Lois Chiles told to go to Hell from Robert Evans
mooreisbest
Posts: 49MI6 Agent
Has anyone read the brilliant book,"The Kid Stays in the Picture". It is about the life of Robert Evans, the legendary man who ran Paramount Pictures. The film is fantastic, but if you read the book you'll read about how he had an affair with a certain Doctor Goodhead, and how, Good Head or not, he soon dumped her when she turned nasty. Here is an extract:
"Hey, who the Hell are you?"
Doing an about face, she said "Chiles, Lois Chiles"
Still not understanding, "Yeah?"
"I'm doing a film with Ray Stark"
"One of Ray's jokes hey?"
"I'venever been a joke. Sydney Pollack is directing me: The Way we Were. It's Ray's, he must be a good friend. He gave me orders to break your spell"
Ray wasn't Hollywood's top producer by mistake. He was right, she was the only woman who could have. She did.
Moxie? The dame put the word to shame, in two days she moved in lock stock and barrel.
The chapter goes on with Lois wanting a part, the part in The Great Gatsby. When Evan's gets her a part in it, she goes crazy because it is not the part she wanted. The chapter ends:
Her voice was one I'd never heard before. "Jordan, you're telling me I'm Jordan? I want Daisy, do you hear? I want Daisy!
From seductress to witch in a blink. Shocked? Yeah.
"Thanks kid, you just put me through college, you earned it, now get the **** out!"
She didn't get out. "but we're leaving for Acapulco tomorrow..."
Cutting her off with the warmth of an iceberg, "You're lucky the elevator's near. Listen real close. I'm a memory. Got it! If we're in the same room, you don't see me. Got it! Now get the **** outta my life. Got it!"
The chapter ends there.
Oh well, I guess she doesn't talk to her film students about Robert Evans much...
"Hey, who the Hell are you?"
Doing an about face, she said "Chiles, Lois Chiles"
Still not understanding, "Yeah?"
"I'm doing a film with Ray Stark"
"One of Ray's jokes hey?"
"I'venever been a joke. Sydney Pollack is directing me: The Way we Were. It's Ray's, he must be a good friend. He gave me orders to break your spell"
Ray wasn't Hollywood's top producer by mistake. He was right, she was the only woman who could have. She did.
Moxie? The dame put the word to shame, in two days she moved in lock stock and barrel.
The chapter goes on with Lois wanting a part, the part in The Great Gatsby. When Evan's gets her a part in it, she goes crazy because it is not the part she wanted. The chapter ends:
Her voice was one I'd never heard before. "Jordan, you're telling me I'm Jordan? I want Daisy, do you hear? I want Daisy!
From seductress to witch in a blink. Shocked? Yeah.
"Thanks kid, you just put me through college, you earned it, now get the **** out!"
She didn't get out. "but we're leaving for Acapulco tomorrow..."
Cutting her off with the warmth of an iceberg, "You're lucky the elevator's near. Listen real close. I'm a memory. Got it! If we're in the same room, you don't see me. Got it! Now get the **** outta my life. Got it!"
The chapter ends there.
Oh well, I guess she doesn't talk to her film students about Robert Evans much...
Comments
Great story, Mooreisbest.
I haven't read the book, but I have seen the movie adaptation. It really is a fascinating memoir. Like him or not, and many don't for understandable reasons, Evans is one of the great movie moguls of all time. Really kind of a throwback to an earlier era, when the producer's name above a title was as significant as the director or star's. A modern-day Irving Thalberg, to whom Evans has been compared. When you look at the movies the guy has been involved in, it can't all be a happy coincidence.
I'm going to have to read the book. I know the film must have skipped over a lot of fascinating stuff. But anyone who hasn't seen the film really should, especially because Evans narrates it. He has a way of talking all his own. Dustin Hoffman, a close friend, apparently is reknowned for mimicking Evans at parties. In fact he does his Evans impression at the end of the film, if I recall, and was channeling Evans in his Wag the Dog role.
Anyway, I still think she is gorgeous, one of my favourite Bond girls. But then again, Moonraker is one of my favourite Bond films, so I am probably just demented!
I hope Chiles does warn her female acting students about lothario film producers and tells them not to put out until they've got the right part, or had that holiday in Acapulco.
Who knew that people used cheap B-movie dialogue in real life? 8-)
I'm with Drake. No doubt Evans was a brilliant producer -- he gets a lifetime pass based on Chinatown alone. But at the end of the day, who wants to read another book about an arrogant prick?
Right or wrong, and certainly uninformed, I'll side with Lois on this one.
Hold on there, gentlemen. Let's take another look at the stated facts before we assume the Hollywood producer (and an admittedly smarmy one at that -- but that's part of what makes him fun to read about) is the bad guy here. There's no evidence here of a pre-existing quid pro quo in which Evans verbally agreed beforehand to trading a part in Gatsby for a piece of Lois (or is that a piece of Gatsby for a part in Lois? ;% I'm so ashamed). Had there been, Lois' wrath would have been justified. But it sounds to me as if Lois offered herself to Bob with merely the unspoken assumption that Bob consults his penis when he casts his films. I guess she was only partly right, but I'd say she got more than she was ever entitled to for the roll -- at least as far as the role is concerned. So if Bob somehow turned the tables on her, I'd say the little golddigger had it coming. (Help -- I can't stop the sexually suggestive puns)
Maybe Evans has a small part, so she only got a small part. It was like for like, if you know what I mean. Nudge, nudge,
He had a run in with Sharon Stone, too. He 'conned' her into appearing in Sliver by making out Geena Davis was going to take the role. Davis had been in the frame for Basic Instinct and Stone gazumped her for it. So this news triggered Stone to do Sliver, a real dog of a film and later she learned of the ruse and put it about that Evans had a young woman chained up in his apartment for weeks on end or something...
He's also pretty sour about Francis Ford Coppola and makes out he did massive reedits on Godfather and its sequel to make the films better...
Roger Moore 1927-2017
Er... oh right; because that's a valid way of getting work! If you try to sleep with someone to get a job, I don't think you've got the moral high ground somehow!
Anyway, I'm sure this is all to be taken with a pinch of salt. I can't imagine he's the most reliable witness, but the book sounds like a lot of fun, nevertheless!
I was being fairly tongue in cheek. I should have used a smilie.
Agreed. I'd trust Evans as far as I could throw Francis Ford Coppola.
Ah; fair enough- tricky thing, the old tone of voice!
And tone of voice brings us back to Bob. He is without question one of the oiliest men on the planet. He's crude, and there's nothing light or sweet about him. He's the living embodiment of every stereotype of the tough-talking, starlet-preying, self-aggrandizing Hollywood producer. And yet the movies he produced read like a who's who of '70s cinema, both in terms of artistic and financial success. Maybe an ego like Evans' is what it takes to deal with the egos of the folks onscreen or behind the camera. But then again, maybe it's an image as carefully crafted as those of the stars. When you're flat broke and a Hollywood outcast and a star of Jack Nicholson's magnitude buys your house out of bankruptcy and gives it back to you, there has to be something there.