While for the American film industry the depression years were characterized by rapid growth, the war years saw an uneven mix of patriotism, profit, and propaganda. From the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor until peace was declared, the studios faced a number of conditions that attenuated their bottom lines. Shortages, price inflation, rationing, the loss of contract talent to various organizations comprising the war effort, and governmental pressure to produce films intended to "educate" the public all combined to diminish studio output and income.
Having a punctured eardrum at the time of his enlistment, actor Fred MacMurray was rejected from the armed services. While he did much during this time to support the war effort, he also worked almost constantly, in part due to the dearth of available leading men. In 1943 he became the highest paid actor in Hollywood. Under contract to Adolph Zukor's Paramount Pictures, Fred starred in three releases (all comedies) and four films slated for release in 1944, one of which is the still incomparable Double Indemnity, the third film of screenwriter-turned-director Billy Wilder. So, in the middle months of 1944, with his contract set to expire early the next year, Fred asked Paramount for a raise.
On June the sixth of 1944, the Allies invaded Normandy. By the time Double Indemnity was released on the sixth of September (an immediate hit), Paris had been liberated by the French Resistance, the French Forces of the Interior, and the U.S. 4th Infantry Division. Fred’s wife Lillian thought this was reason to host a party.
Constitutionally, Fred regretted any breach of the monthly budget (a trait that over time earned him the moniker "the thrifty multimillionaire"). But this month, as naturally disinclined as he was to the frivolous expenditure of a party, he was preternaturally inclined to the just-as-frivolous expenditure of a new fishing pole, one he had seen advertised in the previous month’s Field and Stream, and the money for which he had quietly earmarked from the present budget. First, Fred tried to dissuade Lillian with specious objections: her frail health made such an undertaking tentative, his request for a raise had received no counteroffer, no offers from other studios had yet been tendered. To no avail. He then suggested they delay the date until the following month when they could better prepare. Lillian held her ground. Refusing to cut bait, Fred then did what any red-blooded outdoorsman in Fred’s hip boots would have done after losing his new rod and reel; he waded deeper into the river to get it back.
From each of the prior parties they had thrown, Fred remembered a preponderance of leftovers, all of which were given away to the hired staff at the end of the night. Thinking himself this time able to order close enough to the bone to thereby save the cost of his fishing pole, he insisted on making the catering and bar arrangements. Using a simplified actuarial technique to determine probable liabilities, one he had read of in Reader’s Digest, Fred made tabulations from the list of invitees based on the eating and drinking habits he’d observed while working and socializing with them. For example, while it was likely(1) that Claudette Colbert would eat(1), it was likelier(2) that Judy Garland would not(0), and likeliest(3) that Sydney Greenstreet would eat twice(2). However unsound this method, it did deliver a reasonable total. The madness only became clear when estimating the amount of alcohol, and by then it was too late. Not only was Fred a homebody and forced to guess at the drinking habits of many, but the sums he derived varied widely depending on the inclusion of certain unpredictable outliers, such as the length of time William Holden was figured stay. Exasperated, Fred decided to chance it, and he ordered for the party ninety percent of what had been invoiced for last one plus an option to take fifteen percent more the night of, guaranteed delivered within thirty minutes, but for a budget crushing twenty percent surcharge.
The evening of the party arrived, and Fred’s calculations suffered an early setback. In attendance were actors, actresses, directors, producers, and moguls in excess of original invitees, attesting to the high esteem in which the industry held both Fred and parties. The temperature, warm for late September, also conspired against him—though promising for the adequacy of the food, it boded ill for the amount of alcohol. Whatever few fledgling hopes Fred managed to maintain aloft in this regard were bluntly shotgunned out of the sky by the arrival of Dana Andrews, who also had not been invited. Though this exempted Fred’s actuarial abilities under the clause of force majeure, it was hardly a consolation. After the customary greetings, Fred sulked up to the house to telephone the distributer for his optional fifteen percent.
In the interim, as the last drink for a time was leaving the bar, producer Samuel Goldwyn arrived, riding high on both the promising returns from his recently released Up in Arms and the publicity its independent premiere had attracted to his antitrust battle against the monopolization of motion picture distribution by the Big Five studios. As a nod to when his star was rising at MGM in the 20s, he decided to wear a reprise of an equestrian outfit he then favored. But due to the high production costs of his most recent venture, Goldwyn’s current fiscal underpinnings were much thinner than his physical ones. So, for this iteration, he instructed his tailor, Jerome Chisl, of the Hollywood clothier Gull & Chisl, to use only materials that he could find in wardrobe at Goldwyn Productions. This decision proved catastrophic.
