Get Shorty: A Novel cp-1

by Elmore Leonard

  “Tom Cruise?”

  “Wonderful young actor, but that’s the problem, he’s too young for the part. I’ll have to show you my list, the ones I’ve considered are at least good enough and the right age. Bill Hurt, Dreyfuss, who happens to be hot at the moment, Pacino, Nicholson, Hoffman . . . Dustin I saw as a close second choice.”

  “Yeah? Who’s your first?”

  “Michael Weir, superstar.”

  Chili said, “Yeah?” surprised. He said, “Yeah, Michael Weir,” nodding then, “he’s good, all right. The thing I like about him, he can do just about anything, play a regular person, a weirdo . . . He played the mob guy in The Cyclone that turned snitch?”

  “One of his best parts,” Harry said.

  Chili was nodding again. “They shot that in Brooklyn. Yeah, Michael Weir, I like him.”

  “I’m glad to hear it,” Harry said.

  “He’s a different type than your usual movie star. I think he’d be good,” Chili said, even though he did-n’t know how to picture Michael Weir in this movie, whatever it was about. “Have you talked to him?”

  “I took a chance, sent the script to his house.” Harry sat back, brushing a hand over his frizzy hair. “I find out he not only read it, he flipped, absolutely loves the part.”

  “You found out—he didn’t tell you himself?”

  “Remember my saying I need half a mil? I have to deposit that amount in Michael’s name, in a special escrow account before he’ll take a meeting with me. This is his fucking agent. You have to put up earnest money to show you’re serious, you’re not gonna waste his time.”

  “That’s how it’s done, huh? Make sure you can handle it.”

  “It’s how this prick does it, his agent. He says, ‘You know Michael’s price is seven million, pay or play.’That means if he signs and for any reason you don’t go into production, you still have to pay him the seven mil. You make the picture, it’s released, and now he gets ten percent of the gross. Not the net, like everybody else, the fucking gross. Hey, but who cares? He loves the script.”

  “How’d you find out?”

  “From the guy who’s cutting the picture Michael just finished, the film editor. We go way back. In fact, I gave him his start on Slime Creatures. He calls, says Michael was in the cutting room with the director, raving about a script he had with him, Mr. Lovejoy, how it’s the best part he’s read in years. The cutter, the friend of mine, doesn’t know it’s my property till he notices ZigZag Productions on the script. He calls me up: ‘You’re gonna do one with Michael Weir? I don’t believe it.’ I told him, ‘Well, you better, if you want to cut the picture.’ I don’t know yet who I want as my director. Jewison, maybe. Lumet, Ulu Grosbard . . .”

  Chili said, “What’s it called, Mr. Lovejoy?”

  “That’s Murray’s title. It’s not bad when you know what it’s about.”

  Chili was thinking it sounded like a TV series, Mr. Lovejoy, about this faggy guy raising a bunch of kids of different nationalities and a lot of that canned laughter. He wondered if they got people to come into a studio, told them to go ahead, laugh, and they recorded it, or if they told them jokes. He remembered a TV program about how movies were made that showed people kissing their hands, the sound of it being recorded to go in a love scene the hand kissers were watching on a screen. Movies were basically fake. The sounds in a fight scene weren’t anything like what you heard nailing some guy in the mouth. Like the fight scenes in the Rocky movies, Stallone letting some giant asshole pound him, he’d be dead before the end of round one. But there were good movies too, ones that had the feeling of real life . . .

  Harry was saying once he had a development deal at a studio, that would satisfy Mesas, they’d quit bothering him. Harry saying now if he could get to Michael Weir through Karen he wouldn’t need to raise the half a mil . . .

  Wait a minute. “What?”

  “You knew she was married to Michael at one time.”

  “Karen? No . . .”

  “Four years, no kids. This is the house they lived in till Michael walked out on her.”

  “No, I didn’t know that,” Chili said. “So you want her to call him, set up a meeting?”

  “That’s all—put in a good word.”

  “They get along okay?”

  “They never see each other. But he’d do it, I know.”

  “Then what’s the problem? She won’t ask him?”

