Ayn Rand's The Showerhead

The year is 1949 – King Vidor’s ground-breaking adaptation of Ayn Rand’s philosonovella The Fountainhead has just, predictably enough, broken new ground. Audiences around the States, and other places, are in raptures over Gary Cooper’s moving depiction of a man who stood his ground – a feat only an actor as awful as Cooper could perform and still get paid for.  Audiences are clamouring for more! More stories about integrity, more pictures about daring new ideas, more about Randian supermen like Howard Roark and Dominique Francon – and when the public clamours, The Warner Bros. go a’clam-digging.

Work starts immediately on a sequel. However the short notice, the tall orders, tight deadlines, loose salaries, and the tendency of the actors to fall asleep before finishing the 2^nd page of the script (carefully handcrafted by Rand herself (and interns)) have resulted in a general stalling process known in Objectivist terms as “Rand Licensing” but colloquially coloured by the Best Boy as “Atlas F----d!”

The Warner Bros. executives, keeping their finger on the pulse of this particular dead horse, feel they need some extraneous talent, a gimmick to give some horsepower to the deceased equine. Scouring their little black books, and their budget, they finally seek out recourse in a different set of Bros…

Meanwhile, in the opposite corner of Hollywood, down at United Artists studios- a very  narrow corner-in fact, a broom closet – three men of respectable age and scatological demeanor are slapping each other over a card table and a bottle of gin. Washed-up, but certainly not washed, the three erstwhile Marx Bros, Groucho, Chico, and Harpo, are in a tizzy over gambling debts, the crankiness of age, and poor dividends from their last picture Love Happy (what small success it incidentally did incur was hardly attributable to the brothers and must be accorded to the new bombshell Marx Girl, one Marilyn Monroe - née BADUMBABUM).

Irving Thalberg, adoptive father of the Brothers since they were left on MGM’s doorsteps one cold night by the deadbeat dads at Paramount, storms into the room with a phone clutched in one knuckle-white paw.

Thalberg: Will you bums keep quiet for a second!?

Groucho: We’re not bums, Thalberg, we’re just big-boned.

Chico: Speak-a  for yourself, the only big-bones I see fo’ the last five years are the ones I been stealin’ from the stray dogs ‘round the corner.

Groucho: A BONE-afied criminal, eh?

Harpo: *HONK*

Thalberg: JUST SHUT UP WOUDYA!? I think I might actually have some work for you boneheads, so-

All three: WORK!? (*honk*!?)

The brothers simultaneously tackle Thalberg…

***

Although the film itself was never completed, one scene at least survived the purging process, much to the satisfaction of Non-Objectivists everywhere. This reel is kept behind lock, Rottweiler, and keylime, but this lucky reviewer was given a special screening one night after the requisite pass at three glasses of Pernod and unspeakable favours to the cleaning staff.

The following summary describes, more or less, what I remember of the film:

Ayn Rand’s The Showerhead

Scene: Architect Howard Roark (Gary Cooper) and Sultry Seductress Dominque Francon-Teasdale  (the delicious Patricia Neal being, alas, pinched for another project, the role was taken up by the ever unpinchable Margaret Dumont).

Both are standing before the doors of wealthy business ownentrepenaire Julius K. Grasshopper.

Roark (Cooper): Ms. Francon, I hope you know I can’t accept any terms on this building but my very own.

Francon-Teasdale (Dumont): Oh Howard! You are ever so stubborn. Ever!

Roark: Be that as it may, I have to stick by what I believe is good and true. A man who can’t do what he himself feels is true is nothing but a shell, Ms. Francon, an empty shell, a pandering tool of other men to use in whatever way they see fit.

Francon-Teasdale: I am sure I quite understand.

Roark: I suppose my bold, unblinking force of will is making you faint?

Francon-Teasdale: That, and this Sidecar, Mr. Roark. But I am ever so worried, oh..

Roark: A true man never worries. A true man is only –

Francon-Teasdale: But Roark! Dear, uncompromising Roark! How will you ever convince him?

Roark: Whom? Him? What? I pay him no mind. I haven’t even thought once about him and his sponsorship and the millions upon millions he could invest in my building. No mind at all.

Francon-Teasdale: But Howard! Mr. Grasshopper is as willful a man as yourself – stubborn, uncompromising, completely tied to his own high-minded ideals. You can at least respect that?

Roark: Respect it, maybe, but I won’t capitulate.

Francon-Teasdale: Really Mr. Roark, must you curse?

They enter the room.

 It is a large, Art-Deco style executive office about 40 feet long and 20 feet wide. A mammoth desk, made out of real Mammoth, engulfs 3/4ths of the room. At the other end, we see the back of an expensive swivel chair, made out of real swivel. Puffs of cigar smoke indicate the chair is occupied.

Francon-Teasdale: Mr. Grasshopper, I present the architect Howard Roark. He’s the genius behind the scandalous Bollocks-Pimsdale building, and the new Oedipal Living Complex. I beg you, I implore you, use him! If you would do anything for me, if you still love me, use him!

