Me and Orson Welles (19 page)

“Orson Welles Meets Dora Samuels,” I said, heading out the door. “A Comedy in Three Acts.”

 

I met up with Stefan outside his chemistry class. He was walking out the door of the lab with his arm around Caroline. He yanked his arm away the second he saw me, and Caroline practically ran down the hall.

“I tell ya, people work fast in this school,” I said. “You may be a lying, duplicitous, drunken son-of-a-bitch, but you're
fast,
you know? I've got to give you credit for that.” And I realized, even as I was saying this, that my moral outrage was more theatrical than anything else. The truth was that
I
had just been unfaithful to her in a way I couldn't even have dreamed about a week earlier. But I enjoyed playing the role of the injured lover. It was a good, loud, Orson Welles part.

“Listen, bozo—”

“I'm not even debating this,” I said. “Because frankly I don't care who you pounce on anymore. Jesus, it's the same story over and over again.”

“We gave you the chance, little buddy.”

“What chance do I have against guys like you? You guys
always
win.”

“I told you, they want you to fight for 'em. If you don't, they move on to somebody who will.”

“Then if that's the case, I don't want 'em,” I said. “If they're that superficial and
prehistoric,
I don't want anything to do with 'em.”

“Suit yourself, stud.”

I watched Caroline disappear down the hall. “Did she even
mention
me at all? Did she act as if she was
remotely
interested in me?”

“We haven't done that much talking.”

“Yeah, I know it's tough to talk when you've got her left breast in your mouth.”

“Nothing's happened yet.”

“That makes me feel
so
much better.”

“I told you, stud, girls want you to fight for 'em. You don't have to
mean
it, for Christ's sake. But you gotta make the bullshit gesture.”

“Here.” I pulled out my two complimentary tickets for
Caesar.
“If I knew anybody else on
earth
I could give these to I would, but I can't think of anybody, so here they are. They're for that show I told you about, the one I'm opening in tonight.”

“Tonight? Don't you want to give these to your folks?”

“Oh, yeah. Great. So my mother can show up with a garden rake. Are you coming or not?”

“Sure, I'll be there.”

“And show up with Skelly, all right? Not Caroline, for Christ's sake.”

He examined the tickets. “Yeah. This could be fun.”

“And don't
yell
anything either. O.K.? This is Broadway.”

 

I left all my books in my locker and during lunch I cut out the back door onto Walnut Street. I simply couldn't sit in class and pretend it mattered.
Screw the consequences.
When the show was a hit it wouldn't matter anyway.

Under a pine tree Kristina Stakuna was taking a drag on a cigarette; Joe Rutgers had shown up in his new Chrysler pounce-mobile.

“Kristina?” I said as I walked by.

She looked up narrowly.

“You are one exquisitely beautiful woman.” Joe Rutgers looked up to see who I was. “I just wanted to say that to you once before I graduated.” I held out my hands innocently. “No other motive here but pointing out beauty where I see it. And you are one beautiful woman.”

Her eyes went warm. She laughed.
“Muchas gracias.
You want a cig?”

I shook my head. “Heading into the city. Want to get there a little early. Opening on Broadway tonight.

She raised her head in mild curiosity.
“¿Es verdad?”
She took another drag on her cigarette. I wanted to kiss her.

“Es verdad
, sister,” I said. “Me and Orson Welles.” I crossed my fingers. “Like
that.
Give you all the dirt tomorrow. Got a train to catch.
Adios, lindita.”
I headed down the path toward town.

And I left Joe Rutgers standing there with his big ape mouth hanging open.

 

The wind was up. I pulled my collar tightly around my neck, set my hat at an angle.

I had some time.

I thought: O.K., if I don't get hit by a cab, I'm opening tonight in
Caesar.
If that guy in the doorway doesn't jump out and smash my skull in with a tire iron, I'm opening tonight in
Caesar.
If those construction guys up there don't drop a fifty-ton vat of cement on my head, I'm opening tonight in
Caesar.

I had a cup of coffee and a plain doughnut in some little dive with steamy windows. I thought: O.K., if I don't choke to death on this doughnut, I'm opening tonight in
Caesar.

I turned up West 14th Street. The clock from the Spanish Church was striking two. There was a cab waiting in front of Welles's apartment.

I heard Welles's deep laughter, then Sonja's laughter—and up from the basement steps came the two of them.

I hid lamely behind a street-sign pole.

Welles was reading aloud from a folded copy of the
Times.
“Good God, listen to this,” he said. “ ‘Slowly paced, incompetently spoken, badly edited, this
Anthony and Cleopatra
'—
Anthony
with an h! Christ, Atkinson can't even get the goddamn name of the play right! ‘. . . this
Anthony and Cleopatra
is a considerable trial of an audience's patience and good will.' ” Welles shook his head. “Why don't they just ask poor Tallulah to apologize for being born? ‘Her voice has none of the music that blank verse requires; she misses the rhythm of poetic speaking, and a large part of what she says cannot be understood.' God, this is priceless.”

Sonja was breathless with laughter—then she spotted me. I had half-turned away, but there was nowhere to hide. She touched Welles on the sleeve. He glanced up, and then put his arm around her and headed toward me. He laughed heartily.

“Lucius, old man! What are you doing down in these remote parts of the isle?” he said. “A great night tonight! Can you feel it? Going to be one of those magic nights.”

“May I have one minute alone with Sonja?”

“What's the problem?” said Welles. He lit a cigar in the windy street. “We've got half a dozen interviews this afternoon, a final tech—”

Sonja raised her index finger. “Give us one minute, Orson?”

He shrugged and walked toward the parked cab.

