Curt Leviant - Kafka's Son

A picture on the wall behind Danny’s head caught my eye. It looked familiar. Wait a minute. Where had I seen that lithograph? In a gallery recently? At MOMA or the Gug? Perhaps a New York Times ad for a Miro show at the Pierre Matisse Gallery? The same blaze of primary colors and velvety pastels, happy swirls, hint of a man smiling. Then it came to me; it slid on a sliding door into my mind. Jiri in the hospital, the cheap, commercial-print version of the Miro image above his bed. And here was the much larger — perhaps 14” x 36”—original lithograph, signed and numbered by Miro, an enormously valuable work of art.

At once memories of Jiri flooded me. I missed him. I wanted to ask him about Terezin. I wanted to ask him about his job as director of Prague’s Jewish Museum. I wanted to ask him about his family, his father, his mother. There were so many questions I wanted to ask him. I had known him so briefly yet befriended him so quickly. I was the middle link between him and his friend in Prague, whom I would find in the Altneushul. A tenuous link was I. Jiri was gone and his friend in Prague was still a shadow in my mind. Busy with plans for Prague, I hadn’t realized how much I missed Jiri until that Miro floated into view behind Danny K’s head.

Was this picture another secret message being sent to me, like the arcane language that Jiri and Betty spoke whose messages I could not penetrate, except for “nepa tara glos” and “nepa tara pilus”? If you remove the “K” that has accompanied me all my life, what link, what possible connection could there be between the “K” of Krupka-Weisz and the “K” of Danny K?

Never mind. No time now. There was Danny to look at — and so I fixed my gaze on him. Except for a few whispered exchanges with his friend, Danny hardly spoke. He sat quietly and ate slowly from the platter the producer had brought him from the buffet table. I noticed Danny’s fork trembling as he brought it to his mouth. Seeing others watching him, he switched to his left hand. When he turned he moved his head slowly. Had he had a stroke?

My heart fell. I felt I was seeing my childhood idol, one of my two spiritual K fathers, shattered, defeated, broken. As if a rock cast at a windshield caused a spiderweb of shattered glass — and I’m seeing my beloved Danny through those glass spiderwebs. Could it be that he already had dementia and was reliving his early days in show business when greasepaint was applied to his mobile face? But why would anyone bring him to a party if he was unwell?

Conversations swirled near him, to his left and to his right, leaving him powerfully alone. I longed to rescue him, to become a hero of one of his films, like The Secret Life of Walter Mitty , where he wins all battles, rights all wrongs. Were people afraid to talk to him, afraid of disturbing or annoying him? Or were they avoiding him like people avoid the deformed and the incurably ill? But Danny did not seem to mind. No sign of petulance, disdain, or impatience was on his face. While others went to the buffet, he didn’t move. He looked down at his plate or up at empty space as he chewed. Once in a while, his left index finger absently traced a little line on his left cheek.

The hostess had placed one extra linen napkin next to every goblet. Danny took one stiff” napkin, opened it, made some folds, and shaped a little boat. He did the same with a neighbor’s napkin. Then he reached for another and another and did the same. Soon he had a small armada. Others watched Danny as they ate, but they did not use this odd game of his to open a conversation.

An idea suddenly flowered. I took my napkin and made a large boat. Then, from a glass vase filled with red roses on the buffet, I took one rose. I broke off most of the stem, placed the flower in my linen boat and sent it sailing with my gift, my homage, to Danny. He looked up, saw my ship approaching his fleet, and made room for my rose-bearing craft by moving two boats. He smiled delightedly as with thumb and forefinger he pulled in my rose boat to shore. For a moment I fancied he’d pick up the rose, place it between his teeth, and break into a little dance.

Instead, he picked it up, sniffed it, and said softly, “Thank you,” in his nuanced, high-pitched, and rather nasal voice. Then he gave out his famous charming little giggle that I remembered from his films and stage shows. Just then the producer sitting next to him was called into the living room. I too rose and pounced. I moved around the table and slid into the vacated seat.

“Hi,” he said. “I’m Danny K.”

My heart thumped. All my memories of Danny K coalesced at that moment. Sitting next to him, it was as if a waterfall of photos and scenes had come cascading into my head and they were about to pour out.

I smiled. “Don’t I know it!” I introduced myself. We shook hands.

“Thanks for the rose. Very imaginative.”

“No less than the armada you created as if you wanted to sail away from here.”

Danny looked me in the eye. In his warm glance pain and sadness mingled, but he didn’t respond to my comment.

“Can I ask you a question?” I said.

“Sure.”

Danny K studied my face as if wondering where he knew me from. From my resemblance to you, I thought. But I wasn’t going to tell him that. Or maybe he remembered me from that backstage visit years ago.

“What’s your question?”

“I hope this won’t sound strange. But for years I’ve had two heroes. The two K’s. You and K. I’m just wondering if you’ve ever read anything by him.”

He perked up from his seeming slumber. He smiled, shook his head in wonder.

“I can’t believe someone is talking to me about something other than show business.”

“Do you mind?”

“Mind? I’m delighted… Of course I’ve read him.”

“Which is your favorite work?”

“‘The Metamorphosis.’”

I said, “Mine too.”

Now his face lit up. He shifted in his seat as if to drive away the immobility, the almost sculpted freeze position he had had for half an hour. He stood. He was still as tall as I remembered him from years ago.

“Come, let’s sit here on the sofa.”

Now he became animated, the old Danny K. He was plucked out of his somnolence. His chalky complexion vanished. Natural oils overtook his pores. The mask of makeup dissolved. All the other guests stared at us, wondering who was this guy who had pulled Danny K out of his torpor.

“I love that story,” he said. “I’ll tell you something few people know. Once I even proposed to a producer to make a film version in which I would play the lead.”

“A comedy?”

“Yes. Of course.”

“Good.” I wanted to hug him. “No one thinks of that story as a comedy. Everyone considers it a tragedy. But K himself thought of it as a comedy. When he read it aloud to Max Brod and his other friends, they all laughed, including K. Same thing happened when he read selections from the The Castle.”

“Are you a K scholar?”

“Yes. A Danny K scholar.”

He laughed his delightful high-pitched giggle.

“And what happened to your film proposal?”

“What do you think? They turned it down, of course. It wouldn’t make money. I even proposed that for the scene where the three lodgers see Gregor creeping into the room where his sister is playing the violin, I suggested that for that hilarious scene they get the Marx Brothers for a cameo appearance — but it didn’t come to pass.”

“Too bad.”

“That’s Hollywood… I understand you’re all filmmakers here. Why don’t you make it?”

“Well, I do documentaries.”

“Then focus on K.”

“You read my mind. I’m leaving for Prague in less than a month…”