  “I haven’t asked her,” Harry said. “If I did, I’m pretty sure she’d turn me down. See, but if she thinks about it a while and it becomes her idea, then she’d do it.”

  “I don’t follow.”

  “That’s ’cause you don’t know actors,” Harry said, “the way their minds work. Karen can’t just call Michael up cold and ask him. She wasn’t even that talented—aside from having that chest, you might’ve noticed, which I think is what made her a fantastic screamer. But, she still has that actor mentality. Karen would have to feel the situation. First, she has to want to do it as a favor to me . . .”

  “For putting her in your movies.”

  “Yeah, and she lived with me too. Then, she has to have a certain attitude when she calls Michael, feel some of the old resentment. He walked out on her, so he owes her the courtesy of a positive response. You understand?”

  “You and Karen lived together?”

  “Three and a half beautiful years. So for old times’ sake Karen lays a guilt trip on Michael and I get a free meeting with him.”

  “Will she do it?”

  “She’s lying in bed at this moment thinking about it.”

  “It sounds like a long way around to get there,” Chili said, taking his time. He couldn’t see Karen living with this guy, even if he wasn’t fat then. He could see her with Michael Weir. He said to Harry, “Well, if she doesn’t want to help you for some reason, maybe I could talk to Michael, get you your meeting.”

  Harry said, “How? Threaten him?”

  “I’m serious,” Chili said. “I think I could get next to him, talk about that movie he was in, The Cyclone.”

  “How would you do that?”

  “You want to discuss Michael Weir or Leo the drycleaner? All that dough he’s carrying around? Came here with four hundred and fifty thousand . . .”

  Harry wasn’t saying a word now.

  “You’re thinking,” Chili said, “what if I was to put you next to the drycleaner. Ask him what he’d rather do, invest his dough in a movie or give it back to the airline and do some time.”

  Harry squirmed around in his chair saying, “It did cross my mind.”

  He reached for the pack of cigarettes and tore it open to get at the last one.

  “Except I know it would bother you,” Chili said, “the idea of using money Leo got the way he did.”

  Harry said, “Well, you take my investors, if you want to get technical,” tapping the cigarette on the table, fooling with it, “or any investors. You don’t ask where their money comes from.”

  “Which brings us to the limo guys,” Chili said. “You want ’em to leave you alone, be patient. The time comes to do the Freaks movie, okay, you’ll give ’em a call. But right now you’re into something does-n’t concern them.”

  Harry looked like he was afraid to move, hanging on every word.

  “See, what I could do is talk to the limo guys along those lines,” Chili said, “make the point in a way they’d understand it.”

  He reached over to take the cigarette from Harry’s fingers.

  “You gonna smoke this?”

  “No, it’s yours.”

  Harry struck a match to light it.

  “What would you say?”

  “I’d tell ’em it’s in their best interest, till you’re ready for ’em, to stay the fuck off your back. Isn’t that what you want?”

  “You don’t know these guys.”

  “It’s up to you, Harry.”

  Chili watched Harry’s gaze follow a stream of smoke. Harry the producer, with his f
orty-nine horror movies and his frizzy hair, looking at the offer. His gaze came back to Chili, his expression tired but hopeful.

  “What do you get out of this?”

  “Let’s see how we get along,” Chili said. “I’ll let you know.” He thought of something that had been on his mind and said to Harry, “The seven hundred-pound broad that seduces guys in her trailer—what exactly does she do?”

  Karen felt the bed move beneath Harry’s weight. Lying on her side she opened her eyes to see digital numbers in the dark, 4:12 in pale green. Behind her Harry continued to move, settling in. She watched the numbers change to 4:13.

  “Harry.”

  “Oh, you awake?”

  “What’s going on?”

  “It’s late—I felt you wouldn’t mind if he stayed over.”

  “Harry, this isn’t your house.”

  “Just tonight. I put him in the maid’s room.”

  “I don’t have a maid’s room.”

  “The one back by the kitchen?”

  There was a silence.

  “I don’t get it.”

  “What?”

  “This guy—what’re you doing?”

  “He’s got some ideas, gonna help me out.”

  “Harry, the guy’s a crook.”

  “So? This town he should fit right in.”

