Bill Seiter is to direct their next picture, Sons of the Desert. He hasn’t worked with Bill Seiter before, so he asks around. Bill Seiter has a reputation for being unable to smile. Someone suggests that it may be congenital. Bill Seiter also brings in pictures ahead of schedule and under budget, which may explain why Henry Ginsberg has assigned him the task of directing Sons of the Desert. Bill Seiter brings in pictures ahead of schedule and under budget because Bill Seiter never deviates from the script. Bill Seiter distrusts improvisation.
It might, as Hal Roach suggests, be wise to work on Bill Seiter.
Bill Seiter owns a yacht, the Victoria, which Bill Seiter has bought to impress his wife, the actress Laura La Plante, who was a big star at Universal but is now on the slide. Laura La Plante is fucking the director Irving Asher, so Bill Seiter will soon be left with a yacht and no wife. But Bill Seiter is salving his wounded heart by fucking Marian Nixon, the same Marian Nixon who is in the process of disencumbering herself of her second husband, Edward Hillman, Jr.
He considers introducing Ben Shipman to Bill Seiter, and maybe Marian Nixon too, just for the money, but decides that it might not be good for Ben Shipman’s digestion.
He and Bill Seiter set out for a weekend vacation to Catalina Island.
You know, he tells Bill Seiter, on our pictures the script acts as a guide, but it’s not carved in stone. Babe and I like to make up gags as we go along. Ideas will strike us on the set, and we’ll test them to see if they work. If they do, they go in the picture.
—I prefer to stick to the script. I think it’s important.
—Well, I appreciate that, but if this picture goes well, and I enjoy working with you, then we could look at doing some more pictures together down the line.
Bill Seiter will soon be getting divorced. Divorces are expensive.
Bill Seiter gets the message.
It’s always good, says Bill Seiter, to try new things.
Despite Ben Shipman’s warnings to the contrary, he does not intend to lead a monastic existence for his two days on Catalina Island. Nobody goes to Catalina Island for the weekend in order to read an improving book. People go to Catalina Island to drink and to fuck.
He and Bill Seiter spy two women on the deck of the Avalon, the ferry from Wilmington. By the time it docks, he and Bill Seiter are waiting. They invite the women to join them for lunch on the Victoria, the women accept, and a couple of hours pass pleasantly enough. The women’s names, they learn, are Gladys and Virginia, although Virginia prefers to be known as Ruth. Bill Seiter makes a play for Gladys, and he makes a play for Ruth, but nothing comes of either, not even when the women discover his identity. Bill Seiter also later makes a play for Ruth, which he doesn’t like. Neither does Ruth, and she lets Bill Seiter know it.
Bill Seiter bitches all the way back to Los Angeles.
Trust us to find the only two virgins on Catalina Island, says Bill Seiter.
Not only did Bill Seiter fail to get Gladys into bed, Bill Seiter didn’t even catch her second name.
He, on the other hand, knows exactly where to find Virginia Ruth Rogers.
114
Sons of the Desert begins filming. Bill Seiter does good work on the picture—not so good that he will be petitioning Hal Roach to hire Bill Seiter again, but good enough.
During filming, Babe issues a statement announcing his reconciliation with Myrtle:
We are making a new start, realizing that we owe to each other the duty of taking our just share of blame for any past misunderstanding, with the acknowledged determination to achieve and preserve our newfound happiness.
The rest of the statement reads the same way. He has to go through it three times just to figure out what exactly is being said.
You didn’t write this, he says to Babe.
—Ben put it together for me.
Ben Shipman, he thinks, will never write a sonnet.
—What about Mary, and the punch on the nose?
—All water under the bridge.
Babe plays with his fez.
I suppose you think I’m crazy, says Babe.
—I don’t think anything of the sort.
—I do love Myrtle. You’ve seen her when she’s not drinking. She’s a different woman. I can’t abandon her. It wouldn’t be right.
—Where is Myrtle now?
