Queen of the Oddballs (19 page)

We hear a VOICE call from the backyard gate.

 

LYNDA (O.S.)

Helloooo!

 

Hillary ties to contain herself. Paul opens the gate and there’s Lynda standing with a MAN. Paul and the man give a warm hug--they know each other. Lynda sees Hillary.

 

LYNDA (CONT’D)

Oh, I didn’t know you were coming with us tonight.

 

Hillary can barely get out a greeting as Lynda and the man walk in.

 

LYNDA (CONT’D)

Hillary, this is Richard LaGravenese.

 

 

HILLARY
(pulling herself together)

Hey, nice to meet you.

 

 

RICHARD

You too. You guys wrote a great script.

 

Thinking, “then why are you here?” Hillary just says, politely:

 

HILLARY

Thanks.

CUT TO:

 

INT. GREAT WESTERN FORUM–BACK TO PRESENT DAY

Hillary sits next to Paul, who sits next to Lynda, who sits next to Richard, all in the audience watching Debbie Gibson. The crowd goes wild as Debbie finishes her concert.

 

DEBBIE
(from the stage)

Thank you so much. Good night, everyone!

 

Thunderous applause and standing ovations.

 

DISSOLVE TO:

 

INT. FORUM CLUB–LATER

An after-concert party is in progress. There’s a long line of people waiting to talk to Debbie. Lynda grabs Richard by the hand, takes him over, and cuts to the front of the line. Hillary and Paul tag along.

Lynda hugs Debbie.

 

LYNDA

What a fantastic show! Just wait ’till all your fans see you shine in
Skirts
!

 

 

DEBBIE

Thanks! I’m so excited!

 

 

LYNDA

Debbie, I want you to meet the writer of
Skirts
.

 

Hillary smiles, starts to move toward Debbie. But she’s cut off by Lynda who continues:

 

LYNDA (CONT’D)

This is Richard LaGravenese.

 

 

DEBBIE

Hey Richard. So happy to meet you. I can’t tell you how much I love this script.

 

SLOW PAN OVER to Hillary who looks like she’s been kicked in the gut. Oh wait, she
has
been.

 

CUT TO:

 

EXT. MELISSA ETHERIDGE’S BACKYARD–AFTERNOON–MONTHS LATER

Hillary is at a party filled with attractive gay women. ELIZABETH, a striking brunette, brooding and dark, is flirting with Hillary. MELISSA ETHERIDGE, with short spiky hair, brings the woman over and introduces her to Hillary.

MONTAGE of Hillary going out with her new girlfriend, ELIZABETH.

—At a concert together.

—At a cabin by a lake.

—Driving in a convertible down the streets of L.A.

—Calendar pages flip, six months passing.

CUT TO:

HEADLINES SPIN INTO FRAME:

—
Daily Variety
: “SONY BUYS COLUMBIA. GUBER-PETERS SET AS CO-CHAIRMEN.”

We see more of the article: “Whether Dawn Steel will remain at Col is unclear. In any case, one of her films,
Skirts
, starring Debbie Gibson, is safe. Picture is fully crewed and cast, set to start filming in Los Angeles shortly.”

—
New York Daily News
spins into frame. We see: “
SKIRTS
…VICTIM OF STUDIO POLITICS: DEBBIE GIBSON’S CHAMPION, COLUMBIA PICTURES PREZ DAWN STEEL, IS RUMORED TO BE ON HER WAY OUT.”

—
The Hollywood Reporter
spins in, its headline says: “GUBER, PETERS DROP STEEL’S
SKIRTS
PIC.”

 

CUT TO:

 

INT. HILLARY’S HOUSE–BEDROOM–DAY

Hillary lies on the bed; all the papers with headlines we’ve just seen surround her. It’s clear she’s been crying. She looks at the phone, hesitant. Finally she picks it up and dials.

WE HEAR THE PHONE RING and KATIE ANSWER.

 

KATIE
(on the phone)

Hello?

 

 

HILLARY

Hey. It’s me. Did you talk to Paul?

 

 

KATIE

Yeah. I can’t believe it. I really wanted to call you but I thought….

 

 

HILLARY

I know.

 

 

KATIE

Honey?

 

 

(beat)

I’m so sorry. About everything.

 

 

HILLARY

I know. Me too.

 

 

CUT TO:

 

INT AIRPORT–ONE WEEK LATER–DAY

Katie gets off a plane and walks through the gate into LAX.

CLOSE ON her face, filled with shock and delight as she spots someone.

