Dirty Movies (46 page)

After a tumultuous January for both
brothers, Stephen and Joe were once again, scheduled to share the spotlight at the annual Oscar nominees’ luncheon in early February. As the date grew ever nearer, the world’s media began rubbing their hands together in glee that the usual spectacle of back-slapping and faux comradeship at the event would be, quite literally, shoved aside for another spectacular De Vries scuffle.

Stephen,
now existing on more lives than the proverbial after the Sy Jacob savaging and a stinging defeat at the Producer’s Guild Awards, was once again flying high with a remarkable triumph at the Director’s Guild Awards several nights previously, which his brother had been far too busy chasing his ex-runner up and down Hollywood Boulevard to attend.

Arriving early
, to maximise his exposure with lots of well-choreographed autograph signing shots with affectionate fans smuggled to the front by Garrett’s gofers, he had eventually drifted into the
Beverley Hilton Hotel
just as Joe and Michael rolled up with Christine and Benito, who were also nominated in their respective categories.

An enthralled silence descended on the waiting press as the quartet stopped to pose.  In the past
, Michael Wilson’s movie-star looks had tended to influence the direction of the lens. But now it was Joe whom everyone was straining to snap.

Badgered into a designer suit by Michael
, and teased into a decent haircut by Polly, with whom he’d just spent the last few days hopping in and out of bed with, Joe looked every inch the successful movie director. Yet all agreed it was his near-constant smile that contributed most to his transformation. As he postured left and then right, happiness seemed to beam forth from him like the flare from a lighthouse.

‘Newman
and Redford eat your heart out,’ muttered one photographer, as Joe and Michael strode into the International Ballroom to circulate with cocktails in hand.

Once i
nside, Joe soon found himself sandwiched between Robert De Niro and Meryl Streep. At the same time, he was acutely aware of his brother standing just a few metres away and flirting shamelessly with a very tall, lithe and statuesque Charlize Theron. Glaring at Stephen’s ridiculously smooth, richly-moisturised skin, perfectly arched-but-still-manly-eyebrows and re-highlighted hair, he tried to remember the last time his brother had viewed him as anything other than a door mat - to be trodden on and discarded when the bristles went a bit manky in the rain. Certainly not when they worked together, perhaps not even as children.

‘
Something unfortunate happening to him might be better than winning an Oscar,’ muttered Michael, squeezing into the gap left by Meryl only moments before.

‘I’ll
take the Oscar,’ said Joe. ‘He’ll get his comeuppance in the end. People like him always do, well they do in the movies anyhow.’

‘But not in movie towns
,’ warned Michael. ‘It’s EscapesVille for all the nasties in those burnished Hollywood hills. People wield celebrity up there like it’s a get out of jail free card.’ Just then, he caught sight of Maisie pretending to hug Tom Hanks and licking her lips suggestively his way.

‘No fucking way
,’ he mouthed back defiantly.

‘Is something wrong?’ asked Joe, following his gaze, but Michael’s response was drowned out by
a deafening applause as the jolly-looking Academy President took to the stage.

Sometime after lunch
, all the nominees were duly summoned to take up their positions for the much celebrated group photo. Called in sets, which to Joe’s horror and Michael’s sincerest sympathies, were lumped in A – Z categories, he inevitably ended up next to his brother.

Standin
g side by side on the bleachers and deliberately ignoring one another, every journalist and publicist in the room could have sworn there was a shower of sparks as their jacket cuffs touched for the briefest of seconds. 

‘Brother Dearest, what a delight to have you back in the race
,’ murmured Stephen, briefly turning away from George.

Joe scowled and kept his eyes fixed straight ahead. ‘It would be nice if you actually meant it
.’

‘Oh
, but I do! It’s always far more satisfying to humble one’s competitors in person, rather than a gloating email afterwards. It’s much more public. And you know how much I like
doing it
in public. I seem to remember your ex-wife did too,’ he taunted him, giving Tarantino a quick wave. ‘But I doubt you knew anything about that. She always said you were somewhat unimaginative.’

For the first time in three days
, Joe’s smile began to slip.

‘Why, you
piece of s….’

Next thing
, the room had exploded in a deluge of flashbulbs and his expression of insolent outrage was captured forevermore. 

Later on, after they had been called forward one by one to collect an official certificate and Oscar Nominee’s sweatshirt, as bestowed to all the lucky hopefuls, Joe took Michael to one side.

‘No more Mr Nice Guy,’ he growled, eyes glinting, face set with determination. ‘And balls to this bloody sweatshirt! I want another meeting with Bill. We need to ramp this thing up. I’m going to mail my heart on a plate to those voters. Hell, i’ll even sob my heart out to Sy Jacob if needs be but we’re going to win that Best Picture Oscar! Even if we have to pose naked for PETA to do it.’

