LOS ANGELS, CALIFORNIA
Bungalow on Venice Beach
Interviewer: Susanne L. Lambdin
INTERVIEW 3:
I sit with Stephanie on the back porch, drinking white wine, and watching waves crash against the beach. Stephanie is an actor, but that’s only part of the reason why I’m interviewing her today. There are only a few people on the beach. Things have changed since I was here a few years ago. I suppose if I had been in Los Angeles during the zombie outbreak, I'd feel uneasy. Her dog, a German Shepard, sits quietly beside her chair, watching me. I wonder if the dog was with her during the outbreak.
It’s peaceful here. I’m surprised you still live in Venice Beach. Why is that?
Oh, I know there are entire neighbourhoods left abandoned, including Beverly Hills, which is under reconstruction. A fire swept through the Hills and burned quite a few of those old beautiful mansions to the ground. I lived on Venice Beach before the outbreak, so it only seemed right to return. I mean, things look normal, right? True, you won’t find any seagulls or homeless folks on the beach.
Can I be candid for this interview?
Please.
[Directly off the shore lies a cruise ship turned on its side to provide a breaker for the waves.
To tell you the truth, I am surprised to find so many houses in pristine condition, though I suppose most here are empty like the buildings in the downtown area. The view from the helicopter was startling, to say the least.]
You should have been here during the Zompoc. It’s funny how people give nicknames to things, as if it makes it less scary. Let’s just admit the zombie apocalypse was real, that fifty percent or more of the U.S. population died, and we’re no longer a world power . . . not according to the TIMES.
That’s just propaganda. However, Los Angeles is listed at the top of the Worst Hit Cities.
This is a quiet neighbourhood, but people are slowly coming back. I don’t like to look at those big empty skyscrapers . . . the ones that still stand.
Next week, you start shooting your new film, ‘The Last Stand,’ about the L.A. outbreak. It’s supposedly based on your life story.
I don’t like the title, but the character of Jessica is based on me. The screenwriter, Tim Henson, spent weeks corresponding with me about what happened. The studio has kept it all ‘hush hush.’ Of course, you know I play a woman who led a group of survivors, beating all odds to stay alive. Do you want to talk about the film or the true story?
Oh, I want to know what really happened, if that’s okay with you?
I’d prefer to talk about me, not Jessica. The studio said you wanted to take a few pictures of me. Maybe I can stand on the beach. I don’t want anyone to see my house. That partially submerged cruise ship would make a great background.
Do you know what happened to the ship?
[She offers a movie star smile; her lipstick is red.]
When it happened, I was sitting right here, watching, and still can’t believe what I witnessed. My boyfriend, Doug, was in the kitchen making breakfast. I was just about to go for a walk with Samson. That’s my dog – he’s going to be in the movie, too. [She laughs as the dog thumps his tail – he knows we’re talking about him.]
We had heard earlier on the news a cruise ship was returning to the Los Angeles port from Mexico. They said the passengers and crew were ill from food poisoning, but instead of stopping in port, she kept heading north. The few people who made it assure so the captain and officers were dead, and when I say dead, I mean zombies.
Did the Navy sink the cruise ship?
Two Coast Guard vessels were escorting the ship. There were seven choppers in the air, and the LAPD drove their cars right onto the beach. I still think a torpedo hit the cruise ship. I mean, I heard multiple explosions, but the Navy denies it. Doug and I watched the ship roll onto its side, and people jump into the water, and the Coast Guard opened fire. It was the craziest thing I’d ever seen. Doug is a surfer, and he grabbed his board, thinking he could save someone.
Did he?
While he swam out on his board, including a dozen more surfers, the passengers dragged them off their boards. I saw Doug go under, but he never resurfaced. A few people made it to shore, ran past the cops, screaming, and I waved them over to my house. I suppose it was a stupid idea. I really didn’t know what was going on, but when the police started shooting at folks coming out of the surf I started to wonder if I’d done the right thing bringing strangers into my home. Only one of them was bleeding, Trent, a teenager who claimed the navigator bit him.
