up the mountain past dazzling white houses and shady glades of fragrant pines to our secret little hideaway. Pushing open the heavy wood door, I light the candles and prepare some food, and the children and I sit together, miles from anywhere. We play games and I sip wine, our skin tight and tingling, until the night weighs heavy on our eyelids and we fall into bed.

  Rising late, the sun floods in through my little window. I lie across the sheets listening to the bells tinkling on the sheep that are herded through our olive groves by a woman in a long black dress and an old sun hat. The same woman who sits alone beneath the almond trees on the fringes of the village. Looking out, the day already offers a sultry promise of heat, and the rich soil glows like red ocher in the morning sun.

  Washing the salt from my clothes each morning, I drape them over a line of rope slung loosely between two fig trees. Stepping back, I marvel at the way they sparkle as the breeze lifts the fabric and the sun catches their beads. Nothing will erase the beauty and color of that vision.

  When that idyllic summer is over, we return reluctantly to our beach house in Malibu, and my life as a solitary parent. But I can’t bear to break the spell. It feels so strange, this bustling world of cars and people rushing to get places. Trying to hold on to the magic of Ibiza, I follow my old routine for a while. I play with the children on the beach; I wash my own clothes and hang them out to dry on the line. I light the candles each night for dinner and sip some wine.

  For just a little longer, I don’t want to be anything other than the nameless mom of two small kids living in our beautiful little rock house by the blue-green sea. For a few weeks more, I desperately want to stay in this place of simplicity. Part of me never wants to return to the real world.

  power

  Power is sometimes misinterpreted as strength.

  Striding across the lot of Columbia Pictures, I have a script tucked under my arm that I am very excited about. Making my way up the stairs to the first floor, I am ushered into the opulent office of the studio’s head of production and handed a ritual cup of coffee.

  “Thank you for finding the time to see me,” I tell him, taking a seat opposite his enormous desk, “and, as I told you on the phone, I think this is a movie you might really be interested in making.”

  “You certainly sounded passionate about it on the phone,” he says, smiling. “I am interested to hear why.”

  “Well,” I begin, placing a copy of the script on his desk and taking a deep breath, “I fell in love with this movie for many reasons. This is a heroic woman’s story. But it’s not just about one woman, but all the women who stayed home during the Second World War. For the first time in their lives, they had to learn how to do man’s work—build airplanes, fix toasters, mend cars. They took care of themselves while their men were off fighting the good war.

  “When it was over, these women were expected to lay down their tools and put their aprons back on. They were lured back into the kitchen by new washing machines and appliances, but it was very hard for them to give up the liberation they had experienced, both sexually and personally. That is what this movie is about.”

  The head of production sighs. “The problem we have here, Goldie, is that this is a period picture. As I’m sure you’re aware, period pictures are sometimes difficult and expensive to make, so I’m curious about why you think this one would work.”

  “Oh, but I see the movie in a way that is much more modern,” I counter. “The clothes should be fabulous, the swing music should be great, and I think we need a director who is young and fresh and edgy, who can really give this an up-to-date feel. This shouldn’t be your usual forties movie.”

  The studio executive sits and listens to me patiently, drumming his fingers contemplatively on his desk. When my time is up, he thanks me warmly and escorts me from his office.

  “That was a terrific pitch.” He grins. “Very impressive. I’ll be in touch.”

  By the time I return to my office on Westwood Boulevard, at Hawn-Sylbert Productions, the message is waiting for me that he has turned me down.

  “Why don’t you try Warner Brothers?” my business partner, Anthea Sylbert, suggests, seeing my crestfallen face. An Academy Award–winning costume designer turned producer whom I first met when she designed my costumes for the movie Shampoo, Anthea always makes such sense. “After all, we do have a deal with them.”

  “Oh, I don’t know,” I tell her doubtfully. “They want me to do fish-out-of-water comedies. See, this film isn’t funny. It’s an ensemble picture and not at all what they seem to have in mind for me.”

  To my surprise, Anthea is right. Warner Brothers agrees to make this movie, which is called Swing Shift. Having cut a nonexclusive deal with me to produce movies for them on the back of my success in Private Benjamin, they give me the green light.

  Within a few weeks, I am sitting in my cozy office, excitedly waiting for a young new director to walk through my door. I have just seen his latest movie, Melvin and Howard, which I loved, and I just know he’s the right guy to direct Swing Shift. My assistant shows him in, and the first thing I see is his big colorful tie. Above it is the beaming face of Jonathan Demme. Straight in from New York, this guy has tremendous style. He looks as if he has stepped out of a movie. I love him instantly—the way he looks, the way he talks, the way he thinks.

  “I’ve read the script and I think it needs work,” he tells me candidly. “I have some ideas, and we’ll have to do some rewrites. I like what it has to say.”

  “I have found the guy who should direct our movie,” I tell the head of production at the studio excitedly the minute he leaves my office. “He’s awesome and he’s available and I love, love, love him!”

