Three Ex Presidents and James Franco (15 page)

              The bad news is the guys are really losing sight of the main aim. Two of them went home with a porn star last night. They are acting like this was the greatest thing to happen to them in their lives. It’s impossible to get any of them off their asses and into the sperm clinics. I'm getting quite restless, and James is beginning to complain about what he calls the wannabe drag queens.

              On a possible positive, I met one of your countrymen. An old, battered and booze swollen ex-priest. His name is Malachy, which was a disappointment, I half wanted him to be called Mick or Joe. I shouldn't say ex-priest, he hasn't been defrocked. As far as the clergy know, he's dead. He just got up and vanished from Ireland one day and has been hanging around New York, or somewhere, ever since. I told him about our plan and he seemed enthused. Poor guy, think he just wants friends. Can't tell if he's not used to company or if he just has difficulty speaking, but he comes across as extremely awkward. He wants to join us, and to tell you the truth I couldn't say no. If he can still get it up he's of use to us. And probably of more use than these others I've put my faith in.

              Gotta dash. Lights up in twenty, gotta get back. The show must go on.

PS Have started reading Moby Dick, as you recommended. I get it.

71.
We're becoming minor little celebrities now. Are spending our nights hanging with the locals of Greenwich after the show. It seems nearly everyone has lost sight of the main objective. Even James who has spent the last two nights letting himself be seduced by some lady boy.

              The play needs to be changed again. I think the idea of the slavery being a metaphor for gay discrimination isn't coming across. I even had a guy approach me yesterday and tell me it was a great rallying call for the re-introduction of slavery. I'm not kidding.

              Turns out his boyfriend and himself run a blog calling for the re-introduction of slavery. Not for blacks, you'll understand, but for whites as well. For pretty much everyone. They're into the S + M scene and want the law to allow one of them willingly become the legal property of the other. In a weird way it sounds kinky, but just one look at the two middle-aged pot-bellied guys makes you think again.

              And they also seemed interested in getting involved. At this stage I can't be choosy. These guys I've brought up from Pennsylvania seem completely enthralled by the big city. I'd never even stopped to think that the experience might derail my plans. I may have to leave them here.

-Jake

72.
I've been in touch with Fiona. Seems the film is almost ready to go. They are having trouble trying to get a star. Most of the big Hollywood actors want nothing to do with it, the re-working of such a classic. I've been in touch with the Stepfather and have impressed upon him the need for a young actor. I suggested James Franco. He'd never heard of him, which strangely made it easier for me to sell the idea. Franco has the youth market on his side and surely that’s the point, selling the story to a new generation. Surely.

              I think I may have convinced him.

              Fiona was also talking about politics, she never stops. That play has really got her thinking. And I'm not sure where exactly her thoughts are going. But more of that again.

-Jake

PS You could come up and meet us if you'd like. To be honest it would be nice to see a familiar face.

PPS Ok, I'll come out and say it. I'm beginning to think I miss you. Kinda.

73.
So you haven’t seen the original High Noon? You’re so parochial Irish. It’s a western about a  good and noble sheriff, Gary Cooper, on his wedding day to Grace Kelly. They get ready to head off on their honeymoon when word comes through that a nasty character, whom Cooper had locked away, has been freed. He’s on his way to town to exact revenge on our good sheriff. Pressed upon to leave on his honeymoon anyway, by both villagers and his bride, the sheriff relents and heads off. But of course he changes his mind and returns to the village to face his nemesis.

              Cooper looks for help from the villagers, to fight the bad guys. But one by one they turn their back on him. They appeal to him to leave again, to spare the town from a shootout, from bloodshed. The movie continues like this in real time, the first movie to do that, until the final showdown. Does Cooper die? Watch it yourself, but you really should know the answer to that anyway.

              The movie was written by Carl Foreman, a blacklisted screenwriter, who said it was about the oppression of McCarthyism. The director said that was a rubbish analysis, and it was simply a yarn about a man having to do what a man has gotta do. So the movie is whatever you want it to be. One man standing alone against the vagaries of the world, and he has to do it for whatever reason you care to mention. Consequently everyone likes it.

              Even if you haven't seen it, you would recognise the music. Dum-dum-dum-dum-dum-dum-dum-dum. Or something like that. As you say yourself, there is no vocabulary for sounds. The rhythm is beating out the ticking of the clock in the town square, working down the minutes, until the arrival of the bad guy on the train.

              You've heard the music before. There is a very modern re-mix of it playing in my house on the night of my party. Very, very different. But you can still make out the urgent rhythm of the original. I know you must remember it, because it was a fairly shit, intrusive, version.

74.
Getting ready to leave New York. We're off in a few hours. It’s James, Zach, Malachy and Fred and Blake, the S+M duo. I'm leaving the other guys behind. Between the 5 of us we got all 17 sperm clinics done in the past two days. I'm leaving the other guys some money with the understanding that they will check out the clinics by the time I return. And try to get everyone they meet to do the same. It seems they intend to keep the play going. It’s developed its own little cult following. And it’s getting them laid, so they’ll definitely keep it going.

