Bridge for Passing (12 page)

“What do you think was your best part?”

Somewhere in the thick of the questions, usually very soon, it became all too apparent that English was sadly weak, in fact nonexistent. The only perfect English sentence was the same one. “I cannot speak English.”

“Where did you study English?” we inquired.

“In school—yes.”

“How many years in school?”

“Six yahs.”

“Six years?”

A nod. We tried not to smile as these six years were repeated again and again. One of the young men least learned in English said, “Ten yahs.”

We tried repeating English words, bits of dialogue. A good ear may make it possible to teach the English dialogue. Sometimes the ear was very good. Usually it was not.

“Next time you make a picture,” I advised myself privately, “let’s stick to the English-speaking countries.”

When at last an actor appeared who spoke perfect English, we tried not to accept him merely because he could speak. There were other requirements. So the days passed, not hopeful and yet not quite hopeless. Meanwhile the matter of the assistant director was not allowed to die. The production manager told us one morning that we were to meet the Japanese director. I was daily more impressed by the production manager, his efficiency and his chronic desperation. He must produce a motion picture every week for Japan’s film-hungry population. It was and is an intolerably heavy schedule, but he assured me it could not grow lighter until television improved and provided real competition, when, he said, the motion picture companies would have to produce better pictures and therefore not so many. Meanwhile he could not stop. He carried on conferences with directors, with everybody, it seemed, while he kept a finger in our pie, appearing and reappearing, always in shirt sleeves, his large face shining with sweat in spite of air-conditioned rooms. He had a very handsome face, in the Japanese classical tradition, although not as handsome as it used to be, doubtless, when he was young, before wine and whatever goes with it made its mark. It was too heavy now in the jowls, there were bags under the fine eyes. It lighted easily with laughter, nevertheless, and when he laughed it was with the roar of a lion. He put aside formalities whenever possible and begged us for frankness. He spoke in Japanese, his interpreter one of the pretty young women who softened what he said without destroying its force. She was very skillful. But I still did not really know him. That came later.

One afternoon then, we were led to another office where we were told to wait for our meeting with the proposed Japanese director. We waited. He entered after five minutes or so, looking vaguely like a Japanese Stokowski, but bigger. He was handsome for his age, his white hair swept back, his profile proud. He bowed but not too deeply and I noticed a coldness creep over the face of the American director. Two young men actors were about to create a scene for us. The Japanese director sat down. He understood English as well as the production manager did, but like him, he would not speak it. The American director explained that he wanted the two actors to do a scene between Toru and Yukio, the main characters in
The Big Wave
. The Japanese director seized a pen and began to write down what he thought the scene should be. The American director tried through our interpreter to stop this on the grounds that he did not want the scene to be fixed but fluid. The Japanese silenced her with an imperious wave of the hand. Steel shone in the American’s eyes and he instructed the interpreter again.

“Please tell this gentleman I do not want the scene written down. I wish the actors to improvise.”

The interpreter, awed by the Japanese director’s fame and hauteur, made an effort. Again the imperious wave of the royal hand! The American took over. When the Japanese leaned to give the paper to the actors with his own instructions the American removed it, saying in firm English, “I don’t want them to have written instructions.”

There was a moment of awed silence on the part of the actors. Whom should they obey? The American, they finally decided, and the Japanese sat back, looking formidable. I knew what was coming, but knew, too, that it must wait until we got back to the hotel. The American maintained perfect manners in public but when the scene was over, rather well done considering the tense atmosphere, we got up, bowed to the Japanese director and everybody else, and took our leave. The interpreter was in the car with us so nothing was said. As we got out, however, at the hotel door, the American spoke to me through clenched teeth. “I must talk with you before everything falls apart.”

I bowed to the inescapable. “Very well. Let’s have it now, in my rooms. I’ll expect you in fifteen minutes.”