  They know Jonathan and hire him immediately. Before I know it, he has an office on the lot, and our movie is on the fast track.

  “This is going to be so much fun,” I tell Anthea. “I’ve just got a great feeling about this guy. He’s young and enthusiastic, and, best of all, I’m back in the chorus again. This is one picture I know I won’t be carrying by myself.”

  Warner Brothers organizes a series of meetings and brings in a producer who is attached to a group of financiers. “We want to bring these guys on board to help pay for this movie,” the studio heads tell me, “and it would really help if you would chip in here. Would you relinquish your producer’s fee and take your name off the production, Goldie? It will leave room for the others.”

  I don’t even have to think about it. “Sure,” I tell them. “No problem. I’ll
do that.” Honestly, it is a relief. No strings, no producing, no walking on eggshells. Just to work on a film I believe in with other actors is a joy beyond belief. I can just be an actress again.

  Jonathan and I read with a number of actors and actresses. A young man named Kevin Costner is among them, and he’s great but, sadly, not available when we need him. Dozens more men and women pass through our door. Sitting eating sandwiches in Jonathan’s office, I am having the best time, back in the trenches.

  “Who’s next?” I ask, my mouth full. It is the end of a long day, and I am snacking before going home to bathe the kids.

  “A guy called Kurt Russell,” Jonathan replies, running his finger down the list.

  The moment Kurt walks in and sits down, I am suddenly on full alert. We have an instant, easy connection.

  “You know, we’ve met before,” he tells me, his eyes twinkling mischievously.

  Uh-oh, I think. “Where? When?”

  “We did a movie together called The One and Only, Genuine, Original Family Band.”

  “You’re kidding! But that was, like, my first part in a movie, even before Cactus Flower.”

  “I know. You played the giggly girl. I was sixteen years old and the drummer boy in the band. I had the biggest crush on Lesley Ann Warren.”

  I laugh. “Oh my God!”

  “No, but it gets better than that,” he says, rocking back on his chair and grinning. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a man more comfortable in his own skin.

  “It does?”

  “Do you remember you were lost? On the Disney set, when you arrived for the audition?”

  “Well, kind of.”

  “And you stopped and asked a woman sitting on a bench for directions?”

  “I did?”

  “Well, that was my mom. She was a dancer, and when she came home to dinner that night she told us, ‘I met a girl today, and she’s going to get the part.’”

  “Oh my God! Your mother’s a dancer? I met her? This is unbelievable.”

  He smiles. “Yes, you remind me a lot of her, actually.”

  I can feel light beaming out of my body. The muscles that control my smile ache. When he gets up to leave, I don’t want him to go. As he reaches the door, he turns around and looks at me and says, “You know, if I don’t get this part I’d still like to take you out for coffee sometime.”

  “Oh, great…I mean, yeah…okay.”

  He closes the door, leaving a big empty void.

  Remembering that Jonathan is in the room, I turn to him in a daze. “Oh boy,” I say, my heart still pounding in my chest. “He’s pretty great, isn’t he?”

  Jonathan smiles. “I think we just found our Lucky.”

  “I’m married!” I yell at Kurt, pushing him away, my face flushed. “Don’t you understand? Don’t you get it?” Spinning on my heels, I run away from him, turning my back on temptation.

  “And cut!” Jonathan shouts. “Thanks, Goldie, Kurt. That’s a wrap.”

  Looking across at our director behind the camera, I wave and smile. “Okay, then, Jonathan. Great. Thanks, honey. See you tomorrow.”

  Pulling off the forties-style scarf that holds my wig in place, I brush down my factory dungarees, eager to get out of my costume. Turning, I give Kurt a broad grin. Oh boy, am I falling in love.

  When we reach the makeup room, Kathy Blondell, my hairdresser, sits me down and starts to unpin my wig. Peering at myself in the mirror, I grimace. “I hate this wig. It always seems to go on the wrong way. I wonder what it really looks like in this film. I haven’t seen it yet.”

  “Well, why don’t you ask Jonathan?” she suggests, glancing out the window of the trailer. “Looks like he’s on his way to the dailies.”

  “Great idea,” I say, jumping up, my wig half off. “Hey, Jonathan, are you on your way to the dailies?” I call out to him.

  “Yes, yes I am,” he says. He pauses. “But I would really prefer it if you didn’t see the dailies, Goldie.”

  I feel a little sting. Looking into his eyes, I realize for the first time that despite our great working relationship, I still pose some kind of threat to him. I have tried so hard not to step on any land mines; I have been so aware not to say anything that might make him feel defensive or unsure of my true intentions. “Oh, okay,” I say. “I just wanted to check my wig out on film because sometimes I think it looks a bit funny on my head.”

  “Okay,” he says. “I’ll check it out.”

  “Hey, thanks.”

