Forward to Glory

by Brian Paul Bach

  ‘The, um, Subconscious Muse has a creative capacity like no other being. She produces, directs, writes, designs, scores and casts the films of Dreamery – in our own private studios. We all – all of us – are so equipped. Yet, access is certainly limited, if not closed altogether. Their coy manipulation of our senses is at once tantalizing and full of equivocation. Often we wish we could interact with these nocturnal or dreamt-in-day productions, as they are so seductive, their moods so attractive and full of longing! I reflect on these things, but they are all so fleeting… Our dreams – we think of them as something three-dimensional, but even by sheer will, we cannot restore or even construct them after they have been created and run their course. Not in the same way. Not at all. Past the state in which we awakened, there is no way back to the set upon which they were photographed, as it were. The whole fabulous city or landscape or chamber, or bare space itself, if not the state of mind, in which a dream takes place, so effortlessly created and delineated when it is in progress, is gone. Gone with the wind! (And I am not referring to Margaret Mitchell’s tale of the Old South, nor David O. Selznick’s production therein, nor even of Dowson’s ‘Cynara’!) No, our dreams are mere evanescence, felt, but not grasped. Waking thought cannot replicate it, and we cannot even try. So, we are left with vague memories – sweet nostalgia for an impossible dream. Or, if we awaken in the wee hours, after a dangerous excursion through the Sub-Muse’s bleakest anxiety of sharpest horrah, the dark side, too, exists! And we are relieved to return to the mundaneness of daily life.’

  Jacques Wok, the ultra-cynical World Desk editor from the ‘Daily Brubb’, whispered into the adjacent ear of Usher St. Fredrics, Photoplay Critic of the ‘LA Times’:

  ‘What the hell happened to him over in the France – did he get conked on his head? Or what?’

  ‘Dreams are a fragile privacy, as elusive as the æther of cyberspace,’ the star continued.

  ‘He’s been reading Huysmans,’ replied St. Fredrics quietly, ‘You can tell.’

  ‘Cosmic dust is more definable, more graspable than a dream. Such sand inhabits the hourglass of time.’

  Was the star acting right now?

  ‘I think he’s just talking about that Frenchie chick who’s his girlfriend,’ muttered Wok.

  ‘Well, he’s just acted in Hugo. ‘Toilers’ is going to be big. Now shut up, Wokkie. I’m listening.’

  ‘Bending your ear to the ‘Master’, St. Frud?’

  ‘Shut up, Cynicus Maximus.’

  Outside, ol’ Riverside County. Butterbugs shifted gears.

  ‘We are left then, to turn to the Seventh Art to construct and restore our dreams. Thus do I dedicate myself to the search for that distant land. And I will take up the task again, presently.’

  St. Fredrics, who was plainly moved, asked:

  ‘Butterbugs, you mentioned nightmares, ever so briefly, and not even by name. Do you experience them, and are they, too, part of your quest?’

  ‘I am not plagued like some, Ush, but I cannot ignore them. So yes, they cannot be excluded.’

  ‘In this, your quest into the subconscious?’ Wok interjected.

  ‘I do not call it that, Zhok. So you cannot expect a campaign of any such nature. But I have to tell you, I’ve not really experienced anything nightmarish, whilst on my back in slumber.’ (Butterbugs genuinely forgot about some of his early, just-arrived nights in the DeSoto, waiting, as it were, for an 18-ton boulder to drop on him.) ‘– Except! Except in my early days. (He was remembering now…) When I came to the city of cinema, and I did not know what was to become of me. And my heart was located where all who have dwelt in the twilight of unknowing wait out their terms, if not their lives. I tell you, I have lived with such things, and it is in my ken to acknowledge them to you now. I have sympathy. Oh yes, I have empathy, too. Both in the fullest of measures. But I am interested in ascents – not necessarily of mountains, unless, of course, I am asked to climb one within the requirements of a picture show. I am keen on exacting the processes that give the gift of the ascendant. To rise up, up, into the ionosphere if necessary, or even the empyrean! But to do so solidly, like a continent thrusting up from protozoan seas! Can we not be interested in the enhancements, therein?’

  ‘Butterbugs, is this a manifesto?’ queried DeWitte Bensohn of the ‘The Hammer Report’.

  ‘No, DeWi. It is not. Merely thoughts of a not-so-private person.’

  Genial laughter.

