Read My Lips (21 page)

I had initially been offered the film by MGM, turned it down, and soon after had a change of heart. Then one weekend I’d found myself on a picnic with friends. Howard Zieff was with us. I was wearing big, checkered pants and four-inch Candie’s high heels,
looking like the Jolly Green Giant. Howard and I got to talking, and he told me about his brother, a land developer, who built much of the tract housing in the San Fernando Valley. I was not a fan of tract housing in my Valley and let him know. The next day I got a call from my agent.

“Sally, Howard is not sure if you’re right for the part . . .”

Can’t say I didn’t see that one coming. So I decided maybe I should call.

“Howard,” I said, “don’t be like your brother and ruin the Valley. How about we have a meeting first?”

He agreed. I wore tight jeans, a T-shirt, and flats. As we talked, I learned that James Caan was worried I was too tall to star with him. So I said, “Well, you want somebody good or somebody short?”

I finally went in to do the reading. When it was over, everyone in the room, including Jimmy, stood up as I was leaving. I looked around and said, “I don’t think Jimmy’s too short.”

I got the job. And in every production office, at all of our locations, my picture hung next to Jimmy’s on the wall—six inches higher.

Slither
was a road movie, and my character, Kitty Kopetzky, was on the run with Jimmy. He had great charm and was so much fun; I loved him from the first day. Jimmy taught me to box; he practiced lassoing on me. He was irreverent and adorable.

For a while we were shooting near some cliffs that overlooked the Pacific Ocean. The location was invigorating. Jimmy was all brawn and machismo. I was free, unattached, as Rick and I were split up by that point. Maybe a little affair would be just the ticket, I thought.

One night when we were on location in northern California, we were all wandering around a small town. There was some sort of festival going on, and I arrived just in time to see a young woman being crowned “Little Miss Rodeo” or something. I went back to my room at the motel and was lying on my bed, thinking about Jimmy. At a certain moment I happened to look up.
Strolling past my window, on the way to his room next door, was Jimmy—arm in arm with Little Miss Rodeo.

Well,
I thought.
I guess that won’t be happening.

There would be other nights, other girls, other locations, other towns—and Jimmy made the most of them. One night I got locked out of my hotel room. Jimmy’s room was next to mine, as always, so I went next door for help. It was a huge property, and it was late, and the office seemed too far away. Jimmy gave me a choice: he would be happy to help me break into my room, or I was welcome to stay in his. Believe me, I was torn, but having seen the steady parade of women past my window; I just couldn’t do it. Sweetheart that he was, he did help me get into my room.

Jimmy was one of only two men—the other was Bob Duvall in
M*A*S*H
—who I ever slept with on film. Jimmy had the decency to take the gum out of his mouth before we kissed. At the end of the shoot he presented me with a photo—of my ass. You see, before all of my takes, I used to bend over and flip my hair in front of me to fluff it up. Jimmy was a devil. He must have gotten the set photographer to snap the photo when I wasn’t looking. As a parting gift, he wrote notes all over the picture like, “I can’t believe I ate the whole thing,” and other lovely remarks. One of the reasons I love him.

I still really hadn’t had a date since Rick and I broke up. Jimmy wasn’t going to break my dating ice, so it had to be someone else. That’s when Jennifer Jones stepped in.

After David Selznick’s death, Jennifer had married philanthropist and art collector Norton Simon. She was having one of her fabulous dinner parties and phoned me in my big empty house to say, “Sally, Henry Kissinger would like you come as his date to my party.”

“Ewww, Jennifer!” I said. “I’d be embarrassed to be seen with him! Besides, I’m working for McGovern.” It was election time, 1972, and George McGovern was running against Richard Nixon, who had made Kissinger his national security adviser.

I was not a Nixon fan or a supporter of the war in Vietnam.

Jennifer laughed and said, “Well, would you at least sit next to him?”

I loved Jennifer so much; I couldn’t tell her no.

“All right,” I said, “if I have to.”

