Liberation (52 page)

A couple of nights ago, a man named Philip Chamberlain called me to ask if I would introduce one of the films at the Filmex exhibition. I asked him how much they paid. He said nothing— and then made the tactless mistake of going on to give me a list of all the distinguished people—like Norman Corwin
¹³
and Ray Bradbury!—who were doing it for free. This was supposed to be a rebuke and it made me mad, especially since the invitation was obviously a last-minute need for a substitute and they felt they were scraping the bottom of the barrel. So I told Chamberlain that I thought it was “deeply dishonest” to organize an exhibition and not put aside any money to pay speakers. This shocked him. Don says I did wrong, and I did, I should have just refused. Now I have probably offended all the other organizers, including his cute friend Gary Abrahams. It's just that I hate this type of academic public relations fart.

Today we had lunch with Hunt Stromberg at Universal. He's back from Texas to get “Dr. Frankenstein” on the road, ha ha. When we met, he told us that ABC has announced a Frankenstein film of its own, but this didn't seem to worry Hunt a bit. He says we have a big start on them! To me, he seemed dazed and not with it, like a dope taker. Still, at least he's here and answerable to us.

 

November 11.
The Forces of Hell won by a landslide, which I hope will carry them downhill to disgrace and Nixon's impeachment, during the next four years. There's much talk of the upcoming scandals, which will involve the White House.

Every single person we voted for lost—except that Bugliosi, the Queers' friend, still claims that he will upset Busch when the damaged ballots have been counted.
¹⁴
And the death penalty was reinstated. And the marijuana initiative was defeated.
But
, for our side, the obscenity initiative was thrown out and so was the labor relations initiative,
and
Proposition 20, to protect the coastline, won, contrary to all expectations.

Mark Andrews says that Gavin has now sent him the money. He got the car he wanted to buy but lost the apartment.

Peter Schlesinger came to see us on the 7th, looking seedy and pale. He says that David still makes scenes from time to time and tries to get him back. But he has no intention of going. He won't even live with his Scandinavian boyfriend, says he still loves living alone. Somehow, Peter charmed us less, this time. For one thing, he kept saying about nearly everybody he mentioned, “He's so stupid.” And he seems so languid and cold-blooded and un enthusiastic and sloppy and ungracious. Still—he
is
doing a lot of painting.

On October 10, for the first time, I started recording my weight in my daily diary. Perhaps because I had hit a longtime high, 152 and ¾ pounds. During the month that has followed, my low has been 148. This morning I was 150 and ½.

Hunt now declares that the studio has given him the go-ahead and that he wants to get a director this coming week. Don says this means we get a hack. We're going to try calling John Boorman in Ireland tomorrow, but he never did answer our cable; and now Hunt claims that Boorman's agent here has told him Boorman is no longer interested in the “Frankenstein” project. Jon Voight says languidly that he'll still do “Frankenstein” if he can fit it in, maybe. Meanwhile, he is eager to get us to work on a film with him, says he'll raise the money and we'll be independent of Universal. He wants to do
The Idiot
.

Today we got to page 30 of the rough screenplay of “Lady from the Land of the Dead.” It's sort of fun, as long as you do it in a carefree spirit.

Another refusal of our play, by Ronald Bryden for the Royal Shakespeare Company.
¹⁵
Well at least it was considered “very seriously” by Trevor Nunn
¹⁶
and David Jones,
¹⁷
but they decided they couldn't do it unless they could get Alec McCowen (he's far too old,
we
think) to play Oliver. And he turned it down, choosing to do
The Misanthrope
instead.
¹⁸

 

November 23.
We are having our Thanksgiving dinner with Joe Goode and Mary Agnes. Much to give thanks for: life with Don, work accomplished and good health. We are through the first part of “Lady from the Land of the Dead” in rough, started the second part today. I have very nearly finished the big thick manuscript volume in which I'm reconstructing journals from 1945 to 1952 and maybe onwards. Am now halfway through 1949. Mike Montel, who has a repertory theater in New York, The New Phoenix Repertory Company, is doing
A Meeting by the River
for one or two performances at the beginning of his season on December 18, and we have got Larry Luckinbill and Sam Waterston to play in it again.