—In Rosemead.
Back in the sanitarium. Drying out.
So this is what Babe has decided: he will be a husband in name only, trapped in a marriage in which he is the guardian to an alcoholic, and in torturing himself he will do penance for cheating on Myrtle with other women.
Viola Morse has gone the way of the divorce proceedings. She and Babe are temporarily estranged. Babe has replaced Viola Morse with Lillian DeBorba, who is the mother of a child actor, Dorothy DeBorba, one of Our Gang. Dorothy DeBorba is capable of crying on cue, which endears her to Hal Roach who admires any actor that can produce on demand, especially if the actor works cheap. Babe has managed to secure Lillian DeBorba a part as an extra in Sons of the Desert, so they will have an excuse for being seen together.
He, meanwhile, is dating Ruth. He visits her boutique shortly after returning from Catalina Island, buys some neckties, and asks her out. Only when he manages to convince her that his divorce is imminent—he would not be the first man to make such a claim in order to get a woman into bed, and so this process of persuasion takes some time—does Ruth agree to a date.
As with Babe and Lillian DeBorba, he has managed to secure Ruth a part as an extra in Sons of the Desert, so they will have an excuse for being seen together.
He knows about Lillian DeBorba, and Babe knows about Ruth.
But no one else does.
He is back in Ben Shipman’s office. It is October 9th. They are engaged in a final consultation about the divorce hearing, which will take place the following day. He is not entirely sure why his presence is required in the office. He and Ben Shipman could have clarified any remaining details over the telephone.
Ben Shipman is softly spoken. Rival attorneys often find themselves leaning forward just to hear what is being said by Ben Shipman, which is when Ben Shipman sucker-punches them.
Just as Ben Shipman does with him, right now.
Who exactly, Ben Shipman asks, is Ruth Rogers?
115
The newspapers all take a similar approach to reporting the divorce hearing, which is some variation on the old line, also uncomfortably familiar to Babe, that life with a comedian is anything but funny. Lois accuses him of being absent from home for long periods, and refusing to tell her where he has been upon his return, but this is now about the limit of her complaints. It could, as Ben Shipman tells him, be much worse, especially if someone had discovered that his new girlfriend, who is not even an actress, was working on his latest picture. The day before, Ben Shipman has exercised himself considerably while explaining to him just how foolish he has been in consorting so openly with Ruth.
He has never been shouted at so quietly.
The judge grants the decree. There is no reason why the judge should not. After all, he is not contesting it. In fact, as Lois reiterates in court, he recently told her that she could not get a divorce quickly enough for his liking, which is true. He regrets it now. He is a private man, and wishes that all these words spoken in anger could have been shared with the judge in a less public forum, but the law requires it this way.
It is ritual.
It is theater.
Lois gets the house, and custody of their daughter. Some horse-trading remains to be done over the alimony payments, but Ben Shipman warns him not to expect much mercy.
So it’s done, says Ben Shipman. You have what you wanted. I’d suggest that you don’t immediately go parading your new girlfriend around town, but when have you ever listened to anything I have to say?
They are drinking in Ben Shipman’s office. It is late in the afternoon. The building is quiet apart from a low, nauseating buzzing, the source
of which he cannot locate, but that he fears may lie in his own head.
How do you feel? asks Ben Shipman.
—Whatever it is, it’s not what I thought I’d be feeling.
—You expected relief, maybe?
—Yes.
—Let me tell you something. You and Babe Hardy, you’re sweet men. I like you both very, very much. Babe’s problems are different from yours, and that’s all I’ll say about them. You probably know as much as I do about Babe’s private life, but I’m still his lawyer, and I won’t discuss his difficulties with you any more than I would discuss yours with him.
But you, you didn’t have a terrible marriage. Lois wasn’t a bad woman, and you’re not a bad man. The two of you made a lovely daughter together. As for what happened to your boy, that was bad luck—the worst, just the worst—but you don’t need me to tell you that.
