B00AZRHQKA EBOK (42 page)

“Art?”

“A dolt. He may see it, he may not. Right now he’s hitched his wagon to Star—and if She’s happy,
he’s
happy. And She
is
—why not?—it’s all hers now.”

“What do you think’ll happen?” I asked.

“With the show?”

“Yes.”

“I think it’ll fail and She’ll succeed. They’ll say too bad this great artist wasn’t given a vehicle worthy of her. She
had
a vehicle, the silly bitch, and She drove it right off the road.”

Driving back to Washington:

“Will you go back if they ask you?”

“Of course. And they will. That cream puff can’t handle the job. It doesn’t require talent—or even brains—but it
does
call for experience. It may turn out to have been Russ’s fatal blunder.”

“Anyway, haven’t he and Buddy bust up?”

“Have they?”

“That’s what I heard.”

“Wouldn’t matter. You can fake along in a so-called executive position; but something as technical as production—no. You have to hit the right buttons at the right time.”

Supper at Trader Vic’s:

“It all
looks
different, too,” I said. “Or is it my imagination?”

“Of course it looks different, you goose. It’s all been relighted. She and Val like hot white light on her all the time—but the sets weren’t designed for that lighting—or painted. Ivan’ll have a fit.”

Walking back to The Watergate, we said nothing. The long discussion of the impossible situation had drained and depressed us. But for some reason, the last thing he said stuck in my mind. Ivan.

Clay took me to my door and said, “I’ll come in, for just a minute.”

“Fine.”

Inside, he looked at me and said, “I know about you and Gene, of course. And I’m happy for both of you.”

“Thanks, Clay—but you know there’s not much future there.”

“Who knows?”

“I
know.”

“Hold the thought,” he said.

“All right.”

“Still, I
would
like to kiss you good night.”

I was startled, but nodded, automatically.

He embraced me and kissed me with feeling. It was really lovely.

“Thank you,” I said.

“My pleasure.”

All the time I was preparing for bed, I kept trying to formulate a plan. Ivan. But what could
he
do? Did
he
have the power Clay talked about? Probably not—yet something impelled me that Sunday night at ten-thirty to call him at his country house in Newtown, Connecticut.

“Hah-
law,”
he said, in that basso-profundo voice of his.

“Ivan, this is a confidential call I have no business making. I’m counting on your discretion.”

“You can kont,” he said.

“I think you should come down and see the show. A lot has been happening.”

“I naw,” he said. “Lahrry is no more. Why he quitted?”

“He didn’t really. He was sort of forced out.”

“Yes,” he said. “Hoppens—always hoppens to directors—But me—I cannot come Vashington now—hahv new show. Maybe I send Nadia.”

“Come yourself, Ivan. It’s important.”

“What means important?”

“Important to
you.
The show’s in trouble.”

“I heard wass good.”

“Wass,”
I said. “But no more.”

“Sets you cannot change, so what use?”

“You can’t, but they
did.”

“Did?!”

“Well, not the sets exactly, but the way they’re used, they way they’re lighted.”

“I come!” he shouted. “I come
tomorrow.
With Nadia. With Millie. Goodbye!”

What makes me think Ivan can make a difference? Well, I don’t think
that
exactly, but his presence here may lend some weight to the effort that has to be made to get the show back into shape.

I have noticed he is the only man connected with this enterprise never once bullied by Art. It may be his age or his eminence that has kept Art at a respectful distance. On the other hand, it may be the fact that Ivan conveys complete theatre knowledgeability. I have never heard him say one silly or careless or exaggerated thing about the show. His comments have always been perceptive and meaningful and profound. He possesses that rarest of all human attributes—common sense.

“Why She’s acting so dignified, so like a star, in there the beginning there? When She is still the Hoor? The dignified should be for later. When She’s the Hoor, She should act like the Hoor, not like the star!”

Or:

“The women—they are wearing the costumes like they are costumes. They are not costumes to those people—to those people they are
clothes!
Everyday clothes. Not fonny, not strange—
clothes!
Like we’re wearing these clothes
we’re
wearing, so in fifty years somebody will do a show in the period nineteen seventy-nine—so the actors and the actresses will wear clothes like this, and to them it should be the same then like it is to us now!”

