Just don’t let this become any worse, Babe says.
—I’m broke, divorced, on strike, and living with the wrong woman. If anyone makes things worse, it’ll be Hal. I don’t have it in me.
But he is, of course, mistaken.
122
Hal Roach is informed of it by Louella Parsons, but Hal Roach lends it no credence until the story appears in the newspapers the next day.
Jesus Christ, Hal Roach says, he’s gone crazy.
Babe hears about it in a telephone call from Mexico. Babe calls Ben Shipman.
Ben Shipman reaches for the Bromo-Seltzer.
Later, he will admit to Ben Shipman that his judgment may have been impaired by alcohol and depression, which will lead Ben Shipman to inquire:
—How much alcohol, and how depressed? Because it must have taken a hell of a lot of both.
This is what he does:
His threats of departure to Europe have not brought him any closer to Lois.
His letters have not brought him any closer to Lois.
His phone calls have not brought him any closer to Lois.
So he decides that his only recourse is to marry Ruth, thus causing Lois to relent, at which point he can leave Ruth and remarry Lois before the original divorce is made final. At least, he believes this may have been the logic behind the endeavor. Then again, he may just have decided to hell with it, and figured that at least being married to someone might restore a sense of order to his life. The fact that Ruth, after one argument too many, is no longer living with him does not impact in any way on this decision. It is simply a spur, accentuating the urgency of addressing the current impasse in order to prove to Lois that another woman desires him enough to marry him, and therefore Lois should renew her claim on him as quickly as possible lest he settle down with this other woman and begin conceiving more children.
And if Lois remains resolute, then he will have Ruth to fall back on instead. Ruth is no bad deal, even if Ruth is not Lois.
On the morning of April 3rd, 1935, he telephones Ruth and proposes to her. Ruth accepts. He urges her to pack a bag, and informs Baldy and Alice Cooke that their services will be required, and therefore they also should pack a bag. Then he, Ruth, Baldy and Alice are driven to the station, where they catch a train to Tijuana, Mexico. He rents two adjoining rooms, calls a justice of the peace, and by nightfall on the same day he and Ruth are married. They enjoy a short honeymoon before returning to Los Angeles to accept the congratulations of family and friends.
Except the last part doesn’t quite work out that way, because Ben Shipman is waiting for him at the station, and upon arrival takes him aside with no small amount of force, dragging him into a corner away from the flashbulbs and the reporters.
What do you think you’re doing? Ben Shipman asks.
—I got married.
—You’re not allowed to get married. Your divorce isn’t final.
—That’s why I got married in Mexico.
—The state of California doesn’t care if you got married on the moon. The law stipulates that you may not live in wedlock in California until your final decree is issued.
—So we won’t live together until then.
—But you were already living together before you left.
—We were chaperoned, and nobody was paying much attention anyway.
—Well, they’re certainly paying attention now. And by the way: the last time we spoke, you told me you wanted to get back with Lois. How helpful do you think your latest actions might be in securing such a happy outcome?
He has been drinking champagne on the train, so his reactions are duller than he might wish. He had been planning to explain his reasoning to Ben Shipman upon his return, but the requisite faculties desert him now that he is faced with the lawyer in the flesh. He needs a clear head if he is to discuss matters of such import.
I’ll come by tomorrow, he tells Ben Shipman. We’ll talk then.
And Ben Shipman replies:
—I can hardly wait.
He is hungover when Hal Roach calls him first thing the next morning. They have not spoken since the beginning of their dispute. Hal Roach has already been forced to postpone Babes in Toyland once, and will soon have to do so again. By this point, Hal Roach would like to fire him and have done with it, but he still brings in a lot of money for Hal Roach, whatever the accounts might state to the contrary, and MGM does not want to make Babes in Toyland with Wallace Beery and Raymond Hutton. MGM wants to make it with Babe Hardy and this man.
Or MGM did until he decided to marry his girlfriend in Mexico while still technically wedded to his first wife. Babes in Toyland is meant to bring in kids as well as adults, and Mexican marriages are not compatible with family entertainment. The reputation of Hal Roach and his studio rests on his stars, and their behavior, good or bad, reflects on Hal Roach.
Hal Roach does not engage him in conversation. Hal Roach talks at him, and then, just to be certain that the message has got through, Hal Roach talks at him some more.
—I don’t approve of how you’re leading your life. You’re jeopardizing your good name and your livelihood, and you’re jeopardizing the good name and livelihood of everyone who works on your pictures, including Babe Hardy.
I believe that you were wrong to leave Lois, and I’ve done everything in my power to effect a reconciliation. I’ve even talked her down over this alimony business, because God forbid she goes back to the judge and accuses you of reneging on your legal obligations, especially now that your health appears to have recovered sufficiently to enable you to get married in Tijuana. If you’re well enough to marry, you’re well enough to work, and if you’re well enough to work, you can make your alimony payments.
