Caryatids
Louis B. Mayer was arguably the most powerful man in Hollywood. As head of MGM studios, he could make or break careers as easily as Henry Ford turned out automobiles on his assembly line. Only somewhat less powerful a movie mogul was Victor Logue, the founder of Galaxy Films. Historical sagas, biblical epics, romantic comedies, spinetingling thrillers and action-packed westerns: over the years, he had made them all on the sprawling backlot of his studio.
Logue began his career by making one-reel comedies but soon advanced to longer, more serious films. Once he firmly had his foot in the door of the fledgling movie industry and was on the way to fame and fortune, he married and fathered a son. His wife died unexpectedly not long after, leaving him a widower before he reached the age of forty, however; and he never considered matrimony again. He saw no need to remarry, for his brief union had given him an heir to his celluloid empire. There were paid servants to take care of his son, clean his house, cook his meals and do his laundry. Besides, he was not foolish enough to believe in true love and lifelong devotion. After all, he lived in Hollywood, a land of make-believe, where houses were often nothing more than false façades and an eighteen-inch jointed model could easily be transformed into the eighteen-foot-tall King Kong and climb a scaled-down Empire State Building.
Although Victor was determined not to take marriage vows a second time—when he knew he had little hope of keeping them—he was still a relatively young man; and as such, he frequently sought the company of attractive women. Being the head of a movie studio, he had little difficulty in this regard. In fact, in an era when the number of auditions held on a casting couch would have put Harvey Weinstein to shame, the head of Galaxy Films could hold his own with the best of them.
As he sat in his posh private office one day, looking through the window at Mount Lee's Hollywoodland sign in the distance, he recalled the first movie he had produced at his own studio: a silent two-reeler that was a condensed version of Dickens's A Tale of Two Cities. Despite his wife being alive at the time, the pretty seventeen-year-old blonde he cast as Lucie Manette was the first of a long line of actresses who bartered her favors for a movie role.
A knock on his office door interrupted his reminiscing about the past and brought him back to the present.
"What is it?" he called.
There were only three people who had access to his office door: his secretary, who did a commendable job screening his visitors; his son, Danny; and director Otto Ziegland, the closest thing Victor had to a true friend.
"Why are you hiding out here in your office?" Otto asked. "I thought you were going to stop by the set today."
"I planned to, but then I decided to sit in my office and sulk."
"What have you got to sulk about? You're a West Coast Zeus sitting atop Mount Olympus, controlling the destinies of mere mortals like me."
"I'm not having much success controlling Danny's life," Victor admitted sullenly.
"Uh oh! What trouble has your boy gotten himself into?"
"All these years, I've been bringing him to the studio, trying to teach him the business; and now that he's at an age where he can start working here, he tells me he wants to go to college."
"What a disappointment that boy is!" the director declared facetiously.
"Go ahead and laugh. You don't have kids."
"So, your son wants to get an education. What's the big deal? That doesn't mean he won't take his rightful place here at Galaxy after he graduates."
"But he wants to go to school back east, to either Harvard or Princeton. How much do you want to bet that after four years in one of those expensive colleges he'll announce he wants to go to law school or medical school?"
"You're the only person I know who would be disappointed to have a doctor or lawyer in the family."
"I run a movie studio. I don't need doctors, and I already have a team of lawyers at my beck and call."
"It's his life. If that's what he wants to do ...."
"It's his life all right, but it's my money."
"And you've got plenty of it."
"Regardless, I told him if he insists on going to college, I'm not paying his tuition or his living expenses."
"He can't afford to do it on his own."
"That's exactly it. If he's bound and determined to go to Harvard or Princeton, he'll have to work here at the studio and earn some money first."
Although Otto disagreed with his friend, believing Danny should be able to decide his own future, he dared not argue. Friendship or not, Victor Logue was too powerful a man to cross.
* * *
It was a warm Sunday afternoon in early May. With his teenage son deliberately avoiding him whenever possible, Victor sat alone in his house, glancing at the newspaper out of boredom.
What's wrong with me? he wondered.