ANGLE ON Hillary, in a crowd of drivers who all hold signs to pick up a specific passenger arriving.

Hillary holds a sign, too. It says CLORETTA.

Katie dissolves into laughter and runs up to hug Hillary. They don’t let go for a long time.

 

CUT TO:

 

INT. THEATER–MONTHS LATER–NIGHT

ANGLE ON an audience. We see Katie sitting with Paul and Kenny in a small auditorium. Hillary’s girlfriend Elizabeth sits with them, too.

The lights dim and Hillary walks out onto the stage. The audience applauds.

 

HILLARY

Hey everyone. Thanks so much for coming tonight. When I started volunteering at Aviva, the residential treatment center for at-risk teenage girls, I was teaching creative writing. But as I spent more time with the girls, I realized there was a piece of material that would be perfect for them to appear in. So I’m proud to present the girls of Aviva starring in…
SKIRTS
!

 

MUSIC KICKS IN. The curtain goes up. Twelve teenage girls who’ve all really been in gangs, enter onstage. They start dancing, doing the routine that Kenny had choreographed at the
Skirts
dance auditions. The girls are as kick-ass and powerful as the professional dancers. What’s more, they’re the real deal, totally capturing the initial essence and vision of
Skirts
.

ANGLE ON Katie, Kenny, and Paul, who all couldn’t be more thrilled.

Katie sees Hillary standing in the wings. Hillary catches Katie’s eye, too. We see in their look that despite all they’ve been through--personally and professionally--everything’s OK now, and they’ll remain close friends and collaborators for a long time to come.

FADE OUT ON: The MUSIC THUMPING, the girls dancing, and the audience clapping along.

THE END

^*
This is a fictitious screenplay based on actual events.

• Ken, Sam, and I continue to rent our house out as a location for films, TV shows, and commercials. Bea Arthur sleeps in my bed, Billy Crystal tends our garden, and the entire exterior of our house is painted pink.
  
 

• At Farm Aid IV, Elton John dedicates “Candle in the Wind” to teenage AIDS patient Ryan White. White dies the next day. Ten more people I know succumb to the disease.
  
 

• Other endings: Nelson Mandela is set free from prison, signalling the end of apartheid in South Africa; President Bush and Soviet Union Leader Mikhail Gorbachev sign a treaty to end chemical weapon production; and Sammy Davis Jr. dies.
  
 

• The Fender Stratocaster that Jimi Hendrix used to perform his famous version of the “Star Spangled Banner” at Woodstock is auctioned for $295,000. My brother, still a huge Hendrix fan, and his wife give birth to their second child.
  
 

• A photographer friend is hired to take pictures of one of my favorite singers, Nina Simone, in Nina’s L.A. apartment. I pose as a photographer’s assistant so I can meet her.
  
 

• Unemployed and living on state benefits, J. K. Rowling comes up with the idea for
  Harry Potter
  while on a train ride from Manchester to London.
  
 

• Mötley Crüe’s Tommy Lee is arrested for indecent exposure after mooning an audience during a concert in Georgia. Maybe now he’ll stay out of trouble.
  
 

• After breaking up with Elizabeth, I take some time off from relationships. MC Hammer dominates the charts with “U Can’t Touch This” and the top-grossing film of the year is
  Home Alone.
  

I
trip over a tricolored gnome lawn ornament that hovers protectively next to the front door, nowhere near any lawn. I obey the handwritten sign that reads “PLEASE NOCK” and I “nock.”

A plump Eastern European woman dressed in stone-washed denim hot pants, a Lakers T-shirt, and rhinestone-studded high platform shoes greets me. She leads me into a small living room inside the stuffy house in the San Fernando Valley and gestures for me to take a seat beside her on the plastic-covered sofa. I have waited weeks for an available appointment and now
finally
I’m here with Madame Zola, Psychic to the Stars.

A familiar-looking brunette wearing a lot of gold jewelry sits across the room on a plastic-covered rocking chair. Will she be present during my reading? Who is she, anyway? I know I’ve seen her before somewhere.

Madame Zola offers me a butterscotch Lifesaver. I accept and suck away on it, anxiously waiting for our session to begin. But instead of divining my future, she turns toward a large console television set that blares from one corner of the room and settles in to watch the soap opera playing on it.

Then I get it. This is not Madame Zola, Psychic to the Stars. At least I
hope
it isn’t.