Eric, Miles, Tina, Loretta and Marcus were college kids, not much younger than me. I guess Doug left my handgun on the coffee table. In any case, Eric used it to shoot Trent in the head. Samson nearly attacked Eric but stopped when bullets hit the sliding glass door. All of us hit the floor. I managed to get Samson under control, and that’s when I noticed someone climbing the steps to the porch. Miles held onto Samson while I crawled over the glass, hoping it was Doug, only to find a zombie on the porch. It was one of the crew. He had been shot numerous times, his face was lacerated, and he snarled as he came up the stairs. Behind him were hundreds of things that were no longer humans. It was sheer pandemonium on the beach, and I knew it wasn’t safe to stay here.
I loaded everyone into my SUV and headed north down Pacific Coast Highway. It was my intention to get out of Los Angeles, but everyone else at the beach had the same idea. Traffic came to a standstill right outside of Santa Monica. You could see boats in the water, headed north, along with the two Coast Guard vessels. There was a large crowd on the beach running in the same direction, and folks started to get out of the cars. It was sheer chaos. No one told me that some zombies could run too. Not until later did Eric explain what happened on the cruise ships, how they had to hole up in his room, and jump from his deck. He said the zombies were breaking down doors to get to the people inside. People just assume zombies can’t think but they know enough to catch their prey. So we fled from them.
Where did you go, Stephanie? Did you follow the crowd?
Look, I’m from Texas, and I know what cattle do when they’re in a stampede. People act the same way, and you don’t want to be caught in the middle of it – trust me. I kept us on the highway, thinking I would take everyone to my trailer in Topanga Canyon. We ran seven miles, passing where Sunset Boulevard meets PC1, where we ran into gunfire. Samson kept running, so I followed the dog, and Eric and the others followed me. We ran past the Getty Villa, saw it on fire, and finally reached Topanga Canyon Boulevard to find a cop car pulled over to the side of the road. We found the officer lying in the ditch, his brains splattered, and I grabbed his gun. We stole his car, with Eric driving, and drove up the road.
It was a sunny day, and it was hot. There were a number of cars on the road, as well as people on foot, who I guess had the same idea. We managed to drive into Wildwood before someone shot out the back window, killing Miles, like a fool, Eric pulled over. I took the keys, unlocked the shotgun from the rack, and then opened the door. Several men rushed us out of the bushes; they wanted the car. Without thinking, I shot the first man in the stomach, and fired off another round at his friends. Something just clicked in my head, and I guess I went loco for a second. You don’t mess with someone from Texas.
Is that in the movie?
In ‘The Last Stand’ they have me on the cruise ship, leading folks to safety at Topanga Canyon. A Latino gang jumps us near Sunset Boulevard, and in the crossfire, I shoot the leader. You have to understand, in reality, I was scared. I just wanted to find some place to hide. But it was my idea to head to my trailer on foot. The college kids decided to come with me, but I knew they were frightened of me as much as what was going on. Samson led the way.
People were in their yards, trying to find out what was going on, and looters had already started to break into houses, shooting the occupants. I can’t even describe the horror of it all, but I got us off the road and onto an old hiking trail that led to the ba
ck of a ridgeline. The grade was steep at points, and all I could do was hope my trailer was still intact, where I thought we’d be safe.
It took an hour to reach the top where we had a view of the Pacific. A flotilla of yachts and small craft headed north, and smoke from a number of fires filled the sky over Los Angeles. Along the way, a mother and two children joined us. I’d seen her before at a local grocery store, but didn’t know her name until then. Mary Gonzales. Her children were Monolete and Victoria. Samson took right to the kids; he’s quite a dog. I kept the group moving, already thirsty, and we followed a long stretch of twists and turns that led us into in Dix Canyon. This is a shaded area almost the entire way to the trailer, with lots of growth and overhanging branches so we had to duck down many times. We saw one other couple who joins us, Carl and Barbara Goldstein, who turned out to be producers.
So, other people joined your group on the road. How many people reached your cabin?