Despite having everything he ever wanted, he was unhappy. True, he felt a deep sense of accomplishment. Why wouldn't he? He was one of the richest men in the country. But there was no joy in his life.
There's nothing wrong with me, he answered his own question. It's Danny, my ungrateful son. Since the day he was born, he was handed the world on a silver platter. Yet now, for the first time, he hears the word "no" and turns on me. Hell, I never even told him he couldn't go to school. All I did was insist he work to earn the money to pay his own way. This town is full of people who would cut off their arms to get a job at Galaxy Films, but my own son won't talk to me since I put him on the payroll.
He tossed the newspaper on the coffee table and let his eyes wander around the sprawling living room that had been decorated by an Academy Award-winning set designer. Both the furnishings and the artwork screamed wealth and influence, but except for the collection of Oscars on display, there was nothing that said "Victor Logue lives here." There were no framed photographs of either his son or his late wife, no cherished memories from his youth and no souvenirs of his early days in Hollywood. Even the expensive paintings that adorned his walls did not reflect the man he was or his tastes.
They're ugly, each and every one of them—especially the Picasso!
Hoping to dispel the melancholy he felt, he searched through his briefcase for the telephone number of Lana Arnett, a stunning young starlet who hoped to be cast in the lead female role of Otto Ziegland's next picture. She had already been "auditioned" by the director, who passed on a glowing recommendation to the studio head.
"Miss Arnett," he said when she answered her telephone. "This is Victor Logue."
There was no need for any further introduction since his name was well-known in Hollywood.
"Mr. Logue!" the redheaded actress exclaimed. "What a surprise!"
"Otto Ziegland tells me he's considering you for the part of Berenice opposite Henry Fonda. Perhaps you'd like to come over to my house where we can discuss the matter further."
There was never any doubt that she would accept his offer, knowing full well what it entailed.
More than two hours after he hung up the phone, Victor heard the front doorbell ring.
"There's a Miss Arnett here to see, sir," the butler announced.
"Yes. I've been expecting her. Show her in."
The butler, a London stage actor who failed to make his mark in motion pictures and settled for working as a domestic, moved aside, and the stunning redhead entered the room.
"Would you like a drink?" her host offered, moving toward the fully stocked bar.
"Sure."
"What will you have?"
"A Coke would be nice."
Victor looked closely at her face and realized she was about the same age as his son.
She's just a kid, he thought, as he poured himself a glass of high-quality Scotch.
"I thought you were going to stand me up," he said, handing her a cold bottle of Coca-Cola.
"Sorry I'm late," she apologized. "I had some difficulty finding the house. Would you believe I actually drove past it a few times before I realized this was the right place?"
"Were my directions that bad?"
"No. I was expecting something much larger. I thought, being the head of a studio, you would live on a huge estate, sort of like that castle William Randolph Hearst has been building in San Simeon."
"What's wrong with my house?" he laughed.
"Nothing. It's cute."
Cottages, bungalows and chalets could be described as "cute." Surely, the adjective did not come close to describing the multimillion-dollar Logue mansion.
What do you expect from a kid who asks for a bottle of Coke? he told himself, in an attempt to soothe his injured pride.
That night, as Victor lay in bed trying to sleep, his brain replayed the day's events, particularly his conversation with Lana Arnett. One thing she said stuck in his mind, like a splinter deeply and painfully embedded beneath the skin: "I thought, being the head of a studio, you would live on a huge estate."
It was after three in the morning when he finally fell asleep, making it difficult to get up at five on Monday morning.
Shortly after he arrived at the studio, Otto Ziegland walked into his office.
"You look terrible," the director observed.
"I didn't get much sleep last night."
"Lana Arnett, right? That must have been some audition."
Victor did not comment on his encounter with the red-haired actress. Instead, he asked a question that seemed totally irrelevant to his friend.
"What do you think of my house? Honestly?"
"What's that got to do with anything?"
"I wanna know. Do you think it's a home befitting the head of a major studio?"
"It's a bit dated and a little small by Hollywood standards, but otherwise, yeah. Sure. It's a nice house."
