I had never met Max and hardly knew him, having only had some telephone conversations with him. I had previously found him because he was the agent for Kurt Vonnegut Jr. Actually, my wife, Annie, and I first became aware of the name Kurt Vonnegut Jr. when we were living in suburbia, Merrick, Long Island, and Dan Kramer, a neighbor I would see on the train ride to Manhattan, told me about this book Cat's Cradle that his teenage son had introduced him to.
Max Wilkinson
As fate would have it, about this time that I first became aware of this Vonnegut book, another young man engaged me to acquire the film rights to this same novel, Cat's Cradle. This was why I had previously located Kurt's agent, Max Wilkinson. Through some telephone calls, Max and I came to an agreement and I made a deal for the film rights for my client. The client never made the film and there is a lot more to the story of the film rights to Cat's Cradle, which will be told later.
***
My telephone conversations with Max Wilkinson were always friendly, as he was a friendly guy. He was the epitome of the Southern gentleman. He always called me "Dear boy." I always waited for him to pat me on the head, but, of course, that didn't happen. He told us that he had worked for Samuel Goldwyn in Hollywood before he became an agent and claimed credit for writing some of the famous Goldwynisms. He always claimed that he was the one who wrote "If Freud were alive today he would be turning over in his grave."
Apparently my telephone discussions with Max impressed him enough that shortly afterward he called me one day to ask for help with a television matter of Kurt's that he did not know how to handle. An agent in California represented a client who wanted to make a film based on one of Kurt's short stories. Max had no idea how much money he should ask for the rights to make the film and did not know what to ask for if they wanted to turn it into a series based on the short story. After I advised Max how to handle this matter, it worked out very well for Kurt. Max and I became telephone friends. So the call from the Brass Rail bar that day was preceded by just my telephone conversations with Max.
***
When I got the call I had also never met John D. and knew him only by some communications through the mail. That was when people wrote letters with a pen or pencil, put the paper in an envelope, affixed a stamp, sealed the envelope, and put the envelope in something we used to call a "mail box." I had written to him, in a spirit of humor, accusing him of libeling my friend and client Jim McKimmey when he wrote a snarky review of a book written by Jim.
***
So here I am with these two guys I had never actually met till that day. The three of us left the Brass Rail and went over to the Century Club, which was Max's favorite haunt. It was so easily accessible to him, and to us at that time, being located just west of Fifth Avenue on 43rd Street, which was right around the corner from his office on Fifth Avenue. This was also my first visit to the Century Club. What a day: my introduction to Max, to John D., and now to the Century Club.
***
The Century Club was the last social club in New York to permit women to become members, and for years women were never permitted above the first floor. The club is a haven for many in the publishing business, and there is a strict rule that no business can be conducted in the club above the first floor, which meant that briefcases and other working papers had to be checked on the main floor. This established it as a pretty somber place. The members were some of the famous editors and publishers of this era.
It was quiet, dignified, stilted, and populated by the old-timers, many of whom were retired or semiretired. All of which prompted Max to one day remark that, "The reason they have not let women in the club is that they would go snooping around in the corners and discover that some of the old guys sitting there are dead."
When John D., Max, and I arrived at the club after that morning breakfast of martinis they had at the Brass Rail, we each ordered a Silversmith and talked. Legend has it that a member named Silversmith gave the club a present of a number of silver goblets. This huge silver goblet, named after its donor, is a Silversmith, and it holds a drink about three times the size of a regular size martini glass. Strangely enough, the Silversmith drink we would order tasted exactly like a martini. Drinking two Silversmiths was like drinking about a half a dozen martinis. I guess this guy Silversmith liked martinis.
After this initial meeting with Max and John D., Max continued to call me for help with some of the matters he was handling for Kurt. Shortly after this, my wife and I met this tall, lanky guy, Kurt Vonnegut, at a party at Max's apartment near Gramercy Park. Max was smart, as he wanted us to meet Kurt since he knew I would be able to make his job easier by helping him with some of Kurt's proposals. It was a very casual meeting. There were interested people there, and Kurt seemed to be the center of attention. He was affable, friendly but shy.
We didn't get a chance to talk any business and we had nothing else personal to talk about at this time. It is not my nature to be aggressive in a situation like this, as I knew that I would have ample opportunity to get to know Kurt without the distraction of people trying to curry his favor. This kind of thing appeared to distract Kurt, not knowing who to relate to, but it was a short meeting and a good beginning, as he now had an idea of who was assisting Max with some of his matters.
At this initial meeting, Kurt was still not aware of how successful Slaughterhouse would become, nor was he conscious of how famous he would become. He was also licking his wounds from the lousy time he had trying to sell Saabs and trying to subsist on rejection slips and payments of $500 or $750 for an occasional short story picked up by one of the popular (and some not so popular) magazines of that time. Kurt wanted to be trusting but knew to be cautious. One can only surmise he still had memories of that real slaughterhouse he was trapped in.
It was nice being exposed to Kurt at this stage of my introduction to the business of the entertainment industry. Kurt and I were both beginning to build our careers. I don't think that either of us knew it then, nor would either of us have acknowledged it then, but in retrospect, our common insecurities in our just-beginning-to-flourish careers, our common military histories, and our common political beliefs and attitudes about society and care for the underprivileged bound us in ways that would develop into a lasting friendship. Annie shared these attitudes and made it easy for us to develop the relationship apart from what I did for Kurt and his business.
Kurt the Humanist
Kurt, as we would later learn, believed in humanism, which is a philosophical belief that emphasizes the value of human beings, individually and collectively, and generally prefers critical thinking and evidence (rationalism, empiricism) over an established doctrine or faith. This was fine with me. I had spent my high school days on the debate team espousing and believing these same principals. Kurt and I were both liberals and proud of it and hence supported the Democratic Party. Kurt insisted that he was not a Christian but thought Jesus to be a great person, and Kurt extolled the Sermon on the Mount. Kurt's humanism was consistent with my Jewish upbringing, which accepted the charity and generosity espoused by Judaism and rejected the strict dogma that some Jewish people adhere to.
Kurt was also proud of his remarks that he made at the funeral for Isaac Asimov, a fellow humanist. Asimov was a strong believer in humanism and wrote and spoke often on the subject. Kurt always said that he broke them all up at Asimov's funeral when he stood up as the speaker and said, "Isaac is up in heaven looking down at us now." Kurt thought that was the funniest thing he had ever said.
Max and I continued talking on the phone about matters of Kurt's that Max was working on, and gradually we would get Kurt involved in the discussions. Although Max and I were the deal makers, I had this idea, and still do, that the client should have some say-so in, or at least approve of, what we were doing for him. So gradually Kurt and I communicated more and more about his business happenings, and we became more and more friendly. Kurt needed someone to help him and someone he could trust, and I was a young, energetic attorney who loved his writing and found the deals I could make for him intriguing.