[Stephanie refills our wine glasses. Earlier, she placed out a cheese and cracker tray, and during the interview, she’s been feeding Samson. The dog has remained quiet the entire time.]
You must have heard I ran some type of Noah’s Ark out there. Thirteen people came with me to the trailer. They just kept appearing on the trail, lost, frightened, and unsure where to go. A few had backpacks. Some carried rifles, and one man led a donkey. There was only one more gunfight, when we arrived at the trailer, and found two bikers already in residence. It was a man and a woman, both about thirty, and neither wanted us around. Maybe I should mention I am an accurate shooter.
Who shot them?
I sound like a monster, don’t I, when I say I shot her right between the eyes? Nevertheless, I had people to protect, and the bikers started shooting first. Eric, however, turned out to be quite heroic, and shot the man. I guess Eric thought the same about me. [She shows off a wedding ring.]
Yep. We are now married.
You made it to the trailer. I can’t imagine it was large enough for fourteen people.
It had three rooms, a kitchen, a bathroom and a porch. You can’t see it from the trail, and it’s close enough to a creek that we had all the water we needed. I had also stocked up on enough supplies to last us a week. I used the trailer when I wanted to rehearse. A friend, Bill, lived nearby and took care of the place for me, and he and two daughters joined our merry band. Sadly, his house went up in a fire that nearly burned the entire valley. It’s common in that area, wildfires, but a miracle happened, and it rained that night. It rained hard, until it flooded the creek, but it also brought zombies.
People who lived in the area?
Well, they weren’t people anymore. Some zombies were washed down the creek. Bill had the idea to set up a rope line with tin cans to warn us whenever zombies were in the area. It worked. We all lived together in the trailer for several weeks, rationed food, and then we foraged.
Samson caught rabbits and squirrels, but he usually ate them before he returned to the trailer. Eric finally decided we needed to leave the trailer and head back up the trail into a neighbourhood.
Did you loot houses?
Jose was the man with the donkey. He had an interesting past. He was actually in a gang when he lived in Tijuana, and for what it’s worth, he was fearless. On his donkey, he’d brought a cache of weapons, so it’s not like we weren’t armed. Jose, Bill and Eric usually went with me on raids, while Marcus remained behind with my dog to protect the group.
We’d go out at night, only a night, and hit as many houses as possible. Sometimes we got lucky and made it back within a few hours. Sometimes we had to walk for miles before we reached a house, only to find zombies or scavengers in the area, and had to hide in an attic or closet until the next night. It was just not safe to be out in the open during the day. You know, you see on TV people using zombie guts to hide their scent, when in truth, zombies can’t smell a damn thing. Zombies rely on their hearing and vision, while it remains, to hunt their prey. Obviously, walking corpses rot, and they can’t digest what they eat. When they eat too much, their stomachs burst open. Eventually, they decompose and start losing their eyesight, ability to hear, and you can be sure their gums rot, and teeth start to fall out. It’s their hands you need to worry about – they claw, they rip, and they stuff flesh into their mouths, swallowing without chewing when the teeth are gone. That means they’re still dangerous.
In movies, zombies seem able to bite right through leather or armour. You always see cops in Kevlar and helmets among the living dead. How is that possible?
You forget all it takes is a scratch to be infected. The infection is spread through their saliva, blood, and blood gets under their cracked nails. As long as you don’t walk around with bare arms or legs, and wear gloves, you can avoid being scratched. By the time we ran out of bullets, we used bats, tree branches and golf clubs as weapons. The problem was when you ran into other humans.
Did you run into scavengers very often?
Not one person at my trailer was bitten or scratched by a zombie, but the donkey didn’t make it. We had guards stationed on top of the trailer, day and night. Nobody went outside at night, other than my patrol, and no one living ever found the trailer. We were fortunate in that regard, but we did run into other people when we went foraging. Jose gave his life to save mine. I’ll never forget it. I got caught in a house by those same two men who tried to steal the police cruiser. They had a knife to my throat, intending to do bad things, when Jose snuck up, swinging a bat. He clocked one before his friend stabbed Jose in the throat. Eric found us and clubbed the man over the head with a log. It cracked his skull. There was nothing to be done for Jose. We watched him die, and then Eric used the log to bash in his brains to keep him from turning. I hated telling Mary happened, since they’d formed a close relationship, and her kids took it hard.
