Long Live the Queen
When Oscar-winning filmmaker Jude Sparkman announced his next project was to be a big budget adaptation of the bestselling thriller Bloodbath, he took Hollywood by surprise. Why would such a highly respected, critically acclaimed director waste his talent on a horror movie, the film industry people wondered. This question was put to him by a late-night talk show host, and he had an answer ready.
"I loved horror movies when I was a kid," he explained. "Every Saturday night I tuned into Chiller Theater and Creature Features to watch the old Roger Corman and Hammer Films classics. I idolized Vince Price, Boris Karloff and Bela Lugosi. And there were others, among them Peter Cushing, Barbara Steele, Christopher Lee and Lon Chaney, Jr., who all inspired me to want to make movies myself."
"And yet you're known for directing artistic masterpieces," the host pointed out. "It's hard to imagine the man whose films dealt with political and social issues such as the Holocaust, the plight of Native Americans and the Civil Rights movement enjoying movies about zombies, vampires and werewolves."
"Up until now, I've wanted to shed light on historical accounts and on the very real issues that threaten us today. I think it's time for me to take a little break from reality."
Talk around the film capital was that Jude was making a big mistake and endangering his career. Some people openly ridiculed him and accused him of "selling out."
"Why should I care what people think?" he asked Murray Isaacson, the billionaire producer who agreed to finance Bloodbath. "I have nothing to prove to anyone. I've had more than my share of Oscars, Golden Globes and other awards. As for money, I've got plenty, enough to last me a lifetime."
"Don't pay any attention to them," Murray advised. "James Cameron proved those naysayers wrong with Titanic, didn't he? And when Citizen Kane was released, it was a failure at the box office. Not only that, Orson Welles was actually booed at that year's Oscar ceremony. Today, his film is considered one of the greatest—if not the greatest—ever made!"
"I hardly think Bloodbath will be another Citizen Kane or Titanic," Sparkman joked. "I'll settle for it being ranked up there with The Godfather and Casablanca."
"And it would be if you would follow my advice regarding casting."
The smile disappeared from Jude's face.
"We've had this discussion before," the director said with annoyance. "I don't want any Hollywood A-listers in my picture. I want to cast actors who have spent their careers making horror movies. I'm willing to concede to your demand that Janel Kingman play the young heroine of the story only because she's appeared in at least a dozen films in the horror genre."
"You're forgetting the fact that she's the only one in your cast whose name young moviegoers will be familiar with. And who goes to see horror movies? Young people."
"Still, you've got to admit my leading lady has class," Jude said, defending his casting choice. "The audience could easily believe she's a sixteenth-century aristocrat."
Said leading lady, Renee Devereaux, a woman George A. Romero once dubbed the Queen of Horror, was to play the role of the murderous countess who bathed in the blood of young virgins in hopes of retaining her youth and beauty. Although she had retired from acting twenty-five years earlier, Renee still looked good for a woman in her mid-sixties. As for the supporting cast, their names read like a Who's Who of B-movies. Several were men and women who had not appeared in front of a camera since the Seventies and Eighties.
Janel Kingman, on the other hand, was from a younger generation of "scream queens," which included Neve Campbell and Sarah Michelle Geller. Known more for her curvaceous figure and pretty face than for her acting talent, she never graduated to more serious roles. Instead, she appeared in one low-budget thriller after another, always portraying the scantily clad "naughty" girl who gets butchered by the killer.
Both Renee Devereaux and Janel Kingman were eagerly looking forward to appearing in Bloodbath, each for a different reason. Renee hoped her performance might result in a rekindling of her career, whereas Janel was delighted at having the opportunity to work with an esteemed director and playing a role where, not only did she keep her clothes on throughout the movie but she was still alive when the credits appeared at the end.
What neither Jude Sparkman nor Murray Isaacson had anticipated was that a fierce rivalry would develop between the film's mature leading lady and its ingénue. The first sign of trouble came within moments of the cast and crew arriving on location in Romania.
"Renee Devereaux!" Jude exclaimed with delight when the silver-haired actress walked into the hotel lobby. "What a pleasure it is to meet you! I've seen every one of your films, and I can't tell you how pleased I am at the prospect of working with you."
As the director gushed over the aging leading lady, her young costar—who had the reputation of being a diva—seethed with jealousy.
I'm the one with the box office drawing power, she thought peevishly. He ought to be fawning over me, not her.
"Have you met your supporting cast yet?" Jude asked Renee.