I negotiated some great multimillion-dollar publishing deals for Kurt later on. I do not want to take any great credit. Kurt and I got along famously. From my point of view, I have always said that it is a cinch to make a deal when you have all the marbles. Kurt was getting "hot," and I knew it, and his publisher knew it.
***
We don't have to worry that I took advantage of the Big Bad Publisher, as it didn't happen that way. I have always believed in, and in fact wrote a whole book based on, the idea that there is no such thing as an agreement in the entertainment and publishing business that is good for one party; it's either good for both or it's good for neither.
I don't know how you can take advantage of a star in the agreement you make with her, as an unhappy star will either sing flat or not show up at all.
***
After this initial meeting with Kurt and my few telephone conversations with him, Annie and I would make a point of showing up at places where Kurt was appearing. When Kurt spoke at the 92nd Street Y, we were there and arranged to take him to dinner after the speech at a local restaurant with a few other friends of Kurt's. We started attending book signings by Kurt, and Annie and I were now being included when they were followed by a dinner sponsored by the publisher.
I gradually did more work for Kurt, who was starting to become very popular, and Max and Kurt and I, sometimes with John D. MacDonald, were drinking more Silversmiths at the Century Club. It became habit-forming, and about once every ten days, Kurt, Max, and I would meet at the club, and each of us would consume close to three of those potent, if not lethal, drinks.
During our trips to the club, about three in the afternoon each time, we would make a trip to the kitchen, which, of course would be closed. By banging on the door, we could get someone in the kitchen to come out with a few sandwiches to stop the racket. Convivial talk ensued, the sandwiches were consumed, and then it was time for bed at three thirty in the afternoon. Kurt walked home. He always walked home. Max disappeared. I went home or tried to work in the office. Another day's work done.
With Max having his office around the corner from the Century Club and with him spending a lot more time at the club drinking Silversmiths than he spent in his office, his author client Richard Gehman one day was prompted to remark, "Hey, Max, I need an agent in the afternoon, also."
It just happened that as I started advising Kurt, Annie and I became friends with him.
***
I was now negotiating major business deals for Kurt at the suggestion of and in cooperation with Max. As I did more and more for Kurt, Max was pleased to be relieved of the major responsibility of negotiating some complicated deals, and Kurt was relieved that I was gradually doing more and more of his personal business, which included assuming the responsibility of collecting his money and paying his bills. Our friendship with Kurt and the Vonnegut family grew rapidly at the same time that I was assuming more and more of the responsibility for Kurt's business.
There was a period of time that I was handling all of Kurt's money, and as fate would have it, I had invested some of his money in New York City bonds, a rather safe investment at the time. In 1975, for some unknown reason, I sold all of Kurt's New York City bonds, and two weeks later it became known that New York City was near bankrupt. It was a stroke of luck on my part that for some reason unknown to me, I sold the bonds at precisely the right time.
This gratuitous stroke of faith caused me to realize that it would be important for me to relieve myself of the duty of investing Kurt's money for him. I kept enough in the bank account and paid the bills, but any extra money after that was handled by an experienced broker that I engaged for Kurt and watched over.
As a fiduciary I was extremely careful to never take a dime belonging to Kurt. What is ironic is that at one point, poor me (poor as compared to my friend Kurt), loaned Kurt money from my account. It was not usual for me to be lending Kurt money, but for some reason I made a mistake and wrote a check on Kurt's account that was for more than was on deposit in the account. Not wanting the check to bounce, I loaned Kurt's account the money from my account. He paid me back.
Kurt's Nephew Steve and the Rest of the Gang
Annie and I became very friendly with one of Kurt's nephews, Steve Adams. Actually Kurt and his wife, Jane, raised Steve and two of his brothers, Jim and Kurt (Tiger), after a traumatic week in 1958 in which their father, James Carmalt Adams, was killed on September 15 in the Newark Bay rail crash when his commuter train went off the open Newark Bay Bridge in New Jersey, and their mother, Kurt's sister, Alice, died of cancer the next day. Peter Nice, a fourth nephew, went to live with a first cousin of their father's in Birmingham, since Jane, at the time, had her hands full with her three children, but she always regretted not also raising Peter.
Our friendship with Steve blossomed when he was in his early twenties and he made a trip, with his guitar-playing friend Headly, to break into showbiz. Steve had been invited and intended to stay with Kurt at his four-story white-painted brownstone on 48th Street in Manhattan, but when he arrived, Kurt was embarrassed to tell Steve that he was not welcome, so Steve moved in with us and lived on a sofa in our living room. We even found room for his bike in our living room, as Kurt's place could not accommodate the bike either.
My wife, Annie, has made it a point to telephone Steve every year on his birthday and on his half birthday. Annie does not consult the computer, she just has this uncanny memory for birth dates and always said since he was an orphan it was the nice thing to do to call him. As Steve grew older, Annie called his house just to speak with Steve one day when it wasn't a birthday or half birthday. When Jeannie, Steve's wife, answered, she panicked and said, "Oh my God, did I forget Steve's birthday?"
We were also friendly with Kurt Adams, whom everyone knew as Tiger, and although we were friendly with Jim Adams, we almost never saw him. Tiger we would see on special occasions with his wife, Lindsay. Tiger was an airline pilot for Continental Airlines and only recently retired. It was always fun being with the Adams boys. Jim was an incredible furniture maker. He designed and built furniture that was startlingly complicated and beautiful. Peter, who also was called Peter Boo by the boys, was raised down South and recently moved up near Steve and Tiger. He actually looks like his brothers, who were raised in the North, and talks like his brothers raised in the North, but it's a surprise to us, because he does it with a Southern accent.
Kurt and Jane, in addition to raising the Adams' children, had three of their own to care for, Mark, Edith, and Nanny.
Mark was named after Mark Twain. He grew up to become a successful pediatrician practicing in the Boston area. He says he likes saving lives. Mark has also written some important books, Eden Express and Someone With Mental Illness, Only More So. Kurt's daughter Edith (Edie), an artist, was named after Kurt Vonnegut's mother, Edith Lieber. Kurt's youngest daughter, Nanette (Nanny), is married to realist painter Scott Prior. Both Edie and Nanny are very accomplished fine artists. Kurt, after his divorce from Jane, later adopted Lily as an infant in 1982.
My wife, Annie, has always had a very close relationship with Kurt's daughter Nanny. Nanny calls Annie often, and Annie is always ready to counsel Nanny if she should have a question about raising kids, which is what most mothers deal with. If there was anything that was not personal relating to his relationship with his children, Kurt would not be bashful about asking my advice, which he may or may not have agreed with.
