between the real and the superreal, that Charles Van Stratten had brought the camera crews and location vans of Orpheus Productions, Inc. As the Lincoln joined the column of cars moving towards the summer-house, we could see the great canvas hoardings, at least two hundred yards wide and thirty feet high, which a team of construction workers was erecting among the reefs a quarter of a mile from the house. Decorated with abstract symbols, these would serve as backdrops to the action, and form a fragmentary labyrinth winding in and out of the hills and dunes.
One of the large terraces below the summer-house served as a parking lot, and we made our way through the unloading crews to where a group of men in crocodile-skin slacks and raffia shirts – then the uniform of avant-garde film men – were gathered around a heavily jowled man like a perspiring bear who was holding a stack of script boards under one arm and gesticulating wildly with the other. This was Orson Kanin, director of
Aphrodite 80
and co-owner with Charles Van Stratten of Orpheus Productions. Sometime
enfant terrible
of the futurist cinema, but now a portly barrel-stomached fifty, Kanin had made his reputation some twenty years earlier with
Blind Orpheus
, a neo-Freudian, horror-film version of the Greek legend. According to Kanin’s interpretation, Orpheus deliberately breaks the taboo and looks Eurydice in the face because he wants to be rid of her; in a famous nightmare sequence which projects his unconscious loathing, he becomes increasingly aware of something cold and strange about his resurrected wife, and finds that she is a disintegrating corpse.
As we joined the periphery of the group, a characteristic Kanin script conference was in full swing, a non-stop pantomime of dramatized incidents from the imaginary script, anecdotes, salary promises and bad puns, all delivered in a rich fruity baritone. Sitting on the balustrade beside Kanin was a handsome, youthful man with a sensitive face whom I recognized to be Charles Van Stratten. Now and then,
sotto voce
, he would interject some comment that would be noted by one of the secretaries and incorporated into Kanin’s monologue.
As the conference proceeded I gathered that they would begin to shoot the film in some three weeks’ time, and that it would be performed entirely without script. Kanin only seemed perturbed by the fact that no one had yet been found to play the Aphrodite of
Aphrodite 80
but Charles Van Stratten interposed here to assure Kanin that he himself would provide the actress.
At this eyebrows were raised knowingly. ‘Of course,’ Raymond murmured.
‘Droit de seigneur
. I wonder who the next Mrs Van Stratten is?’
But Charles Van Stratten seemed unaware of these snide undertones. Catching sight of me, he excused himself and came over to us.
‘Paul Golding?’ He took my hand in a soft but warm grip. We had never met but I presumed he recognized me from the photographs in the art reviews. ‘Kanin told me you’d agreed to do the scenery. It’s wonderfully encouraging.’ He spoke in a light, pleasant voice absolutely without affectation. ‘There’s so much confusion here it’s a relief to know that at least the scenic designs will be first-class.’ Before I could demur he took my arm and began to walk away along the terrace towards the hoardings in the distance. ‘Let’s get some air. Kanin will keep this up for a couple of hours at least.’
Leaving Raymond and Tony, I followed him across the huge marble squares.
‘Kanin keeps worrying about his leading actress,’ he went on. ‘Kanin always marries his latest protégé – he claims it’s the only way he can make them respond fully to his direction, but I suspect there’s an old-fashioned puritan lurking within the cavalier. This time he’s going to be disappointed, though not by the actress, may I add. The Aphrodite I have in mind will outshine Milos’s.’
‘The film sounds rather ambitious,’ I
One of the large terraces below the summer-house served as a parking lot, and we made our way through the unloading crews to where a group of men in crocodile-skin slacks and raffia shirts – then the uniform of avant-garde film men – were gathered around a heavily jowled man like a perspiring bear who was holding a stack of script boards under one arm and gesticulating wildly with the other. This was Orson Kanin, director of
Aphrodite 80
and co-owner with Charles Van Stratten of Orpheus Productions. Sometime
enfant terrible
of the futurist cinema, but now a portly barrel-stomached fifty, Kanin had made his reputation some twenty years earlier with
Blind Orpheus
, a neo-Freudian, horror-film version of the Greek legend. According to Kanin’s interpretation, Orpheus deliberately breaks the taboo and looks Eurydice in the face because he wants to be rid of her; in a famous nightmare sequence which projects his unconscious loathing, he becomes increasingly aware of something cold and strange about his resurrected wife, and finds that she is a disintegrating corpse.
As we joined the periphery of the group, a characteristic Kanin script conference was in full swing, a non-stop pantomime of dramatized incidents from the imaginary script, anecdotes, salary promises and bad puns, all delivered in a rich fruity baritone. Sitting on the balustrade beside Kanin was a handsome, youthful man with a sensitive face whom I recognized to be Charles Van Stratten. Now and then,
sotto voce
, he would interject some comment that would be noted by one of the secretaries and incorporated into Kanin’s monologue.
As the conference proceeded I gathered that they would begin to shoot the film in some three weeks’ time, and that it would be performed entirely without script. Kanin only seemed perturbed by the fact that no one had yet been found to play the Aphrodite of
Aphrodite 80
but Charles Van Stratten interposed here to assure Kanin that he himself would provide the actress.
At this eyebrows were raised knowingly. ‘Of course,’ Raymond murmured.
‘Droit de seigneur
. I wonder who the next Mrs Van Stratten is?’
But Charles Van Stratten seemed unaware of these snide undertones. Catching sight of me, he excused himself and came over to us.
‘Paul Golding?’ He took my hand in a soft but warm grip. We had never met but I presumed he recognized me from the photographs in the art reviews. ‘Kanin told me you’d agreed to do the scenery. It’s wonderfully encouraging.’ He spoke in a light, pleasant voice absolutely without affectation. ‘There’s so much confusion here it’s a relief to know that at least the scenic designs will be first-class.’ Before I could demur he took my arm and began to walk away along the terrace towards the hoardings in the distance. ‘Let’s get some air. Kanin will keep this up for a couple of hours at least.’
Leaving Raymond and Tony, I followed him across the huge marble squares.
‘Kanin keeps worrying about his leading actress,’ he went on. ‘Kanin always marries his latest protégé – he claims it’s the only way he can make them respond fully to his direction, but I suspect there’s an old-fashioned puritan lurking within the cavalier. This time he’s going to be disappointed, though not by the actress, may I add. The Aphrodite I have in mind will outshine Milos’s.’
‘The film sounds rather ambitious,’ I
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