The Early Ayn Rand Page 15

  “It was splendid,” he said, tensely, harshly, as if grudgingly, his eyes dark between half-closed, insulting eyelids.

  “Thank you, Mr. Ayers,” she answered; her voice was polite and meaningless; she turned abruptly and walked away.

  “I want,” Mr. Bamburger was shouting, “I want articles in all the fan magazines! I want interviews and I want them syndicated! I want photos—where’s that fool Miller, has he been sleeping?—photos in bathing suits and without bathing suits! Wonder-Pictures’ new discovery! Discovery, hell! Wonder-Pictures’ new gold mine!”

  Claire Nash struggled, wept, wrote letters, wasted nickels in phone booths, fought for and obtained an interview at Central Casting.

  She sat—trembling and stammering, unable to control her part any longer and the part running away with her—before the desk of a thin, gentle, pitiless woman who looked like a missionary. Central Casting ruled the destinies of thousands of extras; it flung opportunities and ten-dollar-a-day calls by the hundreds each single day. Wasn’t there, Claire begged with an indignation merging into tears, wasn’t there room for one more?

  The woman behind the desk shook her head.

  “I am sorry, Miss Roberts,” she said precisely and efficiently, “but we do not register beginners. We have thousands of experienced people who have spent years in the business and who are starving. We cannot find enough work for them. We are trying to cut our lists in every way possible, not augment them with novices.”

  “But I . . . I . . .” stammered Claire, “I want to be an actress! I may have a great talent . . . I . . . God! I know I have a great talent!”

  “Very possible,” said the woman sweetly and shatteringly. “But so say ten thousand others. It is very ill advised, Miss Roberts, for a lovely, inexperienced young girl like you to be thinking of this hard, heartbreaking business. Very ill advised. . . . Of course,” she added, as Claire rose brusquely, “of course, if your situation is . . . well, difficult, we can suggest an organization which undertakes to provide the fare back home for worthy girls who . . .”

  Claire forgot her part for the moment; she did a thing which no beginner would have dared to do: she rushed out and slammed the door behind her.

  They are fools, Claire thought, sitting in her hotel room, all of them just blind, lazy fools. It was their job to find talent, yet they did not see it, because . . . because it seemed that they didn’t give a damn. Who had said that to her before, so long ago? Then she remembered who had said it, and the cold, mocking eyes of the speaker, and she jumped to her feet with a new determination; a new determination and a brand-new feeling of loneliness.

  If they had no eyes to see for themselves, she decided, she would show them. If it’s acting experience they want, she would throw the experience in their faces. She started on a round of the little theaters that flourished like mushrooms on Hollywood’s darkest corners. She learned that one did not get paid for acting in the wretched little barns, because the “chance to be seen” was considered payment enough for the weeks of rehearsals. She was willing to accept this, even though she did wonder dimly how she would have been able to accept it were she a real beginner left alone to struggle on her own earnings. But her willingness brought no results. In four of the theaters, she was told that they employed no one without previous stage experience. In three others, her name and phone number were taken with the promise of a call “if anything came up,” a promise made in such a tone of voice that she knew this would be the end of it, and it was.

  But in the eighth theater, the fat, oily manager took one look at the thirty-dollar hat and bowed her eagerly into his office.

  “But of course, Miss Roberts,” he gushed enthusiastically, “of course! You are born for the screen. You have the makings of a star, a first-class star! Trust me, I’m an old horse in this business and I know. But talent’s gotta be seen. That’s the secret in Hollywood. You gotta be seen. Now I have just the play for you and a part—boy, what a part! One part like this and you’re made. Only, unfortunately, our production has been delayed because of financial difficulties, most unfortunate. Now, two hundred dollars, for instance, wouldn’t be too much for you to invest in a future that would bring you millio—Well,” said the manager to his secretary, blinking at the slammed door, “what do you suppose is the matter with her?”

  The agents, Claire thought, the agents; they made their money on discovering new talent and they would be honest about seeking it. Why hadn’t she thought of them before?

