LOCATION LOCATION by Kit Sloane
—George Abbott & Frank Loesser (From their 1952 musical comedy, Where’s
Charley?)
Chapter I
“The sharks are circling, Margot.”
Margot O’Banion touched Max’s hand. “It’ll be all right,” she said. “We knew going independent wouldn’t be easy.”
Max Skull shifted in the plane’s first-class seat. “Yeah, yeah, sure. We always know things so long as they aren’t happening to us. It’s when they’re happening to us that reality moves in.” He stretched his long legs out, slumping under the confines of the seatbelt. “I just wish we weren’t being bankrolled with Colin’s money.”
“Only half the money. Other people are involved, Max. They believe in you.”
He scowled. “Why did Colin have to leave his damned fortune to us?”
Margot sighed. This was one of Max’s recent, persistent mantras. “Colin didn’t know he was going to die, did he? Anyway, if he’d been around us more, he’d probably have rewritten his will. We weren’t terribly nice to him. But he wasn’t around and he didn’t write us out. We’re his beneficiaries. We’ll do the best we can with the money. Don’t worry about it.”
“Yeah, but those sharks. They’re circling like wagons around this gigantic bonfire. You know, trying to keep from freezing out there in the snow. I’m the fire. They’re after my hide.”
Margot O’Banion listened with half an ear to the flurry of anxious mixed metaphors, her gaze focused on the water 35,000 feet below them. As the sun set, the ocean was turning improbably turquoise hues, deepening to a velvety blue-black where the floor fell to depths she didn’t want to think about.
“Pioneers circled their wagons to share the fire and keep warm and cook,” Margot said. “It gave them security to be together. The fire was a good thing.”
“Okay, I said it wrong then.” Max turned. “See, I’m this big, prime piece of tuna dropped into that ocean you’re staring at. Starving sharks are circling me, fighting to see who gets to me first, battling to see who gets the biggest bite.”
“Surely you’re not comparing yourself to Hemingway and his Old Man and the Sea? Oh, Max, stop being so melodramatic. We knew a lot of people would want to invest in a Max Skull film. And we knew a lot of them wouldn’t be the kind of people we wanted to associate with. Most of them would just want to invest and take the money and run. The movie business attracts people like that.”
“Well, I don’t mind the real greed-mongers. At least they’re honest about their motives. But I still hate being a shark pit for every ambitious jerk wanting to get his foot into the movie business.”
Margot nodded, wondering where he’d found the term “shark pit,” and then pointed out the window. “Look at that!” she said.
Max leaned forward as far as his seatbelt would allow and nodded. “Wow,” he said. “There must be a hundred down there. God, I’ve gotta get that on film.”
Ships, looking like bathtub toys, formed a half circle on the ocean below. They were in single file as though on parade, waiting in line for entrance to the Panama Canal. The ship lights were just beginning to come on, vessel by vessel, glittering like Christmas ornaments, as the sun set beyond the western sea.
“Are there sharks off Panama?” he asked.
“You said there are, Max.”
“No, I mean real sharks.”
“Probably,” she said. “Sharks are everywhere, aren’t they? They’re the survivors of the wild. Well, I think they are. Something has to be.”
The plane began a gradual descent, circling closer over the stilled ships. It turned, banking back over the green of the land, the downtown high-rises, sparkling white in the last rays of the sun.
Max buried his head in his notebook. “M2 Productions” was emblazoned on the vinyl cover. They had their own company at last, and, as Max liked to lament, it was thanks to the problematic generosity of old Colin Peabody, Max’s former producer at Arcturus studio. Now they were on their own, in more ways than one. Colin was dead. Max had left the studio. M2 Productions belonged to them. It was their baby, as Max called the company.
The plane banked again and they were close to landing in Panama City. Margot felt a frisson of excitement. Max had selected Panama for his first independent film, a neo-noir thriller he’d titled The Big Ditch. That’s the nickname people use for the canal, he’d told her. He’d selected Panama because there was a new government recently elected, one that was supposedly hungry to branch out and embrace the arts, including foreign film companies and their lucrative location budgets. Plus there was the undeniable fact that the whole country was picture-perfect with a cosmopolitan capital, mountains, two oceans and jungles, real jungles. Max loved jungles.
Much of the film would be done on location, unless circumstances forced them to change that, of course. Margot knew that nothing was ever in concrete in film production. Here in Panama City they would utilize sites that Max and his production designer had agreed on. This weekend the talent would fly in and production would start on Monday, just six days away. Margot felt a knot in her stomach.
Well, production would start if their line producer was correct and all the funding was actually in place and in a local bank, ready to dispense to the long list of creditors they’d chalked up so far. The stars had consented to do the film for scale. They were the least of the financial worries. Of course, no one else on the 200-plus crew was taking a pay cut. She and Max, with their lawyer’s advice, were using half their inheritance for this first project. But that was it for them, Max had cautioned. Only a fool bankrolls his own film.
