Heaven and Mel (Kindle Single)

by Joe Eszterhas

  MEL'S BACK, WITH HIS OLDER SISTER, Maura, and his brother-in-law, Sean. His other guests quickly arrive: Tom, an old friend from New York, and two priests. One is from Nebraska and the other is from India, the temporary pastor at Mel's privately built church in Agoura Hills.

  Naomi and Maura, who get along instantly, make the salad. Mel makes the pasta: Linguini with garlic and olive oil. The dinner is good and pleasant. There is wine but I notice Mel drinks none of it. He drinks coffee — many cups of it — and he smokes nonstop. It reminds me of how obsessively I used to smoke.

  Mel's brother-in-law, Sean, and I hit it off instantly too. We talk boxers and boxing: Hey, Roberto Duran was better than Sugar Ray Leonard — never mind what happened — and yes, the Ali-Liston fight was fixed. Easy conversation; laughs; fun.

  Afterwards, we're in the kitchen, sipping a little more wine. The Indian priest has sipped too much. He sits in the living room slumped, his head down. Or maybe he's praying.

  We suddenly hear a scream. It is loud, ear-splitting. It is a roar, a bellow. I recognize the voice immediately. It is the voice from the Mel/Oksana tapes! Mel Gibson in full, demonic fury! Mel Gibson gone berserk!

  * * * *

  "FUCK YOU!" HE SCREAMS. He screams/roars/bellows. And we see him now, between the dining room and the kitchen. He is screaming at the poor priest from Nebraska and at Tom, his friend of thirty years. He is out of breath, cigarette in hand, apoplectic, hyperventilating.

  "Fuck you!" he screams at the priest. "Get out of my house! You motherfucker! Fuck you! Fuck you!"

  The Indian priest in the living room, I see, sits there with his head down, obviously praying harder.

  Tom tries to calm Mel and now Mel screams at him: "You are not my friend! You brought this cocksucker (the hapless Nebraska priest) into my house! Get out of my house! Get him out of my house! I am fucking serious!"

  We hear Mel yelling outside chasing the unfortunate Nebraska priest and his old friend Tom toward the guest house above the garage.

  Mel's screams outside gradually stop and we decide — hesitantly — that we'll stay the night.

  The Indian priest still sits on the chair in the living room, but he's no longer praying. His mouth is open and he's snoring.

  * * * *

  Maura leaves and Naomi and I are alone in the guest bedroom. I say to her, "We should leave now!"

  Naomi says, "But he's out there! In the darkness! We'd have to call a cab and get our bags!"

  "The hell with the bags," I tell her. "We'll just leave now and have our bags picked up tomorrow.

  Naomi says, "I'm scared to go out there."

  * * * *

  I TRY TO LOCK THE DOOR to our room but the lock doesn't work. I look around for some kind of a weapon. But all I can find is a golf club. I place it next to my side of the bed.

  We shut the light off and hold hands. My rosary and Naomi are in my right hand. I keep my left one around Mel's golf club.

  As I fall asleep, I wonder if the Indian priest will still be out there snoring in the morning.

  * * * *

  IN THE EARLY MORNING, I hear voices in the kitchen. Naomi is already awake.

  "I'm going to go out there," I say, "to see what's going on."

  "Oh great," she smiles, "leave the golf club."

  I walk out to the kitchen warily and see that Mel is out there already with his old friend Tom and the poor priest from Nebraska. The Indian priest is nowhere to be seen so he's either praying in some other part of the house or is gone.

  Everything is hunky-dory, as they used to say. Mel is smoking like a chimney already and trying to get his new espresso machine to work. Tom and the priest are all smiles and trying to give Mel tips on how to work the machine. The instant they see me, all three of them look at me like I'm the guy who's ruining their little party.

  "I'm sorry," Mel says sheepishly. "I really am. I apologize."

  I nod and Mel looks away and says, "Naomi probably doesn't ever want to see me again."

  "Well," I say, "you can apologize to her too."

  He looks at me evenly, like he isn't too thrilled about what I just said to him.

  * * * *

  WE'RE GOING TO SUNDAY MASS at Mel's church, The Church of the Holy Family, in Agoura Hills, a twenty-minute drive from his house in Malibu. It is the church Mel built from the colossal profits of "The Passion."

