Stardust(177)

“Not if you can do it,” Ben said finally.

“Ha.”

“Why do you say that?” the lawyer said.

“You don’t have to ask me,” Ben said to Lasner. “You’re going to do it anyway.” He paused. “He can hurt the studio.”

“More?” Lasner said. He turned to Fay. “How many times I worried about that before? It doesn’t change.”

“Neither do you. You think it’s still Gower Gulch.”

“Where do you think he gets all this from,” Lasner said, sweeping his hand to take in the room. “Pictures. He doesn’t even know where he gets it, but it’s pictures.” He looked at Ben. “I know pictures.”

“Then fight him with that,” Ben said.

When they resumed Minot was sitting up straight, the papers in front of him stacked, everything back in control.

“Mr. Lasner, have you had enough time with counsel?”

“Yes, sir. Thank you.”

Minot looked up at this, but played along. “Good. Now if we can continue.”

“Certainly. But first I’d like to apologize if I expressed myself—”

“No apologies necessary, Mr. Lasner.”

“It’s just that I appreciate the importance of these hearings and I didn’t want you to waste your time on—”

“We’re not wasting time, Mr. Lasner.”

“On Convoy. I mean, for all the people saw it, it wouldn’t have done the Russians much good anyway.”

“It was my understanding the movie was a success.”

“Well, that depends on whose accountants you talk to.”

There was an amused murmur, everyone in the press section now following closely.

Minot referred to a paper. “Mine said fifty thousand net.”

“With second release,” Lasner said smoothly. “Yeah, we made our costs back, I’m not saying that, but wartime that’s not hard to do. Everything gets an audience.”

“The military audience, you mean,” Minot said, not even aware he was following Lasner.

“Overseas? They get it free. Part of the war effort. The industry paid for the prints, those pictures you used to see,” he said, Minot suddenly a GI again, young. “The boys, we didn’t make a dime on them. Wouldn’t. Your gross was in the home market.”

“And not enough of them wanted to convoy to Murmansk,” Minot said, trying to be light, but sounding forced.

“Not until second release.”

“And yet you’re full of praise for Mr. Schaeffer—everybody who made it, in fact.”

“It was a good picture.”

“You say that even though—”

“There were timing problems,” Lasner said, going somewhere else. “They put out a Bogart early so all the sudden we’re up against that in the first run. Plus Cover Girl was still—you know, you’re going to do tremendous business with a Hayworth.”

Ben noticed that the names made the audience more attentive, as if the stars themselves had entered the room.

“Mr. Lasner,” Minot interrupted, sensing this, “the fact remains that millions of people saw Convoy to Murmansk. We’re not interested in the studio’s account books. We’re interested in what the movie had to say, how it was changed to say it. Now I can appreciate you want to make money, I guess most of us do, but we’re here to see how these people work, how they get their message out when the rest of us are just going about our business—you up there counting your money—” He broke off, seeing Lasner’s face grow tighter. “Now I also appreciate that as head of the studio, you want to take responsibility for everything that happens there, but one man can’t do it all. These are people who know how to play on sympathies. It’s not just what happens in the front office, who decides this or that, it’s what happens on the ground—I guess we’d say on the sound stage. And what happens off.”

“What happens off.”

“Social life’s an important part of the business, wouldn’t you say? Sometimes you want to know about a person, you can tell by who he knows.”

“You mean like you coming to my house?”

Minot said nothing, blindsided, barely noticing the ripple of interest in the press section, a new detour.

“I know what you mean,” Lasner said. “People listen to us a while ago—” He raised his hand slightly, deflecting an argument. “My temper, I know. But they wouldn’t think you’d been to my house. Had dinner. But maybe we have more in common than they think. This country, how we feel about it. Of course, I don’t know what it says about you and Milt Schaeffer. I mean, both of you being there, at the same party.”