Prater Violet Read online

  “On the contrary. It’s probably just beginning.”

  “But I mean, the fighting has stopped. And his family’s safe. What more does he want?”

  “Look here, Ashmeade,” I said. “It’s no use our talking about this. You couldn’t possibly understand.… You want the picture finished. I see that. Just be patient, a little. He’ll come round.”

  “I hope you’re right,” Ashmeade gave me a playfully wry smile. “It’s costing the studio a lot of money.”

  “He’ll come round,” I repeated, confidently. “You’ll see. I’m sure it’s going to be all right.”

  But I wasn’t sure. I wasn’t even hopeful. And Ashmeade knew it.

  * * *

  I DON’T KNOW exactly how the whole thing started. Two days later, I overheard Joyce saying something to Clark about Eddie Kennedy. It would have made no impression on me if they hadn’t stopped talking and looked guilty and slightly gleeful as I came up.

  Several times that morning, I heard Kennedy’s name. Fred Murray said it. Roger was mentioning it in a conversation with Timmy. Prince Rudolf was murmuring it to Count Rosanoff, as they waited to rehearse a scene. They glanced toward Bergmann, and their faces betrayed a discreet satisfaction.

  Then, while we were in the sound booth together, Roger said to me, “I suppose you’ve heard? Eddie Kennedy looked at our rushes this morning.”

  For the moment, I didn’t understand what he meant.

  “That’s funny,” I said. “I was in the projection room myself. I didn’t see him.”

  Roger smiled. “Of course you didn’t. He saw them later. After you and Bergmann had gone.”

  “I wonder why?”

  Roger gave me a glance, as though he thought I might be acting innocent. “There’s only one explanation, Chris. Figure it out for yourself.”

  “You mean—they’re going to put him on this picture?”

  “I don’t see what else it can mean.”

  “Gosh…”

  “Do you think Bergmann knows?” Roger asked.

  I shook my head. “He’d have told me.”

  “For Christ’s sake, Chris, don’t tell him I told you this.”

  “Do you suppose I want to talk about it?”

  “I’m sorry for Bergmann,” said Roger, thoughtfully. “He’s had bad luck here. I don’t care if he does sound off sometimes. He’s a decent old bird.… I wish this didn’t have to happen. Besides, Eddie could no more direct this picture than a drunken cow.”

  My one cowardly idea was: Bergmann has got to hear this from somebody else, and not when I’m around. At lunchtime, I tried to sneak away; but he was watching for me. “Come,” he said, “we shall eat at the hotel.” This was exactly what I had feared.

  Sure enough, Kennedy was there, sitting with Ashmeade. They were deep in conversation. Kennedy seemed to be outlining some plan. He had arranged his knife, fork and spoon in a square, and was demonstrating something with the pepper-pot. Neither of them took any notice of us; but, as we passed, Ashmeade looked at Kennedy and laughed an intimate, flattering laugh. Several of the other Bulldog directors and executives regarded us curiously. I could feel their eyes following our backs.

  During the meal, Bergmann was thoughtful and moody. We scarcely spoke. I had to force myself to eat. I felt as if I were going to vomit. Should I tell him? No, I couldn’t. I waited for something to happen.

  We had nearly finished when Patterson, the journalist, came in.

  He greeted everybody, stopping at each group for a joke and a word or two; but I knew instinctively that he was making for our table. His face was beaming, it seemed to me, with the malice of the stupid man who thinks he is going to score a point.

  “Well, well, Mr. Bergmann,” he began, sitting down without being invited. “What’s all this I hear? Is it really true?”

  “Is what true?” Bergmann looked at him with distaste.

  “About the picture. You’re really dropping it?”

  “Dropping?”

  “Retiring. Giving it up.”

  For a moment, it seemed that Bergmann still didn’t understand him. Then he jerked out, “Who told you this?”

  “Oh, well, you know,” Patterson looked maliciously coy, “these things get about.” He watched Bergmann’s face inquisitively. Then he turned to me, with a most unconvincing display of anxiety. “I say, I hope I haven’t put my foot in it?”

  “I never pay much attention to studio gossip,” I said incautiously, in the agony of my embarrassment.

  Bergmann turned on me, quite savagely. “You heard this, too?”