When it came to adjectives to describe his home, Victor thought "nice" was on a par with "cute." He would much rather live in a "grand" or "lavish" residence.
"You're absolutely right!" he announced, feeling a surge of excitement. "That house is too old and too small for me. I'm going to buy a new one—better yet, I'll have one built."
"But the redhead ...?"
"Oh, yes, her. Don't even think of giving her the part of Berenice or any other role. I never want to see her in a Galaxy production. And if she dares show up here, I'll have her thrown off the lot."
As Victor left his office in search of an architect, Otto scratched his head in confusion, wondering what Lana Arnett could have said or done to evoke such anger in his friend.
* * *
After spending hours studying drawings of architectural styles from baroque and gothic to Victorian and art deco, Victor was leaning toward neoclassical.
"All these columns in front remind me of ancient Greece," he said, looking at photographs of the buildings and monuments in Washington, D.C.
Hearst built himself a castle, but I can do him one better. I can create my own Mount Olympus, he thought, remembering that Otto had recently referred to him a West Coast Zeus.
"If it's columns you want, take a look at this," Roman Lennard, the architect, suggested, handing his client a photograph of the Acropolis. "Try to imagine a home that looks similar to the Parthenon, only a lot grander. I can create two stories of living space that form a large rectangular building around an open courtyard in the center. It will be ...."
"What's this?" Victor asked, interrupting Roman's description of his vision.
"That's the Erechtheion, a complex that consists of several sanctuaries."
"It looks like there are statues of women holding up the building."
"That section is called the Porch of the Caryatids. It uses six caryatids, or sculpted figures, in place of ordinary columns."
"That's it!" the movie mogul cried with excitement. "That's what I want."
"I get it. You want a temple, not just a house. You want to surround yourself with goddesses like Aphrodite, Athena and Artemis."
"No. This is Hollywood, not Athens. I want the columns of my home to be statues of my leading ladies."
Although Roman thought Victor's idea was vulgar and that the home would be gauche, if not downright comical, when finished, he was not too high-minded that he would turn down such a wealthy client.
"I'll begin drawing the plans at once," he agreed. "I know a number of artists who can create the caryatids to look like Joan Crawford, Bette Davis ...."
"You find the artist, but leave the selection of which women will be used as models to me. I certainly don't want to look out my window and see the backsides of Louis B. Mayer's stars."
On the drive back to his office, Victor thought about who would be given the honor of being models for his columns. Should he choose his top-grossing female stars? If he did, it might create envy and resentment in the ranks. Besides, many of his most popular actresses were far from beautiful; some were downright homely.
If my house is to be the most glamorous in Hollywood, the caryatids will need to be stunning.
His mind suddenly conjured up the face and form of the young redhead who, by referring to his current home as "cute," had incurred his wrath and at the same time inspired him to build another. He imagined what Lana Arnett would look like if she were made of marble. Even without her magnificent fiery curls, she would appear as exquisite as any of Zeus's goddesses.
His mind went from Lana to other young, voluptuous women who had graced his personal casting couch in hopes of landing a part in a Galaxy Films movie. The faces of blondes, brunettes and other redheads came to mind. A number of them did go on to enjoy successful acting careers, while others eventually gave up their quest for stardom and got married or became waitresses, receptionists, store clerks and even call girls. Few would earn a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, leaving them no choice but to tread the Boulevard of Broken Dreams instead.
No sooner was Victor back at his office desk than he picked up a fountain pen and began writing down the names of some of the most attractive women he had "auditioned." Once his list reached nearly three dozen, he buzzed for his secretary.
"Do me a favor," he told her. "Get me photographs of the actresses on this list."
The secretary, whose own career never went beyond three walk-on parts and a one-line role as an army nurse in one of Galaxy's morale-boosting WWII dramas, glanced at the names, immediately recognizing a few but not all of them.
"I've never heard of some of these women. Are they under contract to Galaxy?"
"They might be. If our casting department has nothing on file for them, try contacting their agents."