I told my mom, who at that time was a good Republican. She was over the moon and mailed me a newspaper article about Kissinger and Nixon’s historic trip to China.

When Jennifer married Norton, she bought a modern beach house from director John Frankenheimer. Norton was a passionate art collector; in fact, his collection is now housed in the museum named for him in Pasadena, California. Jennifer and Norton had hired Frank Gehry, the famed architect behind the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Downtown Los Angeles, and countless other stunning structures, to construct a second house next door. A beautiful garden, with mirrors hidden in the landscaping to reflect the greenery, connected the two houses.

The night of the party, as I entered Jennifer’s house, the first thing I saw was Vincent Van Gogh’s
Mulberry Tree
hanging in the foyer. The second thing I saw was Henry Kissinger, sitting across the room in a low chair. I walked over. After being introduced, I asked him, “So, how was China?”

“Why?” he asked. “Did your mother send you an article?”

“Yes,” I said. “How did you know?”

Damn, that made me like him right away.

We adjourned to our table, sitting with Rita Hayworth, Dorothy McGuire, Joseph Cotten and his wife, and Paul Ziffren, a successful Hollywood lawyer, with his wife, Mickey. The food was great, and somehow the conversation got around to
M*A*S*H
and why Henry hadn’t seen it. He said that Nixon wouldn’t allow it in the White House. Henry had a wonderful sense of humor and an easygoing manner.

It was a very enjoyable evening. At the end of the dinner we all stood up from the table, then Henry asked—in front of everyone there—if I’d like to accompany him to a dinner honoring the
Soviet ambassador coming on his first trip to the States, another historic moment in Cold War relations. My politics reared up again. A public dinner with Henry Kissinger, Nixon’s key adviser? I was a lifelong Democrat, picketing the Vietnam War alongside Jane Fonda. But all eyes were on me. I couldn’t say no.

The week before the event Henry called to make sure I was still going. I finally came clean. “Henry, I feel ambivalent about going with you because you guys are murderers, and I’m working for McGovern.”

He responded, in his low distinctive voice, “Sally, I’m sure you don’t mean ‘murderers.’”

“Well, maybe not ‘murderers,’” I mumbled.

On the night of the dinner Henry picked me up at the white elephant. There was nowhere for him to sit, but he seemed to be a good sport. I got in the car and began grilling him about why we were in Vietnam and why the Nixon administration was keeping us there. Henry started to reply, “The president—” when I interrupted him, saying, “I don’t care about the president. What are you doing there?”

He seemed to take it all in stride. I guess that’s what being a diplomat is all about.

We arrived at the Bistro, an elegant Beverly Hills restaurant that the Who’s Who of Hollywood used to patronize. The maître d’ escorted us upstairs to a private room. He opened the door, and instead of seeing fifty people, which is what I was hoping for—easier to get lost in the hubbub—there were only about fifteen people, among them Cary Grant, John Wayne, and the Soviet ambassador and his wife. Just my usual crowd.

While mingling before dinner, I heard John Wayne talking about Vietnam.

“We should have gone in there and wiped them off the face of the Earth,” he said. In spite of our significant differences on that issue, I liked John and always found him warm and respectful.

During dinner Henry asked me to stand up and welcome the Soviet ambassador. It was the last thing I wanted to do, and I
don’t remember one word of what I said. After a nice meal and many toasts, Henry and his two bodyguards—who barely fit in the car—drove me home. We were an odd pair, especially politically, but I had fun.

I
T WASN’T AS THOUGH
I
WAS SPENDING HOURS ON END WORKING
the phones for George McGovern, but I did my best to spread the word. I did my share for different causes, but the bottom line was that I was a follower. McGovern was about getting out of Vietnam, cutting back on defense, and getting the Equal Rights Amendment ratified. I was on board with all that. I wanted McGovern to be president instead of Nixon. End of story.

