“You are hired, Ezra,” I said.
27 March
Thinking of sequences for the film.
A frenzy of desire?
Sensible lovers taking precautions?
Swimming with horses?
28 March
Today we filmed the genius. I made no attempt to frame or place him. We simply stood him in front of the camera and let him speak.
“Divorce in Indonesia now costs a penny,” the genius began. “Architecture students in China must now build with their own hands whatever they design. The plan . . . the plan offers metabolic support to ninety-nine percent of reality as well as peak load servicing of maximum social stress. Under omni-favorable conditions no one will ask you any questions and you will be able to go your way utilizing our two great options, trial and error.
“There is no limit to what can be accomplished,” the genius said. “That is unfortunate, I would prefer a limit. The latest schedules call for a rate of growth in the corruption of public officials of something like twenty-two percent per annum. This ‘noise’ in the system is a good thing. Successful administration endangers anti-growth positions.
“The sudden world population bulge offers no threat, contrary to certain opinions expressed in the newspaper. Preterminal mummification of the deserving poor has been spoken of but I don’t think we’ll actually do it — not yet. Managerial capabilities and leadership potential may yet be discovered in you, predicted by your colored felt-pen drawings as a child, but not noticed at that time. These qualities offer possible new solutions that should not be discounted until progressive failure phases have been worked through. ‘Pipe’ dreams, which allow brine to cool passions and oil to flow under the ice, should be sought after. Better people yet unborn will evolve still other methods, doubtless superior to our own, yet retaining a flavor of improvisation, poking around, smashed thumbs, chemical accidents. It is difficult to do anything right, the first time. As one erects slatted fences in order to control dune formation, so we mix vodka and vermouth in a fully bundled hard- and software operation designed to soothe those of our clients whose jitters incapacitate them for ordinary life. Cyclic event-recurrences distress those who had hoped that rewards and punishments would change places, that painting things with red lead would retard lust, that Breton would not patent the soluble fish, that in the fires along the coasts at midsummer, witches are not being burnt, really. That is all I have to say, at this time.”
“You did very well,” I said to the genius.
“Yes!” he said. “I think so!”
2 April
Just saw, on the street, a man in yellow shorts, orange shirt, orange straw hat. He was carrying three naked putters and a book, the latter decently dust-jacketed. And he was shouting, shouting at the top of his lungs:
“I am angry!”
“I am very angry!
“I am extremely angry!
“Oh, I am so angry!
“I am furious!”
Something for the film?
3 April
Today we shot “country music.” These country boys, despised and admired, know what they’re about. The way they pull on their strings — the strings of their instruments and the strings of their fates. Bringing up the bass line here, inserting “fills” there, in their expensive forty-dollar Western shirts and plain ordinary eight-dollar jeans. We’re filming a big battle dance in Rogers, Tennessee. It’s the first time the crew really has had something to chew upon, and everyone is slightly excited. We set up backstage trying not to get in the way. Four bands are competing at the Masonic Temple. The musicians are unscrewing their flasks and tasting the bourbon inside, when they are not lighting their joints and pipes and hookahs. Meanwhile they’re looking over the house, a big pile of stone erected in 1928, and wondering whether the wiring will be adequate to the demands of their art. The flasks and joints are being passed around, and everyone is wiping his mouth on his sleeve. And so the ropes holding the equipment to the roofs of the white station wagons are untied, and the equipment is carried onto the stage, with its closed curtain and its few spotty worklights shining. The various groups send out for supper, ordering steak sandwiches on a bun, hold the onions or hold the lettuce, as individual taste dictates. We send out for supper, too. The most junior member of each group or a high-ranking groupie goes over to the café with the list, an envelope on which all the orders have been written, and reads off the orders to the counterman there, and the counterman says, “You with the band?” and the go-for says, “Yup,” succinct and not putting too fine a point on it. Meanwhile the ushers have arrived, all high-school girls who are members of the Daughters of the Mystic Shrine Auxiliary, wearing white blouses and blue miniskirts, with a red sash slung across their breasts tied at the hip, a badge of office. These, the flower of Rogers’ young girls, all go backstage to look at the musicians, and this is their privilege, because the performance doesn’t begin for another hour, and they stand around looking at the musicians, and the musicians look back at them, and certain thoughts push their way into all of the minds gathered there, under the worklights, but then are pushed out again, because there is music to be performed this night! and one of the amplifiers has just blown its slo-blo fuse, and nobody can remember where the spare fuses were packed, and also the microphones provided by the Temple are freaking out, if one can say that about a microphone, and in addition the second band’s drummer discovers that his heads are soggy (probably a result of that situation outside Tulsa, where the bridge was out and the station wagon more or less forded the river) but luckily he has brought along a hot plate to deal with this sort of contingency, and he plugs it in and begins toasting his heads, to bring them back to the right degree of brashness for the performance. And now the first people are filling up the seats, out in front of the