outlet."
Castaldy added thoughtfully, "And there are thousands and thousands of
dune buggies. More all the time. Nowadays you even see them in cities."
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The Silver Fox shrugged. "They take a utility Volkswagen without pizzazz,
strip it to the chassis, then build pizzazz on."
A thought stirred in Adam's mind. It related to what had been said...
to the torn-down Volkswagen he had seen earlier tonight... and to
something else, hazy: a phrase which eluded him... He searched his mind
while the others talked.
When the phrase failed to come he remembered a magazine illustration he
had seen a day or two ago. The magazine was still in his office. He
retrieved it from a pile across the room and opened it. The others watched
curiously.
The illustration was in color. It showed a dune buggy on a rugged beach,
in action, banked steeply on its side. All wheels were fighting for
traction, sand spewing behind. Cleverly, the photographer had slowed his
shutter speed so that the dune buggy was blurred with movement. The text
with the picture said the ranks of dune buggy owners were "growing like
mad"; nearly a hundred manufacturers were engaged in building bodies;
California alone had eight thousand dune buggies.
Brett, glancing over Adam's shoulder, asked amusedly, "You're not thinking
of building dune buggies?"
Adam shook his head. No matter how large the dune buggy population became,
they were still a fad, a specialist's creation, not the Big Three's
business. Adam knew that. But the phrase which eluded him was somehow
linked... Still not remembering, he tossed the magazine on a table,
open.
Chance, as happens so often in life, stepped in.
Above the table where Adam tossed the magazine was a framed photo of the
Apollo 11 Lunar
wheels-283
Module during the first moon landing. It bad been given to Adam, who liked
it, and had had it framed and hung. In the photo, the module dominated;
an astronaut stood beneath.
Brett picked up the magazine with the dune buggy picture and showed it
to the others. He remarked, "Those things go like hellt-I've driven
one." He studied the illustration again. "But it's an ugly
son-of-a-bitch."
Adam thought: So was the lunar module.
Ugly indeed: all edges, corners, projections, oddities, imbalance;
little symmetry, few clean curves. But because the lunar module did its
job superbly, it defeated ugliness and, in the end, took on a beauty of
its own.
The missing phrase came to him.
It was Rowena's. The morning after their night together she had said,
"You know what I'd say today? I'd say, 'ugly is beautiful.-
Ugly is Beautiful/
The lunar module was ugly. So was a dune buggy. But both were
functional, utilitarian; they were built for a purpose and performed it.
So why not a car? Why not a deliberate, daring attempt to produce a car,
ugly by existing standards, yet so suited to needs, environment, and
present timethe Age of Utility-that it would become beautiful?
. I may have an idea about Farstar," Adam said. "Don't rush me. Let me
put it out slowly."
The others were silent. Marshaling thoughts, choosing words carefully,
Adam began.
They were too experienced-all of them in the group-to go overboard,
instantly, for a single idea. Yet he was aware of a sudden tension,
missing before, and a quickening interest as he continued to speak. The
Silver Fox was thoughtful, his eyes half-closed. Young Castaldy
scratched an ear lobe-a habit when he concentrated-while
284-wheele
the other product planner, who had said little so far, kept his eyes on
Adam steadily. Brett DeLosanto's fingers seemed restless. As if
instinctually, Brett drew a sketch pad toward him.
It was Brett, too, who jumped up when Adam finished, and began pacing
the room. He tossed off thoughts, incomplete sentences, like fragments
of a jigsaw... Artists for centuries have seen beauty in ugliness.
.. Consider distorted, tortured sculpture from Michelangelo to Henry
Moore... And in modern times, scrap metal welded in jumbles-shapeless
to some, who scoff, but many don't... Take painting: the avant-garde
forms; egg crates, soup cans in -collages... Or life itself 1-a
pretty young girl or a pregnant hag: which is more beautiful?... It
depended always on the way you saw it. Form, symmetry, style, beauty
were never arbitrary.
Brett thumped a fist into a palm. "With Picasso in our nostrils, we've
been designing cars like they rolled off a Gainsborough canvas."
"Tbere's a line in Genesis somewhere," the Silver Fox said. "I think it
goes, 'Your eyes shall be opened."' He added cautiously, "But let's not
get carried away. We may have something. Even if we do, though, there's
a long road ahead."
Brett was already sketching, his pencil racing through shapes, then
discarding them. As he ripped off sheets from his pad, they dropped to
the floor. It was a designer's way of thinking, just as others exchanged
ideas through words. Adam reminded himself to retrieve the sheets later
and save them; if something came of this night, they would be historic.
