Bleak Read online

  While pundits extrapolate what a .07 blood alcohol level three hours after the fact means, gossip columnists speculate what in her purse was so important she braved swarming photographers to retrieve it.

  “Her stash of blow?” asks TMZ, voicing the thought had by Moxie watchers everywhere.

  “Why do you think she went into the bathroom. Hello? The toilet. Everyone knows it’s the best place to dispose of illegals,” adds Carmen Cardosa of HotScoop.com.

  While the speculation flies, Moxie’s publicist, Jessica Hornet, sticks closely to the paparazzi story, insisting that photographers giving chase on foot are just as terrifying as those in cars. She cites their immediate presence as proof of their culpability. They were at the scene of the accident as soon as it happened, ergo they must have caused the accident.

  The logic is dizzying and takes Matt Lauer, a senior correspondent and a dry-erase board five minutes to figure it out.

  I watch the story unfold with a growing sense of detachment. At first I’m incensed at the paparazzi. There are enough things that can go wrong with a movie in Hollywood without voracious photographers running your star off the road. In my head, I write letters to the editor, invoking the name of Princess Diana and calling for sweeping changes in the paparazzi laws. Ten years minimum for tailgating.

  For once this is something I can control. Public outrage will lead to a political response, which will make Moxie just a little bit safer.

  But then the truth comes out, and I realize it’s just another act of an out-of-control teenager. They all trash their parents’ cars. It’s a rite of passage.

  In many ways, this is a comforting thought. Seeing Moxie as a run-of-the-mill eighteen-year-old gives her an edge of invulnerability. Every generation has its parties and designer drug, and every year millions of teens emerge to become mature, responsible adults who pay FICA and mow the lawn.

  There’s nothing new here.

  But even as I try to remain calm and reasonable, I can hear Carrie and Ruby listing all those who didn’t make it. Marilyn Monroe. Judy Garland. John Belushi. River Phoenix. The list is long and predictable, the story as boring as it is sad.

  By the end of the third day, when the police swab the bathroom at the Easy View looking for evidence of cocaine, I know I have to stop thinking about it. Obsessing over Moxie’s life, worrying over every choice she makes or doesn’t make, is slowly destroying me. Because all I can think of as I imagine her mangled body at the wheel of a silver Porsche 911 Turbo is myself. Rehab I can work with. Death I can’t.

  I know I can’t save Moxie. I can’t sit her down in a quiet room and make her understand that the streets of Hollywood are littered with drugged-out rag dolls like her. That’s for someone else to do, her mother, maybe, when she sobers up, or her manager.

  But I can save myself.

  Day 896

  In an age of self-conscious facial hair, John Vholes takes it to the next level with unreconstructed muttonchops. Epic, they start nimbly as sideburns, tread thickly across his cheeks and bloom into wholehearted bushiness along the line of his jaw. His naked chin, like a swath of cleared underbrush in a primeval forest, seems to point the way forward.

  I like him instantly.

  He greets me at the door to his studio with a glass of milk. “Rule number one,” he says, “calcium is essential for strong bones.”

  I wrap my fingers around the glass and follow him inside.

  Like every other home owner in Los Angeles, he has a small guest house in his backyard, a white clapboard building with bright blue shutters, and it’s here that he’s set up shop. The space is spare but comfortable. A maroon couch runs along the black wall and faces a well-used table buried under several stacks of scripts. There’s a laptop computer at one end and a tray of chocolate chip cookies at the other. Off to the left side, adjacent to the French doors, which lead out to a stone patio, is a compact galley kitchen, the kind you frequently see in New York City apartments.

  “Sit, sit,” he says, indicating to the couch. He brings over the cookie tray and places it on the cushion between us. I eye them hungrily. Per my new habit, I skipped lunch this morning to take a dip in the pool, which was empty. As far as I can tell, I’m the only one in the building who uses it.

  John pushes the cookies closer to me. “Please take as many as you want.”

  I don’t see the connection between snack time and screenwriting, but I’m willing to give him the benefit of the doubt, especially since the chocolate chips are so warm and gooey they practically melt in my mouth.

  “These are delicious,” I say. “Did you make them?”

  “Got ’em from a bakery on La Cienega. Rule number one: Never waste time doing something yourself that someone else can do better.”

  I snag another cookie. “In that case, I’ll let you buy all my baked goods from now on.”

  He smiles, and the lush jungle on his cheeks flutters as if in a breeze. “You can put in your order at the end of the session. So I’m gonna get right into it in unless you want to run through a few getting-to-know-you exercises. Some people find that helps to get their creative juices flowing.”

  I’m pretty confident that my creative juices, if they exist at all, don’t respond to familiarity, so I shake my head. “Nope, let’s just do it.” I take a pad and pencil out of my bag.

  He crosses his legs and leans back against the thick cushions. With his relaxed air and crazy muttonchop beard, he looks like a Victorian Buddha, Chester A. Arthur at the knee of Siddhartha. “Good. Rule number one: Your very first line should be your inciting event, not the second line, not the third and not, God forbid, the fourth. Jump right into the story. Some people will say it’s OK to take a few pages to get there. They’re wrong. Do it immediately and never look back. It’s the only way to grab your reader.”

