Thursday, September 29, 2016

Terry (Part 2)

     It's a Wednesday, and Terry and I are aimed for Century City on our putts.  I'm on my black outlaw Sportster, while Terry has borrowed Bekka's purple beast for the day.  Terry's Dyna Glide is in the shop, having the frame cut and the front forks extended twenty inches, a pretty serious chop.  Next, the engine gets bored and new gearing is installed.  Then the chrome work.  Then fresh paint.  She wants to have "Eddie," the Iron Maiden mascot, airbrushed on each side of the tank.  This was her second choice of design.  Her first was to have a giant hard dick, lovingly detailed, on each side, cum dripping from the tip.  Bekka and I gently steered her away from this idea, pointing out that every little kid in the world is drawn to outlaw bikes, and there was no sense in offending so many parents every time she left home.

Terry (Part 3)

     Terry, Angel and I sat at a table in the back of the trattoria.  With us was Trish, who was making her way through her third cup of coffee and was becoming animate.  The China White was wearing off, aided by the float-a-mule-shoe coffee the trattoria served.  She took us in and said, "I can't believe he'd do that."
     I responded, "Oh, I can.  I just had lunch with the prick."
     "Ronnie kept going on about how I'd be breaking big, I'd be the next Becky Page.  He said he wanted me to meet the morons he was going to fleece, so I should come to lunch with him.  He wanted to get high, so we snorted up some junk, but he made my line too big, and I was a zombie."

Terry (Part 4)

     Goose was back.  He was one of our Hell's Angels security guards, and he'd been shot in the leg by a psychotic fan.  Healing and physical therapy had kept him out of action for a while, but now he was doing okay and ready to get back to work.  Goose's old lady was a bit worried about him returning to Inana, but everyone was assuring her shooting at a porn studio was a once in a lifetime event.  Unfortunately, they were wrong.  There had been three shooting incidents at the mansion so far, all of which involved me, and one of them planted me in the hospital with seven holes in me.  I avoided sharing this little statistic about Inana Productions.

Terry (Part 5)

     Terry backed the hot rod Nova into a space at the Gun Range on a Wednesday evening.  It was the night  of the weekly "shoot-out," an amateur target competition.  She got in the trunk of the Nova and grabbed two gun cases.  One held a Colt 1911, a .45 caliber semi-automatic.  The other contained a Beretta Target 87, a .22 target pistol.  Terry used the Colt for warm-up, and the Beretta for competition.  When she first started entering the contests, she was using a Beretta 92, a 9mm cannon most commonly known as standard issue to anyone in the US military who would carry a sidearm.  She had learned to shoot with a Beretta 92FS, and was comfortable with one.  The Gun Range rented guns, so she would rent a 92 to use in the competition.  Compared to what other contestants were using, she may as well have been using a bazooka.  A friendly gun geek got her straightened out so far as what was both more practical and appropriate for target competitions, so she had picked up the Target 87 out of brand loyalty.

Terry (Part 6)

     That night, Gerald had his first sexual experience since graduating college, eleven years earlier.  (Don't lie, you've been dying to know how things worked out.)
     He followed Terry's Nova home in his Dodge Omni, barely.  While Terry was quick to point out that her '72 Nova looked faster than it was --- it was a former movie stunt vehicle, so looks were everything --- it was certainly quick, and had a driver at the wheel who wasn't afraid to use the pedal on the right.  Terry would engage in her habitual bursts of speed, while Gerald desperately tried to get the Omni to actually accelerate, a futile hope for one of those cars.  She would check her rear-view, realize Gerald was rapidly getting smaller in the mirror, and back off until he caught up.  She finally figured out that his car had a zero-to-sixty time of about fourteen minutes, and forced herself to putt along with all the motoring panache of a nun on Quaaludes.

Terry (Part 7)

     Dear Lenny and Bekka,
     We're in Berlin.  Sorry I haven't written for a while.  I was kinda busy.
     Hamburg RULED.  We were there for five days, and I could stay for another ten.  Oh my god, everything I'd heard about what a rager of a town Hamburg is turned out to be true.  I'd told Vito that I wanted to do some serious partying in Hamburg, like out-all-night partying, and would probably be going to places with music he would hate.  He told me to stay safe, and turned me loose to do anything I wanted, all day and all night.  Oh shit, I did.

