 |
 |
    |
|
|
|
| [Lights open on a Hollywood cafeteria, early in the morning. It is 1943. Harry Cohn and Louella Parsons sit at a table, smoking and talking. Rose Lindstrom and Oberon linger, apart, by a coffee urn. They whisper. Patriotic music from World War II plays quietly in the background.] | |
| OBERON: | Rose, have you read today’s script pages? |
| LINDSTROM: | Uh-huh. |
| OBERON: | Well? |
| LINDSTROM: | I thought we were making a war picture, but it says here I have to give you a big, um [flips through script, reading] ‘compelling facial gesture of love and conviction’. Is that a kiss? |
| OBERON: | It is not a handshake. |
| LINDSTROM: | Is it legal? |
| OBERON: | Certainly. In Mexico. Christ! Dorothy must be insane. Does she want the War Commission to put us all behind bars? There’s a lesbian love scene for her. |
| LINDSTROM: | [reading script] No kidding – you say to me: ‘You spin and spin till you get so full of circles you forget your own name’. [laughs] You sound like a boy. |
| OBERON: | After this, I’ll be lucky if they let me tape down my breasts and do a submarine picture. |
| LINDSTROM: | [laughing and caressing Oberon’s leg] All hands on deck! All hands on deck! |
| OBERON: | Sweetheart, submarines don’t have decks. They go under the water … [sees Lindstrom’s blank look] … never mind. [lights cigarette] No wonder Dorothy left this scene till the last day of filming – the studio is trapped, the money’s already been spent. |
| LINDSTROM: | [tries to kiss Oberon] Merle, don’t you like to kiss me? |
| OBERON: | [pushes her away] Idiot! Don’t you like to eat? |
| LINDSTROM: | Maybe this is a trick, a joke. She found out about you and me and she’s jealous. She’s showing her hand, but not for real – in a sneaky way. Kinda like playing poker. |
| OBERON: | Do be quiet. I’m tired. I was up all night practicing my love scenes. [sneaks a quick kiss, looks at script] What can Dorothy be thinking? This scene was not part of the original script. I have a very firm contract and an even firmer lawyer – |
| LINDSTROM: | Don’t get riled yet. When we get to the set maybe we’ll all just have a big laugh. |
| OBERON: | [holding Lindstrom’s face] Don’t ever try to be sensible with me, my love, you’ll upset my equilibrium. |
| LINDSTROM: | [sneaking a kiss] I like your equilibrium, it’s pretty. I dreamed about you last night. You and me, riding this big tank down Ventura Boulevard, and all the people were out on the streets cheering and throwing those paper bits – |
| OBERON: | Confetti – |
| LINDSTROM: | No, no food, just paper. Like pink snowflakes. [becomes agitated] And then this man jumps out of the crowd with a rifle in his hands – |
| OBERON: | Rose, please. You’re awake now. Have some coffee and clear your mind. One cup should do. [points to Parsons] She’s as bright and bouncy as ever. I think I’ll try hanging upside down at night. |
| LINDSTROM: | Your face will fall. California has enough mudslides. |
| OBERON: | And a surplus of starlets. Mind yourself. |
| LINDSTROM: | You know, I wasn’t born pretty, I willed it. I stared into the sun until all the ugly burned away. Nearly went blind. [sneaks a second kiss] |
| OBERON: | [brushing Lindstrom away] See if you can will yourself over to another chair, I feel a little overexposed. [prods Lindstrom along to a further chair] |
| [Parsons and Cohn glance at Oberon and Lindstrom, watch the two women sit together at a distant table, then continue with their own whispered conversation.] | |
| PARSONS: | Where’s Arzner? |
| COHN: | I dunno. |
| PARSONS: | Have you seen today’s shooting script? Are you going to fire her? Can I watch? |
| COHN: | Gheesh! Ain’t there no immigrants or cripples you could kick around for fun? It’s the last day of shooting. Sometimes Dorothy likes to make a little joke on the last day. She ain’t crazy. She knows better than to make two girls go at it on film. It’s gotta be a gag. I tell ya, Louella, Dorothy’s always been a good girl for me. |
| PARSONS: | How much money have you spent on this picture? Dorothy Arzner’s war picture to inspire our brave boys at arms – a war picture with no male characters. It’s a scandal. |
| COHN: | Not yet it ain’t. Keep your delicate little dictaphone off of Dorothy until it’s official. There is a war on, Miss Chicago 1897. |
