The Slipper (20 page)

All that changed abruptly when, finally, they flew to France and the filming actually began. Eric was very unhappy with the revised script. He was unhappy with the sets, the costumes, the casting. He had wanted Olivier for Marat, got Sir Robert instead. He spoke very little French but, because of regulations, half the work crew and technicians had to be French, and he was constantly having to deal with French government officials in order to get permission to use actual historical sites for exterior scenes. Nothing satisfied him, and he secretly feared his
Gone With the Wind
was going to be the disaster his enemies predicted it would be. He was in a foul mood from day one and, fearing failure as he did, badly needed a scapegoat. He found one in the raw and inexperienced young actress who had never been in front of a camera before and didn't know the first thing about film acting.

He turned on her. Viciously. Carol was confused. She was bewildered and hurt and completely at a loss, unable to understand his radical change in attitude. The man who represented security, the man who had guided her and protected her and treated her like a daughter now shouted at her, raged at her, mocked her. He took a perverse delight in humiliating her in front of cast and crew, gloating when her nerves snapped, when she burst into tears. Carol tried. She tried valiantly. She wanted to learn. She wanted to do a good job. She wanted to make him proud of her. She wanted direction, but Eric didn't direct her. He shouted. He bullied. He demeaned her and called her a stupid bitch. Carol felt as though the floor had dropped from beneath her and was well on the way to a complete nervous collapse. After four weeks, after a particularly humiliating episode, she fled the set in tears and knew it was over, knew she couldn't go on any longer. It was then that Sir Robert came to her trailer.

The renowned English actor had just recently arrived in Paris, and they had yet to film any of his scenes. He had been visiting the set that day, watching the proceedings with a jaundiced eye. Fifty-six years old, a professional actor since the age of seventeen, Sir Robert saw immediately what was going on and knew the reasons why. He had a strong sense of justice and it went against the grain to see Berne abusing this child and setting her up to take the blame for what was clearly an ill-fated project. Larry had turned the film down, wisely, of course, but Sir Robert had very little strength of character when it came to money, and the salary he was being paid would enable him to make the much-needed repairs on his estate in Kent.
Daughter of France
wouldn't hurt his career, wouldn't matter one way or the other, but it could easily destroy this charming girl who so clearly wanted to do a good job. He knocked lightly on the trailer door and, receiving no answer, stepped inside. Carol was sobbing, her eyes wet with tears, a wad of Kleenex in her hand.

“Tough, luv, isn't it?” he said.

Carol looked up in anguish, and she was startled to see Sir Robert standing there before her. She had been introduced to him only that morning, and she had been very much in awe. He was one of the greats, his
Lear
a legend, and a flood of embarrassment swept over her as she realized he had witnessed her humiliation on the set. She wiped her eyes and sat up, and Sir Robert grinned that engaging grin that had helped make him a matinee idol during the late 1920s and throughout the '30s. Suave, distinguished, dapper in his trim Savile Row suit and a pale blue ascot, he took out an exquisite platinum case and offered her a cigarette. Carol shook her head, and Sir Robert lighted one for himself with a matching platinum lighter.

“I—I'm sorry,” she said miserably.

“Oh, no, luv, you mustn't apologize. You were perfectly right to leave the set like that. I would have too, I fear, at your age. I hadn't much confidence back then. I didn't have the sense to stand and fight. I let everyone walk all over me.”

“He—I don't understand why he—”

“It's plain to see, luv. He's got a bomb on his hands, and he has to cover his tracks. You've been elected to take the blame for what will almost certainly be—uh—something less than a triumph for Eric Berne.”

Carol was still shaken, still embarrassed, and at first she didn't comprehend what he was saying. Sir Robert perched elegantly on the arm of a chair and exhaled a plume of smoke.

“He's out to ruin you, you know. He can't
fire
you, not after all that publicity about the search and his marvelous ‘discovery'—the public would turn on him. If you walk out, he's guilt-free in the eyes of the public, and
you're
the quitter, the girl who couldn't make it.”