  “There must be some mistake, of course,” Patterson was now openly malicious, “if you know nothing about it, Mr. Bergmann.… It’s a funny thing, though. I got this from pretty high up. It certainly sounded authentic. Eddie Kennedy was mentioned.…”

  “Oh, if that’s all it was…” (I was desperately trying to give Bergmann a chance of pretending he knew this already.) “it’s quite easily explained. Just because he saw our rushes this morning … You know how these things are misrepresented.…”

  But Bergmann was beyond all diplomacy.

  “Kennedy saw the rushes? And I knew nothing about it! Nothing! I wasn’t told!” He swung round upon me, again. “You knew this all the time? You were in this conspiracy against me?”

  “I—I didn’t think it was important.…”

  “Not important! Oh, no! If I am betrayed and tricked and lied to, it is not in the least important! If my only friend joins the enemy, it is not important!” Suddenly, he turned back to Patterson. “Who told you this?”

  “Well, really, Mr. Bergmann—I’m not at liberty to say.”

  “Of course you are not at liberty to say! These people are your paymasters! Very good: I will tell you who it was. Ashmeade!”

  Patterson tried to look inscrutable. He didn’t succeed.

  “It was Ashmeade!” cried Bergmann, triumphantly. “I knew it!” He spoke so loud that the people at the next table stared at us. “I shall confront him immediately with this impudent lie!”

  He jumped to his feet.

  “Friedrich!” I grabbed his arm. “Wait. Not now.”

  My tone must have been commanding in its desperation, for Bergmann hesitated.

  “We’ll talk to him at the studio,” I continued. “It’ll be better. Let’s think this over first.”

  Bergmann nodded and sat down again.

  “Very well, we shall deal with him later,” he agreed, breathing hard. “First, we must see his master. At once. After lunch.”

  “All right.” My one idea was to pacify him. “After lunch.”

  “I’m afraid I’ve been the bearer of evil tidings,” said Patterson, with a smirk. At that moment, I really hated him.

  “Look here,” I said, “you aren’t going to print any of this?”

  “Well…” Patterson became cagey, at once. “I’ll have to get it confirmed, naturally.… If Mr. Bergmann would care to make a statement.…”

  “He wouldn’t,” I interrupted, firmly.

  “I shall make a statement,” said Bergman. “Undoubtedly I shall make a statement. This is nothing secret. Let the whole world know of this betrayal. I shall write to every newspaper. I shall reveal how a foreign director, a guest in this country, is betrayed. I regard this as a clear stab in the back. It is discrimination. It is persecution. I shall bring an action for damages.”

  “I’m quite sure,” I told Patterson, “that everything will be explained satisfactorily. You’ll know by this evening.”

  Bergmann merely snorted.

  “Well,” said Patterson, with his teasing smile, “I hope so, I’m sure.… Good-bye, Mr. Bergmann.” He left us, delightedly. We saw him go straight over to Ashmeade’s table.

  “That dirty spy,” Bergmann hissed. “Now he makes his report.”

  When we went out of the dining room, a few minutes later, Patterson, Ashmeade and Kennedy were still sitting together. I took Bergmann’s arm, resolved, if necessar
y, to prevent him from speaking to them by force. But he contented himself with saying, very loudly, as we passed, “Judas Iscariot is in council with the High Priests.”

  Neither Ashmeade nor Patterson looked at us, but Kennedy grinned pleasantly, and called, “Hi, Bergmann. How’s everything?”

  Bergmann didn’t answer.

  I had hoped that the taxi ride would have given him time to cool down. But it didn’t. As soon as we were back at our office in the studio, he told Dorothy, “Call Mr. Chatsworth, and say I demand to see him immediately.”

  Dorothy picked up the telephone. She was informed that Chatsworth was still out at lunch. Bergmann grunted dangerously.

  Eliot came in.

  “All ready to rehearse the restaurant scene, sir.”

  Bergmann glared at him. “There will be no shooting today.”

  “No shooting?” Eliot echoed, stupidly.

  “You heard what I said.”

  “But, Mr. Bergmann, we’re behind schedule already, and…”

  “There will be no shooting today!” Bergmann shouted at him. “Is that clear?”

  Eliot crumpled. “What time shall I make the call for tomorrow?” he ventured to ask, at length.

  “I don’t know and I don’t care!”