How long were you at the trailer before help arrived?
Eight months.
Will everything you told me be shown in the movie?
Yes. Of course, our names will be different. Mary’s character joins us on patrol. The studio wanted another woman foraging, and Jose actually saves her life, not mine. It’s a bittersweet moment in the script.
I look forward to seeing the film. Let’s take those photos now.
[I grab my camera and we walk out to the beach with the dog. Stephanie poses for me, but I can’t get her to smile through her tears. She’s a good actor, able to hold back her emotions during the interview, but I’m sorry she didn’t move. The view of the cruise ship must remind her every day about what happened, and soon her story will be immortalized on film. Oh, well – ‘the show must go on’.]
THE SECOND IRANIAN REVOLUTION
Interviewer: Mick Franklin
INTERVIEW 4:
Mashhad, capital of Iran's Khorasan Province and Iran's second largest city, known for the shrine of Imam Reza. Mashhad literally means "burial place of the martyr." The city started out as Sanabad, a resting point for trade caravans traveling to and from Turkmenistan. It was only after the martyrdom of Imam Reza at Tus in 818 and the construction of his shrine here that the city became a pilgrim site. Today, the city is celebrated for another reason. It is the headquarters of the new Persian government that arose from the civil war that took place during the zombie outbreak and almost destroyed the country. Although there is still much work to be done in rebuilding this country this government very much marks the return of the days of the Shah, who ruled from 1941 to 1979.
We had theocratic dictatorship rammed down our throats for generations. I’m sure you saw the news videos back in 2018 with Persian women standing up in front of crowds and waving their head coverings and showing their full faces. That’s real defiance right there. That was just one part of the riots and protests where ordinary Iranian citizens resisted the government. I’m extremely proud to say I was one of those citizens who went up to the mullahs and shouted, “Mullahs be ashamed and leave Iran.” The military cracked down on us, killing innocent peopl
e, trying to discourage anyone else from joining this revolution. Despite this the protests continued to spread from city to city. The problem for the Ayatollah’s government and the military was that the Persian people had had enough. We thirsted for freedom. It had been denied for us for so long.
As it just so happened, the War broke out not long after our protests begun.
I feel I ought to provide you with some context for the Iranian people before we go any further. From 1941 to 1979 we had a constitutional monarchy led by the Shah. That means we had a king. This was a kind of renaissance for us, following on from a time when our nation was in ruins with a literacy rate of just one percent. It’s no small compliment to the Shah that he was able to transform our nation in this time, he did so much for women’s rights and protecting minorities and non-Muslims, as well as building roads and libraries, installing electricity, building nuclear power plants and essentially modernising our country. He built dams, which helped us irrigate our dry lands, you know one of our greatest fears in a desert country is running out of water. He established universities and provided incentive programs to get young people to enrol in them. Would you believe he even built an Olympic stadium? The Shah donated half a million acres owned by the monarchy to farmers. He made our nation ninety percent self-sufficient and made us all look forward to a bright future.
Yeah, sure, we had lots of money generated from oil revenue, we were the world’s second largest oil exporter in the 70s, but I don’t see that as taking much away from the Shah’s achievements, which are frankly astonishing. We were actually a country that was described as “a country with growth without inflation.” Even without the improvements in the economy there are no words to describe the sheer increase in freedoms and opportunity that the Shah gave us by reversing the theocratic dictatorship we were being strangled by. All of this should be . . . and I can’t emphasise this enough . . . all this should be all the proof you ever need of just how much the Persian people can achieve when you give them freedom and opportunity. Once we have those two things watch out, because the Persian people really are amazing. During that time we stood out in the world as a nation of freedom, liberty, literature, science, innovation and an industrious work ethic.
Zombie War: Interviews From The Frontline Page 3