And:

“Too much difference, Lahrry, so far, between the scenes and songs and the nombers. Got to be in a shaw like this shaw—every song in a scene and every scene is a song. Can’t be scene song scene song. Is like two shaws in one time. Got to be
one
shaw in one time.”

Also:

“What do you mean 'old-fashion’? Who cares old fashion? Why everybody is scared the word? A
tree
is old-fashion, no? The sky! Beethoven’s Fifth—that’s not old-fashion? And the mawst old-fashion you know is what? Fawking! Fawking is the mawst old-fashion from everything!”

SHINE ON, HARVEST MOON

Company Bulletin

Tuesday, January 8, 1980

TONIGHT
: Please make note of the running order for tonight’s performance. Act I remains the same, but Act II is as follows:

ACT II

Russ Kelly

There will be a picture call immediately after the performance on Thursday, Jan. 10. Remain in costume after the call. Go to your dressing room and you will be called.
Only Act II
will be photographed so we will be following this running order working backward from Act II, Scene 7, through Act II, Scene 1. Food and beverage will be provided in the Green Room.

Russ Kelly

THE COMPANY YOU KEEP: ROGER CORMAN
(Claude)

My mother and father are both devout New Yorkers, but I was born in Denver, Colorado. Explanation: they were both touring in OKLAHOMA! My mother played right up until about 10 days before my debut. With those costumes she was able to manage, she says.

Early on, I am on. Every kid part around, I got. Professional Children’s School. Magnificent education.

Shows too numerous to mention, but among them: CAROUSEL; THE KING AND I; DO RE MI; SUBWAYS ARE FOR SLEEPING; NO, NO, NANETTE (the revival, of course!); MACK AND MABEL; SO LONG, 174
^TH
STREET; DEAR WORLD; GANTRY—well, you get the idea. I’ve been around the block a few times.

P.S. Mom and Pop are still working.

OUR NORA
:

THE NEW YORK HERALD NOV. 22, 1923

NORA BAYES WILL TOUR

ONLY IN PRIVATE CAR

Court Hears Long “Jumps”

Made Her Ill

If Nora Bayes can’t have a private car when she goes on tour there won’t be any touring. That was the substance of her answer to an application yesterday in the Supreme Court for an injunction restraining her from appearing under any other management than Fulcher & Behan during the next twelve weeks. If the injunction is granted the patrons of the Palace and the rest of the Keith Circuit will get along without Miss Bayes.

Miss Bayes was to get $2,500 a week and one-third of the profits from her tour and during the sixteen weeks she was under contract she was to appear at ninety theatres, make long “jumps” and play one-night stands.

Nathan Burkan, her attorney, said she would never have signed the contract if she had known she was expected to jump from place to place without her own private equipment, and she had become ill owing to the strain. She had produced a physician’s certificate, he said, showing that she was unable to continue the tour. Justice Mullan, before whom the appeal came, said he would send the case to a referee.

Like those of Gallagher & Shean, Miss Bayes’s services in the complaint are described as “unique and extraordinary.”

QUOTE FOR TODAY
:

      “Gambling diverts men faster than lechery.”

Minna Everleigh

There are now 24 days until our New York opening.

50

Another crisis. Everyone turned up on Monday night. The lobby before the performance looked like the old days when we were beginning. Art and Cindy and Paul. Ivan and Nadia and Alicia. Clay hovering about. Gene, the new boy.

The performance was hardly under way when there was a violent disturbance in the theatre. The first shift—from The Everleigh Club set to the train—was made as an open change.

A shout from the audience.

“Wodihell is doing here? Stop it!
Mistake!”

Ivan. No amount of shushing could placate him. He had to be taken out to the lobby.

I
VAN
:
(Beside himself)
Who did that, who?

N
ADIA
: Ivan, please. They’ll
fix
it!

I
VAN
:
They’ll
fix? I’ll fix
them!
Who did that, who?
(Apprehensively)
They’re going to do
again? Horr-
bull. Awpen change?

M
E
: Yes. All of them.

I
VAN
:
All??!!

M
E
: Russ thought it speeded up the show.

