Exploiting Hollywood 1980

"Where was Lone Dove filmed?" Ronald called Paula Wagner to ask her about the filming location of the mini-series that Diane was involved in.

In this TV series, Diane is the heroine, Lorena, a "salon girl" in a small Texas town. There are two male protagonists, one is Gus played by Robert Duvall, and the other is Woodrow played by Tommy Lee Jones. Both characters are retired Texas Light Cavalry war heroes and current cowboys.

"In the wilderness around the town near Bastrop State Park in Texas, are you going to visit Diane?" Paula was a little surprised.

"Yes, tell me how to get there, contact the crew, and I'll go see Diane."

"You have to fly to Austin, Texas, and then transfer from there. It's on Highway 674 near Bastrop State Park, called Alamo Village. You'll know you've arrived when you get to the dusty place. Forget it, I'll go with you. That place is too hard to find. Before we go, I'll call producer Susan..."

Paula Wagner said halfway, and then realized that she had to be more active in Diane's affairs. Ronald rarely visited such a far place.

"That's great, I won't get lost with you. What are the filming conditions there? Should I bring anything?"

In fact, Ronald went to Lone Dove to visit the crew, in addition to seeing Diane, and another purpose was to talk to Robert Duvall, who played Gus. Ronald also consulted his agent Niceta before he found him. He was more familiar with the network of these veteran actors than he was.

Before becoming an actor, Duvall had a stable job at the post office. After quitting his job to pursue his dream of acting, he found another actor who had already begun to make a name for himself in New York. Duvall, who had little money, rented a room in his house at a very cheap price.

The actor also introduced him to audition for Arthur Miller's play. In the end, both of them were chosen and co-starred in a new play. As a result, he became famous on Broadway. Later, he was chosen by Coppola to play the Godfather. He became famous for his role as the Godfather's adopted son, Tom Hagin, the military advisor.

The actor who helped him also found his own place in Hollywood, played many tough guy roles, and finally became an Oscar winner because of "The Internet".

This actor is Gene Hackman, the guy who got the script adaptation rights for "The Silence of the Lambs".

...

"Is it not here yet?" Ronald looked at his watch. After getting off the business plane, they had been driving along Highway 674 for two hours, and then turned onto the dirt road in the countryside, driving at a low speed on the bumpy road.

"It's almost there. Haven't you noticed that the dust is getting bigger and bigger?" Paula Wagner picked up the radio and asked the vehicle in front of her, "Rick, when can we get there?"

"It's almost there. The driver said that he has been there several times. It's only a dozen minutes' journey."

"Let's work harder and take a good shower when we get there." Paula Wagner turned on the public channel and shouted to the trucks and SUVs in front and behind the convoy.

"Lonely Dove" is a project strongly promoted by CAA. One of the producers is Suzanne De Passe, a rare female producer in the television industry. For her career dream, she put everything into the filming.

She not only lobbied the TV station and CAA, but also persuaded Robert Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones, two acting stars, to join. It was also after she saw Diane that she asked Paula for an audition.

But although she was ambitious and motivated, De Passe knew nothing about television production, so the crew had no experience in security, many necessary things were not prepared, and the budget was estimated to be hundreds of thousands less. In order to fill the gap, Susan even worked for Motown Records and produced a Christmas special for them.

After learning all this, Ronald wanted to show his kindness to Duval first, and let Diane live a better life during the months of filming. Through his good relationship with the Navy, he rented a mobile toilet from the nearby military base, purchased a large amount of supplies in Austin, and gathered several large trucks to drive all the way to comfort the crew.

"Ding ding..." The convoy arrived at the filming location, Alamo Village. The convoy parked one by one. A naughty truck driver also blew the whistle, and the sound was heard far away in the wilderness.

"Who the hell are you? Who told you to blow the whistle here? We are filming, don't you know? Where is the mayor of Alamo Village? This bastard took our money and never showed up again, causing people to interfere with the filming every time."

A woman with a darker skin color and a loud and direct voice walked over quickly, pointed at the convoy and started to curse. Mini-series recorded live are most afraid of this kind of modern sound interference. At that time, there were only the neighing of horses and cows in Texas. As soon as the whistle sounded, today's scene was shot in vain, at least there would be a re-dubbing afterwards.

