HOWL AND THE PUSSY-KAT.6

ISAAC BLACKMAILS A NEW DIRECTOR ONBOARD

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Chapter Three: PRE-PRODUCTION (Part Three)

From Paris Jason flew to Rome: another dalliance with another married woman. This one, herself the star of a low-budget Italian soap, knew who he was. She told him that the actor who dubbed him in Eldorado (and other major performers) was one of Rome’s most notorious fags.

He sent Myra Mae a fax with details of his hotel and his flight schedule back to LAX. Her reply looked like a cut-price telegram: Enjoy. Call me on return. VOYAGER on schedule.

Jason sent postcards to San Diego and to Cora, still unaware of the scandal that had engulfed her. Nor did he know that Kate Kane had replaced Dolores.

One more surprise: he was to be reunited with Darla Dawson, his sometime paramour from Eldorado. Marcilla Leon had met a lurid demise in last year’s 90-minute Christmas Special. Darla was finding that there isn’t much Life After Soap, a lesson learned by many young Ewings and Carringtons and Colbys. After nine lean months she signed to play Tina Durrance.

The last main supporting part to be cast was Dr Jackson, the former Dr Jacquith. Actors great and small (and black and white) were itching to work with Katharine Kane. Isaac’s casting director finally signed C.O. Jones, an ageing middle-rank black actor who would give Dr Jackson a touch of Claude Rains gravitas. For most of his career C.O. had been a poor man’s O.J. Simpson (of course, O.J. was now a poor man’s O.J. Simpson), playing supporting roles in disaster movies and cheap comedies. He’d always gone down big in Latin America where just the name C.O. Jones – cojones - in the credits guaranteed an early laugh. Now he was more like a low-rent Morgan Freeman. He was also a Grant Agency client. Isaac was still tossing bones to Myra Mae.

Having blown Isaac to get it, Dolores had now blown her contract, which guaranteed her $10 million per picture or $5 million in any year that no suitable part came up. Her ‘severance’ was 50 percent of this year’s $5 million.

Kazman insisted on Kate being paid $2.5 million now that she was ‘a serious actress’, way beyond what she was worth even after the success of Poor Nellie. Left with half the $10 million earmarked for Dolores, Isaac made a last-minute decision to invest in a better director than the studio hack who’d been slated for Voyager.

* * *

‘Rodney?’

‘Is it really you calling me, Isaac? To what do I owe the honour? I guess I should start by asking how Dolores is getting along.’

‘You’re talking about one very unhappy lady.’

Rodney Fire’s laughter came down the line. ‘So, I guess this isn’t a good time to call round for some of the best head in Hollywood.’ Isaac chortled.

‘Not unless you’re looking for a cut-price sex change. Dolores is gonna bite the gonads off the next guy she goes down on. If she still does guys.’

‘Well, it won’t be you, Isaac. And every cloud has a silver lining. I hear Katharine Kane’s going to take over in your Voyager remake.’

‘Yeah, Al Kazman’s kinda sunk his teeth into my nuts.’

‘I heard that too. It could come good, Isaac. Kane was pretty slick in that Brit-flick. So who’s gonna direct her for you? One of your studio jerk-offs?’

‘That’s why I’m calling. I thought maybe you could come back and do it.’

‘Hot Rod’ responded with another bark of laughter. ‘Isaac, I doubt you can afford me. I hear you’ve got your tit in a crack since they busted Titus. What’s your budget for Voyager? Forty million? Thirty?’

‘Twenty-five,’ Isaac conceded. His guts churned.

‘Then you definitely can’t afford me.’

‘I could give you three point five million.’ A loud silence echoed down the line. ‘OK, four.’ More silence. ‘Come on, Rodney, we go back a ways.’ Isaac hated to sound like Myra Mae.

‘Isaac, you’re not even halfway there.’

‘Don’t shit me. How much did Zola pay you for Bates Motel?’ He didn’t add a reminder that this had bombed. He knew he didn’t need to.

‘Ten. And two points.’

Five million and no points, thought Isaac. Zola Gorgon rarely conceded any percentage points off the gross.

‘I’ll go to five and half-a-point,’ Isaac said. ‘Don’t forget you get a crack at Kathy Kane.’

‘Ohh, Isaac, you temptress. That’s one crack I’d like a crack at.’

‘Well then.’

‘But not for less than ten and two points.’

‘Goodbye, Rodney.’ Isaac hung up.

* * *

Kazman wanted his name on the picture. Hunt Studios and Kazman Motion Pictures would jointly head the credits. At least Kazman Motion Pictures drew a line between Again, Voyager and Pussy Power 14, a ‘Kazman Productions’ product, and TV’s soft-core ‘Namzak Productions’. Isaac could live with it.

Kazman would be credited as Executive Co-producer. He hadn’t demanded an office at Hunt Studios (there were plenty available), but he insisted on being called in on all major aspects of the movie. Such as a change of director.

Isaac had told him of his decision to offer Voyager to Academy Award-winner Rodney Fire. Kazman agreed with the choice. Now Isaac relayed his conversation with ‘Hot Rod’.

‘Can I come to your office this afternoon, Mr Hunt?’

‘I wish you’d call me Isaac – Al.’

‘Isaac. I have something you should see.’

The something was a videotape. A porno tape. A home movie starring ‘Hot Rod’ Fire.

The nickname had nothing to do with turbo-charged cars. It came from below the belt. Rodney Fire always attempted to jump almost every female member of the cast and crew of every movie he worked on. Even the caterers weren’t safe. He’d notched up some notable successes, and a few misses: Kathy Bates had famously kneed him in the crotch when he failed to take her no for a final answer.

