Hollywood (66 page)

After much trepidation, Caroline had gone into a clinic outside Paris, and the deed had been done at the beginning of winter. Now she felt that it was safe to show off her restored—if not exactly new—face. She had been lucky. Aside from all the horror stories of operations gone wrong, many an operation had been so successful that the seeker after eternal beauty was startled to see that she—or he—was indeed made beautiful by the unexpected possession of someone else’s face. Caroline looked like Emma at her best, who was exactly like, though unlike, the original Caroline long since erased by time and Emma’s glory and—now—surgery.

“I have no plans,” said Caroline, who had a great many plans. “
It
was so pleasant being home again in …”

“Alsace-Lorraine. I know.” Miss Kingsley was very good at keeping straight all the lies that the stars had told her. When Mabel Normand had said something to Miss Kingsley about her childhood in Staten Island, Miss Kingsley had gently reminded her that she had been born and raised on Beacon Hill in Boston. Mabel promised not to make such a slip again.

“Dear old Alsace-Lorraine,” sighed Caroline. “Yes. I took the waters there, and lost a great deal of weight.”

“I can see. You look amazingly rested and slender.” This was Miss Kingsley’s code phrase for “plastic surgery.” “Ready to go before the cameras again.” Code: the star is now ready to face with a brand-new face a new career, having lost the old one to unkindly Father Time.

“Perhaps. I’m talking to William Desmond Taylor about a new project, a life of George Sand, actually.”

“Will you wear trousers?” Miss Kingsley frowned at her note-book.

“I think one must, at times. But she was mostly in gowns.”

“I deplore, frankly, women in men’s clothes. Mr. Hearst has an unhealthy passion for this … this perversion. There is no other word, I fear.” Miss Kingsley turned pale pink. “I’ve discussed it with poor Marion, who says it’s what, as she puts it in that cute way of hers, ‘Pops wants.’ ”

“She has not got quite the right bottom for trousers.” Caroline was judiciously clinical.

“I trust
you
will wear a long frock coat …”

“A Prince Albert, yes. And I shall only pretend to smoke a cigar.”

“What you stars must do for your art!” Miss Kingsley shook her head more in pity than awe. “Do you still plan to buy or build your own studio?”

Caroline nodded. Tim had reawakened her ambition. Although she enjoyed acting the part of a movie star in real life, she did not much like
becoming an old woman on the screen. The sudden entirely unexpected realliance with Tim had changed her course. With Tim’s help, what Hearst had done with newspapers she would do with the movies. Others had had the same wish but they had been bemused by the notion of art. Griffith had tried to render the Civil War on the screen in “lightning flashes,” as President Wilson had poetically put it, but he had got lost in the politics of that huge event. Later, when he made
Intolerance
, he had succumbed to spectacle without mind. Yet Caroline knew what he was doing or trying to do. Like Griffith, Tim believed that the imagination of the public could be laid siege to, and won. But Tim chose, perversely, to appeal to everyone’s sense of justice, while Griffith wearied them with grandiose visions of various deadly sins. Caroline knew that the answer was somewhere between the two, in what would look to be nothing more ambitious than a celebration of the ordinary in American life; and then—thanks to the luxury of film editing—dreams could be stealthily planted in the viewer’s mind. Instinctively, Chaplin had done this from the beginning, and Caroline was confident that once he knew what he was doing, he would lose his art. Self-consciousness was the principal enemy of this strange narrative form. Gradually, she and Tim had worked it all out in a way that neither on his own could have done. They were now both hard at work on a dozen photo-plays, each calculated to appeal to as many people as possible, yet with a certain intrinsic design that, if successful, would subtly alter the way everyone observed the world. Where once Huns and Reds were demonized, human qualities would be apotheosized. The fact that they could so easily fail made the attempt all the more exciting.

“We’ve thought of buying Inceville at Santa Monica. Or maybe something in the Valley but only,” Caroline added quickly, “if you approve.”

“My heart shall never go out to the Valley, but if you are there
I
will come out. That is a solemn promise.”

