Then, there on the screen I saw Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor. An American Tragedy, a film I'd seen at least twice, not that it was all that great, but still it was very good, especially the final scene, which was unreeling at this particular moment: Clift and Taylor standing together, separated by the bars of a prison cell, a death cell, for Clift is only hours away from execution. Clift, already a poetic ghost inside his grey death-clothes, and Taylor, nineteen and ravishing, sublimely fresh as lilac after rain. Sad. Sad. Enough to jerk the tears out of Caligula's eyes. I choked on a mouthful of popcorn.
The picture ended, and was immediately replaced by Red River, a cowboy love story starring John Wayne and, once again, Montgomery Clift. It was Clift's first important film role, the one that made him a "star" — as I had good reason to recall.
Remember Turner Boatwright, the late, not too lamented magazine editor, my old mentor (and nemesis), the dear fellow who got beaten by a dope-crazed Latino until his heart stopped and his eyes popped out of his head?
One morning, while I was still in his good graces, he telephoned and invited me to dinner: "Just a little party. Six altogether. I'm giving it for Monty Clift. Have you seen his new picture—Red River?" he asked, and went on to explain that he'd known Clift a long time, ever since he was a very young actor, a protégé of the Lunts. "So," said Boaty, "I asked him if there was any particular person he wanted me to invite and he said yes, Dorothy Parker-he'd always wanted to meet Dorothy Parker. And I thought oh my God-because Dottie's become such a lush, you never know when her face is going to land in the soup. But I rang up Dottie and she said oh she'd be thrilled to come. S thought Monty was the most beautiful young man she'd ever seen. 'But I can't,' she said, 'because I've already promised to have dinner with Tallulah that evening. And you know how she is: she'd ride me on a rail if I begged off.' So I said listen, Dottie, let me handle this: I'll call Tallulah and invite her, too. And that's what happened. Tallulah said she'd love to come, d-d-darling, except for one thing-she'd already invited Estelle Winwood, and could she bring Estelle?"
It was a heady notion, the thought of these three formidable ladies all in one room: Bankhead, Dorothy Parker, and Estelle Winwood. Boaty's invitation was for seven-thirty, allowing an hour for cocktails before dinner, which he had prepared himself—Senegalese soup, a casserole, salad, assorted cheeses, and a lemon soufflé. I arrived somewhat early to see if I could be of any help, but Boaty, wearing an olive velvet jacket, was calm, everything was in order, there was nothing left to do except light the candles.
The host poured each of us one of his «special» martinis-gin of zero temperature to which a drop of Pernod had been added. "No vermouth. just a touch of Pernod. An old trick I learned from Virgil Thompson."
Seven-thirty became eight; by the time we had our second drink the other guests were more than an hour late, and Boaty's sleekly knitted composure began to unravel; he started nibbling at his fingernails, a most uncharacteristic indulgence. At nine he exploded: "My God, do you realize what I've done? I don't know about Estelle, but the other three are all drunks. I've invited three alcoholics to dinner! One is bad enough. But three. They'll never show up."
The doorbell rang.
"D-d-darling…" It was Miss Bankhead, gyrating inside a mink coat the color of her long, loosely waved hair. "I'm so sorry. It was all the taxi-driver's fault. He took us to the wrong address. Some wretched apartment house on the West Side."
Miss Parker said: "Benjamin Katz. That was his name. The taxi-driver."
"You're wrong, Dottie," Miss Winwood corrected her as the ladies discarded their coats and were escorted by Boaty into his dark Victorian parlor, where logs were cheerfully crunching inside a marble fireplace. "His name was Kevin O'Leary. Badly suffering from the Irish virus. That's why he didn't know where he was going."
"Irish virus?" said Miss Bankhead.
"Booze, dear," said Miss Winwood.
"Ah, booze," sighed Miss Parker. "That's exactly what I need," though a slight sway in her walk suggested that another drink was exactly what she didn't need. Miss Bankhead ordered: "A bourbon and branch. And don't be stingy." Miss Parker, complaining of a certain crise de foie, at first declined, then said: "Well, perhaps a glass of wine."
Miss Bankhead, spying me where I stood by the fireplace, swooped forward; she was a small woman, but, because of her growling voice and unconquerable vitality, seemed Amazonian. "And," she said, blink-blinking her near-sighted eyes, "is this Mr. Clift, our great new star?"
I told her no, that my name was P. B. Jones. "I'm nobody. Just a friend of Mr. Boatwright's."
"Not one of his 'nephews'?"
"No. I'm a writer, or want to be."
"Boaty has so many nephews. I wonder where he finds them all. Damn it, Boaty, where's my bourbon?"
As the guests settled among Boaty's horsehair settees, I decided that of the three, Estelle Winwood, an actress then in her early sixties, was the most striking. Parker—she looked like the sort of woman to whom one would instantly relinquish a subway seat, a vulnerable, deceptively incapable child who had gone to sleep and awakened forty years later with puffy eyes, false teeth, and whiskey on her breath. And Bankhead-her head was too large for her body, her feet too small; and anyway, her presence was too strong for a room to contain: it needed an auditorium. But Miss Winwood was an exotic creature-snake-slim, erect as a headmistress, she wore a huge broad-brimmed black straw hat which she never removed the entire evening; that hat's brim shadowed the pearl-pallor of her haughty face, and concealed, though not too successfully, the mischief faintly firing her lavender eyes. She was smoking a cigarette, and it developed that she was a chain-smoker, as was Miss Bankhead; Miss Parker, too.
Miss Bankhead lit one cigarette from another, and announced: "I had a strange dream last night. I dreamt I was at the Savoy in London. Dancing with Jock Whitney. Now there was an attractive man. Those big red ears, those dimples."
Miss Parker said: "Well? And what was so strange about that?"
"Nothing. Except that I haven't thought about Jock in twenty years. And then this very afternoon I saw him. He was crossing 57th Street in one direction, and I was going in the other. He hadn't changed much-a little heavier, a bit jowly. God, the great times we had together. He used to take me to the ball games; and the races. But it was never any good in bed. The same old story. I once went to an analyst and wasted fifty dollars an hour trying to figure out why I can never make it work with any man I really love, am really mad about. While some stagehand, somebody I don't give a damn about, can leave me limp."
Boaty appeared with the drinks; Miss Parker emptied her glass with one swift swallow, then said: "Why don't you just bring the bottle and leave it on the table?"
Boaty said: "I can't understand what's happened to Monty. At least he could have called."
"Meeow! Meeow." The cat-wail was accompanied by the sound of fingernails scratching against the front door. "Meeow!"
Pardonnez-moi, señor, " said young Mr. Clift, as he fell into the room and supported himself by hugging Boaty. "I've been sleeping off a hangover." Offhand, I would have said he hadn't slept it off sufficiently. When Boaty offered him a martini, I noticed that his hands trembled as he struggled to hold it.
Underneath a rumpled raincoat, he wore grey flannel slacks and a grey turtle-neck sweater; he was also wearing argyle socks and a pair of loafers. He kicked off the shoes and squatted at Miss Parker's feet.