LITMIR.BIZ

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      Century Comedies, where even in my wildest dreams I could never have envisioned myself working, was situated on the southeast corner of Sunset and Gower, about a mile from where we were staying. The exact address was 6100 Sunset. On the west side of the street stood Christie Studios and there was an Italian restaurant called The Napoli on the north side of the intersection. The food was very good, but I would come to wish I had never eaten one meal there.

      In the old days, the Century Studios property was a rambling farm complete with a huge barn and outbuildings. When Julius Stern and his brother Abe bought and turned it into a movie studio, they tore down just about everything but the barn and rebuilt a bunch of structures. When we finally reached the entrance to the main office, housed in a small bungalow, adrenaline began coursing through me.

      Papa ambled through the door first. As I had to do in most doorways, I bent over to make my way inside. But in my excitement, I miscalculated and smacked my head hard. When I was no longer seeing stars, the first thing I remember was a sweet, smoky odor. Soon I would learn that that was the sharp smell of raw film.

      The bungalow’s unpainted interior contained two desks piled high with papers, long black pieces of film, photos, and newspaper and magazine clippings. Unlike our home in El Paso, which was always impeccably neat, that place was unbelievably cluttered. It was such a mess that I thought if Mama were there she would have grabbed me by the arm and taken me home on the next train.

      “What do you want?” asked the woman seated behind one of the desks.

      Papa and I froze in our tracks. I would learn that that crotchety woman was Kitty, the secretary to the Stern Brothers. She was about Mama’s age and spoke with dramatic flair in a nasal New York accent. Kitty was a block of a woman, as tall as she was wide. She had a pointy nose and chin to match, which made me think of her as a witch who guarded a bridge in some German fairy tale. She wore a plain black dress that was so large I imagined that under it she stored her broom, her cauldron, and a squad of evil gnomes who did her nasty bidding.

      “What do you want?” she asked again in a now impatient tone.

      I wanted to leave and come back another time.

      Papa shook his head as if tasting a shot of strong schnapps and tried to remember the purpose of our visit. The woman in the black dress put me off; I thought she was rude and I didn’t like her. First impressions can be deceiving. Mine certainly were about Kitty.

      “Ahem,” he made a noise to clear his throat. “I’m Mr. Erlich and this is my son, Jacob. We have an appointment with Julius Stern. We were referred by Mr. Meyers and Mr. Ash.”

      “Of course.” Kitty knew exactly who we were and why we were there. Her belligerence was just for show, a weird initiation rite for newcomers to Century Comedies. “Please have a seat. Mr. Stern will be here soon.”

      As commanded, Papa sat down in one of two wooden, canvas-backed picnic chairs placed in front of one of the desks. Because of my dimensions and all the furniture I had broken in the past, I had gotten quite adept at assessing whether or not a chair could hold me. That time, because of my nervousness, the novelty of the surroundings, and Kitty’s intensity, I forgot to look before I sat. The chair collapsed. I tumbled backwards. I felt more embarrassed than hurt by that fall.

      Kitty ran to my side and bent down. “You poor thing, are you okay?”

      Papa stared at me in amazement. I felt mortified and unsure whether or not I could trust her. I knew that I was blushing in the shade of Purim carnival: candy-apple red.

      “You shouldn’t worry. People fall out of chairs all the time here,” Kitty said with a disarming sarcasm and a coquette’s wink, extending a hand to help me to my feet. I refused it.

      “I’m fine! I’m fine!” I protested to the woman who would become my ally, confidant, and friend.

      Kitty would teach me the ins and outs of Century Comedies. You see, she had been working at the studio since it opened, and had become the Stern’s right-hand man. As such, she truly knew the ropes.

      I rolled to my right and looked up at Papa and Kitty and was startled to see a strange little bit of a man who seemed to have materialized out of thin air. I felt awkward as a newborn giraffe when I clambered to my feet.

      “Stern is my name; Julius Stern,” he said, introducing himself. He had a German accent and a voice that was so commanding I felt my heels click together of their own accord as he spoke. I would meet a lot of memorable, tough people during my time in Hollywood, but Julius Stern was among the most memorable and the toughest.

      Stern was in his midforties, barrel-chested, and bald. He wore thick spectacles that magnified the small brown eyes set deep in his orange-shaped head. He and his brother were sticklers for the rules of fashion. No matter the time of year, Julius was always formally dressed with starched collar and necktie. Since it was summer, he wore a straw boater and white shoes.

      “Let me show you around the place,” he said, opening the bungalow’s rear door.

      “Mind your head,” I heard Kitty say with a chuckle.

      Thinking she was a royal pain, I gritted my teeth and did my best to ignore her. Then Stern, Papa, and I stepped into the back lot and my future. We moved along on a raised wooden walkway painted white that snaked past several framed bungalows. In front of one of them I saw a stack of round silver cans.

      “Those tins contain our bread and butter,” Stern said. “They each hold a finished movie.”

      I was flooded with all of the new sights and sounds. We walked a bit farther to a large building. Coming out of it I saw spear-carrying gladiators, harem girls, and a backdrop of an alpine meadow strewn with edelweiss that two painters expertly carted by us.

      “That’s our prop department,” Stern explained. “It’s huge. It has to be. We need a lot of backgrounds and props because we produce all kinds of serials. You name it: Westerns, jungle adventures, mysteries, even animal flickers. Speaking of animal pictures, here at Century we’ve even got our own zoo with our own bull handler.” Then we walked by the largest structure at the studio. “You know, this old barn was part of the original property. It’s so big I run several crews in there at the same time,” he said.

      I was impressed by the immensity and scale of all that I saw. I had never been exposed to anything like it before. I wanted to stop the tour and start working as soon as I could. If I knew what was shortly to take place, I would have been more patient.

      We moved to an area with two huge, windowless sound stages. On their respective doors, one had a large painted letter A and the other a large painted letter B. Stern opened door A and we entered.

      The space was huge. Several movie crews were working at the same time. We stopped and observed one of them. A half-dozen musicians played for a romantic interlude, acted out by two young actors. I noticed Papa was looking away; he seemed embarrassed. I imagined myself playing the part of the dashing leading man, embracing the pretty ingénue. That’s how naive I was in those days. The scene was framed by blinding lights and captured on film by a hand-cranked Lytax camera and crew of ten.

      Everyone we passed stopped to stare at me. I liked the fact that an instant later they returned to what they were doing, as if I wasn’t even there.

      After we left the sound stage, we continued walking for another five minutes, during which Stern didn’t say a word. I wondered what he was thinking. Maybe he was having second thoughts about his talent scouts’ decision to hire me. We wound our way back to the building that contained the prop department. But this time we entered it and stopped in front of a rack with suits, coats, uniforms, and capes. Though the costumes gave off a very musty smell, just looking at them filled me with anticipation: I wondered which ones I would wear and when they would teach me to act. A short woman with a wrinkled, yellow tape measure draped around her shoulders sat in front of the rack. She looked like a cross between a gypsy queen and somebody’s grandmother. The woman gazed up at me with a look of astonishment that quickly transformed into panic.

      “This

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