“I shall miss Paramount.” Famous Players–Lasky was now more and more known as Paramount Pictures, by order, presumably, of Adolph Zukor, who had also painted the studio green, his favorite color according to Charles Eyton. Yet Zukor was never to be seen in the studio. Instead he reigned over his empire from New York and left movie-making to his employees, a mistake Caroline would not make when she began her new career. Essentially, the movie magnates were not concerned with what was on the screen as long as it was profitable. Those who did care, like Griffith, tended to be self-indulgent and unprofitable. But the magnates must be propitiated. They—or specifically Zukor—owned the movie theaters, and Caroline had done her best to
charm the great man who lived in Rockland County, New York, surrounded by relatives. But then all of the movie magnates were family men on the grandest, most tribal scale. They married off their children in the same calculated way as royal families did, and with, often, the same dire results. No wonder they all wanted to make
Mayerling
. Currently, Samuel Goldfish now Goldwyn, brother-in-law of Lasky but mortal enemy of Zukor, wanted Caroline to play the Empress Elizabeth, whose doomed son Rudolph—Barthelmess had said yes to the role—would kill himself at the hunting lodge of Mayerling. Hearst was now threatening to make his
Mayerling
with Marion Davies as the tragic Maria Vetsera.

“Naturally, you have your two favorite directors both on the lot.” Grace Kingsley twinkled. “Mr. Farrell’s out in the Valley, I’m told, doing a western. I’m due to see him tomorrow.”

“Give him,” said Caroline, “my love.”

Thus far, their realliance as lovers and business partners was in secret. Tim had personal as well as movie commitments to be honored, while Caroline had William Desmond Taylor to—what? She had found it significant that when she had reappeared at the studio, Tim had whistled when he saw her new face. “Is it a success?” she had asked, and he had nodded, while her other “favorite” director had not noticed her surgical master-work. But then Taylor was busy in both his private and his professional life. “
He’s
in Projection Room C, e’en as we speak. He’s editing
The Green Temptation
, which sounds to me like a winner.”

“I certainly hope so.” Caroline smiled with great care. There was still some tightness about her mouth, certain to disappear, she had been assured, once the new face had settled in.

“He tells me he can’t wait to start on his next new Traxler photo-play. But he wouldn’t say what it was.”

“We are hoping to do
Mayerling
.” Boldly Caroline lied. After all, everyone else had, at one time or another, announced that they were doing the story or, indeed, had done a version. The visit was now worthwhile, and Miss Kingsley had her “scoop.” She scribbled happily as Caroline named an ideal—and impossible—cast. No, they would not use Knoblock for the script. He had gone back to England. “Bernard Shaw would be ideal.” Caroline was now swept away by fantasy. There was a kind of perfect joy in lying for no specific purpose. “Of course he would have to adjust to our art-form, so unlike the theater. But I’m sure he could pull it off. Otherwise, there’s always Maurice Maeterlinck.” On Maeterlinck’s much-heralded visit to Hollywood,
he had submitted a script whose protagonist was a bee. Then he had gone back to Belgium.

“Quality. That is what a Traxler movie is all about,” Miss Kingsley intoned.

“One tries,” whispered Caroline, “one tries,” she repeated, quite liking the sound of her own voice.

Then, although each was a lady and Miss Kingsley virginal, they were obliged to discuss that morning’s newspaper account of the on-going Arbuckle case. The accidental rupture of Virginia Rappe’s bladder had taken place September 7, 1921. It was now February 1, 1922 and the press still continued, each day, to invent new revelations or rake over old ones. Secretly, almost everyone in Hollywood had sided with Arbuckle but the rest of the country, spurred on by Hearst’s press, wanted an auto-da-fé with the plump comedian as centerpiece, a flaming torch to morality.

More than ever was Caroline convinced that she and Tim were on the right track. Where it was Hearst’s tactic to bestialize the public, they would civilize them, she thought grandly if somewhat uneasily. Certainly she would have to rein in Tim’s political enthusiasm. They had agreed that in the ordinary American town that they were going to invent, the voice of reason would eventually win over the people, who would come to realize to what extent they are manipulated. The town must seem very real while at its center there would be a family for the whole nation to love. Above all, there would be no overt preaching: if they had done their work properly, their ends would be achieved subliminally. Both agreed that the noble Emma Traxler, a creature of perfect romance, would never set foot in their town.

“I have just had word from Washington,” said Miss Kingsley, putting on her gloves. “The Postmaster General will not be coming to Hollywood.”

“I suppose he still thinks he’ll be president one day, and that Hollywood …”

“… is or will be—I promise you—a
highly
suitable background for
any
important venture.” Miss Kingsley was a fervent booster of their beleaguered dreamland.