Kurt and the Rest of the World
Most of the time, Kurt liked talking to people. He was equally at home with a stranger he might sit down next to on a bench near the river as he was with a famous person. He listened but he also expressed his opinions. We invited Kurt to our house on many occasions, and he would talk with the others present; almost always it was on a one-to-one basis. Kurt never dominated the discussion in the room. Had he started talking loudly enough for all to hear, everyone would have shut up and listened, because even among the sophisticates at the parties we had, most people wanted to know what Kurt Vonnegut had to say on any subject.
On one occasion when Kurt was at a party at our place with a group of smart contemporaries of ours and of Kurt's, Kurt settled in on the sofa talking with our son Seth, who was then a way-out-left progressive teenager. They were very busy talking and exchanging ideas, ignoring all the grown-ups. He respected Seth's ideas and was challenged by Seth. He later gave Seth a self-portrait on which he had written, "For Seth, no matter what he is for or against."
One night we were meeting Kurt for dinner at a restaurant, and Annie and I were sitting inside and we noticed Kurt walking up and down outside the restaurant. I sneaked out and he was busy smoking and talking to someone who wasn't even a smoker. I guess someone recognized him, and Kurt was happy to be exchanging ideas with someone he had never met.
And then there was this other night when we saw Kurt outside the restaurant as we waited, and when I went outside, he was gone. I phoned his home and he answered the phone. I inquired what the heck happened and said that Annie and I were ready to eat and drink with him. He explained that he couldn't find the restaurant. I urged him to get into a cab and come to the same place and I would meet him outside the restaurant. I did just that and we had a good time. Most of the time he was ready to learn by communicating with strangers, the famous, the infamous, and even someone like our young teenage son, Seth.
Another time we had attended a book signing at the Barnes and Noble near Union Square. It was a joint signing of a book written by Kurt, Timequake, and a book written by Lee Stringer, Grand Central Winter: Stories from the Street. Dan Simon of Seven Stories Press, which published the Lee Stringer book, knew that if he had the two together, he would get some good publicity for the Stringer book. We arrived, and the place was packed because Kurt always brought out a mob. Although the place was full, Kurt was not in sight. I went outside and found him up the street smoking his cigarette, which was not unusual, but he was also involved in an interested discussion with another person hidden in the doorway, smoking also. I told him he was needed inside and he followed me in.
Lee Stringer
What a fascinating person and what an incredible story. Lee Stringer was a crack addict who lived under Grand Central Station. Dan Simon, who published some of Kurt's work, had discovered Lee Stringer, who by a strange coincidence had exchanged his addiction to crack for an addiction to writing when he found a pencil he used with his crack pipe and one day discovered that the pencil could write and he could make it happen.
Here is how the relationship of Kurt and Lee Stringer happened. Sometime in 1997, Dan Simon, who publishes books that should be published, had lunch with Kurt at Cafe de Paris, where Kurt liked to eat, and told Kurt that he wanted him to read a bound galley of a book, Grand Central Winter: Stories from the Street. Dan was smart enough to tell Kurt that he was giving him the galley not for a blurb, but he wanted Kurt to read the galley from cover to cover, knowing unless he read it all Kurt would just give him a good blurb as a favor. A few days later Kurt communicated with Dan that he had discovered the next Jack London. Dan introduced Kurt to Lee, and Kurt wrote a foreword to the book.
The joint signing at Barnes and Noble that I referred to was arranged after the book was published in 1998. Kurt was there for the signing of Timequake and also because he had written the foreword to Lee's book. The evening was a smashing success with the banter back and forth between Kurt and Lee about writing and about the condition of the world. Dan Simon was smart enough to record the discussion that took place that night at Barnes and Noble, and it became a book written jointly by Kurt and Lee entitled Like Shaking Hands With God, which was published in 2002. Of course, it was and still is a great book.
Lee Stringer now works with Project Renewal helping counselors who help addicts. After the first book Lee wrote was such a huge success, lots of rave reviews came out, and Dan had lunch with Kurt and Lee again at Cafe de Paris. As Dan tells it, he wanted Kurt to give Lee some encouragement with his writing, since Lee, like many authors, had run into trouble with the writing. Good old Kurt, instead of giving Dan the support he wanted, told Lee that he didn't have to do it, that he had done enough.
Before he died, Kurt had become very friendly with Lee Stringer, a truly most fascinating, talented, unusual human being.
Annie's Seventieth and Endorsement Ads
It was in a small Burmese restaurant on West 56th Street where Annie, I, and David Markson were waiting for Kurt, who was running quite late. When Kurt finally arrived, he apologized for being late and he said to Annie, "I'm sorry, I won't be able to come to your seventieth birthday party."
We had been planning this important date as a surprise party, and Annie may or may not have known at that time that it was happening. David let Kurt know by telling him, "Nice going, Kurt, you blew it, the party was supposed to be a surprise for Annie."
Kurt responded, "Oh shit, Annie, I brought you a present." The present was the original vodka ad, not a print, but the original 1/1, which Kurt had signed with "Happy Birthday to Darling Annie Farber on April 24th, 1995. Kurt Vonnegut." This particular ad was very special, and it was one that was well-known at the time in advertising circles and among Kurt's fans. It was Kurt's self-portrait of his face, and his hands were putting together a cat's cradle with string. In the middle of the ad was a vodka bottle that was labeled "Absolut Vodka." Annie was more than pleased to have the present, and I am sure she already knew the party was coming.
Kurt had very strong feelings about what he would permit his name to be used for in advertising. As everyone knew, Kurt was a cigarette smoker who often jokingly remarked that he was going to sue the tobacco company because they said the cigarettes would kill him and that didn't happen. While he did permit the vodka ad with his likeness, he was adamant about and would never permit an ad for any kind of tobacco product. He knew he was hooked but did not want to contribute in any way to encouraging others to become addicted to tobacco.
Slaughterhouse-Five
Kurt really lived in that Slaughterhouse Five when he was captured by the Nazis. And it is a true story that Kurt and those in the slaughterhouse survived the bombing of Dresden only because they were in that slaughterhouse. Kurt and I often bantered about our army careers but only in a very peripheral way. We had both suffered and seen too much killing to want to actually relive the pain of seeing comrades dying.
Kurt, always in good humor, ridiculed my military service because I was not captured by the Germans. He would insist that I could not surrender to the Nazis, even if I had to, because I didn't know the language. At the time Kurt was captured he was a scout, and it was the scout who was out ahead of the platoon. I told him I wasn't dumb enough to get out there in front of the platoon and get caught.
I did tell Kurt that I was as lucky as he was, since I was getting shot at as an infantryman when I was ordered to work in Division Headquarters seven miles behind the lines. They needed help with the casualty reports and I could read, write, and type and had helped the company clerk when we were in the States. Two weeks after I moved to headquarters, I picked up the casualty reports to learn that my entire company was wiped out crossing a little stream, the Roer in Germany. I think there was one other survivor who happened to be sick in the hospital and missed the crossing. Our military service was just one other thing that Kurt and I shared in common, both being close to unbelievable.
