“Take me to the Beverly Hills Hotel,” says Gore. “We’ll have dinner in the Polo Lounge.”
We’ve been driving around this famous suburb, not far from Gore’s house in the Hollywood Hills. He asks me to stop in front of some mansion: tall palm trees, an immense, well-manicured garden, fountains. “Rock Hudson took me to a party at this house, in the fifties. I got a blow job from some young actor, not Rock, behind the most beautiful flowering bush in the world, under a spray of stars. Hollywood stars.”
He seems wistful today. We park at the hotel, walk behind the main building where the bungalows huddle under palms. “My horrible mother lived in one of these. She was having an affair with this or that leading man. Clark Gable was among them. I don’t know where she got the money. But she always knew where to find it. It was her great gift in life, apart from holding her liquor. No amount of alcohol toppled her. Then again, it wasn’t hard to topple her into bed, if that’s what you wanted.”
Sitting by the pool, Gore orders a cocktail. “I rarely drink cocktails, as they make me sick. But here, it’s different. The years fall away. I came here after the war. Mother introduced me to Jules Stein, who owned Hollywood in those days. He got me passes to all the lots. I met stars and more stars. I understood, from Jules, that there was money in these Beverly Hills, and that I should learn to write scripts. So I did. Very carefully I read scripts and saw what had to be done. Not much, as it turned out. Good dialogue, movement, some plot. Not too much plot. It’s been the death of films, all of this plotting.”
At the Polo Lounge, the head waiter knows Gore by name. He bows and scrapes. “I’ve been eating here for half a century,” Gore says. “I like the formality. They once kicked out Marlene Dietrich, who dared to step into the room in pants. Women didn’t wear pants in those days. Her partner was Hemingway that night. He was probably wearing a skirt. You know Hem. Boys will be girls.”
He sips another cocktail, a sidecar. It’s something Howard likes to make. “I shouldn’t be drinking this,” he says, then tells me that the Watergate scandal started here, with a call from G. Gordon Liddy to Jeb Magruder, a ranking officer on the Committee to Re-Elect the President. “I associate this room with Nixon’s downfall, so it makes me happy. On the other hand, my mother ate over there.” He points to a corner table. “It was always empty when she was around. It was her table.”
Gore doesn’t seem happy, and I ask what’s wrong. “I get the blues here. I don’t know why. Something about the history, my history. Or American history. Isn’t that enough to make anyone sad?”