Not to give thanks for—that Hunt Stromberg has double-crossed us and signed Jack Smight, a C director, behind our backs, and this will almost certainly mean a C grade cast for the picture. They swear they will shoot in England in February.

Maybe to give thanks for—Pancho Kohner
¹⁹
wants to make a movie out of
A Meeting by the River
, but he doesn't want to pay us for developing a screen treatment. There is also a danger that he may want to direct. He's away right now, so this is in the mulling stage. He's a nice young man, sensitive, intelligent but no humor.

 

December 3.
This morning Hunt called, from Texas—and lo and behold, we are even more completely double-crossed. He is going direct from there to England, sailing from New York on the 10th, and we are
not
asked to join him for the shooting of the film (which will be either in February or March). How he puts it is that the studio won't pay our fares unless we have rewrites to do. Well,
of course
we shall have rewrites to do—indeed, they already exist. But Hunt doesn't want us there rocking the boat.

Our only resource now, it seems, is to make friends hurriedly with Jack Smight and try to influence him to insist on our coming over.

I can't say that I feel a great rage against Hunt. It's as if a snake bit you. You know that you shouldn't handle such creatures without precautions.

We have set our trip to New York for the 11th, hoping to have finished the rough draft screenplay of “Lady from the Land of the Dead” by then. I doubt if we shall have quite, but it should be near enough. We have kept up a quite commendable record of five pages a day—and all this in the mornings only, with often a run to the beach or a visit to the gym also fitted in before lunch! We've been fairly good about getting up at seven.

Don has been adorable beyond all words, lately. I can honestly say that the passages in our life together which are like the one we've just been living through represent my idea of “the earthly paradise.”

Am delighted that he has at last got the official invitation to have a show at the Municipal Art Gallery, from July 10 to August 5. This will be his biggest—and he will have, for the first time, a proper illustrated catalogue!

 

December 8.
We did finish our rough draft of the “Lady” screen-play—on the 5th. It is terribly slapdash, but we won't look at it until we return from New York. This may be on the 20th—or later, if we decide to spend Christmas there. We definitely don't want to go to Bill Brown and Paul Wonner in New Hampshire, even if they ask us. (It looks like they aren't going to, for Bill called Don just now and didn't mention it. They are in New York at the moment and want to meet us there.)

Pleasant excitement over the prospect of working on the play. Unpleasant travel jitters. However, we have found an apparently trustworthy (and cute) house sitter named Charles Hill. He's an artist, a friend of Billy Al Bengston. He will stay here with his girlfriend. Michael Montel has called again from New York, friendly and pleased that we are coming. Gordon Hoban has gone over there to play Tom, and Larry Luckinbill's wife, Robin Strasser, will play Penelope and Jacqueline Brookes the mother. Rafferty = Steve Macht. Swamis = Barton Heyman, Tony Manionis and Charles Turner. They are short of one actor, so Rafferty
²⁰
will have to take his own photographs.

On December 5, we met Jack Smight at Universal. We both liked him and doubtless he is competent, but Don feels sure he has no talent. However he is more than ready to be our ally and said at once that
of course
we must come to England and work with him there on the script. He called Hunt about this, while we were in his office, and Hunt agreed—
if
Universal would agree. I still suspect he may manage to find some out. He says he'll let us know definitely by the end of this month, after he gets to England. They still plan to shoot in either February or March. It is definitely to be a T.V. picture and apparently they are going to cut it up into lengths and serve it to the viewers two or three nights in a row!