I need guidance, and I need it now. I have never been at so many crossroads at once. I don’t have a clue what to do next with my career—do I keep writing screenplays, which are lucrative but soul-crushing, in a business where it’s nearly impossible to retain an original vision? Do I return to performing even though the audition process is humiliating and I’ve only managed to be cast in small roles in less-than-stellar projects? Do I keep writing but in some form other than movies? And my love life is in dire need of new direction as well. My last girlfriend, Elizabeth, turned out to be even more dark and draining than the previous few and, even though I managed to overlook those qualities—just like my other girlfriends, she needed her “independence” and was unable to commit to a relationship.

I have always been drawn to psychics. They’re quick, to the point, and they often offer deep insights without having to spend months on the kind of long-winded probing therapists favor. Over the years I’ve had many sessions with clairvoyants who were spot on, helping to guide me. Of course, I’ve also seen just as many kooks, like the effeminate, bleached-blond man in his fifties who, throughout my reading, held on his lap a blind chihuahua wearing a tiny sombrero. Swear. Every time the psychic began a sentence—“There’s someone coming into your life whose name begins with a T…”—the sightless Mexican pooch would squirm and yelp, whereupon the psychic would harshly reprimand him, “Settle down, Pepe,
settle down
!” And there was the woman who, during our session, kept answering her phone, placing bets with her bookie. After the sixth call she finally shrugged apologetically and said, “What can I do? I’ve got the gift.” And I’ll never forget the psychic/astrological reading during which the astrologer kept referring to me as a “
Lie
-bra” rather than a “
Lee
-bra.” Yeah, I could really focus on what
she
had to say. But even the kooks won me over because each of them had at least one enlightening morsel to offer.

My friend Mark told me he had had a mind-blowing, life-altering reading with a psychic in Van Nuys whose premonitions had convinced him to go to an audition he’d planned to blow off, and there he won a guest-starring role on
Knots Landing
. This woman was no storefront scam artist, Mark assured me—her regulars included a who’s who list of Hollywood celebrities.

So I made an appointment to see Madame Zola, Psychic to the Stars.

At the time it seemed like a good idea, but now, sitting in her unventilated living room full of plastic-covered furniture, I’m feeling wary. Tom Selleck and Shelley Long are nowhere in sight. Finally, though, I recognize the familiar brunette in the rocking chair. She could
sort of
pass for a celebrity. She appears on television nightly—hawking goods on the Home Shopping Network. Just a week earlier, during one of my sleepless nights where I was up worrying, it was this very same woman who had almost convinced me to order a set of eight Watering Can Napkin Holders, even though I don’t own a single linen napkin.

The plump woman beside me sucks hard on her Lifesaver and shouts at the soap opera on the TV. “Crook!” she cries. I edge away when she begins to bounce excitedly up and down, each bounce un-sticking the plastic from her bare, sweaty thighs with a THWAP.

“You watch out or he’s gonna get you!” THWAP.

“Don’t go with him!” THWAP.

I consider getting up to leave, but I stop myself. I’m desperate. There is so much I need to know.
What else could I write if not movies? I can’t sit all day and night in an office so TV staff writing is out, and I don’t think I could make a living composing poetry. A book could be great, but what would I write about? And what about my relationships? Will I ever meet anyone who’s right for me? And will she stick around?

I have to stop being so preoccupied with my life. I look around the living room for a distraction and zero in on Madame Zola’s elephant collection. First I count them—two on the mirror, five on the mantle, six on the coffee table, four hanging on the wall. Then I break them down into properties—three ivory, four brass, two wooden, three ceramic, five glass. Twenty minutes later, while the Home Shopping Network hawker shifts uncomfortably on her crackling plastic-covered chair, another hefty Eastern European woman saunters into the room from the back of the house. She’s wearing a floral-print housedress with furry pink slippers, and sports a terrible cough.

Madame Zola, Psychic to the Stars.

She hacks, and then, with an accent as thick as the fur on her slippers, says, “Stephanie, I ready for Stephanie.”

Home Shopping Network lady rises and follows Madame Zola into the back. To avoid obsessing about my situation any further, I begin to count once more. Buttons on the couch under the plastic (twenty-one), pictures of Mary with Baby Jesus (nine), artificial plants (seven). Then I watch the woman next to me jump up and scream at the TV again.

“You’re so full of it!” THWAP.

“Stop lying!” THWAP.

I see she’s yelling at an Aquafresh commercial.

