– I know what he’s in breach of.
Hal Roach has MGM on his back over Babes in Toyland. MGM has committed a lot of money to the picture, and Hal Roach’s reputation now rests on delivering it. But Hal Roach also loves Babes in Toyland. It has become Hal Roach’s pet project, and a symbol of all that has been achieved by his studio. Money will be spent on the picture, and the Audience will see every dollar up on the screen. But Hal Roach cannot start a picture on which one of its two principal stars is refusing to work. This man, of whom Hal Roach is fond and whom Hal Roach admires, for all their occasional differences, is jeopardizing Hal Roach’s studio.
And although Hal Roach will never admit it, there is a sense of hurt on his part. Hal Roach has kept faith with this man. Hal Roach has supported him, and tried to guide him. This is not what Hal Roach expects in return.
What do you want me to do? asks Henry Ginsberg.
– I want you to stop paying the son of a bitch.
So now he has gone from a situation in which he is not being paid enough to one in which he is not being paid at all.
Babe comes to speak with him. Babe has no quarrel with Hal Roach, and no difficulty with Babes in Toyland, but Babe will side with his partner in any disagreement with the studio because that is how Babe is. Yet now he has begun to make noises about quitting the country to work in Europe, about breaking up the partnership. Babe can’t believe that this is even being suggested. Babe has come for reassurance, and receives some, although not as much as Babe might like.
Hal will never let it happen, he tells Babe. We’re worth too much to him. It’s just a means of forcing Hal to make a better offer.
Did Ben approve this? Babe asks.
– Ben doesn’t sign off on everything I do. Ben can’t even secure me a decent alimony settlement. When Ben manages that, then I’ll talk to him about Hal.
– But would you do it? Would you really leave?
– I only know that I can’t continue this way.
Babe feels that he should meet again with Hal Roach, in Hal Roach’s office, over a drink.
I don’t need to meet with Hal, he says. I can find out what Hal has to say by reading the papers.
Hal Roach has taken to wrangling with him through Louella Parsons’s gossip column in the Los Angeles Examiner. Louella Parsons contracts tuberculosis in 1925, and is told she has six months to live, but this turns out to be untrue, which is now a source of great regret to many people in Hollywood. Louella Parsons is friendly with Hal Roach, and Hal Roach is feeding her details of his star’s personal problems in order to force him back to work.
He does not appreciate this negotiating tactic. He believes that it makes him look bad, and not just to the Audience: he does not wish Lois to think this is only about alimony payments. In addition, the more public the dispute becomes, the less likely it is that Lois will be willing to review the status of their relationship in private.
Hal, says Babe, is threatening to take us off the picture.
This, too, he has read in Louella Parsons’s gossip column. Hal Roach has floated the possibility of Wallace Beery replacing Babe, and Raymond Hatton replacing him. Wallace Beery is contracted to MGM, and is reputedly the world’s highest paid actor. Wallace Beery and Raymond Hatton were once a comedy duo, but Wallace Beery now plays hard men and Raymond Hatton plays whatever Raymond Hatton is told to play. If Wallace Beery was ever funny, Wallace Beery has long since given up on being so, maybe around the time Wallace Beery raped his first wife, Gloria Swanson, on their wedding night, or so the story goes. True or not, nobody likes Wallace Beery except the Audience.
The Audience loves Wallace Beery.
Hal won’t replace us, he tells Babe. It’s all for show.
But Babe isn’t so sure. Babe has never seen Hal Roach so enraged. Henry Ginsberg has taken to asking Babe for his thoughts on potential partners if the team has to be broken up. Babe does not want a new partner, but Babe wants to work, and there is only so much golf a man can play. If Babe spends any more time at the Lakeside Golf Club, people will start rubbing his head for luck. And while Lillian DeBorba has exited, and Viola Morse has returned, Babe still requires the creative outlet provided by the studio, as well as the checks that come with it.
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.