We know that military life and serving in the infantry during a war like that can affect one's life in many ways. There is no doubt that this experience influenced Kurt's writing as it influenced other facets of his life. He could not have written Slaughterhouse-Five if he had not been captured and in that slaughterhouse at that time. But the particular response by the person who was Kurt Vonnegut to the bombing of Dresden could only have come from my friend, the Kurt Vonnegut that I knew. All of which makes one wonder, what other writer of note would have survived that bombing and written a best-selling book questioning the moral wisdom and even the strategic military value of bombing a city of our enemies, the Germans, who were out to destroy the civilized world as we knew it and our way of life.
We know that the slaughterhouse was a dreadful experience. We know when the bombing was over, Kurt was forced to clean up the bodies, and we know he saw some fellow soldiers abused and murdered. Kurt and I each knew what the other experienced during World War II, and we only discussed it to the extent that we did not have to conjure up the too-painful memories that we both wanted to suppress.
Cat's Cradle—Save Me from Hilly
I became familiar with Kurt Vonnegut Jr., as I told you, when a young new client wanted to make a film based on the novel Cat's Cradle. He didn't get the movie made, but once I was already doing work for Kurt, he did one day say, "Don, save me from Hilly." Hilly Elkins was in the entertainment business in many ways, agent, manager, producer, promoter, and he had talked Kurt into giving him an option to produce a film based on Cat's Cradle. I do not remember what, if anything, Kurt was paid for the option, but it had to be a mere token, because the total price for the motion picture rights was $50,000.
The option was entered into in 1968, just before I represented Kurt, so when he asked me to save him from Hilly, it was because each time the option was about to run out, Hilly would charm Kurt into extending the option without paying any additional money. I saved Kurt from Hilly by saying no more free option extensions. I was pretty insistent, despite Hilly's urgings. The option was running out at midnight and there was a delivery to my apartment of a check for $50,000 at ten thirty, beating the deadline by an hour and a half.
Hilly, born in Brooklyn, had started his show business career as an office boy in the mail room of William Morris Agency. He shortly thereafter had his own agency with some important clients. One of his early production hits was Golden Boy, a musical that starred Sammy Davis Jr. His biggest hit was Oh! Calcutta! in 1960, which featured nudity and a lot of four-letter words. It was panned by critics but survived for twenty years. The critic Clive Barnes wrote in the New York Times: "Voyeurs of the city, unite, you have nothing to lose but your brains." Hilly did not mind the criticism, as it sold tickets. Hilly had six wives, one of whom was the star Claire Bloom.
Through the years there were many communications with Hilly, as he was holding the film rights in a very valuable property. He didn't get a film made, although there were several attempts. We dined with Kurt and Hilly one evening, and it was an experience. Kurt respected the ability that Hilly had to influence people in a very friendly manner, but at the same time Kurt was skeptical of whether Hilly would ever get the film made. In fact it was Kurt's frequent comment that the film would never be made because no one wanted to work with Hilly. Hilly died of a heart attack December 1, 2010. He left a lot of memories with those of us who knew him. He was smart and charming.
Kurt Vonnegut and the Heaven Stuff
Things were tough in West Barnstable when Kurt was trying to write, trying to sell Saabs, and trying to earn enough to feed his family. He was a lousy car dealer, ran out of money, and desperately needed cash. He asked all of his good friends in town, the library board members, the merchants he knew in town, and no one would guarantee his loan.
Kurt stopped in to Dexter Lean's shoe store. Dexter was on a ladder putting shoes on to the top shelf. He took one look at sad Kurt and asked what the trouble was. When Kurt told him, Dexter without hesitation said, "Send the papers up the ladder." Atop the ladder, he signed them and sent them back down. Kurt's family had food to eat for a while.
Eventually Kurt repaid this remarkable gesture of Dexter's in a most unusual way. Dexter had always wanted an obituary in the New York Times when he died. A short time later, Dexter died and Kurt not only got him an obit, but he managed to arrange for a one-eighth of a page obit with a nice big picture of Dexter. Dexter up in heaven looking down must have been so proud. The only problem was that Kurt, being the humanist that he was, never believed in that heaven stuff.
David Markson
David Markson, who was waiting with us for Kurt at the restaurant I mentioned above, was an American novelist and a good friend of ours and of Kurt's. Kurt admired his writing abilities. While a graduate student at Columbia in 1951, he wrote a master's thesis on Malcolm Lowry's Under the Volcano, which had been published in 1937. He became obsessed with Lowry and later flew to Mexico to live the life of almost constant drunkenness with Lowry. He attended Union College and Columbia University and started his writing career as a journalist and book editor, periodically working as a college professor at Columbia University, Long Island University, and The New School.
In my discussions with Kurt, I learned that he admired David's work because it was eclectic, original, and David was not against taking wild chances with his writing. David's obsession with Lowry was centered in his admiration for Under the Volcano, which later became a motion picture starring Albert Finney.
During the last years of his life, before he died on June 4, 2010, we would have dinner meetings every three or four months with David and Kurt. It was always personal but also an education in what was the current literary scene of the moment. We would have met more often, but during David's earlier days, when he was emulating Lowry, he had messed up his body with so much drinking that he could not easily get around.
We had become friendly with David when Annie was teaching math at LIU in Brooklyn. There was a faculty meeting to discuss a book and they had tables set up for the drinks. Annie went to the martini table and started talking to David. David had given a lecture about the work of Malcolm Lowry. Annie shared with David that our friend Harvey Breit was very close to Lowry. David said that he had called Harvey, whom he had never met, to tell him of Lowry's death. We soon got David and Harvey together at our house.
Harvey was so obsessed with Lowry and later wrote a book of the letters of Malcolm with Malcolm's widow. Harvey at the time was the book editor of the New York Times and was on a personal basis with most of the popular current novelists, including Hemingway, John Steinbeck, Nelson Algren, Norman Mailer, and you name it.
When I say Harvey was steeped in the Malcolm Lowry story, it could be said that David Markson was submerged in the Malcolm Lowry culture. As I said earlier, he went to Mexico to absorb the lifestyle of Lowry. He came back drinking almost all of the time, living the life of Lowry. It was a way of life for Lowry and it became a way of life for David Markson.
David Markson, during his early writing career, wrote some memorable books, and Kurt loved his work. Actually, I think that David wrote the funniest book ever written, The Ballad of Dingus McGee, which was a not so subtle, very clever spoof of Hollywood Westerns. I always told Kurt that I thought The Ballad of Dingus McGee was the funniest book that I had ever read, with the exception, of course, of his books. Kurt liked hearing me say his stuff was the funniest, but he agreed with me on this one. The Ballad of Dingus McGee was made into a film starring Frank Sinatra. As good as the book was and as funny as it was is how bad the film was and how not funny it was.