Terry (Part 8)

     Except for the airbrush art on the gas tank, Terry's Dyna-Glide was done.  The frame was a shiny black.  The engine glistened with chrome.  The front forks now extended well ahead, not quite a '70s style chopper, but definitely in that direction.  The engine and transmission had been modified, with Terry taking it for a test run and declaring it "one awesome fuckin' rocket."  In a bit of a contradiction of most show bikes, Terry had actually added a passenger seat, hand-hold, and a rack for strapping cargo onto.  (Most show bikes had the smallest pad of leather behind the gas tank as a seat.)  Terry wanted the rack so she'd have someplace to strap her gun cases when she went shooting.

Thursday, September 15, 2016

Terry (Part 1)

     Bekka, Terry and I sat in a booth at the Hi-Lo, the bar of residence for the San Diego (Dago) chapter of the Hell's Angels.  Also in the booth was an Angel named Fatso, a rail-thin gent in his forties, generally considered to be the most cerebral of the Angels.  He was building a tall and ornate tower on the table using dominoes.   Bekka and I were sipping our Millers and watching his progress.  Terry was reading a letter, our teenage ward Jane's latest missive from Europe.  She was touring Western Europe, Great Britan, and Ireland that summer in the company of a seventy-eight year old man, Don Vito Ventimiglia of Bel Air.  The Don was the outgoing head of the Southern California mafia, richer than Croesus, and absolutely devoted to Jane, a blue-haired punk rock girl who would be starting her senior year of high school in the fall.  Don Vito's affection for Jane was two-fold: to him, he was a granddaughter he had never had, but also a true friend and confidante.  The Don appreciated Jane's intelligence, self-confidence, and energy, he said being around her had added ten years to his life.  In turn, Jane loved "Uncle Vito" for his dapper style, genteel manners, and overall gentlemanly behavior.  The two had more fun together than one would guess.  They both loved riding their Harley Sportsters, the Don was teaching Jane how to play tennis and cribbage, and she was teaching him how to play electric bass.  Quite a pair.

Devil (Part 1)

     Angel and Vinny both loved my plot outline for the newest feature.  Entitled "Good Girl/Bad Girl," it followed the life of one woman, "Ella Belle" (Elspeth).  The gist was that everyone is morally ambiguous, each of us having an angel on one shoulder and a devil on the other.  In Elspeth's case, the angel and the devil are a little too real: they exist full-size and follow her around, putting in their own views during Elspeth's interactions with the rest of the world.  Elspeth can see them, and will talk to them in private.  The angel would be played by "Skye Tyler" (Ellen), the devil by "Becky Page" (Bekka).  Obviously, the two fight a lot, but are still lovers.  They throw conflicting advice at Elspeth.  In any situation, the angel will of course prod Elspeth into being a good girl, while the devil will encourage....  Not exactly evil, but lewd and crass behavior.  On occasion, the two actually agree.  The worst part was that the angel and devil could break out into reality, and interact.  I was going to have a lot of fun writing this one.

Devil (Part 2)

     If there was a modern labor-saving, life-enriching product for sale, it was being demonstrated in the exhibit hall.  We watched the demos of kitchenware and snacked on the results.  The exhibit hall was like Sears, if every department in Sears had been narrowed down to a thirty by thirty area and staffed by a more manic version of Ron Popiel.  Flooring, power mowers, clothing, jewelry, miracle goo for your car's engine, tanning pills, hot tubs, just about anything you could think of.  Bekka (who had kicked Becky out, and was now back in control) and I spent a bit of time at a booth for a company that did water filters.  The big difference with this system was that there was only one big filter, that was attached to the water main where it came into the house, not at each individual faucet.  Since San Diego water tastes like you're sucking on an iron bar, we liked the idea.  We were very impressed with the results, too.  We made an appointment for a rep to come out to the house.

