Chapter Nine: Trouble in Paradise
Howard was enjoying his afternoon at the casting agency, lolling patiently on the leather couch while Billy was on the telephone. There was a new Asian girl in the next office who was taking a long time to audition for Luigi Pinocchio, a tubby European producer, with a waxed moustache and a heavy accent, and Howard was looking forward to an in-depth interview with her next. He paged through Billy’s binder of models. He bantered wittily with Storm and Summer, who had been dropping off new photographs from her recent tour.
All at once, Colt walked through the door, in tight blue jeans and a black wife-beater that showed his muscles, and with a motorcycle helmet, containing his gloves, in one hand. Without any warning, he punched Howard on the shoulder.
Howard howled, got to his feet, then somehow lost his balance, and plumped down again abruptly on the couch. “What the hell was that for?”
Billy looked up in surprise, for this was not regular behavior in his office, even given the notoriously lax standards and unsavory reputation of the casting agency. He quickly concluded his telephone conversation so that he could intercede.
Colt loomed over the puny production manager. “You know how much I wanted to plug one of those girls?”
“What?” Howard cringed in anticipation of another pummeling.
“Those Paradise girls. I want to do one of them. You’re casting the movie, and you couldn’t find a part for me.”
“That’s why you hit me?” Howard clutched his shoulder where the blow had fallen. “You idiot. They have a list. It’s not my fault that you got cock-blocked.”
“Look, no matter what,” the tall Texan swung around the desk, like a sheriff laying down the law in a rowdy honky-tonk, “Y’all can’t be altercating this in here. This is a place of business.”
Alerted by the commotion, Luigi Pinocchio burst out of the next office, tucking in his shirttails, followed by the new Asian girl, with a smear of lipstick across her cheek. The entire office froze into a scene from a European bedroom melodrama for a millisecond as the implications of their entrance were comprehended, then dismissed.
Colt hung his head. “I’m sorry, Billy. I just saw his goofy face and snapped.”
“I understand.” Billy put a hand on Colt’s shoulder. “You got to learn to control your temperament, that’s all.”
“He’s right,” added Howard.
Colt glared at him. “You just stay out of my way, if you know what’s good for you.”
“Hey,” Howard muttered, “Take it up with Travis Lazar.”
Colt said ominously, “Maybe I will.”
Location scouting was a challenge, since they could not afford locking down a street in Hollywood on Selwyn’s prudent budget. Travis scoured the Los Angeles basin, trying to find the right spot downtown or in industrial areas of the valley, where they could film a sex scene with a New York style exterior. There was a factory off the 5 Freeway, with red-brick walls, and black chimney stacks where they could film the sex scenes outside at night. Miles had shot there a few times, and acting as a producer on Daydreamer, he suggested it as a possibility to Travis. Their start date was approaching, so time was of the essence. Travis and Jack met Miles at the location one evening to see if it would work for the new production. They arrived there to find a movie crew set up for night work. It was Alec Zig’s new movie, Future Foxes, for AXE.
Alec was standing right out front, behind the brick-post factory gates, and in front of the double doors that led into the building. His red beard was groomed, and he was wearing some sort of director’s smock, a pointy cap, and high boots, which attire aided to his mystique as a creative wizard. There were more than enough white production trucks in the parking lot, and a large crew bustling with equipment. Assistants dashed around with walkie-talkies and clipboards and Styrofoam cups of coffee. Long folding tables were laden with appetizers, pastries, and platters of fruit, vegetables and a wheel of cheddar. Electricians had set up work lights, but the exterior was not being used as a set.
It would be easy for Travis to film his night scene in the outdoor lot, which was private and could be dressed as a New York alley, but he also needed an indoor set so they would have something to film during the day, or in case it rained.
“You mind if we take a look around?” Miles asked Alec.
“Actually, it’s a closed set…” Alec sniffed, “All my sets are closed.”
“Oh, that’s okay,” said Travis, walking right through the factory doors, “We’re only going to stay a minute, and one thing we don’t want to see is anyone having sex.”
Miles followed Travis through the big double doors, although Jack lingered outside a moment longer, considering the ramifications of trespassing.
“You really can’t come in now,” Alec protested, striding after them, in an attempt to halt their procession.
