The movie people were in town again and we met their arrival with mixed emotions. Watching movie production was fun, but you had to watch it with one eye. And keep the other on the participants. They were notorious flakes. In the past they'd borrowed police uniforms from us, then tried to steal them. Once a swamp buggy they'd borrowed for some epic had disappeared. One group even stole a PAL football uniform. So, when Otto Preminger's people contacted us to work security for them, we were wary.
Otto was a big deal at the time, and his movie Tell Me You Love Me, Junie Moon was touted to be Oscar material. It starred Liza Minelli, Ken Howard, and former pro football player, and later action star Fred "The Hammer" Williamson was a featured actor.
It was to be a standard deal, off-duty cops and the bill to be paid at the end of the job. (Now this service must be paid for in advance) The cops got to eat and drink the same thing the crew did. We agreed.
Things didn't start out well. One late evening I received a call urging me to go to the Anchor Bar and Lounge. Major faux pas. Arriving, I was greeted by the owner, Bill F, who was so distraught he could only mumble, "I don't even sell peanuts." An officer on the scene made things clearer.
Preminger, Minelli, Howard, and Williamson had been drinking and dancing. Suddenly, Bill came up to them and said they would have to leave. When asked why, he said "Because of him," pointing to Williamson, who was black. This caused an umpah storm, with Preminger yelling at Bill he'd never heard of such crap and Bill yelling for them to get out. By the time I arrived, they had left.
I talked to Bill who was still mumbling about not even selling peanuts. Finally, he calmed enough to tell me: "I can't allow niggers in here. You know the crowd here, I'd lose them all. And you let in one coon, pretty soon the place is full of them. That's why I don't sell food. Don't even sell peanuts. If you don't sell food, the Feds can't make you let them in."
Don't know if the "peanuts" thing was true but, at the time, having blacks and whites mingle in The Anchor, where liquid stupid flowed like tropical rain, could be a bad idea. The irony was, Williamson was a nice guy, educated--someone said he had a degree in architecture--and the Anchor crowd was delighted to have him and his celebrity among them.
The incident, blew over, and Williamson said no hard feeling. Had it been me, I'd have been real pissed off! Howsumever, Preminger was reticent on the issue, taking his revenge on Naples later.
Part 2 tomorrow.
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