David was paid the huge sum of $50,000 for the film rights in McGee, and that was more money than a professor could earn working for a lot of years in the English department at LIU. So when he got the $50,000, before he left for a trip to Europe, he managed to go into the head of the English department and in very graphic English tell the head of the department what he could do to himself, David not being one to mince words.
He came back from Europe broke, of course. There were some rumors, which he always denied, that he was caught in a flood in Spain and saved some persons from drowning in the river. David's denial that he acted as a hero was typical of his way of living. Yes, he could have saved all those lives and just might have done it. We could never know for sure because of his modesty, and because whether consciously or not, David lived with and encouraged a certain mystique about his life and his lifestyle. He associated with the major writers of the era; he was friendly with Mailer, James Jones, Tom Wolfe, Cheever, and you name it.
Rochelle Owens
We were invited to David's apartment on the edge of the West Village (the real Greenwich Village in those days), and that was when we met David's wife, Elaine Markson, who became a well-known literary agent. They were later divorced but were together at this time, and it was there that we met George Economou and Rochelle Owens, both poets and authors. George taught English at LIU and Rochelle was an avant-garde playwright and very avant.
Rochelle wrote a play entitled Futz, which was produced at La MaMa E.T.C., an Off-Broadway theatre in the Village run by Ellen Stewart, who became very famous for her contribution to the theatre. Futz opened at La MaMa in March of 1967 and became the thing to see, even if it meant making a trip to East 4th Street in the Village to get to La MaMa. The play was produced and directed by Tom O'Horgan, who later became even more famous when he directed Hair.
At this time, theatre was pushing the limits of propriety with nude appearances on stage and very graphic language. Along comes the play Futz, and it caused a furor as to what was permissible, but Rochelle had a message and she was going to get this message out in the most exciting, dramatic way possible.
Futz is the story of a young farmer whose luck with women was not very good. Futz loves and sleeps with his pet pig, Amanda. The pig likes it and Futz likes it but the community can't handle it, so they have to hang Futz. Rochelle was definitely making a statement about the condition of our culture.
Rochelle Owens and her husband, George Economou, became good friends of ours, and we attended many of the plays written by Rochelle. All of her plays are dramatic and riveting, even that play that some of us may have found hard to figure out where it is going. Her plays are always fascinating to watch.
Kurt's Film Deals
I did make a few film deals for books that Kurt wrote. Kurt's attitude was always let them make the film and keep him out of it. He said that he really knew nothing about filmmaking, and as long as I made a good deal on the sale of the rights, the book the film was based on had already had its success and they could not hurt him.
Kurt did love what George Roy Hill did in directing the film of Slaughterhouse-Five. He always said that George would consult him and ask his advice and then ignore what Kurt told him. He was pleased with what Nick Nolte did with Mother Night, although the film of Mother Night was not all he thought it could be. He was so upset with the film of Breakfast of Champions that we walked out of the theatre after it was screened for Kurt without even stopping to talk to the members of the cast who were there. He really didn't think Slapstick or Happy Birthday, Wanda June were all that great, although he was thrilled with the stage play of Wanda June.
The Movie Slaughterhouse-Five and Kurt's Characters
Kurt had a habit some other writers have that can be a real headache for the attorney or agent representing him. When the film rights to a novel are sold, the purchaser buys the exclusive rights to the plot, the characters, and all aspects of the story line. Kurt liked to put the same characters in more than one book, including Kilgore Trout. Kilgore is not so bad, but when you include a character like Elliott Rosewater and Howard W. Campbell in Slaughterhouse-Five it can complicate matters, since they were each the main characters in other books Kurt wrote.
Kurt's agent, Max, made a deal with Universal Pictures and sold the film rights to Slaughterhouse-Five, which meant he sold the exclusive rights to Elliott Rosewater, Howard W. Campbell, Kilgore Trout, and other persons whom Kurt put in the slaughterhouse with him. Then someone came along and wanted to purchase the film rights to God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, and as we know, Elliott Rosewater is the main character in this book and an essential part of a proposed film. Max, without realizing, then sold the film rights to God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, thus selling the exclusive rights to Elliott Rosewater twice, since Elliott was in the slaughterhouse in that book and also appeared for a few seconds in the slaughterhouse in the film.
It is an elementary principal that one can only sell "exclusive" rights once. If the exclusive rights to a character are sold twice, it is not an exclusive sale. I discovered this when I woke up to the fact that I was about to sell the exclusive rights to Elliott Rosewater a third time as I negotiated a TV deal for the story. I didn't do it. I stopped, and then I had to unravel the exclusivity of Rosewater given to Universal so a sale of the whole story in the book God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater could be properly sold.
Some negotiations took place with a very considerate person at Universal who understood that the twenty seconds Elliott is in the slaughterhouse in their film should not preclude the making of a film based on the book God Bless You, Mr. Rosewater, which would require the character as the main character of the film. A deal was made and Universal released Elliott Rosewater from exclusivity.
Howard W. Campbell was the main character in Mother Night, and he also was a character in Slaughterhouse, so he too had to be released from exclusivity, and Kilgore Trout as well. A film was made based on Mother Night, and Nick Nolte was Howard W. Campbell.
This concept was of real importance to me when I was representing John D. MacDonald and I was negotiating the sale of the film rights in the book Darker than Amber. John D. had written a whole series of books, each title including a color, and the main character in all of this series was the private investigator Travis McGee. There were over twenty Travis McGee books in the series, and if I sold Darker than Amber for a film, they would be buying the exclusive rights to Travis, and although the film company could not use Travis in any other films based on any of the other books in which Travis appears without getting the rights, neither could John D. sell the film rights to any of the other books in which Travis is a character.
I solved this and preserved the rights of Travis for John D. I made the deal with the film company buying the Darker than Amber rights that they would have the exclusive rights to the character of Travis McGee only for a period of three years after the release of the film and made sure that there was a date that the film must be released. During the three years, the film company would have the option to acquire the film rights to any of the other Travis McGee books John D. wrote, and if they did not acquire the rights in any of the books, the exclusivity of the character Travis McGee would cease and John D. could then sell the other books in that series with Travis as the exclusive character in only that story.
A Man Without a Country
We have these close friends, Jean and Juan Cappello, whom we met in the lobby of our apartment. We have lived in this apartment house for over fifty years and are pleased as punch if someone we see in the lobby even says hello to us. We are just friendly people. Yes, there were a few exceptions through the years, Jerry Berns of the 21 Club who died in 2006, Jack Dreyfus, founder of the Dreyfus funds, and one or two other persons memorable for their friendliness.
