something not commonly known, but the story of Paladin, the jaded and educated gun-for-hire, was actually developed by the playwright Clifford Odets. The author of
Awake and Sing!
and
Waiting for Lefty
, the great young hope of the American theatre, ended his life in Hollywoodland, drinking too much, dabbling with various illicit substances, robotically screwing young starlets and writing for the boob tube.
I’d kindly ask you to remember this as I write down the details of my life.
I also
really
liked, I want to mention, those episodes of
The Twilight Zone
that were of the western genre. They were not infrequent, although apparently Rod Serling insisted these episodes be shot in Death Valley, where the actors and crew suffered from dehydration and even delirium. (That’s my kind of show-runner!) The most memorable was “Mr. Denton on Doomsday.” It was about this schoolteacher who finds a Colt.45, which keeps misfiring when he holds it. He accidentally kills a rattlesnake at fifty yards, and shoots the revolver out of the hands of a notorious gunslinger. So Mr. Denton is accorded a fearsome reputation, even though he is, in reality, a quiet little man. Serling seemed to understand that we are not always responsible for our actions, although that does raise the question
Who, exactly, is?
But of all the westerns I have seen, the most significant is certainly
The Bullet and the Cross.
Like all of my important memories, it has a potency that has influenced the pocket of time that holds it, so I can remember that particular Saturday afternoon, even though in many ways it was no different from any other. I can remember, for example, what van der Glick was wearing as she stepped out of the elevator, which was a dress covered with clownish polka dots. Rainie would make these heartbreaking stabs at femininity; indeed, she still does. It’s not thatshe doesn’t possess a woman’s body now, and didn’t possess a girl’s body then. But clothes never seemed to fit her correctly, and the more girlish they were, the worse they would hang. So on this day she wore a dress, and knee socks although her legs were too thin to support them and they gathered in folds around her ankles. She’d also done something odd to her spectacles. The lenses were darkened, so that her eyes were obscured.
“Are those new glasses?” I asked, although I knew they weren’t, since I recognized the rhinestone-encrusted wingtips.
“Yes,” she lied.
“We’re going to the movies!” said Jay. “Wanna come?”
Jay asked Rainie every week if she wanted to come to the movies, even though we never did anything else. Rainie’s answer was likewise invariable.
“Might as well.” She shrugged. “There’s fuck-all else to do.”
Oh, she had a mouth on her. Still does. Rainie hosts a radio talk show these days, and her speech is peppered with beeps and whistles. She has had a series of careers, proceeding from straight journalism (she spent a few years in Russia as an official correspondent for one of Toronto’s dailies) to somewhat bizarre magazine reportage (when the female press were finally allowed inside the Maple Leafs’ locker room, for example, Rainie took it a step further, actually showering with the lads) to this radio show where she is paid, handsomely, to be cantankerous.
The Bullet and the Cross
was made in 1960 and the director’s name was given as Alan Smithee. What this means is that the real person (or persons) responsible for it were so embarrassed by the results that they chose this default accreditation. Any film bearing the name “Alan Smithee” is by definition bad, just so you can be on the lookout. Perhaps you knew this, but I’ll bet you’re surprised to discoverthat the practice dates back to the 1960s. I know I was, when I did this research a few years back. I think it’s possible that
The Bullet and the Cross
was the very first Alan Smithee movie.
The writer of the screenplay didn’t hide behind a pseudonym.
Awake and Sing!
and
Waiting for Lefty
, the great young hope of the American theatre, ended his life in Hollywoodland, drinking too much, dabbling with various illicit substances, robotically screwing young starlets and writing for the boob tube.
I’d kindly ask you to remember this as I write down the details of my life.
I also
really
liked, I want to mention, those episodes of
The Twilight Zone
that were of the western genre. They were not infrequent, although apparently Rod Serling insisted these episodes be shot in Death Valley, where the actors and crew suffered from dehydration and even delirium. (That’s my kind of show-runner!) The most memorable was “Mr. Denton on Doomsday.” It was about this schoolteacher who finds a Colt.45, which keeps misfiring when he holds it. He accidentally kills a rattlesnake at fifty yards, and shoots the revolver out of the hands of a notorious gunslinger. So Mr. Denton is accorded a fearsome reputation, even though he is, in reality, a quiet little man. Serling seemed to understand that we are not always responsible for our actions, although that does raise the question
Who, exactly, is?
But of all the westerns I have seen, the most significant is certainly
The Bullet and the Cross.
Like all of my important memories, it has a potency that has influenced the pocket of time that holds it, so I can remember that particular Saturday afternoon, even though in many ways it was no different from any other. I can remember, for example, what van der Glick was wearing as she stepped out of the elevator, which was a dress covered with clownish polka dots. Rainie would make these heartbreaking stabs at femininity; indeed, she still does. It’s not thatshe doesn’t possess a woman’s body now, and didn’t possess a girl’s body then. But clothes never seemed to fit her correctly, and the more girlish they were, the worse they would hang. So on this day she wore a dress, and knee socks although her legs were too thin to support them and they gathered in folds around her ankles. She’d also done something odd to her spectacles. The lenses were darkened, so that her eyes were obscured.
“Are those new glasses?” I asked, although I knew they weren’t, since I recognized the rhinestone-encrusted wingtips.
“Yes,” she lied.
“We’re going to the movies!” said Jay. “Wanna come?”
Jay asked Rainie every week if she wanted to come to the movies, even though we never did anything else. Rainie’s answer was likewise invariable.
“Might as well.” She shrugged. “There’s fuck-all else to do.”
Oh, she had a mouth on her. Still does. Rainie hosts a radio talk show these days, and her speech is peppered with beeps and whistles. She has had a series of careers, proceeding from straight journalism (she spent a few years in Russia as an official correspondent for one of Toronto’s dailies) to somewhat bizarre magazine reportage (when the female press were finally allowed inside the Maple Leafs’ locker room, for example, Rainie took it a step further, actually showering with the lads) to this radio show where she is paid, handsomely, to be cantankerous.
The Bullet and the Cross
was made in 1960 and the director’s name was given as Alan Smithee. What this means is that the real person (or persons) responsible for it were so embarrassed by the results that they chose this default accreditation. Any film bearing the name “Alan Smithee” is by definition bad, just so you can be on the lookout. Perhaps you knew this, but I’ll bet you’re surprised to discoverthat the practice dates back to the 1960s. I know I was, when I did this research a few years back. I think it’s possible that
The Bullet and the Cross
was the very first Alan Smithee movie.
The writer of the screenplay didn’t hide behind a pseudonym.
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