I worked as an usher at a huge benefit concert held in his honor called, “Four for McGovern.” Warren Beatty was the driving force behind the event, which was held at the Los Angeles Forum. My friend Lou Adler was producing. No matter what the media says today about the growing ties between Hollywood and Washington, DC, that relationship is hardly new. Warren even convinced Barbra Streisand to perform, along with Carole King and James Taylor, all backed by Quincy Jones and his orchestra. It wasn’t just a single performer stepping out to support a candidate, Warren pointed out to the press, remembering Frank Sinatra’s concerts for Hubert Humphrey in 1968. Rather, it was the group effort and solidarity that he felt made an event like this different and more influential, giving it the power to unite a larger section of the population.

Someone called and asked me to usher for the benefit, and I said, “Sure.” Because I was going to be ushering, I pulled together what I thought would be appropriate usher attire: I showed up that night wearing a straight black skirt, a plain white blouse, and carrying a flashlight.

When I arrived at the Forum, it was positively swarming with media. I was shuffled into a room full of television cameras and reporters. I looked up: Standing across the room was Warren
Beatty, never looking more handsome, and Julie Christie, never looking more beautiful. Both of them were dressed to the nines. Even Jack Nicholson was wearing a three-piece suit. And there I was, in a dowdy black wool skirt, wearing hardly any makeup.

Just my luck, one of the cameras turned on me, and a reporter thrust his mic into my face.

“Why is it, Miss Kellerman, that all of you people are rushing out to vote for someone with so little charisma?” he asked.

“This is not about charisma,” I huffed and puffed in response. “This is about content!”

Thank God they didn’t ask me anything about McGovern’s platform. I would have been in pretty deep water. Luckily, I got to play Miss Indignant.

Ushering along with me were Jack Nicholson, Julie Christie, Peggy Lipton, Michelle Phillips, James Earl Jones, Jacqueline Bisset, Mike Nichols, Shirley MacLaine, Goldie Hawn, Gene Hackman, Elliott Gould, Marlo Thomas, Burt Lancaster, Jon Voight, Raquel Welch, Michael Sarrazin, Britt Eklund, and more. (But I was the only one in proper attire.) Gregory Peck and Joni Mitchell were in the audience. Some tickets were $4 and $10, but Golden Circle tickets were going for $100. And those were 1972 dollars. Warren was right about the crowd—more than eighteen thousand people showed up.

Streisand killed. The screaming crowd, wearing “I rocked with McGovern” buttons, throbbed and got revved up to vote by Barbra, Quincy, Carole, and Sweet Baby James. There was a choir, and Quincy strolled onto stage in a long velvet robe. Too far out.

Barbra’s performance led right into McGovern’s appearance on stage. Finally. The man. The moment. The crowd surged forward. We all waited. He stepped forward and said, “Let . . . the sun . . . shine . . . in . . .”

My God,
I thought as I watched McGovern address the crowd,
why are we voting for someone with so little charisma
?

McGovern made $320,000 that night. The campaign may have failed, but Barbra’s resulting album,
Live Concert at the Forum,
was fantastic. I met McGovern years later, when he was signing his book, and found him one on one to be warm, charming, and charismatic after all.

The war in Vietnam mobilized a lot of people, actors and civilians alike. Like a lot of my friends, I was very much against the Vietnam War but not against the men and women who fought in it. In my mind we were
for
the troops: We wanted them to come home from the war alive. I know that was Jane Fonda’s motivation too.

I’ve always greatly admired Jane’s curiosity and her ability to throw herself into her interests, learning everything there is to know about her passions. She has done so much good for so many people. I also took part in a poetry reading, along with Jane, Donald Sutherland, Jon Voight, and others, in support of Daniel Ellsberg, a former military analyst who released what became known as the Pentagon Papers. At a rehearsal one afternoon, we were standing on stage at the Coliseum when Henry Fonda strolled up with Ellsberg himself. After the handshakes were done and Henry and Daniel were on their way out, Ellsberg turned back and called out, “Sally, I know your sister!”