The Class (53 page)

Contractually, he could still remove his name from the

whole enterprise. And, what the hell, wasn't that something? Didn't his name lend class to the marquee? Didn't his reputation as a serious musician ensure some kind of respect on the part of the reviewers? Edgar still had to stroke him.

"All right. But this has got to be as brief as possible."

"It'll be the Minute Waltz," Edgar blurted. And immediately hung up.

Danny barely had the time to swallow an "Allegro" when he heard a knock. He opened the door with trepidation. There stood a bizarre couple. Elegant, melon-shaped Edgar Waldorf and a youngish, swarthy man with Brillo hair. The latter was garbed in black corduroy, save for a white shirt open amply enough to allow an unobstructed view of a gold medallion nestling in a field of fleecy muscularity.

"Hi." Leon Tashkenian smiled, offering his hand.

"Bollinger," said Edgar Waldorf, offering a magnum of champagne.

Danny said nothing. Never squander ammunition in a siege.

As the two men entered the room, a waiter suddenly appeared behind them, bearing a tray of three chilled glasses. He retrieved the bottle and proceeded to open and disgorge -its contents.

"You played really great tonight," Tashkenian remarked.

"Thanks," Danny muttered sarcastically, taking it as typical showbiz bullshit. "Were you in New York today?"

"No. But you were live on WGBH."

"Oh."

"Let's all drink up," Edgar interposed, foisting champagne glasses into the two composers' hands. He then raised his own goblet in an emotional toast: "To the Show."

Leon lifted his glass but did not drink. Danny merely gulped it and sat down.

"Okay, let's see what you've done," he said, reaching out toward Tashkenian's sheaf of papers.

"Let him play it," Edgar insisted.

"I can read music," Danny snapped.

"I would expect no less of a Harvard graduate, Daniel," Edgar replied. "But, unfortunately, I am educationally deprived. Besides, I like Leon's delivery. C'rnon, Lee, give out with the material." And then turning to Danny, he editorialized, "It's fabulous! Fab-u-lous!"

Boom-barn, boom-boom-barn! Leon played like a mad wood-man trying mightily to fell a Steinway.

Danny raised his hand. "Okay. I've heard enough," "Wait, wait," Edgar protested, "he's just warming up." Danny capitulated with a sigh and turned to refill his glass. Gradually through the din a few sounds became intelligible. The tonic, the relative minor, the second, the dominant seventh. Could he have expected anything better than the most hackneyed, overused chord sequence in pop music?

There had been moments in Danny's life when he had dreamed of becoming Beethoven. Now he merely longed to be deaf. For, among his many virtues, Leon Tashkenian had the voice of a ruptured hyena.

Now and then, Danny could discern a word or two of text. There was something about "Mars," suggesting that the rhyme

"stars" could not be far behind, And it arrived, just as surely

- as "crying" followed "flying." At last, on the very

brink of a vocal orgasm, Leon screeched "above," harmonized by an E major seventh.

The end was near-and so damn predictabl&-that Danny had all he could do to keep from groaning the inevitable concluding wordlet, "love." -

By this point, Edgar was pirouetting around the room. He rushed over to Tashkenian, kissed him on the cheek, and announced, "He loves it, Danny loves it!"

Sweating and gasping for breath, Leon looked up at the

Renaissance man of modern music. -

"What do you think, Mr. Rossi?" he asked like a nervous neophyte. -

"Leon, it gives the word crap a new dimension."

"He's kidding, he's kidding." Edgar laughed nervously.

"He's not," said the young man at the piano, quietly but with less diffidence. And then, turning to Danny, he inquired, "Could I have some more specific criticism?"

"Specifically, Leon, I object to the clichéd use of

'one-six-four-five-one.'"

"A cliché is what you make of it, Mr. Rossi," Leon replied. "Richard Rodgers used it beautifully in 'Blue Moon.'"

"You're not Richard Rodgers-and that mindless sequence of notes isn't music. " -

Tashkenian was young, but he--was aware of his own worth, especially at this moment. After this latest barrage of insults, he owed the maestro no more deference.

"Look, Rossi, I've got better things to do than sit here

and be abused by a pretentious, overrated asshole like you. I know damn well my chord progressions are familiar. But that's the name of the game. The clichés make 'em think it's something they've heard before. They're half-remembering it even before they hear it. And that means they can hum it at intermission. And that, in the musical theater, spells success, You don't have anything against success, do you?"

At this point, however, Edgar Waldorf felt impelled to

defend the star who was providing his show with light if not heat.

"Mr. Rossi is one of the great composers of our time," he said.

But Tashkenian had gone too far to back down.

"Of what?" he sneered. And then turned to Danny. "You're not even that good at classical. I mean, at Juilliard we studied the last movement of your - pseudo-Stravinsky Savanarola ballet-as an example of heavy-handed orchestration, You're nothing but an Ivy League con man." As suddenly as he started, Leon stopped, gripped with fear at what he'd allowed himself to say.

Danny could say nothing. Because some pellets of truth in

Leon's wild shotgun rage had hit home.

They simply stood there, glaring at each other, both frightened at who might explode next. -

Curiously, it was Leon Tashkenian. He began to cry. He

reached into his pocket for a handkerchief, wiped his cheeks, and then said quietly, "I'm sorry, Mr. Rossi. I spoke out of turn."

Danny did not know how to respond.

"Come on," Edgar pleaded, "he said he was sorry."

"I really didn't mean what I said," Tashkenian added meekly.

Danny concluded that magnanimity would be his only way of saving face. "Forget it, Leon, we've got a show to think about." -

Edgar Waldorf rose like a phoenix from his sofa of despair. "Oh God, I love you both. You are two beautiful human beings."