But he knew that what Elroy Braithwaite had said was true. The Silver
Fox, through more years than any of the others here, had seen new cars
develop from first ideas to finished products, but had suffered, too,
through projects which
wheels-285
looked promising at birth, only to be snuffed out later for unforeseen
reasons, or sometimes for no reason at all.
Within the company a new car concept had countless barriers to pass,
innumerable critiques to survive, interminable meetings, with opposition
to overcome. And even if an idea survived all these, the executive
vice-president, president, and chairman of the board had veto powers.
..
But some ideas got through and became reality.
The Orion had. So... just barely possibly
might this early, inchoate concept, the seed sown here and now, for
Farstar.
Someone brought more coffee, and they talked on, f ar into the night.
chapter eighteen
The OJL advertising agency, in the person of Keith Yates-Brown, was nervous
and edgy because the documentary film Auto City was proceeding without a
shooting script.
"There has to be a script," Yates-Brown had protested to Barbara Zaleski
on the telephone from New York a day or two ago. "If there isn't, how can
we protect the client's interests from here and make suggestions?"
Barbara, in Detroit, had felt like telling the management supervisor that
the last thing the project needed was Madison Avenue meddling. It could
transform the honest, perceptive film now taking shape into a glossy,
innocuous m6lange. But, instead, she repeated the views of the director,
Wes Gropetti, a talented man with enough solid credits behind him to make
his viewpoint count.
"You won't grab the mood of inner city Detroit by putting a lot of crud
on paper because we don't know what the mood is yet," Gropetti had de-
clared. 'We're here with all this fancy camera and sound gear to find
out."
The director, heavily bearded but diminutive in stature, seemed like a
shaggy sparrow. He wore a black beret which he was never without, and was
less sensitive about words than he was with visual images. He went on, "I
want the inner city jokers, broads, and kids to tell us what they really
think about themselves, and how they look on the rest of us lousy bums.
That means their hates, hopes, frustrations, joys, as well as how they
breathe, eat, sleep, fornicate, sweat, and what they see and smell. I'll
get all that on film-their mugs, voices, everything unrehearsed. As to
lan-
wheels 287
guage, well let the crud fall where it may. Maybe I'll prick a few people
in the ass to get them mad, but either way they'll talk, then while they
do, I'll let the camera wander like a whore's attention, and we'll see
Detroit the way they see it, through inner city eyes."
And it was working, Barbara assured YatesBrown.
Using cin6ma v6rit6 technique, with a handheld camera and a minimum of
paraphernalia to distract, Gropetti was roaming the inner city with a
crew, persuading people to talk frankly, freely, and sometimes movingly,
on film. Barbara, who usually accompanied the expeditions, knew that
part of Gropetti's genius lay in his instinct for selection, then making
those he chose forget that a lens and lights were focused on them. No
one knew what the little director whispered into ears before their
owners began talking; sometimes he would bend his head down,
confidentially, for minutes at a time. But it produced reactions:
amusement, defiance, rapport, disagreement, sullenness, impudence,
alertness, anger and oncefrom a young black militant who became impres-
sively eloquent-a blazing hatred.
When he was sure of a reaction, Gropettl would spring instantly back so
that the cameraalready operating at the director's covert signalwould
catch full facial expressions and spontaneous words. Afterward, with
limitless patience, Gropetti would repeat the process until he had what
he sought-a glimpse of personality, good or bad, amiable or savage, but
vital and real, and without the clumsy intrusion of an interviewer.
Barbara had already seen rushes and rough cuts of the results, and was
excited. Photographically, they had the quality and depth of Karsh
portraits, plus Gropetti's magic mix of vibrant animation.
288-wheels
"Since we're calling the film Auto City," Keith Yates-Brown had commented
when she told him all that, "maybe you should wise up Gropetti that there
are motorcars around as well as people, and we'll expect to see
some-preferably our client'son the screen."
Barbara sensed that the agency supervisor was having second thoughts about
the over-all authority she had been given. But he would also know that any
film project needed to have someone firmly in charge and, until the OJL
agency removed or fired her, Barbara was.
She assured Yates-Brown, "There will be cars in the picture-the client's.
We're not emphasizing them, but we're not concealing them either, so most
people will recognize the kind they are." She had gone on to describe the
filming already done in the auto company's assembly plant, with emphasis
on inner city hard core hiring-and Rollie Knight.
During the assembly plant filming, other workers nearby had been unaware
that Rollie was the center of the camera's attention. Partly, this was out
of consideration for Rollie, who wanted it that way, and partly to keep
the atmosphere realistic.