A
RT
: Lay off, Midge. I’ll handle this…Now, look, Ivan—we’re trying out, after all—y’know? Trial and error?

I
VAN
: Mr. Clune—I naw from designing theatre—
you
naw—I don’t naw
what
you naw—you naw what
you
naw. If the director—the real director—if he has told me awpen changes—I make a whole different conception—this conception is
not
for—
NOT!
What you got now on the stage is
abortion! Horr
-bull and ogly!

N
ADIA
: Ivan, please! Remember the doctor said.

I
VAN
: The doctor didn’t have to look this abortion—this ruination—seven goddamn months’ work this goddamn show, now these goddamn amateurs—

R
ACHEL
:
(Where did she come from?)
I like it like this. It’s interesting and also it speeds things up.

I
VAN
: Who are you?
(To us)
Who is this stupid God damn it woman with too much bad-taste jewelry?

H
Y
: Watch it, Ivan. She’s my wife.

IVAN: So what’s it her business, this idiot?

(
R
ACHEL
slaps him, hard, with her Hermès evening bag. He is stunned, but not as stunned as she is a moment later when
N
ADIA
slaps her with such force that both earrings fly off. She is almost at once on her hands and knees, searching for them. Meanwhile,
H
Y
retaliates by punching
I
VAN
in the stomach.
I
VAN
comes back with a roundhouse swing that catches
H
Y
on the side of the head and sends him sprawling. His wife, intent on finding her earrings, has missed the action. Now she looks up and sees
H
Y
on his knees beside her)

R
ACHEL
:
I’m
looking here, you jerk! Look somewhere else!

A
RT
:
(In shock)
You’re
crazy,
Ivan, you know it?

I
VAN
: When I have started this goddamn show, I am
not
crazy. You are
making
me crazy.

A
RT
: You hit the wrong guy.

I
VAN
: So tell me right guy. I hit
him,
too.

A
RT
: Trial and error, Ivan.

I
VAN
: No, no.
Error
and error. Not the goddammit open changes only! Who killed the lighting? The lighting is for cabaret, not for scenery!

A
RT
: We’re workin’ on it.

(
H
Y
and
R
ACHEL
,
having found the earrings, leave the theatre)

N
ADIA
:
(To
A
RT
)
Something happens to Ivan’s heart condition from all this, I swear to God I kill you.

(She leads
I
VAN
out)

A
RT
:
(To me)
Call everybody. Meeting onstage right after. Jesus! Get me a Valium.

The meeting, in the circumstances, was surprisingly calm.

Jenny announced that Buddy has resigned and returned to New York.

“What does that do to
you,
hon?” asks Art, solicitously.

“Nothing. I replaced him with Patti two weeks ago, don’t you remember?”

“I know,” says Art. “I just thought.”

“But what does it do to
you?”
asked Jenny. “I doubt Stu can run the show. Can he?”

A word, finally, from Russ. “Whether he can or not is beside the point. He
won’t.
I asked him. He refused.”

“Why?” asked Art.

“He’s scared.”

“He
should
be,” said Jenny.

Art stood up, pointed to me, and said, “Get Clay back here. Right away. Tonight.”

“Sure.”

“Wait a minute,” said Russ.

“Shut up!” said Art. To me: “Where is he? Do you know?”

“Six-oh-eight,” I said.

“What?”

“Right here. In the hotel.”

“He’s still in Washington?” asked Art, astonished.

“Yes.”

“How’s that?”

“He says he knew you’d have to ask him to come back.”

“Boy!” said Art. “Do I hate arrogant bastards like that. Get him up here.”

“Who you should get back is Lahrry,” said Ivan.

“Nothing doing,” said Star. “We’re oil and water. I don’t dig him, he don’t dig me. That idea is out, and I don't want to hear it again.”

“That’s what
you
say?” asked Art.

“Definitely.”

“All right, now listen to what
I
say. I would rather close this show here, right here, and burn the scenery and never mention it again, before I would have
that
louse back. I consider him an enemy. O.K.? Is that clear to everybody?”

“To the show,” said Ivan, doggedly, “he’s not enemy. He did it good job. Very hard. He made it stylish and good.”