Devil (Part 3)

     We picked up where we left off in the exhibit hall.  Once we'd seen all the gizmos, we stepped into a second hall.  The focus in this one was automotive.  All the major American and Japanese makers had booths, with a smattering of German and Italian.  Land Rover also made an appearance.  The other vendors were hawking miracle fuel additives, crankcase goo, paint sealants, wax, off-brand stereos ("Why Pay More?"), radar detectors, and defensive driving courses.  This last one intrigued me.  I considered myself to be a skilled defensive driver, but I wanted to develop better offensive driving talent.  Given our stable of vehicles, I felt it only right I should know how to hot dog it a little, competently.  I spoke with a rep and was told one of their Secret Service/cop/spook driving courses would just about be what I wanted.  The courses were held at Sears Point Raceway up in Sonoma County, north of San Francisco.  My class would last five days.  I was given the impression I could walk around with my shoulder holster and Beretta showing and no one would think it was a bit out of place: I would be in a small minority of civilians taking the course.  "Most cops think they have driving skills.  We disabuse them of that belief," I was told.  "Highway Patrol are somewhat more skilled than city cops, but they still just spent some time lead-footing it and weaving through some pylons.  Anyone taking this course will learn how to use a car aggressively, without endangering random citizens.  The Secret Service loves us.  The Navy SEALS love us.  High end private security love us.  This is not a course for pantywaists."

Devil (Part 4)

     The script for "Good Girl/Bad Girl" was coming together nicely.  This movie was primarily meant to be humorous, and I was happy with the punchlines I was coming up with.  I wouldn't need Eddie this time around.  I'd added some physical comedy, a la the Three Stooges (well, a bit more restrained).  The angel and the devil were forever harassing and tormenting each other: head slaps, pinches, pokes, and the like.  The devil liked to walk past the angel and smack her on the ass.  The angel would hang things from the devil's horns, like keys, air fresheners, panties, and Walkman headphones.  Elspeth's character, named Stella, would occasionally dish out Three Stooges style abuse on both the angel and the devil.

Devil (Part 5)

     "So I've got the perfect camouflage for carrying rigs now," said Crystal.  "Check it."
     She put her purse on her lap and dug into it.  She removed a plastic case, like a large glasses case, and opened it up.  It contained two syringes, a vial, what appeared to be a 35mm film canister, a stubby plastic pen, and a small electronic device, the purpose of which was indeterminate from looking at it.  I looked at her in confusion, so did Bekka.

Devil (Part 6)

Letters From Jane

      Dear Lenny and Bekka,
     We're in Rome!  This city is HUGE, ancient ruins next to apartment buildings from the 1700s next to modern glass office buildings.  Lenny, you would either love or hate driving here -- everyone seems to go as fast as possible, no matter the situation.  Our cab ride from the airport to the hotel was scary for me, I was sure the driver was going to kill someone on a Vespa at some point.  The hotel we're in dates back to the 1500s but has been totally modernized, really really nice.

Devil (Part 7)

Letters From Jane

     Dear Lenny and Bekka,
     Today after lunch we got in our bathing suits, took a taxi to a touristy beach, and rented Jet-Skis, so we could go exploring the coastline.  Neither of us had ever been on a Jet-Ski before, but figured the instincts we'd learned from riding motorcycles would abet us.  We both did fine.  We found a gorgeous sandy cove, where we stopped to relax.  I stripped out of my bathing suit and lay nude in the sand.  Vito considered me and said, "Jane, you are beautiful.  Were I a younger man, I would renounce La Cosa Nostra, assault my father, and shave my head to spend one night alone with you."

Devil (Part 8)

     With the script for "Good Girl/Bad Girl" complete, I dove into the chores of pre-production.  I would be using the city of Oceanside for my exterior shots again, as they were both cheap and willing, two things which could not be said of San Diego's film board.  I also got a hold of State Parks to see about getting permits for filming on a couple beaches.  One scene would take place at La Jolla Shores, which is always crowded, but that's what I wanted.  I would also be shooting a softcore scene at Black's Beach, San Diego's main "clothing optional" beach.  The guy from Parks warned me we might run into some hostility from others at Black's, as soon as they saw the cameras.  Apparently there's always creeps at the top of the cliff, trying to get photos of naked people, and the locals may assume we are also there to invade their privacy.

Devil (Part 9)

     Our first read-through went well.  While not prompting the outbursts the "Temporary Pleasures" script had, my script still got plenty of laughs.  Cool, I could be funny too, not just Eddie.  Maybe we could put our heads together and make another juicy satire.  Dale asked me, "Why are there big spaces between some of the lines?  The pages have all these blank spots."

