by John Dunning
Jordan agreed—the idea was perfect for radio. The difficult part would be the story, finding something that hit home and made the wartime point. But this came instantly. Rue said, “What about Georgie Schroeder? . . . He had a choice to make,” and in the long silence Jordan saw the entire play unfold in his mind. “I think she’s got it,” he said. “A young German American who gets pressured by the bund. Visitors come in the night. Windows are broken, the old folks terrorized. The wife’s threatened on the street by a pack of wolves.”
“That’s my part,” Rue said. “I’ve got squatter’s rights on it.”
“Keep him much more American than German,” Maitland said. “Not a hint of an accent; we want the listener to be on his side right from the start. Make the old folks Germanic, give them the accents, but even then make it crystal clear that they are true Americans. They came here forty years ago for all the things that are right with this country.”
“Good,” Jordan said. “At the end he has to make that choice. So he opens the door.”
“Good!” Maitland thundered. “Can you write it?”
“We just did.” He sat back, exhilarated. “I’ll have it in script by Tuesday.”
The talk turned to the war bond hour. Jordan had made a list of songs for Miss O’Hara to sing. He had her opening the show with “America the Beautiful,” coming back at fifteen with an extended medley—“My Country ’Tis of Thee,” “You’re a Grand Old Flag,” and “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” Then at midshow a collection of regional Americana—“Beautiful Ohio,” “Carolina Moon,” “California, Here I Come”—and for a smashing finale, “Dixie.” Maitland wanted only to reverse the medleys. “The ‘Battle Hymn’ has more smash today than ‘Dixie,’ and that’s what I want, a powerhouse effect as we get close to the end. I want every listener to sit up straight in his seat and think, Goddammit, that girl makes me proud to be an American—then get out of that chair and buy a bond.”
There was more talk of drama. Brinker enacted a scene from a story he had read, did it in perfect Irish brogue and from memory, and again Jordan realized what a special talent he was: shy in life, easy on the air. Jordan had been asked to bring a script for his upcoming colored show and they gave it a reading, gathering around an imaginary microphone while Stoner stood on a chair with a flashlight and lit up the script. Brinker read Blind Tom’s lines in a black voice as real as Eli’s, and Rue played the missus of the white family that had stolen Tom from his real blood kin. Pauline played Tom’s mother as if she’d been born in a Georgia slave shack and had never heard of England, and Rue stood mesmerized as these lines were read, and Jordan knew she had learned something tonight.
Maitland wondered if anyone had been assigned to direct. “I think it runs a little long,” he said. “I didn’t bring my stopwatch, but my gut tells me you’ll need to make some cuts to get it down to twenty-nine and change. Give yourself plenty of time at the table reading.”
That seemed to bring the evening to an end. Livia’s boys were asleep on the blankets and the bonfire had crumbled into deep red coals. Stoner looked at Becky but she shook her head and said, “This has been lovely, people, but I’ve got an early day tomorrow.”
“What’s going on?” Rue said.
“Nothing. Who said something was going on?”
“Well, listen to yourself. You get a look from Gus and suddenly you get all jittery.” She looked at Stoner. “Gus?”
“It’s nothing,” Becky said. “Kidd asked me to go through the files and weed out some old scripts. I found one I thought was special, and I asked Gus and Jordan and Dedrick not to say anything yet.”
“So show it to us, we’ll give it a reading. That’s why we’re here.”
“I haven’t got it anymore. Kidd saw it on my desk and took it away from me. Look, I don’t want to talk about it. I’m a little disappointed that I lost it like that, so I’d just as soon we dropped it.”
“At least tell us what it’s about.”
“I’m not supposed to.”
“What do you mean you’re not supposed to? You can’t even talk about it?”
“Apparently not.”
“And you’re the only one who’s read it.”
“I guess Kidd read it. He seemed to know it well enough when he saw it on my desk.”
“You mean like, Oh my God, what’re you doing with that?”
“Something like that.”