“Yes.” Miles threw his arm around Alec in a hug. “We appreciate you bending the rules like this for us.”
“We’re doing a big movie for Paradise Media, Incorporated.” Travis embraced his rival from the other side, so the three producers walked in step together along the factory floor.
It was not a pleasant image, although there was something hideously compelling about the trio. They each seemed to be wearing a look of terror from being in the company of the others, like three vicious predators enclosed in the same cage.
From where Jack was standing, it looked as if Alec was being arrested by corrupt detectives.
“I’m doing my science fiction picture,” said Alec, “It’s my major release of the year.”
“It’s too bad you couldn’t shoot on Hooker Alley….” said Travis generously.
Alec coughed and expectorated. “We were planning to, but you destroyed the sets….”
“Obliterated…” Travis explained, with a white-teethed grin, “Things got lost in the shuffle in all the mix-up with Tiffany….”
Miles supported Travis. “I always destroy everything after I shoot it. I don’t want my centerpiece to end up in another picture.”
They reached the set—a boiler room, full of a huge round furnace that dominated the space, and various pipes, catwalks, and smokestacks, which had been lit in such as way as to cast soft linear shadows. The brick walls, which were painted white, were streaked with colors–pinks, cyans, purples–created by gels of different hues, which were pinned over the lights. Sharply focused spotlights hit the catwalks like a fashion runway. One of the electricians was sweeping a handheld light in a haphazard pattern, and a glitter ball off camera sprinkled dots of light in a rapid orbit. There were female performers in white latex suits, white boots and red lipstick in a line along the walkways. It was all meant to represent Alec’s view of the coming millennium.
“What you got going on here, Alec?” Jack caught up with the three producers.
“We’re doing a big orgy scene….” Alec boasted.
“Very futuristic,” nodded Miles.
In front of the furnace, stood Colt, dressed in a costume made of chrome and leather that made him look like a rugged twenty-first century gladiator, and frankly, a little gay. He was covered in oil so that his muscles rippled and shone. Travis walked down the metal ramp towards him. “I heard you have some problem with me, Colt. You have something to address?”
“Oh, no, sir,” said Colt sheepishly.
Travis was obliged to confront the actor because Howard had invoked his name. “That’s not what I heard from Howard.”
“No, sir, we were just fooling around.” Colt glowed in the flickering light emitting from the furnace where the crew had installed a flicker box to simulate fire.
“I can’t have people assaulting my production manager,” Travis said sternly.
“No, sir, of course not, sir.”
“Okay. As long as we understand each other.” Travis was not intimidated by actors. “I like your costume. You look medieval.”
“Well, you know Alec…” Colt struck a bodybuilder’s pose. “But we’re all right, right?”
There was a sudden string of curses to do with the constriction caused by a tight-fitting outfit, and Tiffany emerged, also in a white latex catsuit complete with a hood, which ensemble given her bust size looked like a balloon ready to burst. With a hand on his hat, Alec scurried over to mollify her, or charm her under his enchanting spell.
“I can’t breathe in this stupid suit,” she protested, “I feel like my entire body is wearing a giant condom.”
Travis studied how Alec was preparing to direct the scene. It was going to be hand-held camerawork, which was a no-brainer for an orgy scene, but would not really showcase the intriguing location. The correct way to do it would be to get back and high to establish the ge-
ography. There was no comfortable way for the necessary number of performers to qualify for an orgy to have sex–it was mostly hard and narrow–so the sex scene would be weak. There was one camera too many, so the cameramen would be climbing over one, and getting into each other’s shots, trying to catch the action. The lighting looked too flat in places, and the color palette was nauseating.
He would have done it differently. He would have painted the walls dark, and kept the lighting moody and ominous and full of contrast. The background would be warmed with an amber backlight to flatter the sole couple, and so that the metal railings would show up in silhouette. He would have placed the camera on a dolly, and sent it gliding past all the rails and chimneys and gridwork. There would have been a smoke machine working through the pipes, with a crate of dry ice thrown in to keep the fumes low to the ground, the way they did it on Starlight. The boiler would be working, bubbling and steaming. He would have never used a flicker box for the furnace; he would have got Fleet down there as a monitor, and brought in a pyrotechnician with a fire bar for real flames to make it hellish.