By referring to her part as a supporting role rather than a costarring one, the director added salt to Janel's wounds. She retaliated not by attacking the director but by reminding Renee of her age.
"Hi, I'm Janel Kingman," she announced, as she boldly stepped forward to shake her fellow actress' hand. "I remember you, Miss Devereaux. My mother was a big fan of yours when she was a kid."
Renee, however, was not one to be easily hurt by verbal slings. Having been married and divorced three times, she had mastered the art of sarcasm.
"Oh, are you in this picture, too? I didn't realize you were an actress. I thought you might be Jude's assistant. What's your name again, dear?"
"I'm Janel Kingman," she replied, her face getting red with anger.
"The name sounds vaguely familiar. Are you one of those reality TV stars?"
"No. I'm the reigning scream queen. I've appeared in Teen Slayer, Massacre at Camp Minnitonka, Ripper High and many others."
"Scream queen, you say?" Renee laughed. "You ought to be called Princess 'Die' since those are all slasher films."
"Princess Die—that's a good one," Jude said, unknowingly adding fuel to the fire that was already raging in Janel's brain. "Maybe we ought to use that in our advertising: Queen of Horror meets Princess Die!"
Tired by the long flight from L.A. and bored with exchanging barbs with what she considered a no-talent little brat, Renee excused herself and went to her room. Janel soon followed suit, fuming that she had failed to get the last word.
Let the old bag enjoy her victory, she thought as she headed toward the hotel's elevator. She may have won the battle, but I intend to win the war.
* * *
Rehearsals began the following day. Unfortunately, the icy atmosphere between the two actresses had not thawed. On the contrary, it had grown colder.
"If you need any help remembering your lines, just let me know," Janel offered with a false smile. "I can help you."
"You can?" Renee countered. "I wasn't aware your previous roles had much in the way of dialogue. But if I need help screaming, I'll be sure to ask you."
"All right," Jude said, stepping in before a major catfight erupted, "let's begin with the scene where the countess learns of her husband's death."
Despite the animosity between the two women, they both put aside their personal feelings when they stepped into their roles. It was immediately clear to everyone in attendance that Renee was the better actress. Janel's performance, although believable, was stiff and lackluster. Her director could see why her career was limited to slasher movies.
During the break for lunch, Renee entertained the cast and crew with anecdotes from her glory days when she starred in some of horror's classic films.
"What was your favorite role?" Jude asked.
"I really enjoyed playing the accused witch in Satan Comes to Salem."
"That was a great movie!" the director agreed. "Vincent Price did a cameo as one of the judges. It must have been quite an experience."
Janel, who hated to be ignored, rudely interrupted the conversation.
"I played Mary Warren in my high school production of The Crucible," she announced proudly. "I wanted to play either Abigail Williams or Elizabeth Proctor, but both roles went to seniors. I was only a junior at the time."
Mention of the Arthur Miller play led Renee to recall her early days on the stage. Before making her Hollywood debut in Revenge of the Lake Monster, she had appeared in several Broadway productions.
"I got my first role at the age of seventeen in Grease. I wasn't one of the Pink Ladies, though. In fact, I only had one line. But I had my foot in the door and was able to get other roles. I was in the running for the role of Magenta in Rocky Horror Picture Show when I decided to head west to Hollywood."
"Why leave New York when you were just making a name for yourself?"
"Because my fiancé got a recurring role on a TV sitcom that was being filmed in L.A. It's just as well, though. Rocky Horror closed after only forty-five performances, and I found my true calling in films."
"Broadway's loss was our gain," Jude declared gallantly.
Janel was glad when rehearsal resumed. In a one-upmanship match with Renee, she was clearly the underdog.
* * *
By the time filming began, the two actresses were no longer exchanging barbs and thinly veiled insults. Instead, a cold war existed between them. When necessity forced them to speak to each other, they did so with frigid, forced politeness. The détente lasted less than three weeks, however. Hostilities resumed the day a correspondent from Hollywood Reporter visited the set to interview Jude Sparkman.
"I'm sure you've heard this question before, but I've got to ask it," the journalist said. "Given your impressive body of work, why are you doing a horror movie?"
"I'd like Bloodbath to do for horror films what Damien Chazelle's La La Land did for old-fashioned musicals."
Although Janel had not been invited to take part in the interview, she chose to add her comments nonetheless.
"It's not actually a horror movie. It's an elegy like The Crucible."
"Elegy?" the journalist echoed with a smile of amusement on his face.
"I think she means allegory," the director explained.