“And he didn’t even know it had been there in the files, is that what you’re saying? That means he’s got another copy. What was yours, an original?”
“Mimeo.”
“Which means they okayed it for production, way back whenever, and made at least one copy. Then never put it on. Is that what you’re saying?”
“That was my impression, from the notes and correspondence that were there in the file with it.”
“And you’re not going to tell us about it.”
“He told me not to. He was very clear about that. Do you want me to get fired, Rue, just so you can satisfy your curiosity?”
Rue looked at Livia. “Damn it, I hate stuff like this. Secrets. You see how it gets, Liv? You see how it gets? Something’s going on and we’re the last to know. Come on, Jimmy, let’s get out of here.”
( ( ( 20 ) ))
FRIDAY was always his busiest day. Saturday, his new day off, that went on without end. He welcomed Sunday like a long-lost friend. He arrived in darkness, at four forty-five, and found his cast already at work on the soundstage. Emily Kain, Eli’s sister, was reading from the script at the center mike. Occasionally she broke away from her reading to ask a question, and Waldo would do his best with it. Across from Emily, at a second mike three feet away, Ali Marek began the long, painful monologue that would close the show. Her role was pivotal. She was only twenty-three but she would play Blind Tom’s mother, Charity Wiggins. She’s going to be great, Jordan thought: she would be a superb actress if they let her.
Eli stood off-mike, his part done. Blind Tom was one of the Bethunes now as the play ended: his European tour alone had made them at least $100,000, but Tom and his blood kin had seen none of it. Eli was going to be the weak link, adequate maybe, but far too nervous to rise to the performance that Ali Marek would give as his mother. He’s in love with her and that’s a hindrance, Jordan thought; they are kindred spirits even to the sound of their first names, but he’s thinking too much about acting and not enough about the man he needs to become.
The fourth player was Rudo Ohlson, a light-skinned Negro who spoke with a trace of Jamaican. This he lost in the role of Tabbs Gross, a black man who had filed a lawsuit on Tom’s behalf, trying to get him away from the Bethunes. That had worked about as well in 1865 as a man of 1942 might expect.
He waited until Ali Marek had said her final lines, then he walked down to the soundstage in the sudden quiet. “Mornin’,” he said, nodding to each of them. “Y’all must’ve slept here tonight.”
He could see the fear in Waldo. It had probably been building all week. Waldo nodded distantly and said, “We been here awhile.” There was an awkward moment as they all struggled with their barriers. “You’re sounding good,” Jordan said, and Waldo tried to smile. “I don’t think we’re ready to take it to Broadway yet. But that was a helluva play you wrote for us.”
“I don’t think the play’s ready for Broadway either,” Jordan said. “But you all sound great, and I think this may be the most exciting thing ever heard at eight o’clock on Sunday morning.”
They all laughed and that got the ice broken. Jordan and Waldo came up on the soundstage and they sat at the table with the cast hunkered around. The first order of business was choosing a director. He had a hunch Maitland might show up and hoped he would, but they had to assume they were on their own. “I never done any directing, not for real,” Waldo said. Jordan hadn’t either but he had seen plenty done in the month, so the division of chores settled itself. Waldo would run the board and Jordan would point the cues.
&nb
sp; The first table reading went quickly. Eli blew some lines but Jordan motioned for him to keep going. While they read he ticked off places where the script might be shortened. At six o’clock Becky Hart came in, wearing a stopwatch on a long string around her neck. Jordan felt a flush of gratitude. Livia arrived. She had already read her script and had marked it profusely for sound effects. She had never met the cast and Jordan made the introductions, and they all shook hands and tried to share a few easy moments over coffee. Then Livia moved over to the soundman’s section and began rigging her microphones.
“Let’s give it a dry run before the organ man gets here,” Jordan said. “Then we’ll do a dress and by then we should be ready.”
They began. “Just keep it going,” he said, warming to it. “Don’t bother about fluffs, just talk over ’em. Keep it natural, Eli, just stay loose. You sound fine.”
