Hollywood (19 page)

Cannes was another matter. I received a phone call from Pinchot from over there. “We don’t expect to win but we hope we can come close.”

“I think that Jack Bledsoe might get best actor.”

“It is rumored that the French are going to give the Palme d’Or to one of their own.”

Down at Firepower the publicity department kept sending various trade magazines to interview me about the movie. Having broken some cathedral windows in my time, the magazines sensed I was something or somebody they should bait, somebody to get blathering stupid drunk, somebody who could be persuaded to say something stupidly useable. And they got it one stupid night. I said something negative about an actor that I really liked as a person and as an actor. It was a small thing, it described only a small segment of this person. But like his wife told me on the telephone, “It may have been true but you didn’t have to say it.” She was right but in another way she was wrong. We should be free to speak freely especially when we are asked a direct question. But there is the matter of tact. Then there is the matter of too much tact.

Hell, I had been attacked continually over the years but I had somehow found this to be invigorating. I never believed my critics to be anything but assholes. If the world lasts until the next century, I will still be there and the old critics will be dead and forgotten only to be replaced by new critics, new assholes.

So, I was sorry about wounding the actor but maybe actors are just more sensitive than writers. I hope so.

And I stopped giving interviews.

Actually, I would tell anyone who asked that the charge was $1,000 an hour. They would quickly lose interest.

Then Jon Pinchot was on the phone again from Cannes.

“We have problems . , .”

“Like what?”

“Jack Bledsoe won’t come out of his hotel room to be interviewed...”

“I can understand that.”

“No, wait. . . It’s because he won’t speak to anybody who didn’t give his last movie a good review. Problem is, he didn’t get many good reviews for that one. The reporters were all waiting in the lobby and Jack said, ‘No, no interviews, you people don’t understand me.’ A guy held up his hand and said, ‘Jack, I gave your last movie a good review!’ Jack said, ‘All right, then I’ll give you an interview.’ So they set it up. At a certain cafe, at a certain time. Only problem is, Jack doesn’t show up.”

“Jon, I guess these actors are more sensitive than writers or directors...”

“Sensitive? Well, you can call it that...”

“How’s Francine doing?”

“Fine. Fine. She talks to everybody. She wears these summery dresses. She speaks well of all of us. She knows that she has made a great comeback. She feels that she is the last of the last of the great ones. She walks about like a goddess. It’s a great show.”

“Yeah. How’s Friedman?”

“Oh, he’s great! He’s everywhere, talking and sweating, waving his arms. He’s hated by all the powerful people here. At the same time they fear him because of his tenacity and energy. He disturbs their sleep. They speak of him over their drinks. They want to rip his ass off with their deathrays.”

“No chance. Anything else?”

“Just Jack. If we could only get him out of his hotel room. We did finally get him to agree to appear on one of the most popular TV programs in France. He agreed. Then he didn’t arrive.”

“Why did he go to Cannes at all?”

“Damned if I know...”

The time went by as time will do. The track was still there. Also, I reread some James Thurber. At his best he was wildly funny. It’s just a shame he had such an upper-middle-class viewpoint. He would have made one hell of a bad-assed coal miner.

I also knocked out a handful of poems. The poem has some value, believe me. It keeps you from going totally mad.

Yes.

And then, no. The film didn’t win anything at Cannes.

And Sarah began planting new flowers and vegetables in the garden.

And our 5 cats watched us with their ten beautiful eyes.

After Cannes there was still more work in the cutting room to be done. Pinchot was working hard at it.

I had a small part in the movie. I played a barfly in one scene. It was brief but it could have been longer. They cut most of it out. Let me explain. I am sitting there with these other two fellows, we are at the bar, not sitting together but separately. It’s the scene where Jack first meets Francine. The three of us, as barflies, are just supposed to sit there like barflies. Once the camera was on us, though, I couldn’t help myself. I took a large gulp of beer, rolled it around in my mouth, then shot it back down into the neck of the beerbottle from a good six inches. An excellent trick. Not a drop fell on the bar. I don’t know what made me do it. I had never done it before. But that part ended on the cutting room floor.