  Nodding, I scribble: No. 1 rule—first line inciting event. Grab reader immediately.

  I underline immediately four times.

  Vholes continues at the same breakneck pace for the next three hours. He explains what an inciting event is and how it effects the entire screenplay. He has dozens of examples, all of which he’s memorized, and he goes through the list as if reciting the lyrics to a favorite song. One flows melodiously into the next.

  At first, I write down each example but my hand tires quickly and I realize three are sufficient. After a while, he’s no longer making his point so much as showing off.

  As he talks, I apply rule number one to the screenplay I hope to write. I plan out the first scene: High school senior opens mail box, takes out thin envelope from Harvard and sees he’s number five on the wait list.

  No, that’s already wrong. The first line has to be the incident that kicks off the entire action. So forget the mail box and opening the envelope: Start with the kid’s eyes, the shock and disappointment as he realizes he didn’t get into Harvard. But all is not lost: number five on the wait list!

  The first scene is so solid and clear, I feel some of my anxiety fade. The last few weeks have not been easy. Shaken by samson&delilah’s know-it-all tone and Moxie’s accident, I’ve second guessed my decision to move here a million times. I’d sit on my balcony, with the blindingly beautiful California sun shining down, and wonder what I was doing three thousand miles from my career and everyone I know. I should be home, studying for the LSAT and shopping for kitchen cabinets with my sister.

  It got so bad, I even bought a new book of practice tests. I promptly sat down in the café, ordered a low-fat latte and applied myself to logic problems, zipping through the section with a breezy ease I’ve never experienced before. Here, I thought, relieved that the logical part of my brain had finally kicked in, was the omen I was looking for. I’d buy my return ticket first thing in the morning and put this whole mad escapade behind me
.

  I am enough of a Carstone to regret change.

  But as soon as I started grading the test, I realized my easy comprehension wasn’t because I was suddenly full of logic but because I’d already taken this exam.

  No wonder Mary and her 5:05 out of Saratoga seemed so familiar.

  Disappointed that the fates weren’t pushing me in a particular direction, I stayed in the café for the rest of the day, drinking coffee and reading magazines. I flipped through twenty and not a single one contained an indication of what I’m supposed to do with the rest of my life.

  The universe is never there when you need it.

  During the three-hour session, John stops only once, to refill my glass with milk. I tell him it’s not necessary, but his commitment to calcium and good bones is resolute. He brings out another tray of cookies, ensuring that my faith is just as strong.

  John treats screenwriting very seriously, as an art form worthy of years of hard work and study, and he shares none of Harry’s cavalier attitude. He believes there are far easier ways to make a living than writing scripts and cautions me against getting involved if I’m not willing to submit myself entirely to the craft.

  I am, I think, as he moves on to the next point. I really, really am.

  I’m ready to submit myself entirely to something.

  John’s passion is in every sentence he utters. His talk on characterization is fervent and precise. “Rule number one,” he says, “we have to root for your hero. He or she has to be likeable, vulnerable, with clearly identifiable and generally relatable goals. Someone you’d want to be friends with. Make him human. Look around you at the people you know and figure out what makes them real. Break them down to their elements. Rule number one: Humanity is in the details. Identify their quirks and use them. That’s how you create a believable character. You’re not aiming for Superman here. Nobody likes perfection. Give your hero a judicious amount of faults, just enough to humanize him without pushing him over the edge into a disaster waiting to happen. That makes people uneasy. You want your film to be a hundred percent watchable.”

  At first I think his constant use of “rule number one” is a verbal tick or a lazy speech pattern he’s never bothered to correct, but I soon realize it’s a by-product of his conviction. He believes in all his axioms equally. Rule number one: Everything is rule number one.

  Far from being annoying, this vehemence, so unexpected in a man who has muttonchops—I mean, seriously, they have to be an ironic comment on goatees and soul patches—is oddly endearing. The more ardently he talks, the more I like him.

  We wrap up day one at the end of act one, at which point the inciting event turns into a decided course of action. This is where poor wait-listed Tad Johnson realizes the only way to ensure his admittance into Harvard is to knock off the four people ahead of him in line.

  My story is a black comedy, like War of the Roses and Heathers. It’s dark and a little twisted with flashes of humor. I hope Lester will like it and want to represent it.

  When I try to bring up my movie idea with John, he quickly interrupts and explains that he can’t discuss script specifics during this class. “We’re doing intro to screenwriting, which is an overview of the industry. Getting into the details of an original project is the next level, which requires a different pricing structure. It’s all been formalized by the guild and has nothing to do with me. I’m sure you understand. The rules are in place to protect both of us.”

  “Yes, of course,” I say, embarrassed to have stepped over the bounds. I hate not knowing proper etiquette.

  John nods. “So next week we’ll do act two. Cookies OK or would you like to try the brownies?”

  “Brownies,” I say immediately.