“One day, I suppose so. Of course, he’d have great power here. I wonder if he understands that.” Caroline also wondered why she, herself, had not given the subject more thought. There would be ridiculous censorship, of course, but there would also be encouragement for the sort of thing that the virtuous conspirators had in mind. Hays—or some other high federal officer—could act as a bridge between politics and the movies. If Caroline and Tim, somehow, could capture the bridge, the impulses that now came to
Hollywood from Washington would be reversed and Mr. Hays, or whoever, would be
their
transmitter from West to East, from the governed to the governors.

At the door to the commissary Caroline and Miss Kingsley parted. Then Caroline entered the dining room, aware that she was still a source of interest. She heard her name through the rattling of dishes and the roar of several hundred conversations. The room smelled of beef stew, and mothballs from Western Costume’s costumes.

William waved for her to join him. He was seated with his writer, Julia Crawford Ivers, and his editor, Edy Lawrence. In the past, Caroline had noted with some bewilderment that all of William’s intimates were women and yet, as far as she could tell, he was not interested in them sexually. She had come, gradually, to Tim’s conclusion. Yet, once, there had been a wife, and, now, there was still very much a daughter, whom he was sending through an expensive New York school. Had he undergone some sea change in middle life, and shifted from nymph to faun? Or was he simply yet another victim of the Californian Curse?—or, more precisely had she been, during the time of her passion, now entirely ended, thanks to backgammon and the return of Tim.

Caroline told them that Will Hays would not be coming to Hollywood.

“Then we’ll get Herbert Hoover,” said Julia Ivers. “They say it must be a member of the Cabinet.”

“Or Supreme Court.” Like everyone in Hollywood, Edy Lawrence was not enthusiastic about a supervisor from Washington.

“The worst thing, of course, will be the censorship.” Taylor’s handsome face was paler than usual. He smoked one black cigarette after another from a gold case which Caroline thought had been stolen the previous July when the man-servant, Eddie Sands, had decamped with most of the contents of the bungalow, as well as Taylor’s car. Knoblock had been at the studio when Eddie had disappeared, after first telling Knoblock that he intended to get married in Catalina. But Eddie had gone elsewhere, as checks with Taylor’s forged signature began to crop up in different parts of the state. Taylor notified the police; hired a Negro servant, Henry Peavey; bought a new car and engaged a new chauffeur. The whole business had caused him a good deal of distress.

“Where did you find this?” Caroline touched the cigarette-case.

Taylor frowned. “A pawn shop. Where else? The police put me onto it. He seems to prefer the pawn shop to the fence.”

“I like Hoover.” Julia Ivers was a comfortable sort of woman, who could eat as much macaroni and cheese as she liked while Caroline picked at a sliver of white fish.

“He’s honest,” said Taylor with no great conviction.

“What about censorship?” Caroline’s interest in Taylor’s domestic problems had long since been satisfied.

“Isn’t it inevitable? The Motion Picture Producers and Distributors want someone to clean up, whatever that means, the movie business, and make the world forget poor Fatty Arbuckle.”

“To be paid one hundred fifty thousand dollars a year.” Mrs. Ivers sounded mournful.

Then they discussed the usual subject—movies. Who was making what and where and for how much. At the end of lunch, Taylor turned to Caroline. “I think I’ve got a project for us. Charlie Eyton and I had a talk just before lunch.”

“Not
The Rocks of Valpré
. I’m too old.”

Mrs. Ivers shook her head. “The story’s too dull, anyway. Not enough action.”

“But there’s a wonderful part for Mary.” Taylor sighed. “Anyway, I’m outvoted. No, something else. Can I take you home? At five? We’ll talk in the car.”

Caroline returned to her office to find Tim, dressed like a cattle wrangler, talking on two telephones, while the secretary smiled an unfocussed happy smile. Absently, Caroline tapped his head; then she went into her office, where scripts were piled beneath icons of Emma Traxler, suffering and aging from one station of life’s way to the next. Well, there could be a rebirth soon. She looked young again; but did she still resemble Emma? That was the question whose answer, if negative, would come too late on film. Fortunately, Emma’s days were now numbered. There would be one more glamorous film, then Emma would remove forever her spectacular ear-rings, and pass into history.