Liberation (168 page)

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Authors: Christopher Isherwood

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75
I.e., Steegmuller's 1972 edition of Flaubert's travel notes and letters.

 

76
Radio and T.V. writer; he scripted Burns and Allen in the 1930s, and in the 1950s and 1960s he wrote for “Bonanza,” “Rawhide,” “Combat,” and “Bewitched.”

 

77
Both were under investigation in connection with the break-in at Democratic headquarters in the Watergate Hotel complex in June 1972; see Watergate in Glossary.

 

78
Ellsberg and Russo leaked the Pentagon Papers to the press; see Glossary under Pentagon Papers.

 

79
Who led the break-in; see Glossary.

 

80
A distinguished physicist; see Glossary.

 

81
Graphic artist and designer, later an instructor at Miramar Fine Arts College in San Diego.

 

82
Tom Bradley (1917–1998), lawyer and former policeman, first black mayor of Los Angeles, held the post for twenty years.

 

83
Sarada was outwardly serene, but Bachardy sensed neurotic disturbances within and, unlike Prabhavananda, was not surprised when she decided not to be a nun.

 

84
Isherwood's guess is correct.

 

85
Porn star Linda Lovelace (1949–2002).

 

86
American Vedanta nun at the Hollywood Vedanta Society, also known as Sushima, then in her late forties or early fifties, vivacious, a good singer, and a good cook. She left the order around 1980 and died a few years later.

 

87
Nicole
, starring Caron; see below, July 15, and Glossary under Laughlin.

 

88
German-born stage director (1900–1989); he joined Max Reinhardt in Los Angeles in 1941 and became Professor of Theater Arts, Dean of the School of Fine Arts, and a founder of the Professional Theater Group at UCLA. He was director of the Max Reinhardt Archive at SUNY, Binghamton, New York 1969–1973 and co-author, with Kenneth MacGowan, of
The Living Stage: A History of the World Theater
(1955) and
Golden Ages of the Theater
(1959).

 

89
Der Liebhaber: Erinnerungen seines Sohnes Gottfried Reinhardt an Max Reinhardt
published that year in Germany; it later appeared in English as
The Genius: A Memoir of Max Reinhardt
(1979).

 

90
I.e., the coin-operated booth which produces instant automatic portraits.

 

91
Leyland (b. 1940), who emigrated to the U.S. in boyhood, founded the Gay Sunshine Press, also publishing gay erotica and translations. He reprinted the Isherwood interview in his
Gay Sunshine Interviews
, Vol. 1 (1978), which includes interviews with Allen Ginsberg, John Rechy, Gore Vidal, Tennessee Williams, and others.

 

92
Seven Upanishads translated by Prabhavananda and Isherwood and read by Isherwood, produced as a double L.P. in 1976.

 

93
Sudhir was a Hollywood devotee who lived nearby in Vedanta Terrace; he sang in the choir and wrote folk songs. Sat was Jimmy Barnett.

 

94
Joe Cooper; Nelson is also known as Devadatta. They settled in Santa Barbara.

 

95
New York drag queen (1944–1974); she starred in Warhol's
Flesh
(1968) and
Women in Revolt
(1971), and had bit parts in
Klute
(1971) and Tennessee Williams's play
Small Craft Warnings
(1972).

 

96
Curtis Opliger, art critic and abstract film maker, then in charge of the gallery.

 

97
From “Haymaking.”

 

98
In West Kensington, London, the largest indoor exhibition hall in England when it opened in 1886 as a venue for agricultural shows, circuses, motor, and air shows.

 

99
Adler (1890–1985), born in Vienna, was Reinhardt's personal secretary and later worked as a researcher at Warner Brothers. Her memoir,
Max Reinhardt, sein Leben
, was published in German in 1964. Bachardy recalls that Isherwood possibly had a typescript of an English translation (published later); otherwise, this is Isherwood's own translation.

 

100
American cinematographer (1931–1989), his many T.V. and feature films include
Save the Tiger
(1973),
Rhinoceros
(1974),
Rocky
(1976), and
The Karate Kid
(1984).

 

101
Reinhardt staged Offenbach's
Tales from Hoffman
in Berlin, November 1931–April 1932.

 

102
Socialite and fundraiser (d. 1987), wife of George Behrendt; she became President of the Los Angeles Philharmonic and later was on the board of the Norton Simon Museum.

 

103
Bassist, trained at Juilliard; he joined the Los Angeles Philharmonic in 1970 and became a Principal Bass late in 1973.

 

104
In the Prologue to his autobiography,
Memories, Dreams, Reflections
(1963).

 

105
On September 9.

 

106
Liza Maugham's second marriage was to Lord John Hope (1912–1996), 1st Baron Glendevon, the younger of Linlithgow's twin sons; see Glossary under Maugham.

 

107
Strong (b. 1935), then Director of the NPG, had purchased Bachardy's drawing of Auden in 1969. See Glossary under National Portrait Gallery.

 

108
Auden was buried in Austria; see below, October 7.

 

109
Lions and Shadows
tells how Isherwood was stricken with fever and tonsillitis whenever he met “Hugh Weston,” the Auden character: “these psychological attacks became one of our stock jokes” (pp. 216–217).

 

110
On October 6, Yom Kippur, Egypt attacked across the Suez Canal and Syria attacked along the Golan Heights trying to recapture territory occupied by Israel since the Six-Day War in 1967.

 

111
In Richard Attenborough's
Young Winston
(1972).

 

112
“While we happen to be on the subject of death, W.H. Auden has also caught it in Austria . . .”