The day before yesterday we saw Swami. He was in a strange mood—that's to say, he seemed
other
than himself. We were talking about the fragmentary poem by Vivekananda, scribbled on a piece of notepaper while in the United States. There is one line about age having “no hold,” and Swami said, “I can tell you this from my own experience—I have seen that there was
no difference
in ages between Thakur and Holy Mother and Maharaj and Swamiji.” What was strange wasn't just the absolute authority with which he said this but also the look in his eyes. He was looking at me as he said it, fixing me with his look, and yet I felt he wasn't seeing me. He looked
inseeing
, withdrawn, closed. I thought, as I have so many times, that his look was like a rock face; it inspired awe. And then, a few moments later, he was himself again and full of such sweetness. He asked Don why he wasn't sitting on a cushion and he looked at him really lovingly. And later, when Don was helping him on with his shoes, he placed his hand on Don's head, obviously blessing him. Don was well aware of all this; he spoke of it later.

I must repeat it again, I have been so happy with Don lately. Even my rides with him in the car, which I used to hate, are snug now. He drives more recklessly than ever—everyone who rides with us notices it and gets nervous—but I lie down on the back seat, with a pillow under my head, wrapped in a blanket, and we have long intimate talks, punctuated only occasionally by a terrific jerk as he stands on the brake, having just avoided a smash! And the wonderful intimacy of sitting with him in the movies and feeling his closeness. And the joy of waking with him in the basket—the painful but joyful tenderness—painful only because I am always so aware that it can't last forever or even for very long, Kitty and Old Drub will have to say goodbye.

I still try to keep up my midday sits, but wow what resistance! The Opposition is bent on making me forget to do them, and often I do forget, or only remember hours later. What
do
I think about, moon about, worry about, when I'm not thinking of God? Plenty, apparently.

 

December 22.
We got home the day before yesterday. The plane was crowded and two noisy parent-indulged moppets were sitting near us. However they had their function, as far as we were concerned; they made us so nervous that we started working on “Dr. Frankenstein” to distract ourselves. Don wrote and I dictated dialogue, my voice getting louder to drown out the screaming until I was giving a performance which must have been audible to all our immediate neighbors. (No one complained either of the children or of us; most of them were elderly, so perhaps they were also deaf.) By the end of the flight, we had roughly reconstructed the entire Prima-Elizabeth-Fanshawe sequence, insofar as it needed reconstructing. This was all the more satisfactory because we hadn't done one lick of work on it all the time we were in New York.

Charles Hill met us at the airport and drove us home. He and his girlfriend Paula Sweet appear to be the ideal house sitters; the place was spotless and they enjoyed their stay, into the bargain. (However, in justice to former house sitters, I must add that they are the only ones we have paid for being in the house. When I suggested this to Charles, before we left, he asked for twenty-five dollars.)

Yesterday, Jim Charlton called; he has just arrived from Honolulu on a short visit. I had to go the UCLA library so I took him along. He looks suddenly very much older—or rather, his youthfulness looks far more damaged; he is still incredibly young-looking for a fifty-some-year-old. He was more affectionate than usual; he seemed really glad to see me and anxious to show me that he was. I was happy to see him, as always, but this is a most awkward time for visitors. There's so much to do.

Jim struck me as being perhaps a bit less lonely than when I last saw him. His work is going well and he has a capable assistant. He still lives alone but there are lots of boys around; he says he falls in love about three times a year and that he usually falls in love with a boy only after the boy has left him and gone off to some other place. He also has a lot of friends. Does he really want anything more than this? I doubt it. He wants to wander. He wants to be the stray boy who finds shelter with a succession of families or individuals but stays nowhere long. He told me he has no intention of visiting Hilde at Christmas time [. . .]. Jim is still stingy. But why shouldn't he be, as far as [she] is concerned?

I was going to the UCLA library because I wanted to look up an article on Gore Vidal written by a man named Gerald Clarke, who has been told by
Esquire
to interview me. I want to find out if he's a bitch or not, before I say yes. I couldn't discover the article, because I was looking too far back in the files. But Jim found a copy of a book he's been hunting for for years, an anthology complied by Dashiell Hammett,
Creeps by Night
, containing a story called “The Red Brain.”
²¹