The Autograph Hound

by John Lahr

  “Then I could pretend this never happened. I was never here. I could listen to Judy. I could watch her films. It’d be like she hadn’t gone away.”

  “She hasn’t,” says Probst. “With cable television, cassettes, tapes, there’s going to be more Judy Garland than ever before.”

  “I never thought of that,” says Gloria.

  “That tramp routine with her teeth blacked?” says Moonstone. “Corny, man.”

  “She made ten thousand dollars a night when she played the Palace,” I say. “She sang in E-flat. Her records on Decca sold millions.”

  A girl listening to Judy’s records on the pavement pushes up beside me. She’s wearing a lumberman’s shirt and blue jeans, with a black armband that says “33,000” and the word JUDY pinned over it. Her glasses are the wire ones. “I want to say something. If you’re not going to speak up for Judy’s soul, I will. Have you ever heard Edith Piaf? Helen Morgan? Marlene Dietrich?”

  “Sure.”

  “Well, Judy was greater! All her life she wanted to be free, to fly over the rainbow. Understand? Drugs helped, but she had a bad karma. Death was the great leap. She was free of her husbands, the networks, the star system. She was free because she chose freely. In that act, that last moment, Judy showed us how great she was, and how brave. She was liberated! No more pig capitalism, no more sexist guilt …”

  A Rolls Royce pulls up to the front of Frank E. Campbell’s. The sun shines off it. Television reporters, their hats tipped over their eyes from the glare, rush toward the car with their cameras.

  The girl keeps talking. I don’t have time to answer.

  “She was free. No more exploitation. No more media freaking. Now she can do her thing …”

  “Who is it, Benny? Can you see?”

  “I think that’s Judy’s Silver Cloud. It was custom designed for her.”

  “No kidding?”

  “See the running board. I rode three blocks when I Could Go on Singing premiered.”

  “You could’ve been hurt,” says Gloria.

  “The windows are bulletproof and electronically controlled. They have to be closed most of the time for the air-conditioning and hi-fi. Acoustics are very important to Judy. I had to push my pad through the side vent. Judy signed it.”

  “You really rode with her?” says Moonstone, opening his eyes. “Wow!”

  “Judy and I were friends. I talked with her many times. The car cost forty-eight thousand dollars. The bucket seats are made of kangaroo, the softest and rarest leather in the world.”

  “We got peacock leather at the Waldorf.”

  “Peacocks don’t have pouches. This was made from the kangaroo’s pouch where they keep the baby. Extra soft.”

  A lot of people are listening to me. “It’s a home away from home. A singer’s on the road a lot. The car’s got banked mahogany panels, twenty coats of paint, a television, a radio with tapes, a bar, a refrigerator that folds out of the arm rest, and an electric clock that chimes ‘Come Rain or Come Shine’ on the hour.”

  “That’s poetry,” says Gloria.

  “Is it stick or automatic?” says Macready.

  “This is a funeral, not an auto show!” the girl with wire glasses butts in.

  “I’d love to own that mother,” says Macready. “One big bet. That’s all I’d need. How do you think these rich guys do it? They don’t bet tens and twenties. They bet a bundle. When they hit, it’s a real jackpot.”

  “It’d cost a fortune.”

  “Whadda you know, Walsh?” says Macready. “Maybe I’d get lucky and hit the daily double.”

  “That’s a great human interest story,” says Probst. “I’m gonna take a picture of that car.”

  The girl shoves her face right up to mine. I can smell her toothpaste. “Judy’s dead! Don’t you see? She’s dead!”

  “Amateurs don’t understand, miss. When a person becomes a legend, everything about him counts. James Dean’s cigarettes—they called him the ‘human ashtray.’ Joe Namath’s alpaca carpet. Hugh Hefner’s round bed.”

  “You don’t know squat about history!” the girl screams.

  “Judy spent some of the best times of her life in that car. That’s a historical fact. I watched her grow. She’s as great after a performance as during it. The time I leaped on the running board, I could see her mouth moving. She was singing her heart out. When the window come down, I said, Judy, I’ve seen you six times in six nights. She smiled and pushed my pad (and pen) back. ‘Only see me once,’ she said. Do you get it? Once. I went to the show again. Nothing happened to me. She was better than ever. I passed the test.”