"Yes, that's it, an allegory," Janel said, embarrassed by her mistake and hoping she was not coming off as just another dumb blonde. "The countess represents the upper classes and big business feeding off the blood of the poor and the workers."
"That sounds more like your type of movie," the reporter told Jude.
"I don't know where Miss Kingman got such a ridiculous idea. This film is not an allegory. It has absolutely nothing to do with socialism or financial inequality. Bloodbath is exactly what it appears to be: a horror movie loosely based on the life of Hungarian Countess Erzsébet Báthory."
Having been made to look like a fool in front of the visiting journalist, the actress got up from her seat and stormed into her dressing room.
"What the hell was that allegory bullshit all about?" Jude demanded to know once the reporter left the set and filming was ready to resume.
"I just wanted to make this picture seem something more important than a common horror movie."
"Well, don't! And if there are any more interviews, I expect you to keep your mouth shut!"
Janel did not dare argue with the director for fear of being replaced. This picture, she hoped, would be her stepping stone to greater roles. When she turned and saw the smile on Renee's face and heard the actress' soft laughter at her expense, however, she found a lightning rod for her anger. Rather than engage in a verbal battle, which she had little hope of winning, she would do something to publicly humiliate the former Queen of Horror. She had no idea what that would be, but it would come to her in time. Since revenge is allegedly a dish best served cold, she would bide her time until the perfect opportunity came along.
She found it with the help of Demetrius Stefanopoulos, Renee's third husband. Knowing their divorce had been an acrimonious one, Janel contacted him for possible dirt on her costar. The result was far better than anything she could have hoped for. Without his wife's knowledge, Demetrius had made a sex tape during the couple's honeymoon in Tahiti. He agreed to sell a copy to her for five thousand dollars. It was a steep price for a twenty-minute video, but it was a priceless acquisition for one bent on vengeance.
* * *
Six weeks into filming, Jude stared out the hotel window at the clouds hanging low over the Carpathian Mountains. The view was downright eerie. It was no wonder macabre legends of undead creatures preying on the living sprung up in the surrounding area over the centuries.
Real life, however, is often more frightening than tales of vampires, werewolves and ghosts, he thought despondently.
There was little doubt he was a success in his chosen field. Fame and fortune had come easily to him. Interpersonal relationships was where he fell short. With the exception of an eighteen-month-long marriage when he was twenty-two, his life was devoid of romantic entanglements. Yet now he found himself drawn to a woman who was, quite literally, old enough to be his mother.
When he was twelve, he had a schoolboy crush on Renee Devereaux, much like his sisters idolized pop singers when they were young. Whether her role was that of the evil alien queen on a planet populated by beautiful woman who mated with and later killed men from Earth or the innocent peasant girl who gets bitten by a werewolf and is reluctantly forced to share his fate, she became the object of his adolescent fantasies. His obsession with the Queen of Horror only faded once he went to high school and began dating his female classmates.
Why have those old feelings suddenly come back to haunt me? he wondered. I'll be turning forty in three years. I'm at an age when many men start thinking about younger women. Why am I attracted to someone who's more than twenty years older than I am?
Although she was still an attractive woman, who looked at least two decades younger than she actually was, it was not a physical attraction the director felt. Simply put, Jude enjoyed being with her. Since they had arrived in Romania, the two spent many hours together, sharing a bottle of wine and talking. He had had plenty of girlfriends in his life but never a female friend—or a close male friend, for that matter. As a man who devoted his life to his career, he had business associates, not friends.
I'm reading more into this friendship than there actually is, he decided, trying to rationalize his emotions. I'm feeling this way because we're on location out here in the middle of nowhere. If we were back in L.A., things would be different.
"Or would they?" the voice of doubt asked.
Anyway, we'll be done shooting here in another couple of weeks, and then life will return to normal.
At least that was what he hoped.
Meanwhile, in a room two doors down from Jude's, Renee was battling with her own demons. After three failed marriages, she had given up on love and romance. Living happily ever after was only possible in fairy tales, Hallmark movies and sappy romance novels. Why then, now that she was a senior citizen collecting benefits from her IRA and relying on Medicare to cover the medication for her bad heart, were those old, foolish romantic notions coming back to her?
And why am I attracted to a much younger man? she wondered. I'm not some old cougar, looking for a boytoy. Even if I were, I certainly wouldn't choose to go after one of the top directors in Hollywood. I'd stick to pool boys and hungry young actors looking for a break in Hollywood.