Roark: Listen Mr. Grasshopper, I don’t intend to bend over backwards for you. If you want to use my plans for this new building I am more than happy to agree – I congratulate you for your excellent taste. But don’t think you can change anything – I mean any one thing. A man like me lives for his work, Grasshopper, his life’s work is all that matters, and not money, not fame, not the applause of the disgusting rabble can ever change that, and least of all you. Surely a man of your strength and power of will can accept that?

Grasshopper: … *cigar puffs from behind the chair*

Roark: Surely you can respect where I am coming from?

Grosshopper: … *more puffs*

Roark: Now listen here, surely you can make me an offer? I’ll refuse it of course, if it is the slightest bit compromising, but surely…

Francon-Teasdale: Mr. Grasshopper, please! I beg you, I --

She walks over to the chair and turns it around, revealing Groucho asleep, in nothing but his underwear, with a half eaten piece of plain toast on his lap, as well as a chimpanzee, who is wearing his glasses and smoking his cigar.

Francon-Teasdale: MY WORD!

Grasshopper, waking up suddenly: Wha!? No! It’s my word, I saw it first! Buy! Sell! What!

Francon-Teasdale: Mr. Grasshopper!

Grasshopper, taking his glasses and cigar back and addressing the chimp: Thanks for covering for me. You’ll be promoted for this. Expect a big pay raise – I’m not talking bananas here.

The chimp sticks out his tongue.

Grasshopper: Alright, bananas!

The chimp hobbles out.

Grasshopper: He’s the best man I’ve got . But what did you want? I’m afraid you’ll have to wait until tonight if you’re here to clean-up, comprendez? Tonight? And watch out for that john, it’s NO HABLA in there, got it? And have you any black-strap molasses? I said molasses you filthy swine - get your head out of the gutter and into my lap!

Francon-Teasdale: You misunderstand, Mr. Grasshopper. This is the architect Howard Roark!

Grasshopper: Oh an architect! An architect! Fancy that, bringing an architect into my office like that, an architect! And at this time of day! (It is day, isn’t it?) I mean, of all the nerve, here, now, an architect!

*Pause*

What’s an architect?

Francon-Teasdale: He’s going to design your new building, if you let him.

Roark: And you better, sir, not get any funny ideas of changing my plans around, or you can count me out.

Grasshopper: I assure you, Mr. Roark, I cannot count that high. But come, you think you’re the only architect in town? Why I have architects battering down my door just so they can design a new one.

Roark: I can’t speak for them, I can only claim that none of them have my vision or integrity.

Grasshopper: Well, we’ll see about that. *Picking up the phone * Bubbles, would you see the OTHER architect in please?

The chimp enters leading Chico(Bologna Genoa) and Harpo (Keter Peating) into the room. Harpo immediately chases down Francon-Teasdale while Chico dives through his legs to reach Grasshopper and shake his hand.

Chico: How you do? Wait, don’t tell me – I gotta sixth sense for these things – you do well, you rich! You gonna be a big success! Just keep you nose to the grindstone - I got big plans for you boss. Can I borrow a five?

Grasshopper: You must be the architect.

Chico: No, he’s the architect.

Points to Harpo who is chasing Francon-Teasdale around the room.

Chico: I’ma his agent.

Grasshopper: You see that Roark, he’s got an agent? That’s an architect!

Chico: A, that ain’t nuthin. You should see what else he got!

Harpo: *HONK* Reveals a deep sea diving helmet, a hamster, and what looks to be a life-size building model from under his coat.

Grasshopper: Well, now we’ve got a show here. Ok, Roark, how about instead of all this Algonquin Roundtable flim-flam about vision, we do this the old fashioned way. A novel idea! Let’s see who’s got the nicest model building.

Roark: Tough but fair.

Grasshopper: On the count of three, reveal – one, two…

Chico: Wait! It’s no fair! He gotta the hometown advantage. We need to do this fairum squarum.

Chico switches the models around.

Roark: Hey, what is this!

Roark switches them back. Chico switches one and throws the other to Harpo. Grasshopper starts narrating a play by play of the football match. Finally, Roark gets a hold of his model, still covered, and they prepare to reveal.

Grasshopper: Alright, let’s get this road on the show. One, two, three!

The big reveal – both models are exactly the same.

Roark: But! But that’s impossible! He stole my idea!

Harpo looks angry and honks aggressively, getting into his boxing posture.

Chico: Well boss, that’s not true, they not exactly the same.

Grasshopper: No? What’s different?

Chico: Look in apartment 405.

Grasshopper peers in and snaps back, shocked.

Grasshopper: Yowza! Is she a permanent resident?

Chico: Sure, and her husband he’s an ambassador to Chile.

Grasshopper: Well, she could stand some warming up then. Ladies and gentleman, upon deep aesthetic reflection, I think I’ll take this one – the assets are certainly sure to be in order.

Chico: Deal!

They shake hands, Roark storms out, Francon-Teasdale faints, and Harpo starts to play Yankee Doodle on a fife as the screen fades out to a shot of the waving American Flag.