  ‘I – I am a photoplay player. And as such, I join with those such as Paul Newman, Amy Adams, Sidney Poitier, Susan Sarandon, Johnny Depp, Lummox O’Charlie, Jane Fonda, Lindsay Lohan, Greg Peck, Samm-Art Williams, Joe Flynn, Kate Beckinsale, Whoopi Goldberg, Cerise ConCubbah, Shikshak Mundra, Elodie Bouchez, Whit Bissell, and others who have taken on causes of heart, soul and mind.’

  ‘The stars: leaping into politics?’ inquired Pe’Shwazai Kei’tatamo of ‘The K’ah’ha’na’h Ko’ka’hai Daily Twist of the Isles’.

  ‘Not hardly, my dear Pe’Shwee. Who in this chamber doubts that politics can emerge from nightmarish circumstances?’

  More genial laughs, somewhat aggressive this time.

  ‘But I do not wend that way now. Ask the average Irving or Janey whom you meet outside the gates of Union Station, in a short while. Ask them about the concept of uplift. They will tell you the same thing!’

  ‘Have you become a mystic now?’ queried Helen Thomas of ‘Walter Wanger Presents: The News’.

  Butterbugs smiled.

  ‘No such thing, Helen-Thom. When one is a player in picture shows, one is exposed to all aspects and pursuits in life. That is what keeps my sense of wonder in tip-top condition. I have recently had time to think, and I thought of many things.’

  ‘But Butterbugs, you just went through a grueling shoot with ‘Toilers of the Sea’!’ exclaimed Dairdrah O’Færærtiogh of ‘The O’Kegginses View of My World’.

  ‘I think you will find it a fine picture, Dair-o-Fær. I am most proud of it. Great score by Benny Herrmann.’

  ‘Where’s Faun, Butterbugs?’ Sugar Derrellson of ‘Almost Midnight’ sounded off.

  ‘In Paris, Shoog!’ Butterbugs cheerfully sounded back.

  ‘Waiting or shopping?’

  ‘Both, Shoog!’

  ‘‘Over’, or just ‘on hold’?’

  ‘Neither. We love each other, and we are dear, dear friends. We enjoy each other’s intimacy, and will continue to do so, as our schedules allow.’

  ‘You two are a beautiful couple!’

  ‘Thanks, Shoog. I’ll see what I can do.’

  Wm. Randy Hearst VI seized the next pause in the dialogue.

  ‘Butterbugs, we’ve followed you continuously since your repose that night near the Ed Poe wrap-up site. We observe and see a man who exudes confidence and (as you say) a sense of mega-wonder at all that he encounters. You state that such experiences as nightmares are not currently visited upon your house. Do you nevertheless experience anything akin to them?’

  ‘I do, Bill-6. I tell you, I do! Remember, I hail from this here Earth too, and not from Planet X. My mind sings the same songs and shrieks the same shrieks as does any CEO or paper cup picker-upper – and anyone in between. And I did not say I was immune from nightmarish moments. Nor could I ever be so impertinent. But the thing is, I am not afraid. For has not Fuseli shown us that there can be art therein?’

  Some of the reporters essentially missed out on the latter statement, but Butterbugs’ performance was so refined and perfect, he might as well have been reciting 1960 US census data. It was a good thing that Ernie Haller and his crew had their 35mm Eyemos rolling, so that audiences could see for themselves, via newsreels at the Chinese, or the Nonstop Newsreel Needs Now! over on Broadway, that very night.

  There was not one media person’s throat that did not tighten, and no paparazzi-plucker’s eyeballs that remained dry. All they could do was cry out, in unison.

  ‘Welcome back, Butterbugs!’

  Butterbugs hims
elf daubed his peepers with a checkerboard kerchief.

  ‘And now, People, we draw nigh.’

  All who knew this route spotted the conspicuous Southwest-Deco railway buildings that were uniform with the Union Station terminus. Time to gather their goods. There was not one member of this press corps who did not remain silent as they now went about their business. Each one was pondering the star’s pronouncements. Were these nothing more than banal words of obviousness from a mere actor, or were they the utterances of a visionary, sharing a rediscovery of truths most thought concluded? But now, today, viewed through newly-forged glass, re-minted for our re-consideration?

  Lud the Reporter happened to catch up with Butterbugs as he proceeded through the corridor of sleepers.

  ‘Butterbugs? I can’t help but present the following to you.’

  Butterbugs kept going, but acknowledged the familiar voice.

  ‘Luddy?’ he asked, with even-handed cheer.