  I watch him walk away and feel yucky inside. I wander back to the makeup trailer. Flopping back into my chair, I rip off my wig and stare at myself in the mirror. A skullcap flattens my hair to my head, and my big ears are sticking out, and I think to myself, How could he be threatened by this?

  “What’s the matter?” Kathy asks as she unleashes my own hair.

  “Well, that was strange. Jonathan doesn’t want me to see the dailies.”

  “Ah, well, you don’t like to see the dailies anyway,” she reminds me.

  “No, I know,” I tell her sadly. “But he doesn’t know that.” Looking up at her concerned expression, I muster a smile. While brushing out my hair, Kathy says, “Jonathan doesn’t know you well enough yet.”

  The next day on the set is one of the most perfect of my working life. Jonathan agreed at the beginning of the movie that my mother could have a small part, playing Ethel, the landlady who owns the garden houses where the principal characters live.

  Today is her big day. She has to speak a few lines and make a few moves all by herself. She is surprisingly nervous as she is manhandled into her forties costume and has her hair and makeup done.

  Jonathan is incredibly sweet with Mom. He really gets to her, and they make each other howl with laughter. He approves her clothes and escorts her to and from her dressing room as if she were the Queen of England. But, bless her, no matter how many takes he allows her in a scene where we are all listening to the radio for news of the war, Mom can’t remember her lines.

  Sitting at the kitchen table filing her fingernails, all she has to do is look up at me as I walk past and say, in that incredible voice of hers, “This American’s going to die with perfect nails.”

  She tries it over and over, but she gets it wrong every time. She looks at the camera, she looks at Jonathan, she looks everywhere but where she’s meant to be looking. When she finally looks at me, she flubs her lines. Jonathan laughs and laughs each time she gets it wrong, and so does the rest of the crew.

  I am mortified.

  “Oh my God, Mom, this is taking so much time!” I finally tell her in a whisper. “Just try and concentrate on what you have to say and where you are meant to be looking and let your lines come out naturally.”

  My mother scowls at me. “This job! My God! Oh, for Christ’s sake, Goldie, you say them!”

  “But I can’t, Mom!” I laugh, as everyone breaks up around me. “I have my own lines to say.”

  Finally, after I don’t know how many takes, she gets it word-perfect, sitting in exactly the right spot and looking up at me like she’s supposed to. The entire crew breaks into spontaneous applause. We are one big happy family. My mother smiles and nods, gets up and walks off that set like Tallulah Bankhead.

  Walking down the path toward my trailer after my scene, I spot Kurt getting ready for his. He is sitting astride a 1940s motorcycle with a funny little sidecar, looking like a gazillion-trillion dollars in a leather jacket and a smile that could melt an army. I am so in love from my head to my toes, I am tingling.

  “Come on, hop in,” he says. “I love this machine.”

  “But I can’t! I have to change my costume.”

  “That’s okay, get in,” he insists. “I’ll take you for a ride.”

  Climbing into the sidecar, I let him take me for a ride all the way around the lot. I feel so stupid sitting down below him, like a character out of the Keystone Kops. But looking up at him, the wind ruffling his curly hair, I know I am looking at the man I
hope to have in my life for a very long time. I love him for being so smart, so real, so loving and so unaffected by this business. I look up to heaven and wonder if my dad has not sent him to us.

  The film is over, our happy troupe of players has disbanded after a sad last day and a bittersweet wrap party. Jonathan had his photograph taken kissing every member of the cast and made them into a collage for his wall. I still have the photos of us puckering up.

  It’s six months later and the night of the studio screening of the first cut of our movie, Swing Shift. As usual, we are all a little anxious as we file into the Warner Brothers screening room. As actors and crew, we have all given our best, but—as with every movie—they are ultimately assembled and made in the editing room, leaving us completely helpless.

  I arrive with Kurt, and wave at a beaming Christine Lahti and Ed Harris. I return Holly Hunter’s wink. I raise a hand in greeting to a nervous-looking Jonathan. Kurt takes my hand, and we sit side by side as the lights dim and the film begins to flicker at us from the projector.

  The movie that I was so passionate about, that I first sold to Warner Brothers, unfolds before our eyes. I take Kurt’s hands. We watch our faces up on the screen, our mouths opening and closing over our lines. There is the airplane factory, the pretty little garden houses and the buzzing, jumping jitterbug bars where I first felt the pangs of love for Kurt. Our costumes look great. My wig doesn’t look too bad after all. But something is wrong. Very wrong.

  When the final scene rolls and the screen flickers blank, you could hear a pin drop in that screening room. I sit staring up at the screen in silence.

  “What happened?” I finally say to Kurt, a lump in my throat. “What happened to the honor of the women in this movie? My character has no conscience. I look like I’m almost enjoying it when I swan off with my husband and leave Lucky just standing there. There is no struggle there at all! And that masturbation scene should never have made the first cut. It didn’t feel right when I did it. Oh my God, I had no idea! I should have said something sooner.”