Vera, Countess Sonia, and Roy Randolph smell money.
It is December.
On their first wedding anniversary, Vera is to begin serving a five-day sentence for the accident of the previous April in which she crashed the rental car, the rental car that she was not insured to drive as she had no license. But Vera cries before the judge. Vera cries so much that the judge fears less for his reputation if Vera is put behind bars than for the risk of flooding to his courtroom.
In the end, Vera spends just five hours in a cell. He drives her to the Beverly Hills city jail, and returns to drive her home when she has served her sentence. They kiss. They pose for the cameras. They announce their reconciliation. He professes his love for her.
Ben Shipman calls him the next day. Ben Shipman has been digesting the newspaper reports. Ben Shipman fears for his own sanity as much as his client’s.
Ben Shipman reads aloud to him from the newspaper.
They are describing you as “gallant,” says Ben Shipman. Since when was “gallant” another word for “crazy”?
He tries to interrupt, but Ben Shipman is on a roll.
—According to the AP, and I’m quoting directly here, you two have “kissed and made up . . . Their divorce is off, definitely, and maybe permanently.” You planted on her, unless the AP is lying, “a resounding kiss as she was led away to a cell,” and you “greeted her affectionately as she emerged.” Finally—and I particularly like this touch on the AP’s part: “‘The divorce is off. I will tell the judge that I want no divorce,’ she trilled gaily.”
Ben Shipman pauses for effect before repeating the last three words.
—“She. Trilled. Gaily.” That woman has never trilled in her life. “Caterwauled,” maybe. “Screeched,” definitely. But “trilled,” no. You want to hear what the Los Angeles Times had to say about it? The Times ran it as a drama, like something out of a Cagney picture. Did she really say “My God, don’t tell me you are going to leave me alone in the big house?”
He allows that Vera may have done so.
—She was going to spend five hours in a country club jail, not a lifetime in Alcatraz. Did she also give her date of birth as September 24th, 1912?
He informs Ben Shipman that this is the date of birth Vera always gives.
—With a straight face? Have you actually met her? I figure you must have, because you married her. I’m looking at a picture of her now, with you grinning beside her. If that woman is twenty-six years old, I’m Mrs. Lincoln. Even the Times struggled to pretend to believe her, and it lies about the age of people in Hollywood as a matter of principle. Jesus, you look younger than she does.
He tries to tell Ben Shipman that many women, under similar circumstances, surrounded by newspapermen and photographers, might deduct a year or two from their age.
—We’re not talking a year or two. We’re talking a portion of an adult life. We’re talking half a person. And did you tell the reporters “We love each other. When Illeana phoned me yesterday and said, ‘Darling, I want to come home,’ I flew to get there. It’s the real thing this time, the divorce will be called off”?
He admits that he may have become caught up in the moment.
Ben Shipman puts away the newspapers. Ben Shipman wishes to set them alight, but not before piling them around a stake and immolating his client in the resulting inferno.
Don’t call me again, says Ben Shipman, not until you’ve regained your senses.
It is January.
He regains his senses.
It does not take much: only further exposure to Vera, and Countess Sonia, and Roy Randolph. They encourage him in his lawsuit against Hal Roach; of course they do. Countess Sonia, when intoxicated, promises that she can arrange for him to be buried in the family vault back in Russia, where he will be surrounded by princes and they can all be together in the next life, just as they must remain together in this one. He does not ask if Roy Randolph will be included in this posthumous arrangement. Neither does Roy Randolph. Perhaps the Dancing Master is afraid to hear the answer.
Meanwhile Vera, when intoxicated, continues to sing, her repertoire now exclusively devoted to lays of disappointment in love.
But he has no money, and as yet Hal Roach shows no sign of bending the knee. If he cannot work in pictures, he must return to the stage. Even Ben Shipman agrees that this is a deft way to improve his finances. He still has contacts on the circuit. The Roosevelt in Oakland is booked for two nights, and two further dates are arranged for Seattle and Vancouver in February. He will be able to pick up more; he feels certain of it.
