WAR COMES TO HOLLYWOOD

 

The glitz and glamour of Romanoff’s, the place to see and be seen in the golden days of Hollywood, was not bulletproof during World War II. My muse transmits to my blog from the ethers an imaginary tale reminiscent of Los Angeles’ vulnerability during the war. It happened on February 25, 1942 -Linda Lee Greene Author/Artist

 WAR COMES TO HOLLYWOOD

 “For several weeks, I had been hard at work on a film in Hollywood for MGM in which I played a battered secret agent in a World War II spy film. I came to Hollywood from cattle country originally. I was a bona-fide cowboy in those days—horse, ten-gallon hat, spurs, and sidearms—the whole rig. I got it in my head that I could rake in some real dough as a stunt man in Hollywood, so I packed my meager belongings and headed farther west. Things went well for me in Tinsel Town as a stunt man, and before long, I got actual parts in movies, speaking a few lines and sometimes kissing a girl. I was tall and blond and smooth-faced, and the studio heads took notice when fan-mail started showing up for me. It was a natural transition for me from bit player to Matinee Idol. I capitalize the term because Matinee Idol meant money, big money, and sprawling houses and pricey cars and expensive dames—lots and lots of expensive dames.

            “There were marriages in between—marriages to two of those high-priced dames—boring, soul-robbing marriages. Not only did they empty out my bank accounts, but they sucked me dry in just about every other way you can imagine, and it showed—on my face, which is the curse of any Hollywood player. My boudoir-days were over, at least on the silver screen. I was lucky to evolve from Matinee Idol to character actor, but still getting top billing and good money, most of the time. My older, craggy face fit in just fine as a saddle-worn but quick-draw sheriff in Westerns, the big, tough guy charged with saving the town and the girl from the bad guys. And then the war created a whole new genre of films in which ‘aging actors’ like me could go on working, hopefully all the way to retirement.

                                                                              

“I was at Romanoff’s that Wednesday night of February 25, 1942, slugging back scotch and avoiding chit-chat with my famous peers. Barbara Stanwyck and Robert Taylor slipped by. I raised my glass in a curt hello and then turned back to my serious drinking. I didn’t like Romanoff’s much. There was a phony and irritatingly glitzy air to it, phony and glitzy like its owner and founder, one Prince Michael Dimitri Alexandrovich Obelensky-Romanoff, nephew of the tragic and safely dead Tsar Nicholas II of Russia. The real deal was that the prince was one Hershel Geguzin, native son of Lithuania and not a royal bone in his body, who landed by boat as a child in Brooklyn, and then to Cincinnati as a fully-grown pants presser named, Harry Gerguson. His arrival in Hollywood as the Russian Prince Romanoff was a story of make-believe to rival anything immortalized on film by Louis B. Mayer. Anyway, I was at Romanoff’s to meet a girl, or at least, I hoped to meet a girl—the girl—I was damn well convinced of it. Trouble was, she wasn’t convinced of it at all.

“I had met the sweet young thing, Adele was her name, a few months back at Perino’s. She was a model—tall and slender and well-formed in all the right places. On a regular basis, Alexander Perino, an Italian immigrant rumored to have Mafia ties, pushed back the tables of his fine-dining, Hollywood restaurant and featured fashion shows. The sweet young thing slithered out in a silky floor-length getup one evening, and slipped straight into my heart. I corralled her to my table and spent the rest of the night fighting off every other guy in the place. I did learn that like most beautiful females in La La Land, she lived for the day she could leave the runway behind and mount the film set. She was from a small town in Ohio—had made it to first runner-up in the Miss Ohio Beauty Pageant a couple of years before. I pointed out to her that Hollywood was overrun with former beauty queens aching with the same dream, girls busting tables, ushering at theaters, and changing dirty diapers on rich people’s kids. A few months down the road, I asked her to marry me. She looked me straight in the eye and replied, ‘No way!’ But I wouldn’t give up. I couldn’t give up!

“For those of you who think that nothing happens in Los Angeles but sick Hollywood marriages, divorces, trysts on casting director’s couches, and wild-fires, let me take you back to the clear moonlit night of Wednesday, February 25, 1942, the place I began this story. In case you haven’t put it together in your mind, while all the hanky-panky was going on at Romanoff’s and Perino’s, and other Hollywood hotspots, the United States was into World War II for nigh on to three months following Japan’s bombing of America’s Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Nipping at the heels of Japan’s warmongering, Germany and Italy got in on the act and declared war on the United States, too.

“In fear of an attack on mainland United States by Japan, the early months of 1942 found the nerves of the populace of west-coast America as tight as a bow string. People were on their last nerve when on Monday, February 23^rd of 1942, a Japanese submarine surfaced and shelled oil installations at Ellwood, California, located about 2 ½ hours north of Los Angeles—plainly, the worst fears had come true: Japan had brought the war to California. But the war was the last thing on my mind. I was going to bed this gorgeous female and make her mine.

