Peter Spiegelman - Red Cat

My fingers were aching and my back was stiff, and I wanted to go to bed. Instead, I returned to the laptop and Holly’s files. That was when I found the video of Gene Werner.

But for the stage lights, the tiny theater was dark, and but for Claudius, Hamlet, Laertes, and the director, it was empty. They were gathered at stage left, near a frail-looking table. I was quiet coming in, and they didn’t look up as I took a seat in the last row. The air was warm and old, and there was a chemical smell in it, like antifreeze.

King: Yo, playahs, the O.G. drinks to Hammy!

Let’s light it up

And you judging muthafuckahs bear a wary eye.

Hamlet: Come on, bitch.

Laertes: You come on, dawg.

Gene Werner watched as Hamlet and Laertes circled each other, foils wobbling in their uncertain hands. “No, you idiots,” he shouted, “you’re fencing, not skipping. You’re fighting for your fucking lives!” Werner’s own foil whipped through the air and snicked Laertes’s leg.

The actor dropped his sword and spun. “Screw you, Gene- you do that one more time, you’ll be fighting for your own fucking life.”

Werner’s laugh was rich and haughty, and it carried easily to the back of the house. “That’s right, Sean, get angry! And Greg, keep your fucking arm up. The way you hold that thing, you look like a faggot houseboy, mincing around the den with a goddamn feather duster. You’re the fucking prince of the ’hood, for chrissakes- the lead. This play is all about you!”

Hamlet’s face was shiny, and there were rings of sweat under his arms. He wiped his forehead and flipped Werner the bird. Claudius hitched up his baggy jeans and laughed, and the actors took their places to run it through again. Werner walked to the front of the stage and peered into the darkness. I didn’t think he could see me in the thick shadow, but some actor radar had made him exquisitely sensitive to the presence of an audience. I kept still, he turned back to his players, and the rehearsal continued.

I’d spent most of the morning in Brooklyn, where I’d paid another visit to Holly’s neighbor, Jorge Arrua. I’d spent the afternoon back in my apartment, reading through my notes and drawing up a timeline. I’d called Mike Metz several times throughout the day, and heard every time from his secretary that he was still downtown, at the Seventh Precinct house, with Stephanie.

When I’d finished the timeline, I’d gone hunting, on-line and on the telephone, for Gene Werner. I remembered what he’d told me about his upcoming directing projects, and I’d found one of them, a hip-hop interpretation of Hamlet, mentioned on the website of the Little Gidding Theatre. According to the site, the production was due to premiere in a month, and I’d called an information number and learned that rehearsals were taking place all afternoon, in the basement space on West Thirteenth Street.

Werner’s nasty laugh rolled over the rows of folding chairs. “What part of ‘switch swords’ don’t you get, Greg? It means he takes yours and you take his and then you start fighting again. Watch.”

Werner put the tip of his foil under the guard of Hamlet’s, and lifted it from the stage with a flourish. He caught it midair and offered it- grip first- to Hamlet, who took it hesitantly. Werner raised his weapon, and before Hamlet could do the same he shouted “En garde!” He batted Hamlet’s blade aside, stepped in, and locked the guard of Hamlet’s foil against his own. Werner grabbed the smaller man by his shirtfront and grinned down at him. Then he planted his sneaker behind the actor’s heel and pushed. Hamlet went down with an echoing thump and Werner laughed.

He hadn’t been laughing much on Holly’s video, nor had he been nearly so well groomed. It was an untitled, unedited work, shot in her apartment, with a single hidden camera, and Werner was its hapless star. He was unshaven and rumpled, his hair greasy-looking, and his eyes full of fear and anger. Holly, mostly unseen, was at her inquisitorial best. Her voice was a finely calibrated mix- wheedling, sympathetic, seductive, and patient.

“I made you angry, didn’t I?” she said from someplace. “You felt like I lied to you.”

“How else was I supposed to feel? Jesus, Holly, I loved you. How could you do it to me?”

“It wasn’t about you, Gene.”

“Not about me? All that time we were together, and you’re fucking these guys you don’t even know- making these porn flicks- how is that not about me?”

“It’s my project- my work. It has nothing to do with anyone but me.”

Werner shook his head, eyes wide. “Nothing to do with…And you wonder why I was angry. You’re un-fucking-believable.”

“I wonder less about the anger than I do about the theft,” Holly said.

A sheepish grin ran across Werner’s face. “What are you talking about?” he said. He tried for puzzled and irritated, but neither worked.

Holly was relaxed, almost amused. “Come on, baby, we know each other too long for games.”

“It turned out I didn’t know shit about you,” he said.

“You knew me,” Holly said. “You still do.” Her voice was lazy and insinuating, and Werner reacted to it like a dog to a whistleattentive and hungry.

“I thought I did,” he said slowly.

“Was it just money, baby, or was it something else? Say it wasn’t just about the money.”

He made a pouting face. “I was angry, Holly- fucking heartbroken.”

A clash of blades and another fall brought me back to the theater and to the action onstage. Laertes was rubbing his wrist, and Hamlet was dusting himself off. Claudius was laughing.

“The hell with you,” Hamlet said. “I don’t need a gig so bad I’m going to be a punching bag for anyone.”

Werner laughed some more and swept a hand through his shiny hair. “Your choice, Greggers. I’ll have ten guys here in an hour to audition for your part, and not one of them will be too lazy or delicate to learn stage combat. But, as I said, it’s your call. So what’ll it bestay or go?” He crossed his arms on his chest and smiled down on Hamlet.

The actor looked at him. “Screw you,” he said softly, but he picked up his foil and took his position for another run-through.

They stumbled through the fifth-act fight scene many times during the next hour, with no joy and no appreciable improvement in technique. Only Werner seemed to take pleasure in the process, full as it was of occasions for him to berate and abuse his colleagues. I was surprised that when the actors left for the day, exiting stage right, they left him still alive. When their voices faded, and a heavy door opened and closed somewhere backstage, I took a deep breath, and stood.

Werner was collecting the foils, and he heard me coming. He shielded his eyes from the stage lights and looked up the aisle. He took a step back when he recognized me.

“What are you doing here?” he said. No haughtiness now.

“I’m here to see you.” My heart was pounding, and I took some easy breaths, to slow things down.

“Technically, the theater is closed.”

“There was no one around to stop me.”

“Yeah, well- I’ve got someplace to be, so I have to lock up.”

I reached the stage, and jumped up. Werner took another step back. “This won’t take long.”

“What won’t take long?” he said. His jaw was grim and jutting.

“I came to talk, Gene. About the video.”

“We talked about Holly’s videos already, and I told you what I knew. I have nothing else to say about those things; I don’t even like thinking about them.”

“I’m not talking about the videos of her and those men.”

Werner swallowed hard and shrugged. He managed a casual stride to the little table, where he put the foils down, all but his own. “Then what the hell are you talking about?”