Three Balconies (11 page)

Back in the trailer, Harry undressed, got into his own clothes, folded his costume neatly and placed it back on the bunk bed. He considered taking the tie – as another souvenir – but decided it would be tacky of him, even though he was convinced that people like Brad Pitt and Val Kilmer took home entire wardrobes and the studio didn't dare complain, for fear of alienating them on future projects.

And then Harry was back on the street . . . in the rain, no less – no hairdresser, no makeup artist, no stand-in (he'd actually had an extra with his measurements and a similar costume fill in for him during one of the breaks – presumably to save Harry's energy) – just another normal person at the end of the day. He felt sad about all this and realized he was experiencing a bittersweet moment. Even though Harry was pissed off at The Industry for turning its back on him, he had to concede that movies led the way when it came to bittersweet moments. Maybe the theatre too a little bit, but mostly the movies. When all else failed, you could always have some terrific actress (and now
Harry
was saying terrific) biting her lip (did Clinton get that from the movies?) or some actor suddenly realizing he'd made a romantic mistake and running through the rain so he could get back to the terrific actress before she was about
to get on a plane and marry an accountant – and kiss her in the rain and everyone would forget they'd spent two hours being exposed to a stunted and moronic sensibility.

 

“How come they let you go on and on like that?” asked Megan, who had been examining her tan in the mirror.

“It wasn't my idea,” said Harry, who had flown back to Miami and was in high spirits once again, the bittersweet moment just a memory. “I got my teeth into one of the lines, and the director told me to keep going.”

“So you have a huge part now,” said Megan.

“I wouldn't call it that. ‘Substantial' is more like it.”

“This means that we're definitely going to the premiere.”

“Not necessarily,” said Harry, who did not want to set up his daughter for a disappointment, although he himself had wondered if an invitation was part of his deal, such as it was. “The premiere is generally a benefit for rich people to raise money for a disease. But we'll definitely see the movie before the general public does.”

“I hope so,” said Megan, concentrating on the mirror. “And I don't understand why my legs get tan and my face is still white.”

 

Harry awoke in the middle of the night with a horrible thought. He'd been sleeping lightly, playing back – and savoring – his Pushkin scene when it suddenly occurred to him that none of the cameras had been focused on him. Not that there weren't several in evidence. But they all seemed to be positioned behind Harry and trained on the female star – so that all of the shooting was over . . . and past . . . his shoulder. Harry calculated that during his Pushkin monologue, an audience would only be able to make out a sliver of his profile, if that. Harry was shaken and could not get back to sleep. He kept kicking himself for not being aware of the camera; if he had, he would have been able to crane his head around and get more of himself in. It took a great deal of selfdiscipline for him to prepare Megan's breakfast in the morning
and not let on that something awful had happened. But later in the day, it occurred to Harry that perhaps there had been a camera that he had missed, a small discreetly placed one that was assigned to supporting players. And it had been trained on Harry. Or perhaps the main camera, through some technological advance – had the capability of curling around to pick up not only the female star's performance but Harry's as well. Only when Harry had considered these possibilities was he able to relax and to enjoy the rest of his stay in Miami.

 

Several months after returning to New York, Harry received an invitation for two to a screening of the movie for supporting players, hair and makeup people, cameramen, technical crew and various family members. Julie had graciously bowed out – the pressure of all her counseling. Megan had gotten a special pass from school so she could come down from Connecticut to attend the event along with Harry.

“What's a grip?” Megan wanted to know as they took the subway uptown to the screening.

“I'm not exactly sure,” said Harry. “But grips, gaffers, they're behind-the-scenes people who work in the trenches and really make the movie happen.”

“How come we have to go to the screening with them?” she asked

“It's not exactly a disgrace,” said Harry, trying to be patient. “And you keep forgetting. I have a nice little part . . . but it's not as if I took over the whole production.”

 

The movie, which fell under the heading of suspense/adventure, held Harry's attention for the first hour or so. But he could not tell if this was because it was good – or because he was in it. The story was multi-layered and the locales far-ranging. As he waited for his scenes to come up, Harry wondered how and where Vera, the kid he had virtually found on the street, had learned so much. She had never seemed the type to pore over Kurosawa films frame by
frame. And yet here she was, entrusted with the fate of a big budget multi-tiered motion picture. As his admiration for her grew, Harry wondered – generally – what she would be like now as a lover. As he became older, his thoughts along that line became less specific. And then, out of loyalty to Julie, and a resistance to all the built-in complications, he put the whole business out of his mind.

“Are you enjoying it?” he asked Megan.

“Of course,” said his daughter, who enjoyed most movies and was not discriminatory as to their content so long as they were made in the Nineties. “And quiet. Everyone can hear you.”

Harry settled back in his seat, resigned to his fate, which was to spend a major part of what remained of his life trying to impress his fifteen-year-old daughter.

His first scene seemed to come out of nowhere. (Did they still call that a smash cut?) The action had been in a Brussels train station. Suddenly, there was Harry in a New England book store, greeting the leading lady. Much as he suspected, if not feared, there was very little of him to be seen, although he recognized his voice, which he'd been told, on occasion, was distinctive. Harry might have been disturbed by his fleeting appearance on the screen if he hadn't been so fascinated by the angle at which the camera had caught him. Harry was not shy about mirrors. Julie teased him about this – saying he was unable to pass one without a quick look – but this was an ambushing and extra-dimensional look at himself that he had never seen before – and that he imagined most people never get to see of themselves. The camera, predictably, was focused on the leading lady who was far more stunning than she had seemed to be in person; obviously the camera not only favored the actress, but was also head over heels in love with her. Harry – his character, that is – said “Hi” and asked if she needed any help and she said “Not just now.” Then she strolled over to the Poetry Section, the camera lovingly following her while Harry disappeared from the frame.