curtain, some of them sitting in seats that are better, strictly speaking, than those they had paid for, in the hope that the real owners of the seats will not show up, having been detained by a medical emergency. All of the musicians take turns in looking out over the auditorium through a hole in the closed curtain, counting the house and looking for girls who are especially beautiful. And now the m.c. arrives, a very jovial man in a big Western hat, such as the Stetson company has stopped making, and he goes around shaking hands with everybody, cutting up old touches, and the musicians tolerate this, because it is part of their life. And now everybody is tuning up, and you hear parts of lots of different songs, fragments clashing with each other, because each musician has a different favorite bit that he likes to tune up with, although sometimes two musicians will start in on the same piece at the same time, because they are thinking alike, at that moment. And now the hall is filling up with people who are well- or ill-dressed, according to the degree that St. Pecula has smiled upon them, and the Daughters of the Mystic Shrine are outside, with their programs, which contain advertisements from the Bart Lumber Yard, and the Sons and Daughters of I Will Arise, and the House of Blue Lights, and the Sunbeam Vacuum Cleaner Company, and the Okay Funeral Home. A man comes backstage with a piece of paper on which is written the order in which the various performers will appear. The leaders of the various groups drift over to this man and look at his piece of paper, to see what spot on the bill has been given to each band, while the bandsmen talk to each other, in enthusiastic or desultory fashion, according to their natures. “Where’d you git that shirt?” “Took it off a cop in Texarkana.” “How much you give for it?” “Dollar and a half.” And now everybody is being careful not to drink too much, because drinking too much slows down your attack, and if there is one thing you don’t want in this kind of situation it is having your attack slowed down. Of course some people are into drinking and smoking a lot more before they play, but that’s another idea, and now the audience on the other side of the closed curtain is a loud presence, and everyone has the feeling of something important about to happen, and the first band to perform gets into position, with the three guitar players in a kind of skirmish l
ine in front, the drummer spread out behind them, and the electric-piano player off to the side somewhat, more or less parallel to the drummer, and the happy m.c. standing in front of the guitar players, with his piece of paper in his hand, and the stage manager looking alternately at his watch and at the people out front. One of the musicians borrows a last cigarette from another musician, and all of the musicians are fiddling with the controls of their instruments, and the drummer is tightening his snares, and the stage manager says “O.K.” to the m.c., and the m.c. holds up his piece of paper and prepares to read what is written there into the bunch of microphones before him, and the houselights go down as the stage lights come up, and the m.c. looks at the leader of the first group, who nods complacently, and the m.c. shouts into the microphones (from behind the closed curtain) in a hearty voice, “From Rogers, Tennessee, the Masonic Temple Battle of the Bands, it’s Bill Tippey and the Unhappy Valley Boys!” and the band crashes into “When Your Tender Body Touches Mine,” and the curtains part, and the crowd roars.
We filmed all this, for the film.
9 April
A brief exchange with Perpetua about revolutionary praxis.
“But I thought,” I said, “that there had been a sexual revolution and everybody could sleep with anybody who was a consenting adult.”
“In theory,” Perpetua said. “In theory. But sleeping with somebody also has a political dimension. One does not, for example go to bed with running dogs of imperialism.”
I thought: But who will care for and solace the running dogs of imperialism? Who will bring them their dog food, who will tuck the covers tight as they dream their imperialistic dreams?
“My group says I should not be associated with you or with the film,” Perpetua said. “They say you have no more political consciousness than a cat.”
“But that’s what the priests used to say. They said I had no more religion than a cat!”
“The group says you’re a skeptic.”
In truth I am a monster or ex-monster. But ex-monstrousness however hard won is not a position entitling one to ride the first elephant in this particular parade.
“I’ll work on it, Perpetua.”
12 April
Somebody knocked on my door (a rare event). I undid the various locks top to bottom — like unbuttoning a shirt. A man standing there. He handed me a business card.
L. JOHN SILVERMAN
ATTORNEY-AT-LAW
“Did you want to see me?”
“Are you Mr. Rush?”
“Come in.”
Mr. Silverman was a large man with a red face who looked a great deal like the late Wallace Beery.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Silverman? Have a seat.”
“It’s about your picture,” Mr. Silverman said. “I represent some folks — a consortium, you might call it — who are very interested. The long and short of it is, we’d like to buy in.”
“Why?”
“From what we’ve heard you’re making a very peculiar picture. Idiosyncratic and kinky.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t say that. Not exactly.”
I thought: Isn’t consorting a crime?
Mr. Silverman leaned forward earnestly.
“You young filmmakers are the key to the whole situation today. The rest of the industry is arse over teacup.”
“Mr. Silverman, I can hardly be called a young filmmaker. I’m thirty-nine.”
“Don’t matter. Don’t matter. I hear your picture is solid gold.”
“I’m just shooting a lot of raw material right now.”
“The question is, will you let us come aboard?”
“I’d rather not, to be frank. Brewers’ Natural is handling the whole deal and our relations with them are a little delicate and I’d hate to rock the boat at this point.”