He began timing his cues and Livia started throwing them some sound. In the corner of his eye he could see her cuing up records and trying out some manual effects. They reached the midpoint break. There’d be no sponsor, just a pause with music between the acts. Jordan said, “Let’s take five here,” and when he turned he saw Barnet standing behind him.
“So the blind leads the blind. Who told you to rehearse the cast, Ten Eyck?”
“Wasn’t I supposed to? You never said we’d have a real director.”
“You never asked.” Barnet came to the edge of the soundstage and beckoned Waldo out of the booth. “I’ve got a good mind to let you people actually try this by yourselves. Then we’d see a spectacle. You—what’s your name?”
“Waldo Brown.”
“Well, Waldo Brown, do you have any idea what you’re doing back there? Never mind. I’ve got one of Stoner’s new men coming in to run the board. No offense, but it’s a little more complicated now.”
“I guess we had a communications problem,” Jordan said. “It’s my fault.”
“Yes we did and yes it is,” Barnet said. “Have you been taking the time, Rebecca?”
She raised her watch.
“Then let’s go ahead from this point. See if it makes any sense.”
They were all shaken now. Becky clicked on her watch and Eli began to read. He stumbled over a word and stopped. Becky clicked off the watch. Eli stood frozen. Barnet had hand-motioned everyone into silence. He stared at Eli without mercy, waiting for a voice to return.
“I need some water,” Eli said.
“You listen to me now,” Barnet said. “If you do this on the air I will strangle you with my bare hands. Do you hear what I’m saying?”
“You’re not helping him much, Clay,” Becky said.
“Let’s move on.”
Becky came up to stand beside Barnet now, encouraging Eli with her eyes and clicking off the watch whenever they broke away to discuss a point. When Ali Marek read her last line, Barnet spread his arms wide. “Hallelujah! Music up and out, over to the network, and thank God for small favors. How’d we do on time?”
“Thirty-three twelve.”
Barnet gave Jordan a withering look. “Do you always overwrite this much, Ten Eyck?”
“We were just about to make some cuts.”
“Then let’s cut the goddamn thing and get it done while there’s still something left of the day. I think the mother’s part’s going to have to come way down.”
“She’s the best thing on the show,” Becky said.
“Maybe so, but that closing speech goes on way too long.”
“But it’s the whole point of the play.”
“We can cut it in half, save a minute right there, and still make the point. Some of her lines in the middle can be trimmed as well.”
“I can cut it,” Jordan said. “Give me a few minutes with it, I know what to do with it now.”
“Cut the mother’s part. No offense to you—what’s your name?”
“Marek.”
“Well, Marek, you read a line well enough, but this . . . story . . . isn’t about your character, is it?” He nodded at Eli. “It’s about his. It seems the author made an error in construction. In the throes of creating timeless dialogue, he forgot who his main character is.”
“You’re right,” Jordan said. “I see that now. I can cut it.”
“All right, the rest of you take five. I’m going to get some coffee.”
Jordan sat at the table and in two minutes he had cut his script from eighteen pages to sixteen. He lost some of Ali Marek’s good lines in the center, but by spreading the cuts he was able to keep the closing intact.
It was now quarter to seven. Leland Jewell came in, picked up his music, and sat on a stool between the organ and the piano. The piano was vital to this show: it was the spirit of Blind Tom Bethune, a fifth member of the cast. But when Leland spun into his piano and ripped off some of Blind Tom’s old pieces, Jordan felt his spirits rise. Leland was a pro: the music would be fine.
The engineer arrived: some kid with a military deferment hired by Stoner just last week. They shook hands, the kid said his name, Joe Carella, and Jordan walked him across the soundstage making introductions.
Barnet came in and called them together. “How’s the script looking?”
“It should be right on the money now.”
“Then let’s go through it. Cast, get your pencils and make the cuts as we come to them.”
Jordan shuffled his pages. “Page seven, lines 156 through 161. All of page eight down to line 171. Two lines on page nine, 183 and 184. And there’s a place on page ten that can be cut or left in, depending on the time. Lines 192 through 197.”