  I signaled to Eliot with my eyes to leave us alone. He went out, with a deep sigh.

  “Call Chatsworth again,” Bergmann ordered.

  But Chatsworth was still out. Half an hour later he had returned and gone immediately into conference. An hour later, he was still busy.

  “Very well,” said Bergmann. “We also can play at this game of rat and mouse. Come, we go home. I shall not return here. Chatsworth shall come to see me, and I shall be too busy. Tell him that.”

  He struggled furiously into his overcoat. The telephone rang.

  “Mr. Chatsworth will see you now,” Dorothy reported.

  I gasped with relief. Bergmann scowled. He seemed disappointed.

  “Come,” he said to me.

  In Chatsworth’s outer office, as ill-luck would have it, there was another delay. This gave Bergmann’s temper time to reach boiling point again. He began to mutter to himself. At the end of five minutes, he said, “Enough of this farce. Come. We go.”

  “Couldn’t you…” I appealed desperately to the girl at the desk, “couldn’t you tell him it’s urgent?”

  The girl looked embarrassed. “Mr. Chatsworth particularly told me not to disturb him. He’s on the line to Paris,” she said.

  “Enough!” cried Bergmann. “We go!”

  “Friedrich! Please wait another minute!”

  “You desert me? Splendid! I go alone.”

  “Oh, very well…” I rose unwillingly to my feet.

  The inner door opened. It was Ashmeade, grinning all over his face. “Won’t you come in, please?” he said.

  Bergmann didn’t even glance at him. With a fearful snort, like a bull entering the ring, he strode into the room, head lowered. Chatsworth was lolling at his desk, cigar in hand. He flourished it toward the chairs.

  “Take a pew, gentlemen!”

  But Bergmann didn’t sit down. “First,” he nearly shouted, “I demand absolutely that this Fouché, this spy, shall leave the room!”

  Ashmeade kept on smiling, but I could see that he was disconcerted. Chatsworth looked squarely at Bergmann from behind his thick spectacles.

  “Don’t be silly,” he said, good-humoredly. “Nobody’s going to leave any rooms. If you’ve got something to say, say it. This is as much Sandy’s business as mine.”

  Bergmann growled, “So you protect him?”

  “Certainly,” Chatsworth was quite unruffled. “I protect all my subordinates. Until they’re sacked. And I do the sacking.”

  “You will not sack me!” Bergmann yelled. “I do not give you that pleasure. I resign!”

  “You do, eh? Well, my directors are always resigning. All except the lousy ones, worse luck.”

  “Such as Mr. Kennedy, for example?”

  “Eddie? Oh, he walks out on every picture. He’s great.”

  “You make fun of me!”

  “Sorry, old boy. You’re being pretty funny yourself, you know.”

  Bergmann was so angry he couldn’t answer. He turned on his heel and made for the door. I stood undecided, watching him.

  “Listen,” said Chatsworth, with such authority that Bergmann stopped.

  “I shall not listen. Not to your insults.”

  “Nobody’s going to insult you. Sit down.”

  To my amazement, Bergmann did so. My opinion of Chatsworth was rising every moment.

  “Listen to me…” Chatsworth punctuated his sentences with puffs at his cigar. “You walk off the picture. You break your contract. All right. You know what you’re doing, I suppose. That’s your affair, and the Legal Department’s. But meanwhile, somebody has to shoot this God-damned movie.…”

  “I am not interested!” Bergmann interrupted. “The picture means nothing to me any more. This is a case of abstract justice.…”

  “Somebody,” Chatsworth continued, imperturbably, “has to shoot this picture. And I have to see that it’s shot.…”

  “My work is spied upon. Behind my back, the rushes are shown to this ignorant cretin.…”

  “Let’s get this straight,” said Chatsworth. “Eddie was shown the rushes by Sandy, quite unofficially, because Sandy was worried about the way the picture was going. He wanted an outside opinion. I knew nothing about it. As a matter of fact, Sandy was taking a risk. He was breaking a studio rule. I might have been very angry with him. But, under the circumstances, I think he did perfectly right.… I know you’ve been under the weather lately. I know your wife and daughter were in Vienna during this little spot of bother, and I’m damn sorry. That’s why I’ve kept quiet as long as I have. But I can’t throw away the studio’s money because of your private sorrows, or mine, or anybody else’s.…”

  “And so you invite this analphabet to take my place?”

