Because of the personal nature of the story, Warren thought Shampoo was the perfect vehicle to launch his directorial career, but in the end lacked the confidence so hired Hal Ashby instead. For a week Warren, Ashby and Towne shut themselves away to get the script finished, working from nine in the morning till eleven at night. Creative differences still remained, however, between Warren and Towne. The writer always envisaged Shampoo as a Bergman-type film about relationships while Warren was keen to weave a political subtext into the narrative, a statement about the times. Towne was vehemently opposed to Warren’s vision. ‘He told me to do this and that,’ said the writer, ‘and we usually fought about it, and sometimes he really fucked things up.’ Their ‘discussions’ became more and more fierce. ‘You cunt!’ Towne was sometimes obliged to say to Warren. ‘You’re just being a cunt. That’s more cunt stuff.’
When filming began, hostilities broke out between Warren and Ashby. There was only ever going to be one winner: as producer Warren had hired his cronies in key positions and they’d tell Ashby what to do. According to cinematographer Haskell Wexler, a visitor to the set, ‘Warren chewed Hal up and spit him out. He was like an office boy on that set.’ Warren was able to seize creative control because Ashby hated confrontation of any kind, preferring to brood in a corner, anger and frustration squirming inside him. ‘I can’t take it any more,’ he told production designer Richard Sylbert. Well, he obviously could, because he finished the film, but it was a steep learning curve, and Ashby never lost control on one of his sets again, telling colleagues who stepped out of line, ‘Fuck you, this is what I’m gonna do; if you don’t like it, stick it in your ear.’
Warren also put Julie through the mincer on at least one occasion, keeping her waiting until the middle of the night to shoot and then making her endure thirty-eight takes. They do share one memorable scene. At a fundraising event she is seated between Warren and a fat-cat Republican. ‘I can get you anything you’d like,’ says the oily politico. Julie ponders the offer. ‘Well, first of all,’ she says, looking at Warren. ‘I’d like to suck his cock.’ It was the most brazenly sexual line ever heard in mainstream American cinema and caused quite a stir. When the studio saw it they were so shocked they demanded it be removed. Warren refused.
According to friends, Julie was weighing up the pros and cons of maybe getting back with Warren. During filming they stayed at the Beverly Wilshire, but on different floors. Warren seemed more interested in getting into the sack with current Miss World, twenty-year-old American Marjorie Wallace. One colleague said this of Warren: ‘He was afraid of commitment. This is a man who can only have an intimate relationship in a horizontal position. He thinks a hard-on makes for personal growth. He just wasn’t ready for Julie.’
On Shampoo Warren was working himself into the ground, as producer taking all the decisions, working round the clock, sleeping sometimes in his dressing room. But far from the pressure eating away at him, he thrived on it. Friend Buck Henry thought him, ‘psychotic’ about the possibility of overlooking anything, adding, ‘His attention to detail is maniacal. Easygoing is not a quality he has.’
Tony Bill, a former actor, now producer (with The Sting to his credit), was on the film for some five weeks and found Warren to be an extremely collaborative filmmaker. ‘He was a total professional, always talking with the director or the cameraman or the writer; Robert Towne was on the set a lot. So it was very collaborative. And despite being the star, Warren was very much one of the guys, not at all unapproachable or overly serious.’
Shampoo turned out to be a huge hit but critics complained that the performance was easy for Warren; after all, he was playing himself, wasn’t he? One magazine writer accused the star of exploiting his super-stud reputation. ‘I sent his wife a letter offering to do her hair,’ said Warren.
At the film’s premiere at the USA Film Festival celebrity journalist Don Aly, who has no hesitation in naming Warren Beatty the ‘stud-horse’ to beat them all, observed the great man in ‘action’ at first hand. Warren was attending a press conference. ‘I watched him sitting on stage, supposedly intently listening to questions. His eyes moved from row to row, but he was not looking at the folks asking questions. He was checking out the broads sitting there in their tempting low-cut frocks and new short skirts.’
The answers he gave were pap, almost rehearsed, then his attention was gripped by a pretty buxom blonde who looked like a young Jayne Mansfield and they got talking. ‘You didn’t have to hear what he said to understand what was happening,’ says Aly. ‘If you spotted Warren tossing his hotel keys in the lap of the girl with the big gorbanzas, then you pretty much understood what was coming down.’