The only thing that consoled her as she tossed and turned, trying to fall asleep but unable to do so, was the realization that, in roughly two weeks' time, filming would come to an end. She would be able to return home to her cottage on Martha's Vineyard while Jude Sparkman went back to L.A. to begin postproduction work on the film. That thought both pleased and saddened her at the same time.
* * *
Jude and Renee were so engrossed in their personal feelings that neither noticed the change that had come over Janel. During the final weeks of filming, she ceased to be an annoying, pushy and whiny pain in the ass. There was none of her previous moody pouting or temper tantrums on set when she felt too much attention was being paid to the older actress. However, her pleasant demeanor was nothing more than an act. Beneath that benign façade was a cunning shrew who was waiting for the final day of shooting when she would humiliate the leading lady in front of the entire cast and crew—just as she had been humiliated when the director told her to "keep her mouth shut."
You know what they say, she thought, eagerly anticipating her revenge, he who laughs last laughs best.
Three days before the filming was to wrap up, Janel was given the day off. None of the scenes scheduled to be shot involved her character. She took advantage of her break to take a train to Bucharest. While browsing in the shops at Băneasa Shopping City, she decided to purchase a gift to give to Renee at the wrap party.
I'll give it to her just before I spring my little surprise on her, she thought with devious delight.
Although there were more than two hundred and fifty shops in the mall, Janel wanted to purchase something out-of-the-ordinary. On the advice of her taxi driver, she visited a secondhand shop on a dead end street, far from the hotels and restaurants frequented by the free-spending tourists. Since the owner was not likely to speak English, the driver—who barely spoke the language himself—agreed to act as interpreter.
After examining a selection of handbags, scarfs and perfumes, the actress stopped at a display of jewelry. One item, an antique ring, caught her attention.
This is nice, she thought. It's obviously very old—just like Renee.
With a wicked smile that would curdle milk, the young actress picked up the ring and said to the driver, "Tell the shopkeeper I'll take this."
The woman behind the counter shook her head and spouted off more than two dozen words in Romanian.
"What did she say?" Janel asked.
Searching for the proper meanings in English, the cabbie replied, "You cannot buy ring alone. They come in a pair."
The actress looked down and saw a second ring that looked exactly like the first.
"But I only need one. Besides, they're identical. Why would I want two of the same ring?"
"They are—how do you say it?—for exchange. You keep one and give the other away."
"Oh, like friendship bracelets and necklaces. That's a great idea! That way, I'll always have a memento of my stay here in Romania."
And of my triumph over Renee, she thought as she took her Visa card out of her wallet.
On the train ride back to the village later than evening, Janel took the rings out of her handbag and examined them more closely. They were not exactly the same, after all. There was writing engraved on the inside of them, and the letters were in a slightly different order. When she arrived at the hotel, she showed the rings to the front desk clerk who spoke fluent English.
"Do you know what the writing on these rings means?" she asked.
He examined the engraving beneath the light on the desk. Unlike the taxi driver, he had no difficulty translating.
"This one says, 'All that is mine is yours.' The other one says, 'All that is yours is mine.' It appears as though you bought yourself a pair of wedding rings."
Wedding rings? Hopefully, Renee will not learn the significance of the jewelry—at least until after we leave Romania. Once I'm back in California, it will no longer matter what she knows. Besides, that video is my real gift to her, not the ring.
* * *
The last scene having been shot to the director's satisfaction, filming concluded by three in the afternoon. The wrap party would start at six, giving the cast and crew ample time to shower, pack their bags or just relax. Renee returned to her room to get out of her black wig and sixteenth-century costume and to remove the heavy makeup from her face. She was peeling off one of her false eyelashes when she heard a knock on the door.
Is it Jude? she wondered, her heart racing with adolescent-like anticipation.
"Who's there?"
"It's me," her young costar answered. "Can I come in?"
"The door's open," the older woman replied, clearly disappointed.
"I know I haven't been the easiest person to work with," Janel began.
Renee did not try to deny the obvious.
"I came to apologize and to give you a gift."
"That really isn't necessary."
"I know, but I want to," the younger woman insisted as she handed over the ring.
"It's lovely. Thank you."
"It's a friendship ring. I have an identical one. We both wear them as a symbol of our friendship."
"I wasn't aware we had one."
"Look, I don't expect us to ever be BFFs, but think of the ring as a peace offering."
"All right," Renee said, willing to let bygones be bygones.
She then slipped the band on the ring finger of her right hand at the exact moment Janel put on the second band.
"Something's wrong," the Queen of Horror cried as a severe pain in her head caused her vision to blur. "I think I need ...." Her vision cleared midsentence, and she continued, "... to call a doctor."