“She finally showed up that night—very late and very standoffish in a whole new way. By that time, I had sobered up and wanted nothing more than a pillow under my head. We did have a drink, though, and then left the restaurant together. As soon as we stepped out into the moonlit night, I looked at my watch. It was precisely 2:17 AM. I’m going to look like roadkill tomorrow, I said in my mind. I had a 6:00 AM makeup call and it wasn’t a foregone conclusion that I would be in any shape to show up for it. I walked her to her car and she leaned back against the driver’s side door. ‘We need to talk,’ she said to me. She reached into her little purse, extracted her silver cigarette case, flipped it open, and pulled out a cigarette. ‘You?’ she asked, offering me a smoke.

“I shook my head and said, ‘What’s on your mind, my lovely?’ She placed the cigarette between her lips. ‘The blackout,’ I reminded her.

“She cupped her free hand over the end of the cigarette to deaden its light and then lit it with her silver lighter. Squinting her left eye against the fumes, she drew on the cigarette deeply. A gentle breeze caught her exhaled smoke and carried it away. Her face in the moonlight was the Madonna’s. My heart leaped with love for her. ‘I’m going away,’ she told me.

“‘What?! Going away?! Where?!’

“‘I’m going home. I need to spend some time with my family to get them used to the idea that I’ll leave again when Congress passes the bill that will allow women to join the military. And as soon as it’s passed, I’ll join up. I’m leaving for Ohio the day after tomorrow.’

“‘But, wait! You can’t…’ My words were ripped from my mouth by the earsplitting wail of a siren—one siren, and then two sirens, and then a shrill chorus of screaming sirens from every direction. A group of people ran out of the restaurant, their legs pumping like mad to their vehicles. One of the guys stopped for a second and yelled, ‘We’ve been hit! The goddamn Japs hit us!’

“I looked up, and there it was—an aircraft of some kind hovering menacingly above the city. Searchlights lit it up like a second moon in the sky. ‘Jesus!’ I yelled. I grabbed Adele by the arm and hustled her to my car. The ‘ack ack’ of the city’s defense guns split the night as I steered my car through the dark streets. It was like crazy dodge cars out there. Cars were crashing into other cars, and who knows what else? We made it back to my house in one piece. The conflagration outside the walls calmed down after a while, but we were too keyed-up to relax. I looked for a chink in Adele’s attitude—some glimmer of affection for me—something I could hold on to. But she was as stiff as a statue.

“There was no sleep that night for Angeleños. The morning news was full of updates. Although no bombs were dropped, the city did not escape unscathed. Three residents lost their lives in automobile accidents and two others died of heart attacks. All manner of property was damaged from shells and shrapnel. Many people were injured in various ways dashing about seeking cover—in some cases including thousands of volunteer air-raid wardens who frantically tried to tamp down the impending pandemonium. But, despite all the unfortunate consequences, exhilaration was in the air. The city had met its first taste of war with valor. But soon exhilaration turned to humiliation and then outrage when the Secretary of the Navy admitted that no attack by Japan had actually occurred. He blamed it on citizen jitters. Two possibilities were floated. Either the weird object in the sky was a weather balloon, or it was shell bursts from defensive ground guns that were illuminated weirdly by searchlights.

            I drove Adele back to Romanoff’s. She reached across the seat of my car and kissed me. I watched her scoot out of my car and into hers. She gunned the engine and then sped down Rodeo Drive and out of my life. I knew in my gut I would never see her again. Like a curtain parting before my mind’s eye, I saw that she was hurrying toward a destiny I never imagined for her. She put me to shame. It came home to me what a shallow and narcissistic scoundrel I was. There was something going on that was a whole lot bigger than me, and it was time for me to grow some balls and do my part. I pulled my car out of the parking space and pointed it to the nearest Army Recruitment Center.©  -Linda Lee Greene Author/Artist

 

The above is a work of historical fiction based on the actual February 25, 1942 false-alarm attack at Los Angeles.

 

Images: Husband and wife movie-stars, Robert Taylor and Barbara Stanwyck, Romanoff’s Restaurant circa 1940s, UFO over Los Angeles, February 25, 1942.

