Category: Writing

A short story by Dan Gover

Phil and Jess still lived in the old neighborhood along Elmora Avenue where it crosses Westfield Ave and Grand Street in the Elmora section of Elizabeth. Phil still had his nice one bedroom apartment on Elmora Ave right next to the classier old Elmora Towers apartment house. Jess, who was always the more energetic one, still lived in his two family house on Pennington Street, just ten houses away from Elmora Ave. He rented out the first floor to the Alvarados and lived in the top two floors himself. After 45 years, the old house had turned into a really good investment and was now worth seven or eight times as much as he paid for it back in 1983.

Of course the old neighborhood had changed. Elmora Ave was no longer as spiffy as it was in the 90s, but in some ways it was still the same. It was still lined with small shops for three blocks. Tragically, they had lost Goldman’s, the old Jewish Deli that used to serve the best pastrami sandwiches in the world. And since they had both turned out to be single aging men, they used to meet ever Saturday night for dinner, often at the Chinese restaurant on the avenue and then go to the movies at the old Elmora Theater. And it was back there, maybe thirty years ago or more that they had met and gone to see Robert Redford in the baseball movie The Natural. It was a beautifully made baseball movie by the prominent Jewish director Barney Lee Loewenstein. The character of the old manager who had never won the title game and his coach were right up their alley. Redford was as modest and self-contained as Gary Cooper ever was, and his secret history was the endless quest of the creepy sportswriter Max Merciless. There were a few beautiful women who crossed his path, and it wasn’t clear who he’d end up with until the final playoff game when the mysterious Lady in White, played wonderfully by Glenn Close, stood up in the stands, gathered all the sun’s power into her blonde hair and white hat, and inspired the ballplayer Roy Hobbs to reject the Judge’s bribe and hit the game winning home run.

Most of the audience left the Elmora fully inspired by the old ballplayer, played by Redford [maybe in his late 30s], to struggle against life’s hard knocks and win in the end. Jess was certainly turned on in the manic, excited way that he used to have when he was younger.

–That was some great movie, huh?” he said to Phil.

–I guess so, “Phil said in his more laconic, laid-back way.

–Come on Phil, didn’t you like it?

–Yes, but…,” Phil said hesitantly.

–But what?

— Well, I read the book,” he said.

–So you read the book…so what? Who wrote it?

–Bernard Malamud.

–So? A Jewish novelist. Just like Barney Lee Loewentstein, the great Jewish Director.

–But it was completely different.

–It was? How so?

–Roy Hobbs was in on the fix. He needed to be able to afford Memo’s expensive tastes, so he took the Judge’s money and hit terribly. At the end of the game he deliberately struck out.

–What? You’re kidding…Roy Hobbs?

–I wish I was kidding.

–But that would have ruined the movie.

–Exactly. It wasn’t a very uplifting book. Roy was shot full of holes all the way through. He had been knocked out of action for years.

–Barney Lee Loewenstein would never have made a movie like that.

–And he would never have gotten Robert Redford to throw the last game.

–But that’s what movies do. That’s Hollywood. Redford and Barney Lee gave us a better ending. It was filled with Hope.

–Says you.

–Well, you know what my Aunt Florence always says…

–Not your Aunt Florence again.

–There’s only one real question: Is it good for the Jews?

–Oy.

–This was a good movie for the Jews. It shows the world that we look on the bright side. Reminds me of that other great Barney Lee movie, where Dusty Hoffmeier plays the brother with Autism.

–That was a good movie.

–Also with a happy ending. The brother counts cards like a wizard and they win big in Vegas.

–But did you think that he could really do that?

–Of course, some unique people obsess over detailed procedures like counting cards. That movie was another Barney Lee classic.

–I don’t know. In the novel Roy Hobbs believed that he deserved the big bucks in baseball. He just did what he had to do to get them. The owners never paid the players what they really deserved, not until Lew Brock and Free Agency. That’s why Meyer Wolfsheim could easily bribe the Black Sox players to throw the 1919 World Series. And he was the smart Jew with all the money.