There had also been some close calls, usually involving sex with minors, although the kids in high-school movies are often a lot older than they look. Even when these girls were jailbait their greed to get a part was usually enough to avert the threat of legal action. Just once Rodney had paid half a million to silence outraged parents. Outrage had enriched quite a few Hollywood parents over the years.

The two co-producers watched the tape in Isaac’s once-more-gleaming office (cleaning staff boosted with some of Dolores’ $5 million). One of LA’s most notorious cocksmen was not living up to his reputation. Always in focus but not always in shot, a somewhat younger ‘Hot Rod’ was seen, enthusiastically, on the receiving end of some seriously hot rod from gay porn-star Gary Gland in the latter’s Malibu bedroom.

Isaac watched queasily. It was hard to avoid them in today’s more open Hollywood, but he shared Myra Mae’s dislike of fags and certainly didn’t want to see them in action. He didn’t even enjoy watching straight hardcore with its lurid close-ups. ‘Always makes me wonder when I last had the drains checked,’ he’d once confided to Ben.

‘This kid, Gary Gland – he works for you?’ he now asked Kazman.

‘We retired him last year. He tested positive for HIV.’

‘Does that mean Rodney could have AIDS?’

‘Only if he’s still doing what he’s doing there. With no protection.’

‘The Gland kid gave you this tape?’ Kazman nodded.

‘He was trying to get a better deal out of me for his retirement.’

‘How much did you give him?’

The Porn King briefly showed his teeth. ‘He was not in a strong bargaining position. I gave him a hundred grand for this tape and some others.’

‘Anybody I might know?’ Information like this could be useful when you were trying to sign up stars. Kazman smiled again. He reeled off five names, three of which Isaac would not in a hundred years have expected to hear.

‘Jesus H. Christ,’ he said reverentially. ‘I hope you’ve got them in a safe place.’

Kazman nodded but didn’t elucidate.

‘Can I keep this?’

‘Of course. It’s only a copy. So, Mr Rodney Fire will direct our movie?’

‘I think you can count on that,’ Isaac said with a nasty laugh.

‘And how much are we going to pay him?’

‘I offered him five million and a half-point.’

‘But this –’ he waved at the TV screen where ‘Hot Rod’, with the sound muted, was still mouthing encouragement over his shoulder at Gary Gland who was living on borrowed time – ‘this doesn’t make a difference?’

‘He has to want Voyager to be a hit, otherwise he could screw it up out of revenge. And there’s a lot of creative accounting between him and that half a percent. But a deal’s a deal, Al. Let’s don’t forget that we are gentlemen.’

‘Ah,’ Kazman said thoughtfully. ‘Yes, I was forgetting this. Gentlemen. We are gentlemen.’

Just occasionally his foreign origins came through his otherwise perfect English. Isaac assumed that his new partner was Jewish like himself, perhaps a more recent member of the Diaspora. He wouldn’t dream of asking him. In Hollywood, more than elsewhere, talk of religion – offscreen – is taboo. Unless you’re a Buddhist or a Scientologist.

* * *

Isaac messengered the cassette to Rodney Fire and called him an hour later.

‘Rodney? Isaac Hunt.’

‘No, I think I’m the cunt today, Isaac.’ It was a very old joke. Isaac said nothing. Rodney sighed. ‘Did you send me a video-tape just now?’

Isaac had seen too many movies, made too many movies, to fall for this. He often recorded phone calls. ‘I don’t believe I know what you’re talking about, Rodney.’

‘I’ve been putting it together. Gary. Kazman. You. I wonder how much Gary got paid. I’m kind of disappointed, Isaac.’

Isaac said nothing. A noise down the line suggested that Rodney was blowing his nose. Or was perhaps snorting a line of coke.

‘I guess I’m gonna be working for you again, aren’t I?’

‘Rodney, you’ve reconsidered my offer. I’m so glad.’

‘Lucky for you I’m not slated for anything right now. Zola’s got me on ice since Bates Motel flushed forty-five million of her dollars down the can.’

Bad news about Gorgon Pictures always sent a warm glow through Isaac’s system. ‘Maybe she shouldn’t blame you for that,’ he said magnanimously. ‘It was her idea, wasn’t it? I didn’t get to see it, but I hear it had a shitty script.’

‘Isaac, I wrote and directed.’

Isaac laughed. ‘Then I guess you are the fallguy. Never mind. We’re gonna do great things with Voyager, Rodney. That noir quality in the Kathy Bates picture – I did see that one – that’s what I want you to bring to Voyager.’

‘Can I ask how much you’re gonna pay me? I’ve got the bank on my case. I have a crazy mortgage on this place.’ Rodney’s playboy pad was cantilevered over one of the canyons, practically on top of the fault line. Probably uninsurable. If it didn’t collapse during a quake it would burn in a brushfire.

‘You know what I’m paying. We discussed this the other day. Five million plus half-a-point.’

‘Really? I thought the offer might have shrunk in the last hour or so.’

‘Why would it? You’re worth it, Rodney. And we go back a ways. You know I’m from the “old school”, like Titus. We like to think of ourselves as gentlemen. Al Kazman does too, if I’m not I’m mistaken.’

‘Hot Rod’ laughed. ‘A porno king, a major laundryman for the Mob and – I won’t say it Isaac, but ‘gentlemen’ isn’t what springs to mind.’

Isaac gave a benevolent chuckle.

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TRAILER for HOWL AND THE PUSSY-KAT.7

Jason goes to a funeral - and meets Marilyn Monroe.