The Magnificent Elmer by Pearl Bernstein Gardner, Gerald Gardner Read Free Book Online Page A

passports. Barely three days before the plane left for Moscow, we had them.
    Danny Kaye was on the plane. He was not a nominee at the festival. Danny had no film that year to command attention. His best work in movies was a decade behind him. His fascination with all things Russian—culture, language, literature—began when he was lifted to stardom by an Ira Gershwin lyric that Danny sang in the Broadway musical Lady in the Dark . The memorable show-stopper was called “Tchaikovsky.” In itDanny rattled off the names of forty-nine Russian composers strung together by Ira Gershwin in a tongue-twisting inventory. Danny did it in less than a minute. Matter of fact, he did it most nights in thirty-nine seconds and managed to stop the show every time. During Danny’s number, the ostensible star of the show, Gertrude Lawrence, “the lady in the dark,” was sitting on a swing onstage, watching him as he stole her show. And each night, the audience cheered its appreciation of Danny’s tour de force, and each night as they kept applauding, Danny kept bowing and bowing.
    He recalled the song with satisfaction.
    “At each performance,” he crowed, “I tried to break my speed record in reciting those names. The orchestra couldn’t keep up with me!”
    “You should have done it a cappella ,” said Elmer dryly.
    The plane that carried us East contained such seriously famous Hollywood celebrities as Danny, Steve McQueen, Stanley Kramer, and my composer husband.
    “I’d like to see the story in the Times if this plane went down,” I said.
    “I wouldn’t make the first paragraph,” scowled Elmer.
    “Maybe an inside page,” I said.
    ***
    As our aircraft hurtled toward Moscow, on the same approximate route that our strategic bombers had traveled eight months earlier, Elmer idly leafed through the packet of press material that had been given to the luminaries aboard. The Moscow International Film Festival, it declared, was to be held at a newly built auditorium of twenty-five thousand seats that had opened two years earlier and was designed by two distinguished architects.
    Elmer scanned the mimeographed material.
    “Do you realize that there are a hundred-fifty movie houses in Moscow?” he said in surprise. “That makes Moscow one of the cinema capitals of the world.”
    “I can’t believe that,” said Danny.
    “Ask Stanley,” I said.
    Stanley Kramer, who bore no grudge with the Soviets for failing to nominate his 1963 release, It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad, World , was acting as the scoutmaster and administrator on our trip. He distributed the press releases and kept everyone from changing planes in Prague.
    The Ministry of Culture of the Russian Federation which ran the affair had been wise enough in the ways of capitalist public relations to invite various celebrities who were not actually nominated for anything. Thus Danny Kaye and Stanley Kramer whose current work was too commercial to warrant an actual nomination, were invited along with Steve McQueen and Elmer Bernstein whose work was deemed culturally worthy. For their presence the Russians provided the cost of two round-trip airline tickets and four-day hotel accommodations.
    Stanley Kramer had a reputation for serious work, though often as heavy-handed as a Pravda editorial. Stanley had created some fine progressive themed films on topical subjects in recent years— Inherit the Wind , Judgment at Nuremberg , and On the Beach , and in the years ahead he would produce Ship of Fools , and the paean to integration Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner . It was said that by the cynics of the back lot that Stanley Kramer could always be depended on to fight liberal battles three years after they had been won. But I had to admire his attempts to moderate prejudice.
    ***
    The Tverskaya Hotel at 2 Pushkinshaya Square in Moscow was an old and elegant affair. Security checks were heavy. A sturdy middle-aged Russian woman sat at a desk on each floor, checking the comings and