–Why do you always go to the dark side, Phil?

–I don’t know. I guess Malamud was a depressed Jew. It seems appropriate: Jews are neurotically depressed, even in baseball.

–Not in baseball. Not the great Hank Greenberg who hit all those home runs for the Detroit Tigers. Not Sandy Koufax, the Brooklyn boy who was the best pitcher who ever lived when he threw for the Dodgers. They were true Jewish heroes.

–Well, Malamud was Jewish, and I don’t think he would have ever sold the rights to The Natural with a totally different direction and ending.

–Then he would never have gotten the great Jewish Director Barney Lee Loewenstein to direct the great Robert Redford as Roy Hobbs, the great baseball player who wins the last game.

–Do you remember what my hostile therapist said?

–No.

–He said that I was standing in one foot of water, and I felt like I was drowning.

–That’s you Phil, always on the dark side.

–I’ll bet he never stood in one foot of water. After a while, It’s not too pleasant.

Here, a quiet pause followed. Phil and Jess walked down the block to the ice cream store and ordered their cones. Jess got a mint chocolate chip one, and Phil got his usual coffee one. For a few minutes they’d rather lick the sweet ice cream than talk. Then Phil remembered something.

–Hey Jess, remember when we saw that awful play at the college theater a few years ago.

–Which one?

–“Waiting for Godawful.”

–That’s what you called it.

–Because they just waited around for nothing. They didn’t do anything. It was so depressing. I think it had a Jewish director or actor in it.

–But the writer wasn’t Jewish. What was his name?

–Simon Bucket, I believe.

–Well, he definitely wasn’t Jewish.

–I guess you don’t have to be Jewish to be depressed. Those two stupid guys, just sitting around.

–Well, if God was so awful, maybe it’s better that he didn’t show up.

–Those two dumb guys, what were their names? Tricky and Dicky?

–No. Fatso and Lucky.

–No, those were the other guys.

–No, we’re the other guys.

Then Phil said, “I want my money back.”

–What?

–I want my money back from the theater. The movie totally changed the character of Roy Hobbs from the book.

–You’re crazy Phil. You’ll never get your money back. Everybody loved the movie, like me.

–Well, I’ll never get it back if I don’t ask. I’m going back to the Elmora tomorrow to talk to the Manager.

–He’ll throw you out as just another sad sack. What about the beautiful last scene in the movie where Redford was playing catch with that young kid while Glenn Close watched. Everyone was smiling; everyone was happy.

–Okay, it was a good scene. But it wasn’t Malamud.

–The kid was their kid, you know.

–What?

–The kid was the child of Roy Hobbs and the Woman in White.

–Get out of here! No way! Redford and Glenn Close? She was his cousin or his sister. They only visited briefly at that luncheonette in Chicago.

–He never knew that she got pregnant after they got together. He had to go off with his team to another game in a different city.

–Well, he did always get involved with the wrong woman, like the nut-job who shot him when he was young and up-and-coming.

–That’s why that final scene was so moving, because he finally ended up with the woman who really loved him.

–And how long do you think that would last?

–It lasted to the final credits of the movie. That’s all it has to last in Hollywood. That’s why we all felt so good when we left the theater.

–But it wasn’t real. It wasn’t Malamud’s book.

–Tell it to the Kissengers. [In more recent years he would say, Tell it to Netanyahoo].

–I don’t think that’s how he pronounces his name.

–When you’re that powerful, you can pronounce it anyway that you want. You make your own rules.

–Says you.

–I still want my money back.

–I give up.

And so, the next day, they met at Goldman’s Deli and had pastrami sandwiches with cole slaw on the side. Then Phil walked down to the Elmora Theater. Jess had something else to do. The manager was polite. He listened to Phil go on for quite a while and admitted that someone else had told him about the book being different.