  “I hadn’t got as far as thinking of anybody taking your place. I didn’t know you were going to walk out on us.”

  “And now you set this Kennedy to work, who will carefully annihilate every fragment Isherwood and I have built up, so lovingly, all these months…”

  “A lot of it’s damn good, I admit.… But what am I to do? You’ve left us in the lurch.”

  (Oh, gosh, I thought, he’s smart!)

  “Everything destroyed. Obliterated. Reduced to utter nonsense. Terrible. Nothing to do.”

  “What do you care? You’re not interested in the picture.”

  Bergmann’s eyes flashed. “Who says I am not?”

  “You did.”

  “I said nothing of the kind. I said I am not interested in the picture which your Kennedy will make.”

  “You said you weren’t interested.… Didn’t he, Sandy?”

  “It is a lie!” Bergmann glared at Ashmeade. “I could never say such a thing! How could I not be interested? For this picture, I have given everything—all my time, all my thought, all my care, all my strength, since months. Who dares to say I am not interested?”

  “Atta boy!” Chatsworth began to laugh very heartily. Getting to his feet, he came around the desk and slapped Bergmann on the shoulder. “That’s the spirit! Of course you’re interested! I always knew you were. If anybody says you’re not, I’ll help you beat the hell out of him.” He paused, as if struck by a sudden idea. “And now, I’ll tell you what: you and I and Isherwood are going down to look at those rushes together. And we won’t take Sandy along, either. That’ll be his punishment, the dirty dog.”

  By this time, Chatsworth had walked Bergmann right over to the door. Bergmann looked somewhat dazed. He didn’t resist at all. Chatsworth held the door open for us. As I went out, I saw him wink at Ashmeade over his shoulder.

  Down in the projection room, they were waiting for us. We sat through the day’s rushes. Then Chatsworth said, quite casually, “Suppose we look at everyt
hing you’ve shot these last two weeks?”

  My suspicions turned to certainty. I whispered to Lawrence Dwight, “When did Chatsworth arrange for this stuff to be shown?”

  “Early this morning,” said Lawrence. “Why?”

  “Oh, nothing.” I smiled to myself in the darkness. So that was that.

  When it was all over, and the lights went up, Chatsworth asked, “Well, how does it look?”

  “It’s terrible,” said Bergmann gloomily. “Definitely horrible.”

  “Oh, now I wouldn’t go so far as that,” Chatsworth puffed blandly at his cigar. “That scene of Anita’s is damn good.”

  “You are wrong,” Bergmann brightened at once. “It is terrible.”

  “I like your camera angles.”

  “I hate them. It is so poor, so dull. It is without mood. It is just a lousy newsreel.”

  “I don’t see what you could have done better.”

  “You do not see,” said Bergmann, actually smiling. “But I see. I see clearly. The approach is wrong. My eyes are opened. I have been fumbling in the dark, like an old idiot.”

  “You think you can cure it?”

  “Beginning tomorrow,” said Bergmann, with decision, “I reshoot everything. I work night and day. It is perfectly clear to me. We shall keep our schedule. We shall make you a great picture.”

  “Of course you will!” Chatsworth put his arm around Bergmann’s neck. “But you’ll have to sell me your new ideas first.… Look here, let’s have dinner together this evening, the three of us? Then we’ll get down to brass tacks.”

  * * *

  IF I HAD imagined we kept long hours before, I was wrong. The days which followed were unlike anything else I have ever known. I lost all sense of space and time, I was so tired. Everybody was tired, and yet we worked better than ever before. Even the actors didn’t sulk.

  Bergmann inspired us all. His absolute certainty swept us along like a torrent. There were hardly any retakes. The necessary script alterations seemed to write themselves. Bergmann knew exactly what he wanted. We took everything in our stride.

  Incredibly soon, the last days of shooting arrived. One night (perhaps it was the last night of all; I don’t remember) we worked very late, on the big opening scene at the Prater. Bergmann, that evening, was unforgettable. Very haggard, with blazing dark eyes in the furrowed mask of his face he maneuvered the great crowd this way and that, molded it reduced it to a single organism, in which every individual had a part. We were exhausted, but we were all laughing. It was like a party, and Bergmann was our host.