CHAPTER TEN
– HOLLYWOOD BECKONS –
“The name’s Jackson. That’s my first name. Jackson Manquin Kennedy. Just like old JFK. But not president of as much as he was.”
The large man standing in the middle of the lounge of Fred’s flat had a flat head. It was perfectly level on the top, with sides like cliffs, and a jaw that was as straight as a railroad track. His shoulders were broad and his chest impressive. His belly was also something to write home about. It protruded a good eight centimetres over his belt partially concealing a large gold buckle in the shape of a bull.
Motioning with sweeping arm gestures he added: “This here’s Buck. And that’s Chuck. And that there’s F…..” He paused and frowned. “Now just you hold on there a minute. Whatever you might be thinking, that fellow next to Chuck is called ….. Franco.”
He then laughed loudly. “Buck. Chuck. And yeah, Franco.”
Jackson Manquin Kennedy had been introduced to Fred by his PR adviser as the president of a film studio based in Hollywood. JMK Studios.
“So, your man here tells me you want to be rich and famous across the pond too,” rasped Jackson Manquin Kennedy.
Fred was uncertain what to make of the studio president, or of his cohorts who stood around with fixed grins that showed teeth that were far too white. Of course he knew why they had come to see him and he had heard many times stories of how movie moguls and the like had trumpeted promises of untold riches to people just like him who had made a go of something that could be latched onto and made into something far greater and rewarding. But Jackson Manquin Kennedy was the first such person he had ever actually met and he was slightly taken aback by his confident approach which bordered on arrogance.
“Manquin?” said Fred. “I’ve never heard a name like that before. Where does it come from?”
“My momma’s side. She named me after the town in Virginia where she and my daddy met.”
Fred raised an eyebrow.
“Freddie, you don’t mind if I call you Freddie do you, my family were all over America,” Jackson Manquin Kennedy grabbed hold of the pause. “Everywhere. You name it, they were there. Made it big in many places. But it was in Manquin that my granddaddy really struck gold.”
“Oh,” Fred’s eyebrows were still arched.
“Yes siree, in Manquin my future was decided.”
It was Buck who plucked up the courage to smile and say to Fred: “The boss is real glad it wasn’t in one of the other towns that his granddaddy made good.”
Chuck chuckled. “There were other Virginia stopovers. Fanny, New Erection.”
The president still did not take his eyes off Fred.
“Don’t forget Ohio where they spent time in Knockemstiff,” joined in Franco. “And nearer to home there was Humptulips in Washington.”
Still Jackson Manquin Kennedy kept looking straight at Fred.
The others stopped talking. Nobody said anything.
Fred considered breaking the silence but the president spun around and faced his cohorts.
“At least we only spent a few days in Crapo in Maryland,” he barked.
More silence. Then Jackson Manquin Kennedy roared with belly laughter and Buck, Chuck and Franco joined in.
“Anyway,” he said when he finally calmed down, “it was in Manquin that my fate was decided. That was where my granddaddy began smelling eggs.”
Fred’s eyebrows dropped in a hurry. “Smelling eggs,” he said. “Did you say smelling eggs?”
“There you go,” said the president. “You’re doing the same as the people back then did. You’re beginning to wonder if I’m not right in the head. They thought that about my granddaddy too. But he sure showed them.”
“Yes,” was the best Fred could mutter.
“Egg smelling,” stated Jackson Manquin Kennedy. “I can guess by your reaction that you’ve never heard of egg smelling. Well let me tell you back then nobody else had heard of it either. Until, that is, granddad Kennedy started smelling them.”
“Yes,” Fred said again.
“Think about it Freddie. Apart from eating fried eggs for your breakfast what are they mainly used for? I’ll tell you. They are used in food products everywhere. And I mean every darn where. The yolks. The whites. Eggs are used in just about everything.”
Fred still was bemused. “Right,” he said. “I understand that. But what does that have to do with going around smelling eggs?”
“Don’t go making fun,” said the president. “I’ll tell you exactly what it has to do with it.” He hitched his gold bull buckle belt higher on his waist. It immediately slid down to where it was before.
“In just about every batch of eggs that are used in food stuffs there is likely to be a rotten one. And by golly you don’t want that bad egg to be used. Now, someone has to know what eggs are good and what might be bad.”
“You’re not serious?” said Fred breaking into the monologue.
