The phone rang and Ziggy networked awhile. Whoever it was needed advice on whether to sue a hospital, healthcare worker, insurance company or possibly the government over some incident Chet couldn’t fathom. As far as Ziggy was concerned, the details — petty, real or imagined — didn’t seem to matter. It was attitude that counted. Attitude was agitprop; attitude was sacred; attitude was all. And today, “attitude” decreed that someone needed to be sued.
“What about her son?” Chet asked when he hung up. “What about Zephyr—”
“Long gone. Underground railway. Vee haff ways. Vee haff connections.”
“But where?”
Ziggy’s jaw moved around, itching to blab. But the loquacious gadfly was mum. “Gone in sixty seconds.”
Bernie Ribkin
DAILY VARIETY
Spielberg mom in
close encounter;
two critical
REX WEINER
Leah Adler, the mother of Steven Spielberg, was uninjured in a traffic mishap outside a wing of Cedars-Sinai Hospital, ironically named after the helmer.
Two of her companions were severely injured when a car driven by Bernard S. Ribkin, 74, leaped a curb, striking startled bystanders. The injured women are Holocaust survivors who Mrs. Adler was accompanying on a tour of the facilities. She is still expected to attend tonight’s gala wrap-up for the International Artists Rights Symposium, of which her son is a benefactor.
Mr. Ribkin is the father of ICM Senior Veep Donny Ribkin.
Charges were not filed. The news that Bernie had been mugged and was desperately seeking medical attention when the accident occurred drew an outpouring of sympathy. Leah herself sent flowers and a note urging speedy recovery. “I know how terrible you must feel,” she wrote, and went on to bemoan these violent times. The story was carried by a number of papers but none connected Bernie Ribkin with the Undead series from which he made his name. In some articles, he was merely referred to as an “elderly driver.”
The battered producer suffered anxiety attacks for weeks afterward. He was worried the press might unearth skeletons, and brand him a menace. Years ago, they would say, a neighbor had been “mowed down” in a “strikingly similar incident”—that’s the way those sons of bitches liked to talk. Always the conspiracy, always the something rotten. Jay Leno might even pick it up and make him a late-night laughingstock.
Bernie had real nightmares about Clara Rubidoux, and the constant harassment didn’t help. Someone was papering his car with HOW AM I DRIVING? bumper stickers — it played hell with the paint — and he knew the phone calls were from her meshugga Showtime son. They were scary. There was more than one voice, doped up and guttural; maybe the whacked-out friends Bernie met that day in Malibu. The question was always the same, whispered at first, then distorted by reverb and repetition: “Mom too middle-of-the-road?” When the old man thought he recognized his own son’s voice, he called ICM. Sure enough, the Senior Veepee was back in his office. Bernie was afraid to talk, convinced Donny was going to kill him.
The doctor prescribed more Halcion, but still he couldn’t sleep. He took long walks at night to the Spielberg mother/son eateries — the touristy Dive! and Pico Boulevard’s kosher Milky Way — but never went in. He wondered if Leah had a boyfriend. Her husband (Steven’s stepdad) had passed on a short while back. His name was Bernie, too, and maybe that was an omen. The old man started getting ideas. He’d lose some weight, get in shape. What might it take to woo a woman like that? Leah Adler seemed feisty and sexual, a gemutlich powerhouse — a pint-size version of Edie, without the torn synapses. Once, he even “bumped into” her outside the restaurant. When he said how much the flowers had meant, she looked at him quizzically. The old man had to remind Spielberg mère who he was.
But who was she? And where would he begin? This was no lonely schizophrenic who happened to live a few flights up — this was the gaudy, tough-minded mother of a billionaire, arguably the most powerful man in the history of the Business. She was probably a snob, with every reason to be. Let’s say, Bernie thought, by some miracle he managed to get a foot in the door. What about his provenance of schlock? How could she even introduce him to her son? But maybe it wasn’t so bad, maybe Steven never approved any of them and Leah kept her admirers hidden; or maybe the director just didn’t care, long as Mom was happy. Could be all the boyfriends were geriatric schlocks, silver-maned fuck-ups and that was just her tacky friggin taste in men — with friends thinking it endearing and hilarious and loving her even more. Scramblin and Scream Works would get her laughing, and that was three-quarters of the battle. Once they were laughing, you were home to bed. Jesus H, maybe Spielberg was an Undead fan himself, the way Tim Burton was a freak for Ed Wood. Who knew?
Four in the morning. Bernie sat in the chair watching Creepshow on the cable. Leslie Nielsen was burying his wife and her lover alive in the sand of a private beach. Sets up monitors so the two can watch each other drown. Then Nielsen goes back to the house and settles in front of the TV with a drink to watch. Stephen King sure has a mind. Days later, the moldy couple has their revenge: swaddled in seaweed and very undead, they snatch him from bed and haul him to a watery grave. Jesus H, Nielsen was funny. The old man could split a gut just looking at him.
He tossed and turned for an hour, then got up and dressed. He figured he could make the Colony in half a day, by foot. What was the rush? The sun was just coming up.
As he passed the Beverly Hilton and ascended the luxurious ramp of Wilshire that divided the country club, the producer felt a surge of youth. His gait was steady and sure — the Bernard S. Ribkin Walk-a-thon was in full swing. He could go on forever. Like Creep-show’s Ted Danson, he saw his body buried in the sand outside Edie’s house and laughed aloud. She’d laugh too, she’d have to — and forgive. Laughter was three-quarters of the way. That’s what he would do then: outrageous showmanship would save the day. He’d have to dig after dark, so as not to be discovered…chortling again at the image of those algae-blistered, stringy-haired zombies, an homage to his Undead if ever there was one. He’d send King a fan letter, thanking him for the tip of the hat.
At Beverly Glen, he was barely winded. Bernie thought about stopping in the Village for a cappuccino. No — he’d keep going until he reached the terrace of greensward that overhung Pacific Coast Highway. Watch the tourists before setting out to the Colony. There was a camera obscura over by the pier. Maybe he’d have a look.