I would meet Jerry Berns at the bus stop on Fifth Avenue, and we would ride down on the bus together. The 21 Club was famous as a most celebrated speakeasy during the days of prohibition. No limo was waiting to take Jerry to work, and lucky for me, I too rode the bus with him. When the bus would approach the 50s Jerry would say, "How about breakfast in the basement?" How do you say no to an invite to have breakfast in the basement of the 21 Club, which was not open for breakfast? As he and I ate our breakfast, Jerry explained to me that they had ninety-one employees. What a treat.
Jack Dreyfus, on the other hand, always had a car waiting to drive him. No buses, but he always sat in front with the chauffeur and was one class act. During his lifetime he became a master at bridge, a tennis player of remarkable talent, a chess master, and of course hugely successful at mastering the stock market maneuvers. He was one nice guy and gave a lot of his time to promoting the medication Dilantin, which he claimed saved his life and helped with his depression. He also invested millions of dollars to promote the medicine.
I met Jack in the elevator going up one evening after walking Penny, our dachshund. Jack loved dogs and took in a lot of stray dogs and cared for them. Jack looked at Penny and said she didn't look so hot and that I had to stay on the elevator and go up to his penthouse apartment with him. Actually it was two penthouses he had as one, and Penny and I accompanied him. He handed me a medication, Dilantin, of course, and said give it to Penny and she will perk up and be in better shape. I thanked him, and when I met him the following day I told him that Penny was better. It's only now I have to admit that Dilantin may have been great for him, but I just could not give it to Penny.
So we finally met Jean and Juan Cappello, both charming people. The doorman introduced us, and Annie and I decided to have them over for cocktails. We have been close, close friends ever since. Both are well educated and smart. They are mature parents and grandparents. Jean rides her bike all over the city, including the other boroughs, and once a week she works for the American Red Cross as a volunteer. She help people who are burned out off their homes by placing them in temporary housing. She drives the Red Cross truck and adds comfort and help.
Juan is charming, an accomplished tennis player who, although in his seventies, gives some of the pros a game. He is important in Chile, where they still have a home. When I say important, although he will never admit it, I know he influences who will be governing Chile. He has worked in all the South American countries and is respected in all.
So we were invited to the club for a special evening honoring Juan for his endeavors in Chile and his work in helping the country economically and politically. We were seated at the table right in front of the honored speaker and we had guests in town, as luck would have it, who were from Chile. JJ and his wife were here because JJ had purchased the film rights in Kurt's book A Man Without a Country and was doing some filming.
They seated me between JJ's wife, Lo, and the Chilean ambassador to the UN, Heraldo Munoz, who during the coup in Chile was a real hero. But I felt an obligation to talk to the attractive wife of JJ on my left, since she knew no one in the US, and I guess I neglected Heraldo. At the end of the evening, after the inspiring words of Juan Cappello, Heraldo and I agreed that it was sad we did not have more of an opportunity to talk. He scribbled his address on a piece of paper and said cocktails at their house on Tuesday. Of course we showed up at their house for cocktails and a stimulating evening with people from all over the world, many from Chile.
JJ was all over the city and the other boroughs filming for his adaptation of Kurt's novel. He filmed in Central Park, he filmed on the Manhattan Bridge, he filmed Morley Safer, the regular on the TV news program 60 Minutes, in the basement of the Algonquin Hotel, he traveled to Boston and filmed Mark Vonnegut. He decided that he would film Annie and me in our apartment in the city, so I volunteered to make him a pizza. Wouldn't you know it, he wanted to and did film me making the pizza, with the pizza stone, the works. Only problem was he brought more of a crew than anticipated so I ended up making three big pizzas.
JJ finished the film. Went back to Chile and spent so much money on the film, but it needed a lot more work, so he started over with a new concept and a new partner. That's showbiz.
Nick Nolte in Mother Night
When Nick Nolte was in town for the Mother Night movie based on Kurt's book, I gotta admit I was a little proud to be walking down the street with a real movie star. I should have been used to it by then because Annie and I were the best friends of Joan Bennett, a genuine movie star who made seventy-four movies before her then-husband Walter Wanger shot her friend Jennings Lang in the Paramount Pictures parking lot. As such a close friend to Joan, we had many great times drinking and dining together and, of course, talking and attending movies and theatre. I always got a kick out of it when we would get into a cab with her and the cab driver would say, "You look exactly like Joan Bennett," and I could proudly retort, "She looks like her because she is her."
Kurt was fond of Nolte, and my only meeting with him was a quick scheduled lunch, which he had to leave and miss the lunch, but we talked and I was impressed. He played the part of Howard W. Campbell, a double agent. Kurt left me puzzling about a lot of things in his writing and in his personal life, and most of the time I could figure it out. But when it came to Campbell, Kurt was playing a game with me, and I think he played the game because he didn't know the answer either, or didn't want to furnish an answer.
In the end of the book, it is not clear just whose side Campbell was really, really on. Was he a loyal American spying on the Nazis for us, or a double agent working for the other side? So you know me, shortly after we parted from Nick, I boldly asked Kurt whether Campbell was a loyal American or not. His answer was so Kurt. He simply said, "Don, what do you think?" And when further pressed by me insisting that was not responsive, he made it even more confusing for me by inquiring, "What would you like to believe?" To this day, I don't know whether Kurt had an answer to the question, and I think he wanted the reader to come to his or her own conclusion, which was the right conclusion for each reader.
Joan Bennett
I represented Tamara Geva, George Balanchine's first wife, who was referred to me by Richard Barr, the producer who produced Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolff and a whole lot of very important other plays by Edward Albee and other important playwrights.
Tamara Geva decided to sublease her apartment on West 81st Street, and a young man, Zia Mohyeddin, who was starring in A Passage to India on Broadway came to our house after the late performance at eleven thirty p.m. to sign the sublease. He left at three thirty a.m. because Annie and I and Zia had so much to talk about. After the opening of Passage, the reviews for Zia were so great they put his name above the title, even on the marquee. We became close friends. In the meantime I got involved in the divorce between Tamara and her husband, John Emery, a tall, handsome, serious dramatic film and stage actor. John had taken up with Joan Bennett when he and Tamara split, and it was incumbent upon us to meet Joan, with whom he was living.
I have to admit that the first dinner when we were invited to Joan's house was memorable. She was such a beautiful, kind, gentle, caring woman. Of course the dinner was a lot more formal than what I was accustomed to. The scotch before dinner was usual for us, and the wine at dinner we were into, but another part of the dinner was a bit of a surprise.
What did I know, a hick from Nebraska? So when the finger bowl was placed before me by the maid, Annie knew I mistook this ritual as a serving of soup and managed to warn me before I drank the contents.
What I should have known, but how could I, was that in proper society after the dinner plate has been cleared, the waiter brings each guest a finger bowl, which is a small bowl filled with water, often with a slice of lemon floating in it.