“Did you see me?” Harry asked his daughter, lowering his voice this time.

“Sort of,” said Megan. “But can I please watch the movie?”

With his Pushkin scene coming up shortly, Harry was able to damp down any general annoyance he felt and to settle back and enjoy whatever turned up on the screen. However, no sooner had the leading lady reached the Poetry Section than the action switched once again, this time to a furtive drug transfer on a dock in Cap Ferrat. And there was no Pushkin scene. Harry felt that a pail of ice water had been dumped on his neck, and at the same time – the contradiction notwithstanding – he would have sworn that smoke was coming out of his ears. To steady himself, he gripped both armrests, which resulted in an impatient look from Megan. Fainting was a possibility, canceled out only by Harry's fear of causing further embarrassment to his daughter. This is all ego, he told himself, stating the obvious. And what does it really mean in terms of a lifetime? In terms of the cosmos, for that matter? He had close friends who were writers, and had major credits on movies, much more important than Harry's. They had died recently and already been forgotten. Did anyone care if one of them had a role in a movie (which none of them had ever gotten, incidentally) – and a scene of theirs had been eliminated?

Gathering some stability, if not confidence, Harry reminded himself that the style of the film was to jump around in time. Maybe his Pushkin monologue had been folded into the climax where it might make some kind of ironic statement and have more impact. But when the picture ended with a series of brilliantly photographed explosions, Harry had to face the fact that his Pushkin scene had been eliminated. As he and Megan left their seats and crossed the lobby in silence, he felt that every eye was on him. His arthritic leg, which he'd always looked upon as an amusing inconvenience, ached so profoundly that he had to stop and sit for a minute opposite the refreshment stand.

For his ego, Harry passed up the subway and hailed a cab to take them home; and for Megan's sake, he kept what could only be
called his humiliation in check. But as they approached the West Village, he could contain himself no longer.

“So what did you think?” he asked, bracing himself for her response.

“I thought you were great,” she said. “And can we go to more screenings? I really enjoyed sitting with the grips.”

Harry had been concerned about sending his daughter to school with all the spoiled and wealthy Connecticut Muffys and Buffys. Now he saw that in the crunch she was going to be all right. And that these were different times – and that maybe he had underestimated the Muffys and Buffys as well.

 

In the days that followed, Harry wondered if Vera had deliberately set out to punish him for the humiliation she'd felt when he had met and fallen in love with Julie – and begun to withdraw from Vera. (He hadn't done it suddenly – he had graciously taken both women to a New Year's Eve party.) But it was Julie who was surprisingly generous when Harry raised that possibility.

“Give her a break, Harry,” she said. “She's got a lot more on her mind than embarrassing you. I'm sure you were good, but maybe the scene just didn't work in the movie.”

And Harry realized that this was probably the case. The Pushkin scene, when he thought about it, was totally irrelevant. At one time, there had been a code named “Pushkin” but that had been dropped from the plot. So to let Harry do at least a ten-minute monologue on Pushkin – and to
include
it in the movie – just because he was good – would have been ridiculous. He even thought of calling Vera and telling her he understood why she had to make what was no doubt a painful decision – in case she thought he harbored some ill feeling. But whenever he tried to reach someone he knew in Hollywood, they were always in post-production (“So and So is in ‘post'”) and could not come to the phone, which made him feel even more sharply that he was left out of the party. So he did not make the call.

Harry's hurt feelings, like an old tennis injury, slowly began to disappear. The picture went into general release and Harry received a cassette from Vera's office. He'd been so upset at the screening that he had not even stayed for the credits. But he saw now that even though his part had been cut to a line – a line and a half to be generous – he was listed as “Daniel” when the credits rolled. Soon afterward, a golf bag arrived by Fed Ex, with the title of the film embroidered on the cloth. Even though Harry hated golf, he appreciated the touch. And he was delighted when a check for $500 came along in the mail with a note from the studio accountant saying he could keep it all – since the law permitted an individual to make one picture without joining and paying dues to the Screen Actor's Guild. And though the check did not quite cover Harry's airline tickets and traveling expenses, he appreciated the courtesy. And didn't actors get residuals? Once the movie turned up on television, other five hundreds might be coming along as well.

And then Harry started to get the calls. The first came from Julie's sister, Patsy, who had seen the film in a little theatre, just down the road from her Rape Crisis Intervention Center in the deep South. She thought Harry was excellent. And then Lenny, his old college roommate, called from Nebraska. A sports announcer now in Omaha, Lenny's great disappointment in life was that he had never cracked the networks.

“At first I heard the voice,” he said, in the dramatic announcing style that had failed to impress CBS, “and then, to my great surprise, there was my old buddy on the big screen. I've been telling everybody for years that you were going to make it, and I was right. I'm proud of you, Harry, and I'm sure that all of Omaha feels the same way I do.”

Half a dozen more calls followed, including one from Megan who said she had taken a group of girls from her dorm to see the movie. Not only had they enjoyed it, but they loved Harry's acting as well. And then Harry received what he considered the ultimate compliment. He was eating alone one night in an Italian restaurant
on Thompson street – which was not unusual. Julie was so wasted during the week from her counseling that she pretty much collapsed when she got home on weekdays. It was all she could do to watch an episode of
Will And Grace.
Harry was about to dig into his main course when an attractive man he recognized as having appeared in several episodes of the
The Sopranos
approached his table and said he'd seen Harry in the movie.

“I thought you did an excellent job.”

“But I went by in a flash,” said Harry.

“Never mind,” said the fellow, his voice taking on an ominous tone that Harry recognized from the hit series. “What I liked is that you didn't try to do too much. You kept it neat. You were very professional.”