When the press conference closed Aly followed the blonde out into the street, where she hailed a cab for Beatty’s hotel. He asked if he might share the ride and split the fare. ‘She seemed happy to do that, probably a little embarrassed that she was on her way to a little sex session with the great cinema lover!’ Aly knew that Warren was now dating Michelle Phillips and that she’d accompanied him to the festival, but when he hadn’t seen her at the press conference he’d assumed that Warren had left her behind in the hotel, as was his custom. ‘That, of course, left him free to womanise with whomever he wanted and make arrangements for secret meetings later. Frankly, I knew what Beatty had on his mind. And since I wasn’t privy to the exact relationship he had with Michelle, I didn’t know if they played these little ménage-à-trois games frequently or not.’
After the blonde made her way up to Warren’s room Aly decided to wait in the lobby to see what would happen, thinking it might make an amusing aside in his showbiz column. ‘And as it turned out, it did. Just a few minutes later the busty blonde stepped off the elevator and deftly deposited Warren’s key down a mail chute.’ Aly got talking to her again and she explained what had happened in Warren’s room. ‘I don’t know who that girl was up there,’ she said, rather frustrated. ‘I started to leave; I thought I had the wrong room.’ Aly nodded sympathetically, and grinned.
Back home, preparing for the premiere that night of Shampoo, Aly called a friend, actress Morgan Fairchild, ‘whom I know Warren put the hustle on on three different occasions. She turned him down each time, making her one of probably few women in Hollywood who had the gumption to say no.’ They’d first met when Morgan, a sixteen-year-old high-school student from Dallas, worked as an extra on Bonnie and Clyde. Arriving for her first day on location in Texas, Morgan was looking for the film crew when she noticed this guy shuffling toward her. ‘Is this the way to the set?’ she asked. The guy looked up, ‘Well, uh, yeah, yeah, the uh, it’s down that way,’ he said. ‘And I thought, my God, that’s the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen in my life,’ Morgan recalled. ‘And of course it was Warren. He just glowed.’
Aly told Morgan what happened with the blonde and that he’d also tried to get an interview with Warren but had been brushed off. ‘Why, that skunk!’ she exclaimed. ‘Tell you what we’ll do. I’ll call my sister and invite her to the premiere. When you walk into the theatre lobby with the two of us on your arms, Warren will be all over you in a New York minute. Don’t worry about a thing. We’re gonna have a ball.’
That’s exactly what Aly did, and when Warren saw them he made a beeline across the lobby and sequestered them in a corner. ‘Hey, baby cakes,’ he commented. ‘What’s shaking, baby cakes?’ The three of them just looked at one another and laughed and completely ignored Warren, walking right past him to their reserved seats.
Once the movie was over, Aly spotted Warren heading for the men’s room and followed him in. Standing side by side at the urinals Aly said, ‘Hey, guy, enjoyed the movie. Oh, by the way, I’ll give you Morgan’s phone number if you’ll give me a good quote.’ Warren shot Aly the old evil eye, zipped up his pants and prepared to leave. Then he suddenly stopped and turned round. ‘What’s the number?’ he asked. Aly wrote down the number of an escort service and gave it to him. ‘Warren gave me a quote, but I don’t u
sually repeat it in print or in mixed company. I never saw Beatty again and I’m glad. I think maybe he got the message. What a jerk.’
Ever since the LA Playboy Club opened on Sunset Strip in the mid-sixties Warren had taken good care to ingratiate himself with Hugh Hefner and his bunnies. More so at Hefner’s LA mansion, which during the seventies became one of the celebrity hang-outs. Jack was a regular visitor too, especially on Friday nights, when Hefner threw lavish dinner parties. One day Warren was ambling along with a bunny girl on each arm when he met Hef, who enquired, ‘Have you been robbing the hutch again, Warren?’
He also continued to cruise Sunset Boulevard with Jack, picking up girls. Time magazine reported that ‘an occasional recreation of [ Jack Nicholson] and Warren Beatty’s is riding around town, skunk spotting on the street.’ The New York Times added that Jack ‘still sophomorically goes on random girl-hunts in a car with his friend Warren Beatty’.