Mr. Silverman became agitated. He reached into his coat pocket and withdrew a plastic vial containing yellow pills and popped one into his mouth without even asking for a glass of water. The pills were not hard to recognize — Valium, a tranquilizer I’ve often used myself.
“I know, I know,” Mr. Silverman said, catching my expression. “It’s a crutch.” Then, businesslike: “Mr. Rush, I just want to leave you with one thought.”
“One thought?”
“There’s such a thing as too much individualism.”
“There’s such a thing as too much individualism?”
“You’ll be hearing from us,” he said, and stomped from the room.
13 April
Then I, Thomas son of Titus, took thought with myself about what measures might be taken against the threat. I devised then in my mind many fine punishments of the first water for anyone who might dare trifle with our enterprise in any way great or small. On the first day the trifler will be hung well wrapped with strong cords upside down from a flagpole at a height of twenty stories. On the second day the trifler will be turned right side up and rehung from the same staff, so as to empty the blood from his head and prepare him for the third day. On the third day the trifler will be unwrapped and attended by a licensed D.D.S., who will extract every tooth from the top part of his jaw and every other tooth from the bottom part of his jaw, the extractions to be mismatching according to the blueprint supplied. On the fourth day the trifler will be given hard things to eat. On the fifth day the trifler will be comforted with soft fine garments and flagons and the love of lithesome women so as to make the shock of the sixth day the more severe. On the sixth day the trifler will be confined alone in a small room with the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen. On the seventh day the trifler will be pricked with nettles. On the eighth day the trifler will be slid naked down a thousand-foot razor blade to the music of Karlheinz Stockhausen. On the ninth day the trifler will be sewn together by children. On the tenth day . . .
14 April
Thinking about my father.
My father was a drinker, favoring vodka. Vodka is for people who wish to conceal their anger. Sometimes my father concealed his anger in the middle of the afternoon, mostly he concealed his anger around dinnertime. Once in a while at breakfast, when he concealed it in Minute Maid orange juice.
A banging on my door. I opened it. A little man was standing there. He handed me a folded piece of paper.
“What the hell is this?”
But the man was already scampering down the stairs.
I unfolded the paper. There was nothing on it except, in the center of the sheet, a black circle.
I had been tipped the black spot.
15 April
Today we photographed fear, a distressing emotion aroused by impending danger, real or imagined.
I’m interested in fear not only for its own sweet sake but because it seems the one emotion among the emotions that presents itself pure, unmediated. One does not so much observe oneself experiencing fear as experience it directly.
Perpetua watching, sitting in a folding chair, hands in her lap. Her breasts hiding beneath the long gray gown. She has red hair!
We filmed the startle pattern — shrinking, blinking, all that. We did the sham-rage reaction and also “panting.” Mitch panted. Then we shot some stuff in which a primitive person (my bare arm as stand-in for the primitive person) kills an enemy by pointing a magic bone at him.
“O.K., who’s got the magic bone?”
The magic bone was brought. I pointed the magic bone and the actor playing the enemy fell to the ground. I had carefully explained to the actor that the magic bone would not really kill him, probably.
Then, the thrill of fear along the buttocks. We used a girl named Heidi for this sequence because her buttocks are the most beautiful I know. This was a silent bit so that everyone could talk as Heidi’s buttocks thrilled.
“Hope is the very sign of lack-of-happiness,” Heidi said, stomach down on the couch.
“Fame is a palliative for doubt,” I said.
“Wealth-formation is a source of fear for both winners and losers,” Ezra said.
“Civilizatio
n aims at making all good things available even to cowards,” said the actor who had played dead, quoting Nietzsche.
Perpetua said nothing. How can I persuade her to have a drink with me? She does her parts of the film (mostly disquisitions upon revolutionary tactics and the oppression of women) in a stern and serious and workmanlike manner and refuses to have a drink with me afterward.
I took the magic bone home with me. I don’t believe in it, exactly, but you never know.
17 April
Thinking about “Flying to America.” Will it really say what I want it to say?
A telephone call. The Bill Bones Forwarding Company. Mr. Bones speaking.
“Listen, Rush. You want to finish that picture?”
“Who is this?
“You got our message.”
“The black spot?”
“We want two hundred thousand.”
“You’re out of your mind. We don’t have that kind of money.”
“Put in to the bank for an overrun.”
“If the bank ever saw what I’m doing —”
A pause.
“You mean you’re ripping off the bank?”
“Not exactly.”
“O.K.,” Mr. Bones said patiently. “Put us on the picture as consultants.”
“Who is this?”
“L. J. Silverman Incorporated.”
“I thought you were Bill Bones Forwarding.”
“Bill Bones Forwarding is a subsidiary of Pew Associates, which is part of a conglomerate called L. J. Silverman Incorporated. Make the check out to L. J. Silverman but send it with a letter of transmittal to Bill Bones Forwarding. And a blind copy to Pew Associates. Ha ha.”
“Do I have any options?”
We considered this together.
“I don’t see any,” he said. “Do you? And I want to leave you with one thought.”
“I know,” I said. “There’s such a thing as . . .”
Flying to America Page 2