  John walks me to the door, promising to pick up a box of chocolate chips cookies for me to take home. Warmed by his generosity, I assure him it’s not necessary, but he won’t listen. “I’m allowed to spoil my new favorite pupil. You have a lot of talent, Ricki, I can see it, and I want you to think carefully about going all the way. It’s not something I recommend to everybody, but I think you could do it.”

  Life, so recently dreary as I contemplated a spread of Oprah’s favorite things in O magazine, suddenly seems flooded with possibilities. I might not be a logic genius, but I have other skills that will take me farther than a small windowless cube at Hertzog, Wright, Silver and Penn. John thinks I can be a great screenwriter if I just commit. And I will. I’ll do whatever he advises.

  This is my future, and I have to grab it with both hands.

  Day 912

  Although Lester calls our meeting an official welcome-to-L.A. breakfast, I expect him to spend the entire meal trying to talk me out of the move. As I look for parking, I can hear the lecture about hitching my dreams to impossible stars and setting myself up for failure. “Go back to New York, my dear, where there’s a misguided paralegal for every light on Broadway.” I imagine him taking a backroom bribe from my parents to play on my insecurities. I wouldn’t listen to the Pirellis—an insurance salesman and a dental hygienist—but a Hollywood superagent telling me I’m wasting my time would send me scurrying to the airport.

  But Lester is warm and encouraging. “I think it’s wonderful,” he says after the waitress takes our order. We’re sitting in the back garden of a light-filled café on Sunset Boulevard. The menu selection is a brisk and efficient array of fresh-baked goods, fruits and cereals, making me realize this is going to be a short meeting. Lester’s calendar is full to brimming; we arranged this gathering a month ago and still he had to squeeze me in at eight a.m.

  “You have a very nimble style and tend to write quick, staccato scenes, which I think will translate well to the screenplay format. You’re very talented and I can’t wait to see what you do next.” He pauses as the waitress brings our muffins—blueberry for him, corn for me—to the table. She refills my coffee and brings Lester more hot water for his tea.

  Flustered by such effusive compliments from an experienced Hollywood player, I unthinkingly drink from the refreshed cup and burn my mouth. I try not to sputter as the steaming Peruvian blend scalds a trail down my throat. It hurts but I’m too excited to care. For days, I’ve been working up the nerve to ask him to read my script when it’s finished and thought for sure I’d be humiliated with a brusque no, or, worse, a polite yes while inside he curses his bad luck to be stuck with yet another upstart novelist with delusions of grandeur.

  “The important thing to remember is a screenplay is tricky,” he says. “It takes a lot of work, and you’ll probably go through two dozen drafts before it’s ready. Don’t lose heart. It’s typical.”

  I nod. John had made the same gloomy prediction, and while I’m not surprised to hear Lester confirm it, I couldn’t help hoping he’d feel differently. I want to be practical and realistic in my outlook, but it’s hard to imagine the twentieth draft when you haven’t even started the first. John is still teaching me the basics of screenwriting. This week’s lesson was on the third act—the shortest of the three but the most action-packed.

  I cut the corn muffin in half and ask Lester if he’s heard anything about the movie.

  “There’ll be nothing to hear until the script’s in. The quality of the material is the single biggest factor in whether a movie gets made. The story has to be on the page. If it’s not, the project is dead in the water,” he explains.

  “When do they expect to get it?” I ask, although I’m not convinced the script is as important as Moxie. I go to the movies; I see the trash they churn out. Clearly not everyone is worried about the story being on the page.

  But I don’t pursue it. Lester is part of the industry—more than that, he helped build the industry. He has to believe in the quality of what he does.

  He raises the mug to his lips. The steam curls, rise
s and disappears. “There’s no telling. Sometimes it can take up to a year, depending on what other projects the writer has going.”

  “A year?” I repeat, appalled. “An entire year?” The amount of time seems inconceivably long, an epoch required by a lazy, indulgent idler who can’t be bothered to have one complete thought a day. It took me six months to write J&J, and that’s a whopping seventy thousand words. A script is fifteen. I could churn that out in a week.

  Lester smiles sympathetically. “Most likely less. But you’re due for a second option payment in March, which is only four months away. That’s good. The longer this drags out, the better for you.”

  “Right,” I say, but I don’t need him to remind me about the second option payment. I think about the twenty thousand constantly. What little I have left from the movie is dwindling rapidly, and I need something to refill my coffers. It’s either that or cut in to my inheritance from my grandparents, which I can’t do—under any circumstances. It’s for my retirement or when I buy an apartment or to put my kids through college. “And Moxie’s still attached?”

  “As far as I know.”

  “I hope she holds on. I’m terrified that by the time the movie’s ready to start filming, she’ll be in rehab, or, worse, in some fleabag hotel in Puerto Vallarta passed out on the floor.”

  Instead of putting my fears to rest, Lester reaffirms them. “She’s a very troubled young woman. It’s sad what’s happening to her. But don’t worry. It won’t come to that. If she becomes a problem, Lloyd will pay to get rid of her. It’s done all the time.”