| PARSONS: | Harry Cohn! You badger-bellied prick! Fortunately for you, I am constitutionally incapable of holding a grudge. And it’s Miss Illinois, to be precise. Furthermore, I have never known a war yet that did not increase newspaper circulation. I like to think of all the boys overseas reading my little column, all a-dazzle about the goin’s-on in Hollywood – who’s kissing who, who’s divorcing who, who’s singing happy songs, who’s crying in public, who’s a worn-out bull dagger making war movies for deviants – |
| COHN: | One word, one single word sees print and I’ll sue your paper out of business! |
| PARSONS: | You silly, where would you advertise your pictures? [both laugh] |
| [Lindstrom and Oberon catch laughter at the other table, watch for a moment, then continue to talk quietly.] | |
| LINDSTROM: | [flustered] You oughta treat me nicer. Maybe I wasn’t born with ballet slippers under my chin, but someday some part of me, a cheekbone or an ankle, someday someone’s gonna see that perfect part of me and build a whole world around it. A world all about me – a new continent. |
| [Arzner enters, unnoticed by Lindstrom. Arzner is a younger version of the woman seen in the prologue. She is dressed in a man’s blazer and shirt and tie, with a long skirt. Her hair is slicked back and mannish. Oberon notices Arzner, and moves away from Lindstrom.] | |
| ARZNER: | [placing hand on Oberon’s shoulder, looks over Lindstrom] [to Lindstrom] When you find that special, undiscovered corner, polish it up – bring it around to me. [to Oberon] I like shiny things. Girlish things. [to Lindstrom] And I like my coffee black, and quick. |
| [Arzner takes a seat next to Oberon, Lindstrom walks back to the coffee urn.] | |
| OBERON: | You’re causing quite a stir this morning. |
| ARZNER: | [caressing Oberon’s arm] You cause a stir all day long. Don’t worry, everything will be fine. |
| OBERON: | Careful, the Sphinx is watching. |
| ARZNER: | She’s old enough for the part. [sneaking another caress] Remember, I love you. |
| PARSONS: | [watching Arzner and Oberon] I will live to be 102, and I am positive that even in my advanced age and abundant wisdom I shall never comprehend your reasoning for giving Dorothy Arzner a war picture. Dorothy simply does not understand – the camera is a man’s eye. |
| ARZNER: | [hitting Oberon playfully with script] What’s the matter with you this morning – don’t you like to kiss pretty girls? |
| OBERON: | In the privacy of my own home. Or yours. [pointing to Cohn] He looks too calm. |
| ARZNER: | All people with simple needs are calm. I can handle him, I’ve done it for years. I give him what he thinks he wants. [pointing to Cohn’s head] You see, the motion picture camera is designed to draw a thin black line, a tiny telegraph cable, between the screen and the dumbest, most airless interiors of the American male psyche. And he’s as thick as shoe leather. |
| OBERON: | I dare you to say that a little louder. |
| ARZNER: | I know Harry Cohn. He respects honesty. |
| OBERON: | You told me once that the camera never lies. |
| ARZNER: | Except when it’s on. |
 | |
| PARSONS: | [to Cohn] In fairness, however, Dorothy’s hardly what anyone calls a woman. |
| COHN: | Shut up, will ya? Dorothy’s an old pro. She’ll come through. Like I say, Dorothy has always been a good girl for me. |
| [Arzner raises her voice, Parsons, Cohn and Lindstrom all strain to listen.] | |
| ARZNER: | You don’t understand … my love … it’s [kisses her furtively] less than thirty seconds of screen time – twelve feet of film. Approximately the length of your bed. It’s nothing. It’s 720 frames, only five camera angles – one hour studio time – it will go by like lightning. |
| OBERON: | I adore you, Dorothy, but you can’t snow me with technicalities. My ideals go as far as the next actress – which is about the distance between here and the studio gates – but women do not kiss other women in pictures. |
| ARZNER: | You sound like Harry. Merle, it’s just 720 tiny little frames. You’ve got more diamonds than that. It’s the blink of an eye. My eye. The camera makes you beautful, now I’ll make you real. |
| OBERON: | I’ve been real. I believe it was a Tuesday, in San Diego. Awfully rainy. |
| ARZNER: | [takes Oberon’s hand] I called you last night. Did you go out? I had a dream: we were on a ship together, surrounded by green waves. Suddenly, hundreds of flying fish came out of the water – |