"Susan, it's me." Paula jumped out of the car and hugged the producer Susan.

"Oh, you are finally here, we don't have to solve it in the bushes." Susan De Paz immediately changed her face and walked to the trailer behind to look at the two mobile toilets. The military production is really good.

"This is Ronald, he funded you to add some equipment and supplies." Paula introduced Ronald, the sponsor of all this to Susan.

"Aha, it's you. I like you so much. The women in your movies are so independent and strong." Susan, who has Jamaican descent, burst out with her Latino nature and hugged Ronald enthusiastically.

"The crew filmed the scene today very smoothly, except for just now... Anyway, the director said that we can go home after one more shot." Susan said, leading everyone in front to the real shooting location.

It was a wilderness, and the land was golden under the setting sun. It looked beautiful, but it was actually very dirty. There was a stream next to it, and there were several tents by the stream. Several people were standing by the tents, and there was a camera not far away on the other side.

"Simon, Simon, our stuff is here..." Susan shouted at the director Simon Winchel behind the camera.

"What is it?"

"It's what I told you about. Someone sent us a batch of stuff, mobile toilets, refrigerators, mobile grills, and a lot of food and Coke."

"Ronald..."

Susan was explaining to the director and crew, and a girl wearing a long skirt from the Westward Movement screamed and ran over here quickly.

Diane had red hair, braided into two pigtails and coiled on her head. She was wrapped up tightly, but her waist still showed her great figure. She rushed over happily and jumped on Ronald.

"Hahaha..." Ronald put his right hand under her knees, picked her up horizontally and turned her around twice. Diane's joy also infected him, and everyone laughed inexplicably.

Ronald treated everyone to a meal of pizza and Coke that was still warm in the trailer camp. The filming looked very difficult, and even big-name actors like Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones ate very happily.

"It was 1958, not long after I retired from the Marine Corps, and I slept in the guest bedroom. Gene was married at that time, and he and Fee lived in the master bedroom. Later, there was a guy from California who slept on the living room floor, that is, Dustin Hoffman."

Robert Duvall knew Ronald's purpose and talked about the past with Ronald in the trailer. He, Hackman and Hoffman were all friends before they became successful. Gene Hackman was very careful about his privacy, so he didn't make any real friends after he became famous, and he just kept in touch with two old friends.

"Later, he and Fee couldn't stand it anymore, so they paid for Dustin and me to find a youth apartment on the sixth floor without an elevator at the intersection of 109th Street and Broadway. Not long after we moved in, Fee became pregnant, and that was his son Chris, and later we had two daughters."

Duvall was a little nostalgic when talking about the past many years ago, which was very different from the tough guy Gus he played in Lonesome Dove.

Duval was in a good mood today. Thanks to the mobile refrigerator and mobile toilet sent by Ronald, the conditions for filming in the wild were improved a lot. He agreed to help Ronald's idea and said that he would call Gene Hackman in the evening.

...

"It's great that you are here. I can get off work early and rest for a while. The filming here is really intense. This is my first time filming a TV series. They filmed so fast."

Back to the hotel in the town, Ronald and Diane lived together. After taking a shower, Diane smelled fragrant and lay in Ronald's arms to talk.

"Is it because you have never filmed a low-cost movie?" Ronald laughed. Diane has filmed regular Hollywood productions since her debut. She has never tried the kind of movies that Roger Corman made.

"We have to shoot eleven pages of scripts a day. There is no time to figure out the role by ourselves. Many places rely on experience. Fortunately, I got the original version to read before filming, otherwise many places in the script, the behavior of the characters are not very logical."

"Eleven pages? That's too fast. Are you too tired? I see your hair is split." Ronald combed Diane's red hair with his hands.

Diane's hair was originally dark brown, but in order to play the role well, she deliberately made it red, which is the hair color of girls that represents passion and impulse in American culture.

"The environment is too bad. We are in the dust every day. The food we eat is often visited by ants and bees. Sometimes we have to solve it in the bushes..."

"Do you regret it a little?" Ronald thought to himself. It seems that the pressure of shooting TV series is greater than that of movies. There are eleven pages of scripts every day, and the shooting is very fast. Now when I shoot movies, I only have one or two pages a day.