Travis looked over at Miles and Jack, and nodded. He wanted the location. He was planning to shoot a furnace scene in Daydreamer on Alec Zig’s centerpiece.
The second shipment of goods from Majestic Movies to a destination in Hamburg was ready for collection in Chatsworth. The wire transfer from Germany had posted to Travis Lazar’s account, and a trucking company from Los Angeles International Airport had received instructions for pickup. Klaus was so pleased with the deal, after the way it was presented to him by the producer, that Travis managed to extract from him the promise of a favor for the future. Travis was now square with Beppo, for funds he had fronted and earned on Hard Time, no small achievement in itself, but not really an enviable position.
With an associate like Beppo, it was always good to have something on account between each other for the sake of good faith. They stood in the warehouse of Majestic Movies together, watching the freight company load up the shipment.
“I wish I could give you another movie to make,” said Beppo, gazing wistfully at the empty space in his warehouse, where the dusty overstock had been stored, “But nobody’s got any money in the summer. And I don’t want to be put in the position where I have to screw you.”
“I appreciate that,” Travis said, with the greatest respect, because he did not want to put Beppo in such an awkward position either. “But, I’m okay now that I’m in Paradise. We’re all set. Talent is booked. Locations are locked down.”
“Just be ready for the unexpected,” Beppo advised.
“It’s all going through Miles,” Travis assured him, “I’m just a gun for hire.”
“Be ready, that’s all,” Beppo repeated.
Selwyn Felwyn’s office in the Chatsworth headquarters of Paradise was refreshingly modest, given the fanfare of publicity that promoted every Paradise Media release. He sat behind an inexpensive secretary’s desk, in a bare four-wall rectangle, upon which was nothing other than a computer, a yellow legal pad with immaculate notes, a copy of a trade magazine, and a telephone. There was a gray industrial carpet, and a small window with horizontal blinds, and incongruously, an antique grandfather clock in the corner that chimed the hour. Selwyn dressed simply in black slacks, and a tight short-sleeve navy blue shirt, which exaggerated the size of his biceps, and he kept the top button open at the neck. He wore his telephone on a headset, and after his early morning routine in the gym, he spent most of the day fielding telephone calls, mostly from his own employees to ensure that the company kept running like a well-oiled timepiece. On the odd occasion, he received a telephone call from his impressive rival.
“Duncan,” Selwyn began, “What a pleasant surprise.”
“I’m sure it’s a surprise,” growled the President of AXE, “But I’m not sure it’s going to be pleasant.”
“The pleasure is mine,” insisted the President of Paradise, “What can I do for you?”
“You made a deal with one of my directors.”
“I did?”
“I’d prefer it if you didn’t hire Travis Lazar.”
“Now, Duncan,” Selwyn purred, enjoying the taste of every syllable, “You don’t really own directors, and you don’t own the industry, and you don’t get to tell me who I can or cannot make a deal with….”
“I’m not trying to tell you anything.” Duncan defended himself. “But Travis Lazar belongs to me.”
“In any event,” Selwyn raised his soft voice, and got to his feet alone in his office, “I was under the impression that you no longer wanted him.”
“That’s not the point. He belongs to me, even if I don’t want him.”
“I don’t see what all the fuss is about.” Selwyn strolled to the small window, with his hands in his pockets, and looked out over low commercial rooftops. “You can have him. I don’t want him. I only gave him a deal because I was doing a favor for Miles Flannigan.”
“Consider this a favor to me.”
“Personally, I think he’s highly overrated. You really think he’s a decent director?”
“He’s got a great name. He just did a big picture for me. Dreamboat, starring Tiffany West….”
“I heard you used Jasmine Lanoire.” Selwyn could not hide a touch of glee.
“Yeah, we added her,” Duncan said nonchalantly, “She was good.”
Selwyn laughed deliberately. “She was good thirty pictures ago, Duncan….”
Duncan started sputtering on the other end.
“…Thirty pictures ago,” Selwyn jeered, “And I’ve got ‘em.”
“Well, I’ve got Tiffany West,” Duncan recovered himself and strolled right into his opponent’s trap.
The grandfather clock in the corner began to toll eleven.
