Valley of the Dolls (40 page)

The tears ran down her freckled cheeks. One week of sleep and diet and she’d be as good as new. He knew that. Why was he carrying on like this?

His secretary interrupted to say the Paris call had come through. He picked up the phone, his face beaming unctuous charm. “Hello!” He was shouting as people usually do when they are speaking across impossible distances. “Yes.” His voice lost some of its volume. “I can hear you clear as a bell. Marvelous, isn’t it? Yes, Mr. Chardot . . . yes, I received your letter this morning. That’s why I put in the call. Your terms are . . . well . . .” He forced a soft laugh. “Impossible is an understatement. Naturally I want to do a picture with Miss North. And I’m perfectly willing to let you co-produce. But a one-picture deal with you owning fifty per cent of the foreign rights is not feasible. After all, this star of yours—we will be putting her in clothes, covering her completely. How do we know she will have the same appeal? Yes, I realize she was fully clothed in her last three pictures. But let’s face it, Mr. Chardot, an actress she’s not. What? Well, maybe she did win those awards . . . maybe it’s because I don’t understand French. But in English, how can we be sure? And your not giving me a second picture option—is that fair? I spend all the money on advertising and then some other studio grabs her for the second picture. I want a three-picture deal, and you can have your terms. She can have her own production setup. The money will be deposited in a Swiss bank. . . . How much? . . . Oh, my good man, where are you getting those figures? No one could meet your demands, Mr. Chardot.”

He held the phone silently, a pained expression on his face. “Mr. Chardot, a Louie Esterwald will contact you this afternoon. . . . What? Oh, it’s eight o’clock at night there. I never can get over this big difference in time. All right, tomorrow morning. He’ll negotiate the fine points. He speaks your language, a very fine French. And can we expect you here in September? . . . Now Mr. Chardot, if we wait until February that brings us into ’fifty-seven. I want to report to my stockholders that we have a Jennifer North picture in the works for ’fifty-six. . . . Fine, I’m looking forward to it, too. Have you started shooting on her new picture? . . . You’ll do two between now and November—God, I envy you. Between now and November I’m lucky if I get one finished. But you haven’t got union problems, and that goddam television. Wait, you’ll see—in a few years you’ll feel it too. It’s like cancer, that television. It spreads to every place.”

After he hung up he immediately placed another transatlantic call. Neely waited patiently while he toyed with a pencil. He slammed the receiver down in disgust. “A twenty-minute delay!”

Suddenly he seemed to remember her. “All right, you can leave.” He waved his hand.

“I thought we were having lunch,” she said, stunned.

“You can skip lunch. With that belly, you’re better off. I’d think you were four months gone if I hadn’t seen you that way so many times. I’ve got to wait for the call to Louie Esterwald to come through.” He sighed. “Imagine the deals I have to make and the footsies I have to play to get that naked whore to come make a movie for me. Ten years ago the Industry would have thrown her out. Now every studio is fighting to get her. Something’s happening to this country. We’re going to go immoral. And television is doing it. I’ve always stood for clean American pictures, but now we have to fight television with everything we can get—tits, asses, French whores . . .”

“She’s no French whore,” Neely said. “She’s an American girl, and very nice. I roomed with her once.”

He was genuinely interested. “You roomed with Jennifer North?”

“Eleven years ago. We were both in
Hit the Sky.
She was just a glorified showgirl, then she married Tony Polar. She was out here.”

“Of course! He was married to a Jennifer . . .” He shook his head. “No, it can’t be the same girl. This girl is only twenty-three.”

Neely laughed bitterly. “In French pictures everyone is twenty-three. It’s the same Jennifer I roomed with. Jennifer is . . . Geez—I don’t know—I was seventeen, and she was supposed to be twenty-one. . . .”

“That would make her thirty-two.” He was amazed.

“That’s right,” Neely said. “And you’re hollering that I’m old at twenty-eight.”

“This girl must take care of herself. And she’s reliable. Two pictures by November.” He shook his head. “She won some award at some foreign film festival, so now she thinks she’s an actress. Just my luck—the French get her when she’s naked . . . I have to get her when she’s an actress.” He sighed with a rattle that shook his whole body.