There is an urban myth about the guest who drank from her finger bowl, who like me thought the clear liquid was a kind of soup. In order to put her guest at ease, the hostess did the same thing and drank her bowl of water intended to cleanse the fingers.
I didn't give Joan an opportunity to put me at ease by drinking the contents of the finger bowl after I did, because I didn't drink it.
John too was a very unpretentious, kind man. He and a film star of that time, Zachary Scott, in the thirties or forties, were vacationing from Hollywood in Mexico and were so bored they just got drunk and did the unthinkable, at least then it was unthinkable: they got their ears pierced and put in earrings and were trendsetters, the beginning of the practice of men wearing earrings in this country.
A few years later John Emery died. After the funeral service there was a meeting of some friends at the apartment of Joan's daughter Stephanie Wanger. Annie, always anxious to help, asked Mr. Steinbeck, who was also attending, if she could get him a drink. He took both of Annie's hands in his and said to her, "Am I going to have to call you Mrs. Farber, or will you please call me John?" Annie returned with a drink for John. What a kind gentleman.
Our Friend the Chancellor
Harvey Perlman was our friend who had been the youngest dean of a law school in the country before he became the chancellor of the University of Nebraska. About twenty years ago, we took Harvey to dinner one night and he noticed I was limping along in pain. After dinner we were in front of the restaurant on 79th Street near 2nd Avenue at about midnight, and Harvey said that I didn't have to limp around in pain. The chancellor of the University of Nebraska took off his shoes under the lamplight and pulled out his orthotics to show me what an orthotic is. I got orthotics after that and could walk. I have been indebted ever since to the chancellor whose contribution to my education allowed me to walk pain-free. Don't ever underestimate the knowledge of our educators.
Shepard Traube, Zia in Boston, and Alan Alda
Shepard Traube, a film and stage producer, wanted to produce a play in 1963 and wanted to hire Zia Mohyeddin for the cast, since Zia was hot at the time, having received the rave reviews for A Passage to India. Zia really didn't want to do it, so he asked for an outrageous fee about three times the offer, and he got it. Traube had become somewhat well-known in the business for having produced Angel Street, a play that also became a movie entitled Gaslight that starred Charles Boyer and Ingrid Bergman, who had previously gained real fame for her role opposite Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca. So Traube engaged Pippa Scott, a sought-after ingenue, Zia Mohyeddin, an overpaid hot performer at the time, and a young aspiring actor, Alan Alda.
The play previewed in Boston and was a total flop. We were in Boston to see Zia perform. It was such a lousy play I don't even remember the name of it, and as confirmation of how lousy it was, I can't even find it on Google. The play closed even before opening, or right after opening, and again I am not sure when, and we were on a train from Boston to New York. There was a bridge game going on with Zia and this handsome young guy Alan Alda, and Annie and I were kibitzers. We became friendly with Alan and in a few weeks invited him and his charming wife, Arlene, for dinner and continued to associate with them for some time.
Alan got busy, we were busy, and we did not see them for some years. He had landed a part in a television series called M*A*S*H and became one of the biggest stars in the business. Lots of stars "forget" their friends. Not Alan.
We had not seen Alan and Arlene socially for about twelve years; we all just got busy. Annie was demonstrating by marching in the street and pitching our liberal cause, probably concerning the Vietnam War (back then some of us did that kind of thing), and Alan was out protesting too. Alan, now very famous, saw Annie in the mob, ran over to her, and started reminiscing with her about old times. One nice guy.
Alan's father, Robert Alda, was an established actor in film and stage and was the star in the original production of Guys and Dolls on Broadway. Frank Loesser composed the music and wrote the lyrics of Guys and Dolls and Abe Burrows and Jo Swerling wrote the book, which was based on two Damon Runyon short stories. Since I had developed a friendship with Frank Loesser, we were invited to the opening of the play, which at this time starred in addition to Robert Alda, Vivian Blaine, Stubby Kaye, and Sam Levine.
I saw the performance in its entirety. I don't know how much of the performance Annie saw because this guy Clark Gable, the megastar of Gone With the Wind, sat down beside her. She spent much of that evening gazing at him. I don't know of a woman in the world who would blame her. Probably some men also.
Tamara Geva
Tamara Geva was a client and a friend. Yes, we met Zia through her, and indirectly Joan Bennett when Tamara's ex-husband moved in with Joan. But we were also friendly with Tamara, though we saw a lot less of her. She who was an incredibly talented, determined, strong-willed woman.
In 1936 Tamara and Ray Bolger created a Broadway sensation in the Rodgers and Hart musical On Your Toes, for which George Balanchine choreographed both the dramatic "Slaughter on Tenth Avenue" sequence and a balletic parody. Reviewing the show in the New York Times, Brooks Atkinson wrote that Miss Geva "is so magnificent as the mistress of the dance that she can burlesque it with the authority of an artist on a holiday."
In addition to dancing, she acted in many well-known films and stage productions. Tamara was so fixed in her ways and knew a great deal about theatre, which was what I helped her with the most. What was remarkable about her was the fact that, in spite of her strong feelings on every subject, she was always ready to listen to my advice about theatre producing and to actually utilize the advice that I gave her.
I was thrilled to be associated with this world of theatre, film, TV, and ballet. When our daughter, Pat, was young, she got herself into the American School of Ballet, without our help, and at the age of nine or ten was dancing as one of the fairies in A Midsummer Night's Dream at Lincoln Center. Of course we got to the theatre early and wanted to see Patty after she went on.
We got on the backstage elevator, and to my surprise there was a handsome gentleman there in a tuxedo. I said to myself, "My goodness, because it is opening night, how chic, even the elevator operator is in a tuxedo." I then asked the gentleman in the tuxedo to take us to the third floor. I was told when we got off the elevator that I had just asked George Balanchine to take us to the third floor.
Kurt and Music
It's not fair, but I have discovered that some people who have talent are talented in more ways than one. Kurt was a writer, an artist, and more than that, a musician. Most people knew that he would jam with a group that included Woody Allen at a place called Michael's Pub. Kurt, we all knew, played the clarinet. What we didn't know was that he also played a mean, wild ragtime piano. He didn't like to talk about it, but on one or two occasions he just sat down at our piano and it all spilled out, traces of that Scott Joplin stuff.
Kurt and I would speak music. I let him know that when I was growing up, after six years of classic piano training, I gave up and taught myself to play the drums and then the tympani. A Gene Krupa drum book helped. At the age of fifteen, the local tympanist left town and I was invited to play with the local symphony. They got me dispensation from the union, and I played my first concert with Jascha Heifetz. What is ironic and sad is when I tell young people now that I played with Heifetz, when I was fifteen and he was thirty-six, they often ask, "Who was Heifetz?" When I tell them that Isaac Stern said that Heifetz was the greatest violinist of all time, they usually ask, "Who is Isaac Stern?"