Leonard Wingate of Personnel, who became interested in Barbara's project
the night they met at Brett DeLosanto's apartment, had arranged the whole
thing without fuss. All that anyone in the plant knew was that a portion
of Assembly was being filmed, for purposes unexplained, while regular work
went on. Only Wes Gropetti, Barbara, and the camera- and soundmen realized
that a good deal of the time they appeared to be shooting, they were not,
and that most of the footage taken featured Rollie Knight.
The only sound recording at this point was of assembly plant noises while
they happened,
wheels-289
and afterward Barbara had listened to the sound tape played back. It was
a nightmare cacophony, incredibly effective as a background to the visual
sequence.
Rolhe Knight's voice, which would be dubbed in later, was to be recorded
during a visit by Gropetti and the film crew to the inner city apartment
house where Rollie and May Lou, his girl friend, lived. Leonard Wingate
would be there. So-though Barbara did not report the fact to Keith
Yates-Brown -would Brett DeLosanto.
On the telephone, Keith Yates-Brown had cautioned, "Just remember we're
spending a lot of the client's money which we'll have to account for."
,'We've stayed within budget," Barbara reported. "And the client seems
to like what we've done so far. At least, the chairman of the board
does."
She heard a sound on the telephone which could have been Keith
Yates-Brown leaping from his chair.
"You've been in touch with the client's chairman of the board!" The
reaction could not have been greater if she had said the Pope or the
President of the United States.
"He came to visit our shooting on location. The day after, Wes Gropetti
took some of the filin and screened it in the chairman's office.~
"You let that foul-mouthed hippie Gropetti loose on the fifteenth floor
I"
"Wes seemed to think that he and the chairman got along well."
"He thought so I You didn't even go yourself?"
"I couldn't that day."
"Oh, my Godl" Barbara could visualize the agency supervisor, his face
paling, a hand clapped to his head.
She reminded him, "You told me yourself
290-wheels
that the chairman was interested, and I might report to him occasionally."
"But not casuallyl Not without letting us know here, in advance, so we
could plan what you should say. And as for sending Gropetti on his own
..."
I was going to tell you," Barbara said, "the client's chairman phoned
me next day. He said he thought our agency had shown commendable
imagination- those were his words-in getting Wes Gropetti to begin
with, and urged us to go on giving Wes his head because this was the
kind of thing which ought to be a director's film. The chairman said he
was putting all that in a letter to the agency."
She heard heavy breathing on the line. "We haven't got the letter yet.
When it comes..." A pause. "Barbara, I guess you're doing fine."
Yates-Brown's voice became pleading. "But don't, please don't, take
chances, and let me know anything instantly about the client's chairman
of the board."
She had promised that she would, after which Keith Yates-Brown -still
nervously-repeated that he wished they had a script.
Now, several days later and scriptless as ever, Wes Gropetti was ready
to film the final sequence involving hard core hiring and Rollie
Knight.
Early evening.
Eight of them, altogether, were packed into the stiflingly hot,
sketchily furnished room.
For Detroit generally, and especially the inner city, it had been a
baking, windless summer day. Even now, with the sun gone, most of the
heatinside and out-remained.
Rollie Knight and May Lou were two of the eight because this was
where-for the time being -they lived. Though the room was tiny by any
wheels-291
standard, it served the dual purpose of living and sleeping, while a
closet-sized "kitchen" adjoining housed a sink with cold water only, a
decrepit gas cooker, and a few plain board shelves. There was no toilet
or bath. These facilities, such as they were, were one floor down and
shared with a half dozen other apartments.
Rollie looked morose, as if wishing he had not agreed to be involved
with this. May Lou, childlike and seeming to have sprouted like a weed
with skinny legs and bony arms, appeared scared, though she was
becoming less so as Wes Gropetti, his black beret in place despite the
heat, talked quietly to her.
Behind the director were the camera operator and soundman, their
equipment deployed awkwardly in the confined space. Barbara Zaleski
stood with them, her notebook opened.
Brett DeLosanto, watching, was amused to see that Barbara, as usual,
had dark glasses pushed up into her hair.
The camera lights were off. Everyone knew that when they went on, the
room would become hotter still.
Leonard Wingate, from the auto maker's Personnel department and also
the company's ranking Negro executive, mopped his perspiring face with
a fresh linen handkerchief. Both he and Brett were backed against a
wall, trying to take as little space as possible.
Suddenly, though only the two technicians had seen Gropetti's signal,
the lights were on, the sound tape running.
May Lou blinked. But as the director continued to talk sof tly, she
nodded and her f ace adjusted. Then swiftly, smoothly, Gropetti eased
rearward, out of camera range.
May Lou said naturally, as if unaware of anything but her own thoughts,
"Ain't no good
292-wheels
worryin', not about no future like they say we should, 'cos it ain't ever
looked as if there'd be one for some like us." She shrugged. "Don't look
no different now."