  Mel drives, smokes, and hawks up phlegm. I sit next to him in the Lexus, Naomi sits in the back.

  Mel swerves wildly around the traffic on Kanan Dume Road and talks about his church: "I was driving around Calabasas and Agoura Hills with one of my boys and I saw a beautiful spot up the hill from the road. It was perfect, but I didn't know if it was available. I knew I had to find out. But I got busy with one of my movies and I sort of forgot about the land. I was away on the shoot and Robyn calls one day and says she's found the perfect piece of land and it's available. I said, 'If you really feel that strongly about it, then buy it.' And she did. When I got back from the shoot, I got real busy and I forgot all about the land again. One day Robyn said, 'The land — the church land — you've never seen it!' So we drove on out there. It was the same property that I'd seen. We knew then that God had chosen it."

  Mel drives wildly over the swooping and dipping green-brown hills that lead from Malibu to Agoura Hills. The roads are full of weekend bikers who zip around us or stick close to the side of the road as Mel roars by them. He suddenly takes a sharp right and we head uphill on a long driveway with two security guards at the top. We pull up next to a small chapel and, as we get out, we see a helicopter up in the sky, right above us.

  Mel looks up at the helicopter and says, "Yeah, company."

  * * * *

  HE HURRIES INSIDE. "If you want to go to confession, you've got about twenty minutes."

  "I'm good," I say, "thanks." I don't say that if I went to confession it would take me significantly longer than twenty minutes.

  Mel wants to go to confession, so he hurries inside. Most of the fifty or so people in this little chapel wear suits and dresses, the women's heads covered with old-time Catholic chapel veils. I have the St. Joseph missal that Mel gave me in my hands when the Indian priest, looking more than a little tired, comes out with two altar boys. One of the altar boys is Mel.

  The Indian priest wears an ornate robe and faces away from the congregation, his back to us. The Mass is in Latin. Mel, looking a little jittery (maybe from his many cups of espresso), wearing jeans and a shirt, hurries around the altar trying to help the Indian priest.

  The priest has a thick accent, so he sounds like he is speaking neither Latin nor English. Occasionally the flutter of the helicopter outside muffles his voice.

  I watch Mel closely in his role as the altar boy. When I was a boy, I was an altar boy too. Now here Mel and I are, two aging Hollywood altar boys. Mel made "The Passion of the Christ," the ultimate crucifixion movie, and I'd written my own crucifixion scene that thankfully wound up on the cutting-room floor in… "Showgirls."

  * * * *

  WE'VE BEEN IN THE CHAPEL, but not the church — which is still being constructed and is not quite ready to open. The church is a hundred yards or so on a plateau uphill from the chapel.

  Mel will give us a tour up there, but first we're going to meet Mel's dad, Hutton, who is 90 years old. We meet him outside the chapel, where everyone is drinking coffee and eating sweets.

  Hutton is an elf-like little man with snow-white hair, a roseate complexion and Mel's baby blue eyes.

  Mel introduces us and Naomi drifts away toward Maura, her new friend, who is teaching bible class to a group of children.

  Hutton is lively and friendly and I tell him that Mel and I have been talking about the Catholic Church on the way over here. Hutton smiles pleasantly and says, "Did you know that Cardinal Ottaviani sat on Pope John Paul I's face and suffocated him so they could get the Pope they wanted, John Paul II?"

  I tell this pleasant little man that I didn't know that.
He says, "Well, it's true. Study up on it."

  I know that Hutton lived in West Virginia for a while, and since I'm from Ohio, I ask him if he liked West Virginia.

  He gives me an icy look with those blue eyes and says, "No, not really." Shortly after that, he moves away from me and talks to a group of other people. Standing by myself suddenly, I am left to conclude that no, Hutton really didn't like West Virginia.

  Naomi is still with Maura and the bible class kids and I see that Mel is sitting in his Lexus, parked by the chapel. I go over to him.

  He says, "Come on, I'll give you a tour of the church."

  I say, "Wait, let me get Naomi."

  He laughs and says, "The hell with Naomi, she'll find us," and laughs again.

  I look at him a moment and then I laugh, too. "I'm going to go get her or she'll kick my butt."