  ‘You bet. Butterbugs, I can’t help but point out – your observation about dreams and dreaming – not being able to recreate – or continue – one’s dream – about how fleeting – not remembering – the impossibility of it all. I can tell you – uh – I for one – have been able to control, recreate, and do second takes of dreams. Really!’

  ‘Then you,’ replied the star in friendly tones, ‘should be directing pictures, I should think.’

  ‘But I like what I’m doing now. How come you put it that way?’

  ‘I was trying,’ he answered, halting, smiling, ‘to be appealing.’

  Lud the Reporter gazed at him in wonder.

  ‘Did it work, my dear Ludworth?’

  The mere actor paused for a second, then moved on.

  ‘It worked…’ Lud reported to the world.

  And when his locomotive steamed into Union Station, there were the confident hordes of greeters, the pleasant motorcade, and the beloved, echoey Great Hall all around him. He felt the lump in his throat when presented with a jar of palm oil from the cute Voted Best Darn Kid in Greater Los Angeles. At that very instant, Butterbugs knew that it was ‘triumph complete’, all the way home.

  Back in Now-A-Go-Go Hollywood.

  Wow! Things were wiggin’ ’n’ shakin’! Change was in the air. Big change. Good change. Indefinable as of yet, but it was as if new, never before imagined camera angles existed, in which different perspectives were detected, be they scenes familiar, or not.

  The boulevards were as vital as ever. Bustle, hustle, greener, and cleaner. Still, that edge existed, intact. The edge of which such chimæricists as Dr. Hunter S. Thompson only knew, through those who had gone over it, and lived to relate the tale.

  But for the remainder of those who walked the LA earth, reality still worked, with the same earthquaky edge, the same drive-by edge, and the same sunset-of-the-world edge they had always lived by. And the same people still met their ends upon the pavements of the freeways, and amongst the six-lanes, and at the left-turns onto arterials, and in the intensive care wards and in the dead-end spirals of the alleys, where cars are parked for years, and where those who must live in them do so, without portfolio, and without documentary profile.

  Sam Bronston had him for dawntreader cordials. Sonny had him for breakfast. Old Atrocity had him for morning-break bearclaws. Shonnaleen had him for a working lunch. Sheridan and Ruth Morley had him for tea. TABP had him for dinner. DeMille had him for cocktails. And Saskia and Justy tucked him up and cuddled him in girl-boy-girl configuration.

  A bright Vinejuice breakfast: with everyone in bathrobes.

  ‘Tell me, either of my sweets,’ said Butterbugs as he opened all the door panels to the terrace and settled back with his flute of fresh-squeezed durian juice, ‘What of the remains, the site, you know, where I crawled out of terror and towards hope, when there was a spiral down the drain – where he – you know, the saintly geologist, met his end. I want to know, as I honor his memory, and he is in my thoughts.’

  Neither of the sweets said anything.

  ‘All right, I will be direct: what of the Isaac Davis Building? That which slew College Plerrie, noble scientist? His family is well provided for and enriched by the Plerrie Deep Subduction Vent Foundation we set up, but I beseech you, what of the site itself? What has transpired?’

  ‘Oh, Butterbugs! You were blameless, and heroic!’

  ‘Please, Justy, I don’t need bolstering in that respect. I just want to know what has become of the place.’

  ‘Covered. Boarded up. Cordoned off. Sealed in controversy. Deeply buried.’

  ‘Buried in time,’ added Saskia.

  ‘Time,’ observed Butterbugs, ‘which is all we have to gauge our progress. Folly lies within its carriage, and yet, evolution toward something we do not yet know, is contained therein…’

  ‘Indeed,’ agreed Saskia.

  ‘Most certainly, dear concerned one,’ added Justy.

  There was an awkward pause.

  ‘We knew you not during that epoch, Butterbugs,’ Saskia said in epic tones.

  ‘Nor could you have,’ he replied quietly. ‘How could you have? For I didn’t… either…’

  They drank their morning beverages in silence for a while, solemn at first. Then, rising to the natural influx of the canyon’s daily ecosystem of bugs and birds that spread onto the terrace, simplistic immediacy commanded all three thoughtful ones’ attention. Proof that updated progressiveness was not only sensible, it appealed to these three cinema-oriented souls’ realization, that they were in possession of the higher gains of achievement in this here town.

  ‘You two, I’d like to change the subject now.’

  ‘That would be fine,’ answered Justy.

  ‘And Bob’s your uncle!’ smiled Saskia.

