The Bad and the Beautiful Page #2

All right, so I won't argue with you.

I'm taking off my agent hat

and putting on my friendship hat.

This boy can be the biggest ever,

your next Victor Ribera.

He's got everything: Heart, brains

and he's beautiful to look at.

I don't care what she writes about me.

It's what she wrote about Arturo.

He hit me and hurt me.

I'm not always yelling about

a star's right to a private life.

Fans are entitled to see us

in the flesh sometimes.

Only last week I was in New York...

I've got a full house,

and you can't have four of a kind. No.

Not even in one of your B pictures!

- Harry, I think you're bluffing.

- Put up or shut up.

Money talks, and I've got money.

I raise you 500.

- Right back at you.

- Five, and five more.

- Call.

- Four fours.

When did you begin to tell the truth?

Don't tell me "today." What time today?

- Harry Pebbel's a great poker player.

- Yeah.

But my father could always beat him,

and I could always beat my father.

- To get in a game like that, I need...

- You're crazy!

All I need is a few hundred dollars

for my first stack of chips.

What's a few hundred dollars when

four citizens pool their resources?

Came the dawn...

- Good night, gentlemen.

- Good night.

- Jonathan!

- How much did you win?

- Five hundred?

- A thousand?

- More than that. Six thousand.

- Jonathan!

I lost.

To be exact, I lost $6,351.

- Who won?

- Harry Pebbel.

Harry, I admit it.

I lost the money and I owe you.

- I wish I could pay.

- It's breaking your heart.

- I could give you an IOU.

- What would I do with it?

You don't run this studio,

but you're an executive producer.

- B pictures...

- They make money.

You have four producers, why not five?

At $300 a week I could pay you off,

slowly, but surely.

$6,351.

- All right, you got the job.

- I thought so.

So you're a genius boy.

You think you blackmailed me!

Harry, that's a horrid word.

Well, get this.

My unit turns out 18 pictures a year.

I cry for ideas. If you'd sweat out a

story the way you do $6,351...

...I'd have hired you anyway.

Why didn't you come to me? Too proud?

I tried to. I couldn't get in.

- You know who gave me my first job?

- My father.

- You angle things the cute way.

- I'll pay you $100 a week.

I wouldn't take a dime. Just bring me

a picture I can shoot, Genius Boy.

- One day you'll work for me.

- Get me Joe Clareton in publicity.

Meanwhile, I need an office

with a desk for my assistant.

Shields. Amiel.

- That's a big dream, Jonathan.

- If you dream, dream big.

Meanwhile, you'll be drawing

a modest check each Thursday.

It's time you two made it legal.

- Tell him he's crazy, IKKay.

- You're crazy.

- Tell him I'm not.

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