She and I remained there. Her eyes shone bright and hard. “What do you want me to say, Richard? I told you what I was doing. I'm not sorry.”

I heard Cotten's voice in my head:
Fight for her. It's what she wants.
But I couldn't seem to find the words. The hurt was deflating me.

“Isn't your wounded silence a little melodramatic?” she asked. “You've known me for a week.”

“Sometimes you remember a week for the rest of your life.”

“Then be grateful you had a week.”

“And that's all there is to say?”

“Richard, you're a nice little kid from a nice little town.
Stay
there if you don't want to get hurt.”

^“
I
^'
m not a little kid, and it's insulting for you to call me one.”

She moved in the direction of the cab, then stopped and turned. “Look, I warned you what you were getting into. People betray each other—and now you can add me to the list. I like you, Richard, honestly—”

“I love you. I'm willing to fight for you.”

“Fight for me?” She smiled. “You don't even know me.”

“Then
allow
me to know you.”

She drew herself more tightly into her coat. “Orson is going to introduce me to Selznick.”

“So Selznick makes this morally right?”

Her eyes widened with anger.

“Morally right? This is 1937, Richard—I don't think the words ‘morally right' mean anything anymore.”

“To me they do.”

“You're beginning to sound a little self-righteous.”

I kept thinking to myself:
What would Stefan say?
“I would never do to you—”

She was furious. “You're so
above
ambition? So morally high and righteous? Great!
Quit the show.
You want to impress me with your nobility? Orson and I are so morally second-rate next to you? Great! Quit the show! Make a
real
stand. Make a
real
protest. Be a
real
man.”

Now I was angry.

“You're not worth quitting for.”

“I'm not worth quitting for—or you're just so piss-afraid of missing your Broadway debut that you'll conveniently look the other way? You better think hard before you start pointing the finger of righteousness at me.”

Welles was approaching now. He'd been reading the newspaper, waiting, I imagined, for Sonja and me to resolve our little skirmish. “I told you, Junior, we're late already.”

“Richard told me he wants to quit the show,” said Sonja.

“I did not.”

“What the hell is going on here, Junior?” said Welles.

And suddenly I knew how much I hated that asshole. “First of all,” I said, “my name isn't ‘Junior.' Or ‘kid.' Or ‘Lucius.' My name is Richard, and that's what I want to be called.”

Welles turned to Sonja. “Get in the cab.”

“This concerns me, too, Orson.”

“
Get in the cab
.”

She did.

“Now what exactly
is
your problem, Junior?” said Welles, and he pushed me in the chest. “ ‘Cause you're picking the wrong day to upset me.”

I shoved his hand away. I wanted to punch him. “Sonja is my lover,” I said.

“Your
what?”

He laughed. And it
was
ridiculous, but it seemed to me a matter of pride.

“My lover. As in the-girl-who-I-am-in-love-with. And I resent your screwing around with her, all right? You've got a wife, for Christ's sake—a pregnant wife. This is
my
girlfriend. I'd like you to back off.”

“Your lover, huh? You and half of Actors Equity.”

“Shut up.”

“You're angry at
me,
Junior? And don't you think—” and he pointed at the cab “—Mistress Quickly over there deserves a little of the blame?”

“I'm asking you to back off; you're married for Christ's sake.”

Welles grabbed me by the collar. “You're asking
me
to back off, Junior? Well, here's my answer. Go fuck yourself. And I wouldn't worry your little heart about quitting—because you're fired. Effective this second. And you ever
mention
my wife again, I'll break your fucking neck. Now, you want to apologize to me, Junior? You want to go down on your knees and apologize for being a talentless little, meddling shit, then go right ahead.”

I suddenly wanted to kill him—kill him for his ability to diminish people so completely. It was me. It was Sam Leve. It was Lloyd and Houseman. And, for once, I wanted to turn that destructiveness on him. And maybe, even more than that, I wanted to kill him because for the rest of his life he would be a star, and I would not.

I said, “You want to open your show tonight without a Lucius?”

“I'll cut your scene in two seconds.”

“Then start cutting.”

He used his fingers in a scissor gesture. “Done. You've got half an hour to get your stuff out of my theatre. One half hour, and if I see your talentless little face again, I'm calling the cops.”

“Go to hell, you arrogant fuck.”

“I hope you enjoyed your Broadway career, Junior, 'cause it's over.”

He stepped into the taxi, slammed the door, and the cab pulled away.

I stood there shaking.

The city roared around me.

V
akhtangov met me on the stairs.

“I put your stuff in a box,” he announced. “Orson told me to.” He said nothing more and continued down the stairs.

A couple of extras were up in the dressing room playing hearts. They stopped talking when I entered. My gloves, my stage shoes, my overcoat, and my
John Gielgud's Hamlet
were inside an old carton.

They pretended not to notice me, but I heard somebody whisper:
“Sic transit gloria.”
They all chuckled.

I didn't know whether to say goodbye or
screw you.
I said nothing.

Descending the stairs I met Cotten.

“Put that down,” he said. “Don't you know Orson yet?”

I didn't say anything because I felt I might cry.

“My God, he pulls this every show,” said Cotten. “He just wants you to kiss his ass—that's all. Then you laugh, and he laughs, and you both put this behind you. I was the goddamned star of
Horse Eats Hat,
and he fired me two hours before we opened just because I hammered Henrietta Kaye before he did.” He laughed in his graceful, Virginia-gentleman way. “Just
apologize
to him, for Christ's sake.”

“Apologize for what?”

“For whatever the hell he wants you to. You think it matters for what? Even
he
doesn't remember what this was about.”

Lloyd was coming up the stairs. “You can't quit anyway. We still owe you five bucks—and we're not paying until we get
all
the details.”