So listen closely to what I’m about to say, and I’m speaking as your employer and your friend. The studio is on spring break. When production resumes, you’d better be on my lot and ready to work, or so help me I’ll see you out on the street, and I’ll hold you to your contract so you’ll never again work in this town unless you work for me. And in the meantime, you sort out your private life, and you keep that woman away from your home and my studio until your divorce becomes final. Have some respect for Lois. Jesus, have some respect for yourself.
He could argue his case, he supposes, assuming Hal Roach lets him get a word in, but he does not even try.
Because Hal Roach is right.
123
He returns to work.
He agrees to star in Babes in Toyland, but only if he is permitted to adapt the script in his usual manner. Hal Roach consents, if reluctantly. Hal Roach’s script is for a family picture featuring the names of his two biggest stars above the title, but with a great deal of secondary business going on around them. Hal Roach fears that what he will get back is a vehicle for his two biggest stars, tailored to their strengths but also indulgent of their weaknesses.
Babes in Toyland is a success, but Hal Roach derives no pleasure from it. Babes in Toyland is not the great adornment to the studio for which Hal Roach has worked so hard, and its existence is tainted by the battles fought with one of its stars. Worse, that same star is now pronouncing it to be the most entertaining of their features, he who fought so hard against making it, he who forced its postponement, he who cost Hal Roach time and money and effort, he who showed Hal Roach no gratitude, no gratitude at all.
And Hal Roach will never forgive him.
124
At the Oceana Apartments, he hears Ida chopping vegetables for the pot, and music playing from one of the residences below. He has closed the balcony door. He is feeling the cold. He has tried to write more gags, but the remaining pages of his legal pad remain bare. Some days you have to walk away and let the gags come to you instead of running after them like a man in pursuit of a wind-thieved hat.
He puts a blanket over his knees. He suspects that the anniversary of a death may be approaching, but then the anniversary of a death is always approaching. He has reached an age where barely a week goes by without
the necessity of an observance.
He has never visited Babe’s grave. He did not even go to the funeral. He has never attended funerals: not his son’s, not Teddy’s, and not Babe’s. He could not have coped with Babe’s funeral. He would not have been able to let Babe go.
And he has not let Babe go, since he speaks to him every day, and writes gags for him every day, and likes to believe that he can sometimes sense Babe’s presence, even though he knows that this is an illusion. If there is any ghost here, he has created it in his own image.
When his daughter was young, he would take her to Sunday school at the Beverly Hills Community Church. It was important to him that she should predicate her existence on the possibility of a higher order to the universe, even if he himself remained doubtful about such a design. Now, with the chill entering his bones, he thinks the embrace of order may have been conceivable to him only in terms of his art, and so many of the problems in his personal life arose from a failure to comprehend the distinction between these two facets of his being.
He wishes he were back in Hal Roach’s office on the lot. He would like to be able to tell Hal Roach what he has concluded. He has not spoken with Hal Roach in so long. It ended poorly between them, and when he reads an interview with Hal Roach, or sees Hal Roach being celebrated on television, he encounters a version of their years together that is not entirely familiar to him.
But they are both old men now, and old men misremember.
125
He and Babe make Going Bye-Bye!
They make Them Thar Hills.
They make The Live Ghost.
They make Tit for Tat.
They make The Fixer Uppers.
They make Thicker Than Water.
These are the last of them. No more short pictures. Hal Roach will have his way. The industry will have its way.
He feels the heart going out of him. He can tolerate Hal Roach’s manipulation of contracts, Hal Roach’s refusal to pay him what he believes to be his due, Hal Roach’s coolness toward him—he can tolerate all these as long as he can make the pictures he wishes to make, as long as he can be proud of what he creates, and as long as he can be with Babe. Babe is alone in understanding the effort he puts into the construction of these pictures, and the cost of that effort to him. Babe is alone in understanding how much he cares about what appears on the screen after their names.
And meanwhile Hal Roach hunts.
Hal Roach flies his plane.
Hal Roach blusters.
Hal Roach licenses Henry Ginsberg to engage in guile and perfidy.
Because Hal Roach does not care.
126
Another round of contract negotiations. He anticipates their approach like the footsteps of bailiffs on the stairs, their imminence presaging no good.
Hal Roach has their next picture lined up.
Scotland and India, Hal Roach tells him. Kilts. We may even run with that as a title.
He knows what it is about. He has read the treatment.
Well? says Hal Roach. What do you think?
What he thinks is that Hal Roach is still preventing him from settling his contract at the same time as Babe.
What he thinks is that the proposed new contract is worse than the old.
What he thinks is that this is picture-making by diktat.
What he thinks is that Hal Roach continues to nurse a grudge from Babes in Toyland.
What he thinks is that he’s still paying Lois half his salary, and the half that remains to him isn’t enough.
What he thinks is that he may soon be marrying—in a second ceremony, and therefore for the second time—the wrong woman.
What he thinks is that the best of his career may already be over, and all that is left is decline.
What he thinks is that Hal Roach wants him gone.
But what he says is:
—I don’t like it very much.
What Hal Roach thinks is that this is not going to happen again.
Well, says Hal Roach, then we have a problem.
