I'll Buy That

Is there any better a time than now to tell the story of "Two Hours In The Life of George Washington"?

TWO HOURS IN THE LIFE OF GEORGE WASHINGTON
Back in 1979-1981, when I was living in Denver, a few years before I bought the book about George Washington at the used book/map store in NYC near to where I worked (see my October 31st blog), and about 15 years before the President Clinton/Monica Lewinsky sex scandal (a tale perhaps forever silenced from David Letterman's lips in light of his own "sex scandal"), I tried to make a strange little movie called, "Two Hours In The Life of George Washington".

The idea was, it would be a 45-minute, real-time movie, except for a missing hour and 15 minutes left to the imagination when George Washington goes to the barn for a secret sex rendezvous with a woman who wasn't Martha. The rest of the movie, George and Martha would be sitting next to each other on a cheap, ripped upholstery couch, Martha knitting in a manner that occasionally caused George to quickly duck his head away. One sensed unexpressed tension. Perhaps Martha was even angry about something. And so 45 minutes would pass. I was perhaps influenced in part by my knowledge of a Warhol film where one watches someone sleeping for hours in real-time.

I called up Carl Zucker, who once sat in a two-person office area with me, back when we worked for Lennon's friend and NYC tour guide, Howard Smith. Carl had been Woody Allen's locations manager on "Interiors". Carl said he liked my idea, and thought that a place he knew in Tennessee might be appropriate. A little bit later Woody Allen made "A Midsummer Night's Sex Comedy," and based on the substantial degree to which I have been an influence on Woody Allen, I have to think his movie started with my movie. Or the movie I wanted to make, that is.

Digression
For a very long time Woody Allen's girlfriend was Mia Farrow, who lived in The Dakota in NYC, where John Lennon and Yoko Ono lived, a fact almost certainly of no relevance here. On the same day that Allen's public problems with Farrow first broke in the papers, I was sitting in my co-op living room talking with Allen's then-locations manager, Drew Dillard, who was considering it for Allen's next movie. Outside the window about a block away you could see a little restaurant called El Faro, and also the restaurant sign. You might want to zoom in. Or not. I mean, it was a reasonably nice restaurant sign. Dillard told me to expect to see Diane Keaton replacing Farrow. According to what I later read, even Keaton hadn't been told of this at that point in time. However, I digress. Let me travel back in time and label this paragraph accordingly.

Back To Our Story
For the George Washington part I called up Ken Hanson (Hansen?), with whom I also used to sit in a two-person office area, back when I worked for a company that distributed on the college circuit "Magical Mystery Tour," "The Beatles At Shea Stadium," and other movies. Ken's brother had been a good friend of Yoko Ono's before she met John Lennon, and according to Ken, John and Yoko once gave his brother a tape recorder and a camera. Ken had been the right hand of Peter Max, until someone spiked his drink with LSD and he didn't want to be around anymore, and so said goodbye to Peter Max. Ken went on to run a seven-story art gallery in the Wall Street area, where he displayed the original artwork that was used to advertise Ridley Scott's "Alien," as well as the original artwork that was used for the album covers of a group called, "Slave". Ken agreed to play George Washington.

I now needed to raise about $25,000. This was the part that had doomed the project from the start. I really didn't expect to get an actual backer. And I was right. Nevertheless, I called up Harley Lewin (see my blog of October 11, 2009), a big rock lawyer I had worked for. He sounded interested (not interested enough). However, he did stay in for five phone calls or so. I think he must have thought I might eventually get other backers involved as well. I called up Harley a few years ago and mentioned "Two Hours In The Life Of George Washington". I wasn't still trying to raise money, I was calling for some other reason. He still sounded interested in that movie.

And that was as far as it went.

Perhaps some day the world will truly be ready for a president with a sex scandal and Lewin and Hanson and Zucker and me and so on. Or maybe not. I was perhaps more happy than anyone when the day did finally come where you didn't need a lot to put together a movie.