Nothing happened.
“Go on. Hit it some more.”
The boy raised his hand again, ready to bang the covering. His father held him closer to the glass.
Mom offered a weak protest. “The sign says . . . ”
The father pressed his son’s face until his nose almost touched the side of the glass. Everyone nearby watched this family, then the cage. One man raised a camera, flash bulb ready.
Instead of banging or slapping the glass, the boy tapped one timid finger on the side.
Tap. Pause. Tap, tap.
With a howl and screech, the prop leaped into action. Puppet arms and legs flailed from beneath the furred body, and the rod and string mechanisms hurled the manikin at the side of his cage with a heavy thump. Whether by an unseen puppeteer’s intention, or by coincidence, the prop attacked the same side of the cage the boy had tapped. The boy wriggled in his father’s grasp, as if begging to be set down, but his father held firm. The boy cried out, thrust out a hand to cover his view of the flailing manikin, then simultaneously pulled away as if afraid he could be bitten through the glass.
One camera bulb flashed, then another.
The accompanying sound effect was chilling, piped in through speakers hidden beneath the pegboard. A low growl represented every animal you ever feared—a lion and a puma combined, the grunt of a wild boar. Blended with that was the squeak of a mouse, the screech of a cat after you accidently step on its tail; the sound of a shark’s jaws snapping closed; and other sounds of unease, like fingernails scraping a blackboard, and night wind through barren winter branches.
The manikin itself was hideous. Its round body was tough, like the husk of a coconut. Hairy arms and legs bent in unnatural angles, with the bump of extra joints; they seemed to coil and uncoil like tentacles. The hands were stiff, with bright black nails at the ends of the fingers. It was unclothed, other than small burlap sacks tied over the feet. These improvised shoes seemed oddly disturbing—an unexpected touch of humanity on a figure that otherwise was utterly, horribly primitive.
And the face. A lion’s muzzle, lips bared and mouth open, so full of teeth it seemed the jaws could barely shut. Red eyes gleamed above a flared snout. Pointed ears poked through the wiry mass of a black mane.
It was also quite fake. The guy in line was right.
The manikin moved like a stuffed animal thrown across the room by a child, or like a ball on a shaken stick, the attached arms and legs twisting randomly from the jolting movement. The head itself had features that, individually, would have been scary—but they were crammed together in too small a space. The face itself didn’t move at all. The jaw stayed open as the body shook; the stiff, curled lips never matched the “voice” coming from the hidden speakers. Unblinking eyes were painted on, their glow provided from tiny light bulbs hidden beneath.
Still, it sure gave that kid a scare. He kept crying, and the parents waited awhile before they dragged him away.
#
Jack got the tickets, and I got my sightseeing tour. I rode the top floor of an open-air double decker bus, suffering the heat in exchange for unobstructed views. I borrowed Jack’s camera and clicked through two rolls of film. Some of the shots came out okay, but I would have liked them more if Jack had been with me on the trip. Shared memories are always better.
Before the tour, I booked a room on Eighth Avenue, at the optimistically named Splendid Hotel. It was fairly run down, and in a pretty sleazy neighborhood, but the room was reasonably clean, and it fit Jack’s requirement of close and cheap. I bought some water bottles, two deli sandwiches, and chips from a corner store, and shared the meal with Jack in the ticket line. My bus tour was scheduled for two o’clock.
The guy next to us was strangely silent while we ate. Jack said, “He was driving me nuts about some actress. I gave him an earful about what a hunk Grant Sullivan is, and that kind of shut him up.”
#
By the time I got back to the Splendid Hotel, my arms were pink going on red. I felt the beginnings of a sunburn on the back of my neck, too, and especially on the bridge of my nose. I didn’t care where we ate dinner, as long as the place had some good air conditioning.
Jack had beaten me to the room. He already had the bed pulled down, his backpack open and some clothes spread out on the floor next to the desk. The television was on, and two brown sacks sat on an endtable. “I went ahead and bought sandwiches from that deli where you got our lunch.”