 

#Hollywood, #LosAngeles, #Romanoff’s, #MGM, #LouisBMayer, #WorldWar11, #BarbaraStanwyck, #RobertTaylor, #MissOhioBeautyPageant, #WACS, #AChanceAtTheMoon, #LindaLeeGreene

 

***

Amid the seductions of Las Vegas, Nevada, a sextet of opposites converge within a shared fate: a glamorous movie-star courting distractions from her troubled past; her shell-shocked bodyguards clutching handholds out of their hardscrabble lives; a dropout Hawaiian nuclear physicist gambling his way back home; a Navajo rancher seeking cleansing for harming Mother Earth; and from its lofty perch, the Hawaiian’s guardian spirit conjured as his pet raven that conducts this symphony of soul odysseys. It all unfolds in multi-award-winning author, Linda Lee Greene’s novel, A CHANCE AT THE MOON.

A reader says of the novel, “A gripping tale of romance, vices, glamour, insecurities, betrayal, and murder written in a very descriptive and artistic manner which paints a picture of the environment and characters. This was clearly well-researched and possesses a number of facts and detail on topics from uranium to realistic atmospheres.” 5 Stars

THERE’S NO REALITY IN THE METAVERSE

 

From Anne MontgomerY, AUTHOR

If we’re not careful, we could lose our children to digital gaming on a grand new scale.

 

You’ve probably seen the Meta ad. A young teen stretched out on his bed, clutching a football. “I wanna be quarterback of the Dallas Cowboys,” he says.  “I wanna carry eighty-thousand fans to victory.” Then, we see the boy again, this time in a stadium wearing a Cowboys-like  jersey, throwing a pass. But the kid isn’t wearing a helmet. Instead, he’s donned his Meta Quest 2 Pro headset, a dandy little device that sells for $1,500.

It’s not only the exorbitant price of the virtual-reality apparatus that has me riled, it’s the whole idea of the ad. The kid reminds me of when I was still teaching. I did my best to sit down individually with every one of my students, an effort to tease out what they wanted from life and perhaps formulate a plan to help them get there.

When a kid came to me saying they wanted to be a professional athlete—as many did—I pointed out that there’s a lot of hard work and dedication on that path and no guarantees. Though I know the odds of being an athlete at the pro and Olympic levels are incredibly slim, I never tried to talk anyone out of it, though I always mentioned the need for a plan B, explaining that one awkward step can end an athlete’s career.

“So, you play on our team here at school. What’s your position?” I’d ask.

More times than I care to remember the kid would look at me quizzically and say, “I don’t play on the school team.”

“A club team then?”

“No, I just play in the neighborhood.”

Childhood obesity is on the rise. One reason is because children are addicted to video games, and the lure of the Metaverse promises to make things worse.

 

I would then gently point out that if they really wanted to become a pro athlete, they should actually play on an actual team. “That’s the way to learn,” I’d say. “You can’t become a great player without playing.”

And then they’d just stare at me, as if to say no effort should be required to reach their dream.

Now, back to the Meta ad. What is it really saying to young people? Are Mark Zuckerberg and his boys actually insinuating that wearing their high-tech goggles is better preparation for a career in sports than, um, actually playing in real games? That’s the impression the ad gives me. It seems the idea of hanging out in your room, interacting with pretend people is preferable to actually getting involved with a real coach and players. No weight training or sweating required. No learning the intricacies of your position. No need to develop the interpersonal skills involved with being a team member. No putting yourself on the line in front of actual fans. And if that imaginary pass you’re throwing to an imaginary receiver in an imaginary stadium goes awry, no worries. Just restart your imaginary game and give yourself a do over.

Is this really the message we want to send when one in five kids in the U.S. is clinically obese, which amounts to 14.7 million children and adolescents? Add to that the fact that almost 16% of 12-to-17-year-olds suffer from depression, a condition often brought about by isolation and loneliness. Perhaps their little Meta headset might make them feel like they have actual friends, but eventually they’ll learn the reality of virtual reality. There is nothing real about it. They will reside in a fake world and someday, when they need an actual friend, there might be no one to turn to.

Perhaps I’m wrong. Maybe, someday, some kid will play football or baseball or hockey in their pretend universe and then they’ll become pro players. Sounds ridiculous, doesn’t it. Because it is!

 

We should not allow children to slip into this world. Video games sucking up all their time are bad enough. The Metaverse will swallow them whole.

I know what some of you are thinking. She’s just an old teacher who doesn’t understand modern technology. These are just games. What’s the harm?

All I can say is take heed, parents. Don’t leave your kids for endless hours in their rooms where they will become increasingly addicted to their fabricated worlds.

I really hope I’m wrong.

But…I’m not.

Find Anne Montgomery’s novels wherever you buy books.

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Determining Mr/Mrs Right-for-Your-Life

 

Author Catherine Castle shares with us a sweet story of love and a sneak peek at one of her books on this Valentine’s Day. –Linda Lee Greene Author/Artist

 
Determining Mr/Mrs Right-for-Your-Life

from Catherine Castle

 

How do you know it you’ve met Mr. or Mrs. Right—the one true love of your life?

