beloved publicist, and Diana, Alex's editor, were sitting there over their untouched drinks looking positively catatonic.
"You mean none of this is in the book!" I whispered to Jody. "Not a single word of it."
"Well, what is?" I asked. "Don't ask!"
I SOAKED up over three cups of coffee, then went to the phone booth and rang my house hoping Belinda had found the keys and let herself in or that she'd called and left a message on the answering machine.
No score on either account. Just a call from my ex-wife Celia in New York saying in sixty seconds or less that she needed to borrow five hundred dollars at once.
FINALLY I started the drive back with Alex, and we were arguing almost at once over the wind in the open car about why he hadn't put the little true stories in his autobiography.
"But what about the juicy ones that wouldn't hurt anybody?" I kept insisting. "Forget Bonnie and George Hairdresser What's-his-name, you know all kinds of things-"
"Too risky," he said, shaking his head. "Besides, people don't want the truth, you know they don't."
"Alex, you're behind the times," I said. "People are as hooked on the truth these days as they used to be on lies in the fifties. And you can't kill a career anymore-anybody's career-with a little scandal."
"The hell you can't," he said. "They may put up with some of the dirt they didn't want yesterday. But it's got to be the right dirt in the right measure. It's just a new set of illusions, Jeremy."
"I don't believe that, Alex. I think that's not just cynical, it's a bad observation. I tell you, things are different now. The sixties and seventies changed everybody, even people in small towns who never heard of the sexual revolution. The ideas of those times raised the level of popular art."
"What the hell are you talking about, Walker? Have you watched any TV lately? 'Champagne Flight,' you can take it from me is garbage. It's the step-kid of the fifties 'Peyton Place.' Only the hairstyles have been changed."
I smiled. Only an hour ago he'd been defending it.
"OK, maybe so," I said. "But any TV show today can handle incest, prostitution-taboo subjects they wouldn't even touch twenty years ago. People aren't scared to death of sex these days. They know that lots of the big stars are gay."
"Yeah, and they forgave Rock Hudson for it because he died of cancer, same way they forgave Marilyn Monroe for being a sex queen because she went into the big sleep. Sex, yes, as long as death and suffering comes with it, gives them the moral overtone they've still got to have. Take a look at the docudramas and the cop shows. I tell you, it's sex and death, just like it always was."
"Alex, they know the stars drink. They know they have kids like Bonnie did out of wedlock. It's a long way from the years when they drove Ingrid Bergman out of town for having a baby by an Italian director she wasn't married to."
"No. Maybe for a little while it was really open, when the flower children were big, but now the wheel's turning again, if it ever turned at all. Yeah, we've got a gay guy on 'Champagne Flight' because 'Dynasty' did it first, but guess who plays him, a straight actor, and it's all minor stuff and you can smell the Lysol they sanitized it with a mile off. Just the right dirt in the right measure, I'm telling you. You've got to be as careful with the proportions as you were in the past."
"No, you could have packed your book with the truth and they'd still love you and everybody you wrote about. Besides, it's your life, Alex, it's what you've seen, it's you going on record."
"No, it's not, Jeremy," he said. "It's another part, called movie-star writer."
"That's too cold, Alex."
"No. It's a fact. And I gave them what they wanted, as I always have. Read it. It's a damn good performance."
"Bull shit," I said. I was getting angry. We had glided off the bridge and down the freeway past the ghostly Palace of Fine Arts and into town, and I didn't have to shout so loud now. "And even if
"You mean none of this is in the book!" I whispered to Jody. "Not a single word of it."
"Well, what is?" I asked. "Don't ask!"
I SOAKED up over three cups of coffee, then went to the phone booth and rang my house hoping Belinda had found the keys and let herself in or that she'd called and left a message on the answering machine.
No score on either account. Just a call from my ex-wife Celia in New York saying in sixty seconds or less that she needed to borrow five hundred dollars at once.
FINALLY I started the drive back with Alex, and we were arguing almost at once over the wind in the open car about why he hadn't put the little true stories in his autobiography.
"But what about the juicy ones that wouldn't hurt anybody?" I kept insisting. "Forget Bonnie and George Hairdresser What's-his-name, you know all kinds of things-"
"Too risky," he said, shaking his head. "Besides, people don't want the truth, you know they don't."
"Alex, you're behind the times," I said. "People are as hooked on the truth these days as they used to be on lies in the fifties. And you can't kill a career anymore-anybody's career-with a little scandal."
"The hell you can't," he said. "They may put up with some of the dirt they didn't want yesterday. But it's got to be the right dirt in the right measure. It's just a new set of illusions, Jeremy."
"I don't believe that, Alex. I think that's not just cynical, it's a bad observation. I tell you, things are different now. The sixties and seventies changed everybody, even people in small towns who never heard of the sexual revolution. The ideas of those times raised the level of popular art."
"What the hell are you talking about, Walker? Have you watched any TV lately? 'Champagne Flight,' you can take it from me is garbage. It's the step-kid of the fifties 'Peyton Place.' Only the hairstyles have been changed."
I smiled. Only an hour ago he'd been defending it.
"OK, maybe so," I said. "But any TV show today can handle incest, prostitution-taboo subjects they wouldn't even touch twenty years ago. People aren't scared to death of sex these days. They know that lots of the big stars are gay."
"Yeah, and they forgave Rock Hudson for it because he died of cancer, same way they forgave Marilyn Monroe for being a sex queen because she went into the big sleep. Sex, yes, as long as death and suffering comes with it, gives them the moral overtone they've still got to have. Take a look at the docudramas and the cop shows. I tell you, it's sex and death, just like it always was."
"Alex, they know the stars drink. They know they have kids like Bonnie did out of wedlock. It's a long way from the years when they drove Ingrid Bergman out of town for having a baby by an Italian director she wasn't married to."
"No. Maybe for a little while it was really open, when the flower children were big, but now the wheel's turning again, if it ever turned at all. Yeah, we've got a gay guy on 'Champagne Flight' because 'Dynasty' did it first, but guess who plays him, a straight actor, and it's all minor stuff and you can smell the Lysol they sanitized it with a mile off. Just the right dirt in the right measure, I'm telling you. You've got to be as careful with the proportions as you were in the past."
"No, you could have packed your book with the truth and they'd still love you and everybody you wrote about. Besides, it's your life, Alex, it's what you've seen, it's you going on record."
"No, it's not, Jeremy," he said. "It's another part, called movie-star writer."
"That's too cold, Alex."
"No. It's a fact. And I gave them what they wanted, as I always have. Read it. It's a damn good performance."
"Bull shit," I said. I was getting angry. We had glided off the bridge and down the freeway past the ghostly Palace of Fine Arts and into town, and I didn't have to shout so loud now. "And even if
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