He assembles a cheap bill: Commodore J. Stuart Blackton from Yorkshire, who founded Vitagraph Studios at the end of the last century, but lost all his money in the crash of 1929 and is now reduced to lecturing on old pictures in mellifluous tones; Eddie Borden, a bit part player who came up through vaudeville; and James Morton, who is a gentleman actor of the old school, but suffers from myocarditis and could do with the work. Nobody can call it a star-studded line-up, but it will suffice. The Audience is coming to see him, not the others. All that is missing is a singer: someone inexpensive, someone who will be glad of the exposure.
The announcement is made.
He will be joined in his return to the stage by His Famous Wife, Illeana, Singing Russian Ballads.
Ben Shipman asks his secretary to bring a cold compress for his brow, and takes to his couch.
163
The tour lasts only two nights. It never progresses further than Oakland.
He and Vera get through the first night without excessive drama, although the appetite of the Audience for Russian folk songs proves limited, even if they are being performed well.
Which they are not.
Vera takes this as a personal rejection.
Which it is.
By the second night, Vera is inebriated before the curtain rises. He cannot prevent her from going on stage—without her, they have no singer—but he makes it clear that bad reviews here will affect the prospects for bookings elsewhere.
A lot of people are watching to see how this works out, he tells Vera. Some of them would be happy to see us fail.
—I think that you would be happy to see me fail.
He assures Vera that this is not the case, but he knows Countess Sonia has been pouring poison in Vera’s ear: Countess Sonia, and the Dancing Master. He sees and hears them, these strange courtiers, whispering and plotting in the recesses of his home.
I think that you are trying to sabotage my career, says Vera.
—I don’t have to sabotage your career. You’re more than capable of doing that unassisted. But I won’t have you sabotage mine along with it.
—What career? Show me this career. You don’t have a career. You are nothing, a fucking nobody. Go lick Chaplin’s boots. Go talk to Chaplin of this career. Maybe Chaplin will give you a nickel for it.
Vera moves to pour herself another glass of liquor. He tries to stop her. They struggle; they fight. Vera strikes him, over and over, but he does not return a blow. He will not. He has brought this upon himself, and if the reparation required for his failings is to be here in Oakland, wrestling with a drunk over a bottle, then let it be made, and made in full, so that the debt may be cleared.
This, he thinks, is as low as he can descend.
Vera leaves, and does not return.
Finally, he is purged of her.
In February 1939, Vera is arrested for singing anti-Communist songs at the Balalaika Café on Sunset Strip while intoxicated. Vera also accuses the California state liquor administrator, George M. Stout, who happens to be in the Balalaika at the time, of being a Bolshevik.
He would find this diverting were it not for the fact that Hal Roach has responded to his lawsuit by accusing him of a breach of the morals clause in his contract through his behavior with Vera.
It’s smoke and mirrors, Ben Shipman tells him. Hal wants you back. Babe wants you back. But your wife is the problem. Hal can’t risk an
y more bad publicity. Frankly, neither can you.
In March, Vera sues for alimony, and Hal Roach offers him a new contract contingent upon a full and complete separation from his wife, which is hardly the most onerous or unwelcome of conditions. The news is made public in April. He and Babe are to be reunited. He would have a drink to celebrate, but he is trying to keep away from alcohol.
Babe calls. He asks Babe about Harry Langdon. He does not want to see Harry Langdon on Poverty Row over this.
Harry’s okay about it, says Babe. Hal is giving him a contract as a writer.
—And you?
—I’m okay with it, too.
That month, the latest alimony hearing commences. Lois, his first wife, is dragged into the proceedings. Testimony is offered to the court by Vera’s attorney of the proposed honeymoon cruise with Lois to Catalina Island, of evenings he has spent with Lois at her home, reminiscing and regretting. He cannot deny any of this. He is still in love with Lois.
He was in love with Lois when he was fucking Alyce Ardell.