By the end of the week, the highly competent secretary placed a stack of eight-by-ten photos on her employer's desk.
The following week, on Roman Lennard's recommendation, Victor hired sculptor Pavel Fedorov to create the caryatids that would grace his neoclassical mansion. Not only was the Russian a gifted artist who could make accurate and detailed representations of his subjects, but he also worked quickly.
"Roman tells me your house is to have twenty-four columns: six on each side of the door, front and back," Pavel said, glancing at the thirty-one photographs spread out on a table in front of him. "You have more women here than you need."
"Pick the ones you think look most like Greek goddesses. But make sure you use this one," Logue told him, pointing to Lana Arnett's photograph. "I want her next to the front door where everyone can see her."
"I'll start working on her first then," the sculptor announced and then removed seven photographs from the table and handed them back to Victor.
"You can throw them away. I don't want them," the studio head said.
Pavel believed his client's attitude was characteristic of his reputation as an uncaring womanizer. His disposing of the photographs was a metaphor for the way he had treated the women themselves. As he put the remaining twenty-four photographs in a folder for safekeeping, the sculptor reminded himself that he was being paid to do a job. He did not have to like the man who signed the paycheck.
* * *
While Roman Lennard oversaw construction of the house, high in the Hollywood Hills, Pavel Fedorov spent long hours in his studio creating the twenty-foot-high caryatids that would support the roof. The two men set a realistic completion date for the house of two years. That meant the sculptor had to create one column each month. No sooner did he complete Lana Arnett's likeness than he began the next one. For twelve months, he worked at a steady pace and remained on schedule.
It was right about the halfway point in the project that Pavel Fedorov went out to dinner with an old girlfriend at one of L.A.'s most exclusive restaurants. After the maître d' showed them to a table, they studied the menu for several minutes before the waitress came to take their order.
"Would either of you like to have a cocktail before dinner?" she asked.
When he raised his head and his eyes went from the menu to the server, the sculptor felt the shock of recognition.
"It's you!" he exclaimed, staring at the redheaded beauty.
"Have we met before?" Lana asked, unnerved by the Russian's close scrutiny.
"Not exactly. But I'd know your face anywhere. Victor Logue gave me your photograph."
"Are you a producer?" the girl asked, hoping this might be the break she was waiting for.
"No, I'm an artist, a sculptor. He hired me to create your features in marble for the new house he's building."
"Victor Logue wants a statue of me in his house? Why? I hardly know the man. I met him once, about a year ago, to discuss a part in a film; but I never saw or heard from him again."
"Well, he must have been quite impressed by you," Pavel said and then described the assignment he had been given in greater detail. "If you'd like, you could come to my studio and see the sculpture for yourself. I don't like to toot my own horn, but I must admit I did a good job recreating your likeness."
Two days later, on her day off from the restaurant, Lana drove to the artist's studio to see his work. When she saw her own face, marble white, looming above her from the completed column, she was stunned.
"I'm half naked!" she cried, embarrassed by the exposed breast.
"That's the way Victor Logue wanted it. The figures are reminiscent of ancient statues of Greek goddesses."
"No offense, but this sculpture makes me look like a ... a ...," she stammered, trying to word her remarks as delicately as possible, "a woman of sin."
"Like I said, that's the way Logue wanted it."
"And the other women, they all look the same way. It's as though he deliberately wants to humiliate us."
Although, as an artist, Pavel saw the human form as a thing of beauty rather than something shameful to be hidden behind clothing in the name of modesty, he was sorry the young redhead felt demeaned by his work.
"I apologize that my portrayal of you has upset you. I never meant to offend anyone."
"I know," Lana said, turning away from the marble face that seemed to symbolize how far she was willing to compromise her principles for a part in a movie. "You're just doing what Victor Logue paid you to do."
As she was driving away from Pavel's studio, heading back to the small, one-room apartment she called home, the humiliation she felt began to dissipate, and an overwhelming anger engulfed her.
How dare he! she thought. Every person that sees that column is going to know I slept with him.
