Read My Lips (23 page)

We worked on the film for five months—plenty of time for Ross and me to get under each other’s skin. When I had finished—or thought I had finished—shooting my suicide scene, I was informed the following day that we were reshooting it because the mountains in the background looked too fake.

Well, you would have thought the world was coming to an end by the way I reacted. Like I wasn’t getting paid. “We have to do that again?!”

Then someone quietly said to me, “What’s the problem? Is that the best you can do?”

Wow. That shut me up.

After we wrapped, Ross and I made up and exchanged some nice letters; I really grew to appreciate who he was. Ross was a real showman, for starters. He knew how to produce a film and promote it. He was like an early Harvey Weinstein in that he was great at getting the press excited about a project. And in Old Hollywood style, he didn’t scrimp on glamour either.

Lost Horizon
had its world premiere in Los Angeles at a massive theater in Westwood that, sadly, no longer exists. Ross got Liv out of a play in Sweden for two days and flew her to the premiere. I was so happy she was going to be there. I invited Jerry Belson, a comedy writer and friend I was crazy about, to be my date. Jerry had worked with Garry Marshall on such comedies as
The Lucy Show, Gomer Pyle, Dick Van Dyke,
and together they developed
The Odd Couple
for television. I thought he might offer some comic relief if I hated what I saw onscreen.

Seeing a movie I’m in for the first time is never my favorite thing. For me, it’s hard to be objective about the film, my performance, and the way I look. We all know that looks are not the most important thing, but boy, it’s hard to see yourself up there, thirty feet high and seventy feet wide. It didn’t ease my anxiety when Jerry and I took our seats to find Rona Barrett, then the biggest gossip columnist in the country, sitting directly behind us.

So we watched the movie, frozen, not daring to move a muscle for fear that we’d telegraph our reactions, good or bad, to Rona. I loved the music, loved Hal’s lyrics, loved all the actors—I just wasn’t so sure about the script. I remember there was a lot of gardening going on.

The minute the lights began to come up, it was as though Jerry had read my mind. We both made a beeline for the exit. We were the first ones out. The minute we got outside we had to run the gauntlet of fans and press and people calling out to me, including my friend Liz Hush, who was waving and yelling, “Sally!” Jerry and I just blew past them as fast as we could without breaking into a full-on sprint.

We got to the car. I dove in and closed the door.

“Drive, Jerry. Drive,” was all I could say. Jerry and I both started in with the jokes. (I was beginning to think that bringing my own comedian was a stroke of pure genius.) As we pulled away from the crowd, Jerry asked where we were going.

“Drive, just drive.”

There was a premiere party, and I knew there was no way I could miss it. But until I felt ready to face it, Jerry just kept circling around, driving up and down Santa Monica Boulevard.

Finally we had to attend the party. I scanned the room—people talking, congratulating each other, eating and drinking, a lot of drinking. When I saw Liv across the room, I thought of her onscreen, wearing that powder-blue eye shadow. She was so ethereal and gorgeous—why mess with near perfection? I walked up behind her and tapped her on shoulder. She turned and looked up at me. We stayed like that for a moment, just looking at each other. Not a word was spoken. I guess neither of us knew what to say, how to react in such a public setting.

After the premiere there was a world tour, which meant London, Edinburgh, Manchester, and Leeds. Not quite the whole world, but it was so much fun. Stuart Cohen—my beloved manager, my best friend, and an indispensable part of my emotional life—accompanied me. On our way overseas we stopped in New York for a premiere party. The event was held at the Rainbow Room, high atop Rockefeller Center. The entrance was decorated with giant, cardboard Himalayan arches so everyone knew we were in Shangri-La. More than five hundred guests were invited.

I asked David Rayfiel to be my guest, but he said no—that instead we could meet up after the movie. Still a little stuck on him, I jumped at the chance. So I rushed into the party, gave somebody a high five, and dashed out the back to meet David. Sadly, I think David had the same feeling about having dinner with me. Rushed in, rushed out. In no time I was back at the party. Oh well. . .

As for the rest of the tour, I will say this: no expense was spared. Ross Hunter was definitely Old Hollywood in that respect. I don’t
remember any promotional experience then or since that could compare. Bottomless supplies of the best wine and champagne. All the caviar you could eat—and I can put away some caviar. Bring some friends over to visit? Sure, absolutely. The sky was the limit for any kind of comfort you desired. And plane travel . . . oh, how I miss old first-class European airline travel. This was the tail end of the era when you dressed to fly. Stewardesses—they were still called stewardesses then—strolled down the aisle of the cabin with an entire roast, carving off steaming slices for passengers, as much as you’d want.

On the flight over I was sitting next to some very nice men—strangers—and as we were nearing London, I overheard them talking about clearing customs, and it hit me:
Oh my God
. . .
I don’t have my passport! I’m going to meet the Queen and I don’t have my passport.
I wondered, How
on earth did I even get on the plane
?

Once the plane landed I stuck with the rest of the cast, hoping I could slip through customs unnoticed.

No such luck.

“Passport, please,” the customs official said, in his plummy little accent.

I smiled. I stuttered a bit.

“You don’t have your passport?” he asked.

“Well, no,” I said. “But I am here to meet the Queen!”

He looked at me, and then he waved me through. Talk about a different time.

