“How could you do it to yourself and the studio? You fired him for putting messages in your pictures. Now you take him back as head man. You don’t agree with anything he stands for. But you’ve given him the power to do as he likes, and he’ll get you out.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. Besides, who else was there?”
I’d never seen fear in his face before. I saw it then. Before he left, he invited me to breakfast the next morning at his house on Benedict Canyon. I guessed what would happen there.
We were having a second cup of coffee when the doorbell rang. Somebody came in. I didn’t turn around. “Dore just arrived,” Mayer said. “Will you speak to him?” Of course. Moving into the library where Schary was waiting, Louis muttered a brief hello, then left us.
“You were mighty hard on me, weren’t you?” asked Schary.
“I intended to be,” I said. “I think messages should be sent by Western Union. I don’t believe they have any place in motion pictures. Your politics should be a thing apart from your business.”
“If I promise to put no more messages in my pictures, will you be my friend?”
“Yes. But I doubt whether you can. You’re too full of your own ideas.”
“You have my promise. Will you shake hands on that?” We shook hands, but I gave him fair warning: “The moment you start putting messages in, I’ll be on your back again.” But, sure enough, the “message” pictures got into production again.
This was the time that Ida Koverman faced stark poverty through her prolonged illness. She had to have a job. I went to Schary and asked him to take her back on the payroll. He was only too willing to have her. He needed her.