Stuart Kaminsky: Show Business is Murder

Birch spent the next five minutes being lectured to about the House Un-American Activities Committee, the Hollywood Ten, the blacklist, the graylist, Red Channels, a man named Dalton Trumbo, another man named Walter Winchell, and a lot of other ancient history that meant absolutely nothing to her.

Mendy sipped his black coffee, grimaced, and reached into his pocket for a tiny pillbox. With yellowed smoker’s fingers, he lifted the lid, took out a small white tablet, and slipped it into his coffee. He stirred, drank again, and smiled at Birch, who was watching the operation closely.

“My grandfather had nitroglycerin pills for his heart,” she said in a low voice. “But his doctor wouldn’t let him drink coffee.”

“These aren’t nitro, kid,” the old man replied. “Just saccharin. I’m a diabetic, gotta watch my sugar.”

“Ginger Rogers, too,” Patrick said. “Wasn’t she a Friendly?”

“No,” Mendy said, his sharp eyes narrowing with bad memories, “that was her ma.” He shook his head. “Poisonous woman. Had a tongue on her so sharp it’s a wonder she still had lips.”

“I always liked that Gene Kelly tried to fight the blacklist,” Scotty said. “Him and Bogie and Bacall.”

“Don’t forget the divine John Garfield,” added Patrick. “They all went to Washington to protest the Committee. But then the studios cracked down and they all folded.”

“The whole thing scared the hell out of Kelly,” Mendy agreed. “The First Amendment committee, Bogie, Bacall, Eddie Robinson. They make their big statement and then come back to Hollywood and find out they’ll be fired unless they tell the world they were duped by the evil Commies. It killed Garfield, the whole mess. Friends on one side, friends on the other, people going to jail-it ate him up inside, and one day he just died.”

Patrick asked the question on everyone’s mind: “Did you get called before the Committee, Mendy?”

“Believe it or not, I did. Went to a couple meetings, next thing I know I’m Public Enemy Number One. They hauled me up there, wanted me to name names. I said, hell no, I wasn’t gonna rat out my friends. Never worked again in the Industry. Not one day’s shooting did I get after that.”

“Wow,” Birch said, impressed. “But why didn’t you just tell them you were a Communist for a while but you didn’t want to name anybody else?” For some reason, she didn’t mind showing her ignorance before the old man. It was okay to know less than a guy who must be eighty years old.

“What you have to understand,” Mendy said, “is that you couldn’t do that. Once you answered one question, you had to answer them all. That’s why the Ten took the Fifth.”

Birch nodded as if this made sense. She supposed she knew what taking the Fifth meant, but who were the Ten?

“The Hollywood Ten,” Patrick whispered into her ear. “A bunch of writers. They refused to answer and they went to jail.”

“So if I’d gone in there and said, hell, yeah, I was a Commie and proud of it, or if I’d even said, I was a Commie and I’m ashamed of it now, they’d have asked me for the names of all the people I’d seen at meetings. Everybody I’d ever known in the old days would have been in trouble on account of me.”

“So you were blacklisted?”

“Made no sense to me. I mean, sure, some of the writers tried sneaking pinko lines into their movies, but I was a hoofer, for Chrissakes. What was I gonna do, tap Marxist slogans into my scenes?”

“How did you feel about that?” Birch thought the question was stupid; how would anybody feel about that? But then she realized Patrick already knew the answer, wanted the emotion, not the facts.

“Kid, what do you love more than anything in the world? How would you feel if you had that taken away from you for no good reason? Like they passed a law saying you’d go to jail if you-”

Patrick’s blue eyes glinted. “Honey, they did pass a law. I don’t need a blacklist to feel like a second-class citizen-I’m a faggot.”

Mendy lowered his eyes. “Sorry, kid. I kind of forgot.”

“That reminds me,” Patrick said with a snap of his slender fingers. “Did you know a dancer named Paul Dixon? He came out to Hollywood from Broadway, they wanted to make him a big star. He started rehearsals for, I think it was-”

“ Summer Stock with Judy Garland,” Mendy replied. “Yeah, I knew him a little. In fact, he and I were up for a couple of the same roles.”

“Wasn’t there a rumor that he-” Patrick began.

Mendy nodded. “Yeah, that was almost worse than the blacklist, the way it killed his career. He coulda maybe beaten the Commie rap, but the other-that killed him dead.”

“What happened?” Scotty asked the question, which meant Birch didn’t have to.

“Westbrook Pegler-big columnist back then, not as big as Winchell, but big enough, writes a column calling Dixon ‘a mincing twerp with twittering toes.’ ” Mendy raised a bushy gray eyebrow. “I bet you can guess what he meant by that crack.”

“I could maybe think of something,” Patrick replied, his lips in a thin smile. “It’s one way of saying ‘swishy.’ ”

“I’m not saying that was the end of his career,” Mendy said, “but it was the end of any talk of leading roles. Your Astaires, your Kellys, your Donald O’Connors-they were all straight boys. You kept the swishers in the chorus, you didn’t team them with Rita Hayworth or Judy Garland.”

“So we never got to see Paul Dixon show what he could do,” Patrick said wistfully. “Tragic. Really tragic.”

WED-SAT

Take Me Out to the Ball Game

1 PM, 5:30 PM, 9:30 PM

Fun with Kelly and Sinatra as baseball player vaudevillians. Berkeley directs; Esther Williams stays dry; Betty Garrett and Jules Munshin get the laughs.

An American in Paris

3:15 PM, 7:15 PM

The Oscar-winning, best musical of all time! Gershwin music, glorious dances, and Minnelli’s amazing color palette make this a feast for eyes as well as ears.

Scotty, present

“IF I WEREgoing to die in a movie,” Patrick said as we passed Second Avenue and the former Fillmore East, “I think I’d want it to be An American in Paris. Doubled with Footlight Parade: Jimmy Cagney and Joan Blondell. I love the energy of that movie, the complete conviction that putting on a show, anywhere, anytime, anyplace is just about the best thing anyone can do.”

It was a measure of our madness in those days that nobody said, “What a sick idea.” We all gave the question serious thought.

Stanley, Patrick’s on-again-off-again romance, opted for Pal Joey. He had a thing for Kim Novak, whom he declared the closest thing to a transvestite he’d ever seen on the screen.

“The Bandwagon,” I said without even thinking twice. “Doubled with It’s Always Fair Weather.

“I want Peter Pan, ” Birch said, a dreamy look in her eyes. “I always wanted to be able to fly.”

“My dear child,” Patrick said in his archest, most condescending tone, “you are speaking of cartoons, which, no matter how much music they contain, will never be taken seriously as musicals.”

Birch thrust out her chin and said, “What about when Gene dances with Jerry the mouse in Anchors Aweigh? ”

Patrick threw back his head and laughed. “You’ve been teaching her at home, Scotty. Point taken. If the great Gene thinks cartoons belong in musicals, then you shall have Peter Pan if he makes you happy. After all,” he said, throwing out his arms in a campy, graceful dancer’s arc, “that’s what musicals are about: happiness.”