  “You don’t care!”

  “Don’t say that, ma’am.”

  “You don’t care!”

  “I’m waiting on line like you.”

  “Were you a member of her fan club?”

  “No.”

  “Do you own any of her records?”

  “No.”

  “Did you send a telegram of condolence to the family?”

  “No.”

  “Creeps! You don’t have any respect for the dead!”

  A man pulls the girl back into the crowd. I take out my pad and show my pages. “See how people write to me. ‘To Benny With Love,’ ‘To Benny Yours Truly,’ ‘To Benny the Best,’ ‘To Benny.’”

  “You think they’ll make us leave the line?” Gloria says, in a whisper.

  The crowd quiets down. “She’s a friend of mine, too. She’s a good woman. She’s a performer’s performer.”

  The people look away. They wouldn’t if Judy were right here signing my pad and wisecracking like the old days. People remember the times they’ve seen her. You’ve got it in your brain when you need it. She’s small, but somehow very large. I’d be in their dreams, too, next to Judy’s right hand, standing quiet until she gave me back my pen.

  Sypher’s saying, “These people really take Garland serious. You’re no legend unless you cash in on it. Tyrone Power—the Golden Shower, know what I mean? Garland never grossed as much as Connie Francis at the Empire Room. She never even got one commercial. The minute they do a TV spot, the autograph price skyrockets. She lost a lot of big opportunities. She could’ve grabbed the rainbow, but she blew it.”

  “Will you two stop it!” says Gloria. “You’re missing the poppies they’re unloading.”

  “The Boy Scouts of America recently planted thirty thousand flowers on the most deserted land in America,” says Probst. “It was part of the government’s beautification program.”

  “Poppies are for veterans,” says Sypher.

  “Judy was a veteran,” says Gloria.

  Miss Helen Hayes hurries past us with her son, James MacArthur. On stage she moves fast, too.

  I slip under the barricade and go after her. “Excuse me, Miss Hayes.”

  “Oh!” she says, and jumps back, shaking as if I’d hit her. I rush back to the line.

  I hate quick movements.

  The doormat says—

  FRANK E. CAMPBELL

  “The Funeral Chapel”

  It’s no chapel. It’s a hotel. High ceilings. Chairs with velvet covers, smelling dusty and perfumed. Tall men with slick black hair and pleated pants stand guard by the sign-in book on either side of the entrance. “Straight ahead and watch your step.”

  The voice sounds familiar. I ask if he’s in show business.

  “Straight ahead and watch your step.”

  I can see Judy’s coffin. It’s propped open like her concert piano. I thought I’d want to say good-bye to Judy, but I can’t. Some people kneel, others stand and gaze. I always think of Judy moving, I don’t want to see her still.

  “I wish I had a flower to throw,” says Gloria. “Aren’t you coming?”

  “I’ll wait here.”

  Gloria walks ahead on tiptoes. My last chance, but my feet won’t move. There’s a weight on my chest as if Mom’s cats had been sleeping on it all night.

  From here, all I can see is Judy’s nose. It
shocks me. If other people are looking at what I am, they should shut the coffin right away. The nose isn’t a nose. It’s a man’s ding-a-ling. Tears are in my eyes. People probably think I’m sad, but I’m laughing. People praying to a cock’s a scream. I got the giggles like this once before at Saint Luke’s kindergarten, when my thing got caught in my fly. Sister Angelica came into the bathroom and crossed herself. She slapped my hand for playing with it. “It got stuck.” She slapped my face. We walked three flights down to the Matron’s office. Sister Angelica tried to shade me with her big brown dress. She wouldn’t look behind her, and I was afraid to tell her to go slow. All the kids saw it. They came out of finger painting to look. The girls giggled. The boys giggled. I laughed, too, but then the pain hit me and shriveled me up.

  Sister Teresa finally got me free. It took her a long time because her crucifix kept dangling in the way. She said I should be ashamed of myself, and to use my will power. The next day at school, they caught George Sage and Mary Louise Rizzo kissing, and the class giggled about them. What’s so funny about a kiss?