Now that’s the question of the century. Sometimes you know right away with a “zing” goes the heart strings. Sometimes you don’t know until certain dramatic things happen in your life. And sometimes true love is revealed only after the loved one is gone. I saw all three of these in the lives of my parents.

Let me tell you a story about my parents, who apparently got it right.

My parents met after WWII, right before Dad was going to enlist in the Foreign Legion. He came to visit Mom’s uncle. Mom peeked at Dad from behind a newspaper during that visit and her interest in him was obvious enough that he asked her on a date. Their courtship was a short one. They met in October and by Thanksgiving the following month they were married. Dad’s family said to Mom, “Don’t marry him. You don’t know what you’re getting into. He drinks. He gambles. He carouses around with his brother.” But ‘Love is blind.’ And Mom didn’t listen to the naysayers. That’s the “zing” goes the heart strings moment.

The dramatic happening for my folks occurred early on in their marriage. True to the warning of his family, Dad did drink and gamble and run around with his brother, leaving Mom at home with two small children.  After about two years of this kind of behavior, Mom gave Dad an ultimatum. “It’s me and your daughters or carousing with your brother. You can’t have both. Choose what you love most,” she told him. Dad chose us. He walked away from his old life and built a life around his family.

It took the remainder of their life together to discover the last expression of love.

Dad was a meat and potatoes kind of guy. Dinner fare for us was always a meat, which ran the gamut from pickled pigs’ feet and cow brains to fried chicken and smoked pork. Some form of potatoes (usually fried) sat next to the meat platter. Then green beans and another vegetable filled out the menu. We’d often have bread, too, from sliced store-bought bread to homemade cornbread or biscuits. Dessert was rare and saved for company. Without fail, meat, potatoes, green beans and a second vegetable appeared on every dinner table.

No matter what combination of those four dishes Mom put on the dinner table, Dad ate it. He wasn’t choosy about what meat Mom served, or how the potatoes were fixed, or what alternate veggie she served beside the green beans. He ate it all, and as I remember it, with gusto. In all the years I sat at the table with them, eating Mom’s down-home meals I never once heard Dad complain about or critique Mom’s cooking. I thought he loved everything she made, even though I always didn’t.

Then, in 1987, Mom died of complications from pneumonia. After the funeral Dad was wandering around the house saying, “You girls should take this, or this. It belonged to your mom and I can’t look at it now that she’s gone.”  We obliged him and took the offered items, because, as I’ve since learned, guys can’t deal with looking at stuff that belonged to their deceased wives.

When Dad walked into the pantry where Mom kept all her home-canned goods, he said, “Take all these green beans home with you.”

“I can’t take food off your table, Dad,” I protested.

“I hate green beans,” he replied.

I’m sure my mouth dropped open, because it still does when I think of this story. “But you ate them almost every night,” I said. “If you hate them why did you eat them?”

“Because your mother served them.”

For thirty-seven years and four months, my father ate a hated vegetable every day just because Mom served it. And he ate it without letting anyone at the table know he hated green beans. Now, if that isn’t true love, I don’t know what is.

Ain’t love grand?

Catherine loves to laugh at herself and loves to write comedy. Check out her award-winning romantic comedy, with a touch of drama, A Groom for Mama.

 

 

 

Beverly Walters is dying, and before she goes she has one wish—to find a groom for her daughter. To get the deed done, Mama enlists the dating service of Jack Somerset, Allison’s former boyfriend.

The last thing corporate-climbing Allison wants is a husband. Furious with Mama’s meddling, and a bit more interested in Jack than she wants to admit, Allison agrees to the scheme as long as Mama promises to search for a cure for her terminal illness.

A cross-country trip from Nevada to Ohio ensues, with a string of disastrous dates along the way, as the trio hunts for treatment and A Groom For Mama.

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Multi-award-winning author Catherine Castle has been writing all her life. A former freelance writer, she has over 600 articles and photographs to her credit (under her real name) in the Christian and secular market. Now she writes sweet and inspirational romance. Her debut inspirational romantic suspense, The Nun and the Narc, from Soul Mate Publishing, has garnered multiple contests finals and wins.

Catherine loves writing, reading, traveling, singing, watching movies, and the theatre. In the winter she loves to quilt and has a lot of UFOs (unfinished objects) in her sewing case. In the summer her favorite place to be is in her garden. She’s passionate about gardening and even won a “Best Hillside Garden” award from the local gardening club.

Learn more about Catherine Castle on her website and blog. Stay connected on Facebook and Twitter. Be sure to check out Catherine’s Amazon author page and her Goodreads page. You can also find Catherine on Stitches Thru Time and the SMP authors blog site.