American Dream Machine

by Specktor, Matthew

“From who?”

  “Bob.”

  It came down so quickly from there. Teddy leaned against the jamb. Beau was back in LA again—again! That spring of ’83, he’d needed to be here constantly.

  “What’s Bob calling you for?” Beau rubbed his eyes.

  “He wants to have lunch.”

  I wonder if there was pleasure in this for Teddy. Maybe there was. But he showed no particular interest in me then, either; it was all between his lawyers and my mom.

  “Huh,” Beau snorted. He hardly needed to ask why.

  “I put him off,” Teddy said. “Told him I’d get back to him.”

  “Don’t do that,” Beau said. Because you never dangled a client, no matter what. “Why don’t you take him to that Japanese place?”

  Teddy loitered there in the doorway. His toes barely poked onto his colleague’s parquet floor. A little paunchy, he still wore that genial mustache, the face of a Midwestern uncle.

  “You sure?”

  Beau watched him. Who was fucking him deliberately and who was merely along for the ride, he never could tell.

  “Yeah.” In fact, he liked Teddy. He always had; neither my paternity nor the Finney incident had changed that. “You go ahead.”

  How complicit are we in our own fates? Was Beau Rosenwald just tired? Did he feel all this was like a trip to the dentist, better to have all your teeth gone in one jerk than to feel them lovingly scalloped one nerve-shearing root at a time?

  “Go. Bobby could use a steady hand.”

  Beau knew what was happening. The American Dream Machine ideal, the notion that the agents should work seamlessly to promote their clients’ welfare above even their own—that there would be no poaching of one another’s clients—had crumbled some time ago. But when his own standing began to fall, he did nothing.

  “What’s wrong?”

  Linda came in after Teddy’d left and found him sitting with his fingers laced and his forehead propped gently against his knuckles, elbows on the desk. He looked like someone at the Wailing Wall.

  “Can I have a tissue?” His face was wet, cheeks streaked with a few tears. “Please?”

  He didn’t even like Bob. Not that he disliked Bob. He liked being with Bob, the way he liked being with so many actors because they resembled him more than anyone knew. Most had thin skins and limited educations and animal intelligence and an impossible degree of self-consciousness. Which part of that was Beau not going to understand?

  “What happened?” Linda handed him a Kleenex and waited while he blew.

  “De Niro’s leaving.”

  “Oh. I’m sorry.” She grimaced. “And good riddance.”

  “Nah. He’s just going up the hall, to Teddy.”

  “Really? You could block that.”

  Beau nodded. “I know.”

  “Then why don’t you? Beau.”

  In her searching stare was everything: Big deal, you lost Marty, you blew a fuse, you think Abe Waxmorton hasn’t got a temper, what are you doing, why don’t you fight, I love you, you big baboon! But Beau just shrugged. He set down the wadded blossom of his Kleenex. Perhaps he was tired, perhaps he was disgusted, perhaps he was just lured by the pleasure of defeat. For there is an exquisite joy in seeing a person collapse, even, sometimes, when that person is yourself.

  “It’s all right,” he said. Linda’s eyebrow curled; the sweet and crooked outcroppings of her face glowed overhead in the morning sun. “We’ll live to fight another day.”

  What a strange year that was! In the spring of ’83, Beau found himself alone. Severin was still at school in New York, or else—occasionally—in Portland, Oregon. He took mysterious trips on weekends. Beau presumed he had a girlfriend there, that pen pal he’d found in eighth grade, whose envelopes continued to arrive, unmarked but with a tellingly feminine scent. Sev was a little young still to be unsupervised, but Beau had his hands full. His clients took flight like swallows. And on April 15—tax day—he was called into Will’s office. Their meeting was set for 11:30 AM, but when Beau strode in, his partner was in a meeting with an actor whose own career was beginning to show cracks.

  “Hey, Beau.” Will gestured to his client, who was angular and equine: the man who launched a thousand disco fingers now sat drinking coffee on Will’s couch. “You know John?”

