Mario Puzo - Fools die

– -

Janelle was looking at me with a little smile. “You really think you’re Merlin, don’t you?” she said.

“A little bit,” I said.

She smiled again and didn’t say anything. We drank a little wine, and then she said suddenly, “You know, sometimes I’m a little kinky and I'm afraid, really, to be that way with you. Do you know what’s a lot of fun? One of us ties the other up and then makes love to whoever is tied up. How about it? Let me tie you up and then I’ll make love to you and you’ll be helpless. It’s really a great kick.”

I was surprised because we had tried to be kinky before and failed. One thing I knew: Nobody would ever tie me up. So I told her, “OK, I’ll tie you up, but you’re not tying me up.’,

“That’s not fair,” Janelle said. “That’s not fair play.”

“I don’t give a shit,” I said. “Nobody’s tying me up. How do I know when you have me tied up you won’t light matches under my feet or stick a pin in my eye? You’ll be sorry afterward, but that won’t help me.”

“No, you dope. It would be a symbolic bond. I’ll just get a scarf and tie you up. You can break loose anytime you want. It can be like a thread. You’re a writer, you know what ‘symbolic’ means.”

“No,” I said.

She leaned back on the bed, smiling at me very coolly, “And you think you’re Merlin,” she said. “You thought I’d be sympathetic about poor you in the orphanage imagining yourself as Merlin. You’re the toughest son of a bitch I ever met and I just proved it to you. You’d never let any woman put you under a spell or put you in a cave or tie a scarf around your arms. You’re no Merlin, Merlyn.”

I really hadn’t seen that coming, but I had an answer for her, an answer I couldn’t give. That a less skillful enchantress had been before her. I was married, wasn’t I?

– -

The next day I had a meeting with Doran and he told me that negotiations for the new script would take awhile. The new director, Simon Bellfort, was fighting for a bigger percentage. Doran said tentatively, “Would you consider giving up a couple of your points to him?”

“I don’t even want to work on the picture,” I told Doran. ‘That guy Simon is a hack, his buddy Richetti is a fucking born thief. At least Kellino is a great actor to excuse his being an asshole. And that fucking prick Wagon is the prize creep of them all. Just get me off the picture.”

Doran said smoothly, “Your percentage of the picture depends on your getting screenplay credit. That’s in the contract. If you let those guys go on without you, they’ll work it so you won’t get the credit. You’ll have to go to arbitration before the Writers Guild. The studio proposes the credits, and if they don’t give you partial credit, you gotta fight it.”

“Let them try,” I said. “They can’t change it that much.”

Doran said soothingly, “I have an idea. Eddie Lancer is a good friend of yours. I’ll ask to have him assigned to work with you on the script. He’s a savvy guy and he can run interference for you against all those other characters. OK? Trust me this once.”

“OK,” I said. I was tired of the whole business.

Before he left, Doran said, “Why are you pissed off at those guys?”

“Because not one of them gave a shit about Malomar,” I said. “They’re glad he’s dead.” But it wasn’t really true. I hated them because they tried to tell me what to write.

– -

I got back to New York in time to see the Academy Awards presented on television. Valerie and I always watched them every year. And this year I was watching particularly because Janelle had a short, a half hour film, she had made with her friends that had been nominated.

My wife brought out coffee and cookies, and we settled down to watching. She smiled at me and said, “Do you think someday you’ll be there picking up an Oscar?”

“No,” I said. “My picture will be lousy.”

As usual, in the Oscar presentations they got all the small stuff out of the way first, and sure enough, Janelle’s film won the prize as the Best Short Subject and there was her face on the screen. Her face was rosy and pink with happiness and she was sensible enough to make it short and she was guilty enough to make it gracious. She just simply said, “I want to thank the women who made this picture with me, especially Alice De Santis.”

And it brought me back to the day when I knew that Alice loved Janelle more than I ever could.

– -

Janelle had rented a beach house in Malibu for a month, and on weekends I would leave my hotel and spend my Saturday and Sunday with her at the house. Friday night we walked on the beach, and then we sat on the porch, the tiny porch under the Malibu moon and watched the tiny birds, Janelle told me they were sandpipers. They scampered out of the reach of the water whenever the waves came up.

We made love in the bedroom overlooking the Pacific Ocean. The next day, Saturday, when we were having lunch instead of breakfast, Alice came out to the house. She had breakfast with us, and then she took a rectangular tiny piece of film out of her purse and gave it to Janelle. The piece of film was no more than an inch wide and two inches long.

Janelle asked, “What’s this?”

“It’s the director’s credit on the film,” Alice said. “I cut it

“Why did you do that?” Janelle said.

“Because I thought it would make you happy,” Alice said.

I was watching both of them. I had seen the film. It had been a lovely little piece of work. Janelle and Alice had made it with three other women as a feminist venture. Janelle had screen credit as star. Alice had a credit as director, and the other two~ women had credits appropriate to the work they had done on the film.

“We need a director’s credit. We just can’t have a picture without a director’s credit,” Janelle said.

Just for the hell of it I put my two cents in. “I thought Alice directed the film,” I said.

Janelle looked at me angrily. “She was in charge of directing,” she said. “But I made a lot of the director suggestions and I felt I should get some credit for that.”

“Jesus,” I said. “You’re the star of the film. Alice has to get some credit for the work she did.”

“Of course she does,” Janelle said indignantly. “I told her that. I didn’t tell her to cut out her credit on the negative. She just did it.”

I turned to Alice and said, “How do you really feel about it?”

Alice seemed very composed. “Janelle did a lot of work on the directing,” she said. “And I really don’t care for the credit. Janelle can have it. I really don’t care.”

I could see that Janelle was very angry. She hated being put in such a false position, but I sensed that she wasn’t going to let Alice have full credit for directing the film.

“Damn you,” Janelle said to me. “Don’t look at me like that. I got the money to have this film made and I got all the people together and we all helped write the story and it couldn’t have been made without me.”

“All right,” I said. “Then take credit as the producer. Why is the director’s credit so important?”

Then Alice spoke up. “We’re going to be showing this film in competition for the Academy and Filmex, and on films like this, people feel the only thing that’s important is the directorship. The director gets most of the credit for the picture. I think Janelle’s right. ”She turned to Janelle. “How do you want the director’s credit to read?”

Janelle said, “Have both of us being given credit and you put your name first. Is that OK?”

Alice said, “Sure, anything you want.”

After having lunch with us, Alice said she had to leave even though Janelle begged her to stay. I watched them kiss each other good-bye and then I walked Alice out to her car.