After Manchester and Leeds, the tour put Stuart and me, along with the publicist, in a Daimler, complete with fur rugs, for the drive from Glasgow to Edinburgh. The Scottish countryside was beautiful. Moody skies hung low in every direction; emerald green sod and thistle dotted the landscape. It was late afternoon, and we were alone on the road, reveling in our luxurious isolation.

And then the car conked out.

The poor driver felt absolutely terrible and started trying to summon help on the CB radio. Stuart saw headlights approaching.
Draped in his fur coat, with his trademark diamond ring glinting, he leaped out into the middle of the road and stuck out his thumb. A huge truck, almost two blocks long, with a little cab in front, screeched to a stop. The driver opened up the door of the cab—no worry about stopping any traffic—and we started to explain our situation.

“Mumble mumble Edinburgh mumble mumble,” the driver said in his heavy Scottish accent.

Edinburgh
? We were sure we heard the word “Edinburgh.” Stuart and I hopped in the truck’s cab, along with the publicist, all squashed and lying on top of each other, leaving our luxurious car and driver behind. We pulled into Edinburgh in grand style in our gigantic truck.

Next stop: London, where the highlight of the tour would be meeting Her Royal Highness, Queen Elizabeth II. After the screening we were shuttled through security, then lined up with others to be presented that day.

Stuart Cohen was standing behind me in his fur coat. Sir John Gielgud was standing next to me, and on my other side was Peter Finch (who would later gain fame in
Network
). Peter was a great English actor, and told me he’d met the Queen many times. So in my mind they were going to have a nice chat. Leslie Caron was ahead of us in line, and I watched as she performed a curtsy so magnificent that it took my breath away. With her graceful arms extending out from her sides, she looked as though she was about to take flight.

You’re briefed on etiquette before you meet the Queen. “Be sure to bow your head,” I was told over and over. “No one ever does it right,” my English friends had told me. I was as prepared as I could be, standing there in a painfully dull white dress, jazzed up with one of David Bennett’s furs. We’d been instructed not to initiate conversation with the Queen, but she asked all of us the same thing: “And are you also in the film?” I looked up and blurted out, “Sure nice to meet you!”

Leslie Caron, I was not. The Queen chuckled at my rebellion, then moved along and said the same thing to Peter.

Before arriving in London I had received a letter from Sir John Gielgud about
Lost Horizon
:

Dear Sally,

I shall look forward to seeing you again tomorrow night . . . It seems you have made the only acting success in the picture. I knew you would
.

Congratulations.

He may have been full of malarkey. But hey, I’ll take it where I can get it. What do you do when someone of Sir John Gielgud’s character and reputation takes the time to write you such a thoughtful note? I just tucked it in my boot and got on about my business, and I never said a word to him about it. What a jerk I was.

Despite Sir John Gielgud’s estimation of the film and its poor early reviews,
Lost Horizon
has become a cult favorite today. I’m tickled to death when people come up to me and ask about it. I even met a man who attended one of my shows at the Roxy who told me that he and his family watch it every Christmas without fail. I guess everyone needs a little Shangri-La in their lives.

I
WAS ABOUT TO STRIKE OUT FOR WHAT
I
HOPED WOULD BE MY
own Shangri-La—my singing career.

While I was finishing up
Lost Horizon,
I had run into Neil Diamond on the beach in Malibu. He wasn’t an idol of mine in the way that Harry Nilsson or Rod Stewart were, but I respected him and his incredible success. So I asked his advice about singing. What he told me was simple: “If you want to be taken seriously as a singer, you have to get a band and go on the road.”

I decided to heed what he said, even though my friend, the legendary record producer Richard Perry, told me, “Stay in the studio, Sally. Keep recording.” Stuart tried to talk me out of it initially too.

But I soon found myself back up at 10050 Cielo Drive, the site of the tragedy in August of 1969. When I needed a place to rehearse—in this case, for my upcoming music tour—there was only one choice in my mind: Rudi Altobelli’s. All of us who had history with Rudi’s home refused to let what had happened color our memories there forever. We chose to focus on the good times we had had there in the past and to make new memories as well. For me, rehearsing at Rudi’s was a clear and easy choice.

I have Lou Adler to thank for my first record deal. After we got back from filming
Brewster McCloud
in Houston, Lou was producing Carol King’s album
Tapestry.
He slipped me into the studio, and I got to record my first demo with Carol King’s rhythm’s section.
Life
magazine’s Alfred Eisenstaedt was there too, and he took some wonderful photographs of the session. My album,
Roll with the Feelin’,
produced by Gene Page and his brother Billy, had been released in 1972. It was rock oriented, a departure from the standards I used to sing when I was younger. The track titles speak to me even now: “Roll with the Feelin’,” “Sweet Journey’s End,” “Take a Chance,” “Child of Mine,” “It All Works Out.” Billboard magazine gave the album four stars—a huge thumbs-up for me, or for anyone else for that matter.

But I had done little or nothing to capitalize on that good buzz because I had been on location shooting
Slither.
I was so excited just to have made the album that I never thought about promoting it. Through the thin walls of our motels I could hear Louise Lasser, my costar on
Slither,
along with James Caan, listen to my album almost every night while we were on the road. I was thrilled. I’d gone from singing in the grocery store to hearing a colleague grooving to my music on an album I had actually recorded. It was heaven.