Early on in the relationship between these two movie titans there developed an unofficial competition about who could score with the most voluptuous beauties; it was an ongoing challenge. Some wondered how much of their reputation as cocks men was pure hype. Bruce Dern said, ‘Jack brags about a lot more pussy than he’s ever gotten. I’d say if you cut half of his pussy in half, you’d have it about right, and still he probably gets more than anybody around. He and Beatty have contests about it.’
Warren and Jack were now so inseparable that it seemed only a matter of time before someone put them in a movie together. They were the dream team, but the film they chose turned out to be a complete nightmare. It was called The Fortune (1975), a period screwball comedy, and Warren breezed into the boardroom at Columbia and got Jack his first mega-buck deal, $1.5m, the same amount he demanded and received for himself. Shell-shocked, one executive commented, ‘I don’t wish on my worst enemy negotiations with that man.’
In business Warren had proved himself a tough operator, someone who refused to make commitments and negotiated tirelessly to get his fees up. Warren wasn’t just smart and ruthless but also devastatingly charming: a dangerous combination. He got people to do what he wanted. He was also the most tuned-in celebrity in Hollywood. ‘Warren talked to everybody in town all the time, and always knew what was happening,’ recalled super agent Freddie Fields, whose clients included Newman, McQueen and Hoffman. ‘He knew about weddings before people got married, and about divorces before couples broke up. He knew who’d get a picture before they knew. He knew release dates and grosses. He’d talk to Jack Warner, Harry Cohn, to studio heads, and the guys running distribution. He was on the phone all day. Part of what drove him is paranoia. He needed information like he needed sex.’
Apart from a script that was never really ready, a further strain on filming was that Jack’s old girlfriend Michelle Phillips was now with Warren, as earlier she’d left Dennis to shack up with Jack. Feeling guilty, Michelle called Nicholson to make sure he wasn’t too hurt about her getting it on with his best friend. ‘I thought it was fabulous,’ said Jack. ‘Because I am fond of them both.’ According to Michelle, however, director Mike Nichols eventually had to bar her from the set because she’d show up and disappear into Warren’s bungalow, ‘And it was terribly painful for Jack.’
There’s a scene in The Fortune where Warren and Jack pass Stockard Channing back and forth between them like a football; some friends speculated that this reflected their attitude towards Michelle. This was unfair; Warren was genuinely serious about her. Jennifer Lee met Warren again around this time and recalls how deeply in love he obviously was with Michelle, though the old reprobate was never too far from the surface, suggesting they all have a nice friendly threesome. Jennifer was past all that; after numerous affairs she’d met the love of her life, comedian Richard Pryor.
Warren was determined that this relationship was going to work, though it didn’t bode well that, although Michelle and her young daughter Chynna moved into his home up on Mulholland Drive, he still spent most of his time at the Beverly Wilshire. At least he played at happy families, driving Chynna to school, helping her with homework, but blotting his copybook somewhat by the odd bit of blatant womanising. Michelle quickly concluded that to keep the errant Warren away from temptation she shouldn’t let him out of her sight.
When news broke that Warren and Michelle were preparing to marry it was a case of ‘we’ll believe it when it happens’. Both appeared to be serious, though, with Bali chosen as the perfect romantic rendezvous to tie the knot. On the flight over Warren started applying the brakes, talking about marriage as ‘a dead institution’, hardly a good sign for any potential bride. They returned to LA still single, and the press sensed storm clouds hovering. Warren waved them away, complaining that the media were behaving like ‘anxious mothers’ trying to push him up the aisle. Michelle felt different. ‘He prefers shallow, meaningless relationships,’ she said. ‘He thinks they’re healthier, or at least the only kind he can have. I don’t respect his lifestyle, but I don’t try to judge him.’ No one ever did.
In one week, I can put a bug so far up her ass, she don’t know whether to shit or wind her wristwatch.