–But sir,”the Manager said, The Natural was the most popular movie we have shown at the Elmora this year. I had to beg the distributor to let me have it for another two weeks. The audience packed the theater every night.

–But it wasn’t the correct presentation of the original book.

–But it’s made so much money. I can’t believe Mr. Malamud would have accepted their money and let them make the movie their way unless he received a good deal of that money himself.

–They made the movie after he died.

–Are you sure about that? You think he didn’t know that they were going to change certain things from the book? Movies always have to change the book in some ways.

–But not completely.

–I’m sorry sir; I might let you in to see it again at a reduced senior rate, but I can’t give you back your money for the ticket you bought of your own free will. If I did that, I’d lose my shirt on every foreign film we show.

— I can’t accept your answer.

–I’m sorry sir. I can only hope that you like the next movie you come to see at the Elmora.

–We’ll see about that.

And so Phil came back a week later and asked to see the Manager. Their conversation went about the same way that it had a week before. Jess told him to forget it, but Phil wouldn’t let it go. He came back the next week, but the manager must have ducked out the back door and wouldn’t see him. Jess offered to give Phil the five bucks he had spent on his ticket, but Phil wouldn’t take it. It wasn’t just the money, it was the principle. Phil kept going back to the theater but he never got to see the manager again. He usually just spoke to the young woman who sold the tickets, and she wasn’t authorized to give anyone’s money back. She pointed to a small sign on her glass window that said that ticket purchases were final and there would be no refunds. He might have caught the Manager selling popcorn, candy and drinks between shows when there was a lot of business, but Phil did his best to boycott the Elmora until he got his money back. It made it harder for Jess to go to the movies with him, but he was willing to drive them over to the movie theater in Roselle Park, even though their movie selections weren’t as good. Meanwhile, Phil would always stop at the Elmora theater whenever he walked past it on his way to meet Jess at the Deli, or the drugstore, or the Chinese restaurant, or the ice cream store.

Eventually the great Deli just shut down. Just like that. The owner was too old to keep it running. His son had gone to the college and had moved to Westfield where he now worked. It was a real loss. The best pastrami ever. Better than Tabachniks, and closer to Phil’s apartment. Another Jewish place opened a few years later called Jerusalem. But it was glatt kosher and just wasn’t that good. It didn’t last more than a few years. There was only one kosher butcher left on Elmora Avenue. And then after a few more years, the final blow landed: the Elmora Theater closed down. Just like that. There were too many movies on television. Local theaters started closing down in the new century. During the next twenty years, most of the individual movie houses in north Jersey shut down. All the movies and shows started streaming on line. Covid was the last straw.

Now that the Elmora Theater was closed, there was no more manager to try to talk to anymore. There was no one left who was even capable of giving Phil his money back for The Natural. Not that they would. And yet Phil would always stop under the old unlit marquee in front of the theater. For a few years the shops in the little entrance arcade leading to the theater behind the glass ticket booth still kept going. One was an old shoemaker’s repair shop. Eventually, it closed down as did all the other little shops. It became more expensive to re-sole or repair your old shoes than to buy a new pair at Payless Shoes in the mall. Even Payless finally closed. Phil had to pay more, not less, despite his principles.

Now Phil and Jess eat dinner on Saturday nights and watch their favorite shows streaming on TV. They liked Breaking Bad and The Sopranos. Time moves on, but Phil still stops under the old Marquee that once protected the sidewalk in front of the Elmora Theater from rain. It really isn’t in good shape anymore. He will probably continue to do so as long as he can still walk. Even with a walker, which is what Jess uses now. But you should see him go down Elmora Avenue with it. He can really move.

— For Robert Redford

Dan Gover is a native New Yorker living in exile in Jersey. He’s so old his memories go back really far, to Palisades Park and Squeegee guys. Humor him.

You might also like his memoir Botswana 1971 and poem Noir Haiku Grunge