He consults with Ben Shipman. Ben Shipman suggests that obstruction may not be the ideal approach to negotiating with Hal Roach. He informs Ben Shipman that he is not negotiating.
A negotiation, he tells Ben Shipman, involves discussion. It requires give and take. Hal Roach negotiates like Mussolini.
Hal’s not that bad, says Ben Shipman.
—Have you met Mussolini?
Ben Shipman admits that he has not.
—Then let’s not jump to conclusions.
He arrives at the lot, and is directed to Henry Ginsberg’s office. He believes that Henry Ginsberg should have a bowl of water and a towel before him, just so Henry Ginsberg can wash his hands after the deed is done.
Like Pilate, except Pilate took no pleasure in what was accomplished.
We have presented you with a new contract, says Henry Ginsberg.
—It’s not satisfactory.
Henry Ginsberg ignores him. Like Bill Seiter, Henry Ginsberg prefers to work from a script. No improvisation is permissible.
—We have also given you details of the next motion picture under your existing contract.
—Which isn’t satisfactory either.
—Without a long-term contract agreement, work cannot proceed on the motion picture in question. As a consequence of this, and your refusal to commit to the scheduled motion picture, we regard you as being in breach of your existing contract.
This is nimble footwork, he thinks, and no mistake.
—Which means?
—Which means we’re terminating your employment. You’re fired. Please be off the lot within the hour.
127
This time, Hal Roach is prepared, and Louella Parsons is primed.
What Hal Roach does is take a business dispute and inject it with rancor. Hal Roach is not a stupid man, and needs his stars. But Hal Roach is also a proud man, and needs his dignity.
And Hal Roach is not only the head of a studio. Hal Roach is an originator. Hal Roach creates stories, and these stories Hal Roach presents to the actors and directors in his employ. Hal Roach does not care to have these stories rejected by a man with no conception of how to tell a tale, or to see these stories torn apart by one who cannot even plot a sensible course for his own life.
Hal Roach tells the press that the studio has terminated the contract of one of its two biggest stars because of his refusal to cooperate in story matters. Then Hal Roach tells the press that he has terminated his own contract. If anyone in the press notices the contradiction between these two statements, there appears to be a disinclination to point it out.
Finally, with the waters muddied to the studio’s satisfaction, Hal Roach turns Louella Parsons loose in their depths. Louella Parsons reveals to the world that he and Babe have broken up, that they have been feuding privately with each other for years, that Hal Roach has always been the pacifying influence.
Until now.
He reads Louella Parsons’s column with disbelief. This is a lie. It is a deliberate attempt to damage not only his reputation, but also Babe’s. That the information it contains comes from Hal Roach is beyond dispute: Hal Roach is named as the verifying source in the article.
Ben Shipman calls him.
They’re playing dirty, says Ben Shipman. And I think Hal may be serious about dropping you permanently.
He is concerned now. He wishes to be paid properly, and to make pictures of merit, but he also wishes to be employed.
And he does not wish to lose Babe.
Make it clear to the studio, and to anyone who’ll listen, that you didn’t resign, says Ben Shipman. I’ll call Louella Parsons and see if we can get our side of the story out there. And you—talk to Babe.
He talks to Babe. Babe does not hesitate. Babe is on his side.
Privately, Babe is always his friend. Now Babe also backs him publicly.
And the Audience is with them. Even Louella Parsons realizes this, and moderates her tone, althou
gh no apology is forthcoming, and she still manages to rake over the ashes of his divorce once again.
It is a month of misery for him.
Eventually Hal Roach concedes. Hal Roach’s pride is not worth the price that might be exacted for it.
But each of these battles leaves wounds, and they do not heal.
128
At the Oceana Apartments, he watches from his window the origami forms of sailing boats upon the water. He had a boat once: forty-six feet, thirty-five knots, mahogany on cedar, a beauty. He named it the Ruth L. He had a boat, and a big car, and a driver.
He had a son.
He had Babe.
All gone.
129
Occasionally Babe joins him on fishing trips, although Babe does not immerse himself in the experience in quite the same way as he. For Babe, fishing is just another leisure activity. Babe collects hobbies the way other men collect stamps.
Babe hunts, but gives up the gun after staring into the dying eyes of a gut-shot deer.
Babe buys horses cursed from birth never to win a race, then Babe continues to bet on these horses out of loyalty, even when Babe can no longer afford the losses.
Babe raises chickens and turkeys and pigs for food on a farm in the San Fernando Valley, but Babe cannot bring himself to have the animals slaughtered, and so keeps them as pets.
Babe grows fruit and vegetables.
Babe is a carpenter.
Babe cooks.
But he is not like Babe. He does not accumulate pursuits. For him, fishing is an escape from himself.
I don’t understand, Babe says. I’ve seen you sit there for hours and finish up empty-handed.
—It’s not about catching anything. It’s about the anticipation. Or perhaps it allows me to pretend to be doing something when, in fact, I’m doing nothing at all.
Babe considers this.
—The anticipation I give you. I guess it’s like being at the track. It’s not about winning or losing. It’s about being suspended in the space between.