Those last four words were spoken in Janel's voice, not her own. When the pain in her head went away and her vision cleared, it was her own face she was looking at. She was overcome with fear when she realized it was no reflection in a mirror.
"What the hell is happening?" Janel asked as she stared in horror at her own features that were looking back at her. "I'm ... YOU."
"And you're me," Renee added.
"The rings!" Janel cried, remembering the engraved inscriptions. "They were inscribed, 'All that is mine is yours. All that is yours is mine.' But I don't want what is yours; I want what is mine!"
She tried to remove the ring but it would not budge. It was as though someone had cemented it to her finger. Renee had no luck taking hers off either.
"Don't just stand there like an idiot!" Janel screamed, dropping her sweet-as-sugar act and reverting to the spoiled diva that she actually was. "Do something!"
There was another knock on the door. This time it was Jude Sparkman.
"What's all the shouting about?" he called. "Is something wrong in there?"
"Yes," he heard Renee's voice answer. "You've got to help me."
The director burst through the door and saw the actresses facing one another, both deeply upset.
"Are you two at it again?"
"She's stolen my body!" Janel shouted, the accusation coming from her rival's lips.
"I did no such thing. You're the one who bought these cursed rings, not me."
"Wait a minute!" Jude said, confused by the women's wild talk of stolen bodies and cursed jewelry. "What exactly is going on here?"
When the Janel in Renee's body told him about the rings and the unintentional "swap" that had taken place, he thought his stars were playing a practical joke on him.
"Very funny!" he said, and turned to leave.
"Wait!" Renee called from inside Janel's body. "I can prove who I am. Ask me a question that Janel won't know the answer to—about one of my movies or the private conversations we've had here in Romania."
"This is ridiculous! I'm not going to sit here and play games. I've got to pack."
"Please."
The director asked not one question but close to fifty. Finally, more than an hour later, he came to believe in the bizarre transformation that had taken place.
"If the rings are the cause, then take them off. You ought to both be able to return to your own bodies."
"We tried that. They're stuck."
The usual tried-and-true methods of removing a tight ring were attempted. Soap, cold cream and cooking oil failed to lubricate the gold bands enough to slip them off. Ice cubes did not shrink the fingers, nor did wrapping the digits in dental floss produce the desired result.
"We may have to call a jeweler to come cut the rings off," Jude suggested.
"Where are we going to find a jeweler in this tiny village?" Renee asked.
"Send for one in Bucharest," Janel demanded. "Damn it! Don't either of you idiots have a brain?"
"Calm down!" Renee cautioned.
"Don't you dare tell me to calm down, Granny!"
"You don't want to get upset. Your—my—heart can't take it."
However, Janel was not one to heed people's warnings. Like a spoiled child, she threw a full-blown tantrum, hurling items from the vanity across the hotel room. Just as she was about to toss a hairbrush at the leading lady, she felt an agonizing pain grip her chest. Renee saw the contorted face and recognized the signs.
"Oh, my god! She's having a heart attack."
By the time the local doctor arrived, the young actress was beyond resuscitation.
The leading lady felt no sense of loss or sympathy as her dead costar—forever trapped in Renee's former body—was taken away in an ambulance.
Poor Princess Die! she thought. Even in real life she gets killed off before the final scene.
* * *
Despite what appeared to be the tragic death of the film's leading lady, the studio released Bloodbath as scheduled. When interviewed, Jude insisted the decision was based on a desire to share Renee Devereaux's last work with the world.
"She was a great actress," he said at the movie's premiere. "And a wonderful woman. She will be greatly missed by all who knew her."
"If they only knew it's actually Janel Kingman who is buried in Hollywood Forever Cemetery under a memorial stone with my name on it," his wife whispered to him as they made their way into the theater.
"They'd never believe it, darling," he said, affectionately squeezing her hand.
"People are claiming you're now the reigning Queen of Horror," Murray Isaacson, the film's producer, announced when the couple took their seats next to him and his wife. "Didn't I tell you this girl would be perfect for your movie?"
"Long live the queen!" Jude said with a conspiratorial wink at Renee.
It did not matter to the director that his beloved was forced to inhabit Janel Kingman's body because the personality, brains and acting ability were still those of Renee Devereaux. The two of them, Mr. and Mrs. Jude Sparkman, would not only enjoy a long, happy marriage, but their professional collaboration would become one of the most successful in Hollywood.
Despite what Salem claims—rings or no rings—he never swapped bodies with Leonardo DiCaprio.