  They shook hands. Nineteen-eighty-three was a shit year in the movie business, but it was a golden age compared to what was coming next. How many great films can you name from the latter half of that decade? Blue Velvet, sure. What else?

  “You wanted to see me?”

  The elder Farquarsen looked at his client, then at Beau. “Can it wait?”

  Beau retreated and stood outside his partner’s office. Once, he might’ve fumed at this snub, as Williams kept his clock with absolute precision. He never let a meeting run late. The actor’s presence was a red rag, a show of dominance on Will’s part. Yet somehow Beau didn’t care. Nick Nolte had bailed on him, Bill Murray. He was down to two clients now: Bryce, essentially unemployable on the heels of three straight turkeys, and Davis, of whom the less said, the better. The gap between Robert Redford and Robert Wagner was narrower than anyone had supposed.

  “You can go in now.” Williams’s assistant, Terry, motioned to Beau with his head. Inside, Williams was sipping an espresso from a lacquered demitasse cup. He stood upright behind his desk, as ever.

  “Beau! Thanks for waiting.”

  “It’s all right.” Even his graciousness felt ungainly, just as Will’s deliberate rudeness seemed almost like politesse. Such was the reverse-gravitational effect of power.

  “You want a coffee?”

  Beau shook his head. Will had had a machine, a big silver restaurant contraption, recently installed in his office. It sat on the marble counter along the room’s western wall, next to the fridge.

  “John’s worried. Advance word on the sequel isn’t great.”

  “Since when did the sequel require reviews to mint money?”

  Williams shrugged. “Everyone worries about something.”

  “You don’t.”

  The two of them were such opposites, but then that’s always the case. People saw Beau as the soulful one and Will as the Cold Sensei, complementary clichés that were almost, but not entirely, accurate.

  “You never worry, Will.”

  “You don’t know me,” Williams shook his head. He sipped again. “After all these years.”

  “I think I do.”

  All Beau had wanted, going in, was advice. And maybe that was all Will wanted to give him. His clients were flying and would Will, his friend and supporter for many years, whose hand was forever steady on the tiller, help him? This was Beau’s gentle intent. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d asked for assistance, and besides, agents were necessarily embattled. It was the business. Look at Sam, who soldiered on—still!—when American Dream Machine had raided his agency’s stable until it was almost bare. Sam was so old he could barely keep his head off his leather blotter, probably needed his assistant to dial the phone because he couldn’t see the keypad’s numbers. Why quit?

  “I . . . Will, I need—”

  Beau opened his mouth. His partner just stood behind his desk, set his cup down on its white saucer, and watched. That great, immaculate slab of a desk, that black block of marble seemed suddenly like a tombstone! He could practically see the dates chiseled into it.

  “I have to leave.”

  “Back to New York? You waited an hour to tell me that?”

  “From the company. I have to go.”

  Williams’s turn to stare. “Are you nuts?”

  His office was cooler than Beau’s. It faced northeast, and the brown towers that rose both opposite and next door blocked the midday sun. Williams swam in its reasonable light.

  “Say you’re kidding.”

  “I wish I could.”

  Williams walked over now and sat down on the green couch. He beckoned for Beau to do the same. For a moment they arrayed themse
lves almost like lovers, Williams turning to face his partner as his fingers winnowed his longish hair.

  “Don’t say that. It isn’t possible. This company isn’t itself without you.”

  “It isn’t itself with me anymore, either.”

  Above them hung a painting by Ed Ruscha, a set of red letters arranged vertically, diminishing in size against a black background:

  The word tapered to a point over Beau’s head, like a dagger that might be driven into his skull.

  “I need you.” Williams leaned forward. “Beau, please.”

  A born king, was Williams. A man cut like a diamond, with all his radiant and slippery faces. But just because my father was being impulsive, this doesn’t mean his decision was ill considered. He’d thought of it often, for a while he’d dreamed of it almost daily. The liberation was all in his being able, at last, to say it.

  “I’m sorry, Will. I truly am.”

  “I am too.” Will sat back and exhaled. “I am too.”