Well, she thought, fighting the anxiety that thinking about this economic roller coaster created, that was all fine, except what if the money hadn’t arrived? As Max liked to grumble about, there had been plenty of people willing to invest in this first independent venture. But one by one he’d rejected them. The reasons seemed legitimate to Margot. This person was a crook. That person, hell, look what he did to the last film he’d underwritten. This next person…his reputation was so bad Max couldn’t believe he’d had the moxie to even approach him.
Then there were the wannabes. These were the would-be investors with agendas that reached beyond just wanting to make money. They had caveats, like wanting artistic control, or wanting to bring in a would-be actor from their family circle, or worse, beyond the family circle.
But, so far, M2 Productions was skating along pretty nicely in this first venture, she admitted. There was Max’s formidable reputation, for one thing, and everyone in the business knew about their inheritance. “The Peabody legacy,” as Max had dubbed it. For while Colin Peabody had been a most paradoxical person, he’d also enjoyed a rarefied reputation as the superb producer behind Max’s best films. And, yes, the investors had flocked to Max’s office—his “sharks,” in three-piece suits, carrying designer briefcases.
“But this ain’t gonna be like The Producers,” he’d said to Margot. “I can’t have six dozen people—and I don’t care how sterling their reps are—all backing this picture. You know the ‘Now you own 150 percent of The Big Ditch,’ schtick. I’ll have legit investors and I just need one person, besides us, of course, that I can trust to be line producer, the bottom line producer. Someone who’ll handle the monies and make sure we don’t overspend and go broke. That’s how things get done.”
The knot tightened in Margot’s stomach. The problem was that the sterling character Max had finally accepted as his line producer was lagging behind in actually getting the money to the bank.
“It’ll be okay,” he told her. “Charley Grenfield has a great reputation. Look how he handled Zen’s Way. They had money left over! He’s a Brit, remember, so he doesn’t have our Yankee impatience driving him to do things exactly on time. He’ll come through for us, though. You wait and see.”
Margot sighed. Well, good old Charley had till this Friday to come through or they would really be, as Max liked saying, shark bait. Now the flight attendants were going along the plane’s aisle, gesturing to pull seatbelts tight and bring seat backs upright as the plane began a steeper descent toward what Margot prayed was the asphalt of the airport runway.
Ten minutes later, they wended their way though the bright, air-conditioned, modern airport toward customs, passports in hand, when the lanky, dapper figure of Charles Grenfield materialized in front of them.
Behind a barrier, Charley waved at them, dodging this way and that amongst the crowd, juggling his laptop computer under his other arm. Not the stereotypical reserved Englishman, Charles Grenfield was always such an energetic physical presence that Margot wondered if he was on something. Max said absolutely no, but the man’s vivacity amazed her. How could Charley ever manage to sit through a meeting?
Still, his was a winning personality and she couldn’t help but smile as Charley danced up to them, thrusting a slightly wilted bunch of red roses at her, giving her cheek the obligatory air kiss, and shaking Max’s hand with great enthusiasm, all at the same time.
“Max!” Charley said. “I have exciting news!”
Max put down his carry-on. “Tell us, Charley. Tell us what’s happened. How’s the money flow coming?”
“Oh, Max, the money is all here. I’ve got it in safekeeping. Trust me.” He patted his computer. “I’ve got half of it banked, your half, and all in code, for security reasons.”
“Well, gimme the codes, Charley. I’d like to be able to put my hands on our share.”
“Don’t worry, Max. No one can break a Charley Grenfield code. We’ll go over all the financial paperwork tomorrow. I don’t want you to fret, but there’s been a little problem with the crew cashing their paychecks, so I’ve got the other half in cash.”
“Cash?” Max said and abruptly lowered his voice. “Jesus, Charley. How much in cash?”
“It’s only two million, Maxie. Just half the stash. I’ve got it safe. I’ll deposit it first thing tomorrow. I’ve found a much more cordial bank. They won’t sit on our checks the way the other idiot bankers did. We’ve got to keep the crew happy, don’t forget. Not that I blame the lads for being upset, but they were on the edge of a bloody mutiny when the bank wouldn’t cash anything for them. But don’t worry about any of that now. The thing is, the truly thrilling thing is…”
Charley paused, smiling. “I’ve found us a screen angel—just for backup, just in case.”
A screen angel. Margot’s ears perked up. What luck if he’d found one of those rare individuals who invested their money in films simply because they loved movies. An actual patron of the arts. Someone without a problematic agenda attached to their billfold.
“This guy’s crazy about your stuff, Max,” Charley said. “He’s a banker in the good old U.K. Now I’ve know Sheridan for a thousand years. Well, maybe not a thousand, but a couple. He’s a really decent fellow and honest, too, a real film buff. And he’s followed your career since you started with those documentaries. He just wants to be a part of The Big Ditch. He’ll pitch in anytime we need his resources.”
“How much has he got?”
“He’s good for two million. If we need it. Not that we will. How’s that sound?”
Margot
blinked. A backup. Maybe Max could expand production. She felt a flood
of relief. If true, this could be just exactly what they needed and wanted.
Perhaps their first foray into the independent film jungle wouldn’t be
a fatal one.