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him just fine—just fine until one afternoon Barrymore took a whole gang of the crew over to Lucey’s for lunch. He always gets very pally with the crew and they call him Jack and he calls them whatever, and they all have a lot of highjinks and nothing but fun and the picture goes in the crapper. So he took the crew to lunch and the crew came back. What the hell. They had to. They’ve got a union. But he didn’t come back. Not that day or the next or the next. In fact, never. We had to stop it. The insurance covered some of it, sure, but not all and that’s another thing. We can’t get any insurance on the guy. So forget it.”
    I had one final trump to play and this seemed the moment to play it.
    I rose and said solemnly, “All right, Pan. If that’s your decision, I accept it, but I must say, I’m surprised. You’ve got a great reputation in this business as a picturemaker but more important, everyone who knows you, who’s dealt with you, says that you’re a man of your word. A man of honor and I’m really surprised to see you betray that idea.”
    A look into his widening eyes told me I had struck home.
    “ What idea?” he blurted out.
    “Well, after the rough time you people gave me about that second assignment, you promised you were going to make it up to me. You said I could do anything on the lot—”
    “If you could set it up, I said!” he shouted.
    I shouted back. “What the hell kind of promise is that? Anything I set up you can knock over you—you—”
    “You what ?” he challenged, demanding me to finish my thought.
    “—you big—little tycoon !”
    All at once, I could no longer see him. I saw only his finger, pointing directly between my eyes.
    “All right, you dumb jerk,” he said. “I’m going to give you enough rope and let’s see what happens.”
    The Great Man Votes was under way. All I had to do now was to persuade John Barrymore to do it. He could be extremely erratic, I was told.
    “Leave it to me,” I said.
    I got Barrymore’s home telephone number from his agent, remembering Mr. Goldwyn’s advice to deal with principals whenever possible. I phoned John Barrymore, identified myself, and began telling him about the script.
    “No, no,” I heard the great voice say. My heart sank. “No, no,” he continued. “Let’s not do this on the phone—a diabolical instrument, in any case. Come on over. Bring the manuscript. Although, to be perfectly candid, I prefer to have you tell me the story and describe the role. A movie script is so boring to read. It’s like a plumber’s manual, isn’t it? Furthermore, I have no idea who you are but when you’ve told me the story, I’ll have some idea as to your competence to convey it to an audience.”
    “When?” I asked.
    “When what?”
    “When can I come over?”
    “Why not right now?”
    I was on my way in a matter of minutes.
    I had difficulty finding his hideaway house and it was precisely noon when I drove up to the front door.
    I rang the bell. I heard it sound loudly inside and waited for a minute, for two, for three. I rang again. Five minutes later, I rang for a third and what I had decided would be a final time. The front door was flung open and there stood John Barrymore, the greatest actor in America, stark naked.
    He squinted at me and asked, “What’s this? Who are you?”
    “RKO,” I heard myself say.
    “Oh, yes,” he said. “Of course. Come in, RKO. Come in.” He slapped me on the back as I entered and added, “Mind if I call you R?”
    He laughed at his joke until I joined him.
    “Were you out there long?” he asked. “I’m sorry. My apologies. We don’t have any servants here. They keep leaving.” He did his famous eyebrow trick, one up, the other down, and said, “More of them leave than we ever hire. I’ve never been able to figure that out. Can it be that they leave before they get here?” He looked around. “My wife should be here but she isn’t. Would you like some