Gropetti's voice. "Cut I"
Camera lights went out. The director moved in, whispering in May Lou's
ear once more. After several minutes, while the others waited silently,
the camera lights went on. Gropetti slid back.
May Lou's face was animated. "Sure they took our color TV." She glanced
across the room toward an empty corner. "Two guys come for it, said we
hadn't made no payments after the first. One of the guys wanted to know,
why'd we buy it? I told him, 'Mister, if I got a down payment today, I
can watch TV tonight. Some days that's all that matters."' Her voice
slipped lower. I shoulda told him, 'Who knows about tomorrow?'"
"Cut I"
Brett whispered to Leonard Wingate beside him,"What's this all about?"
The Negro executive was still mopping his face. He said, low-voiced,
"They're in trouble. The two of them had some real money for the first
time in their lives, so they went wild, bought furniture, a color TV,
took on payments they couldn't meet. Now, some of the stuffs been re-
possessed. That isn't all."
Ahead of them, Gropetti was having May Lou and Rollie Knight change
positions. Now Rollie faced the camera.
Brett asked, still speaking softly, "What else has happened?"
"The word is 'garnishee,'" Wingate said. "It means a lousy, out-of-date
law which politicians agree ought to be changed, but nobody does it."
Wes Gropetti had his head down and was talking to Rollie in his usual
way.
Wingate told Brett, "Knight's had his wages
wheels~--293
garnisheed once already. This week there was a second court order, and
under the union agreement two garnishees mean automatic dismissal."
"Hell I Can't you do something?"
"Maybe. It depends on Knight. When this is over, I'll talk to him."
"Should he be spilling his guts on film?"
Leonard Wingate shrugged. "I told him he didn't have to, that it's his
private business. But he didn't seem to mind, neither did the girl.
Maybe they don't care; maybe they figure they can help somebody else.
I don't know."
Barbara, who had overheard, turned her head. "Wes says it's part of the
whole scene. Besides, he'll edit sympathetically."
"If I didrft think so," Wingate said, "we wouldn't be here."
The director was still briefing Rollie.
Wingate, speaking softly but his voice intense, told Barbara and Brett,
"Half the problem with what's happening to Knight is our own at-
titudes-the establishment's; that means people like you two and me.
Okay, we help somebody like these two kids, but as soon as we do, we
expect them to have all our middle-class values which it took us years
of living our way to acquire. The same goes for money. Even though
Knight hasn't been used to it because none ever came his way, we expect
him to handle money as if he'd had it all his life, and if he doesn't,
what happens? He's shoved into court, his wages garnisheed, he's fired.
We forget that plenty of us who've lived with money still run up debts
we can't manage. But let this guy do the same thing"-the Negro executive
nodded toward Rollie Knight-"and our systeyWs all set to throw him back
on the garbage heap.
"You're not going to let it happen," Barbara murmured.
294-wheels
Wingate shook his head impatiently. "There's only so much I can do. And
Knight's just one of many.-
Camera lights were on. The director glanced their way, a signal for
silence. Rollie Knight's voice rose clearly in the quiet, hot room.
"Sure you find out things from livin' here. Like, most of it ain't gonna
get better, no matter what they say. Besides that, nuthun' lasts." Un-
expectedly, a smile flashed over Rollie's face; then, as if regretting the
smile, a scowl replaced it. "So best not to expect nuthun'. Then it don't
hurt none when you lose it."
Gropetti called, "Cut I"
Filming continued for another hour, Gropetti coaxing and patient, Rollie
speaking of experiences in the inner city and the auto assembly plant
where he was still employed. Though the young black worker's words were
simple and sometimes stumbling, they conveyed reality and a true picture
of himself-not always favorable, but not belittling either. Barbara, who
had seen earlier sequences filmed, had a conviction that the answer print
would be an eloquently moving document.
When camera lights went out after the concluding shot, Wes Gropetti
removed his black beret and mopped his head with a large, grubby kerchief.
lie nodded to the two technicans. "Strike it I That's a wrap."
While the others filed out, with brief "goodnights" to Rollie and May Lou,
Leonard Wingate stayed behind. Brett DeLosanto, Barbara Zaleski, and Wes
Gropetti were going on to the Detroit Press Club for a late supper, where
Wingate would join them shortly.
The Negro executive waited until the others had passed through the mean
hallway outside, with its single, low-wattage light bulb and peeling
paint, and were clattering down the worn wooden
wheels 295
stairway to the street below. Through the hallway door, the odor of
garbage drifted in. May Lou closed it.
She asked, "You want a drink, mister?"
Wingate started to shake his head, then changed his mind. "Yes, please."
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