“And meanwhile what do I do? Just sit?” Neely asked.

“Sit and take off weight. You’re getting paid each week.”

“And when is my next picture?”

“We’ll see. . .”

Her eyes blazed. “Who do you think you are, treating me like this?”

“The head of the studio. And you’re just a little snotnose I made into a star—only you haven’t paid off lately. So you’ll just sit. And you’ll learn a goddam good lesson. Watch a few new stars come up like Janie Lord. Maybe that’ll knock some sense into your head. Now beat it, I’ve got more important things to do.”

She rose. “I could walk out of here and never come back.”

He smiled. “Do that. And you’ll never work anywhere again.”

She sobbed all the way home, racing the car recklessly through the canyons and around the winding hills. She really didn’t care. What was she supposed to do? Go home and sit in that barn of a house? Even the twins didn’t need her, really. They loved their nurse, and they were going to school. Once the word was out that she was replaced in this picture—and right on top of that Front Office Poison award—then she’d really be alone. No one calls a loser. Geez, how could people be so mean? She had worked so hard, tried so hard—and now everyone was out to crucify her.

She went into the house and grabbed a bottle of Scotch off the bar. Then she went to her bedroom, pulled the blinds to shut out the daylight, shut off her phone and swallowed five red pills. Five red ones hardly did anything now. Last night she had only slept three hours with five red ones
and
two yellows. She undressed and slipped into bed.

It must have been midnight when she woke. She opened the blinds. Night . . . and nothing to do. She wandered into the bathroom and unconsciously got on the scale. She had lost two pounds. Hey, that was an idea—if she just slept and took pills and didn’t eat she could take ten pounds off in no time. She took a vitamin pill—that would keep her healthy—then she swallowed a few more red dolls and washed them down with a generous slug of Scotch.

She could see the sun sneaking through the drapes when she woke. She fumbled her way into the bathroom. She was groggy, but not sleepy. No, she wouldn’t get on the scale. She’d wait and be surprised. She felt hollow and empty. Better take two vitamins. . . . Yeah, they had everything in them. She slapped some cream on her face and put lanolin in her hair. Might as well make this a real beauty cure. She’d look like a living doll when she finally got up. This time she took five yellow pills and then two red ones. That would speed up the action. There was just enough Scotch left for another good drink. . . .

When she opened her eyes everything looked too clean and bright. What was that goddam needle doing taped to her arm? And that bottle hanging upside down? Christ! This was a hospital room! She tried to sit up and a nurse rushed over.

“Relax, Miss O’Hara,” the nurse urged in her professionally cheerful voice.

“What am I doing here? What happened?”

The nurse handed her a newspaper. Jesus! On the front page—a picture of her, fresh-faced and smiling, one of her first studio stills. But the large picture beside it—a girl being carried by two men, her head hanging back, her bare feet showing . . . God, it was her! She read the headline,
Star Takes Overdose of Pills,
and the caption,
Accident, Claims Studio Head.
Reading how The Head had come to her rescue, she smiled for the first time. Sure he had been afraid—afraid she might conk out. He didn’t dare say he had fired her off the picture. She read on avidly.

“Miss O’Hara and I had a discussion five days ago”—Geez, had she been out that long?—”and I suggested perhaps she was too tired to rush into production of the next picture. She assured me that she was not, that all she needed was a few days’ rest. Obviously this was all she was trying to do. Get in shape for the new picture. If she lives—” The Head had choked up and had had to pause to wipe tears from his eyes. Tears! That shit could turn them off and on better than any star. He was probably just scared she had left some messy suicide note. She read on. “If she lives, she will play the starring role in our biggest picture. It is not true that we are replacing her with Janie Lord. No one could replace Neely O’Hara. We had been considering changing the script in case Miss O’Hara didn’t feel up to it. Then perhaps Janie Lord
could
do it. But all we want is for Neely to come through. Once in a generation a star like Neely comes along.”

She felt marvelous. There were eulogies about her from every star she had ever played with, and from stars she hardly knew. Even the trades had devoted several columns of praise. It was like dying and being able to watch the crowd at one’s own funeral. She liked the sensation. Geez, they must have really expected her to die. It must have been close for The Head to put himself out on a limb like this. He
had
to give her the picture now.