  Mel laughs again and says, "I bet she will. You'd better go get her."

  We meet Maura and Sean up at the unfinished church. It is spectacular, done in the finest taste, mostly stone and wood. A huge mural of biblical figures backdrops the altar, its centerpiece Moses.

  "You see the chandeliers?" Mel says proudly, "the same guy made it who made the ones in my house."

  We climb up to the balcony. The view of the mural is spectacular from here.

  "This is my favorite spot in the whole place," Naomi says.

  Mel says, "Mine too. Sometimes I come over here alone. I just come up and sit here by myself. It's so peaceful."

  I look at the mural from the balcony and think that one of these figures in the mural — a prophet maybe — looks like Mel.

  It reminds me of the church Naomi and I visited in Long Boat Key, Florida — Our Lady Star of the Sea — which boasts a similar mural behind the altar. Jesus is at the center of that mural. And Jesus looks like the spittin' image of Willem Dafoe, who played Jesus in Martin Scorcese's "Last Temptation of Christ."

  * * * *

  AS WE BEGIN TALKING in broad terms about the filmic possibilities of "The Maccabees," I realize Mel is badly distracted. It's not easy to get him to focus.

  He faces possible criminal charges for allegedly assaulting Oksana. He has continuing court hearings to attend that will decide who gets custody of their daughter, Luci, and he has serious business concerns: The word on his Jodi Foster film, "The Beaver," isn't good, and he has to do reshoots on the film that he himself has financed to the tune of $20 million — "How I Spent My Summer Vacation" — and in which he also stars.

  When we begin talking about "The Maccabees," he keeps veering off and talking about Catholicism.

  He asks me if I've had a chance to read the book he sent me about the Catholic Church — "The Robber Church" by Patrick Henry Omlor. I tell him I haven't had the time.

  "You should make time," he says, almost sharply, "you'll learn more about the Catholic Church from that book than from anything else!"

  He launches into a diatribe: He tells me that the mothers of the last three popes of the Catholic Church were Jewish.

  I say, "So what?"

  He blinks and says, "It's part of the historical record."

  "Even if it's true," I say, "it's not relevant."

  He says, "Check it."

  I say, "I will."

  He says, "There is a Jewish-Masonic conspiracy to destroy the Catholic Church."

  I grin and I say, "Aw, come on, man."

  He says, "The final architect of this conspiracy was John Paul II."

  I say, "John Paul the Great was one of the greatest figures in contemporary history. The man brought down Communism."

  Mel says, quietly, grinning, "He was the Antichrist. He was the Devil."

  I laugh and show him the John Paul medal I keep on the chain that attaches my wallet to my belt. He stares at the medal a long moment like he wants to exorcise it. And then he looks at me and smiles.

  John Paul the Great, who exorcised possessed priests without the public's knowledge, is now himself, the Antichrist, according to the man who made "The Passion of the Christ."

  * * * *

  "I GUESS WE JUST DISAGREE about John Paul," I tell Mel.

  He looks at me a little coldly and then he suddenly smiles. He says, "Tomorrow's going to be such a great day! I've got Luci tomorrow. She's coming over!"

  I'm dumbstruck by the sudden segue. In a split second he goes from hate… from a Jewish conspiracy, and the Antichrist… to love: To the little girl he obviously loves so much.

  His glowing smile at the prospect of Luci's arrival stays on his face so long and is so winsome that I have to smile with him.

  Then he says, "Did you like Hutton?"

  "I didn't really get a chance to talk to him at any length," I say… but I'm marveling at the sudden zippy transition: From John Paul the Antichrist, to Luci coming over, to Hutton.

  His thought process isn't linear. I wonder: Is it A.D.D.? Has something short-circuited upstairs?

  * * * *

  I GOOGLE HUTTON GIBSON, the elfin sparkle-eyed old man I met in church and these, I find, are some of the things that he has said:

  • "There were not that many Jews under Hitler's power, under his sway. They claimed that there were 6.2 million Poles in Poland before the war, and after the war there were 200,000, therefore Hitler must have killed six million of them. They simply got up and left! They were all over the Bronx and Brooklyn and Sydney and Los Angeles."

  • "The Holocaust — it's all — maybe not all — fiction. But most of it is."