“Since you bring up Tiffany,” Selwyn oiled his way to the point, “Let me put it this way. Perhaps, you can do something for me in exchange. I will turn Travis Lazar’s go-picture into a no-picture, but I want you to lend me Tiffany West for something I have coming up with Miles….”
There was a pause on the other end of the line. “You want me to lend you my exclusive contract star?”
“Duncan, it will only take an afternoon,” Selwyn said simply, “Consider it a favor to me.”
In keeping with his magnanimous reputation, and backed into a corner, Duncan Hathaway agreed.
This action produced a chain of events in the industry, which circled from Duncan all the way back to Duncan again, going around to the beginning like the sun coming up after the completion of night work on the Dreamboat production: Within an hour, while she was driving east along Sunset Boulevard in West Hollywood, Tiffany West received a call from Billy Dallas notifying her (and explaining to her) about her booking for a special role in a new movie for Selwyn, in direct contravention of her narrow contractual limitations prohibiting precisely such an appearance.
She was baffled. “I don’t understand how–if I am supposed to be the exclusive contract girl for AXE–how I can go and do a movie for Paradise Media?”
“Duncan is waiving the contract….”
“I don’t care if he’s waving the flag of America. I signed that contract. And my word means something, even if nobody else does.”
“I understand.” Billy had people in his office. “But they are releasing you from your contract as a special courtesy that Duncan is doing to Selwyn.”
“Excuse me?” Tiffany slammed on her brakes in reaction to the agent’s comment, almost causing her famous rear to be rear-ended.
“I’d say that I’m doing the courtesy seeing as I’m the one getting penetrated.” The driver behind her honked his horn, and she held up a single finger without looking back. “But seeing as I signed to do scenes with one studio, the other studio better be paying me my rate, because I am not breaking my contract for free.”
“Paradise will pay you for the scene,” her agent assured her.
“It’s not coming off my money from AXE?”
“No,” Billy said.
“But it better be coming off my scenes for AXE. I am only supposed to do six scenes per month. My precious kitty has to rest. I’m not a fucking tourist attraction.”
At about the same time, coming south on the 101 into Hollywood, on his way to meet with Officer Fleet of the fire department, in preparation for his new production, Travis Lazar received a call in his Mercedes from his fellow producer, Miles Flannigan, to notify him that there was, in his poetic words, trouble in paradise.
A quick call to the Duchess yielded the inside story from Selwyn’s assistant. Travis also called Howard from the Mercedes, who began the painful process of contacting Jack, Tommy and Maria to cancel them, and to double check with Traci that she had heard the news from Billy, which she had been disappointed to receive. No matter how long it took to put a production together, it only took an instant to shut it down. The word traveled along the grapevine, as swiftly as electricity. Everyone in the industry was aware. There was no remedy. The project was off. The deal was dead.
Ninety minutes later, without a formal appointment, Nicholas Pasquale marched bravely into his boss’ office at AXE headquarters. He stood in the middle of the spacious room, at sufficient distance from the large desk and the rampart of chairs that he could evade any projectiles in the eventuality that objects might be hurled in his direction.
“Sir!” he said, his body shaking, “I am sorry to barge in on you like this, but I must speak out. I realize that you could fire me again, but you are not only my boss, you are my mentor.”
Duncan peered across his desk with wonderment at such a dramatic display. “Go on.”
“You cannot do this, sir!”
On account of the fact that he had administered himself a medicinal gin-and-tonic with his lunch, it took the mogul a moment to grasp where Nicholas was headed. “Oh, it’s about your friend.
Travis Lazar.”
“He has a wife and children. This business is his livelihood. If you don’t want to hire him, that’s one thing. It is beneath someone of your eminence to maliciously stop a man from working to feed his family.”
Duncan was highly entertained. “Are you finished?”
“No. It’s wrong to take his name off the movie. He directed it. It will be nominated in Vegas. He deserves the credit.”
“You’re right,” Duncan agreed, “I was just thinking the same thing.” In fact, he had been thinking about golf, but he did not want to have to fire his brilliant right-hand man again, and recognized the importance of allowing Nicholas to save face after such an impassioned plea, notwithstanding saving his own face after boasting about the director to the President of Paradise. “Make sure his name is on the movie, and on the front of the box, highlighted on the posters and all the advertising. No mistakes. Big letters. A Travis Lazar Production.”