Tell-All

uniform, over it the bib apron. On my head the starched, lacy maid’s cap. The hammer blows continue, an audio bridge, now revealed to be an actual pounding sound coming from within the town house.
    The blows ring more loud, more fast as we cut to a shot of the bed headboard in Miss Kathie’s boudoir, revealing the sounds as the headboard pounding the wall. The sexual coupling takes place below the bottom of the frame, barely outside the shot, but we can hear the heavy breathing of a man and a woman as the tempo and volume of the pounding increase. Each impact makes the framed paintings jump on the walls. The curtain tassels dangle and dance. The bedside pile of screenplays slumps to the floor.
    On the page, as Lilly’s astronaut heart beats faster andher hammer batters the box again and again, we hear the headboard of Miss Kathie’s bed slamming the wall, faster, until with one final, heroic pounding, the lights of the space module flicker back to life. The pounding ceases as all the various gauges and dials flare back to full power and, framed in the module’s little window, John Glenn gives Lilly the thumbs-up. Tears of horror and relief stream down the face inside his astronaut helmet.
    In the background of the kitchen, two hairy feet appear at the top of the servants’ staircase, two hairy ankles descend from the second floor, two hairy knees, then the hem of a white terry-cloth bathrobe. Another step down, and the cloth belt appears, tied around a narrow waist; two hairy hands hang on either side. A chest appears, the terry cloth embroidered with a monogram:
O.D
. The robe of the long-deceased fourth “was-band.” Another step reveals the face of Webster Carlton Westward III . Those bright brown root-beer eyes. A smile parts his face, pulling at the corners of his mouth, spreading them like a stage curtain, and this American specimen says, “Good morning, Hazie.”
    On the page, Lilly Hellman struggles in the cold, black void of space, dragging herself along the hull of the Friendship 7 , fighting her way back to the air lock.
    The Webster specimen opens a kitchen cabinet and collects the percolator. He pulls out a drawer and retrieves the power cord. He does each task on his first attempt, without hunting. He reaches into the icebox without looking and removes the metal can of coffee grounds. From another cabinet, he takes the morning tray—not the silver tea tray nor the dinner tray. It’s clear he knows what’s what in this household and where each item is hidden.
    This Webster C. Westward III appears to be a quick study. One of those clever, smiling young men Terrence Terry warned my Miss Kathie about. Those jackals. A magpie.
    Spooning coffee grounds into the percolator basket, the Webster specimen says, “If you’ll permit me to ask, Hazie, do you know whom you remind me of?”
    Without looking up from the page, Lilly suffocating in the freezing stratosphere, I say, Thelma Ritter .
    I was Thelma Ritter before Thelma Ritter was Thelma Ritter .
    To see how I walk, watch Ann Dvorak walk across the street in the film
Housewife
. You want to see me worried, watch how Miriam Hopkins puckers her brow in
Old Acquaintance
. Every hand gesture, every bit of physical business I ever perfected, some nobody came along and stole. Pier Angeli ’s laugh started out as my laugh. The way Gilda Gray dances the rumba, she swiped it from me. How Marilyn Monroe sings she got by hearing me.
    The damned copycats. There’s worse that people can steal from you than money.
    Someone steals your pearls and you can simply buy another strand. But if they steal your hairstyle, or the signature manner in which you throw a kiss, it’s much more difficult to replace.
    Back a long time ago, I was in motion pictures. Back before I met up with my Miss Kathie.
    Nowadays, I don’t laugh. I don’t sing or dance. Or kiss. My hair styles itself.
    It’s like Terrence Terry tried to warn Miss Kathie: the whole world consists of nothing but vultures and hyenas wanting to take a bite out of you. Your heart or tongue or violet eyes. To eat up just your best part for their breakfast.
    You want to see Tallulah Bankhead , not just her playing Julie Marsden in
Jezebel
, or being Regina Giddens in
The Little Foxes
, but the real Tallulah, you only need to watch Bette Davis in
All About Eve
. It was Joseph L. Mankiewicz who wrote Margo Channing based on his poor mother, the actress Johanna Blumenau , but it was Davis who cozied up to