Mario Puzo - Fools die

Malomar said, “You keep putting down producers. Well, they are the guys who get pictures together. And they do it by spending two years kissing a hundred different babies, financial babies, actor babies, director babies, writer babies. And producers have to change their diapers, get tons of shit up their nose into their brain. Maybe that’s why they usually have such lousy taste. And yet a lot of them believe in art more than the talent. Or in its fantasy. You never see a producer not appear at the Academy Awards to pick up his Oscar.”

“That’s just ego,” I said, “not a belief in art.”

“You and your fucking art,” Malomar said. “Sure, only one movie out of a hundred is worth something, but what about books?”

“Books have a different function,” I said defensively. “Movies can only show the outside.”

Malomar shrugged. “You really are a pain in the ass.”

“Movies are not art,” I said. “It’s magic tricks for kids.” I only half believed that.

Malomar sighed. “Maybe you have the right idea. In every form, it’s all magic, not art. It’s a fake-out so that people forget about dying.”

That wasn’t true, but I didn’t argue. I knew Malomar had trouble since his heart attack and I didn’t want to say that this was what influenced him. For my money it was art that made you understand how to live.

Well, OK, he didn’t convince me, but after that I did look around me in a less prejudiced way. But he was right in one thing. I was jealous of the movies. The work was so easy, the rewards so rich, the fame dizzying. I hated the idea of going back to writing novels alone in a room. Underneath all my contempt was a childish envy. It was something I could never really be a part of; I didn’t have the talent or the temperament. I would always in some way despise it but for reasons more snobbish than moral.

I had read all about Hollywood, and by Hollywood I really mean the movie business. I had heard writers, especially Osano, come back East and curse the studios, call the producers the worst cocksucking meddlers in the world, the studio chiefs the crudest, rudest men this side of the apes, the studios so crooked, overbearing and criminal that they made the Black Hand look like the Sweet Sisters of Charity. Well, how they came back from Hollywood, that’s how I went in.

I had all the confidence in the world that I could handle it When Doran took me into my first meeting with Malomar and Houlinan, I spotted them right away. Houlinan was easy. But Malomar was more complicated than I expected. Doran, of course, was a caricature. But to tell the truth I liked Doran and Malomar. I detested Houlinan on sight. And when Houlinan told me to have my picture taken with Kellino, I almost told him to go fuck himself. When Kellino didn’t show up on time, I had my out. I hate waiting for anybody. I don’t get mad at them for being late, so why should they get mad at me for not waiting?

What made Hollywood fascinating was all the different species of empid fly.

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Young guys with vasectomy cards, cans of film under their arms, scripts and cocaine in their studio apartments, hoping to make movies, searching for talented young girls and guys to read for parts and fuck to pass time. Then there were the bona fide producers with offices on the studio lots and a secretary, plus a hundred thousand dollars in development money. They called agents and casting agencies to send people over. These producers had at least one picture to their credit. Usually a low-budget dumb picture that never made back the cost of the negative and wound up being shown on airplanes or at drive-ins. These producers paid off a California weekly for a quote that called their film one of the ten best pictures of the year. Or a planted Variety report that the picture had outgrossed Gone with the Wind in Uganda, which really meant Gone with the Wind had never played there. These producers usually had signed pictures of big stars on their desks inscribed with “LOVE.” They spent the day interviewing beautiful, struggling actresses who were deadly serious about their work and had no idea that for the producers it was just a way to kill an afternoon and maybe get lucky with a blow job that would give them a better appetite for dinner. If they were really hot for a particular actress, they would take her for lunch in the studio commissary and introduce her to the heavyweights who went by. The heavyweights, having gone through the same routine in their salad days, stood still for this if you didn’t push it too far. The heavyweights had outgrown this kid stuff. They were too busy unless the girl was something special. Then she might get a shot.

The girls and boys knew the game, knew it was partly a fixed wheel, but they also knew that you could get lucky. So they took their chances with a producer, a director, a star, but if they really knew their stuff and had some brains, they would never pin their hopes on a writer. I realized now how Osano must have felt.

But again I always understood this was part of the trap. Along with the money and the plush suites and the flattery and heady atmosphere of studio conferences and the feeling of importance in making a big film. So I never really got hooked. If I got a little horny, I flew to Vegas and gambled it cold. Cully would always try to send a class hooker to my room. But I always refused. Not that I was priggish, and of course, I was tempted. But I liked gambling more and had too much guilt.

I spent two weeks in Hollywood playing tennis, going out to dinner with Doran and Malomar, going to parties. The parties were interesting. At one I met a faded star who had been my masturbation fantasy when I was a teenager. She must have been fifty, but she still looked pretty good with face-lifts and all kinds of beauty aids. But she was just a little fat and her face was puffy with alcohol. She got drunk and tried to fuck every male and female at the party but couldn’t find a taker. And this was a girl that millions of young red-blooded Americans had fantasized about. I found that sort of interesting. I guess the truth is that it depressed me too. The parties were OK. Familiar faces of actors and actresses. Agents brimming over with confidence. Charming producers, forceful directors. I have to say they were a hell of a lot more charming and interesting than I ever was at a party.

And then I loved the balmy climate. I loved the palm tree streets of Beverly Hills, and I loved goofing around Westwood with all its movie theaters and young college kids who were film afficionados with really great-looking girls. I understood why all those 1930 novelists had “sold out.” Why spend five years writing a novel that made two grand when you could live this life and make the same money in a week?

During the day I would work in my office, have conferences on the script with Malomar, lunch in the commissary, wander over to a set and watch a picture being shot. On the set the intensity of the actors and actresses always fascinated me. One time I was really awed. A young couple played a scene in which the boy murdered his girlfriend while they made love. After the scene the two of them fell into each other’s arms and wept as if they had been part of a real tragedy. They walked off the set hugging each other.

Lunch at the commissary was fun. You met all the people acting in films, and it seemed as if everybody had read my book, at least they said they did. I was surprised that actors and actresses really didn’t talk much. They were good listeners. Producers talked a lot. Directors were preoccupied, usually accompanied by three or four assistants. The crew seemed to have the best time. But to watch the shooting of a picture was boring. It wasn’t a bad life, but I missed New York. I missed Valerie and the kids, and I missed my dinners with Osano. Those were nights I’d hop a plane to Vegas for the evening, sleep over and come back in the early morning.