So no one got beaten. No one got cheated out of money. No one was a drunk. No one was an addict. Two people met, they got along, they fell in love, they stopped getting along, they separated. You’re not blameless—you know your own weaknesses, and I’m not going to remind you of what they are; although, God knows, women aren’t low on the list—but neither was Lois entirely without fault.
What I’m trying to explain is that there’s no reason for you to feel relieved, not at this moment. Relief may come later, when you want to try again and no obstacle will stand in your path. But, you know, for now it’s okay to feel something else. It’s okay to feel sad, and maybe you should feel sad. In fact, I would expect nothing less of you.
Go home. Get some sleep. Tomorrow will be better, and the day after that will be better still. I’ll call you when I have any news, or you can just call me if you want to talk. I won’t even bill you for my time.
But he doesn’t have a home, not any longer, so he goes back to South Palm Drive. In a bedroom that is not his own, he stares at his divorce papers. When he first began seeing Ruth, he promised to bring the papers to her as confirmation that he was serious in his intentions. They are already past that stage, but eventually he will show them to her nonetheless.
Just not yet.
Just not now.
He starts to cry. He cries for a dead marriage and a dead child. He climbs into bed, pulls a blanket over his head, and stays there as the light fades. He does not eat, and eventually he falls asleep.
Ben Shipman lies. The next day is no better.
But the day after is.
116
At the Oceana Apartments, he keeps in his desk a letter to Lois Neilson, his ex-wife, a letter he writes and rewrites but never sends. He and Lois still see each other occasionally, because of their daughter. Too many years have gone by for them to remain angry at each other.
He cannot say why the letter remains unfinished, and therefore unsent. It may be that Lois already knows everything it contains. If so, then he is writing it not for her but for himself. It is an ongoing conversation with his grief.
The substance of the letter, in all its forms, is the same. Only the words change. It tells Lois Neilson that he thinks of her with fondness. It tells her that no day goes by without some small remembrance of their son. It tells her that he has imagined many different lives for their lost child, but in each the boy is happy.
It tells her that he is sorry.
117
The Hal Roach publicity department keeps a clippings file on each of its stars. The files devoted to Babe and him are larger than the rest, and the secretaries sometimes fall behind in removing the stories from the newspapers.
The studio is closing for the holiday season, but he has some notes he needs to collect, and in passing he goes to the publicity departments to catch up on the reviews for Busy Bodies, which was released in the week of his divorce. He is proud of the picture. Left to his own devices, he would happily make such two-reelers for the rest of his career, although he knows that Babe’s memories of Busy Bodies are less fond. It is a physically arduous shoot for all, but particularly for Babe, who tears the ligaments in his left shoulder so badly that his golfing routine is profoundly disrupted, which leaves Babe in a foul mood.
He takes a seat, and opens the most recent file. Its contents relate not only to his pictures: his divorce also features prominently. The publicity department maintains a record of all stories, good and bad, and entire pages in even the most obscure of journals are devoted to Hollywood gossip. When there are no divorces to fill the columns, or no new pictures to review, the newspapers will accept whatever is fed to them. From the Meramec Valley Transcript of Pacific, Missouri, he learns that Dolores Del Rio has built an ultra-modern kennel for her dog, Mitchell, which includes a bathtub, an electric dryer, and a dressing room. Miriam Hopkins always orders chop suey if she finds it on a menu. James Cagney does not drink or smoke or permit gatecrashers at his home. All or none of these statements may be true. It is enough that someone in a publicity department not unlike this one has claimed they are true, and even this may be open to dispute. He has not forgotten that Hal Roach signed off on a statement announcing his reconciliation with Lois, even though Hal Roach has consistently denied any involvement.
Of more concern to many in Hollywood is the decision by President Roosevelt to order an investigation into the salaries of actors and actresses, given that so many citizens in the country are out of work and struggling to survive. Beside the description of his divorce proceedings contained in the Daily Republican of Monongahela, Pennsylvania, he finds a UP report listing stars’ estimated earnings. This one is longer than some of the others he has seen, and continues on a second page.