Devil (Part 11)

     We decided to do our blocking for location shots at the actual locations.  Oceanside is right up the freeway, and everyone would get a better feel for their positioning, much better than our usual routine of using the driveway and sidewalk outside the mansion.  The city of Oceanside can't say anything to us, we don't have cameras set up, we're just a small group of people hanging out on a sidewalk.  Bekka, Elspeth, Ellen, Small Steve and I went to UTC mall and worked on the blocking for those scenes.  The shoot in the food court is pretty static, no real work there, just Steve deciding where cameras should go.  The shot on the plaza was mostly a matter of timing the dialogue with the amount of distance covered walking.  We ended up having the girls walking fairly damn slowly, so we wouldn't have to cover too much distance.  The shot in the parking lot didn't really need blocking, it's just Bekka running and throwing herself through the side window of a car.  She's practiced that little dive at home, so she's comfortable with it.

Devil (Part 10)

     Dear Lenny and Bekka,
     Sorry I haven't written for several days.  We're in Athens, Greece.  We spent two days each in Le Mans and Reims.  Le Mans was kind of dull, except for the racetrack.  No racing going on while we were there, but apparently France has plenty of mega-rich people who own their own race cars.  The track allows them to run solo laps, only one car on the track at the time.  These rich guys have their cars trailered out to the track, pay some massive fee, and work on their skills.  Ten laps, it's the next guy's turn.  The public is allowed to watch from the stands, for free.  I don't know how, but Vito somehow cajoled a track worker into letting us walk to the pit area, so we could get a closer look at the cars.  We talked with a couple of these amateur drivers (well, Vito did) and they admit, it is a very expensive hobby, but worth it to them.  They both said if they'd had their choice, they would have been professional racers and lived fairly poor, rather than going into business and being rich.

Devil (Part 12)

     Small Steve anchored the mobile production truck, a former UPS truck, in the yellow zone outside the multiplex of University Town Center, a stone's throw from the food court.  Everyone else pulled their cars into the closest spaces they could find, not a difficult task on a Wednesday morning.  I stopped behind the truck, briefly admiring it.  We'd had it painted black, with the Inana Productions logo put on both sides and the rear roll-up door.  The original interior racks had been scrapped, and Steve had supervised the installation of custom racks, shelves, and cabinets which would hold all the stuff needed for shooting professional video on location.  An electric inverter had been installed, powerful enough to run a a playback unit or charge a low camera battery pack.  Angel had even allowed a bit of bling, we now had shiny chrome rims at each corner.  The truck spent much time sitting to one side of the driveway at the mansion, ready to be called into service.  We'd take it for a spin once a week, so the battery wouldn't die.

Devil (Part 13)

     True to his word, the dead guy was nowhere to be found when we showed up at the club that Tuesday to shoot.  A weaselly looking guy in a tight blue shirt who introduced himself as Shadow let us in.  Shadow was the bartender.  He had already been there for a couple hours, trying to figure out why the ice machine kept pissing water.  We wrangled equipment and Small Steve began plotting with Sally for the best spots to set up cameras for footage of the dance floor, both establishing shots and shots of Bekka and Elspeth dancing.

Devil (Part 14)

     We got our shots downstairs fairly quickly.  One of Stella (Elspeth) and the devil (Bekka) standing at the bar briefly, then the two of them out on the dance floor, grooving.  Bekka may have been in costume, but she didn't look too out of place at this club.  While no other girl was showing nearly as much flesh, the devil's horns, fishnets, and domme boots just made her look like one of the more theatrical members of the crowd.  Stella had a more punk rock look, which set her apart.  Doc Martens and bondage collars weren't too common among club kids.

Devil (Part 15)

     We wrapped production, and the usual rigamarole kicked in.  Small Steve completed his rough cut of the movie.  Sound was edited in, copies of the rough cut went to the editors in LA and our music maven, a girl named Corolla who was a wizard with a Korg M1 keyboard, a Stratocaster, and a sixteen track mixing system.  The final edit of the movie, music now mixed in, would be sent down to me and Steve for final approval.  Angel would have his graphics guys create box art.  The run of promo copies would be made, and copies would be sent to all the adult magazines, as well as other media outlets.  Our release date would be set, in conjunction with the publication of the magazines which would contain reviews of the movie.  And I would chew my thumb bloody, hoping the critics and reviewers liked what we'd done.
     The reviews hit.  Score.