“Absolutely,” Jackson Manquin Kennedy almost shouted. “Granddaddy Kennedy had the perfect nose for it. He could smell an off egg straight away.”
“You mean,” said Fred again, “that he made his fortune by sniffing in sulphuric pong for food processors?”
“Exactly,” said the president. “That’s exactly what he did. Like the latrine cleaners back in the days of old England he did the job that nobody else would do. But someone had to do it and my granddaddy did it. Not only did he do it but he had men and women all around the country doing it for him. Granddaddy Kennedy became the richest egg smeller in America back then. But it all began in Manquin, Virginia.”
“And that’s why your mother named you after it.”
“You’re dead right Freddie. My momma wanted Manquin to stay with the Kennedy family for ever.”
“That’s fantastic,” said Fred. “You should make a film about it.”
Jackson Manquin Kennedy shook a finger in Fred’s direction. “You’re a clever man Mr Freddie Nurk. That’s something I do indeed intend doing. Not right now but in the future. Something to leave for my descendents.”
Fred nodded. But he was not sure he would want his own children and their children to be recognised as the heirs to an egg smelling dynasty. Some people eh, he said to himself and once more raised his eyebrows.
“Talking about latrine cleaners,” said the president, “I want to help you make sure that your family in the future will always be famous for inventing toilet paper. Not just any old toilet paper but LIT-TISSUE.”
That made Fred sit up and take notice. He had not given that side of his future a thought. What would his children say, assuming he eventually did go the marriage route and that fatherhood followed, to their ancestry being traced back to toilet tissue? Fred Nurk the toilet tissue king. The Dunny Dad.
Fred recalled a small part of his own childhood. When he was at primary school, aged around ten or eleven, there was a boy at school whose family lived in one of the most salubrious suburbs in a noticeably very expensive house. His mother was prone to speaking in an affected snobbish tone and the boy himself was not backward in looking down on less fortunate classmates. The family as a whole presented themselves as faultless examples of the upper classes. There was only the one hitch though, one that they did all in their power, if not to entirely conceal, certainly to keep in the background.
It was in the days when indoor toilets were a privilege of the wealthy. Normal folk had to step outside and often walk down to the back fence to the outdoor toilet. Sometimes the toilet was further up the yard, closer to the rear of the house. But with all outdoor toilets there was the drum beneath the seat where the human waste was deposited. And that was collected by businesses hired by the local council once or twice a week. It was not sought after work.
However, there were some enterprising men who recognised an opportunity to capitalise and they reaped huge financial rewards. One of those men was the father of the boy with the turned up nose at Fred’s school. And as children the world over are quick to do he was dubbed the Dunny Man.
Decades later Fred recalled the time. The boy was mortified to such an extent that he left the school within a year, taken out by his mother who shunned the mothers of the boys who had dumped the Dunny Man label on her son. The thought that any children of his could be tagged similarly gave Fred much for worried thought.
“Freddie, are you listening?” Jackson Manquin Kennedy peered at Fred.
“Sorry, you were saying.” Fred separated his attention from his worrying reverie.
“I said, I want to make you rich and famous,” said the president of the JMK Studios “I want to put LIT-TISSUE and Mr Fred Nurk up in lights. Lights that will shine around the world. Lights that will be a beacon for brilliant young entrepreneurs everywhere. Lights that will show that with determination and imagination a man can become something. That a man can do something important that will change the everyday world of the everyday man and woman.”
“What’s that?” asked Fred somewhat mystified.
“Why LIT-TISSUE of course,” bellowed Jackson Manquin Kennedy.
Fred tried to smile. “I’m sorry,” he said again, “but I’m not entirely with you. Maybe I’m a little blinded by all the lights you’re shining at me. What exactly are you saying?”
The film company president looked hard at Fred for a few seconds and then began pacing around the room. He said nothing for more than a minute and then stopped across the room, turned and faced Fred, and hitched up his big gold belt buckle.
“There are times in a man’s life,” he began in earnest tones as the belt buckle slowly descended, “when something comes into view and a light goes off. Bam! He gets hit between the eyes. Bam! The idea strikes him with such force that he cannot resist the temptation, the impulse, the narcotic compulsion to grab it and run with it. To turn the idea into reality. To switch on that light. To bring it to life. To give it life.”