  Harry rolled away from her, groaning in comfort.

  “Night.”

  There was a silence, the house quiet.

  “Harry?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What’s going on?”

  “I told you.”

  “You want me to call you a cab? You and your buddy?”

  She felt Harry roll back toward her.

  9

  Chili asked Harry if he liked to sleep in. He said, “If you’re gonna sleep in and 1 have to sit around waiting, forget it. Anything I can’t stand is waiting for people.”

  Harry acted surprised. He said it was only ten after ten. “I got back in bed and Karen wanted to talk.”

  That stopped Chili.

  He wanted to know if Harry was putting him on or what. He couldn’t imagine Karen letting this fat guy get in bed with her. But there was no way to find out if it was true.

  He said, “Well, she was up, no problem. She dropped me off to get my car. I come back and have to sit here another hour.”

  Harry said the limo guys never got to their office before ten-thirty eleven anyway. Then they’d discuss for about an hour where they were going to have lunch and take off. He said it didn’t matter what time you went to see the limo guys, you always had to wait.

  Chili said, “Harry, we don’t go see them. They come see us. You want to make the call or you want me to?”

  Now they were in Harry’s office: upstairs in a two-story building that was part of a block of white storefronts, on Sunset Boulevard near La Cienega. Harry turned on lights, wall sconces in the shape of candles against dark paneling, raised venetian blinds behind his big desk stacked with folders, magazines, scripts, papers, unopened mail, hotel ashtrays, a brass lamp, a clock, two telephones . . .

  “Remember 77 Sunset Strip on TV? Edd Kookie Byrnes, the parking attendant always combing his hair?”

  Harry nodded out the window.

  “They used a place right across the street for exteriors. I used to stand here and watch ’em shoot. Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., and Roger Smith were the stars, but the one you remember is Kookie.”

  “I wanted blond hair just like his, with the pompadour,” Chili said. “I was about ten,” He watched Harry staring out the window. “What about the script?”

  “That’s right,” Harry said, “you haven’t read it.”

  “I don’t even know what it’s about.”

  Going through the pile on his desk, Harry said he hadn’t been in the office much lately and his girl, Kathleen, had left him to work for the guy that owned the building, a literary agent who’d been working in Hollywood over fifty years. Had lunch at Chasen’s every day, or he’d call and have them deliver. Scallops and creamed spinach. Go down the hall right now—Harry bet that’s what he’d be eating, scallops and spinach. “I asked him one time what type of writing brought the most money and the agent says, ‘Ransom notes.’ ”

  “What about the script, Harry?”

  The guy’s mind was wandering all over the place. In the car on the way here, Harry had started talking about Mr. Lovejoy, the story, but was barely into it when he said, “The famous Trocadero once stood right there,” and the ride to the office became a tour of Sunset Strip, Harry pointing out mostly where places used to be. Schwab’s drugstore. Ciro’s, known for movie-star bar fights, now the Comedy Store. A restaurant that was once John Barrymore’s guesthouse. The Garden of Allah, where movie stars used to shack up, now a bank and a parking lot. The Chateau Marmont was still there—look at it—home on and off to Jean Harlow, Greta Garbo, Howard Hughes, where John Belushi checked out. Harry wide-awake, but off into Old Hollywood. Then telling what it was like when hippies took over the Strip, little broads in granny dresses, traffic bumper to bumper. “By the time you got from Doheny to here, you were stoned on the marijuana fumes.” Chili reminded him the limo guys were coming at noon and Harry said, “Oh . . . yeah.”

  He poked through the clutter on his desk till he came to several Mr. Lovejoy scripts. “Here it is.”

  Chili picked one up, the first time he’d ever held a movie script in his hands. He had no idea what it would look like. It wasn’t as thick as he thought it would be, less than an inch of pages between red covers, ZigZag Productions printed in gold on the front with speedlines coming off the lettering, the way they showed cars moving in a comic strip. Chili opened the script about in the middle, studied the way the page was set up and began to read, not understanding the first word he saw but kept going.

  INT. LOVEJOY’SVAN – DAY

  Ilona sits behind the wheel watching the corner bar across the street. Behind her, Lovejoy is getting his video camera ready for action.