Janet Gaynor is making $100,000 a picture, for three pictures a year.
Will Rogers is making $125,000 a picture, for three pictures a year.
Maurice Chevalier is making $150,000 a picture, for two pictures a year.
Mae West stands to make $500,000 for I’m No Angel alone.
Even Baby LeRoy, who is one year old, makes $2,500 for a week’s work on A Bedtime Story. He is no mathematician, but on a week-by-week basis Baby LeRoy is being paid more than he is.
The alimony settlement negotiated by Ben Shipman makes the comparative paucity of his income harder to bear. He was warned not to anticipate good news from the court, but even so the award still comes as a shock: in addition to losing his home, he also has to hand over half his salary to Lois for the first year, after which the payments will be reduced. Half his salary is a lot of money. Maybe, he thinks, he should just marry Baby LeRoy’s mother and live off the kid.
He is still in a rage when he is told that Hal Roach wants to see him. He has not even realized that Hal Roach is on the lot. Lately Hal Roach seems to spend most of his time flying his plane and killing animals that cannot run fast enough to escape Hal Roach’s gun.
This, and—it seems—trying to sabotage his star’s career.
118
He has not been getting along with Hal Roach as well as before. They have not been on good terms since he and Babe returned from their trip to Europe to find that the board of directors—personified always, for him, by Henry Ginsberg, who does Hal Roach’s dirty work—had suspended their contracts and salaries for the duration. He later learns that Hal Roach wrote to MGM during the dispute to warn of the possible break-up of the partnership, only to have Felix E. Feist over at MGM inform Hal Roach that this was unacceptable, and everything necessary should be done to keep the team together.
Everything necessary, that is, apart from giving them back their money.
Hal Roach doesn’t offer him a drink. He doesn’t care. He’s been drinking enough away from the studio, and in truth his head is foggy this morning. His head is foggy most mornings since the divorce. His head might be foggier still except that Henry Ginsberg has fired Richard Currier, who once supplied him with fine liquor for his dressing room. At least Prohibition has now ended, so supply is no longer the issue.
Consumption is the issue.
It will soon be Christmas, his first away fro
m his daughter. He is not sure how he will cope. And yesterday was Teddy’s funeral. Teddy was buried at Forest Lawn.
Laughing gas. Of all the ways for a comic’s brother to die.
Hal Roach expresses his condolences on the loss of Teddy.
Thank you, he replies.
Hal Roach has suspended filming on Oliver the Eighth out of respect for his bereavement. They will pick up again in January. Despite any frostiness between them, Hal Roach is still a fundamentally decent human being.
Hal Roach also likes Lois, his ex-wife: not sexually—although who knows?—but in an avuncular way. Hal Roach thinks he is a fool to have left Lois. Hal Roach may well be right, because he is also starting to think this, but Hal Roach won’t hear it from his mouth.
We need to firm up the slate for next year, says Hal Roach.
—I’ve supplied Mr. Ginsberg with some ideas.
—Mr. Ginsberg informed me. Unfortunately, what you’re proposing to make are all two-reel pictures.
—That’s what we make. You built the studio on two-reel pictures. We became stars because of two-reel pictures.
—You made Pardon Us, and that was a feature. You made The Devil’s Brother, and that was a feature too. You’ve just finished Sons of the Desert, a feature, and that’s just great, maybe one of the best pictures you and Babe have put together. The previews are through the roof. Shorts don’t make money anymore. Even if the studios want them, they can produce their own. They don’t need to buy them from us. Short pictures are dying.
He has in his possession the original scroll presented by the Academy to Hal Roach Studios for The Music Box. The picture wasn’t awarded a statuette, just the scroll, but Hal Roach decided that he should keep it, which was a kind gesture. Perhaps, too, Hal Roach needed the space it might otherwise have occupied for more dead animals.