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torture another classic. Oh, boy … who can we cornhole after we’re finished with Dickens? Or was it that “bear”thing that Mamet wrote? Was that the first picture? Oh, yeah, Alec Baldwin. I bet he’s a lot of fun. Loves producers, I hear. Hoo ha.’
    The vein on the left side of his neck was pumping. He was known in the back rooms of Hollywood as the ultimate swine and there was no stopping him now.
    â€˜And how about that seventies rock movie? What was it called?
Go Go Bliss
or something like that.’
    â€˜It was called
Sunset Strip
.’
    â€˜What the hell was that? As I recall, Fox opened it in only one theater. How about that. One theater! A baby-killing! What a massacre that must have been. Your idea, was it?’
    â€˜I’m afraid so.’
    â€˜Fuck me … and they still let you continue after that? Please, save that barbarous tale for last. What visionaries those Fox execs must have been. Real high-watt bulbs, there. You must love those guys. Oh … wait … I almost forgot …
Fight Club. Fight Club
. Woowee … Good God, man, you really like to make people feel warm and fuzzy, don’t ya?’
    He was certainly prepared. You had to give him that.
    This was going to take more than a breakfast.

TWO
Two Guys and a Bear
    â€˜Hi, this is Bill Mechanic.’ The call came directly – no secretary. He was the new film production head at Fox. Dialing the phone all by himself, I thought, was rather casual and rare. In Hollywood, when you were on my side of the mattress, a little bit of generosity went a long way, especially if you wanted to kiss on the first date.
    â€˜Hi, Bill, howsit going?’
    â€˜I’m well. Listen, I’m in Palm Springs now, but when I return, I think we should get together.’ He spoke matter-of-factly, almost as if we had met or talked before.
    The truth is we only knew each other from press releases in the trades. I knew that he just got the new big plum job at Fox, having been wooed over from Disney by Peter Chernin, and he knew that I was at the tail end of a contract at Warner Bros., where I had just put out the artistically interesting but dismally unsuccessful
This Boy’s Life
. I remember that when it was first test-screened in a Pasadena multiplex, Terry Semel, the then graceful but remote head of Warners, walked up to me at the concession stand, dressed in the newest Armani casual, looked me square in the eye, and slowly nodded.
    â€˜It’s a
good
movie and that’s
all
that’s important,’ he said in a calm and reassuring voice.
    â€˜Well, thanks so much, Terry, it is a
good
movie, isn’t it?’
    â€˜It’s hard to make a
good
movie.’
    â€˜
Very
.’
    At previews, everyone spoke euphemistically. I was fucked.
    I knew too well that at that very moment Terry’s entire distribution staff was in the back alley throwing up on their shoes. You could almost hear them through the crack in the men’s room door: ‘Oh, mother of Christ, De Niro is in this dining room kicking the living piss out of sweet little Leonardo DiCaprio … how the fuck are we going to sell this shit!’ ‘I know! How ’bout selling it as
Father Knows Best
for the criminally insane?!’ ‘Dead beavers and pedophilia, what are they gonna let those disturbed assholes do next?!!’ You get the picture.
Good
in Hollywood is a euphemism for ‘grease up, bite the belt, and try not squeal too much when this baby comes out.’ Well, I tried not to squeal, but I can’t say it bolstered my confidence any. Let’s just say the call from Mechanic came at a very good time.
    â€˜Lookin’ forward to it, Bill.’ I couldn’t have been friendlier.
    It was several weeks before I heard from Bill again, but during that time I had started to work with Michael Mann on what would eventually become
Heat
. It was the early stages. Michael was reworking a script