First, says Ben Shipman, we start separation proceedings.
– And second?
– Second, we sue Hal Roach.
160
It is not pretty, what ensues.
Vera, Countess Sonia, and Roy Randolph, the Dancing Master, all announce their intention to stand fast. Vera tries to take him to bed. When he refuses, she attempts to get him drunk first and then take him to bed. When this fails, she gets herself drunk and commences singing Russian folk songs of the most maudlin kind, while Countess Sonia and Roy Randolph lament in harmony with her.
But in November 1938, he and Vera separate. He is, it seems, to return to court, with his latest failings made public.
Babe calls. Babe is working on the picture with Harry Langdon. The newspapers are reporting that Hal Roach has offered Harry Langdon a seven-year contract, and Babe and Harry Langdon are to be signed for a series. The pictures will be based, Hal Roach announces, on important novels, whatever this may mean. The age of slapstick is over and Hal Roach, like Mussolini, desires to be taken seriously.
How’s the picture going? he asks Babe.
– They’ve changed the title. It’s now called It’s Spring Again.
– What was it called before?
– This Time It’s Love.
– They’re not very good titles.
– Well, it’s not a very good picture.
– That’s all right, then. As long as you’re not engaged in false advertising.
– I’m not sure that truth in advertising is one of Hal’s priorities.
– Don’t worry. You’ll be great in it.
There is a silence on the line, but it communicates pain and regret.
I know, he says, in response to words unspoken. I miss it all.
This business with Harry – Babe begins.
– Look, I understand. You have to make a living. I don’t hold it against either of you.
– No, listen: I don’t think it’s going to work out.
– What?
– Hal has seen the rushes. Hal’s not happy. United Artists isn’t happy either. It didn’t sign on for Langdon and Hardy.
This is the first piece of good news he’s received in months. He has not wished for Babe’s picture to fail because he does not want Babe’s career to suffer, but if the picture is a success then he may never again see the Hal Roach lot, and he may never again work with Babe. Hal Roach Studios may not be perfect, just as Hal Roach may not be perfect, but it is his home. On the other hand, he is about to sue Hal Roach for breach of contract. But if Langdon and Hardy appear unlikely to last, then Hal Roach may be more inclined to settle the suit.
Thanks for letting me know, he says.
– Be seeing you.
– I hope so. I really do.
161
At the Oceana Apartments, he recreates this call in his mind.
Babe, who revealed great kindness in a small gestures.
Babe, who became more Southern at such moments, his natural courtliness finding a complement in his voice.
Babe, who could simply have telephoned Ben Shipman to tell him of the problems with Harry Langdon, and the unlikelihood of the partnership succeeding.
Babe, who almost certainly would have been forced to contact Ben Shipman sooner or later, if only in order to avoid further contractual difficulties down the line.
Babe, who called him instead.
Babe, who was subtle and graceful in Zenobia, as the picture with Langdon was eventually titled, having first gone through more names than a con artist.
Babe, who was better than Zenobia deserved, liberated in his performance because for the first time in years he was not constrained by the limitations of his partner.
Babe: what might you have become had we two not met?
Because here is the fear, glimpsed by him as an adumbration in the mirror of the past: Did Babe made him greater than he was, and in doing so make less of himself than Babe might have been?
If I did this thing, he tells the presence in the dusk, then I am sorry for it. Not for meeting you. Not for all those years together.
But I am sorry for what they might have cost you.
162
Ridding himself of Vera is like extricating himself from a thorn bush. Every action brings misery, and every maneuver snags him on another spine.
Vera seeks to remove him from his home.
Vera seeks $1,500 a month in maintenance.
Vera seeks $25,000 in attorney’s fees.
Vera seeks title to all community property.
Vera accuses him of beating her.
Vera accuses him of slashing her with a razor.
Vera accuses him of waving a loaded revolver at her.
Vera accuses him of hitting her with a shovel and attempting to bury her alive in the garden.
And always, in the background, prowl Countess Sonia and the Dancing Master.
He tries to keep all this from Lois, his daughter, but he cannot tell how much she knows, how much she has been told or has overheard. His reputation is being publicly denigrated through newspaper reports and leaked documents.
Did you really hit her with a shovel and try to bury her alive? Ben Shipman asks.
– I might have dug the hole, but I never actually intended to put her in it.
Ben Shipman considers this answer.
– If you’re questioned about it in court, say you were gardening. Just don’t tell anyone what you were going to plant.
It is November.
Ben Shipman files suit on his behalf against Hal Roach Studios, seeking $700,000 in damages for breach of contract.
Vera, Countess Sonia, and Roy Randolph smell money.
It is December.
On their first wedding anniversary, Vera is to begin serving a five-day sentence for the accident of the previous April in which she crashed the rental car, the rental car that she was not insured to drive as she had no license. But Vera cries before the judge. Vera cries so much that the judge fears less for his reputation if Vera is put behind bars than for the risk of flooding to his courtroom.
In the end, Vera spends just five hours in a cell. He drives her to the Beverly Hills city jail, and returns to drive her home when she has served her sentence. They kiss. They pose for the cameras. They announce their reconciliation. He professes his love for her.
Ben Shipman calls him the next day. Ben Shipman has been digesting the newspaper reports. Ben Shipman fears for his own sanity as much as his client’s.
Ben Shipman reads aloud to him from the newspaper.
They are describing you as ‘gallant’, says Ben Shipman. Since when was ‘gallant’ another word for ‘crazy’?
He tries to interrupt, but Ben Shipman is on a roll.
– According to the AP, and I’m quoting directly here, you two have ‘kissed and made up … Their divorce is off, definitely, and maybe permanently.’ You planted on her, unless the AP is lying, ‘a resounding kiss as she was led away to a cell’, and you ‘greeted her affectionately as she emerged’. Finally – and I particularly like this touch on the AP’s part: ‘“The divorce is off. I will tell the judge that I want no divorce,” she trilled gaily.’