  She was careful to call only on those agents who had never met Claire Nash in person. She found that the precaution was unnecessary: she was never admitted any farther than the exquisite, soft-carpeted waiting rooms, modernistic riots of glass, copper, and chromium, where trim secretaries sighed regretfully, apologizing because Mr. Smith or Jones or Brown was so busy in conference; but if Miss Roberts would leave her telephone number, Mr. Smith would be sure and call her. Miss Roberts left the number. The call never came.

  The agents who had no waiting rooms and no chromium, but only a hole facing a brick wall, and a mid-Victorian armchair shedding dirty cotton upon a spotted rug, were delighted to meet Miss Roberts and to place her name upon the lists of their distinguished clients; which was as much as they were able to accomplish for Miss Roberts.

  One of them, tall and unshaved, seemed more delighted to meet her than all the others. “You have come to the right man, kid,” he assured her, “the right man. You know Joe Billings down at Epic Pictures? The assistant director? Well, Joe’s a partic’lar friend of mine and he’s got a lotta pull at Epic. All I gotta do is slip a coupla words to Joe and bingo! you get a screen test. A real, genuine screen test. How about dinner tonight down at my place, kiddo?” She fled.

  Her face . . . her face that had been called “one of the screen’s treasures” so often . . . her face seemed to make no impression on anyone. With a single exception. One of the agents, whom she had never seen before, did look at her closely for a long moment, and then he exclaimed:

  “By God but you’re a dead ringer for Claire Nash, sister!”

  Then he looked again, shook his head, and changed his mind.

  “Nope,” he said, “not exactly. Claire’s eyes are lighter, and her mouth smaller, and she’s got it over you as far as the figure’s concerned. Great friend of mine, Claire. . . . Tell you what we’ll do: you leave your phone number and I’ll get you a swell job as Claire’s stand-in. You look like her—or near enough for that. Only we’ll have to wait—she’s away in Europe right now.”

  Jane Roberts’ opportunity came; not exactly in the way she had expected it to come, but it came anyhow.

  One evening, as she sat on the bed in her stuffy hotel room, her slippers flung into a corner and her feet aching miserably, a neighbor came in to ask if she hadn’t two nickels for a dime. The neighbor was a tall, cadaverous girl with a long nose and seven years of movie-extra experience.

  “No luck around the studios, eh?” she asked sympathetically, seeing Claire’s eyes. “It’s tough, kid, that’s what it is, tough. I know.” Then she brightened suddenly. “Say, want a bit of work for tomorrow?”

  Claire jumped to her feet as if her life depended on it.

  “You see,” the girl was explaining, “they got a big crowd tomorrow morning and my friend, the propman, got me in and I’m sure he can fix it up for you too.”

  “Oh, yes!” Claire gasped. “Oh, yes, please!”

  “The call’s for eight in the morning—ready and made-up on the set. We’ll have to be at the studio at six-thirty. I’ll go phone the boy friend, but I’m sure it’ll be okay.”

  She was turning to leave the room, when Claire asked:

  “What studio is it and what picture?”

  “The Wonder-Pictures Studio,” the girl answered. “Child of Danger, you know, their big special with that new star of theirs—Heddy Leland.”

  Claire Nash sat, shivering with cold, in the corner of a bus. Snorting and groaning, the bus rambled on i
ts way to the studio through the dark, empty, desolate streets of early morning. The bus shook like a cocktail shaker on wheels, jumbling its passengers against one another, throwing them up at each rut, to fall and bounce upon the sticky leather seats. All the passengers had the same destination—with their tired faces and old, greasy makeup boxes.

  Claire felt cold and broken. Her eyelids felt like cotton and closed themselves against her will. She thought dully, dimly, through the crazy unreality around her, that a director, a real director, would know genius when he saw it.

  She was still thinking it as she trudged wearily through the gates of the Wonder-Pictures Studio. Claire Nash had worked for seven years on the Wonder-Pictures lot. But it was for the first time in her life that she entered it through the shabby side-gate of the “Extra Talent Entrance.” She kept her head bowed cautiously and her scarf under her nose, not to be recognized. She soon found that she had nothing to fear: no one could pick her out in the dismal stampede of gray shadows streaming past the casting office window; no one could and no one showed any inclination to try. The boy in the window handed her her work ticket without raising his head or looking at her. “Hurry up!” her companion prodded her impatiently, and Claire started running with the others in the mad rush to the wardrobe.