"Fortunately, they have a good vision and chose Duvall and Tommy Lee Jones to play the two protagonists, especially Duvall. His personality seems to be exactly the same as the protagonist Gus..."

Diane plays a prostitute who does sex trade in town, but finally falls in love with Gus, an old cowboy who respects her. In the end, she drove cattle to Montana to sell with this old cowboy, and took his ashes back to his hometown after Gus died.

"Hehe..." Ronald laughed. Obviously Robert Duvall's personality is not like this. Some experienced actors will stay in the role when filming such a tight schedule, which will improve efficiency.

"What are you laughing at? Are you jealous because he and I are playing a couple?" Diane buried her head in Ronald's chest. It was warm here and she didn't want to come out. Today, Ronald specially escorted things and rushed to visit her, which touched her very much.

"I just find it strange. Why would your character be attracted to an old man like Gus? And give up his comfortable life to drive cattle? I don't. Wouldn't the audience find it strange? There are obviously young and handsome cowboys." Ronald saw several very handsome young actors wearing cowboy costumes in the crew.

"This is really good. At that time, if girls wanted to escape from rural life, they had only one option, which was to become a prostitute. They had the opportunity to leave their hometown and go to the big city to have a look.

But this kind of life is not something to be envied.

Like Lorena, the character I played, the men in the town only talked to her for one reason...Except for Gus, the veteran who participated in the war, he would come to the salon to play cards with her, talk to her, and treat her as a respected woman."

"So that's how it is...Are you having any difficulties here? Need anything? I'll have someone send it to you. By the way, cowboy scenes, can you ride a horse?"

"Yes, I did a western when I was fourteen, but that movie was very traditional, and it was very exciting to shoot with Burt Lancaster."

Diane's filming was very hard, and she often had to shoot night scenes non-stop. In this rural Texas, there was no one from the actors' union to claim power. With the comfortable feeling of Ronald's warm hands combing her hair, Diane's breathing gradually slowed down, and she calmed down from the intense filming.

Finally, she fell asleep with a smile on her face. Ronald gently held her, moved her to the bed, and covered her with a blanket.

It was also helpless to film in such a remote place. America's national logistics network is supported by highway trucks and air shipping. So no matter which state's countryside, it is easy to see highways, trucks, and airplane contrails in the sky.

Once there is a truck horn or an airplane contrail, the scene will be exposed and re-shot. So the crew can only come to this place to shoot. This place is near the Austin military base, and civil aviation will not come here unless it is necessary. The village is in the opposite direction of the base's air force training, and there are usually no airplane contrail.

...

The next morning, Diane woke up and saw the breakfast that Ronald found. After eating hurriedly, they were about to set off to shoot the morning scene. Diane kissed Ronald on the face several times in embarrassment, "When I finish filming, I will spend a few days with you to make it up to you."

When he arrived at the set, Robert Duvall was already waiting for him there.

"I talked to Gene (Hackman) on the phone last night, and he promised to meet with you once to consider letting you take charge of the production rights of "The Silence of the Lambs."

"Thank you very much." Ronald immediately thanked him when he heard that the words of an old friend were still effective.

"These things you brought us are a great help..." Duvall pointed to the mobile toilet, "We have to be careful of ants and bees when we go to the toilet here..."

"Uh..." Ronald didn't expect that the actors were so happy with his last-minute idea. Can his company build a batch of such equipment for those big crews in the future?

"He and Fei divorced two years ago, and now live in Santa Fe, New Mexico. This is the address." Duvall laughed for a while and handed over a note.

"Santa Fe..." Ronald looked at the address. Hackman didn't live in Los Angeles, but lived in this place. It seemed that Niceta had asked about it. It was true that this person was difficult to work with.

"Gene likes to check the directors and actors he works with. Don't be scared by him." Duval also smiled, patted Ronald on the shoulder, and turned back to get ready.

"Ronnie..." Diane came up to say goodbye to Ronald.

Looking at the departing motorcade, Diane touched her hair, feeling a little unconfident. Did Ronald not like it after dyeing it red? He seemed to prefer blonde hair?