All in all, it was a much cheerier bunch that boarded the plane back to London for the BAFTAS, compared to those who had jetted out in such a fug weeks before. With ten days to go until the final Oscar ballots closed, Michael and Joe had spent every night since the Oscar Luncheon attending different red carpet events in a bid to keep their movie in the forefront of each Academy Member’s minds. As a result, they were more than happy to forgo the complimentary glass of champagne before takeoff.  Polly, meanwhile, was having no such reservation, particularly as she had never flown First Class before. She was busy getting stuck in as Joe sat in the smart leather seat next door, flicking through their publicity schedule for next week.

Across the aisle
, Michael was untangling his iPod headphones with a slight frown on his face. Maybe it was her female intuition, or maybe it was her current state of bliss that came with a yearning for everyone to feel the same, but Polly could sense his unhappiness.

He looked up then,
caught her staring and smiled.

Silly, octogenarian-shagging Lucy
, thought Polly, smiling back. Her friend had gone and fallen for the wrong Wilson. Lucy was insisting on staying in LA, at least until her piece was finished. But with a new Prada bag waiting for her in reception every morning, and a different Michelin culinary experience at lunchtime, all courtesy of a certain Studio mogul, she wasn’t exactly lacking incentives to stay.

Joe’s head appeared over the seat divide and planted a smacker on her cheek.

‘What was that for?’ she giggled, licking spilt champagne off her knuckles.

‘Because I can
,’ he grinned, leaning in for another.

‘Careful
,’ she warned, as he lent so far over the divide that he nearly toppled into her lap. ‘You might get us thrown off for lewd behaviour.’

‘That’s not lewd
,’ he scoffed, gesturing at the little grey lavatory cubical up ahead. ‘Meet me in there after takeoff and I’ll show you lewd.’

Michael pretended not to watch them as he tussled with another knot in his headphones. He would rather die than admit it but Polly and Joe’s rekindled delirium was making him more than a little envious. There was also an Italian-Brit love-fest happening on the other side of the aisle. Every so often, Benito’s great frame would pivot sideways so that he could murmur something filthy to Christine. Dirty devils, mused Michael. He hoped he would get the chance to behave as badly as them one day.

‘Have a good flight, Mr Wilson
,’ called out a passing stewardess.

‘I’d much rather you
had a creative one,’ teased Joe, chucking his in-flight magazine at him. ‘Don’t go plugging yourself in, we need to get cracking on that acceptance speech.’

Michael
nodded and made to pull out his notebook, but as the Stewards whisked away Polly’s empty champagne glass and scolded a po-faced Benito for not fastening his seatbelt, he couldn’t think of a single word to write.

Once again
, he was finding himself quite unable to think about anything other than Lily.

There was something comfortingly familiar about the BAFTA red carpet reflected Joe
, as he and Polly emerged from their limo. As opposed to all the countless others that he had worked like a Brazilian catwalk model this Awards Season. It wasn’t the harmonising smell of fresh rain in the air, once again the great British Weather was refusing to play ball and young actresses in barely-there slivers of satin and lace were paying the price for their fashion vanities, not to mention their ridiculous fat-stripping diets. Nor was it the scene-stealing backdrop of Covent Garden’s glorious Royal Opera House, a welcome change to the ice-white, 1950s expanse of The Beverly Hilton. In the end, it took Polly reeling off the names of all the British elite industry talent drifting past them that made the penny to drop. 

‘John Hurt…
Kate Winslet…Imelda Staunton…Oh My God, is that Daniel Radcliffe?’

Joe gazed in awe at the cheery, pocket-sized actor. At the same time he felt a sense of pride knock him sideways. 

This was his home turf.

An Oscar may be the definitive industry accolade
, and he might be the low-cal rye bread of Hollywood right now, but he was still a Brit. And here he was, on this chilly, stone grey evening. An honoured film-maker with not one but six BAFTA nominations for
Memoir
; Best Film, Best British Film, Best Director, nods for Christine and Benito, in addition to his own for Special Achievement in his first feature as a director.

Scanning the
crowds for Michael, who at the last minute had elected to travel alone, his eyes came to rest briefly on Maisie Peach. As usual she was working the carpet like a pro in oyster grey haute couture. Press and publicists swarming around her like flies on a particularly fruity pile of manure. The young actress had proved unstoppable all award season but hopefully tonight would prove the kink in her red carpet walkover.

Squeezing Polly’s hand, he felt a jolt of exhilaration as she squeeze
d back. All of a sudden, she snatched it away and veered off to the left like a small child spotting an ice cream van. 

‘Danny! Danny over here!’
he heard her cry, waving frantically at a group of faceless black tied individuals and very nearly taking out Gary Oldman and his beautiful wife as they were whisked up on the inside by his publicist.