Ever since he won that exorbitant journalism prize from Chesapeake at graduation, Jack became an expert at what I call “student travel.” Instead of maybe paying a little extra for something nice, you settle for what’s acceptable. If you get a cheap, decent meal someplace—and our lunch sandwiches each had fresh bread and a hefty portion of meat—you go back for the sure thing rather than risking something new. That way the money lasts longer. You have more days of travel, even if some of those days aren’t particularly elegant.
I wanted a slight upgrade, usually, and preferred to try new places. Quality over quantity. But there was another factor: we were getting close to the end of our year of travels. We’d had some good times, but also a lot of odd experiences, and a lot of close calls. I’d keep going with Jack, wherever he wanted to take us. Being with him was the most important thing. At the same time, I looked forward to the day when Jack’s prize money ran out. We could get jobs, settle down and live in an apartment like normal people.
“I saw a bunch of good deals on the walk here,” I told him. “Restaurant Row has places with fixed price menus, dessert and drink included.”
“That’s for the theater crowd, or for tourists,” Jack said. “We can try one for lunch tomorrow, maybe.” Another of Jack’s student-travel tricks: lunch at the nicer places, since it was the less expensive meal.
“Okay,” I said. It was too late, anyway. He’d already bought the sandwiches.
“I wanted us to eat in the room.” He pointed at the television. “This local station is doing a Grant Sullivan marathon.”
#
Sullivan’s first film was playing on Channel Ten. I’d never seen it before.
Jack sat on the bed, the remaining half of his turkey sandwich in front of him on a wrinkled square of wax paper. I used the desk chair—the boxy wooden type typical in college libraries, with a barely padded square of fabric covering the stiff seat; this one had a couple cigarette burns in the fabric. I’d improvised with the room’s outdated New York Sights hardback, setting the book in my lap to serve as a TV tray.
In the long commercial break, Jack summarized the beginning of the movie. “Sullivan plays this American cowboy type in the first bit, and there’s all these shots of him waving a lasso and riding a horse. Shirtless in some of ’em, and he gets a drink from a water pump, then empties the tin cup over his head and water runs down his chest. Too bad you missed that part, right?”
“How come I never saw this one growing up?”
“It was his first movie. The studio buried it once they put him on contract. You’ll be able to guess why.”
“You’ve seen it before?”
“No, I’ve heard about it. It’s really low-budget. There was no dialogue in the first fifteen minutes. Just a lot of stock footage from other Westerns, intercut with Sullivan rounding up cows or whatever. His scenes might have been intended for a completely different film.”
“This is a horror movie, right?”
“Yeah. Technically more in the ‘this old house’ genre. Anyway, no dialogue in the opening sequence, but Grant does this voiceover: a few clichés about growing up on the farm, then how the highway came through and diverted his business.” Jack took a quick bite of sandwich, then put out his hand for me to pass the water bottle. “He gets this letter out of the blue—a close up shows him opening it while the voiceover reads: ‘Your English great-uncle has died. Enclosed is a plane ticket for you to attend the reading of the will.’ Didn’t know I had an English relative, he mumbles, but I guess he finds a
shirt, because next thing you know it’s goodbye American west, hello merrie olde England.”
Jack dropped an angle of crust onto the paper and wadded it up. I couldn’t figure how he’d shoveled in those other bites while he was talking. “From that point forward, in the sections with dialogue, it’s an English production. When the movie got released in the States, they changed the title to The Odd House. Couldn’t change the dialogue so easily. It’s back on.”
The television was a tabletop set with two tuning dials: one for the network stations, and a UHF dial for local channels. Jack leaned forward and stretched his arm to adjust the volume knob—no remote in our no-frills hotel room.
The connection came through a wand and hoop antenna on top of the set. Jack had added some tinfoil from his sandwich wrapping, but the reception was still pretty fuzzy. The film was in black-and-white, and a grainy, jumpy print as well. Not an ideal viewing experience, to say the least, but when you watched a movie this way—knowing you might never have a chance to see it again—it gained a strange kind of intensity. You really had to pay attention, since part of the image might warp for a second, or the whole picture could do a flip. The quick English accents, sometimes undercut by static, made me hang on to decipher every word.