| OBERON: | Stop. Let’s keep to the conscious world. There is a war on. We are expected to make useful, uplifting, deliciously worthless movies. Don’t play games with my career over principles. |
| ARZNER: | I’ll film you in such a way that only me and the camera will understand. |
| OBERON: | Then why bother? Why don’t you just write me a poem? Flowers make a treat. |
| ARZNER: | This is my love poem. Twenty feet high. |
| OBERON: | You have no shame. |
| ARZNER: | You have no courage. |
| OBERON: | I’m still here, aren’t I? Love, give the studio what it wants. Your integrity and these tits are already paid for. |
| ARZNER: | [laughs] I adore you. |
| OBERON: | Well quit it – nobody in this town is fireproof. Not me, not even you. |
| ARZNER: | [holding Oberon] In big black type the screen will say ‘A Dorothy Arzner Film’. That’s right – a Dorothy Arzner film. Mine. And you’re wrong, I am fireproof – I’m with you, aren’t I? |
| PARSONS: | [to Cohn] You’d be doing her a favour. Cut her off now and you can still finish the picture. Call in the script boys and make a new ending. You know how easy it is. Send her on vacation. The studio keeps a lovely little spa out in the desert. Lesbians like the desert, it’s hard and scratchy. I’ll do the story: ‘Lady Director resigns from war picture due to kidney ailment’. Lesbians are always having kidney problems, due to the unnatural vacancy of their reproductive systems. |
| COHN: | Ha! you don’t got no kids – and far as I hear, your ‘system’ don’t got no vacancies either. |
| PARSONS: | Talk dirty all you like, but we both know making movies is not for the timid. A film is not a quilt, a film is a motorcar. Get in or get off the road. |
| COHN: | One day, you’re gonna push me too far. |
| PARSONS: | Mr. Cohn, I am a daughter of the Midwest. We do not ‘push’, we encourage. Now call that aberration against femininity over here and show her what for! |
| ARZNER: | Today, I have a chance to frame the film my way. An opportunity to make an honest picture. |
| OBERON: | Pish! Any woman can get her chance, she’s only got to look around. |
| ARZNER: | It’s not that simple for me. I’m not a movie star. I don’t get to change between pictures. There is such a thing as ‘A Dorothy Arzner Film’ – it’s my style, what people expect. Keeping my career is like sleeping with one eye open and one eye closed. But it protects me. And it’s how you focus the lens. Like shooting a gun. |
| [Cohn waves Arzner and Oberon over.] | |
| OBERON: | [pushing Arzner away] Splendid idea: why don’t you go volunteer for the front? I’ll be a war bride – the public will love me. [rising to go to Cohn] He’s calling. Mind you be sensible. See if you can keep both eyes open to reality for ten whole minutes. |
| [Lindstrom approaches Arzner’s table with coffee for three, sees Arzner heading for Cohn’s table and angrily follows Arzner and Oberon. All convene at Cohn’s table.] | |
| PARSONS: | Dorothy! How nice. I was just completing the first paragraph of my column: ‘In 1943 women starve to keep their children fed on food rations and Miss Dorothy Arzner makes feminine war pictures drenched in expensive silks and European ribbons’. Do you agree? |
| COHN: | That’s cute, go sell it to the Commie rags. |
| PARSONS: | I personally feel sorry for any artiste who cannot grasp the fundamentals of popular morality. To be rejected by the public, to be set apart from one’s fellow artistes – why, the isolation must be a devastation, a personal tragedy, like being sent out to the desert, the hard, scratchy desert – |
| COHN: | Aw, let it alone, will ya? In America, glamour is more important than beans and sugar. Look at the Brits, one ugly war picture after the next. No offence, Oberon, but if I was a Brit and I hadda go to those movies I’d paint a target on my roof. |
| LINDSTROM: | Did you hear about that actress in London, the one who cut off her dress right on the street during an air raid to make a bandage for a bleeding man? A bomb got her, split her clean in half. I’d like to be brave enough to do that, at least in a movie. |
| ARZNER: | Unfortunately, in America, women are not asked to be brave, we are asked to be patient. [to Cohn] And obedient. Subsequently, there are only three roles for women in Hollywood: [to Oberon] maiden, [to Cohn] mother [to Parsons] and monster. |
