"I Oughta Be In Pictures"
Nollson, John
"I Oughta Be In Pictures" Every now and then, General Ulysses S. Grant (U.S. Army, Retired) invites me to visit him for a drink in his condominium at Leisure Barracks. I enjoy it. I'm...
...Wasn't enforced...
...High on the wall across the room was a mural, painted in a sort of urban primitive style, of a big train...
...You became President of the United States, which is more than anyone will ever be able to say for MacArthur...
...His most recent invitation reminded me that this was indeed the time of year when President Lincoln sends him a case of his favorite Bourbon...
...well, maybe Redford and Paul Newman would have been better, but we couldn't get Newman because he says it's against his political principles to play generals...
...Why, many's the night that Doug and I have refought the battles of his Pacific campaign down to the last detail, and I'll be the first to admit he taught me a thing or two about amphibious operations...
...He said: Never did I think when I was but a plebe at the Point so many decades ago that I, heir though I was to a military tradition of some meaning through my paternal forebears, might find occasion to serve this magnificent land in a manner which would bring to me an honor greater than that bestowed on any other general officer who served under the flag of our indomitable Republic—the honor of being portrayed in the cinema by Gregory Peck...
...Sometimes I think I'm the only person around here who hasn't been seen in Panavision...
...How's that...
...A towering Negro named Jimmy, wearing a white, busboy's coat four sizes too small and whose hair was buzzed like a Marine's, shook the blonde's creamy drink...
...schoolchildren could recite his name in proper sequence...
...Nick Castrogiovanni...
...I had not realized that Grant knew Hannibal, and I was about to ask him about something that had been on my mind since the seventh grade: We had been taught that Hannibal was from Carthage, but what language did he speak...
...Grant understood as much from the look of concern on my face...
...Okay, sweetheart," he said, "what ya got here is the next Star Wars, a genyoowine blockbuster that's gonna rewrite all the records, ya understand...
...And yet it is an honor of not unambiguous poignancy, for this singular accolade has dissolved the substance of my immortal utterance on the fate of old soldiers...
...No one had ever made mention of a language called Carthaginian...
...As it is, I have an option on Steve McQueen...
...He'd gone overseas in the War, served with the U.S...
...And beneath it on an overstuffed easy chair sat a frail man, up in years...
...As soon as we began to discuss it, I had the worst argument of my life with him...
...It can go to a man's head, believe me...
...All he's interested in is his damn movie...
...He says he'll kill himself if MacArthur doesn't do better than Patton...
...Nick said he had slipped coming out of the can and broken his hip, but that wouldn't keep him laid up for long...
...A lot of people forget that...
...You oughts talk to Miss Dora," he said, pointing to his left and downward...
...Look at George Patton...
...I have to maintain my image among a bunch of guys who have been played by the biggest stars The American Spectator December 1977 23 in the world: Rommel by James Mason, Napoleon by Marlon Brando, the Mandi by Lawrence Olivier, Lawrence of Arabia by Peter O'Toole, Dwight Eisenhower by Soupy Sales...
...even at the university, I could recall no courses in the subject...
...We had no problem figuring out the co-stars who ought to play us...
...Nick muttered where he wished Tex would go and he murmured Italian blandishments to the blonde...
...24 The American Spectator December 1977...
...A crapulous fat fellow in cowboy clothes who called himself Tex harassed the blonde in Cajun accents...
...The man has no shame...
...If Robert Redford ever starred in Grant, that would sure button MacArthur's lip...
...Still, I'm man enough to admit that I'm just plain jealous...
...Robert E. Lee is a large part of the story, so we will need co-stars who mesh...
...Eric had told us how Nick, the Grand Mixmaster himself, was out of commission with a broken hip, and filling his place behind the bar we found his younger brother John, who is 82 years old...
...But nowadays, he doesn't say a word about military history...
...It took us several minutes of determined squirming to reach the bar...
...we are both Republicans...
...John Nollson "I Oughta Be In Pictures" Every now and then, General Ulysses S. Grant (U.S...
...I nudged Eric and pointed...
...He organizes matinee theater parties...
...Fact is," Grant answered, "Bobby and I aren't speaking...
...My friend Eric Wedig had been urging me for months to come and visit Nick's...
...Oh," I responded unenthusiastically, remembering that I had finally finished reading Grant's memoirs—and had found them none too scintillating...
...He even roped Hannibal and Julius Caesar into going...
...glass and I asked him if somebody could tell me more about the place...
...It is an honor moreover which has replenished a bank account Coming Next Issue: Joseph Adelson Assessing Freud's Theories Christopher DeMuth Do We Need An Agency for Consumer Advocacy...
...And it's not that I'm unwilling to give another man his due...
...Jimmy was sloshing more bourbon into my...
...Bah...
...And he probably wanted the nomination...
...You've never seen him operate...
...He also spit out a string of expletives, reminding me that his reputation for plain speaking was not undeserved...
...There's no doubt," I said, breaking into Grant's rendition of MacArthur's remarks, "that Doug was among the more eloquent of the generals...
...THE GREAT AMERICAN SALOON SERIES by Joseph P. Duggan Nick's Big Train Cafe At 2800 Tulane Avenue in New Orleans, across from the Dixie Brewery, stands a blighted little frame building with peeling paint and a disclaimer hung above the door: "WE DO NOT SERVE DIXIE BEER...
...Army in Italy, come back and opened the bar in 1924...
...John P. Sisk Pornography, Censorship, and the Cult of the Wild West R. Emmett Tyrrell, Jr...
...She was outfitted complete in nurse's garb, cap and white sneakers and all...