  Gloria’s eyes are puffed and pink from crying. “They only gave me thirty seconds with Judy. The women in front got hysterical. The ushers grabbed them and took them away.”

  “You’d never raise your voice to Judy.”

  “I didn’t make a sound. All the time I was in front of the coffin, I was thinking the three Cs of ambulance emergency. Stay Cool, Calm, and Collected.” Gloria folds up her handkerchief smudged, with lipstick and puts it back in her purse. “Cotton tastes terrible.”

  “Was her nose strange?”

  “Everything seemed strange, Benny.”

  “What did she look like?”

  “Her face was very round and rosy.”

  “But Judy was pale and skinny from suffering.”

  “Remember Judy’s cheekbones? Next to Joan’s, Judy had the best cheekbones. I used to try and Scotch-tape mine to look like hers. She looked different lying down. Her cheeks were baggy like anybody else’s.”

  “Was her hair short and swept back like brown duck feathers?”

  “It was reddish orange.”

  “That’s too loud for Judy. You must be wrong.”

  “If you don’t believe me, look for yourself.”

  “I’ll take your word.”

  “Her skin was very smooth, Benny.”

  “No wrinkles from squinting out over the footlights?”

  “None of that.”

  “Gloria, are you sure that was Judy?”

  “Other people were with me. They thought it was Judy. But she always carried roses at her finale. The coffin was filled with gardenias. It was all wrong.”

  “Maybe it’s another Marilyn Monroe trick.”

  “What’s that?”

  “Me and my big mouth! You’re not supposed to know.”

  “We’re friends, aren’t we?”

  “Marilyn Monroe’s living in Bolivia—her death was a publicity stunt to get out of a bad contract with Twentieth Century-Fox.”

  “You’re crazy. I saw pictures of her husband—the ballplayer—at the funeral. He was crying.”

  “That’s just it. You don’t know Joe DiMaggio. He didn’t even cry the day they retired number five from the Yankees.”

  “I think it’s our duty to inform the proper authorities.”

  “Don’t make waves, Gloria.”

  “It’s in the public interest.”

  Gloria and I walk to the main entrance. We go quietly like nothing was the matter. The usher’s standing there.

  “Straight ahead and watch your step, sir.”

  “That’s not Judy in the coffin. Judy wouldn’t go to heaven looking like Corinne Calvet.”

  “All arrangements are made by the deceased’s family. Step this way.”

  “They freeze people now, like meat. They stay fresh. I read where a Japanese scientist kept his dead wife looking like new for twelve years.”

  “Katsaburo Miyamoto,” says the usher. “He crystallizes blood, which keeps the body pores open.”

  “I don’t understand science. It’s too complicated.”

  “We keep up with the latest trends.”

  “Judy deserved the best.”

  “Frank E. Campbell is the best.”

  “You could’ve preserved her. ‘Better living through chemistry.’ How about it? Plastic hearts and lungs. You could’ve saved all these people from crying.”

  “Monday morning quarterbacks. Step this way, please.”

  “Save your breath, Benny,” says Gloria. “His mind’s made up.”

  Outside Gloria takes my arm. We lean against each other, not talking. I know how she feels.

  Sunlight surprises me. So do the voices.

  “BENNY!”

  “GLORIA!”

  We only see arms waving from the curb. We push, but it’s hard to move this crowd. Nobody wants to leave Judy, and nobody wants to stay inside, either. People walk away slowly with their heads down. Only our friends are making noise. It turns out to be Macready and Good News. Moonstone’s taking a nap on the hood of a hearse.

  “I’m glad you guys waited,” says Gloria.

  “Where’s Sypher?” says Macready.

  “He was with you,” says Gloria. “We haven’t seen him.”

  “Let’s split,” says Moonstone, without raising his head. “Louis’s foxy enough to find us. Anyway, he doesn’t give a shit about Judy.”

  “We’ve got to stick together. Nobody remembers her the way we do.”

  “Benny’s right,” says Gloria.

  “My flash attachment worked like a charm,” says Probst.

  “You took pictures?” says Gloria.

  “It’s color film. Did you get a load of the tulips and azaleas? Stand by the Cadillac. I’ll take a group picture.”