He was in love with Lois when he was married to Ruth.
He was in love with Lois even when Lois was suing him for inflated child maintenance, which he could not afford to pay.
But then, he has never claimed to be a rational man.
He settles out of court. He instructs Ben Shipman to agree a property arrangement with Vera. He wishes only for her to be ejected from his life. And Vera will aid him in this regard by being arrested and rearrested; by conforming to her image as a drunk; by being ordered to leave Hollywood, and later the state of California itself, on pain of imprisonment. In time Vera will vanish into the dark of the night, Countess Sonia in tow, and both will die and he will take no cognizance of their passing.
On May 1st, 1939, he is back on the lot with Babe for A Chump at Oxford. Hal Roach has given them a four-picture contract. Better yet, their pictures are to be in a new form: forty minutes in duration, longer than a short, shorter than a feature—“streamliners,” to use Hal Roach’s term for them.
For this new chance he thanks Hal Roach in person on the first day of filming. He is sincere in his gratitude. Hal Roach may have vilified him in the press, called him a lush, spread falsehoods about his willingness to work, but to each accusation he added substance by his own behavior.
It was just business, says Hal Roach. Nothing personal.
This, he knows, is not true, but he allows it to pass. Hal Roach’s office is less grand than once it was. Perhaps he has failed to notice its deterioration before now. The furniture, where damaged, has not been repaired or replaced. The dead animals carry a patina of dust.
Or maybe he imagines it all, and it is only a manifestation of his own slow decline that he perceives.
I understand, he says.
—That Illeana, she did a job on you.
—I helped where I could.
—I never met a man who didn’t.
—Even you?
—Even me. Go on, get out of here. Make me a good picture.
He will try, but as he leaves Hal Roach’s office he observes the approach of evening. The sun loses its warmth, and the lot fades around him as he walks, its buildings losing their solidity, its people turning to ghosts. He calls to them, but they are already departed.
Until at last he is alone.
164
At the Oceana Apartments, he counts off the dead on his fingers.
On May 10th, 1939. Jimmy Parrott dies. Jimmy Parrott is a drunk and a drug addict, but Jimmy Parrott was once much more. Jimmy Parrott kills himself, but the studio labels his passing as heart disease and peddles the lie to the papers.
On June 1st, 1940, Babe’s half-sister, Emily Crawford, dies. She is a supervisor at the Orphans Home, a gentle woman who teaches for no salary. Babe pays her funeral expenses.
On June 20th, 1940, Jimmy Parrott’s brother, Charley Chase, who is a drunk but not a drug addict, dies of a heart attack. Charley Chase also dies by his own hand, drowning himself in liquor, but they don’t call it suicide if you do it slowly enough.
On March 17th, 1941, Marguerite Nichols, the wife of Hal Roach, dies from pneumonia. She was an actress, once.
Formerly in pictures.
But then there are so many dying in those years.
And as the dead fall away, he watches Babe’s body contract and then swell again, diets working and diets failing. He sees Babe’s face grow redder. He listens as Babe struggles to catch his breath.
Let them all die, he adjures, every one.
But not this man.
165
He is with Alyce Ardell once again, for this, too, is a roundelay, a dance within dances. Alyce Ardell is now living with him. Dark hair, dark eyes, dark lips, scent unpolluted by liquor, breath without the vomitous undertow of the permanently soused. His head rests against her belly. Alyce Ardell is humming to him, her hand in his hair.
Why are you sad? she asks.
—I didn’t know that I was.
—You’re often sad.
—I have been through strange times.
—For a strange man.
—Am I strange?
—I believe you are.
—Why?
—Because I love you, and have never asked for anything from you beyond the time we spend together, yet you throw away a year of your life on a woman who never cared for you at all, and who only wished to bleed you dry. So, yes, you’re a strange man.
—Do you love me?
—Of course I do.
—If I asked you to marry me, would you accept?
—Are you asking me to marry you?