  ‘Tell me, who is to be my co-star in ‘Sacred Flame, Sacred Fame’ (Goldwyn)?’

  Saskia perked. ‘Oh, as I’m scripting this one, I can tell you who Porter’s settled on. This little girl.’

  ‘She’s really cool,’ interjected Justy. ‘She’s ProwlerCat.’

  ‘ProwlerCat!’ mused the star. ‘Tell me about her, if you please.’

  ‘Very young,’ said Justy with obvious approval. ‘And more than a tad bit of Japanese. A family member served in internment camps in Idaho and Wyoming during WWII. And the rest of her is Baltic.’

  ‘She is a girl from nowhere, though,’ added Saskia.

  ‘Sounds… like me…,’ Butterbugs mused.

  ‘A girl of the streets and sidewalks. A runner. Fast on her feet, and quick of mind.’

  ‘I had lunch with her last week at Gray Gravy’s,’ said Justy, ‘and she not only charmed me, I wanted to be the first member of her fan club.’

  ‘Cool!’ said Butterbugs.

  ‘Sonny discovered her. No surprise there!’ said Saskia. ‘Apparently she was languishing over at De Laurentiis. Just hanging out. Sonny saw her one day and said ‘Wow, maybe? Yeah, wow!’’

  ‘You know,’ replied Butterbugs, ‘I think I remember Sonny making an oblique reference to ‘a new girl over at Dino De Laurentiis’ during one of his long apologizing sessions.’

  They all chuckled.

  ‘My own session’s lasted over several years now!’ said Justy. Her relations with Sonny had improved exponentially since they’d divorced.

  ‘As I remember,’ continued Butterbugs. ‘– And, I might add, my memory seems to improve the older I get – I think I made a request of Sonny: to lend his expertise for her benefit.’

  ‘Then you discovered her!’ cooed Justy.

  They all laughed.

  ‘Maybe so, Juju, maybe so. I hope it was worth it.’

  When he first saw her, it was not exactly a déjà vu, but there was a connection, as thick and obfuscated as an LA pre-dawn in a raunchy neighborhood. But now, here on the set at Mega|Goth Studios, he looked her in the face and was reminded of the heart-rending scene in ‘Nevada Smith’ (Paramount, 1966) when Steve McQueen tells the dying Suzanne Pleshette:

  ‘I�
�m sorry… I’m so sorry…’

  He almost expected her to say it to him, as if she had, before. Sometime before. Except in the picture, McQueen says it to Pleshette. He would have to create a link:

  ‘I’m sorry… I’m so sorry… that we haven’t yet met… Yet.’

  She was reticent, because she saw something in his face, as well. She caught herself quickly scanning his body from head to foot, and then, as if undressing him with her eyes, she almost laughed. But then, as if he had never uttered ‘sorry’ just now, she said:

  ‘I’m sorry… I’m so sorry… but we have… met.’

  Her tone of voice and the words it spake turned on a spigot in his mind.

  ‘I – I think… maybe we have… Where? When?’

  ‘I’m, well, I’m not sure I should… say,’ answered ProwlerCat.

  No matter how big the star, director Henry Hathaway was not a man to be delayed.

  ‘Places!!’ he bellowed. Funny, he always seemed like such a happy guy. Until he gave orders of direction.

  Ray Kellogg, who was a.d. for the day, placed a dividing hand between the two dawdling stars, aiming one one way and the other another.

  ‘H.H. says ‘Places’,’ he warned.

  It seemed that, while attending to the busy schedule of filming this strange Parsee drama in the frequent hubbubbia of Karachi and Bombay, there was little opportunity for the two stars to continue their introductory – or re-introductory – conversation. They were actually in very few scenes together, and Butterbugs was obliged to keep a very packed social calendar, whether catching up with familiar faces located in the Merewether Clock Tower area of Sind’s metropolis, or in every Bombay neighborhood, from Byculla to Worli to Chowpatty, and back again.

  For her own part, ProwlerCat maintained a distance from Butterbugs. She was polite, but somewhat firm. Even in the film’s somber climax, filmed in the Towers of Silence on Malabar Hill (Butterbugs brokered access to these off-limits precincts on the premise that the essential nexuses of the Towers not be shown), the two actors, whose characters reconcile while serving as carriers of the dead, encountered no opportunity to take up the subject of their first meeting, as they had to observe strict Zoroastrian respect procedures, according to the Yasts, if filming were to be allowed.