Kurt and Ping-Pong
Kurt really loved the game of Ping-Pong, and there was this Ping-Pong parlor run by Marty Reisman at the Riverside Table Tennis Courts at 96th Street and Broadway in the 60s that we would go to on occasion. Marty Reisman was a real hustler who competed in the game in China and was world renowned. Marty said he was a millionaire three times and an ex-millionaire three times.
When we arrived there one day with Kurt, Marty said to Kurt that he would bet one million dollars against one dollar of Kurt's that he could beat him. To make the game interesting, Marty immediately threw away the first twenty points deliberately, so the score was Vonnegut twenty and Reisman zero. One could never ever predict what would happen next, but it did in fact actually happen. On the next play, Kurt, without knowing what he was doing, hit the ball into the net and it fell onto the other side of the net, landing on Marty's side but impossible for anyone to get to the ball, let alone to return it. Kurt won the game twenty-one to nothing, with the twenty points Marty gave him and the fluke that landed on Marty's side of the net. Kurt, generously, did give up his claim to the million dollars he was owed, but not without a sound berating of Marty.
Dell Publishing
It was a comedy of errors. Only we were not making the errors. My office at the time was located on 3rd Avenue between 50th and 51st Streets. Dell Publishing Company, Kurt's publisher, had its office on 3rd Avenue at 46th Street. There was a little café, a sort of clam house, located on 3rd and 49th Street where I often had my lunch. This same café was also the local eating spot for many of the Dell employees.
It was in the early seventies that I was negotiating a bunch of agreements for Kurt. George Delacorte, who was the founder of Dell, had retired, and his secretary, a very accomplished woman, Helen Meyers, was now running the company. In the negotiations, Sam Lawrence, who was Kurt's early publisher with Dell, was in on all the negotiations. We would meet at Helen's office, and after batting around the ideas, I would end up at the little café for lunch.
I had a lot of things going for me and Kurt, namely his tremendous success with Slaughterhouse-Five and his popularity with the young readers who had found Kurt's work and had their own cult around him. Dell wanted Kurt to continue to write books for them, as he was a very valuable asset to them. I was negotiating a five-book contract that involved a good deal of money. When you are negotiating this kind of deal, there are a number of significant but important details to settle, like how the advance will be spread out, whether the books will be cross-collateralized, the amount of the advances and the royalties, etc., etc., etc.
There was always a contingent of Dell workers at the café waiting to pounce on me to hear how Kurt was winning in the negotiations. Of course, I could not in good conscience disclose what happened in Helen's office, but they were all so glad to hear someone was holding their own in negotiating with Mrs. Meyers and Sam Lawrence, and it satisfied them enough if I simply told them not to worry, that Kurt was really doing very well. And Kurt was doing very well because, as I said, this was the time that his career was hot.
Fan Mail
What made my relationship with Kurt very special was the fact that we had mutual respect for each other and total trust in the other person's honesty, loyalty, talent, and abilities. It felt awfully good when I would negotiate a big or little deal for Kurt, and after explaining it to him, he would always ask what I thought. Without hesitation or questioning, he would say, "Do it." Then I would sign everything, except autographed items, with the power of attorney, which Kurt gave me.
No matter where my office was, Kurt would walk to my office every week or ten days, sometimes twice a week. He loved to walk and it was all the same to him if the office was three blocks from his 48th Street house or twelve blocks. He came to the office to exchange stories, to go over some business, to go through the mail that I thought he should see, and to sign some autographs.
I handled as much of the routine mail as I could without involving him, and there was a lot of Kurt's mail coming to me. Which letter he responded to was a random hit-or-miss thing depending on how the letter or the picture enclosed struck him at that particular moment. If he wanted to reply to a letter, he would shove it in his pocket and take it with him. It was not predictable what he would respond to or what his response would be.
He would sign the books that arrived, sign the pictures that arrived, and even sign some silly things like shirts, ties, and panties. If it struck him as really dumb he would not sign it. He sometimes sent me copies of his replies to letters and sometimes he did not.
Every now and then I would make a deal with Easton Press to publish some leather-bound autographed copies of a book. This meant that Kurt had to sign five thousand or ten thousand blank pages to be inserted in the books. He often would sign two thousand at one sitting in my office, sometimes less than that. On occasion I would make arrangements for him to do the signing at his home, but he liked the discipline of doing it with me supervising. When he finished this chore, he would ask: "Can I go home now?" I am sure he walked home, and if it was a nice day, he might find a bench to rest on for a spell. He sure didn't stop off at a bar, as that was not his style.
Strangely enough, some of these autographed blank pages ended up with the leather-bound edition of Kurt's book Look at the Birdie, published after his death, being posthumously autographed by Kurt. Kurt did not come back to life to autograph these books published after his death, but when we discovered we had two thousand pages Kurt had signed before his death, it was a natural to use some of those autographed pages for the autographed leather-bound version. Rumor has it that they did the same thing with one of the books of Mark Twain. Now would not that be ironic, that if it did happen, it was Twain, whom Kurt admired and to whom he was often compared?
About once every four months the large amount of fan mail would contain an offer of marriage. Of course, each had a photo of a smashingly attractive, very young lady. But there was every kind of imaginable fan mail, and presents galore. Once some sheets and pillowcases arrived with a marker pen for Kurt to autograph them, and there was always a return stamped, addressed envelope.
Neither Kurt nor I were surprised by the variety of requests in the letters. There were a great number of invitations to dinner in New York where Kurt lived and even some from different parts of the country, with the offer to send him airfare. Many suggested that they would cook special meals for Kurt. He had a very loyal fan club.
On the Stage of the Library of Congress
Kurt was devastated. Standing on the stage of the Library of Congress, a few minutes into his carefully honed speech, a gruff guy stood up at the back of the room and started yelling at Kurt: "You are a disgrace! You should be a role model for young people, and instead you write this garbage, which gives them the wrong message. You should be writing to encourage the young people to do the right thing."
Kurt shrank from his six foot three inches to about five feet nine inches in front of our eyes. He was almost in tears. Unable to speak, he backed off of the stage, a beaten man.
A half hour later there were six of us sipping coffee with Kurt, and we were all upset and angry. Herman Wouk, the author of Marjorie Morningstar, The Caine Mutiny, and other great works, tried to console Kurt with "It happens to us all," relating in detail the number of intellectual beatings he had lived through. It did not help. This attack was so wrong, so evil, not in keeping with Kurt's world.
It was a number of months before Kurt got up the courage to go onstage again with his chalk and blackboard. When he did get back his courage, he made many speeches before all kinds of audiences. The agent scheduling the speeches knew that Kurt could charge more for his speaking engagements, but after some increases Kurt resisted, and though he could have been paid more, he said that it wasn't worth that much to listen to him.
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