62 – Sign me up
Dan only shook his head as we watched her leave.
“It’s only going to get worse if you don’t do something,” he
said. “I’ve heard talk about these places. They just suck a girl in, promising
them good money for innocent shots, and then making them get deeper in and more
hard core.”
I already suspected Louise had moved well beyond “innocent.”
“Come on,” I said. “I’ll go do something.”
“Go where?” Dan asked.
“Just walk with me,” I said. “You won’t have to go in with
me.”
The fumes from the taxi still hung in the street when we got
down the stairs. Louise had left no clue as to where the film shoot might take
place. We turned up McCaden in the direction of Hollywood Boulevard, twisting
through the tangle of turns at De Longpre and the crop of stores and other
business, then across Sunset.
Despite my earlier illusion that Hollywood had become Los
Angeles version of the East and West Village, most of the hippies who had
occupied it had fled long ago, moving up into enclaves in the hills north and
west of where we walked, out from the prying eyes of police, leaving behind the
dregs of the hip culture, the run aways and the wannabe outlaws, many of whom
clogged the street corners begging for spare change or selling copies of the LA
Free Press, who the cops routinely rousted on petty charges such as jay walking
or loitering.
Dan often spoke of a place called “Houdini Castle,” a half
demolished building up in Laurel Canyon many of the hip camped out at or used
to meet people, a kind of hip Disneyland Dan had never seen, but which was
among a number of falling apart buildings local home owners and cops called
“Roach Row.”
Many of the landlords who owned the building had rented them
out for years, the equivalent to cold water flats back eat, tiny apartments
with substandard kitchens, heat and plumbing not much different from the
apartment I had lived in over in East LA, now occupied by hippies who could
afford the cheap rent when Hollywood had become too expensive – illegal places
that made the landlord rich and sometimes when fires broke out, killed the
occupants.
Houdini Castle, a mansion partially destroyed by fire in 1959 and shrouded by a two or three
story-high hedge became a nesting ground for hippies. They found a way to tap
into local electricity illegally and at night camp fires glowed from the
interior. Rock and roll often blared out from the place, raising complaints
from posher neighbors for police to clear the hippies out. But some of the hippies monitored police
frequencies and managed to avoid arrest when the cops arrived.
Hippies were abundant in the whole area, taking advantage of
the cheap rents, though much to the chagrin of many of the slum lords, they
skipped out without paying rent.
The more Dan spoke about the castle the more attractive it
became to me, even though I knew Louise would hate it as much as she hated
Roachville.
We emerged onto Hollywood Boulevard near the Egyptian
Theatre and down the street from the Gold Cup where all the gays hung out,
spilling into the street and along the side street book store. The old Torch
Room sign still showed, as did the sign for the Croker Citizens Bank, and
nearer to hand the large rooftop covered wagon sign for Pioneer. The massive
sign for Hollywood Inn glowed even in daylight, hinting of a glorious Hollywood
past.
Old timers constantly complained about how pathetic
Hollywood Boulevard had become, bemoaning the loss of the old Gower Gulch where
cowboy actors used to hang, four blocks east of Vine. The Broadway Department
store still existed, as did Rexall Drugs and Hody’s Restaurant on three of the
four corners of Hollywood & Vine – the American Airlines building making up
the fourth corner, east from where we were, my destination a few blocks closer
than Dan’s. He had business to conduct at the Hollywood distribution center for
Free Press on Argyle. This part of the boulevard had its share of cheap shops,
going out of business signs for businesses not going out of business, mixed in
with a number of tourist traps, people selling maps to homes of the stars over
in nearby Beverly Hills.
This part also had an ongoing war between Jesus Freaks and
the gays – a Christian Science Reading Room inserted in the middle like a
referee.
The Jesus Freaks were relentless, handing out their
pamphlets of salvation with determination. They would save our souls even if we
refused to have our souls saved. When Louise and I strolled here, we usually
stepped around them or paused long enough for them to latch on to some other
poor fool so we could scamper passed.
Dan didn’t pamper them, but plunged directly through them
the way he might a cloud of midges, ignoring their “Jesus Loves You,” mantra as
he ran over them, the floppy leather had he had taken from me when I abandoned
it (I had bought it thinking of Hank’s from back east but it wasn’t the same)
fapping as he cursed them, “Get the fuck away from me.”
They jumped back, briefly stunned, then when recovered,
screamed after us, calling Dan “Son of Satan” and how Satan had taken
possession of our lives. Maybe Satan had, which would explain why such places
as Pecks and Fredericks existed, and the modeling agency my footsteps rapidly
took me towards, and the host of theaters that boasted of films marked XXX.
