A Touch of Stardust (26 page)

Julie said nothing for a moment, gazing at her idol. Marion’s dark hair was pulled back into a businesslike bun, with streaks of gray at the temples. Her hands, in this light, looked more heavily veined than Julie had noticed before, and sprinkled with dark spots. What her mother called liver spots, Julie remembered with
a jolt of surprise. She thought of Frances Marion as ageless, but she wasn’t.

“You were with Andy Weinstein at the Mankiewicz party, as I recall. Any news about his grandparents?” Marion asked unexpectedly, leaning back in her swivel chair, hands pressed together under her chin.

“They were arrested; that’s all I know,” Julie answered, feeling awkward. If he had heard more, he had not told her.

“Put in a camp, probably. I was in Berlin last year,” Marion said. “Swastikas everywhere. Lots of strutting soldiers with guard dogs. We should be doing movies about that, but nobody—not L. B. Mayer or the Breen Office—wants to offend Hitler. Mank wrote a good script about Hitler in ’33, which pretty much decided its fate. Breen’s censors killed it.”

“Why?” Julie was sure she was asking a stupid question, but Marion answered soberly.

“We make too much money over there. Forty percent of our revenue comes from foreign markets.”

“What do you think is going to happen?”

“Eventually, war. The Nazis aren’t going away. I have two sons.…” Her voice trailed off for a moment before she pulled herself upright into a more professional posture. “We’ll take care of all the details,” she said briskly. “Your job will be to sit in on story conferences and work with other writers and producers to develop various scenarios. Whatever Abe decrees. No credits are promised, and all rights fall to the studio.”

“And I get three hundred dollars?”

“Julie, you get three hundred dollars
a week
. This
is
Hollywood.”

Julie gasped. “Oh my goodness, I can’t believe it.” She could save, maybe even save up to buy a car.

“It’s almost like play money out here, you know. That’s what draws writers like Scott Fitzgerald. He gets twelve hundred a week.”

“Miss Marion, what happens to my screenplay?”

“Just call me Frances, will you?” She smiled. “Miss Marion has
a thing for Robin Hood, and I don’t have a thing for Errol Flynn.” She made such an unexpectedly comic face, Julie laughed.

“That’s the girl,” she said approvingly. “Tuck your screenplay away in a drawer, but don’t throw away the key.”

“Okay.” Julie drew a deep breath; it was still hard to say goodbye to her labors. “Can I ask—does my story really need a corpse rouger?”

This time Frances Marion laughed—a hearty laugh. And when they were both laughing, Julie began to feel that something good might actually be happening. At least for six weeks.

“Three hundred dollars
a week
?” Rose screeched the words. “Julie, that’s incredible, I’m so happy for you!”

Julie had come in to the mimeograph room at Selznick International in search of her friend, who was working her last day, and Rose, bless her, actually jumped up and down as Julie gave her the news. It made Julie a little dizzy to watch her. The throbbing in her head had definitely not gone away. The room was encased in glass to save the rest of the office from the sound of the rattling machines, but Julie could see a few curious glances thrown in their direction—including one from the always inquisitive Doris.

“When do you start?”

“Not until next Monday. I haven’t the slightest idea what they’ll have me doing.”

“Have you told Carole?”

“She’s the first person I called.” The whoop over the phone had been such a pleasure to hear. “She told me not to forget to laugh.”

“Does Andy know?”

“I haven’t seen him,” Julie said.

They stared at each other.

“I think he might be happy for you,” Rose ventured.

Her coaxing was having an effect; why shouldn’t she seek Andy out and tell him her news?

“They’re viewing rushes today. Maybe—”

“—I could take a stroll over to the screening room?” Julie smiled at her friend. “Well, maybe I might.”

“If you don’t, you can mimeograph this big stack of releases,” Rose said jokingly, gesturing to a basket full of paper, making a face. “No, I didn’t think you wanted to do that.”

A slight breeze was blowing, just enough to make Julie glad she could button up Carole’s green jacket, which was indeed quite damp now under the arms. The path to the screening room was deserted, for which she was grateful. It gave her time to think.

It was all very well to get congratulated on landing a writing job at MGM, but the job didn’t feel any more substantive than a cone of spun sugar. What was she supposed to do? She thought of Andy’s story about Mayer’s stable of writers, wondering if that was what lay ahead for her. Irritated by her own nervousness, she straightened her shoulders as she walked. For six weeks, she had a real job. Hard though it was to admit this, it had stung a little when Vivien Leigh called her “Lombard’s girl.”

Julie made her way to a graceful street, a street straight from the old Atlanta of the Civil War. No one was around—no technicians in overalls, no extras smoking cigarettes, no directors, camera crews—it was empty. Tempted, she decided to walk through it.

To her left was the façade of a redbrick building, with a large, bold sign nailed to the wall that read
ATLANTA EXAMINER
. And just ahead was the railroad-depot set, designed—at Selznick’s insistence—as an exact replica of the actual train-car shed destroyed by Sherman in the Civil War. Up on the hill behind it was the Tara mansion. And there was the white-columned church that soon came to be a hospital for the sick and wounded soldiers. The wind whispered around the corners of the façades; here and there, a door flapped back and forth, exposing the sturdy plywood structures holding them up from behind.