Sullivan looked good. Younger than I’d ever seen him, but still masculine and confident. In case the audience forgot he was American, he wore Wrangler jeans and an open collar shirt with those country-western stitchings at the shoulders and over the pockets. An attractive woman in a vest stood close to him, holding a pen and notepad.
Jack did some running commentary. “The lady reporter is doing a story about the will, and now she’s gonna tag along as the heirs visit the house. That old guy’s the lawyer.”
Sullivan, the reporter, and a clump of Sullivan’s distant relatives stood in front of heavy wooden doors, waiting as the solicitor held up a ring of keys. “I remind you, if you choose to step within the walls of this queer house, each of you forfeits your thousand-pound inheritance currently provided, as stated in the will.”
“Queer house?” I couldn’t help laughing as I figured out the movie’s original title. In 1957, “queer” apparently still meant weird or strange or odd in England, without the strong reference to sexual orientation it already had in America. How hilarious that a famously masculine American actor began his career in a movie called The Queer House.
“I’m always up for a challenge,” Sullivan’s character said. The lady reporter jotted down his words.
The lawyer pushed an old-fashioned key into the lock, turned it with a heavy click. “Whoever stays within this queer house the longest, will inherit the entire estate.” The doors creaked as he pushed them inward. “It’s not too late to change your mind.”
A thin, weasel-faced man peered into the dark opening. “A thousand pounds is a lot of money, darling.”
His wife elbowed him in the ribs, saying, “We’re not letting this American or anybody else take what’s rightfully ours.” She scowled at the other relatives, got behind her husband and pushed him to a higher step on the porch.
The dialogue provided unintentional laughs throughout. At one point, after weasel-face and his wife die separately under mysterious circumstances, the reporter tells Sullivan, “I think this house killed them. Do you really want to stay here? These queer walls could be your tomb.”
Silly, formulaic stuff. Yet there’s an odd—should I say queer?—tension that rescues the film. The idea of Sullivan being tested and found lacking, a threat that the house’s awful secrets could frighten him, make him feel like less of a man. The fact that a skeptical audience watches, ready to laugh at him.
But I realized I was laughing at the movie itself, at the unfortunate, almost relentless repetition of the title’s adjective. I never laughed at Sullivan. In this uninspired, micro-budget cheapie, his first movie role, he still had presence. He was convincing.
One last example. In a fairly predictable twist, it turns out the reporter was working for the English relatives: they bribed her to get close to Sullivan, so she’d convince him to surrender the challenge. He finds out, confronts her, and she breaks down. “It’s true. I tried to get you to leave so you’d lose your chance at the inheritance. But then the unexpected happened.” (Unexpected for her, maybe.) “I fell in love with you. And now I’m asking you to leave because I want to protect you from the terrible secrets of this queer house. I don’t care about the money anymore. I’m frightened for you. For us.”
And they kiss. He puts his arms around her and he comforts her, even though she’s betrayed him, and it works because of Sullivan. Because it’s believable she’d fall in love with him.
#
The Rialto marquee was bright that night, even with a good number of bulbs burned out. Before entering, we had to wait in line again. When we got to the front I noticed the prop pedestal was empty: no manikin, no iron or glass cage.
Once inside, Jack rushed to an aisle seat one-third back from the screen—he liked to stretch his long legs into the aisle once the movie started.
The theater was packed. The place had been cleaned about as well as our hotel room, unfortunately. A drab red curtain was tied back on either side of the screen, and the screen itself had a few sections that were torn and cheaply patched. A stretch of duct tape held my seat cushion together, both of my seat arms had gum stuck beneath, and the floor was tacky from popcorn butter or spilt soda, I hoped. I tried not to remember how recently they showed porn movies here.