If so, why did these saviors not attack those places rather
than us? Why didn’t they help the people sleeping in the doorways at night,
homeless or high or both? There was a mission up the street near Highland that
tried to help, but got raided frequently by Sheriffs’ officers, as did several
other venues down near Sunset.
Dan and I parted ways when I reached the corner of Hudson
and Hollywood where Louise and I had signed up with Pretty Girl International
Agency, suggesting I meet him at the Free Press office after which we might seek
some LSD. I rushed through the glass doors and up the stairs, as Dan continued
down the boulevard, his face partially hidden by the flapping of his leather
hat.
Even more circulars cluttered the stairs this time, some of
them Jesus Freak paraphernalia, others flyers with a picture of a pretty girl
and more advertising for a pin-up models.
The same woman sat behind the desk when I entered the
waiting room. This time she wore a tight green dress with red lipstick, red
fingernails; she had died her hair a different shade of blonde. Although
startled at seeing me, she did not seem surprised, as if someone had warned her
I might arrive.
“Your girlfriend isn’t here,” she said finally, her right
hand creeping across the desk as to get near to the telephone in case of
trouble – whether police or some thugs, I couldn’t tell.
I halted in front of her desk, struggling to keep my rage
from showing, taking deep breaths, so that when I spoke, I sounded calm.
“I didn’t come here for her,” I said, laying out the
bullshit I had rehearsed in my head the whole walk there from McCadden.
The woman’s hand near the phone relaxed. Her dark eyebrows
folded in towards the bridge of her nose as she gave me a puzzled look.
“Then why are you here?” she asked.
“For the job I signed up for when I came in here before,” I
said, again sticking to the script.
Her gaze studied me, her eyes showing alarm, as she
evaluated me. Was I a vice cop? Dan claimed the whole industry got spooked when
actor Ted Cooper got busted a year earlier, a straight actor who had got caught
with more than a 100 blue movies by the vice cops.
Cooper had played in “The Wild Ones” and “Caine’s Mutiny,”
yet couldn’t resist the lucrative porno market.
“A lot of people expect the industry to go mainstream,” Dan
claimed. “Right now, all those films get made for stag parties. But the
theaters think the dirty code will end and they are waiting to market higher
quality porn that’ll fill theater seats.”
This made me wonder if that’s why Louise insisted on getting
involved, having been sold the idea that she might really become a star if she
stuck out the small stuff.
The receptionist may also have suspected the ugly truth –
that I had less interest in making dirty movies than getting access to the sets
where Louise worked so I might keep an eye on her, and maybe find a way to pull
her out before she got too deeply sucked into the industry.
For a long time, the woman simply stared at me, her gaze
attempting to read my intentions, while I tried to keep calm, even as I
imagined Louise already engaged elsewhere.
Finally, unable to learn anything from my expression, she
simply asked.
“Are you doing this because of your girlfriend?”
“To be honest?”
“That would be nice.”
“Yes,” I said.
“I did warn you to steer her away.”
“I tried,” I said. “But I found out how little my opinion
counts when it comes to this.”
“We get a lot of girls like her coming in here,” she said.
“Most of them are much younger, runaways from some suburban home who think this
will get them into legitimate movies. Some leave when they find out what we
really do. But some get a real taste for it.”
“Then what?”
“Then there is no going back,” she said. “And you might as
well just walk away, find someone else to be with.”
“And if I don’t want someone else?”
“Then she’ll eventually dump you,” she said. “I’ve seen it
happen over and over.”
“Can’t you people help?”
“Us?” she laughed sourly. “This isn’t the Salvation Army. We
recruit them; we won’t turn them away if they’re willing.”
“Then sign me up,” I said. “I’ll try to deal with it my
way.”
“That’s not a good idea,” she said. “I might feel for you.
But the people I work for won’t. And when they find out what you’re planning
they will get very angry. It’s not wise to get people like them angry.”
“Just do it, please.”
“All right,” she said, scribbling my name down on a card.
“Come back tomorrow and I’ll tell you where to go.”
I gave a stiff nod; The woman smiled, looking a little less
ruthless.
“Just don’t do anything stupid, okay?” she said as I paused
near the door.
“Me? Never,” I said, then plunged out into the hall beyond,
down the stairs to the street, turned towards the corner and stopped,
overwhelmed by traffic and the crowds, if not as bad as Times Square, nearly so
– with its own version of Macy’s nearby, an old fashioned jewelry store with
thick windows showing off a variety of items I neither wanted nor could afford.
To the right, down Calluerga, I caught climbs of World Books, tucked between
the Dental Arts Buildings and Pizza House (takeout orders welcome.) Racks for
magazines lined the front of the book store selling everything from hunting and
sports to fashion and pornography. I was tempted to cross over and take a
gander, but knew it was too soon for Louise’s pictures to be in an of them.
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