| PARSONS: | But Dorothy, director starts with a ‘d’. |
| ARZNER: | Keep going and you’ll work your way up to full sentences. |
| COHN: | [to Lindstrom and Oberon] [whistles] Ma and Pop are fighting. You kids beat it. |
| [Lindstrom and Oberon exit.] | |
| ARZNER: | [to Parsons] My movies make women move when the whole world tells women to sit still. And that makes you nervous. |
| PARSONS: | Why, whatever do you mean? [to Cohn] But of course I acknowledge that I am out of my little puddle of intellectual depth. Thank goodness for brainful women like Dorothy. Every Hollywood coffee table needs at least one intellectual lesbian, don’t you think? |
| ARZNER: | Intellectual will do. |
| PARSONS: | A lesbian anchors the room, sets the men at ease. More coffee, Dorothy? |
| ARZNER: | So many poison cups, I’ve forgotten the taste. |
| PARSONS: | You have no taste. Being, as it is, part and parcel of decorum. |
| ARZNER: | As is serving your guests. [holds cup out to Parsons] |
| COHN: | Now, now, ladies, make nice. Dorothy don’t like scenes. |
| ARZNER: | But I like you. |
| PARSONS: | You two make a smart pair – all business. It’s so refreshing. But anything unnatural is, for a short time. |
| COHN: | Hell right I’m all business. I talk business at lunch, I talk business at dinner. I talk business in my sleep. [motions to Parsons to leave him alone with Arzner, Parsons gets up for more coffee] Shit, Dotty, I even talk business on the privy. |
| ARZNER: | So, let’s talk business. I’ve got one day left on this film, and I like to finish a picture on time. You’ve read today’s script? |
| COHN: | You can’t hear my ulcers screaming? |
| ARZNER: | It reads worse than it looks. |
| COHN: | Tell to me please when I have ever interfered in your work? Tell me the one time I’ve done such a thing? Never. So maybe for once you can do something for me. No kissing between girls. |
| ARZNER: | Look at the context of the whole movie – it fits. |
| COHN: | Like a knife in my back. |
| ARZNER: | All I’m asking for is the same control over my pictures you give other directors. If I was a man I’d – |
| PARSONS: | [re-entering conversation] Dorothy, good heavens. If you were any more of a man you’d be safely off to war. Perhaps in the deserts of Egypt – |
| COHN: | [to Parsons] Enough already! |
| PARSONS: | Dorothy, I dislike aggressiveness in women. I like it even less in you. [rises to exit, to Cohn] Duty beckons. I have a deadline to meet – we’ll talk later? |
| ARZNER: | And sooner. And all the damned time in between. |
| [Parsons exits.] | |
| COHN: | Dorothy, try to be nice. She don’t mean no real harm. She’s just curious. I think maybe she really likes you. We all like you. Everyone just wants what’s best. This picture, what is it? It’s one movie. One movie you can finish by dinner and move on. Finish today, end the picture like me who loves you is telling you to do, which is not with girls kissing girls, and I promise I’ll give you a new picture to make. A good romance. We’ll do it in New England, lots of snow scenes, huh? |
| ARZNER: | It’s all so easy for you. You’ve never made a picture. Your name’s not on the poster. Harry, we’ve been friends a long time. |
| COHN: | Look, Dot, friends is nice but this is money. Don’t abuse my affections. Now and then I turn bad. |
| ARZNER: | I could hardly trust you if you didn’t. And I do trust you, most of the time. |
| COHN: | Look, your movie’s got some good stuff, stuff I like. Nice-looking women, the war angle. It’s a little highbrow maybe – I mean, it’s hard enough selling the trash these days. |
| ARZNER: | But? |
| COHN: | Dot, you and me got no secrets. I know you – you fall in love with these girls and suddenly you gotta do another big social issue picture. And what happens? No ticket sales and more innuendo in the scandal sheets. You directors is all alike – you wanna schtup the leading lady. Fine, be my guest. But have some dignity. |
| ARZNER: | You cheapen the situation. |
| COHN: | No, you do, with all this indiscretion. I like Merle, she’s got kick. [elbows Arzner] Huh? Huh? But stop advertising – the world will catch you. |
| ARZNER: | [exasperated] That’s my business. |
| COHN: | Not when you wanna put it on the screen. Dotty, there’s an awful amount of talk. |
| ARZNER: | I don’t listen to Louella. |