A familiar voice sounded directly behind me. “I read that Lori-Ann did a nude scene. I wonder how much they’ll show?”
I groaned.
Thank God for Jack. “Maybe Grant Sullivan will flash his bare butt,” he said, loud enough for half the place to hear.
At nine o’clock sharp, the lights dimmed. They began with a Warner Brothers cartoon, like in the old days. Next, they screened a series of trailers for older Grant Sullivan films, including a spot advertising his TV show, Mason for Hire.
(Nope, Celia, they didn’t screen the trailer for The Queer House, though I agree it would have been interesting to hear the audience reaction.)
After the trailers, a spotlight came up and a publicity guy wandered onto the stage in front of the movie screen. An assistant wheeled in a cart, its contents covered with a black cloth. “Be sure to stick around after the movie, when Mr. Sullivan will join us to answer some of your questions. He might have time for some autographs, as well.”
I didn’t recognize the publicist at first, since he’d traded his casual-dad clothes for a clean shirt and sports coat. But when he hit the covered cage, I realized it was the father from earlier today. A heavy slap, like he was banging on a television to improve the reception. “We’ll have another guest for you to meet as well, if you dare.”
The cage shook in angry response, probably the assistant rocking it from the handle. The theater’s sound system, impossibly loud, broadcast the recorded growl, shriek, and hiss of the manikin creature.
Why was the cage covered? Everybody had already seen the prop while waiting in the ticket line.
The publicist helped the assistant wheel the cart off the stage. The spotlight went out; in complete darkness, the ominous growl played over the speakers in a continuous loop.
The noise faded. The movie started.
#
Well, let’s just admit that some publicity campaigns are more creative than the films they represent. The script was full of horror-movie clichés. Sullivan’s character purchases an ugly doll in a pawn shop. The doll comes to life, killing Sullivan’s enemies: his boss, the boyfriend of the woman he loves, then his best friend when the friend discovers the doll’s secret. Sullivan tries to return the doll to the pawn shop, but the store has mysteriously disappeared. Feeling betrayed, the doll kills its owner. The End, or Is It?—since final credits show the doll back on a pawn store shelf, ready to corrupt the next owner.
Even with a better script, the general idea wa
s too old-fashioned to scare an audience that screamed through Jaws, Rosemary’s Baby, and The Exorcist. The special effects were good here and there—and I include Lori-Ann’s breasts in this category—but there were too many “off” moments that destroyed the illusion. The manikin might look effective in a stop-motion shot, hiding in the shadows behind an open door. Then it would catapult through the air at somebody’s throat, an obvious hand puppet with its frozen face and flailing limbs. The sound effect for the creature was chilling, but the movie itself was saddled with a plodding synthesizer soundtrack that telegraphed any surprises the film could muster.
Despite these flaws, Sullivan acquitted himself well in the starring role. He was in his late forties, long past the days of alligator wrestling and treasure hunts in an African jungle, but he was still convincing as a romantic lead—even with an actress half his age. His body looked fit, his full head of hair was gray only at the temples, and his voice still had the deep, slightly Southern drawl that audiences always liked. The Manikin’s Revenge was no big budget Hollywood epic, but I predicted it would attract a decent cult following. Sullivan would earn back whatever money he paid for his Executive Producer credit, and then some.
This NYC premiere wouldn’t hurt. There’d be some good newspaper photos of the publicity guy’s kid jumping back from the caged prop. The sold-out crowd would spread happy word-of-mouth after their meeting with the film’s star.
People applauded as house lights came up and Grant Sullivan walked onto the stage. The standing ovation represented fond memories of Sullivan’s full career rather than praise for the current performance, but it was sincere enough. Jack stood up next to me, and we clapped for a long time.
Nobody needed to introduce him, of course. Sullivan took the microphone and addressed us directly, thanking us for our applause and for all the support for his TV show.
Our seats were about thirty feet back from the stage. I realized I’d never been this close to a movie star before. There he was—the guy I’d had a crush on when I was ten years old.
Odd Adventures with your Other Father Page 14