  ILONA How long’s he been in there?

  LOVEJOY (glancing at his watch)

  Seventeen and a half minutes.

  ILONA I wish he’d hurry up.

  LOVEJOY

  (focusing camera) We have to be patient. But sooner or later . . .

  ILONA There he is!

  LOVEJOY (quietly) I see him.

  EXT. CORNER BAR – CLOSE ON ROXY – DAY

  Roxy hooks his thumbs in his belt, looks about idly. Gradually his gaze moves to the van and holds.

  INT. LOVEJOY’SVAN – DAY

  Ilona reacts, hunching down behind the wheel.

  ILONA He sees us!

  LOVEJOY No, he’s walking to the car. Ilona, this could be it!!!

  Chili looked up from the script. “What’s he doing, following the guy?”

  “Read it,” Harry said. “It’s a grabber.”

  Chili closed the script, laid it on the desk where he stood between a pair of fat red-leather chairs, old and cracked. He said to Harry, “We better get ready,” placing his hands on the chairs. “Make sure they sit here, not over on the sofa.” He saw Harry tugging at the string to lower the venetian blinds. “Leave ’em up, we want the light in their eyes. I’ll be at the desk . . . But don’t introduce me, let it go, just start talking. You’re gonna be here.” Chili stepped back from the chairs. “Behind ’em when they sit down.”

  “They’ll be looking at you,” Harry said. “They don’t know who you are.”

  “That’s right, they’re wondering, who’s this guy? You don’t tell ’em. You’re on your feet the whole time. You say, ‘Well, I’m glad you assholes stopped by, so I can set you straight.’ ”

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “It’s up to you. You’re talking, relaxed, you stroll around to where you are now—all you tell ’em is the movie’s been postponed. Say, till next year, if you

  want. But don’t tell ’em why or what you’re doing.”

  “They won’t like i
t.”

  “They don’t have to. Just do what I tell you,” Chili said. “Okay, now the two guys. The one in charge is Ronnie? . . .”

  “Ronnie Wingate. That’s the name of the company, Wingate Motor Cars Limited, on Santa Monica.”

  Harry was poking around the desk again, straightening it up. Or nervous, feeling a need to be doing something.

  “Ronnie, I think of as a rich kid who never grew up. He’s from Santa Barbara, real estate money, came to Hollywood to be an actor but didn’t make it. He thinks he knows the business because his grandfather was a producer at Metro at one time. Now he’s after me to give him a part, wants to play one of the freaks.”

  “Why’s he scare you?”

  “I don’t trust him, he’s unstable. He’s close to forty, he acts like a burned-out teenager.”

  “Maybe that’s what he is.”

  “He has a gun in his office. He’ll take it out and start aiming it around the room while he’s talking to you. With one eye closed, going ‘Couuu,’ making that sound, you know, like he’s shooting.”

  “What kind of gun?”

  “I don’t know, an automatic.”

  “And the other one, Bo Catlett?”

  It was a familiar name. When Chili first heard it he thought of an all-star jazz drummer by the name of Catlett.

  “He doesn’t say much,” Harry said. “The only time he opened up, I happened to mention I was raised in Detroit and started out there doing movies for the car companies. Catlett said, ‘Yeah? I went to high school in Detroit. Loved it, like home to me.’ I told him I couldn’t get out of there fast enough. He said, ‘Then you don’t know it.’ Other times he’d call me Mr. De-troit. He might be Chicano or some kind of Latin, I’m not sure, but he has that look. Ronnie mentioned once Catlett had been a farm worker, a migrant, and a lot of them I know are Chicano. He’s tall, dresses up . . . You see Ronnie, the boss, he looks like he’s going out to cut the grass, Catlett will have a suit and tie on. In fact, almost always. Dresses strictly Rodeo Drive.”

  “Bo Catlett,” Chili said. The one he was thinking of was Sid Catlett. Big Sid.

  “Ronnie, sometimes he’ll call him Cat. He’ll say, ‘Hey, Cat, what do you think?’ But you know Ronnie’s already made up his mind.” Harry came away from the desk. “I have to go down the hall.”