I needed a few minutes in which to prepare myself for the ordeal of a conference with a prima donna. Define prima donna? Whatever the term is in the dictionary, in real life it means a person self-concentric—not necessarily egoistic or egotistical, and not entirely self-centered, but certainly one the nucleus of whose being is the self. Of directors, there are two kinds, generally speaking; the actor’s director, and the director’s director. The actor’s director is the beloved of actors. He woos them, charms them, defers to them, flatters them, binds them to him emotionally until they do their best for him. He calls this “developing their talents.” Sooner or later he also destroys them, especially if they do not release him from the emotional tie he has created between them. He expects to be released as soon as the play opens or the picture is made, for emotion has then served its purpose, and he is indignant if he is not released. Some actors—the females, to be more accurate—are so foolish as to want to continue the tie, and when it is cut off, they are destroyed, at least for a time. Yet so dependent are they in emotional terms that they will continue to speak of him fondly as “an actor’s director.” The director’s director, on the other hand, will avoid the use of emotion as a tool to develop the actor, male or female. He knows what he wants, and will have no truck with “development.” He tells the actor exactly what is to be done, in terms of art and the play, and the actor must perform accordingly. Without exception, so far as I know, Japanese directors belong to the latter group.

At this point of my analysis, there was a knock at my door and the American director entered in what is called ominous silence. He sat down and began as usual by pointing out certain minor mistakes I had made during the day—minor or major it did not matter, for by now every mistake was major and all were mine.

“Why,” he inquired with frightening distinctness, his eyes gimlets on my face, “did you have to greet that Japanese as though he were an old friend? Why did you have to thank him and say it was good to have his help?”

I muttered something about being polite in the Japanese manner, et cetera, but nothing could stop the inevitable. He did not waver.

“I must tell you,” he said, and I knew he must, “that unless this Japanese director is removed at once, I shall return to New York.”

I was speechless. Remove the Japanese after the production manager had invited him? It was to be asked to remove Mount Fuji from the landscape of Japan!

The American proceeded in frigid tones. “There can only be one director. It is I—or it is not I.”

The sky fell. I was crushed. The crisis I had dreaded had arrived. I had hoped that time would make it less violent, I had been foolishly optimistic and now I was desperate. I am not a good fighter at any time and when faced with a battle, I always try to follow the good old Chinese proverb, “Of the thirty-six ways of escape, the best is to run away.” The catch at this moment was that there was no place to run to. I could not run, therefore.

I got up from my chair. It was the end of the day, nearly six o’clock, and I would like to have sent for a pot of Japanese green tea, to which I am addicted, and then, sipping tea, to have read a Japanese novel while I waited for dinner. There was no possibility of either tea or novel. I thought of the worst and most frightening resort and could think of no other. I said,

“Let’s go to the production manager’s office now and tell him.”

I hoped that the American director would admire my courage. It was exactly the same as though I had said let us go to the zoo, find the biggest, fiercest lion and twist his tail. He showed no sign of admiration. He got up and we went, the interpreter timidly behind, paling as we explained our errand.

“Japanese director,” she gasped, “is very big man. So is production manager.”

It was my turn to pale. I began to hate this American director temporarily. And why did I ever yield to this idea of making a picture in Japan? But I was here. We were already in the building. We were going up in the elevator. We announced ourselves at the door of the production manager’s office. Yes, we must see him before he goes, we said. The pretty girl looked surprised, hinted that the production manager was very busy, et cetera, but we said we would wait. We were ushered in and we sat down. The production manager ignored us while he roared into one telephone and another. I noticed foolishly that the telephones were all turquoise blue in a green room. I counted the buttons on a pretty girl’s back as she telephoned into still another telephone, repeating the production manager’s roars in a gentle voice. Green tea was brought but I dared not try to swallow lest I choke. After a long five minutes, ten minutes, whatever the hours are, the production manager lowered his bulk into one of the circle of chairs and grunted at his interpreter. I understood perfectly that he was asking in his own way why the devil we were there.