‘Polly, wait!’
growled Joe. He was certain she was committing some mistaken identity red carpet clanger. The man she was waving at was too clean-shaven to be Danny and he had frown lines stamped into his face like Amsterdam tram tracks. Joe cringed and waited for the embarrassing encounter to unfold. To his shock, he saw him turn towards his girlfriend in recognition.

B
etween Bucharest and Covent Garden, Danny had grown up and kept on going. He looked haggard and demoralized after a year as Stephen’s second in command and all the cheeky bounce of his curls had been shaved off in favour of a military-style crew cut.
No doubt to reflect his bloody tour of duty
, reflected Joe darkly. Glancing down at Danny’s feet, he realized with a pang that even his cherished trainers were gone.

To
his dismay
,
Danny suddenly clocked him gawping and stalked off, leaving Polly kissing air rather that air-kissing his left cheek.

Perhaps tonight wasn’t going to
be such a great one after all, reflected Joe moodily.

Michael was running late. Very late. At the last minute, he had redirected his protesting driver to the outskirts of London to see if, by some miracle, the lights were back on at Lily’s place. Alas, her little house was still as dark and dusky as the double-breasted Tom Ford Tux he was wearing. Motoring back into London at top speed, they were caught short on the Hammersmith Flyover, and by the time he was whisked to his seat by a BAFTA official, the ebullient host was already hovering in the wings for his first cue.

‘What the hell happened to you?’
hissed Joe

‘Traffic was a bitch
.’

‘We
were taking bets whether Stephen had stuck nails in your tyres.’

Michael grinned. ‘I don’t mind him sticking it to my ex but he be
tter leave my goddamn car alone.’ He looked round and saw the man himself, glowering at them from the row behind. Beside him, Maisie was blowing discreet kisses in his direction. Fortunately, the host chose to make his entrance then to a courteous ripple of applause.

Ten minutes later, Michael’s sides were aching with laughter. The BAFTA ceremony
may match the rigid politesse of the Academy Awards, but with a script sizzling with the nation’s own idiosyncratic sense of humour, on the whole, it was a much more sprightly affair.

As the evening unfolded
, the statuettes rained down on Harper Films and GBA like a hotly-contested Wimbledon tennis ball, as soon one category fell their way, the following landed right back in GBA’s court.

It was Benito who took first point
, however, with a very well deserved win for Best Cinematographer. Lumbering onto the stage in a suit two sizes too small, and with Christine’s bright red lipstick marks staining his left cheek, he glared at the audience from beneath his bushy brows before directing a string of Italian at the microphone with such gruffness that it sounded like he was insulting everyone in the room. In truth, Benito’s big heart was overwhelmed with gratitude but these days his smiles were reserved for his Christine only, who was beaming proudly up at him from the third row. 

The Awards
for Make Up and Costume Design were swiped by Stephen’s team, and the cameras captured him punching the air in delight as each one was announced.

‘What a load of crap
,’ whispered Polly furiously. ‘Those were Sally’s designs. She only abandoned
Love Letters
three weeks before wrap. That charlatan up there probably only had to sew a button on.’

Polly became even more indignant when Joe lost out in the Outstanding Debut category. Even though she couldn’t blame Stephen directly, he didn’t have to plaster that revoltingly smug look all over his face as the exultant victor brandished his gleaming trophy at the audience.

Still, all that was swept aside when Joe took to the stage, along with Michael and Christine, to claim the prize for Outstanding British Film. It was a hugely popular choice, as testified by the wildly euphoric, never-ending round of applause. Each time Michael bent down to the address the microphone, the decibel level cranked back up again like the compressed accelerator pedal on one of Stephen’s Ferraris.

Eventually it petered out just long enough for him to unfold a crumpled
piece of paper. Beaming up at the cameras, he started by thanking their wonderful cast and crew. As he did, all those who had blagged upper tier seats that night let out an almighty football roar. Acknowledgments for Flavio and Cosmos Pictures swiftly followed, before he turned to address his on-stage colleagues in a voice teeming with emotion. 

‘And last but by no means least
, we would all like to pay a very heartfelt tribute to a wonderful scriptwriter without whom none of this would be possible. Thank you Mr Tommy Harper, for your extraordinary script, and for breathing life back into three down-and-out strangers. May it be only a matter of time before the true extent of your prolific talent is laid bare for the world to see…’ As he said this, he shot Stephen a loaded look. It didn’t matter if Vincent was dead, the GBA name would be forever muddied with his deceit. The truth may not be out there
yet
, but like a house with termites, the foundations of GBA’s reputation were slowly rotting.

Michael had never
considered what the letters
GBA
stood for before. But as they, and their ultra-suave presenter, Daniel Craig, were escorted off stage by a woman as equally beautiful as any Bond Girl, he was going to make damn sure that they stood for
guilt by association
, or rather
Stephen’s
guilt by association, before the year was out.