Stories in and about Hollywood.
When Harry met Morrie it was 1969. They were two young men, both in their early twenties, both recently released from military service. Morrie was a Navy man while Harry had been in the Marines. Harry had been to Vietnam and was discharged with a Purple Heart he never talked about. In later years whenever Morrie would drive Harry would remind him their relationship…
It is always the end of the world these days. Everyone is apoplectic. No one is apologetic. It used to be that the end of the world would come and go like the tide but it’s everywhere these days like a flood. You pick up the newspaper and the headlines scream it at you. You ride the train to work and all the eyes…
Jimmy Killingsworth always told me I keep too many irons in the fire. He was the first person to give me a copy of Gravity’s Rainbow, the man who turned me on to Pynchon, so I was inclined to take his advice in every area but that one. It was also a delight to entertain him with ridiculous stories of how I managed to…
On my first official day of work with the Agency, I went to the main office on Wilshire Boulevard and was told to report immediately to a separate location in West Hollywood. The Agency was expanding and setting up a new office, and I was one of the lucky elite who would help set up that office. It sounded neither lucky nor elite to…
When I first came to Hollywood, a cauldron of unholy loves sang all around my ears. Which is to say, I was a production assistant at a talent agency that specialized in representing fashion models. This may sound like the ideal job for a young hetersexual male, but while interacting such women may be the object of most male fantasies, the professional reality of…
Gabe Nachman called me in the middle of the afternoon. He wanted to come over right away. “I’ve got the pitch of the century,” he said. “Let me hear it,” I said. “Not over the phone,” he said. “Some fucker at the NSA will hear this, quit his job, and beat us to the punch.” Gabe is an old enough and important enough friend…
It was more than just one thing that brought Harry down. It was in fact an entire series of events that led to the predicament that put poor Harry in this place. To begin with, he was out in Wyoming with the Professor before anything happened. Whether they were on some kind of paleontology dig or just digging recreationally was never made clear, but…
Back in the Eighties sometimes we would spend long hours drinking cocktails and talking about the things people talk about when they spend long hours drinking cocktails. There was an old editor who lived in the village and enjoyed taking small groups of young writers out for dinner and drinks. We usually met at this grand old hotel near the plaza, a vast adobe…
Three weeks into production, they let you know they need a rewrite. All the scenes in the last two weeks of filming need to be redone. The actress broke her nose and had to have surgery. “You can’t see the work so there’s no need to re-shoot,” the associate producer informs you. “But you can hear it. Her voice is different.” You’re about to…
I’m a Hollywood monkey, so my favorite meetings are the ones with fruit. This is also why I like visiting the set: Craft Services usually has fruit, and there’s often a lot of it, because everyone else is eating donuts or chips. Inappropriate starches are not my thing, but bananas, as you know, are a monkey’s best friend. When they called the meeting, I…