A Touch of Stardust (36 page)

“Still pretending you know how to cook?” he said, giving the back of her neck a quick kiss.

“Please, one thing at a time. Next week I’ll try boiling eggs.”

He smiled, but he wasn’t quite up for their usual banter. He looked tired—worn, really. He was nursing along a single bourbon and water to please her, she knew. The pace of filming
Gone with the Wind
was always frantic, but it was getting worse and worse as they approached the last scenes. The NAACP had won the fight weeks ago to get the word “nigger” out of the movie, and the United Daughters of the Confederacy wanted the scene where Scarlett slaps Prissy taken out—because no well-bred Southern lady would do such a thing.

“They lose,” Andy said, suppressing a yawn. “I was afraid the Breen Office’s ruling against the word ‘damn’ was going to hold, but David hauled out the Oxford Dictionary and convinced those damn—okay, laugh—censors that it wasn’t an oath, it wasn’t a bad, bad word, it was a
vulgarism
. That’s this week’s triumph.”

“It’s a good one.” Julie wiped her hands on a towel. The potatoes were in the oven with the roast; now all she had to do was remember when to take everything out.

“We’ll never get rid of the censors.” He paced back and forth. “And here we are, ready to shoot the final scene of the movie, and still nobody knows what the script is until everybody is on the set and ready to go. And Mayer is going to screw up everything if he doesn’t stop fighting for a happy ending. He’s driving Selznick crazy.”

“So what’s going to happen?” she asked.

“He’ll shoot something that hints at a reconciliation between Scarlett and Rhett, but nothing more than that. Christ, Selznick was rewriting the shoot for tomorrow a couple of hours ago. Right now, it ends with Scarlett imploring Mammy to tell her how to get Rhett back, and Mammy comforts her and says he will return. Fade-out, with lots of hope and music.”

Andy leaned against the kitchen door and closed his eyes. “Julie, I’m beyond tired,” he said slowly. “I love my work—I feel excited when it all comes together, when something special comes out of the whole messy process. But what good is it? We pump out movies on anything and everything. Here we are, doing a romance set in the Civil War, but we aren’t doing anything about Hitler.”

“I ran an idea by Goldman, but he was almost horrified at the suggestion,” Julie said.

“They’re all scared.” Andy strode into the living room, picked up a copy of the evening
Herald Express
, and threw it on the counter. “The Nazis taking Czechoslovakia was only the beginning; they aren’t going to stop there. There’s no holding them back. That ship with all those Jewish refugees? What do you think happened to them when they were refused asylum and sent back to Europe? We’re cowards in this business. All people here want to do is read the entertainment rags. They avoid the real news even when it’s in the headlines. In four-inch type.”

“Not everybody is callous and indifferent,” Julie said quickly. “I think at least some people feel it crowding in now. Frances Marion is worried about war. She has sons.”

“If we go to war—” Andy stopped and looked at her tenderly. “Julie, we will, you know.”

Julie felt a chill travel down her spine. “What would you do?” she asked.

“Just what you would expect.”

She turned toward him and briefly rested her head on the shoulder of his jacket, instinctively wanting to hold him tight, against his will.
No
.

He gently pulled away. “Look, we’re both down in the dumps. And in case I haven’t said it clearly enough, your idea for salvaging that bomb of a movie is brilliant—something will work. If you want to be a writer, you will be.”

He was trying to refocus, same as she was. “Thanks for the confidence,” she said.

“And I’ll do anything I can to help you.”

She kissed him swiftly on the cheek, touched. He knew that she wanted to make her own way, that it wouldn’t mean the same if he got her a spot as a script girl on this movie or any other. There were many variations of making it in this town. She had chosen the right route for herself.

“Would you like to come watch the final shoot tomorrow?” he asked, breaking into her thoughts. “Not counting retakes, of course. It’s going to be a big day.”

“With Selznick still rewriting the ending?”

Andy managed a laugh. “Okay, here it is.” He cleared his throat. “ ‘Oh, Mammy, he’s gone again. How’ll I ever get him back?’ ”

“And Mammy replies—”

“I’m no actor, so, with apologies to Hattie McDaniel, here’s the last version I saw this afternoon.” Andy cleared his throat again. “ ‘He’ll come back. Didn’t I say de last time? He’ll do it again. Ah knows. Ah always does.’ ”

“It’s a comforting ending,” Julie said. She frowned, thinking of the book. “But not an honest one.”

“Bingo.” Andy lifted his bourbon and drank.

“You think it will be different in the morning?”

“I guarantee it. Vivien and Clark will be reading their final lines for the first time.”

The next morning, the soundstage, vast as it was, felt almost crowded to Julie. People were trickling in, slowly at first, then faster—Selznick employees who could manage to sneak away from their jobs, a loyal cadre of David Selznick’s friends—and by nine o’clock it looked like a gathering at a Hollywood party. With, of course, many reporters. Julie spied Louella Parsons standing under one of the huge studio lights, nodding graciously, flashing her hard smile. One after another, those who lived or died on what she wrote offered homage. It gave Julie the shivers—all those false, bright faces.