Half a mile from her apartment, she made a U-turn in the road and headed toward the studio head's house. She had no difficulty finding it this time. Since there were no iron gates, Lana was able to drive right up to the house. She then got out of her car, walked to the front door and pounded on it with her fist.
"May I help you?" the actor-turned-butler asked.
"I want to see Mr. Logue."
"I'm afraid he's not here right now."
"Where is he?"
"I'm not at liberty to say, miss."
"I need to see him. I want to give that ... that monster a piece of my mind."
"What's going on down there?" Danny Logue asked from the top of the stairs.
"This young woman wants to see your father," the butler answered.
"So, you're his son, are you? Well, your father is a real ...."
"Monster? Yes, I quite agree with you. Tell me, what's he done to make you so angry?"
With a blush on her cheeks nearly as red as the hair on her head, Lana told Victor's son about the caryatids his father had commissioned to adorn his new home.
"I'm sorry for what my father has done, but I'm not surprised. The man has no scruples."
"If you feel that way about him, why are you still living under his roof?"
"Because he holds the damned purse strings. I want to go to college, but the tuition at Harvard is quite steep. So, I've been working at the studio for the past year, putting aside every dime I make. I can't afford to move out and live on my own."
Lana sympathized with the good-looking young man. Her only ties to Victor Logue were a scantily dressed statue and the memory of an afternoon spent on his casting couch, whereas Danny was bound to the brute by blood and dependent upon him for financial support. That sympathy became the basis for a close friendship between the two, which would eventually evolve into stronger, more tender feelings.
* * *
"What's this about?" Victor demanded to know when he came home from the studio one evening and found several packed suitcases in the foyer.
"I'm moving out," Danny calmly informed him.
"You're what? How the hell can you afford a place of your own when you're saving your money for school?"
"Not that it's any of your business, but I got a new job, a better paying one."
"Where? Doing what?"
"At MGM, doing pretty much the same thing I've been doing at Galaxy, only for a lot more money."
Upon hearing the news, Victor Logue became downright apoplectic.
"My son working for MGM! I won't hear of it!"
"I'm over twenty-one. I don't need your permission."
"If you leave this house, so help me, I'll call up MGM and have you fired. Your father has got a lot of influence in this town."
"So does my new boss. You see, Dad, Louis B. Mayer himself gave me my new position."
Mention of his archrival's name made Victor blanch.
"Why, I'll ... I'll ...."
"You'll what? Have an artist create a column for your new house in my likeness to advertise to the world that you've got an ungrateful son?"
"How do you know about the house or the columns?"
"I met one of the young ladies whose photograph you gave to Pavel Fedorov."
"Trust me, not one of those twenty-four women could be considered a lady."
"You're pathetic," Danny said with disgust, picking up two of the suitcases.
"Wait! Don't leave."
However, nothing Victor could say would change his son's mind.
"I'll send someone for the rest of my things," he called over his shoulder as he was going out the door.
* * *
When Victor received the phone call from Roman Lennard, notifying him that the new house was finally finished, the news was anticlimactic. Three weeks earlier, knowing the mansion was nearing completion, he had arranged for a grand housewarming party to show it off. More than two hundred invitations were sent out; only twelve people RSVPed their attendance, all of whom worked for Galaxy Films and felt their presence at the event was mandatory. Neither Danny nor Lana would be there, nor would any of the other twenty-three women whose features Pavel Fedorov sculpted in marble. Rather than face the public humiliation such a poor turnout would bring him, Victor cancelled the party.
On his way to view the completed home for the first time, he stopped by Roman's office to pick up the keys.
"The project was completed on schedule and came in just under budget," the architect boasted.
"Thank you. Should I ever decide to expand the studio, I'll keep you in mind."
That promise, however, was an empty one. The studio system in Hollywood was dying a slow death. Galaxy Films, along with its major competitors, was accused of violating antitrust laws. While there was little danger that his movie-making empire would crumble, he would lose a good deal of his power. His days of being an absolute monarch like Louis XIV or Henry VIII were numbered.
When he turned off the road onto the long driveway, he could see his house at the top of the hill. The sheer size of the building was impressive, even by Hollywood standards.