“Was I very sick?” she asked the nurse.

“Sick! Until a few hours ago we didn’t think you’d make it. You’ve been in an oxygen tent for twenty-four hours.”

“But I only took a few pills. I really was just trying to get some sleep.”

“It was lucky your butler called the doctor. He came up and found you hardly breathing. He grew concerned about you being without food for three days.”

She grinned. “I bet I’m nice and skinny now.”

The nurse turned abruptly away. A second later the doctor came in. “I’m Dr. Keegan.” She recognized the name—The Head’s personal physician.

“Well, we made it,” he said briskly.

We sure did, she thought. But knowing The Head would get a full report, she merely smiled weakly.

“Silly thing to do. What does it prove?” he asked.

It got me the picture back, buster. But she held onto her wistful smile and added a few tears for good measure. Then she said softly, “I . . . I didn’t want to live without the picture.”

“Oh, yes . . . yes . . . the picture. We’ll have to see. Can’t tell whether you’ll be up to it”

She sat up. “I
am
up to it!”

“You’ve had a rough time. We’ll see. If I don’t think you’re ready, I’ll tell the studio. Can’t let you have a relapse.”

So that was it! This was his out! His own personal physician would say she wasn’t strong enough.

She smiled sweetly. “Well, let’s hope you find me ready. Because it was The Head’s idea that I lose weight, and the faster the better. And as for my not being in shape, it was The Head who first got me the green goof balls—when I was eighteen—to kill my appetite. And I worked many times with
no
food at all for a week at a time—on his orders. So I think you’ll find me strong enough. Let’s see . . . wardrobe fittings must be in a few days. I’m thin enough, so I can make them. Then I have a whole week to rest before we begin shooting.”

The next day she had her lawyer and her agents at her bedside. It was a cinch. She couldn’t be taken off the picture now, not with the statements The Head had given to the papers. It was better than any contract. And public sympathy was riding with her too. But she didn’t dare miss one day of shooting. Her agent warned her. “One day . . . one hour late, and out you’ll go. He’s mad now, and he’d do it, even at a sacrifice to the picture. You’ve outsmarted him, and he doesn’t like to lose.”

She was nervous the first day of shooting. She saw Sam Jackson standing with the crew, and he seemed nervous, too. Everyone seemed nervous. But she had studied her lines. She knew the scene cold.

“We’ll have one run-through and then try it on camera,” Sam suggested. “Let’s start with the dialogue where you address the audience in the nightclub. You beg them for quiet, then you sing.” He turned and shouted, “Extras in placel Let’s get going!”

The scene was set and she ran through it. It went well. But why were they all so nervous? And why was Sam avoiding her eyes? This wasn’t like him. Was he embarrassed because he was on trial and could be taken off the picture? Everyone knew The Head was a bastard. She’d talk to Sam at the end of the day.

She watched them set the boom and pull the cameras into place. Was Sam this hysterical for the thousand bucks bonus a day? No one could do an actual take in one shooting. Christ, if they got through one whole scene in a day it would be good shooting.

The lights flooded the set, the slate was snapped under her eyes. . . . Jesus, she had never done a scene on camera with just one run-through. No one did.

It went fairly well. She missed a few cues, but for a first take . . . Geez, he might even get a foot of actual film out of it. She turned to him with a smile when it was over.

“You blew the lyrics.”

She shrugged. “Two lines. The recording is taped already. So I mouthed it wrong. . . next time—”

“All right. Let’s do it again. And I want this to be a final take.”

God, he was sick. He’d never get through the picture running this scared. But it was his funeral.

She returned to the set. This time she turned her ankle and lurched over the wires of the hand mike she was supposed to be carrying.

“Cut!” he shouted. He walked over. “Are you feeling all right, Neely?”

“I feel fine. Hey, relax, Sam. You didn’t expect to get an actual take with the second try.”

“I expected to get it the first time.”

“Sam, are you crazy? I know the heat’s on you, but don’t push the panic button. You act as if we’re shooting a quickie. Even The Head would laugh if he heard you expected to do a full scene with one take.”

He ignored her and turned to the crew. “Get ready for Take Three.”