“Look, Jon,” I said, “why don’t you put that part back in?”

“I can’t. Everybody would be asking, Who the hell is that guy?’ “

When you’re an extra, you just don’t ad-lib.

Anyhow, the time came when there was no more to be done to the film. The date for the release was set.

This particular night about a week before the opening Jon was over at our place and we were sitting around.

“Well, are you going to write us another screenplay? I’m ready when you are.”

“No, Jon, I’m afraid of Hollywood. This is it. Or, I certainly hope that this is it.”

“What are you going to do now?”

“A novel, I guess.”

“About what?”

“You never talk about it first.”

“Why not?”

“It lets the air out of the tires.”

“Hank is always checking his tire pressure,” said Sarah. “He carries this little gauge around with him. To test his novels.”

“She’s right. . . Listen, Jon, is there going to be a premiere for this film?”

“A premiere? Why, no...”

“No premiere?” asked Sarah. “That’s ridiculous!”

“Jon,” I said, “I want a premiere!”

“
You
want a premiere? I can’t believe this!
Why
?”

“Why? For
laughs
. For bullshit. I want a white stretch limo with a chauffeur, a stock of the best wine, color TV, car phone, cigars...”

“Damned right,” said Sarah, “and Francine will love it!”

“Well,” said Jon, “I’ll see what I can do.”

“Tell Friedman it’s for publicity purposes,” said Sarah. “Tell him it will help the gross.”

“I’ll work on it...”

“And, Jon,” I reminded him, “don’t forget the white stretch limo.”

Somehow Jon managed it. The night of the premiere came around. Sarah was upstairs getting ready as the white stretch limo came up the drive. The little neighborhood kids had seen it and were already gathering in the yard next door. I went outside and guided the limo up the drive.

“Hank, are you famous?” one of the kids asked.

“Famous? Oh yeah, yeah...”

“Hank, can we come along?”

“You wouldn’t like it.”

“Yes we would!”

The chauffeur cut the engine and got out.

We shook hands.

“I’m Frank,” he said.

“I’m Hank,” I said.

“You’re the writer?”

“Yes. Have you read my stuff?”

“No.”

“Well, I haven’t seen you drive either.”

“Oh yes, you have, sir. You just saw me drive up the driveway.”

“That’s right, isn’t it? Listen, my wife is still getting dressed. It won’t be long.”

“What do you write, sir?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean just that, sir. What do you write?”

The fellow was beginning to piss me off a little. I wasn’t used to chauffeurs.

“Well, I write poems, short stories, novels....”

“And you wrote a screenplay, sir.”

“Oh. That. Yes.”

“What do you write about, sir?”

“About?”

“Yes, about. . .”

“Oh, haha, I write about life, you know. Just life, you know.”

“My mom,” one of the kids said, sticking his head over the fence, “says he writes dirty stuff!”

The chauffeur looked at me. “Please tell your wife that it’s a long drive. We mustn’t be late.”

“Says who?”

“Mr. Friedman.”

I walked into the house and yelled up the stairway.

“Sarah, the limo is here, hurry...”

“He’s early...”

“I know. But it’s Friday night and it’s a long trip.”

“I’ll be down in a moment. Don’t worry. We’ll make it.”

I cracked a beer and turned on the TV. There was a fight on ESPN. They were really slugging it out. The fighters were better conditioned now than in my youth. I marveled at the energy they could expend and still keep going and going. The months of roadwork and gymwork that fighters had to endure seemed almost intolerable. And then, those last two or three intense days before a big fight. Condition was the key. Talent and guts were a must but without condition they were negated.

I liked to watch the fights. Somehow it reminded me of writing. You needed the same thing, talent, guts and condition. Only the condition was mental, spiritual. You were never a writer. You had to become a writer each time you sat down to the machine. It wasn’t that hard once you sat down in front of the machine. What was hard sometimes was finding that chair and sitting in it. Sometimes you couldn’t sit in it. Like everybody else in the world, for you, things got in the way: small troubles, big troubles, continuous slammings and hangings. You had to be in condition to endure what was trying to kill you. That’s the message I got from watching the fights, or watching the horses run, or the way the jocks kept overcoming bad luck, spills on the track and personal little horrors off the track. I wrote about life, haha. But what really astonished me was the immense courage of some of the people
living
that life. That kept me going.