“Dear Louella, she should’ve been born into royalty,” said a familiar throaty voice. “Got herself positioned perfectly for attention, don’t you think?”

Julie spun around. “Carole,” she said delightedly. “You mean you aren’t going over to genuflect?”

“Not me, honey.” Carole tossed back her blond hair and beckoned Julie into the seat next to hers. “Glad you came. I usually get bored on the fifth take or so, but Clark wanted me here today.” She surveyed the scene around them thoughtfully. “Look at all these jumpy, scared people. If it’s a disaster, they’re finished, of course. Kind of our town’s version of the old-fashioned human sacrifices of the Incas or whoever they were.” She glanced down at a copy of the morning
Examiner
someone had left on a chair and paused. “Nothing
makes what I just said sound more like pure horseshit than a picture like that,” she said, pointing.

Julie looked down. A large photo, above the fold, of a line of people with hungry, haunted faces—Czech Jews, the caption said, being pushed from their homes by the Nazis. One figure, a woman, holding a child in her arms, stared straight at the camera. Not imploring, not pleading.

“Look at her expression,” Carole said. “What do you see?”

Julie stared at the photo. “Nothing,” she said. “Her face is blank.”

“Yeah. That’s what giving up looks like.” Carole sighed and passed Julie her cup of coffee. “Take a sip while it’s hot, honey. This place is cold as a witch’s tit. How are your parents?”

“Resigned, pretty much,” Julie said, gratefully taking a swallow before handing it back. “My mother keeps talking about Rhett Butler.”

“Did you tell them about your idea for a script?”

“No, they wouldn’t understand that at all.”

Carole cradled the cup. “They will when it works,” she said. “No word from Marion yet?”

“No.” Even with Carole, she felt anxious talking about it.

“Remember, you’ve still got a backup job with me. Maybe even with a raise—though, hell, not to three hundred bucks a week.”

The noise around them was intensifying. It was more than a buzz; there was shouting.

“That’s what Clark was afraid of,” Carole said, lowering her voice. “L.B. is making his last stand.”

Louis B. Mayer, portly, his face an unhealthy purple, stood under the lights on a raised platform, shouting at Selznick. Like a wave retreating, actors, assistants, and gaffers all stepped back. Only Louella held her ground, her face as alert and sly as that of a ferret. Julie could imagine her burbling in tomorrow’s column: Dear, dear, a last-minute fracas, such a pity, heads toppling … Along that line.

Julie’s eyes searched for Andy. There he was, in the middle of it, not shouting, speaking calmly to Selznick, soothing Mayer, looking totally in command of himself—perhaps the only one on the set who did. Mayer began to calm down. Whatever bargaining was going on between the two men was not audible from where she and Carole sat.

Finally, Selznick walked over to Clark and Vivien, who both stood stiffly, in full costume, as if waiting for some kind of execution. He handed them each several sheets of paper. Clark let out a disapproving snort.

“I told Pa not to bother memorizing his lines last night,” Carole said. “Here we go, a new final scene. Save these seats. I’m going to get more coffee.”

For another twenty minutes, the crowd waiting for the finale of filming what people were calling the most trouble-plagued movie in history clustered in groups, talking among themselves, sneaking glances at Clark and Vivien rehearsing over in a corner.

Carole came back with two coffees and a cheery report. “Ran into Andy,” she said. “He said all has been forgiven, and they’re about ready to go.”

As she spoke, Selznick lifted his bullhorn and demanded quiet. An almost instant stillness fell over all the onlookers in the huge sound studio.

Selznick turned and faced the crowd. His voice was solemn and commanding. “Ladies and gentlemen, I want to point out to all of you that you are about to see us shoot what will be in the near future a historic scene in a historic movie.” He paused, looking around. No one could say he didn’t know how to frame this speech. He had risked his own health and many thousands of dollars to make this movie, and he wanted the world to know it. “We are going to make movie history!” he shouted. “This will be one of the greatest films ever made!” He whipped around and pointed at Clark and Vivien. “Are you ready?” he demanded.

The pair nodded almost simultaneously. Both were dressed in somber black, Vivien with a single ivory brooch at her throat.

The lights on the set turned low. The cameras moved forward, focused on the set of Rhett and Scarlett’s home. As Julie watched, the two actors took their places.

The grand house broods, dark and filled with sorrow. Rhett is packing a valise in his office
.

“What are you doing?” Scarlett says. She looks at him, frightened
.

“I’m leaving you, my dear. I’ve tried. If you’d only met me halfway—all you need now is a divorce and your dreams of Ashley can come true.”

“Oh no!” she cries. “No, you’re wrong, terribly wrong! I don’t want a divorce. I love you!”

Clark’s voice resonates, imbuing Rhett with the strength of finality. “That’s your misfortune,” he says, heading for the door
.

“Oh, Rhett! Rhett!” She follows him. “If you go, where shall I go, what shall I do?”

Rhett opens the door to a swirling fog outside, then turns back to her, speaking sadly but with full purpose
.

“Frankly, my dear, I don’t give a damn.”

He walks away, disappearing into the fog
.