  • "World War II was FDR's private war. He went there for money. The money power that runs this country. The Fed Reserve and those foreign bankers who own our currency and charge us for it. The foreign bankers who run the International Reserve like the Rothschilds and their allies who were Jews."

  • "There are too many Holocaust survivors. It's just a gimmick to collect money. They all look out for one another, you got to give them that. They are at the same time willing to sacrifice a few of their own if it helps."

  • "I don't know what their (the Jews') agenda is except that it's all about control. One World Religion and One World Government. That's why they've attacked the Catholic Church so strongly, to ultimately take control over it by their doctrine and make One World Religion and One World Government."

  • "The ones that we have there in the Vatican are all involved in the Jewish plot."

  • "To a Jew, a Christian commits idolatry every time he looks at a crucifix and says a prayer."

  • "I urge someone to go out and hang Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan."

  I find a website that calls Hutton Gibson "a Nazi" and I remember that my father, Istvan Eszterhas, was called "a Hungarian Nazi."

  I don't want to convict Mel of his father's sins, just as I wouldn't want to be convicted of my father's sins.

  But then, in my Google search, I find this quote from Mel: "I share my father's views because I believe them to be true."

  And I think to myself, I'm going to write a "Jewish Braveheart" for this guy?

  I hear my father laughing in his grave.

  * * * *

  MEL'S CHURCH BOASTS a holy relic no other church in the world possesses: Jesus's Crown of Thorns.

  No, not that one.

  Not the real one.

  But the one worn by that other J.C., Jim Caviezel, in "The Passion of the Christ."

  There it is, hanging above double doors that lead into the church. On display, the same way Planet Hollywood in Beverly Hills once displayed the ice pick I had conjured in "Basic Instinct."

  * * * *

  EATING IS AN ISSUE AT MEL'S HOUSE. Naomi and I aren't big eaters, but Mel eats less than we do.

  He drinks coffee and his health shakes all day, and mostly smokes instead of eating. The shakes he makes are filled with health foods and powdered substances. Sometimes he mixes avocado and coconut with everything else that he has in the refrigerator.

  He's always offering one of his concoctions to us. Being the Hungarian from Clevel
and that I am, I always say, "Not for me, Mel, I'm not drinking that."

  He always laughs and says, "Okay, big guy."

  He loves blueberries and coconut oil. He uses a lot of fake sugar. He eats everything with his hands, even steak and salad.

  He eats burritos and tacos, chicken and steaks, but little fish. He eats no sushi or sashimi. He says people who eat them, like Naomi and I, are "addicted to the parasite."

  He likes to make what we are calling "Mel's Eggs." It's bread with a round hole cut into it, fried in bacon grease with an egg cooked in the middle. He makes that several times for us, but he never eats any of it.

  Another night when we're about to sit down to eat in the dining room, Mel says, "This is a great room to pray in. I sit in this room a lot and say the rosary. I've even had Masses said in this room."

  It is the room where he screamed and went berserk at the priest the first night we were here.

  Another time, as we're about to eat, I say, "Let's say a prayer."

  I say the Our Father, the Hail Mary, and the grace before meals. And then I add, as I customarily do, "Thank you, Jesus — Thank you, Mary."

  Mel looks at us and says, "Geez, you guys are serious!"

  After dinner, he reaches into his pocket and hands me what he calls a "greenie." It is a green Blessed Virgin Mary scapular.

  I still wear it sometimes, as I still use the St. Joseph missal he gave me.

  * * * *

  LUCI COMES OVER WITH HER NANNY, Annie. Luci, two years old, is dazzling and gorgeous and so is Annie, the daughter of a preacher, in her early forties. She is a black woman married to a white man and, as I watch Annie, I try to forget the ugly racial epithet that Mel called black people in the Mel/Oksana tapes.

  Mel clearly adores his green-eyed, brown-haired little girl. He scoops her up and holds her high and he crawls around on the floor with her. He laughs with her and sings to her, tickles her and makes her laugh.

  I have seven children and I've tried to do the best I can to be a good and loving father… but I am mightily impressed with the way Mel is with Luci. What a wonderful dad! And how little Luci makes him smile!

  Mel Gibson has a lot of troubles besieging him, but this magical little girl seems to make him forget all of them.