“What about the ending?”
“This seems to do it. I don’t think we need to mess with the ending.”
Barnet simmered. “From the depths of his wisdom the master speaks. Did I not make myself clear when I said cut the ending?”
“You asked for a three-minute cut.”
“Listen, you. When I tell you where to cut a script, I goddamn well want it cut there. Now let’s go through it again.”
“It’s getting late,” Becky said. “We’ve still got a dress to do.”
“We can’t rehearse until we’ve got a script.”
“Excuse me,” said Joe from the booth. “I need some mike levels.”
“Just hold your horses.” Barnet picked up his script. “Now. Let’s put the cuts back in on page eight and take out everything on page eighteen after line 313.”
“All right, Clay, you’re the director,” Becky said. “But I think it’s a much weaker show that way.”
“I agree with Becky.” It was Livia, across the stage.
Barnet ignored them. “Now we have our script. Let’s give the engineer his levels and get this done.”
The cast took their positions around the three standing mikes. Each of the microphones was tested, as well as the two in sound and the two at the organ and piano. Barnet walked around, drawing a few curtains, and finally he joined Joe Carella in the booth. Rudo, who would also announce, came to the center microphone and nodded that he was ready.
“All right, cast,” Barnet said through the intercom. “We’re running late, so let’s do this thing right the first time. Thirty seconds.”
A spate of coughing. “Coming up,” Barnet said.
It began with an old slave song and segued into a thundering organ crescendo as Rudo boomed the opening title. Nice, thought Jordan: Leland had written the music especially for the show, and it gave them an important heft right at the top. But Barnet waved angrily and shut it down.
He stalked out of the booth and went over to confer with Leland. This went on for many minutes, with Leland improvising and Barnet waving for new silence. Becky looked at the clock as Barnet continued his harangue. “This is not the goddamn Cavalcade of America, Mr. Jewell, no matter what Ten Eyck may have told you. Don’t make it boom, don’t puff it up, don’t give it any exaggerated importance.”
“Come on, Clay, give us a break here,” Becky said. “Just ease up a lit
tle. We’re running out of time and everybody’s tense. This is going to be a difficult, important show . . .”
“You’ve got that half right. It is going to be damned difficult, it’s going to be just about impossible to make this thing into a half hour that anybody outside of Harlemville U.S.A. will want to listen to. Just don’t try to attach any importance to it, Rebecca, because you risk your own credibility when you do.”
Back in the booth then for a new intro. Leland played a watery variation of what he had done, and the story began.
It was good. Stoner had been right, it was going to be a decent show in spite of the tinkering. The cast was rising into it, even Eli sounded better. But again Barnet shut them down.
“You sound like you’re reading, Mr. Kain. The trick is to read without sounding like it. Let’s try it again, top of page two.”
Becky clicked her watch, but Eli had been shaken and missed his cue. Ali Marek leaned in and whispered something behind her hand.
“No coaching, Marek.”
They waited. Eli dabbed his eyes.
“Are you going to be all right, Mr. Kain? If you’re not, now’s the time to say so. It’s a simple reading job, couldn’t be easier.”
“I got some sweat in my eyes.”
“Don’t sweat,” Barnet said. A funny line but nobody laughed.
“Maybe Ten Eyck can read the part,” Barnet said. “I hear he’s a budding radio star. Apparently he wowed the morning crowd the other day.”
Barnet made a what’s-it-gonna-be gesture. “It’s probably not too late to call Mr. Stallworth. He always does well in roles like this.”
What an insult, Jordan thought. What an asshole this guy is.
“You . . . Waldo Brown. Can you play this role?”
“I wouldn’t think of it.”
“Then we’re stuck with you, Mr. Kain.”
Suddenly Ali Marek threw her script down. “For God’s sake leave him alone.”
Barnet blinked and leaned toward the glass. “What was that?”
“She said leave him alone,” Jordan said.