Sarah came down the stairway. She looked great.

“Let’s go!”

I snapped off the TV. Then we were out the door.

I introduced Sarah to the chauffeur.

“Sarah! Sarah! Sarah!” the kids screamed. The kids liked Sarah.

“Can we go with you, Sarah?”

“You’ll have to ask your mothers,” she laughed.

Mothers? Didn’t anybody ever ask the fathers?

The chauffeur helped us into the back. The limo slowly backed out with the kids following along the fence. Hell, I’d soon be dead and someday about half of them would be sitting down to word processors and writing unimaginably bad’ shit.

We drove down the steep hill and I got the cork out of the first bottle of wine. I poured two tall glassfulls.

“Here’s mud in your eye,” I said to Sarah, clicking our glasses.

“Here’s mud in both of our eyes,” she said.

I turned on the TV. It didn’t have ESPN. I shut it off.

“Do you know how to get there?” Sarah asked the chauffeur.

“Oh yes...”

Sarah looked at me. “Did you ever think you’d be taking a limo to the premiere of a movie that you had written?”

“Never. I’m just glad I got off of that park bench.”

“I like limos. Don’t you like the way they ride?”

“They glide. We’re on a glider to hell. Here, let me give you another drink.”

“Great wine...”

“Oh yes...”

We went up the Harbor freeway north and then we cut onto the San Diego freeway north. I hated the San Diego freeway. It always jammed. Then I noticed a slight rain beginning to fall.

“That’s it,” I said, “it’s beginning to rain.” All the cars were going to stop. California drivers didn’t know how to drive in the rain. They drove too fast or too slow. Most of them drove too slow.

“We’re going to be late,” Sarah said.

“I think so, kid.”

Then it really started to come down. Terror filled the other drivers on the freeway. They peered through their flipping wipers with their tiny soulless eyes. The fuckers should be glad they had wipers. Once I had an old car without them. You want to know about hard driving? Try that. In rainy weather I carried a sliced potato with me. I’d stop the car, clean off the windshield with the potato and drive on. You had to know how to do it: just a very light rub.

But these drivers, now, in their cars, acted as if they were practically on their death beds. You could feel their panic in the downpour of rain. Dumb panic. Useless panic. Wasted panic. You ever want to use your panic, save it for something real.

“Well, baby, we have plenty of wine.”

I poured a bit more.

But I had to allow the chauffeur a bit of credit. He was a pro. He seemed to know which lane would slow down and which would soon move and he slid that limo, that large large limo gently back and forth between lanes, getting all the best of the flow. I almost forgave him for not being one of my readers. I loved professionals who could do what they were supposed to be able to do. They were rare. There were so many inefficient professionals: doctors, lawyers, presidents, plumbers, quarterbacks, dentists, policemen, airline pilots and etc.

“I think we’re going to make it,” I told him.

“We might,” he admitted.

“Who’s your favorite writer?” I asked.

“Shakespeare.”

“If we make it, I’ll forgive you.”

“If we make it, I’ll forgive myself.”

I just couldn’t engage in conversaton with that mother. He put the stopper to me each time.

Sarah and I just sipped our wine.

And then we were there. The chauffeur pulled up and opened the door. We got out.

It was at the edge of a large shopping mall. The theatre was back in there somewhere.

“Thank you, Frank,” I said.

“You’re welcome. I’m going to park now. I’ll find you when you come out.”

“How can you find us?”

“I’ll find you...”

Then he was in the driver’s seat and the white stretch limo was gone into traffic. The rain was still falling.

I looked and there were 4 or 5 men with umbrellas waiting for us. It was the open part of the mall and some of the rain drifted in. The men with the umbrellas rushed toward us, looking very very concerned that we might get wet.

I laughed. “This is ridiculous!”

“I like it!” Sarah laughed.

We all rushed toward each other. Then we moved into the mall. There were cameras flashing. Big time. I had left the park bench behind.