By some miracle, both men avoided his passionate lunges. He then took Leon's lead sheets and handed them to Danny.

"Here, schmaltz 'em up with your classical virtuosity."

"What?"

"You gotta play these tunes to the cast tomorrow morning." What new humiliation was this? Was he to "schmaltz" up Leon's musical guano as this cheap hack looked on gloating?

"Why do I have to play it?"

"Because it's supposed to be your stuff, Dan."

"They don't know about Leon?"

Edgar shook his head emphatically. "And they never will." Danny was speechless. He turned to the young man, whose eyes were still red with tears, and asked, "You really don't want any - credit?"

Leon smiled shyly. "It's part of the business, Mr. Rossi. I'm sure you'd do the same for me."

"They're humming! Do you hear me, Danny? They're humming!" Edgar Waldorf was phoning from the manager's office of the Shubert Theatre. It was the first intermission after Leon's numbers had gone into the show. They had even added a reprise of "The Stars Are Not Enough," which Theora Hamilton would

now sing just before the curtain fell -(Sir John Chalcott, who had threatened to resign if this change were effected, was at that moment on a flight back to London).

- Danny had not been able to bring himself to go to the theater for fear of-he knew not what. Hearing the new songs fail? Or, worse perhaps, hearing them succeed?

"And, Danny," Edgar continued to enthuse, "I smell

success. We've got a winner! Trust Edgar Waldorf, we've got a smasheroo!"

Toward the midnight hour, there was a sensuous tap-tap-tapping at h-is hotel door. -

It was the distinguished-and heretofore coolly distant- leading lady. Miss Theora Hamilton was carrying a bottle of showbiz soda water, otherwise known as champagne.

"Mr. Rossi," she cooed, "I've come to toast a genius. That new ballad you wrote for me is a classic. I could see tears in their eyes as the curtain fell."

Danny had never taken much heed of her opinions, but he

had always entertained some interest in her breasts. He was

pleased to see that she had not neglected to bring them along. -

"Well, may I enter, or do we have to drink this in the hallway?" - -

"Madame," said Danny with a gallant bow, "je vous en

prie." And so the legendary Theora wafted in. First bottle,- then breasts, then the heart that lay passionately within, They all were his that night.

Yes, music hath charms. Even if it is by Leon Tashkenian.

On the night of the New York opening, Danny had his driver bring Maria from Philadelphia directly to the theater. While she went in to watch the performance, Danny and Edgar paced nervously in the empty lobby. Every time they perceived laughter or applause they exchanged glances and mumbled something like, "Do you think they liked it?"

During the ride to the party, Danny anxiously asked Maria what she thought. -

"Well, frankly, the original version was a little more to my taste, But the audience seemed to like it and I guess that's what's important."

"No, it's only what the critics think that counts."

"I looked everywhere," she said, "but I didn't see Stuart and Nina." -

"They were both too nervous," Danny improvised. "In fact, I don't think they'll even come to the reception. They'll

probably just sit at home and watch the television critics." By eleven-thirty, almost all the important reviews were

in. The networks had been unanimously favorable. All complimented Stuart Kingsley's literate book (Edgar's wife, who had stepped in when Neil Simon declined the rewriting task, went graciously unbilled). And all remarked on Danny Rossi's "sinewy, melodic score" (CBS-TV). It now seemed a foregone conclusion that the Times would come through with a rave.

And it did. In fact, Edgar was on the bandstand at that

very moment, tearfully reading the words that would make them all rich and famous forever.

"It's a Valentine!" he shrieked, waving a yellow sheet of paper above his head, "an unadulterated Valentine! Listen to his goddamn headline-'Melody Makes a Mighty Return to Broadway.'" -

The crowd of actors, investors, and Beautiful People broke into cheers, Edgar raised his hand to plead for silence. At last, they quieted down to hear more. Only the tinkle of glasses was audible, occasionally punctuated by melodramatic female sighs and appreciative whispers.

Meanwhile, Edgar read on from the sacred document.

"Tonight, at the Shubert Theatre, Daniel Rossi confirmed beyond doubt that he is master of every musical form. What better demonstration of the enormous range of a composer than the comparison of his complex, powerful, nearly atonal Savanarola ballet with the dulcet and unabashedly simple melodies from Manhattan Odyssey. Certain to become standards are gems like, 'This Evening, Like All the Other Evenings,' and, especially, 'The Stars Are Not Enough.'

"Poet Stuart Kingsley has also shown that he has a magical gift for the theater

Immediately after the definitive critic's closing salvo

("I hope it runs forever"), the band broke into "The Stars

Are

Not Enough." And everyone, -young and old, drunk and sober, began to vocalize. Except Danny Rossi.

As the guests sang chorus after chorus, Maria leaned over and whispered in her husband's ear.

"It's really lovely, Danny."

He kissed her on the cheek. Not to acknowledge what she

had naively intended as a compliment, but because there were photographers watching.

The following March, at the Tony Award ceremonies,

Manhattan Odyssey was chosen as Best Musical of the year. Not unexpectedly, Danny Rossi won for Best Score. Accepting the prize on behalf of Stuart Kingsley, who had won for Best

Book, Edgar Waldorf gave a touching little speech about Stu's teaching commitments making it impossible for him to attend. In a frantic round of bidding, MGM carried away the screen rights for a record sum of nearly seven million dollars.

Not long thereafter, Danny Rossi's picture appeared on the cover of Time.

For a long while Danny felt ashamed about the secret Manhattan Odyssey humiliation. Though only two other people in the world knew, he harbored an inner sense of failure.