The Godfather

 “The Godfather” By Mario Puzo
 
154
happens. I won’t be able to sing for a month now. But I’ll get over the hoarseness in a 
couple of days.” 
Nino said thoughtfully, “Tough, huh?” 
Johnny shrugged. “Listen, Nino, don’t get too drunk tonight. You have to show these 
Hollywood broads that my paisan buddy ain’t weak in the poop. You gotta come across. 
Remember, some of these dames are very powerful in movies, they can get you work. It 
doesn’t hurt to be charming after you knock off a piece.” 
Nino was already pouring himself a drink. “I’m always charming,” he said. He drained 
the glass. Grinning, he asked, “No kidding, can you really get me close to Deanna 
Dunn?” 
“Don’t be so anxious,” Johnny said. “It’s not going to be like you think.” 
* * *
The Hollywood Movie Star Lonely Hearts Club (so called by the young juvenile leads 
whose attendance was mandatory) met every Friday night at the palatial, studio-owned 
home of Roy McElroy, press agent or rather public relations counsel for the Woltz 
International Film Corporation. Actually, though it was McElroy’s open house party, the 
idea had come from the practical brain of Jack Woltz himself. Some of his 
money-making movie stars were getting older now. Without the help of special lights 
and genius makeup men they looked their age. They were having problems. They had 
also become, to some extent, desensitized physically and mentally. They could no 
longer “fall in love.” They could no longer assume the role of hunted women. They had 
been made too imperious; by money, by fame, by their former beauty. Woltz gave his 
parties so that it would be easier for them to pick up lovers, one-night stands, who, if 
they had the stuff, could graduate into full-time bed partners and so work their way 
upward. Since the action sometimes degenerated into brawls or sexual excess that led 
to trouble with the police, Woltz decided to hold the parties in the house of the public 
relation counselor, who would be right there to fix things up, pay off newsmen and police 
officers and keep everything quiet. 
For certain virile young male actors on the studio payroll who had not yet achieved 
stardom or featured roles, attendance at the Friday night parties was not always 
pleasant duty. This was explained by the fact that a new film yet to be released by the 
studio would be shown at the party. In fact that was the excuse for the party itself. 
People would say, “Let’s go over to see what the new picture so and so made is like.” 

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