What would happen to all this? Would it be left to burn in some future cataclysmic fire ordered by some future powerful producer? And what would rise from those ashes? Julie smiled to herself with a certain ruefulness. She was writing melodrama in her mind—at least, some kind of script.

She was reaching the end of the street. Ahead was the present—the projection building, a solid, sealed edifice that had no windows. It was totally without magic from this view, but, with luck, there was magic shaping up inside.

The screening room, with its dark, fabric-covered walls and comfortable seats of thickly padded tan wool, was supposed to be a more relaxed place than most of the sets of
Gone with the Wind
. Andy, back when he was introducing her to the culture of the movies, described the screening room as a place where tempers could cool, anxieties abate, credit be given. All, of course, if the rushes were good. If they weren’t, the tensions heightened.

She remembered the wry twist of his mouth as he chuckled. “But you get at least the illusion of progress.”

There was a different kind of atmosphere here today; Julie felt it the minute she walked into the screening room. The curtains onstage were open, but the screen was blank. They hadn’t started yet. The place was filled with people moving back and forth, restlessly connecting, talking in low tones. The smoke from their cigars and cigarettes was so thick, it was a wonder they could see each other. This was where a pimple on Scarlett’s cheek or a drooping chin line on the aging Ashley Wilkes would be discussed for half an hour; where technicians would decide if some scratched footage could be repaired; and where the cinematographer could enjoy quiet satisfaction when a particularly good shot drew approving comments from his colleagues.

Julie had been here only a few times, enough to know that the gravitational center of the room was usually the frowning, exhorting
David Selznick. Not today. Everything seemed focused on a short, squat little man in the back, puffing on a cigar, talking to a frazzled-looking Victor Fleming in a voice that screeched like a rusted bedspring.

“I want a happy ending,” he sputtered loudly, “and I’m not settling for anything else. People going to the movies want a love story that ends good, hear me? And no more of those scenes like Cukor going on forever with Melanie eating the chicken leg—this is a big story and it’s gotta end like a big story!”

This could only be one person. Julie hadn’t seen him before, but knew immediately it was Louis B. Mayer, Selznick’s father-in-law. The powerful L.B., head of MGM, who once sold scrap metal, often referred to in lowered, tense voices—and, in fact, Julie’s new employer.

The rumor was, Mayer couldn’t read very well. He hired women readers to outline for him the plots of books that he considered buying. And, as Andy had told her, the bargain Selznick struck with Mayer to get Clark from MGM was to give Mayer a big share of the film’s profits. How strange to look at this legendary man radiating power and think of him as the father of the cool woman she had chatted with at the Mankiewicz dinner. A wealthy father who wouldn’t let his daughter go to college? Her parents would scorn him.

“Julie.”

She turned around, her heart thumping. And there he was, looking much the same as he had the evening when she first met him standing so casually against Selznick’s tower. She could see it all again: his hands, his steady, amused gaze—taking in the plight of a scared messenger about to lose her job. Andy, you need another haircut, she wanted to say. But she wanted to say it while lifting a hand to push the hair away from his face, her lips close to his.

“How are you?” she asked. With a great effort of will, she stopped herself from moving closer.

“Good. And you?”

He seemed as uncertain as she was.

“I’m fine.”

“I didn’t expect to see you here.”

She took a step forward. “I’ve got some wonderful news—”

A familiar voice cut through the room, knife-sharp. It was Selznick, his face flushed, arguing with Mayer. “I won’t allow a stupid ending pasted on this picture; it isn’t going to happen. We’re getting close to wrapping this, and I’m not fucking it up.”

Mayer’s face turned purple. “The public wants these two to end up in each other’s arms, do you hear me?
And so do I
.”

“Shit,” Andy said quickly to Julie. He nodded to the back row of seats. “Get a seat, hurry. Save one.” With that, he moved swiftly to the two titans of industry glaring at each other, past an apoplectic Fleming. Andy put an arm casually on Selznick’s shoulder. He leaned close, murmured in his ear, smiled at Mayer, and tossed off something casual. A joke? Mayer didn’t exactly smile, but his response sounded a little like a grumbled laugh.

The jittery atmosphere of the room began to ease. The men started drifting to their seats. Julie sat down; after a few more words with Selznick, Andy strolled back, all smiles, and settled into the seat next to her.

“How do you stay so calm?” she asked, knowing better.

“It’s part of my job.” His lips twisted in a cheerless smile.

The lights in the room were dimming as the film editor signaled the projection room. And then, large, startlingly vivid, the face of a steely-eyed Rhett confronting Scarlett appeared on the screen. It took Julie a moment to orient herself to which scene it was. None of the rushes were in sequence, of course, because nothing had been filmed in sequence, which drove the actors to distraction. Vivien Leigh had garnered much sympathy a few weeks ago when she lamented, “We’re handed scraps of paper, scenes that don’t connect; how does an actress know where she is in the story?”