Finally HSN’s Stephanie leaves out the front door, and Madame Zola summons me. I follow her into the kitchen. She stops at a Formica table covered with orange peels and a spray bottle of Lime-A-Way. With a long, loud slurp, Madame Zola swallows a section of an orange and drops heavily into a stained velvet armchair.

“Seet,” she says.

I seet on the metal folding chair across from her.

“Geeve me your hand.” Madame Zola covers her mouth as she coughs, and then, with that hand, also sticky with orange juice, she grabs mine.

“You tired, no?”

My eyes are dark-circled from lack of sleep—it didn’t take a psychic to see that. “Yes, I am,” I say, unimpressed.

Cough, cough, cough. “I see relief.”

I hope you can say the same for yourself, Sister.

“You have doubts about something?”

“Sure.”
Well, she’s right about that. That something would be her.

“I knew that.” Cough, cough, cough.

She pulls a Kleenex from a plaid print box and hacks something into the tissue.
Would she have done that if Barbra Streisand were sitting here? Probably. And Babs would rave about her reading, “She was so refreshing. Who feels comfortable enough to expel phlegm in front of me, know what I mean?”

Madame Zola tosses the soggy tissue into a woven trash basket that brims with previous wads. Her focus returns to me. “I see much confusion.”

I perk up. “Yes. That’s true. Tell me more, Madame Zola.”

“I see a man. Deep, brown eyes. Mysterious.”

“Hmmm…are you sure it’s a man?”

“I see a moustache, you figure,” she shrugs. Cough, cough, cough.

Madame Zola, if you know so damn much, why don’t you get a fucking lozenge?

“You think too much.”

I sit there quietly, thinking about what she has just said.

“You so busy thinking, you no can hear.”

I think about that, too.

“Think with heart instead of head. Answers will come.” Cough, cough, cough.

For the next fifteen minutes, Madame Zola hacks and tells me many inconsequential things—“You will go on trip someday, somewhere.” “Blue is good color for you.” “Beware of a Leo.” Then she stands up abruptly, hand outstretched.

“Fifty dollar please.”

I place the cash on the table, avoiding her coughed-on, sticky hand. I thank Madame Zola and quickly leave her house.

Heading south on the Hollywood Freeway, twisting past Universal Studios, I ponder Madame Zola’s words. “
Think with heart instead of head. Cough, cough, cough
.”

That night I go to Aviva Center, where I’ve been volunteering, teaching creative writing. My class is made up of eight teenage girls who represent four races, five gangs, and nine felonies. Uncommunicative at best, they are guarded, hostile, defensive, and defiant. One girl in particular stands out. Raging and rebellious, she constantly speaks of morbidity, destruction, and death. Ironically, her name is Serenity. For the past month she has refused to participate in any writing exercises. But tonight Serenity pulls me aside.

“Here,” she says, shoving a pile of her journals into my hands.

“Take ’em. Read ’em. Lemme know what ya think.”

When I return home after class, I turn on the TV, keeping the volume low, and then listen to my messages. There’s one from my agent regarding a meeting with Disney about a job rewriting a script.
Do I want to rewrite someone else’s script? Do I want to write scripts at all? What should I be doing now? Should I even go to the meeting?

Then, like a spiritual sign reminding me to quiet down and stop spinning out, I see a familiar face on the TV. It’s Stephanie on the Home Shopping Network selling a Scrapbook Set by Pixie Press.

I settle onto my bed, open Serenity’s journals, and start to read. Piece after piece, in poems and essays and journal entries, her writing is eloquent and powerful, insightful and raw. I’m completely blown away. Her work reminds me of what I love about writing: the art of it, the essence; bold, intimate sharings of soul spilling onto paper what we might not dare say aloud. The kind of writing that has nothing to do with bidding wars and green lights and notes from studio executives’ maids.

I get up and stroll outside to my balcony. I see cars snaking in all different directions on the streets below. I breathe in the night-blooming jasmine and listen. Other than a few crickets chirping, it’s finally quiet. And—as if illuminated by a spotlight circling the Hollywood skies to announce a premiere—amid the many roads, I clearly see which one to take. Serenity should have a forum for her writing. So should Lakeisha, who’s been on the street since she was twelve, and Sara, a chubby, pierced Riot Grrrl who publishes her own zine of rants called
Sourpuss
. Why not write a book and include their voices?

I look up to the Moon, which has always been a comfort since my own teenage days when I hung out on my roof. I feel grateful. Especially to Madame Zola for her sage advice.

And anytime in the future that I find myself thinking with my head instead of my heart, I will give myself a reminder—a simple “Cough, cough, cough.”