  “It’s not like the time we jammed the ballot box for the Miss Rheingold contest and our girl won, Probst. It’s a setback, not a victory.”

  “We’re alive, ain’t we, Walsh?” says Macready. “You win some, you lose some. Tomorrow’s another day.”

  “I say stick tight. Remember the last assassination. There weren’t as many people around for a loss as a win. That’s why it’s important to have your own crowd.”

  “So Garland kicks, so what?” says Macready. “There’s Streisand waiting. She’s young. She don’t mainline. She hits the high notes. She makes people just as happy. She’s a winner. You whisper her name to people—a little joke or somethin’—they cough up some jingle. Whisper Garland after today and it’s a guaranteed goose egg. People forget. Take it from a guy who puts the touch on hundreds of people a day.”

  “You’re wrong. Judy’s no ordinary loss.”

  “Walsh, you remember the touchdowns, not the fumbles.”

  “Don’t pay attention to Macready,” Gloria says. “I don’t want to go back to my room either. Good memories should be shared.”

  There’s shouting in the middle of the crowd. “It’s hot! It’s hot! Watch out!”

  Sypher elbows his way out of the crowd. “Hey, where were you guys? I was talkin’ to Otto Preminger, the producer. He wants to make me an extra. I think I can kiss you douche bags in on the deal.”

  “We’d be downtown already,” says Probst. “But Benny said to wait.”

  “Hey, that’s great, Walsh. A fraternity.”

  “See, Macready? Sypher feels the same way.”

  “Fuck off with this Boy Scout shit, Walsh.”

  The funeral has done Sypher good. He puts his arms around Macready and me. Probst takes our picture. “Get me in my street clothes,” Sypher says. “Autographed pictures in my peasant outfit later.”

  “What are you talking about?” says Gloria.

  “Preminger’s making the life story of the Pope. It’s called Pope. They’re filming in Spain. Catholics are cheaper there. In technicolor. Thousands of pilgrims. Otto said I could be a pilgrim.”

  “That’s how it happens,” says Gloria. “You never know
where or when. Somebody discovers you. You make new friends. You move up. You have to start low like Louis, so you can rise high.”

  “Who cares about stardom,” says Sypher. “If they give me a contract, I’d rather have the money than the publicity. I won’t forget you guys.”

  “See, Louis struck it rich at this funeral,” says Probst. “Right under our noses.”

  “How’d you go up to a guy like that?”

  “It happened so quick, Walsh, I can’t hardly believe it. I heard him talking about Judy, saying how great she was. We struck up a little repartee.”

  “What balls,” says Moonstone.

  “You know I’ve been thinking,” says Sypher. “People who need people are the luckiest people in the world.”

  “That’s a very nice thought, Louis,” says Gloria.

  Good News snaps Sypher’s picture again.

  “Am I right, Benny-boy?”

  “Did you get Preminger’s autograph?”

  “My mouth should be washed with soap for what I said about Judy. I make myself sick. She’s worth a lot. Mr. Preminger wouldn’t lie.”

  “Judy was always touching people, always friendly with everyone. Seeing her must have rubbed off on you.”

  “You got to like people, Walsh. You’ve got to give them the shirt off your back,” says Sypher. “I promised Mr. Preminger one of my Garland autographs.”

  “You don’t have any.”

  “I told him my name was Benny Walsh. If I land the part, I’ll say Sypher’s my stage name. You’ve got four Garlands. He’s waiting inside. You don’t want to cross a big man like that—he could blackball us in the industry.”

  “But they’re my autographs.”

  “All for one and one for all, remember?”

  “My autographs are from different times in Judy’s career. They say ‘To Benny.’ They’re mine.”

  “We’re a fraternity, right?”

  “But—”

  “Then loan me one autograph. It’s my big chance, Benny.”

  “I can’t do it, Louis. Anyway, I wouldn’t carry Judy on me.”

  “Look, Benny, it’s how you get ahead in America. Beg, borrow, or steal. You gotta give to get. All the big shots do it. They come into our restaurants, right. They tip for better service. You give something extra, you get something extra. That’s democracy. I bet I can get this movie if I grease his palm with a Judy Garland.”