The following morning, I was summoned to Arthur Freed's office. With him was a short man with a cherubic face and bright, inquisitive eyes.
"This is Irving Berlin."
In the flesh. The genius who had written "Alexander's Ragtime Band," "God Bless America," "There's No Business Like Show Business," "Puttin' on the Ritz," and "Top Hat." Someone once asked Jerome Kern what he thought Irving Berlin's place would be in American music.
Kern said simply, "Irving Berlin is American music."
"I'm Sidney Sheldon," I said, pretending not to be completely awestruck.
Mr. Berlin held out his hand. "I'm happy to meet you. I understand we're going to work together." He spoke in a high-pitched voice.
"Yes, sir." I did not mention my New York experience where I had almost replaced him as the top songwriter in America because we were going to work together, and I did not want to make him nervous.
When we started to work on Easter Parade, Irving Berlin was sixty years old, with the enthusiasm of a teenager.
He had been born Israel Baline in Russia and had come to the United States when he was five. He started his career as a singing waiter at the Chinatown Cafe in New York. He had never learned to play the piano on a regular piano. He used only the black keys, and he had an instrument that changed keys at the push of a lever.
Irving Berlin had questions and comments as I talked about the possible directions the screenplay could go, but oddly enough, Arthur Freed seemed to take no interest in what we were doing. He was completely silent. It was not until later that I found out why.
I said, "Mr. Berlin, I want to tell you - "
He stopped me. "Irving."
"Thank you. I want to tell you how excited I am to be working with you."
He smiled. "We're going to have a good time."
The writing was going well. I remembered what Sam Weisbord had said. Come through with this, and you're fixed for life.
Several times a week, while I was writing the script, Irving Berlin would bounce into my office.
"Tell me what you think of this," he would say enthusiastically. And in that shrill voice of his, he would begin singing a song he had just written. The only problem was that he could not carry a tune, and I had no idea what the song sounded like. He could not play the piano, and he could not sing. All he had was his genius.
I had lunch every day at the writers' table in the commissary and one of the writers would usually invite me to visit his set after lunch. The pictures shooting on the lot were The Best Years of Our Lives, with Myrna Loy and Fredric March; Saratoga Trunk, with Gary Cooper and Ingrid Bergman; and The Secret Life of Walter Mitty, with Danny Kaye and Virginia Mayo.
I went on the soundstages and watched the stars going through their scenes just a few feet away from me. These were the stars I had watched from the back aisle of the RKO Jefferson Theatre, when I was an usher. Now, every week I saw the biggest stars in Hollywood making their movies, and it was a wondrous time for me.
I was finishing the script of Easter Parade when Sammy Weisbord came into my office.
"I have good news, Sidney. I got a call from MGM. They want to negotiate a long-term contract with you."
"That's wonderful," I exclaimed. That was the dream of every Hollywood writer.
"We haven't worked out all the details yet. There are still a lot of things we're discussing." He smiled. "But don't worry. It will happen."
I was elated. I turned in my screenplay to Arthur Freed and waited to hear his reaction. Silence. He hates it, I decided.
Another day went by. I reread the script. The New York critic is right about my lack of talent. The dialogue is so wooden it could splinter.
No wonder Arthur Freed doesn't want to talk to me.
One week after I had given the script to Arthur Freed, his secretary finally called.
"Mr. Freed would like you to be in his office tomorrow morning at ten o'clock to meet Judy Garland and Gene Kelly."
I felt a sudden sense of panic. I simply could not meet them. They would find out what a fraud I was, just as Arthur Freed had. They would all hate my screenplay. I knew I could not go to that meeting. It was deja vu. Max Rich saying, Meet me at my office, ten o'clock tomorrow morning, and we'll go to work, and Irving Reis saying, "Camera . . . Action," and my running away from the screen test with Cary Grant. I knew I had to run away again.
I got little sleep that night. I had vivid dreams of Arthur Freed screaming at me about the terrible script I had written.
In the morning, I made a decision. I would go to the meeting, but I would not say anything. I would listen to their derogatory criticisms and when they were through, I would quit. I spent the hour prior to the meeting packing up my office, getting ready to leave the studio.
At ten o'clock, I walked into Arthur Freed's office. Freed was seated behind his desk.
He nodded. "Interesting screenplay."
Whatever that meant. Was that a euphemism for "You're fired"? Why did he not come out and say what he really thought?
At that moment, Judy Garland walked in and my spirits lifted. It was like seeing an old friend. She was Betsy Booth, the girlfriend of Mickey Rooney's character in the Andy Hardy series. She was Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz. She was Esther Smith in Meet Me in St. Louis. When I was an usher, I had seen her movies over and over.
Judy Garland, nee Frances Gumm, had been with MGM since she was in her teens. The Wizard of Oz had made her a star when she was just fifteen. She had become so popular that the studio put her in movie after movie, giving her no chance to rest. She made nineteen movies in nine years.