  Who betrayed who here? I’ve scrutinized this moment my entire life, searching for its small seams. I don’t think I’ve ever understood, really, which of these men was more murderous, which truly mad.

  “I could tell you why,” Beau said. Calmly. “We’ve lost our way.”

  “I’ll give you twenty-four hours.” Stung, Williams ignored his words and pinned him with a clarifying stare. Eyes as hard as agates. “Perhaps you should reconsider.”

  “I don’t need twenty-four hours.” Beau levered up. “We can sort out the details later, what to do with my stake.”

  “Your stake.” Will spat this word out with a vehemence that suggested, also, its alternate definition: something you’d drive into a vampire’s heart. Beau just looked down at his partner and blinked. His gaze was almost pitying.

  “I love you, Will. I always did. Even when I married Rachel, and you were there, I may have loved you better. You were who I wanted to become.”

  “Pity you didn’t.”

  Such hatred from Will. Where he, too, had once loved Beau like a brother.

  Beau strode toward the door. “You’ll hear from Bert in the morning,” he snapped, referring to his attorney.

  “It’ll be too late.”

  “It is already.”

  It had been for a while. With his heart broken so violently, as it had been before their partnership’s beginning, Beau hardly needed the company to do it again. He unknotted his tie and he strode into the elevator, across the building’s lobby, then into the breeze-way to the garage before he dropped his briefcase and exhaled. My God, he was free! He stood there on the brick-brown tiles, panting. And then he practically skipped to his car. A seraphic blond toddler pointed as he passed, as if to say, Look, Mommy, look. Look at the happy fat man!

  XII

  BEAU CAME HOME in the fall. Severin came with him, though I hardly recognized my brother when he landed. They’d spent the summer bunkered up in New York, where Beau fought the very battle you’d expect against Will. He had a good attorney, he had a big and brazen mouth, he had a renewed sense of purpose. He hadn’t felt this much like himself since the old days, the old old days at TAG. He called everybody he ever knew: Mike Nichols, Elaine May, Bob, Marty, Other Bob, Sidney. Full of beans and hopped up on hotel coffee, he made his move.

  “Sweetheart? It’s Beau Rosers.” I can picture him now, leaning back, feet on the edge of his desk. “Listen, how would you like to play for another team? Same winning records, but different uniforms and stronger management.”

  You’ve seen the movies, you know how this goes.

  “Uh-huh.” A cloud crossed Beau’s face. “That’s true, but . . . ”

  Rocky punches the side of meat, Rocky runs up the Liberty Bell steps.

  “But . . . ”

  Rocky gets his sad Guinea ass handed to him on a platter.

  “I’m sorry to hear that. Really, I am.”

  Forget Dolph Lundgren, forget Brigitte Nielson’s tits, the true and original story of man is one of defeat. If you happen to prefer your stories true and original, that is.

  “We’ll stay in touch. Of course, Jill.” He downed a mouthful of tepid brown swill. “Call me if you change your mind.”

  Beau had so much going for him. All Will had were some old medical records, doctors’ bills, evidence of indiscretions past. Pit those up against a renewed sense of purpose, and guess who wins? I tell you, it wasn’t pretty.

  “Dude!” Severin came up to me on the first day of school and wrapped me in a choke hold. “What’s going on?”

  “Yo.” I writhed around so I could see him. “When did you get in?”

  Beau had “resigned” in July. I’d heard that from my mother, but he and Severin had been MIA for the last few months. I really didn’t know what had happened. And now I checked out Severin, emaciated and shorn. He looked hardcore.

  “What the fuck is with your hair?” I said.

  He shrugged. He’d shaved it all off, had nothing now but quarter-inch bristles. Young Williams came over too and gave him a hug.

  “Hey.”

  I guessed things were all right between them, even if the fathers were at war. Even if Will the Elder had just screwed the fat man out of his portion of the company. According to my mom, Beau had cashed out with a mere ten percent. There was a lot I didn’t know. All my gossip was secondhand.

  “You join the army, holmes?” Williams snorted.

  Once more, Severin just shrugged. “I’m learning to play guitar.”