  Three stern-faced, gloomy-eyed, frozen individuals in shirtsleeves stood behind a wooden counter, distributing the extras’ costumes. They fished the first rags they could reach out of three hampers filled with filthy junk and pushed them across the counter into uncomplaining hands. When Claire’s turn came, the lordly individual threw at her something heavy, huge, discolored, with dirty pieces of faded gold ribbon, with a smell of stale makeup and perspiration. “Your ticket?” he ordered briefly, extending his hand for it.

  “I don’t like this costume,” Claire declared, horrified.

  The man looked at her incredulously.

  “Well, isn’t that just too bad!” he observed, seized her ticket, punched it, and turned, with an armful of rags, to the next woman in line.

  The extras’ dressing room was cold as a cellar, colder than the frozen air outside. With stiff fingers, Claire undressed and struggled into her costume. She looked into a mirror and closed her eyes. Then, with an effort, she looked again: the huge garment could have contained easily three persons of her size; the thick folds gathered clumsily into a lump on her stomach; she tried to adjust them, but they slipped right back to her stomach again; she was awkward, obese, disfigured.

  Suffocating, she sat down on a wooden bench before a little crooked mirror on a filthy, unpainted wooden counter—to make up her face. But she knew little about screen makeup and had long since forgotten what she had known. For the last seven years she had had her own expert makeup man who knew how to correct the little defects of her face. Now she realized suddenly that her eyes were a little too narrow; that her cheeks were a little too broad; that she had a slight double chin. She sat twisting the greasy tube helplessly in her fingers, trying to remember and do the best she could.

  Around her, the big barrack was full of busy, noisy, hurrying and gossiping females. She saw half-naked, shivering bodies and flabby muscles, vapor fluttering from mouths with every word, barbarian tunics and underwear—not very clean underwear.

  She was about to rise when a strong hand pushed her down again.

  “What’s the hurry, dearie? Put on yar wig, willya?”

  A short, plump girl in a blue smock stood before her, with hairpins in her mouth and in her hand something that looked like the fur of a very unsanitary poodle.

  “That . . . for me?” Claire gasped. “But . . . but I’m blond! I . . . I can’t wear a black wig!”

  “D’ya suppose we got time to monkey around with every one of ya?” the girl asked, swishing the hairpins in her mouth. “Ya can’t have bobbed hair in this picture. It’s the ancient times, this is. Take what ya get. We ain’t gonna bother about the color of two hundred heads!”

  “But it will look awful!”

  “Well, who do ya think ya are? It will ruin the picture, I suppose, will it?”

  The wig was too small. The hairdresser rammed it down till it squeezed Claire’s temples like a vise. She wound a huge turban over it to keep it in place, and stuck a dozen hairpins inside with such violence that she skinned Claire’s skull.

  “Now ya’re okay. Hurry up, ya got five minutes left to get on the set.”

  Claire threw a last glance in the mirror. The black poodle fur hung in rags over her face; the huge turban slid down to her eyes; she looked like a mushroom with a lump in the middle. She was safe; no one would recognize her; she couldn’t recognize herself.

  “Ef-fry-body on de set!” Werner von Halz roared through his megaphone.

  Obedient as a herd, the huge crowd filled the stone-paved yard of Queen Lani’s castle. Four hundred pairs of eyes rose expectantly to the high platform where Mr. von Halz’s majestic figure stood among seven cameras.

  In the solemn silence, Mr. von Halz’s voice rang imperiously:

  “Vat you haff to do iss diss. Der iss a var going on and your country she hass just von a great fictory. Your queen announces it to you from her castle vall. You greet de news mitt vild joy.”

  The mighty castle rose proudly to the clear, blue sky, a giant of impregnable granite and plaster in a forest of wooden scaffoldings and steel wires. An army of overalls moved swiftly through the castle, placing metal sheets and mirrors in, under, above the ramparts. The hot rays of the sun focused on the crowd. Hasty, nervous assistant directors rushed through the mob, placing extras all over the set.