Now, THIS is a house! Not even that dumb redhead would call this place "cute." Speaking of which ....
He pulled up in front of the wide stairs, eager to see his bevy of marble beauties. Squinting his eyes, he tried to focus on the faces of the caryatids, but their features appeared blurry. Perhaps he needed glasses. When he reached the top of the steps, however, and saw them from a distance of less than ten feet, he could clearly see that although the bodies and heads were detailed, the faces were smooth, blank patches of marble with no eyes, nose, mouth or cheeks.
"This isn't what I wanted!" he cried. "I can't tell one figure from another."
Furious, he ran into the house in search of a phone to call the sculptor. They were waiting for him inside, all twenty-four of them, in the flesh. The flaming red hair made it easy to spot Lana Arnett in the group.
"What are you doing here?" he demanded to know.
Before she could answer, the warm, slightly pink skin tones turned white, as did the red hair. The green eyes were gone, seemingly melted into a face of undefined features.
"What the hell is going on?" Victor cried.
All thoughts of calling the sculptor and demanding an explanation deserted him, leaving behind the overpowering urge to escape. He ran out the door, got into his car and raced down the driveway. He did not return to his old house. Instead, he sought the sanctuary of his true home: Galaxy Films studio. It was to the safe harbor of his private office he headed.
"Good day, Mr. Logue," the security guard told him as he waved this boss's car though the front gates.
Dozens of employees—cameramen, technicians and extras—all greeted him as he drove toward his reserved parking space. Victor recognized the men he passed, but the women were all like the caryatids: they lacked faces. Even his secretary had no identifiable features.
"I wasn't expecting you," she said. "I thought you were moving into your new house today."
But her employer did not reply, for he had not heard the question. In his mind, a woman without a mouth was incapable of speech.
Frightened by the faceless, ghostly white creatures he was seeing, he bolted past her desk and into his office, locking the door behind him.
I wonder what's gotten into him, the secretary thought, startled by his bizarre behavior.
"Is something wrong?" she asked, knocking on his door. "Are you all right? Can I get you anything?"
From inside the private office came the sounds of the studio head alternately crying like a baby and laughing like a lunatic. Unable to offer any assistance herself, the secretary phoned his doctor.
Let him worry about Victor Logue, she decided. He gets paid a hell of lot more than I do.
* * *
Danny Logue felt no guilt when he signed the commitment papers that would lock his father away in the private sanitarium for the rest of his natural life.
"It's for the best," the psychiatrist claimed, mistaking the young man's silence for sorrow. "We can take care of him here."
"I'm sure you can. Believe me, Doctor, I have no regrets leaving my father in your hands."
Once Victor Logue was declared insane and incapable of handling his own affairs, power of attorney was granted to his son. At the age of twenty-two, he took control of his father's finances and gained ownership of his property and Galaxy Films.
"So, you're the new head of the studio," laughed Lana, now his fiancée. "I hope you're not planning on making use of the legendary casting couch."
"Have not fear of that, darling. I'm not even going to keep the studio. I'm putting Galaxy Films and both his houses on the market."
Within six months, all three were sold. Shortly thereafter, Danny and Lana were married in a small ceremony in Los Angeles. The newlyweds then moved to the East Coast where the groom enrolled in Harvard, fulfilling his dream of advancing his education. The bride, meanwhile, settled into their home and awaited the arrival of their first child. She no longer cared that her face still graced one of Pavel Fedorov's caryatids since what had been intended to be an elaborate, ostentatious home for a movie industry mogul was converted into an art museum by its new owners. Her face would be viewed as a work of art, not as a trophy of a powerful man's conquest.
As for the former studio head, he remained in the sanitarium, with only male attendants taking care of him. Until the day he took his last breath, he was unable to see or hear women. All the female nurses, patients and visitors to the sanitarium appeared to be made of marble and all lacked defined faces.
Salem had these caryatids sculpted to support the roof of my saltbox, but I shrunk them down to size and put them in the garden to scare the birds away.
