Read Online Hopper by Tom Folsom - Free Book Online Page A

Newman didn’t dig jazz: the music of the Method according to Dean, a raw scorching expression where every note hung in the air as real as real could get. And still Newman managed to land the coveted role of hardscrabble boxer Rocky Graziano in Somebody Up There Likes Me , the one to have been played by Dean. But Hopper was the one ready for stardom! He was the one who shone in the firmament against Rock and Liz!
    Hopper’s reputation in Hollywood was getting weird—Dean worship had left him quirky and neurotic, a nervous persona his peer Anthony Perkins (to play the mama’s boy in Psycho ) already had down. What was the studio going to do with him? Gussied up in white satin pantaloons and a jerkin with gold-tasseled epaulettes, Hopper was the spitting image of the Little Corporal, Napoleon Bonaparte. A Warner flack pointed out how he’d even bought a poodle named Josephine and was giving all of his friends bottles of Napoleon brandy for Christmas. Introduced in voiceover by Vincent Price, who played the Devil, Hopper got about three minutes of screen time before the wacky historical romp moved on to the Marx Brothers. Harpo played Sir Isaac Newton.
    What else could Hopper do? Why not farm him out for a whopping $6,000 to horse breeder and cattle connoisseur Cornelius Vanderbilt Whitney?
    The filthy-rich scion had a notion to make a whole series of films about America. Whitney’s landmark production The Searchers was expertly crafted by director John Ford with his alter ego in the saddle. Once again the Ford/Wayne combination was sure to be a winner! Only this time around, instead of Pappy and the Duke, it was the sons of the Johns—the Pats, Pat Ford producing and the wooden Pat Wayne starring. Stuck in a retread of their fathers’ Westerns, Hopper did what he could in his less-than-stellar role of a twitchy Mexican killer.
    Napoleon, 1957
    Licensed by Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc
    Moseying about Western Street, the main drag on the Warner Bros. Wild West backlot, Hopper played the high-strung Utah Kid in an episode of Cheyenne . After enough time passed for the television audience to forget his face, he returned as a spastic train robber ready to jump out of his skin. His crazed look reminded ol’ Cheyenne Bodie of something he’d seen only once before—in the eyes of William Bonney, better known as Billy the Kid.
    â€œI’d rather face Bonney anytime,” said Cheyenne. “This boy’s a rattlesnake .”
    How much longer would Hopper have to stand around and have such cow shit lines slung on him?
    Figuring he was a real pepper pot, the studio slapped on an evil cowboy getup—black boots, black hat, black leather vest—and sent him back to Western Street to play a Billy the Kid cameo in “Brannigan’s Boots,” the pilot episode of Sugarfoot . Bested by the hapless happy-go-lucky sheriff “Sugarfoot” Brewster, Hopper stole out of town on his horse.
    Meanwhile, back at the Warner Ranch, Paul Newman rocketed to stardom as Billy the Kid in The Left Handed Gun , an edgy version of the outlaw legend, which recast Billy as a brooding juvie from the back alleys of New York.
    At a party at the home of Stewart Stern, the Rebel screenwriter becoming known around town as “the guy who writes for Newman,” Hopper considered Warner Bros.’ new golden boy, about to ride into the sunset with his beautiful Academy Award–winning bride, digging Oscar gold in The Three Faces of Eve .
    What the hell sort of racket was this Actors Studio these two had broken into?
    Hopper began to spew forth a barrage of nonsensical beat-inspired poetry, leaving Joanne no choice but to whack him on the head with Stern’s antique bed warmer, loosening the copper pan from the wooden handle. Perhaps a screw, too.
    â€œI’m a better actor than you are, Newman!” screamed Hopper. “And I’m better than she is!”
    Cool Hand Newman dealt