Hollywood by Garson Kanin Read Free Book Online

Barrymore. I hope I’m not late.”
    “No, no,” he said. “I’m early. I’m always early. I find it affords an opportunity for an extra ration of giggle water.”
    I shuddered. I hoped he did not notice.
    He finished his martini, put it down on the bar, and tapped the rim of the glass with a long, graceful finger. The bartender made him a second martini. I ordered Scotch. By the time I had finished my drink, Barrymore had had another. That made three, I calculated. Three that I knew of. I prayed that Pan Berman would soon leave. I looked over to his table. He was just starting his soup.
    “Well,” I said, “shall we order, Mr. Barrymore?”
    “In a minute,” he said.
    I signaled the headwaiter, who recognized my desperation and brought menus at once.
    “What is this?” asked Barrymore. “A quick-lunch counter? I thought it was a restaurant.” He waved the menus away and tapped the rim of his glass again. “You order for me. Anything out of season.”
    I ordered swiftly and unimaginatively. Shrimp cocktail. Sirloin steak, baked potato, string beans. Salad. Ice cream. The headwaiter left.
    Barrymore drank slowly and steadily but it seemed to have no effect on him. He began to discuss the picture, not so much in terms of the story but in terms of his own role. He was brilliant—deep, thorough, and entirely original. The headwaiter came over to inform us that our first course was on the table. I slid off the barstool and started off.
    “No, no,” said Barrymore. “Not yet. Let’s have a drink.” He looked at the headwaiter and added, “Want to join us?”
    The headwaiter went off again.
    Pandro Berman was looking at us. I hoped he could not hear.
    “Let’s eat,” I said. “I’m starving.”
    “Not yet,” he said and tapped that damned glass again.
    I appealed to him. “Please, Mr. Barrymore?”
    “I’m sorry,” he said to me with the greatest dignity, “but I simply cannot eat on an empty stomach !”
    I sat by while he consumed yet another set of martinis.
    At dinner he ate, discussed the food, talked of other dinners in different places and times.
    Then for a time, he was silent and conveyed somehow that he preferred no conversation.
    I looked at that great, expressive face with its actor’s skin, bearing the patina of thousands of applications of makeup. I thought about the life and work of this larger-than-life personality. His father, the brilliant British player, Maurice Blythe, who upon emigrating “out to the States” decided to give himself a name more likely to impress the natives and chose Maurice Barrymore. In time, he married the daughter of a great American acting family, Georgiana Drew, whose mother was the celebrated Mrs. Drew of the Arch Street Theatre, Philadelphia. Their children were Lionel, Ethel, and John, in that order. The outstanding American leading man of his day, John Drew was, of course, their uncle.
    Could this weary man, slowly chomping on his steak, be the same one who, as a dashing young blade, played Are You a Mason?, An American Citizen, The Man from Mexico, and The Dictator ?
    He had made hit after hit in farce after farce. Then, through the encouragement of Edward Sheldon and later Arthur Hopkins, he began to take himself more seriously. He played in John Galsworthy’s Justice , and, with his brother Lionel, in Peter Ibbetson and the memorable production of The Jest . He made history with his Hamlet , playing it for a hundred and one performances on Broadway.
    John Barrymore looked up from his food and winked at me. The same wink he had used in the hilarious Here Comes the Bride. I began to think of his early silent films. Raffles, Sherlock Holmes, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Beau Brummell, The Sea Beast (a version of Moby Dick ), Don Juan . His first talkie was Show of Shows , a revue in which he appeared in a scene from Shakespeare’s Richard III . Then, in dazzling succession, The Man from Blankley’s (the funniest picture I had ever seen), Moby Dick,