Robert Towne was touting a new screenplay around town, a Chandleresque story about how fat-cat developers made LA into the city it had become, with a subplot about a father who’s screwing his daughter thrown in for good measure. His detective hero was very much written with Jack Nicholson in mind, to suit his ‘blue-collar arrogance’. Bob Evans over at Paramount couldn’t make much sense of the labyrinthine story, but he liked the title, thought it was catchy — Chinatown.
It was Jack who suggested Roman Polanski direct the film. At first he was hesitant about returning to Los Angeles, the scene of his wife’s terrible murder only a few years before. He was still damaged by it, carrying in his bag a memento of Sharon wherever he went, her knickers. Evans finally persuaded Polanski to fly over to discuss the movie. It was a depressing experience for him. ‘Every street corner reminded me of tragedy,’ the director said.
Jack got on well with Polanski, or ‘the Little Bastard’, as some called him, and adapted well to his martinet approach to directing. The feeling was mutual. ‘Jack’s on the wild side. He loves going out nights, never gets to bed before the small hours, and smokes grass.’ Jack did arrive late a few times when the call was indecently early, his eyes bloodshot, but he not only knew his own lines but everyone else’s. His lack of vanity also endeared him to Polanski, who insisted he spend half the movie with a large bandage on his nose, the result of a knife wound. He simply doesn’t care about the way he looks. With Jack it’s only the result that counts.
The real on-set fireworks were between Polanski and Faye Dunaway. Almost from the start of shooting she puzzled over her character’s motivation. ‘Say the fucking words,’ an unsympathetic Polanski shouted. ‘Your salary is your motivation.’ She also fussed excessively over her appearance. In one scene the actress couldn’t flatten a miscreant strand of hair that kept catching the light, so Polanski took matters into his own hands and ripped it out of her scalp. Faye couldn’t believe it, screamed obscenities at him and stormed off the set.
Relations were even worse after that. Faye and Jack were in a car waiting for cameras to roll. She needed to pee rather badly, but Polanski wouldn’t have it; he wanted the shot done. Faye wound the window down and threw a cupful of liquid in his face. ‘That’s piss,’ he said. Faye smiled. ‘Yes, you little putz.’ And rolled the window back up.
The explosion between Jack and Polanski that people were waiting for didn’t happen until near the end of the shoot. Jack’s beloved Lakers were playing a vital basketball game on TV and during filming he’d rush back to his dressing room to catch the latest score while Polanski fiddled about with the lighting. At one point he failed to return on time and Polanski stormed in and smashed the television to pieces. ‘You are an asshole,’ he fumed at Jack, hurling the smoking hulk out of the door. (The TV, that is.) Jack’s reaction was, in Polanski’s words, ‘
dramatic in its irrational fury’. He tore off his clothes in the full glare of everyone on the crew and walked off the set. Too mad to continue, Polanski quit too.
On the way home, Jack pulled up at some lights. Looking over, he saw Polanski in his car. The two of them stared at each other in silence. Finally, Jack mouthed the words ‘fucking Polack’. Polanski grinned and the two men burst into laughter as they drove off in opposite directions.
Still at his philandering best, boasting to one friend that a top fashion model had flown 10,000 miles just to spend the weekend with him — ‘What can I do, I’m hot!’ — Jack started to look for something a little more permanent. He found that special someone in Anjelica Huston, the daughter of veteran director John, who was a successful model at the time. They met at a party during the Chinatown shoot. It was instant attraction, he seduced by her feline sophistication, she by his hypnotic eyes and the famous Jack grin. ‘His whole face lit up when he smiled. I wanted him!’
Friends agreed that Anjelica was perfect for Jack, and it was her love and understanding that brought him out of the self-imposed shell into which he’d retreated after his break-up with Michelle Phillips, nervous about plunging into another long-term relationship. Theirs would be a tumultuous love affair that lasted, on and off, for the next seventeen years.
It was a playful one, too. At home with a Rolling Stone reporter Jack, dressed in a bathrobe, was showing off stills from his latest movie, including love scenes with the sultry Valerie Perrine. ‘Let me see that,’ Anjelica said. ‘No,’ said Jack, defending himself as Anjelica jumped at him on the sofa and they began to wrestle, she making a grab for the hem of his robe. ‘Help!’ Jack cried. ‘She’s trying to expose my wanker to Rolling Stone.’
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