—Maybe I’m not sure until you offer an answer.
Alyce Ardell laughs.
—This isn’t a scene in a picture. It doesn’t work that way.
—You haven’t asked me if I love you.
She is quiet for a time. He prompts her.
—Well?
—I haven’t asked because I’m afraid of how you might reply.
—Then that leaves both of us with questions we’re scared to have answered.
They speak of it no more. Eventually, he dozes. When he wakes, she is watching him.
What? he says.
—When are you happy? And don’t reply with some foolishness about when you’re here with me. Tell me the truth: When are you really happy?
He reflects.
—I’m happiest when I’m by the sea.
166
As he has Alyce Ardell, so too does Babe have Viola Morse.
Babe and Viola Morse have been together for so many years that they are more of a married couple than Babe and Myrtle ever were. Viola Morse is a handsome woman; not striking like Alyce Ardell, but with a considerateness that is a complement to Babe’s own benevolence, and a son from her marriage to whom she is devoted. Viola Morse accompanies Babe to Santa Anita and Agua Caliente, and dines with Babe in clubs and restaurants. But when they are photographed together, Babe often looks away from the camera. He thinks that this may not be unconnected to Babe’s sense of propriety, although he cannot blame his friend for guarding his privacy. After all, Babe has only to glance in his direction to be reminded of the consequences of allowing one’s private life to become public property.
Alyce Ardell joins him on the set of The Flying Deuces. Hal Roach has loaned out Babe and him to Boris Morros for the picture, so Hal Roach can have no say in the company he keeps. The script is not good, but it is work, and he is with Babe. Boris Morros, meanwhile, is a Russian émigré who spies for the Soviets for ten years before recanting and working as a double agent for the FBI for another ten. Nobody is very surprised to learn of this. Nothing in Hollywood is genuine, not even treachery.
Perhaps, he thinks, Babe should marry Viola Morse. The word “fiancée” is often used of Viola Morse, sometimes even by Babe, although no formal arrangement exists between them. But he believes that it is Viola Morse’s misfortune to have been Babe’s mistress and companion for too long, and so Bab
e can no longer think of her in any other way. He understands this because he shares the same reservations about Alyce Ardell. He and Alyce Ardell have used each other—for sex, for consolation, for the staving off of loneliness—and though a kind of love may exist between them, the years have stripped it of depth and meaning. But he says nothing of this to Babe, as they stand in the July heat after the master shot has been completed, waiting for their close-ups.
How goes the Great Wall? Babe asks.
He is building an even higher barrier around his property. Babe jokes that it is to keep out all of his ex-wives, but there is weight to the jest.
—I think it might be cheaper just to lower the house.
A woman approaches them. She is not unpretty. When she smiles, her cheeks bunch like those of a squirrel in fall. Her name is Virginia, but everyone calls her by her second name, Lucille, so she is Lucille Jones. She is the continuity girl, responsible for ensuring that there are no discrepancies between shots. She tries to make some small correction to Babe’s costume, but Babe is always prepared, and always remembers, and so she leaves Babe to his own devices. When Babe takes to the set, all will be as it should.
He notices Babe watching Lucille Jones depart.
He says nothing.
167
At the Oceana Apartments, a bad memory.
A club in wartime, champagne flowing. He is there. Babe is there. Babe is with Lucille. And he—he reckons, he is not sure—is with Alyce Ardell, but if so, then their time together is coming to an end.
He is moving through the crowd, almost unrecognizable: a middle-aged man in a tuxedo that no longer fits as it should, a face less familiar without a derby to hide the thinning gray hair.
An arm appears before him, blocking his way.
—Hey.
He sees him now: an actor, one of those who believe that portraying gangsters on screen by day, and consorting with them in clubs by night, imbues the imitator with the aura of the original. The faces of the actor’s companions are flushed with alcohol and hostility, flashing like warning beacons in the gloom. They have glasses in their hands, but these glasses are not filled with champagne. Whatever is happening here, it is no celebration.