  He’d ditched his glasses, wore Doc Martens too. There was something grimly studious, East Coast about him. For a moment we just stood, shuffling our feet on the royal-blue baize.

  “You look fucked up,” Williams muttered.

  Around us, the hallway thronged with young girls in bloom, the sound of metal doors banging shut, like options, around us. People disappeared into Kafka, into Dickinson.

  “I’m glad you’re back,” I said. But I really wasn’t. I slammed my locker closed, thinking how his return complicated everything. “I’ll catch you later.”

  Williams and I were cool, too. The fathers were at war, but that was a technicality. We knew enough then to keep our sins separate. But after all that, Severin and I just weren’t quite as close as we used to be. A small crack had appeared. I still went over to his house sometimes and hung out after school, but I was conscious of a change, one more small transference of power. He’d gained an edge over me that might’ve lasted a lifetime.

  On Thanksgiving weekend, Severin and I took LSD. Lying on the floor of his bedroom, exactly as we used to do. The room was a museum, with a baseball glove calcifying in a corner, a skateboard poking its scarred nose out from under the bed.

  “Where’s the old man?”

  “Dunno,” Severin muttered. “Upstairs, probably.”

  He was in seclusion. But Beau wouldn’t be a big part of my life until later. When our paths crossed at Severin’s, he nodded or tapped me on the shoulder and grunted. Heya, kid. I think I embarrassed him.

  “Doing what?”

  “The fuck should I know?” Severin’s eyes were narrow; mine were wide. “Dad shit.”

  “Dad shit?” I snickered. “What would that be, exactly?”

  We were tripping our brains out. Severin’s face was glowing bone, candescent under UV light.

  “I have no idea, man.”

  The air scissored with hallucination. The stereo played something grinding, abusive, a pulsating synth-drone and hiccuping vocals.

  “What the fuck happened in New York?”

  Sev shook his head.

  “Did Dad lose it, or what?”

  My brother didn’t have the answers. He was just witness to something I would come to believe was a crime. He never thought so.

  “Is Will’s dad fucking insane?” I said.

  Severin just started laughing again.

  “What is it?”

  But I knew. The air felt wet. Our own father was scarier, funnier, more radicall
y absurd when we were on acid than he was when we were off of it. Which was saying something.

  “Fuck!” I shouted, while my hand drew fleshy trails in the air. I lay it across my face like a starfish, like Alien. “Our dad!”

  “Yeah,” Severin chuckled. “He’s into some heavy, heavy Beau shit.”

  Later, oh later, I would find out what this meant. Beau had ECT that year, for cataleptic depression. My mother told me this, though not till I was an adult. But I understood that leaving ADM really tore him up. Beau shit. Heavy dad stuff. His own father finally died that year, and it affected him less. Most people thought Beau had hung himself with his own rope, that his long-simmering craziness had simply caught up with him. But I had my own ideas.

  “Do you think Williams pushed him out?” I asked my mother. “What do you think?”

  My mom was not the most reliable witness at that time, either. Her drinking had accelerated to the point she’d pour us both vodka tonics when I came home from school. She treated me more like a bar-stool companion than like a child.

  “Oh, Nate.” Her voice dripped contempt. “Why do you care?”

  “I care because . . . ”

  “You think there’s something in it for you? You think if you could get to the bottom of what happened at American Dream Machine it’d make a difference?”

  “No.” That was exactly what I thought, though. And I couldn’t help but think of Will as my own father too. I thought of his sanity and fate as being no less relevant than Beau’s.

  “Your father doesn’t give a shit about you. He doesn’t about anybody but himself.”

  My mother’s scorn was ill timed. Who knew how much had to do with Beau and how much was meant for Teddy, or herself? We were in the dining room, that former shrine to our domestic life, which was littered with tonic bottles.

  “You knew Will,” I said. “You were at TAG when he came.”

  She blew smoke. Liquor had carved deep furrows into the corners of her face, around her eyes and lips. It looked as if she was melting a little. Just forty-two, she was blowsy and haggard, with the derelict beauty you saw in certain actresses. The late Faye Dunaway.

  “I was.”