Star. “Next time I do a show—if there
is
a next time, which I doubt—I’m going to insist that everybody connected speaks English.”

Ivan studied her for a moment, and said, “When you sing is better than you talk.”

“I tell you,” said Star to Art, slowly, “that Larry Gabel is out and is going to
stay
out as long as I’m
in
—so what the hell is Rasputin starting in again?”

Ivan. “Because I always hope somebody is maybe going to learn something. Me, I learn something every day, and I am three times old as you.”

“Well, I hope you learned something today, which is I don’t do this show with Larry Gabel. In fact, with
anybody
named Larry.
Or
Gabel. I wouldn’t do it with
Clark
Gable.”

“Is that clear?” asked Val.

Gene. (At last.) “Very well. I suppose that’s your privilege—if not your right.”

“No, no,” said Val. “Her right, too. Legal right. It’s in her contract. Approval director.”

“In the beginning,” said Gene. “Yes. And she
did
approve him. I doubt her contract allows for whimsical changes of mind.”

“Whimsical!” yelled Star. “What the fuck do you mean by that?”

“I mean,” said Gene, “that we are all—you included—faced with a reality. The reality is a sinking ship. I have the great advantage of having been away for two weeks. I remember only too well the impression I carried away. It was simply beautiful. The show I saw tonight is not. It’s lost all the qualities that made it exceptional: charm, warmth, style, humanity, fluidity, and effortless tact. So the question is: How can you get them back?” He looked at Russ. “Do you think you can?”

“Look, I haven’t finished what I want to do—what I’ve
been
doing. Everybody’s jumping on me like this is it. I don’t claim this is it. For me, this is like second week of rehearsal.”

“But just what is it that you 'want to do’—as you put it?” asked Gene. “Can you tell us? Can you verbalize it?”

“Of course not.”

“Well,” said Gene, “that’s understandable.”

“Second week of rehearsal,” Star whispered to herself, frowning. “Jesus, God!”

There was a long silence. The sinking ship descended deeper into the morass of general disaffection. Finally, Russ rose and spoke.

“What I want to do—what I’ve been
trying
to do—is create a great frame for our Star. In my not-so-humble opinion, She happens to be the greatest Star in show business today. How many personalities are there—in the
world,
I’m talking—who can carry a whole show single-handed?
Name
them. We’ve got her, and in my not-so-humble opinion, we should present her—no, more than that—we should
flaunt
her! All right. I’ll admit some of the effort looks crude now, even a little too strong—but it’s easier to edit something down than drag it out—a question of dynamics. Of course, we all understand that. The open changes, Ivan, are a mistake. I see that. I apologize. I was trying for tempo—but I see now it is too high a price to pay. And Gene, to answer your questions—yes, I
do
think I can get all those qualities you correctly miss back into the show—that is, if everyone will bear with me and help me—because after all, we’re all in the same boat—if it goes down—we
all
go down—but we’re
not
going down. This show is, potentially, a history-making smash—and I’m going to see to it that we realize that potential.”

At this point, Clay walked in. Russ continued.

“And my unfortunate contretemps with Clay was another mistake on my part, for which I am deeply sorry. There is
no one
who can run this show as well as Clay, and I hope he will come back to help me. Other than that, I can only say that it is a great honor to be associated with this superlative group of creative artists, and I can assure you that your confidence in me—when we reach our goal—will not turn out to have been misplaced. Creation is discovery, and I keep discovering things every day about all of you and the show and myself: weaknesses, to be sure—but much more important—strengths. And in the end, that’s what counts. So why don’t we all get up and wipe off the blood and go to work?”

A smattering of applause. Gene looked at me, flabbergasted. I could hardly believe I had heard what I had heard.

(Later that night, in bed, Gene laughed and said to me, “Not since Nixon’s Checkers speech—and I thought
that
was going to fail, too. Wrong twice.”)

The little pipsqueak put it over. He is still in, but aware that he is walking a razor’s edge. His power derives from the relationship with Star and Val, but that—considering
them
—is tenuous as can be.

If he were as talented as he is crafty, he could own Broadway. He is a lesson in out-and-out audaciousness; impressive when it works.