“My God, I can't believe he—”

“Oh, it's a diabolical little scheme, and apparently it's working just as he planned. You're ready to give in, give up, and Eric Berne has his scapegoat. Pity.”

“That son of a bitch.”

“An opinion shared by everyone who's ever worked with Berne, I understand. I suppose you'll go back to Kansas and marry the boy next door. This is a tough business, luv, and only the tough survive. There's no room for whiners, no room for quitters. You have to fight.”

“That rotten son of a bitch!”

“You're a very sweet girl. It's probably just as well you leave this business.”

“I'm not
go
ing to leave!”

“No?”

“He—I can't believe he—I—I'm not going to let him get away with it! I know I'm not—not very good, but I
can
be. I know I can be, if only I have the chance to learn—to grow.”

“That's the spirit, luv. You photograph divinely—the cameraman told me you have a luminous quality the camera loves—and with a little help you could give a very creditable performance.”

“That's the problem. He won't
give
me any help.”

“It's not in his best interest. I'd be delighted to work with you, Carol. I've done a little directing in the past, and I have a vested interest in this epic. It's going to receive no plaudits, but
I
intend to be brilliant, as usual. If you don't look good, I don't look good.”

Carol was stunned. She stood up and paced back and forth, fuming, unable to believe anyone could be as … as Machiavellian as Eric Beme. He was deliberately sabotaging her career, hurling her to the wolves so that he wouldn't be blamed for a film clearly doomed from the beginning. Well, it wasn't going to work. He wasn't going to drive her away. Carol felt something harden within her, a tight core of strength she didn't know she had, and a steely determination filled her. She intended to stand up to the son of a bitch. She intended to fight back. It wouldn't be easy and it wouldn't be pleasant—she wasn't a fighter by nature—but, by God, she'd show the bastard what she was made of, and it wasn't sugar and spice and everything nice. She paused in her pacing to take one of her cigarettes and light it. She smoked furiously, momentarily forgetting the presence of Sir Robert Reynolds.

He coughed discreetly. She turned to him, and he saw the determination in those lovely blue eyes. The little girl from Kansas had spunk after all. From the looks of her, she had a formidable amount of spunk.

“You—you'd actually work with me?” she asked.

“On the side. In private. I'd dearly love to see the mighty Berne foiled in his nefarious plans. Alas, I can't stand injustice, and what he's trying to do is dastardly indeed.”

Carol looked at the still-handsome, world-famous actor who was so willing to come to her rescue. Why? After all she had been through, all she had seen, she couldn't help but be a bit suspicious of his motives. Sir Robert seemed to read her mind, and again he grinned.

“You're learning, luv. Never take anyone at face value, not in this business. I assure you my intentions are quite honorable. I hope to keep my youth, and I fear he'd desert me in no time flat if I started seducing attractive young costars.”

“I—” Her cheeks flushed a delicate pink.

“Are you game, luv? Shall we put one over on Berne?”

Carol hesitated a moment, and then she nodded decisively. “Let's,” she replied.

“Sure you've got the stamina?”

“If—if I have to be a bitch, I'll
be
a bitch.”

“Bully for you, luv.”

“You—Sir Robert, I—I can't tell you how much—what it means to me for an actor like—of your stature to—oh, shit, I'm going to start crying again, I can feel it.”

“I reread the script last night. I may cry myself.”

Sir Robert put out his cigarette and stood up, taking Carol's hand and giving it a reassuring squeeze. “Come on, luv. We'll get some lunch and plan our strategy. Eric Berne just may have met his match.”

Carol reported to work the next day with grim determination, and when Berne began his shouting, his bullying, she stood her ground firmly and refused to let him shake her. She read her lines as Sir Robert had instructed her to read them and refused to waver. Berne was livid, but he was unable to break her down, and a battle royal began that caused everyone involved with the movie to take sides. The studio people, the money people, naturally took Eric's side and commiserated with him for having to work with such a highly strung, untrained and temperamental young actress. Almost everyone else—the technicians, the grips, the cameraman, all her fellow actors—took Carol's side and spread horrifying tales of Berne's shouting, his maniacal tantrums, his sadistic bullying of the sweet, unspoiled girl who couldn't satisfy him no matter how she tried. Explosions on the set made news on two continents, and there were those who wagered the film would never be finished. Others, more cynical, claimed it was all publicity carefully generated to keep
Daughter of France
in the public eye.