...What's more, I have a special problem...
...Two ceiling fans, one missing a blade, spun over our heads...
...I mean, we'll tolerate a little eccentricity...
...asked Grant...
...Son-of-a-yellowbellied-rebel...
...Sitting beside him in a straight-backed chair and holding his hand was a hangjawed woman with big glasses tumbling over her nose...
...It's science fiction they want these days, isn't it...
...You should have seen Old Blood and Guts the night George C. Scott won that Oscar for playing him...
...I can still remember Caesar fuming that Hollywood had no sense of the classical period...
...Yes, old "Unconditional Surrender" himself was suffering from low self-esteem...
...The tiny saloon enjoys wide renown for its smooth and flavorful drinks, and that night, as always, the place was crowded...
...I say to you: I have not died...
...And he produced another sheaf of papers, much thicker than the first...
...Maybe he'll have an idea or two...
...I couldn't blame Grant...
...I'm a civil-war buff, and the General has more than his share of yarns to spin...
...It's MacArthur," Grant complained...
...The fool damn near blew his own foot off...
...Anyway, the two of you should stick together...
...Narrow wooden slats sticky with chipping varnish made up the ceiling, and out of them poked four naked incandescent bulbs...
...We had just seen All the President's Men and we knew that Robert Redford and Dustin Hoffmanwould be the perfect pair...
...His feet were propped up by a pillow that rested on a case of Falstaff empties...
...I had often thought how wonderful it would be to be played by Robert Redford...
...down on Poydras Street some 83 years ago, he told us...
...Maybe we can still work something out," Grant concluded...
...he's a good leader of men, but does he really deserve all that much attention...
...He had brought a stenographer with him and insisted that his remarks on that occasion be recorded...
...So I expected the usual convivial atmosphere at Leisure Barracks...
...By now, I thought all us military geniuses had learned how to live together...
...there aren't many of your kind left...
...I began to get a sense of what was eating at Grant...
...The nurse warned us not to get Nick too excited, and since my Weller had gone watery, I decided to inch back toward the bar...
...True, Doughas been played by Gregory Peck, but you are ahead of him in one significant respect...
...none of them will do for me...
...Instead, the General was definitely out of sorts, far more cranky than I had ever seen him...
...We caught a lot of elbows from the crowd...
...Anyway, it was easy enough to agree on Redford and Hoffman, but that muleheaded Bobby Lee insisted that he should be played by Redford...
...It's Nick," he said, and we began to shove our way across the floor...
...For the first time in years, he strapped on that silly pearl-handled .45 of his and challenged George Custer to an old-fashioned quickdraw shootout...
...Not much he can do about it, though," I said...
...It was a side of Grant I had never seen before...
...Besides," I continued, "I think you have no reason to be jealous...
...It was obvious, from just that one remark, that Grant was hopelessly out of touch with the mass taste...
...And after the news got out that President Nixon had seen the film every night for a month, there was simply no living with him...
...It would be hard to get financial backing for the kind of project he envisioned...
...True, Grant had been President of the United States...
...Have you talked to Lee about it...
...Grant could make Truman himself blush...
...He reads Variety every week to get the latest figures on the gross receipts...
...Worst Book of the Year Award previously rendered nugatory...
...Joseph P. Duggan, former assistant managing editor of The American Spectator, is an editorial writer for the Greensboro [North Carolina] Record...
...He was at his most expansive...
...Doug strode into the billiards room, his corncob pipe giving off a whisp of smoke...
...But he was not at ease...
...They were mostly from Tulane and Loyola, flush-faced frat rats in rugby-striped alligator shirts and smooth-faced, slender girls, quiet and tastefully coifed...
...I looked the place over...
...And with Eric's company and that of a blonde schoolmate I did...
...John dribbled my Weller into a glass...
...Can you imagine that?—especially since Robert Redford is so obviously the perfect me...
...This is Nick's Big Train Cafe, a celebrated watering-hole in a city famous for its fonts of refreshment...
...What's that...
...And with that, he produced a thick sheaf of papers...
...bellowed Grant...
...Eric, could that be...
...Friends and comrades-in-arms...
...I asked...
...Yes," Grant acknowledged, "we are a rare breed...
...Perhaps he still felt the implicit rebuke of Mark Twain's famous remark: "I would rather sleep with Lillian Russell naked than with Ulysses S. Grant in full-dress uniform...
...You know," Grant said, "sometimes I think I would make a wonderful subject for a film epic...
...But before I could frame my question, Grant was at it again: "None of us will ever forget the world premiere of MacArthur...
...He really had learned how to talk turkey...
...Yes, he was born right here in N.O...
...What about Prohibition, we wondered...
...Casting," Grant went on, "is turning out to be something of a problem...
...I have not even faded away...
...He's become just plain intolerable since they made that movie about him...
...Ha...
...Well, all right," he muttered...
...It's this damn movie...
...said Grant as he bit off the tip of a cigar and spit the piece of tobacco out onto the floor, showing outstanding coordination of teeth and tongue...
...The blonde ordered a Black Velvet Smash, I a Weller and water...
...In fact, I'm working on the screenplay myself...
...And both of them swore to me they would never go to another Hollywood feature—after they had been grossed out by Victor Mature's portrayal of a Roman gladiator...
...we've all had absolute command over hundreds of divisions and we know how that can swell a man's head...
...his likeness appeared on coins that were available in strictly limited editions from the Franklin Mint of Philadelphia...
...He had begun to think of himself as a second-class citizen...
Vol. 11 • December 1977 • No. 2