| COHN: | Good for you, but everybody reads the papers. Dot, you and me know there’s a million ways to end a movie, but if the public sees you with Merle and then they see Merle making mush with another broad on the screen, they’ll put two and two together and get three to five in Sing Sing. Why don’t we marry you off to one of the faggots in wardrobe, then you can make all the lesbo pictures you want? The audience, see, they know already about the girls in your picture – but they don’t wanna be told outright ‘cause then there’s evidence and people prefer to know dirty things inside their heads. It makes them feel smart. The heart don’t need eyes. |
| ARZNER: | It’s only one kiss. Women kiss all the time. Why are Americans incapable of imagining women in love? I’m giving the audience psychology … a whole continent, built on a single, perfect face. Merle’s face. Look at the rest of the picture – women in airplanes, spies, murder, heroism. Nobody will even imagine – |
| COHN: | Perverts? To you I say this: say what? And so what? If this big continent on Merle’s face is so blinding nobody’s gonna notice she’s making hooey with cutie face, what’s your point? Is it a lesbo picture or not a lesbo picture? |
| ARZNER: | Both. It depends on who’s watching. |
| COHN: | Oh no, don’t try that on me. Don’t give me such tsuros to make a lesbo picture nobody’s gonna know is a lesbo picture. And if they do figure it out, it’s now a picture I can’t show. This is logic? Me, I’m practical. I say let the Krauts make the art pictures, that’s how they lost the last war. I gotta tell ya I hate art pictures anyway. My father, god rest his bastard soul, he used to swear every movie he ever saw was about balls: ‘Think balls. Who’s got balls, who don’t. Throw in a conflict, you got drama’. |
| ARZNER: | You don’t believe what you’re saying. We’ve made good movies together, movies that changed things. Now I want more. I want to make movies about things I can’t mention in polite society. All my secrets, twenty feet high. The eyes teach the heart – we feel what we see – and you taught me that. |
| COHN: | That’s very pretty but still I say thank you no. Dotty, I love you like my own brother, but lately your films are not paying. And now you wanna make pervert history? Your movies are like poetry – they’re pretty, they make the heart soar. I got no problem with any of that except it don’t make money. |
| ARZNER: | Take the losses out of my percentage. |
| COHN: | [sighs] This town is full of lesbos and I gotta sign the one who wants to direct. Go into costumes like the other daggers. |
| ARZNER: | I know what I’m doing. [puts one hand over Cohn’s left eye] This is how the camera works – one eye shut dark, one eye wide as a summerhouse gate. Voluntary blindness. |
| COHN: | And from this demonstration I am deducing what? |
| ARZNER: | The audience can only see what it wants to see. It’s built into the camera. Voluntary blindness. |
| COHN: | [gets up to leave] Try putting that on the poster. You want to make dirty movies, fine. I’ll set you up in the back lot. All the girls you need. But don’t ask me to put my family name behind a secret-code movie that only deviates and the censor board can figure out. |
| ARZNER: | [stands up, covers Cohn’s eyes with hands] Can you see me? [lifts one hand off his face] How about now? |
| COHN: | Sure, I can see you ok. |
| ARZNER: | [takes second hand off] Better? |
| COHN: | Dotty … |
| ARZNER: | I’ve spent my whole life in half light, one blink away from disappearing. I’m afraid it’s permanent. |
| COHN: | Dotty, you gotta calm down. |
| ARZNER: | Whoever blinks first loses. |
| COHN: | One scene, Dotty. That’s all I ask. |
| ARZNER: | Last night when the set was dark I looked into the lens … the black doubled back on me. I saw my own eye reflected in the focus. My eye was shaking, I was shaking. Like a trapped cat. [laughs] I’ve made too many films to be so skittish. |
| COHN: | Dot … Dotty, think it out. Two times in your life you’re gonna feel secure – when you got a big hit and when you’re dead, and you never had a big hit yet. |
| ARZNER: | That hurts, Harry. |
| COHN: | [pauses] How about the two girls make with a really long hug? Huh? |
| ARZNER: | Sure … fine. I’ll just shut my eyes. |
| COHN: | There we go – everybody’s friends again. Be a good girl. |
| END |