Brando thought a moment, then said, “You think that’s something Sorkin would want to write?”
“Uhm, maybe.” Even though it seemed obvious to Bud that he was pitching himself to script it, he thought he should have been clearer. “This whole area’s actually totally in my wheelhouse. [A word the agents used 30 years ago, though Bud wasn’t sure if it was still en vogue] “I really think I could ace this. And I’ve got a great title: Hotmail. I don’t think we’d even need to get permission from Microsoft, because it’s ‘fair use.’ Isn’t that a cool title? Hotmail?”
. .
Telma finally finds Michael and Catherine.
Big hugs.
Michael turns to Rita Wilson and says: “That’s my tea partner. My tea partner in crime.”
He formally introduced Telma to Tom and Rita. “Aha!” said Tom, waving the program. “So you’re the one who’s closing the show! I gotta warn you, though, Telma, Beyoncé can be a tough act to follow.”
“Talk to Beyoncé, Tom,” said Michael. “Have a few words.”
“I’ll tell her to bring it down a few notches,” said Tom. “I’ll tell her to sit on it.”
“I’ll bet you will,” said Michael. Catherine instantly swatted him.
“I’m sorry, Cat,” said Tom re Michael’s penchant for double entendre. “Apparently, it doesn’t take much to get this guy started.”
“Don’t listen to these two clowns,” said Catherine to Telma. “You’re going to blow Beyoncé out of the water.”
“Of course she is,” said Rita.
“Don’t you worry about Telma,” said Michael. “She can hold her own. She’s a showstopper, this one. Aren’t you.”
. .
Suzanne Somers storms over to Gwen — a woman on a mission. They’ve known each other for years but never really outside of the benefit machine. Tho watching Suzanne playfully grab hold of Gwen’s arm for all to see, you’d think they were sisters.
“Come with me NOW.”
Suzanne’s putting on a little show, the way celebrities do, holding Gwen’s hand as she weaves them through tables with an oomfy stride, everything sped up, just a smidgen larger than life, acceptable theater, low-watt, kicky spectacle. Gwen feels the eyes of the diners on them and it feels good; like having a small serving of how celebs must feel most of the time. In this case, everyone knows Suzanne, of course, but no one knows Gwen… she must be somebody, but who? Gwen loves the ambiguity.
As they head for god knows which table, Suzanne says, “He’s amazing.”
“Who?” says Gwen, a bit breathless, pleasantly distracted by each fresh set of spectator eyes.
“He worked with Tina on her chanting album.”
“Tina?”
“Turner. It’s called Beyond. Tina’s a Buddhist, no one really knows that, she doesn’t talk about it. She made a CD of her own personal chants, it is so beautiful. Barry almost produced it.” (Gwen knew she was close to Barry Manilow.) “Will you promise me you’ll download it?”
“I will.”
“He’s also an incredible jewelry designer. He’s basically become Donna Karan’s jeweler and spiritual advisor!”
They reached a table that was empty except for one man. (The show was about to begin and the bathrooms were being used en masse.)
“This,” says Suzanne, “is Montenegro. Montenegro? Meet Gwen.”
Then she leaves.
He’s sixtysomething, ruddy and sweetsmelling, impeccably turned out. He too is larger than life: big white wolf teeth, big wide beard, big wide spicy eyes. One dangly gold earring.
“Please! Sit.”
She does. And right away he takes her hand.
“You’re suffering. Because you want to—need to — tell someone you love more than life a painful truth. And he — she? — she has already suffered so much. Too much! And for what? But there is no choice, you cannot live in lies, you can only live in truth. You need to live in truth or you’ll cause more damage, more harm. Not just to the one you love, but to you. The truth will be the gift you can give her. Do you understand?”
. .
How, how did he know those things?
And why did Suzanne Somers lead her to him?
She felt like a ruin, dizzy, all clogged up.
She’s had enough of herself, she’s just had — enough.
There goes Steve Martin to the stage, there goes laughter and applause, there go the doctors, doctors and more doctors, there go the tributes to the doctors, and now there goes a short film projected on the giant wall panels featuring herds of bald children w/eyes big as Montenegro’s. There goes Young Hollywood—& more awards… she tells Phoebe she can’t take much more. But she does not tell her she wants to die.
She’s been thinking about dying, about dying and taking Telma with her.
Suddenly Catherine Zeta-Jones is onstage in top hat and tails, singing at Michael.
“ONE singular sensation, at the bot-tom of the tongue—”
Gwen tuned in long enough to recall reading something about how furious Catherine was at all the American doctors for missing it, how close their bumbling bullshit came to killing him, triggering another internal jag (one more in a series) of Gwen’s… motherfuck American doctors, boy o boy could she relate, a person had a better chance of surviving heart surgery in the fucking Sudan, she was determined one day to bond with Catherine over mutual nightmares. But at least theirs had a happy ending. . . ….
Gwen looked up at the monitors. The camera was on Michael watching Catherine from his table, eating it up. He loved his wife’s passion and mischiefmaking.
“—THREE wrongful di-ag-NO-ses, every test that he takes!”
Lots of laughter, a bit awkward in that doctors never quite warm to indictments of their own… so many things could happen… those tumors were so hard to——Gwen reverting, retreating into her fog, Michael accepting his award, Michael with tears in his eyes, Michael stressing the importance of head&neck checkups… so so foggy. She looks around — Aleisha and Telma already gone, and Phoebe too. Phoebe probably saw the condition she was in & made an executive decision to be one of the adults accompanying the kids to the green room backstage where they would be wired for sound and generally prepped for their tearjerky rockstar finale. Gwen wants to be with them backstage, waiting in the wings for their cue, wants to be with Aleisha&Melanie, wants to be supportive, propping up her own sweet tragic maimed and mutilated daughter but doesn’t for the moment have the strength to move from her chair.