He stood very still and almost glared at Fred who could not hold his gaze and instead studied the floor at his feet, searching for something, anything, that would explain in detail what the big American was getting at. Exactly.
“Look at me,” said Jackson Manquin Kennedy finally. “What I want to do is to make a film of your life, the life of LIT-TISSUE and how you came to the decision to invent it and bring it to the world. A household world that will never be the same again. I want to bring LIT-TISSUE to the big screen.”
He stopped talking and sniffed twice and nodded at Fred. And then nodded some more. Buck, Chuck and Franco joined in with curt nods of their own.
“I get it,” said Fred cautiously. “You want to make a film about how LIT-TISSUE came about.” He paused. “A film about toilet paper. Albeit toilet paper with books published on it. But toilet paper nonetheless.”
Jackson Manquin Kennedy nodded so positively that his head almost became a blur.
“I can’t recall ever having seen a film,” continued Fred, “or heard of one, that centres around anything such as toilet tissues. Soap for instance. Or shampoo.”
There was a silence. He looked at Buck, Chuck and Franco who turned away and looked at the president.
“Ok,” said Fred, “there was a film called Shampoo, with Warren Beatty and Julie Christie in it I think, but that wasn’t a film about shampoo.”
Still there was silence.
Fred shrugged. “So what makes you think a film about toilet paper will be a hit?”
“The time.” Jackson Manquin Kennedy began stepping forwards closing in on where Fred was. “It is the time for such a movie. The world is on the brink of facing something very serious that will change our lives for ever. Climate change. The earth is warming and people are becoming more worried. If we are not careful, if we don’t do all we can now to try to reverse the situation or at least to halt it, the earth will go to pot. It is already going to pot.”
He kept walking slowly, taking little steps. “But in everyday life too there are major changes taking place. People are growing anxious. You witness it every single day. People are more and more rude. People are more and more looking for something to brighten their endangered lives. People are looking for things to take their minds off the dangers of the future. Especially when they are in contemplative mood.”
Jackson Manquin Kennedy was just a meter away from Fred when he suddenly slammed his hands together in front of his face. “Bam!” he shouted and clapped three more times. “Bam! Bam! Bam!”
Fred involuntarily took a step backwards.
“That’s when it hit me,” said the film studio president. “When are you the most contemplative? I’ll tell you. When you are in the can. When you are sitting doing your business in solitary confinement. That’s when your mind turns to serious thoughts. These days worrying thoughts. How is the world going to end? And that’s where LIT-TISSUE comes in.”
He straightened his back and squared his shoulders. “LIT-TISSUE will take their minds off these issues. LIT-TISSUE will allow them to think better thoughts, or at the very least to read the thoughts of others, characters in the books printed on the paper. And if the books are comedies or love stories then LIT-TISSUE will brighten the lives of those who read them. It is a brilliant idea. And you Fred Nurk are the brilliant mind behind it. That’s why I want to make a film about LIT-TISSUE and that’s why I am utterly convinced people in their millions will want to watch it.”
He ceased talking and reached to hitch his belt up but stopped mid-action apparently resigned to the reality that the big gold bull’s head was content to stay where it was, partly hidden by his protruding belly.
Fred could not argue. Well he could, but he assumed anything he said to counter the enthusiasm and determination of JMK Studios president Jackson Manquin Kennedy would be waste of time and breath. The thought that people might consider buying up LIT-TISSUE to take their minds off concerns as to how the world might end instead of simply to have something novel to do in the toilet was to him rather ridiculous. He recalled graffiti he had seen many years before in a public toilet that some wag had scribbled in biro on the inside of a cubicle door. Some come here to sit and think while others come here to shit and stink. He sided with the second group.
“Would I be correct in thinking that even if I didn’t want to go ahead with this project you would still make the film?” he said to the president.
“You are correct,” answered Jackson Manquin Kennedy. “I will make the movie. It’s a movie that needs to be made. But I want your help. Your experience. Your guidance. Your support.”
Fred had something to think about and an important decision to make.
He could accept the offer extended to him and play a part in the making of the film. By doing so he would be able to ensure that it was factual and not the usual Hollywood version of history which distorted details to such an extent that often the so-called document drama bore little resemblance to reality. As part of the team he would also be able to negotiate a financial return that reflected his integral participation.
