The first act curtain falls as the chorus girls rush to change into their sequined shark costumes for the sinking of the USS Indianapolis at the opening of the second act. Ray Bolger prepares to die of congestive heart failure as Franklin Delano Roosevelt. John Mack Brown preps to assume office as Harry Truman opposite a small cameo appearance by Ann Southern as Margaret Truman.
Amid the sea of empty seats, Terrence Terry and I sit in the twentieth row center, buttressed by our parcels and Bloomingdale’s bags and various thermos bottles.
Alone in row twelve, stage right, sits Webster Carlton Westward III, his bright brown eyes never leaving the form of Miss Kathie. His broad shoulders leaning forward, both his elbows planted on his knees, he thrusts his American face toward her light.
From any closer than row fifteen, Miss Kathie’s dyed hair looks stiff as wire. Her gestures, jittery and tense, her body whittled down by fear and anxiety to what Louella Parsons would call a “lipsticked stick figure.” Despite the constant threat of murder, she refuses to involve the police out of fear she’ll be humiliated by W. H. Mooring in Film Weekly or Hale Horton in Photoplay, depicted as a dotty has-been infatuated by a scheming gigolo. It’s a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea: whether to be killed and humiliated in book form by the Webb, or to remain alive and be humiliated by Donovan Pedelty or Miriam Gibson in Screen Book magazine.
Even as the stagehands change the plaster rocks of Iwo Jima for the canvas hull of the doomed Indianapolis, I’m scribbling notes. My fountain pen scratching my handwriting along line after line, I scheme and conspire to save my Miss Kathie.
Eyeing the Webster specimen, the matinee idol outline of Webb’s American profile, Terry asks if we’ve discovered any new murder plan.
Midsentence, still writing, I retrieve the latest pages of Love Slave and toss them into Terry’s lap. I tell him that I found this newest revision in Webster’s suitcase this morning.
Terry asks if I’ve arranged an escort for the show’s opening next week. If not, he can stop by the town house to collect me. His eyes skimming back and forth across the typed pages, Terry asks if Miss Kathie has seen this version of her demise.
Flipping to a new page of my notebook, still writing, I tell him, Yes. That accounts for her vibrato.
Peering over the top of the Love Slave pages, squinting at my notes, he asks what I’m writing.
Tax returns, I tell him. I shrug and say that I’m answering Miss Kathie’s fan mail. Reviewing her contracts and investments. Nothing special. Nothing too important.
And reading aloud from the new finale of Miss Kathie’s life story, Terry says, “ ‘Katherine Kenton never knew it, but the Japanese Yakuza are deservedly world-renowned as ruthless, bloodthirsty assassins…’ ”
ACT II, SCENE TEN
“ ‘A Yakuza assassin,’ ” reads the voice of Terrence Terry, “ ‘can perform an execution in as little as three seconds…’ ” We dissolve to a misty street scene. The fantasy stand-ins for Miss Kathie and Webster stroll, window-shopping along a deserted city sidewalk, gilded by a rind of magic-hour sunlight. Whether this is dawn or dusk, one can’t tell for certain. The lithesome pair linger at display windows, Miss Kathie perusing dazzling necklaces and bracelets proffered there, dense and heavily set with glittering clusters of diamonds and rubies, even as Webster never takes his eyes off her face, as bewitched by her beauty as she is by the resplendent wealth of lavish, sparkling stones.
The voice-over continues reading, “ ‘A common assassination technique is to approach the target from behind…’ ”
Trailing a few steps in the wake of Miss Kathie, we see a figure dressed in all-black garments, his face concealed within a black ski mask. Black gloves cover his hands.
“ ‘What actually occurred may always be one of film-land’s most enduring mysteries. No one could say who had paid for the gruesome attack,’ ” says Terry’s voice, “ ‘but it did exhibit all the earmarks of a professionally trained killer…’ ”
The happy couple saunter along, aware of only the glittering gems and their own happiness. They move in the slow-motion bubble of their own supreme bliss.
“ ‘The weapon was an ordinary ice pick…’ ” reads Terry.
We see the masked figure extricate a gleaming spike of needle-sharp steel from his jacket pocket.
“ ‘The assailant has merely to step close to the victim’s back…’ ” reads Terry in voice-over.
The masked figure sidles up immediately behind Miss Kathie. Shadowing her footsteps, he reaches toward her svelte neck with the cruelly sharpened ice pick.
“ ‘Thereupon, the well-practiced assassin extends an arm over the victim’s shoulder and plunges the steely weapon’s point deep into the soft area above the clavicle,’ ” reads Terry. “ ‘A quick side-to-side jerk effectively severs the subclavian artery and phrenic nerve, causing fatal exsanguination and suffocation within an instant…’ ”
Yeah, yeah, yeah, on-screen all this happens. Blood and gore spray an adjacent shopwindow filled with sparkling, glistening diamonds and sapphires. The clots and gobbets of gore slide streaks of brilliant crimson down the polished glass even as the masked assailant flees, his running footfalls echoing down Fifth Avenue. At the death scene, Webster Carlton Westward III kneels in the spreading pool of Miss Kathie’s scarlet blood, cradling her movie-star face in his massive, masculine hands. The light in her famous violet eyes fading, fading, fading.
“ ‘With her final dying breath,’ ” reads Terrence Terry, “ ‘my beloved Katherine said, “Webb, please promise me…” She said, “Honor and remember me by sharing your incredibly talented penis with all the most beautiful but less fortunate women of this world.” ’ ”
On-screen, the idealized Miss Kathie sags, limp, in the embrace of the soft-focus Webster. Tears stream down his face as his stand-in says, “I swear.” Shaking one bloody fist at the sky in frustrated rage, he shouts, “Oh, my dearest Katherine, I swear to perform your dying wish to my utmost.”
From behind their thin scrim of red gore, the diamonds and sapphires watch, glinting coldly. Their multitude of polished, flashing facets reflect infinite versions of Miss Kathie’s demise and Webster’s unbearable heartbreak. The emeralds and rubies bear detached, timeless, eternal witness to the drama and folly of mere humankind. The Webster character looks down; seeing blood on his Rolex wristwatch, he hurriedly wipes the timepiece on Miss Kathie’s dress, then presses the dial to his ear to listen for a tick.
Reading from the Love Slave manuscript, Terry says, “ ‘The end.’ ”
ACT II, SCENE ELEVEN
Professional gossip Elsa Maxwell once said, “All biographies are an assemblage of untruths.” A beat later, adding, “So are all autobiographies.”
The critics were willing to forgive Lillian Hellman a few factual inaccuracies concerning the Second World War. As presented here, this was history-but better. It might not be the actual war, but this was the war we wished we’d fought. For that, it was brilliant, dense and meaty, with Maria Montez slitting the throat of Lou Costello. After that, Bob Hope tap-dancing his signature shim-sham step through a field of live land mines.
Compared to the opening night of Unconditional Surrender, no doughboy crouched in the trenches nor GI in a tank turret ever shook with as much fear as my Miss Kathie felt stepping out on that stage. She made a ready target from every seat in the house. Dancing and singing, she was a sitting duck. Each note or kick step could easily be her last, and who would notice amidst the barrage of fake bullets and mortar shells that rocked the theater that night? Any wily assassin could squeeze off a fatal shot and make his escape while the theatergoers applauded Miss Kathie’s bursting skull or chest, thinking the death blow was merely a very effective special effect. Mistaking her spectacular public murder for simply a plot point in Lilly Hellman’s epic saga.