 

113
Stephanie Spaulding Zimbalist (193[4]–2007), second wife of actor Efrem Zimbalist Jr. (b. 1918) and mother of actress Stephanie Zimbalist (b. 1956).

 

114
Evidence suggested he had accepted bribes in office, but he was charged only with tax evasion and money laundering for failing to report the income.

 

115
Portrait of a Marriage
(1973), about Nicolson's parents.

 

116
They had already met three times: at the Bracketts' in 1954, as Isherwood records in
D.1
; again in 1965 when Tennessee Williams introduced them backstage before a preview of the New York opening of
The Night of the Iguana
; at a recent dinner party at Roddy McDowall's.

 

117
Bachardy was the one who set the alarm clock.

 

118
Good News
; see Glossary.

 

119
Holmes and his nemesis, master criminal Professor Moriarity, reel into the falls fighting in Conan Doyle's “The Final Problem” (1893).

 

120
American singer, dancer, and actress (b. 1929); she was a child radio star, a lead in MGM musicals including
Seven Brides for Seven Brothers
(1954), and later performed in stage musicals and on T.V.

 

121
Non-irritating moisturizer.

 

122
I.e., the National Institute of Arts and Letters; see Glossary.

 

123
Not her real name.

 

124
In the spring of 1974, Stoltenberg met the feminist Andrea Dworkin, became her life partner and, like her, an anti-pornography activist. His books include
Refusing to Be a Man: Essays on Sex and Justice
(1989).

 

125
American conceptual and installation artist (b. 1941); Wilder staged Nauman's first solo show in 1966, and Nauman rapidly became known for his experiments with sculpture, video, performance, neon, hologram, photography, printmaking, and interactive environments.

 

126
Filming for an “Arena: Cinema” segment called “Hooray for Hollywood”; see Glossary under Jebb.

 

127
Coppola, George Lucas and Walter Murch founded American Zoetrope Productions in 1969 to escape the commercial control of the Hollywood studios. Isherwood disliked Coppola and thought his films overpraised. MacMillan later shared three Academy Awards for sound work on
The Right Stuff
(1983),
Speed
(1994), and
Apollo 13
(1995).

 

128
Isherwood and Bachardy still slept together, and Bachardy recalls that during his infatuation with Bill Franklin (see below), he and Isherwood had sex several times; see Introduction, p. xxi.

 

129
Clark worked closely with Schlesinger, beginning with
Darling
in 1964, and is credited with salvaging
Midnight Cowboy
although he was not officially the editor. They were then shooting
Day of the Locust
. He was accompanied by his wife, Laurence, and two daughters.

 

130
Jewish by background, though not a religious man.

 

131
He was a builder. Kate Clark, then about eighteen and still a student, married and divorced him; later she married tenor saxophonist Hart McNee and settled in New Orleans.

 

132
Andrew Raeburn (1933–2010), Cambridge-educated musician and conduct -or; an administrator for the Boston Symphony from 1964 and for Detroit from the mid-1970s. Later, he directed the Van Cliburn International Piano Competition in Fort Worth and the Honens International Piano Competition in Calgary.

 

133
And also his business partner; Schlesinger later split with him.

 

134
Christ's words, repeated three times, to Simon Peter in John 21.15–17; Swami published the story in his
Eternal Companion: Brahmananda, His Life and Teachings.

 

135
Arab oil-exporting countries imposed an embargo in retaliation for U.S. involvement in the Arab–Israeli conflict in September. See Glossary under Energy Crisis.

 

136
Sanskrit and Bengali for Ganges, the river sacred to Hindus.

 

137
Not his real name.

 

138
Trone was an aspiring actor; he later changed his name to Buddy Ochoa to take better advantage of his Mexican-American ethnicity. He had a few small T.V. parts in the 1970s and then worked in radio marketing, selling advertising.

 

139
Mexican-American actress wife of Eddie Albert; see Glossary.

 

140
Symbolic hand gestures, connecting external actions with spiritual ideas in order to focus the mind on God.

 

141
Gwendolyn Thomas (1922–2007), born in California, educated at San José State and Julliard, where she studied violin. In New York, she was a devotee of Swami Bodhananda, then she joined the Hollywood convent in 1954, took brahmacharya in 1959, and sannyas in 1965. She performed at Sunday services, directed the women's choir, and taught Vedanta classes in Spanish. She also helped establish the Vedanta Society in San Diego.

 

142
“Death is but crossing the world as friends do the seas; they live in one another still.” William Penn,
Some Fruits of Solitude
(1693).

 

143
For
T.V. and Radio Times
, promoting the T.V. broadcast of
Cabaret
; one photo appeared on the cover. The previous year, a month before she won the Academy Award, Minnelli (b. 1946) appeared dressed as Sally Bowles on the February 28 cover of
Time
and, during the same week, on the cover of
Newsweek.

 

144
November 10, 1812, to Lady Melbourne,
Byron's Letters and Journals
, ed. Leslie A. Marchand, Vol. 2, 1810–1812,
Famous in My Time
(1973).

 

145
Yves-Marie Hervé, then studying art history at the École du Louvre. Hockney drew him several times.

 

146
Symbol of Shiva, shaped like a pillar or sometimes rounded like a doorknob, and often set inside a basin to catch offerings. The phallic element embodies the male principle, the container, the female principle.

 

147
Originally published by Isherwood in 1969.

 

148
Dominick Dunne (1925–2009), then a film and T.V. producer, later a novelist and contributor to
Vanity Fair
. Brother of John Gregory Dunne and brother-in-law of Joan Didion.

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