I myself wondered. I wished that I were not there, but a glance at the American’s grim profile was enough to destroy question and answer. I plunged in, knowing that I was committing suicide. I began by assuring the production manager, who understood every English word I said but pretended he did not, that we were honored by his wish to help us but, under the circumstances, directors being directors, young and old—I meandered on, hoping to avoid the final issue, the last moment, when I must somehow say bluntly that we did not want the Japanese director—that is to say, the American director did not—that is to say, I was sure the production manager understood how embarrassing it would be for an American director making his first picture in Japan, to say to an elder director, one so respected, et cetera. The American found such an action impossible even to contemplate, not to mention the confusion of actors who would not know which one to—and so forth—

The interpreter struggled with my faltering efforts. As I knew, the production manager understood perfectly what I was getting at. He cut across faltering and interpreting. He banged his fat knees with his big handsome hands. He roared at us and in English! “American director must be strong! American director must say to everybody, ‘You are listening to me!’”

He beat his barrel chest to illustrate how the American director must behave. The American, however, was unmoved. He said with frightful calm, “I know how to behave like this in my own country. I will not behave like this in Japan. I must ask that the Japanese director be removed.”

The two men stared, not to say glared, at each other. I opened my handbag and took out the Chinese fan I keep for such emergencies. Although the room was well cooled, I found it necessary to fan myself. I tried to think about something remote and pleasant, the mountains of Vermont, for example, as seen from my living room window there.

I heard a loud gust of a sigh. It was the production manager. He got up and stalked about the room, rubbing his head with his hands. He was muttering, still in English. “I am fearing something like this to happen—oh yes, goddam!”

He sat down and pondered. I know my Japan and I understood that he was very unhappy. Somebody had to lose face, and it could not be the aged and famous Japanese director. Nor could it be ourselves, since as foreigners, we do not know enough to lose face. He lifted his head and sent me a reproachful look. You, he conveyed to me, you know better. You should have spared me this.

“I am sorry,” I murmured from behind my fan. “I am so very sorry. But what can I do? If I had not told you, if we had gone on location, trouble would have been worse.”

“Ah, sodeska,” he sighed. “True—better get it over.”

He relapsed into Japanese. He could not speak English any more. “Tell them,” he said to the interpreter, “tell them that I will attend to it. Tomorrow I will see them. I am busy but I will see them.” He turned his back as soon as possible, and we returned to the hotel.

“At least it’s done,” I told the American.

He refused to be cheerful. “We have not seen the end of it,” he said grimly.

Next day it appeared that he was right. We returned to the studios and resumed casting. Everything was as it was the day before except we did not see the production manager, upon whom we depended for everything. Pretty actresses came in, reported that they had studied English for six years, declared that they could not speak English and left us again. Handsome young men came in with ditto. We were enormously cheered by an older actor who could take the part of Toru’s father and spoke perfect English. And all this time there was no production manager. When we inquired of a pretty girl, she went away and returned to say that he could meet us in the city offices at two o’clock. He was very busy, et cetera. We were served delicious meat sandwiches—yesterday beef and today spiced pork. I pause here to say that the beef in Japan is made of beer-drinking Kobe cows, hand-massaged every day by devoted cowboys, and is tender beyond any beef I have ever tasted.

At two o’clock promptly we were in the city offices. No production manager appeared on the horizon of today or any day. The American became indignant and I became resigned. The pretty girls trotted off and returned to say that the production manager would see us at five o’clock the next day, or the next or the next. This meant a delay in deciding upon our cast which we simply could not afford. We went back to the hotel and complained to my special friend by telephone. It was useless to think of food or sleep if the production manager had abandoned us. There was a long wait. She called us. This time the American took the brunt. He explained his position, unaltered and unalterable. He listened to her reply and his face cleared for the first time in two days. I gathered that the matter of the Japanese director had been settled. He had been invited to resign. Everything would be all right, my friend said.