Due mostly to war-time shortages, the costume Chisl fashioned was from fabrics made entirely of polyester, including an ersatz felt for the pants, and in weaves and densities which, though comfortable on an air-conditioned set, became oppressively air- and water-tight in the warm outdoors. In ensemble it had an R-value of roughly 16. As Goldwyn left his limousine, he was sweating liberally. By the time he reached the pool, his straw hat was soaked through, and the lower legs of his riding breeches, rather than leak out, had begun to fill up with perspiration, a testament to Chisl’s skill as a tailor. By the time he reached the bar, the light cardboard used to firm up the capacious thighs of the pants had been sweated through and was crumbling, while the fabric that wasn’t bolstered clung tightly to the area below his waist, giving it the look of stunted circus elephant after a heavy dose of Nembutal and violating at least three articles of the Motion Picture Production Code, not the least of which was the prohibition against throwing ridicule on any religious faith. Finding the bar completely dry, Goldwyn sloshed out toward the periphery of the pool area and faced away from the party as if in contemplation of the nearby landscape.
As rumor has it, Billy Wilder was on a nearby chaise lying covered by a large white beach towel. He was engaged in game of hide-and-seek with an aspiring starlet from the Ivory Coast named Coco Powder. By all appearances it seemed Miss Powder hadn’t understood the game. Or perhaps she had, having left the party twenty minutes before with Howard Hawks. The following, found in a notebook Wilder kept at the time, has been the subject of much dispute by biographers and film historians. Though Fred was but a few months later offered a part in Goldwyn’s The Best Years of Our Lives (which he turned down) and soon after given a large contract by Twentieth Century-Fox, many say the character of Lily is too against type to be accurate. Others who knew her say she would never have so involved herself in the business end of Fred’s work. One interesting theory suggests that it was written by Wilder to posthumously embarrass Goldwyn as payback for the $1000 Goldwyn shorted Wilder in payment for the script to Ball of Fire three years earlier.
EXT. MACMURRAY HOME– POOL AREA
Lily emerges from around a small cabana at the edge of the pool area. With two fresh drinks in her hand, she walks over to a table where Adolph Zukor is seated. She sets down one of the drinks in front of him then gently places her hand on his shoulder. After a brief sally of pleasantries, Lily smiles, gathers Zukor’s empty glass and moves away. She stops by the edge of the surrounding patio to set the empty on a tray of others. Standing nearby, facing a row of laurel figs lining the pool area, Goldwyn sees her and turns, slowly, like a heavy gate, due to a sizeable collection of water in the legs of his riding breeches. On his way through, he grabs her upper arm, mostly to stop himself from swinging past. Both are facing away from the party.
GOLDWYN: (nodding back toward Zukor)
What’s he got that I don’t got?
LILY: A passable command of the English language, and
hopefully my husband’s next contract.
GOLDWYN: Don’t think I didn’t see you deliver that drink.
LILY: Why don’t you put Fred in some of your pictures?
Then I might finally like one of them.
GOLDWYN: You got a lotta mexie, serving Zukor a drink
when this whole party's thirsty.
LILY: Mr. Zukor doesn’t drink.
GOLDWYN: Sure. Maybe it was just one of those fig-mists of
my imagination.
LILY: Doubtful. Word is, you have no imagination.
GOLDWYN: Well then, I guess my eyes didn't lie.
LILY: Not like you do. Eyes are the window to the soul,
Mr. Goldwyn. You should take care that someone
doesn’t try to throw a brick through yours.
GOLDWYN: So what’s the hitch? What’s a gantseh mancha gotta
do around here to get his whistle wet?
LILY: He could try putting it down the front of his
jodhpurs. It looks like it would get wet eventually.
GOLDWYN: That's hitting below the felt.
LILY: To get a drink around here, you need to be man
enough to hold Fred’s contract, or at least pretend
you want to.
GOLDWYN: How does he like it held?
LILY: Confidentially, and with nice raise. Nothing too
outré.
GOLDWYN: And what about that deaf little touch of sincerity
you served with it?
LILY: Please don’t think I’m being fresh, Mr. Goldwyn, but
a big fish needs a big hook. And there’s no better bait
in this town than sincerity. It being in such short
supply. I may not know much, but I know that you
can be caught with much smaller tackle. Besides,
I hear sincerity makes you cry.
Lily holds out the other drink.
LILY: I hope you don’t take it personally.
Goldwyn takes the drink.
GOLDWYN: Not at all, Lily. I respect a woman who knows
what side her Fred is buttered on.