              Yes, I am dubious about my travelling companions. I don't know who will want Malachy's sperm and he'll be a little spooky, whichever role he's given in the play. Also, it is a bit strange travelling in the same car as the two S + M guys. Each to their own, different strokes for different folks, and all that. But, at least I do my thing in private. Their thrill comes from calling each other slave and master in public. It’s like everyone else in the car is part of their sexual fantasy whether they like it or not. Anyway, as I keep saying, I'm not in a position to be choosy.

              Zach is fine as usual. I think James is a little sad to go. He gave his lady boy a flower, accompanied with a sweet kiss, as he said goodbye. It was quite touching.

Anyway, we're away to Boston.

-Jake.

75.
So now the old man seems to be finally going ahead with the movie. The funding has been taken care of and James Franco is ready to star.

              I have a sneaking suspicion the Stepfather wants to re-make it as some sort of liberal point. A comment on where our country is going right now. It’s a time for lone heroes. The movie must be some sort of placebo reassuring him that his liberal credentials are still intact. Obama is on the rise, the lone hero is on the horizon.

              Incidentally, I figured out how you met Clinton. He's fundraising for his wife. Pretty desperately now I imagine. He’s going to take a cameo in the movie. Just as a thank you for my father. It seems ludicrous that an ex-President would pursue celebrity cameos in movies, but perhaps not more ludicrous than movie stars becoming President in the first place.

              Anyway, Clinton adores the film. The original, that is. A sheriff, the lone abandoned hero, risking his life to do what is right. Clinton says it’s his favourite movie, which is rich. The author of the third way and compromise loving a film about a man who refused to compromise. I suppose that’s the allure of the movies, it’s about seeing lives you'd like to lead rather than the life you actually have.

              ‘Don't ask, don't tell.’ What a joke. One hundred years after your countryman, Oscar Wilde, we've given legal status to the phrase, 'the love that dare not speak its name'.

              I know he did a lot of good. I know he can't just be judged on the gay question. But if I'm not going to hate him for it, who is? It’s like I have a moral obligation to hold it against him.

              James hates him too, and has more cause to than most. And maybe I feed off that hate. He calls him the white devil. Which I like. We need to be reminded of the enemies in our ranks. The bad guys masquerading as good guys.

              I wonder what role he'll have in the movie. The only real role for a cameo is one of the frightened villagers. One of the guys who knows that something bad is going to happen but tries to convince the sheriff that all harm will be avoided if he just leaves. To hell with the sheriff's moral dilemma, he should just swallow it, leave, and then conflict will be avoided. 

              So yes, I’m on the Obama bandwagon. Seeing people on the road out sacrifcing their time for him, I’m a convert now. I see them out canvasing and I think to myself that they are my people. Even though they might not know it yet.

76.
Man, you’re an idiot. William King was dead long before Abe was President. So how could he turn up in your play, talking about Lincoln’s Presidency?

              No, you’re not an idiot, you just need to learn to use Wikipedia. Do they not have that in your country? I got into a conversation with one of my father’s friends about the play last night, and he pointed it out. A happily married congressman turning up in a gay bar. He was mortified when I recognised him, though I’m not sure what he expected.

              I was asking him who he is going to support, Hillary or Obama. And I got some non commital answer, the same non commital answer everyone like him is giving. I think he’s a Hillary man at heart, but he was talking about how bad it is for democracy to establish dynasties. From Bush to Clinton to Bush, back to a Clinton. Potentially 28 years of the same two families in the White House.

              And it was the William King thing that got me thinking. Aren’t two gay guys in politics going to end up together? All things being equal, I mean. They would have so much in common. So why wouldn’t two powerful politicians like Bill and Hillary end up together? That’s what happened with King and Buchanan. And didn’t happen later with Buchanan and Lincoln. Though don’t tell anyone I admitted that, it’s the only gem of controversy keeping this show on the road.

              She’s not actually a Clinton. People marry people from work all the time. It’s just the boring reality of it.

              This congressman I was talking to married another politician, a state senator. Though that marriage isn’t going to last long if he keeps getting caught in gay bars. Poor guy. Poor her, really.

77.
We did a college show as part of an arts festival run by the on campus gay society. All went well the first night. But word got out about it, and the second night we were heckled off the stage. A guy went for me, and might have hit me too, had James not intervened. I don't mean intervened in his pulling-of-a-gun kind of way, he just stood in front of me and it was enough to get the fool to back down.

              I could bitch and scream about the homophobia which sought to censor us, but I have to be happy. The honest truth is that we're terrible. Were it not for Zach, who is becoming a very eloquent Buchanan, we really would be beyond salvation. Anyway, the whole point of this endeavour is to stir some kind of controversy. Some kind of discussion. And that’s happening.

              Was in touch with my sister. It turns out Mr Clinton is going to drop by campus to pay a visit to her and her eager Young Democrats. No doubt her father arranged it, a little treat for the apple of her eye. The Clintons need the college kids right now, and definitely need the old man’s money. She is more excited than I've ever heard her be.