Two months ago, the “near mishap” on the set had made blazing headlines all over the world, and there were photographs of the gigantic guillotine and a shaken young star having hysterics in the arms of the wardrobe woman. A full-scale replica of the original guillotine had been built at enormous expense and set up on the original site. Hundreds of extras were hired and put into period costume and the execution of Charlotte Corday had been filmed at a cost only a few thousand higher than the cost of a relatively modest feature film. There had been a number of problems with the weather, problems with the lights, problems with the leading lady. She kept blowing her lines and couldn't do anything to please her volatile director. Corday's lengthy final speech finally filmed, she was led up the steps of the scaffold, forced to her knees, her head fastened into the wooden stocks beneath the blade.

There was a delay while lights were rearranged. They were to shoot several close-ups before a dummy was substituted for the actress and the blade descended to sever an amazingly lifelike replica of her head that had been planted with a plastic pouch that would burst on contact and spew blood in all directions. The stocks were very uncomfortable and Carol's knees were beginning to cramp and she insisted she be set free until the lights were ready. Berne told her to shut up and be professional. Fifteen more minutes passed. She was in agony and pleaded with him. Berne ignored her. A crew member finally took it upon himself to defy the monster. He leaped up onto the scaffold and loosened the wooden stocks and helped Carol to her feet only seconds before a rope broke and the blade came crashing down. The actress had hysterics. The director turned gray. The crowd roared. Photographers scrambled to capture it all for posterity.

BERNE ALMOST BEHEADS STAR,
Variety
announced in letters four inches high, a statement that surprised few who had worked with Berne before. Carol was sedated and briefly hospitalized and was so shaken she had to recoup for four days at the St. Tropez home of her friend Gaby Bernais. The mishap cost them two more days—all those hundreds of extras earning full pay—and Carol's stand-in was used for the remaining shots. If it was a hoax, as many believed it was, it was certainly the most spectacular hoax in recent memory and garnered a gigantic amount of publicity for the film. Berne welcomed his star back from St. Tropez with huge bouquets of pink roses and a large pear-shaped star sapphire suspended on a chain of fine platinum, a jewel so expensive Elizabeth Taylor had passed on it when it was shown to her at the exclusive shop on the Champs Elysées. The photographers were on hand for the return, too, and in their PEOPLE column
Time
ran a picture of the thin, pale-looking actress with cropped hair holding up the gem and smiling tearfully at the bulky director.

“You're not getting it back, you bastard,” Carol informed him.

“But, Carol, my precious, it is the gift. It is my apology.”

“You're not deducting it from my salary, either.”

“But of course not. The studio pays for it.”

“I didn't think the money came out of your pocket, you miserly son of a bitch.”

“This is not nice, talking to your Eric this way. I am very concerned over this accident. I feel very bad about it, am horrified it happens. Come now and give us a hug. The photographers are waiting.”

“Go fuck yourself,” she said succinctly.

Remembering the incident now in her dressing trailer, Carol shuddered anew. She wouldn't put it past the son of a bitch to have arranged the whole thing himself, as a lot of people believed he had. It was certainly his style. The fact remained that if Jean-Claude hadn't released her when he did, she would literally have shared the fate of Charlotte Corday. Carol was prepared to give her all for this movie, but there were limits. The studio couldn't have bought the publicity for a million bucks. They could bloody well pay for the sapphire. Carol had placed it in a safe deposit box for possible future resale. At five hundred dollars a week, plus expenses, she was hardly making a fortune. Prior to coming to France, her weekly salary had been half that amount. Wisely, she was putting most of it in the bank.