  Claire followed every assistant with an eager, hopeful glance. No one noticed her. She was not chosen for the best, prominent spots. And when, once, an assistant pointed her out to another, that other shook his head: “No, not that one!”

  The cameramen were bent over their cameras, tense, motionless, studying the scene. Werner von Halz watched critically through a dark lens.

  “A shadow in de right corner!” he was ordering. “Kill dat light on your left! . . . I vant sefen more people on dose steps. . . . Break dat line! You’re not soldiers on a parade! . . . Dun’t bunch up like sardines on vun spot! Spread all ofer de yard! . . . All right!” he ordered at last. “Let’s try it!”

  Heddy Leland’s slim, quick figure appeared on the castle wall. She spoke. The crowd roared without moving, only hundreds of arms shot vigorously in every direction, as though practicing their daily dozen.

  “Stop! Hold it!!” Werner von Halz roared. “Iss dat de vay people iss glad? Iss dat de vay you vould meet your queen speaking of fictory? Now try to tink she iss saying dat you are going to haff lunch at vunce! Let’s see how you vill meet dat!”

  Queen Lani spoke again. Her subjects greeted her words enthusiastically. Mr. von Halz nodded.

  “Diss vill be picture!” he announced.

  Frantic assistants rushed through the crowd, throwing their last orders: “Hey, you there! Take off your spectacles, you fool! . . . Don’t chew gum! . . . Hide that white petticoat, you, over there! . . . No chewing gum! They didn’t chew gum in that century!”

  “Ready?” boomed Werner von Halz. The huge set froze in silence, a reverent silence.

  “Cam’ra-a-a!!”

  Seven hands fell as levers. Seven small, glistening eyes of glass were suddenly alive, ominous, commanding the scene as seven cannons fixed upon it. Four hundred human beings in a panic of enthusiasm stormed like a boiling kettle of rags at the foot of the castle. On the wall, two thin, strong arms rose to the sky and a young voice rang exultantly through the roar of the crowd.

  And Claire Nash felt herself torn off her feet, pushed, knocked, tumbled over, thrown to left and right by human bodies gone mad. She tried to act and register joy. Pressed between two huge, enthusiastic fellows, she could not tell on which side stood the cameras and on which the castle; all she could see was a piece of blue sky over red, sweating necks. She tried to fight her way out. She was thrown back by someone
’s elbow in her ribs and someone’s knee in her stomach. A woman screaming frantically: “Long live our Queen!” was spitting into her face. A gentleman with the figure of a prizefighter stepped on her bare foot, taking the skin off three toes. She smiled pitifully and muttered: “Long live our Queen,” waving a limp hand over her head. Even the hand could not be seen by the cameras. . . .

  When, at last, the piercing siren blew and assistants shouted “Hold it,” when the cameras stopped, when Claire drew a deep breath and pulled the wig’s hair out of her mouth, Mr. von Halz wiped his forehead with satisfaction and said:

  “Dat’s good. . . . Vunce more, pleaz!”

  Claire had been standing on her feet for three hours when the cameras were moved at last, and she was able to hobble towards a nurse, to get Mercurochrome smeared over the scratches on her arms and legs, to breathe, to powder her face and to look around.

  She saw the tall, slender figure of a man in the simplest gray suit, insolently elegant in its simplicity. Her heart did a somersault. She recognized the clear, contemptuous eyes, the scornful, irresistible smile. He was bending over Heddy Leland, talking to her intently, as if they were alone on the set. Heddy Leland was sitting in a low, comfortable canvas chair, a dark silk robe drawn tightly over her costume, her thin, brown hands motionless on the chair’s arms. She was looking up at Winston Ayers, listening quietly, her face inscrutable; but she was looking at him as if he were the only man on the set.

  Claire felt suddenly as if something had struck her through the ribs. She did not mind the set, nor the crowd, nor her place in it, nor Heddy Leland’s place. It was the man in gray and the look with which he spoke to the girl in the chair. Claire was surprised to learn how much she minded that. She walked away hastily, with one last, bitter glance at the chair with the black inscription on its canvas back: “Keep off. Miss Heddy Leland.”