“Sure,” Harry said, “you bring out that human side you’ve got the audience empathizing with you.”
Chili said, “Why’d he put his hand in his coat like that?”
“It was a fashionable way to pose,” Michael said. “And that’s what I’m talking about. There’s the pose of the character, as most people see him, and there’s the real person who laughs and cries and makes love. I think the romance angle in our story is critically important, that it isn’t simply a jump in the sack for either of them. These two become deeply in love. There’s even a certain reverence about it, the way they fuck. Do you know what I mean? And it’s totally in contrast to the guy’s accepted character.”
“From the way he appears in the beginning,” Harry said.
Michael didn’t even glance over. He went on saying to Chili—no doubt because Chili had spoken to him about it that other time—”Once their lives are in danger and you have the mob guy coming after them, it not only heightens tension, it adds a wistful element to their love. Now, because they have more to live for, they also have more to lose.”
Harry said, “The mob guy?”
Michael, the typical actor, onstage, ignored that one too. A simple, honest question, for Christ sake.
“I also have to consider, I mean as the character, this is another man’s wife I’m sleeping with. I know the guy’s a schmuck, he’s a sneak . . . By the way, what does he do?”
“He’s an agent,” Chili said, “and his wife, he handles, is a rock-and-roll singer.”
Michael nodded. “Like Nicki. I like that. I don’t mean for the part, but a character like her.”
Harry stared at Chili now, Chili eating his ice cream and refusing to look over this way, Chili telling Michael, “We’re still working on the ending.
Michael said, “You are?” sounding surprised. “I thought you were bringing the script.”
“You have the first draft,” Harry said, wanting to start over, make some sense out of this. “The one you read I sent to your house?”
He saw Michael shaking his head with that surprised look and Chili saying right away, “Basically it’s the ending has to be fixed, but there some other parts too.” The hell was be talking about? Now Michael was looking at his watch.
“Elaine wants us to come by tomorrow, sometime in the afternoon. How does that sound?”
Harry saw Chili nodding, so he nodded.
“I have to run,” Michael said. “But what I hope to see, they begin to have misgivings about wanting the money. It becomes their moral dilemma and they try to rationalize keeping it, but in the end they can’t.” Looking at Chili the whole time. “Can they?”
“Which money,” Harry said, “are we talking about?”
GET SHORTY 273
That got Michael’s attention, finally, but with a kind of bewildered look on his face. “The three hundred large. What other money is there? I’m not being facetious, I’m asking, since I haven’t read the script. I think their idea, ultimately, would be to let the husband keep it, knowing he’ll get caught sooner or later. No, wait.” Michael paused. “The mob guy gets to the husband first, the agent, and whacks him, knocks him off. But he doesn’t have the money. Somehow the lovers have gotten hold of it. We see it piled on a bed. Make it a million—why not? The mob guy, who scares hell out of the audience, is closing in but the lovers don’t know it. So now you’ve got the big scene coming up. But just before it happens . . . Well, it could be after, either way, but it’s the shylock who makes the decision, they can’t keep it.”
Harry said, “The shylock?”
Michael turned to him saying, “Look at me, Harry.”
Harry was already looking at him.
Now Chili was saying, “That’s not bad. I think you got it down.”
Harry turned to Chili and back to Michael again.
“Jesus Christ, you mean all this time . . .”
But Michael wasn’t listening. He was getting up from the table saying, “I should keep quiet, I know, till I’ve read the script, but I’ve got a feeling about this one. I’m that shylock. Really, it scares me how well I know him. I could do this one tomorrow, no further preparation.”
“What am I thinking?” Chili said.
Michael grinned at him. “Well, I might need a week to get ready. But I’ll see you tomorrow, right? At Tower.” He started to go, paused and said, “Chil, work on that moral dilemma. Harry? Remember that time you turned me down for Slime Creatures? I’m glad you did. I might’ve gotten typecast.”
Michael table-hopped and touched hands all the
way out. Harry watched him before turning to Chili. “All that time he’s talking about your movie.” Chili nodded. “That’s what we came for?” Chili nodded. “You told Michael about your movie when you
saw him that time? You never talked about Lovejoy?”
Chili finished his ice cream. He said, “Harry,” getting his cigarettes out, “let’s light up and have an after-dinner drink. What do you say?”
26 
Karen was waiting for him. He saw her coming away from the front steps in a heavy-knit white sweater as he got out of the car. They walked around to the patio side of the house and over to the swimming pool that was like a pond with a clear bottom, leaves, dark shapes on the surface, Chili telling about the dinner with Michael, most of what happened, and finally asking her, “Guess who paid?”
Karen said that, first of all, high-priced actors never picked up the check. They had no idea what things cost. They seldom knew their zip code and quite often didn’t know their own phone number. Especially guys who changed the number every time they dumped a girlfriend. Telling him this quietly in the dark. He felt they could be in a woods far away from any people or sounds or lights, unless you looked at the house and saw dim ones in some of the windows. They could have walked in the house when he got out of the car, but she was waiting for him with the idea of coming out here. It told him they were going to end up in bed before too long. He was-n’t sure how he knew this, other than being alone in the dark seemed to set the mood, the idea of moonlight and a nice smell in the air, except the moon was pretty much clouded over. Her waiting for him outside was the tip-off. He didn’t ask himself why she wanted to go to bed with him. It never entered his mind.
“So who paid, you or Harry?”
“I did.”
“You felt sorry for him.”
“Well, yeah, maybe. Twice in one day I have to explain something where he’s already made up his mind I’m trying to stick him. Michael left, we sat there another hour and talked. You know what his omelet cost?”
“Twenty bucks?”
“Twenty-two-fifty.”
“And he ate maybe half of it,” Karen said.
“Not even that. The whole shot came to two and a quarter, with the tip, and we didn’t have any wine.”
“Harry went home?”
“Yeah, feeling sorry for himself. I said to him, ‘This wasn’t my idea, I didn’t call it. If you wanted to ask him about Lovejoy, why didn’t you?’ Harry says, ‘What, follow him out to the parking lot?’ Harry had a point. Michael does all the talking and then he’s gone, never mentioned the check. You know, at least offered. No—see you tomorrow at the meeting. Now I either have to make up something quick or forget the whole thing. Or let him do it. Michael knows more about it than I do anyway. All the time at dinner he’s telling me how it should work: that the love part should be important and how he wants to play the shylock as a nice guy—like people don’t mind paying him a hunnerd and fifty percent interest. You know what I’m saying?”