Los Angeles, when we finally arrived, was everything I had hoped for, and everything Alana had dreaded. Skyscrapers melted into single-story strip malls; business suits were swapped for shorts; polished Ferragamos for flip-flops. In place of Manhattan’s diners, with their sticky menus and home-fried potatoes, there were soy latte stands, oxygen tents, and tofu steakhouses. Walking—Alana’s favorite exercise—was a social taboo. And the drivers were terrible: producers’ wives applying lip gloss at the wheels of stadium-sized SUVs; octogenarian Ferrari owners; uninsured immigrants; and drunk actors snorting coke at the red lights. No one indicated; unless, of course, they indicated in the wrong direction, before pulling a U-turn across seven lanes of traffic. “Ohmigod!” the producers’ wives squealed as their three-ton Chevrolets mounted sedans and bounced over two-seaters. Then there were the Mexicans: the illegal, ubiquitous proletariat, tending to wilted palms, unparked Porsches, and untouched appetizers. And all of it set against the blue monotony of sky, the glare of the billboards, and the rim of smog lining the horizon like scum on an unwashed sink.
I loved Los Anegles. Perhaps it was just because Los Angeles wasn’t New York. Or perhaps it was because of the weather: a crisp seventy-two degrees, as reliable as the London drizzle or the West Village gale. Before I left New York, Glen asked where I was going to live: “Beach or canyon?” I soon realized it was a theoretical choice: I couldn’t afford either. I could live thirty blocks from the ocean in Santa Monica, or in a hilltop home overlooking the San Fernando Valley—within lead-poisoning range of the 101 freeway. Instead, I opted for a West Hollywood apartment, much the same as the one I’d left behind in the West Village. Our new home, at 1131 Alta Loma Road, was less stylish than 666 Greenwich Street, what with its gold fixtures, beige carpets, eighties kitchen appliances, and pink-tiled “wet bar.” But it did have a communal swimming pool, tennis court, and, perhaps best of all, a hot tub.
After signing a lease on the apartment, I went through the standard foreign correspondent’s checklist of Things To Do. I got squared away with a landline, cell phone, desk, computer, printer, high-speed Internet connection, Los Angeles Times subscription (for lift and view), and espresso machine (for the horribly early deadlines). By September, I was ready for work. There was only one thing left on the list: meet the competition. So, with a deep breath, I dialed the number of Oliver Poole, Los Angeles correspondent for the Daily Telegraph.
Like most English correspondents abroad, including myself, Poole was a “bureau chief.” That meant he was the head of a bureau of one, with a budget of his salary (plus the occasional lunch and travel expenses), working from an office halfway between his kitchen and bedroom. Being a bureau chief is psychologically important, however, largely because it sounds good to Americans, with their vast teams of reporters, fact-checkers, copy editors, commissioning chiefs, and subeditors. It also makes us feel like professionals. Whenever English foreign correspondents get together in hotel bars, they laugh about the “one-man bureau,” just as they chuckle about lift and view. No one, however, finds it particularly funny.
After talking briefly to Poole, we arranged to meet the following Friday at Chateau Marmont, the celebrity dormitory in Hollywood where John Belushi died of an overdose, James Dean auditioned for Rebel without a Cause, and Jim Morrison once fell out of a window (there are very few locations in Hollywood where Jim Morrison didn’t fall out of a window). I knew from previous visits to the Chateau that the waiters considered themselves the A-list in waiting. A cold burger, or a warm Chardonnay, could take hours to emerge on a large silver platter, accompanied by an even larger tab. Regardless, it seemed like a good venue.
On the phone, Poole made conversation at a relentless pace, in a broken Etonian tenor hoarsened by early deadlines and cigarettes. “One can get dreadfully paranoid in Los Angeles,” he advised, making surprise use of the royal pronoun. “It’s the distance: six thousand bloody miles to London and an eight-hour time shift. The desk forgets you exist if you don’t call twice a day.” I imagined Poole to be of cavalry height, with dark, Olympian curls, seawater eyes, and an all-linen wardrobe. He would arrive at the Chateau in a shabby, antique Bentley, with an actress girlfriend from Martha’s Vineyard: She would be making some body-money in Hollywood before doing Hedda Gabler at the Globe. Glen had already told me that Poole, three years my senior, had been educated at Eton and then Oxford before taking a job on the South China Morning Post. After that came the Telegraph. According to Glen, Poole’s friends at Eton had included Crown Prince “Dippy” Dipendra of Nepal, who died in a mysterious gun massacre, along with most of his family, amid a dispute over his bride. Poole even had a title—the “Honorable” Oliver Poole—because he was the heir to Lord Poole, the London corporate financier and former Downing Street adviser. I had also heard a rumor that Poole owned a yacht, moored at Marina del Rey (the rumor was actually true, although the yacht was small and Poole owned it with a friend).
I tried hard not to feel intimidated.
When Friday came, I arrived early at the Chateau, accompanied by Alana and some friends I had made while covering my first celebrity fluff story: the Beverly Hills shoplifting trial of Winona Ryder. (The story had gone well, apart from me arriving late on the first day and body-slamming Winona in the corridor, breaking a strictly enforced rule that no journalist could come within ten feet of her. To make matters worse, I had reached out to steady myself and nearly grabbed her right breast.) All of us at the Chateau were either reporters or paparazzi. We sat on sofas and armchairs in the high-ceilinged drawing room, watching the breeze ripple through the tall curtains. Every thirty to forty minutes a walking headshot in a waiter’s uniform would peer into the candle-lit room, then disappear. I made a heroic effort to get drunk; not easy, given the time between refills. There was no sign of Poole anywhere.
At 8:00 P.M., I checked my watch. Poole was an hour late. I wondered if I was in the right place. Then my cell phone started vibrating.
“It’s Oliver,” said a glum voice. “They won’t let me in.”
It was no surprise that Oliver had failed to get past the Chateau’s clipboard-wielding hostess, positioned strategically in the Ferrari gridlock of the driveway. In fact, Alana and I had snuck in through the back garden. It was also reassuring, however: Poole clearly hadn’t arrived in a vintage Bentley. Or with a famous actress girlfriend. “Don’t worry. Sneak round the back,” I advised him. “There’s an unlocked gate that leads into the garden. Meet you there in two minutes.”
I strolled outside, pausing to see if I could trace the outline of Tom Cruise under the heat lamps, then headed for the gate. As I opened it, a young, bespectacled Englishman wearing ripped Levi’s, a zip-up fleece, and desert boots scurried out of the darkness. The fringe of his ruffled schoolboy’s haircut had curled into an accidental quiff, and around his neck was a handmade chain, the provenance of which appeared to be a Goa street market. The effect was nearly, but not quite, cool. Poole looked like a cross between James Dean and Harry Potter.
“Oliver?”
“Chris. Hi,” he said, offering an inky palm.
“Hey. Where did you park?” I asked.
“Didn’t,” he said, speed-walking through the garden. Poole seemed to operate on fast-forward. “Got the bus. Took ages.”
I tried to calculate how long it would take to get from Santa Monica to West Hollywood on Los Angeles public transport. I concluded that Poole must have left his house at about 4:00 P.M. the previous day.