On the other hand if he rejected the offer and the film maker went ahead as he said he would the result could very well end up a mishmash of fiction and fact that made him personally look ridiculous and the journey he had travelled to the LIT-TISSUE destination one of fantasy.
On the surface the choice appeared straightforward.
Fred looked at Jackson Manquin Kennedy and then at his colleagues Buck, Chuck and Franco and then back at Jackson Manquin Kennedy.
“You’re going to make the film with or without me,” he said. “So whatever I decide LIT-TISSUE and how it came into being is going to go up in lights to use your expression. And that, you say, will make everyone concerned with it lots and lots of money.”
Once again he glanced around the four Americans.
“Well, I wish you well with the project,” Fred continued. “And I sincerely hope you are an honest film maker and that the end result is true and not just a fictionalised account put together with the sole aim of making money.”
“You bet,” Jackson Manquin Kennedy said.
“But,” said Fred, “you are going to have to do it without me. I’m sorry but I can’t sign up to it. I’m sorry.”
Jackson Manquin Kennedy looked stunned. “But Freddie, you have to. LIT-TISSUE is you. You have to be a part of it. You are it.”
“Well, I’m not going to be part of it,” Fred answered.
“Why? Why not dammit?”
“I don’t want to see my name up on the big screen. I don’t need the money or the fame it might bring.”
“Freddie, Freddie, Freddie,” said Jackson Manquin Kennedy. “This is not just for the money. This is for posterity. This is for your kids, the people that come after you. This is their heritage, their history. You have to do it for them.”
“No. No I don’t. I really don’t. And if I’m to be absolutely honest with you I hate the thought that any children I might have could be badgered at school because their father was the dunny man who could forever be seen portrayed in a film. That would be going just that little bit too far.”
Jackson Manquin Kennedy shook his head exasperated. “Freddie….” He began.
“And please,” said Fred, “stop calling me Freddie. I’m not a frog and I hate the name. My name is Fred. Not Freddie. And just to repeat once and for all, I don’t want anything to do with a film. That’s my final decision.”
The president of JMK Studios said nothing for a while before saying: “That’s too bad. You could have been really big with this. You could have made a lot of money that you could have used any way you wished. If it’s too much for you then you could have given it to someone who needs it. But, as I said before I am going to make the film, and it is going to be a success, and you will become more famous whether you’re with us on it or not, and then you might wish that you had not been so hasty in rejecting what I consider to be a very generous proposition.”
Fred just shook his gently.
And in half an hour Jackson Manquin Kennedy, and Buck, Chuck and Franco were gone out of his life. And they remained out of his life, at least for the following seven months.
In that time LIT-TISSUE sales through supermarkets up and down the country continued to soar. Adverts appeared on buses and taxis, on billboards, in the press and of course of television. The LIT-TISSUE CHRONICLE was released to massive viewing figures. The first episode was watched by no fewer than twelve million and the critiques were without exception positive. The acting and direction may have had their faults but the story itself was hailed as exceptional.
The amount of money that poured into Fred’s business coffers was simply astounding. Fred himself had no idea of just how much it was. What he did know was that it was far more than he could possibly need or even want. There was nothing he could imagine that he wanted to buy for himself. He already had splurged in his view on a new car. The flat he originally rented he purchased. Otherwise when he needed money for anything he simply withdrew it. His solicitors and accountants looked after the real business side of things. However he had spent some of it.
The Noble Thrones at Bundingo had been added to. Every hut in the aboriginal community where the LIT-TISSUE idea had germinated was knocked down and rebuilt with brick. And every new dwelling had an indoor toilet, every single one of them with a lifetime supply of free LIT-TISSUE toilet paper.
The outdoor toilets were not dismantled though. They remained and were put to very good use. Thanks to Fred’s generosity and the fame that resulted Bundingo became a major tourist attraction in the region. Visitors came from all over the state, from out of state and even from overseas. Bundingo and its LIT-TISSUE latrines were firmly on the tourist map.
It was the joint efforts of Fred’s ambitious marketeer and public relations guru that led in part to Bundingo’s huge and still growing appeal.
Their slogan captured the imagination in a unique way:
See Bundingo from a Nobel Throne
AS YOU Drop in ON
Poo paradise
Even old Benjamin Thompson’s goanna steaks were selling like hot cakes.
He could not believe his luck.