Grassy knoll. Warren Commission. Zapruder footage.
Hard to believe, but my generation's buzz words are now another generation's U.S. History assignment.
And some people evidently haven't been paying as much attention to their homework as they should have.
Or so I discovered after I recently agreed to play the chauffeur in a grade school video project documenting the death of President John F. Kennedy. As it turns out, looks and talent had nothing to do with my landing this plum part. Instead, I possessed a couple of far more impressive credentials.
"We need someone who has a convertible," explained thirteen-year-old "JFK," a seventh grader at Madison No. 1 Elementary School. "We were each going to put in $5 and rent one but they cost too much. Plus, we need someone who has a driver's license so they can drive us around." Although I was flattered, I warned JFK that the back seat of my Mustang probably wouldn't hold the four passengers who rode in the Kennedy limo that fateful day in November '63.
"That's okay," said JFK. His teacher had given the young filmmakers the green light to revise history, where necessary, within the six-minute video. "There's only one girl in our group, so we're not having Governor and Mrs. Connally in the car, anyway. Miss Nelson said it was okay to change a few things as long as we stick to the `official' version. We're not supposed to show that somebody else besides Lee Harvey Oswald shot President Kennedy or any stuff like that."
One pupil smiled smugly when I asked why his group had chosen to film the Kennedy assassination. "Our teacher is, like, totally into Kennedy," the budding brown-noser told me. "She loves Kennedy! We figured we'd get a better grade if we did him."
Another pupil confessed that he was attracted to the Kennedy project because it involved guns and murder.
"Practically all you've got to do is get a convertible, drive it down the street and have someone fire a rifle at it," he beamed. "We thought it would be pretty easy."
The spunky little Spielbergs soon learned differently. While shooting the opening sequence documenting Kennedy's arrival in Dallas (Sky Harbor International Airport doubled as Love Field), the fledgling filmmakers were astonished to discover they'd spent nearly two hours to get one thirty-second scene in the can.
As a result, the film's nonexistent budget promptly went right through the roof. "The airport is a rip-off!" ranted JFK, sounding as if he were personally footing the bill on a junior high Star Wars. "We had to pay $2 just to park the car!" Still, budget problems looked like small change compared with the next headache on the horizon: mainly, no "Jackie." Several angry telephone calls and 45 minutes later, the tardy thespian finally showed up, triggering a barrage of nasty accusations about who was supposed to be where and when. ("You liar! You were not at the school at 12:30!")
This brouhaha had barely died down when JFK spied Jackie's costume for the assassination scene--a beige two-piece suit that had belonged to her great-grandmother.
"That's the wrong color!" he groaned. "Mrs. Kennedy wore pink!"
Jackie sighed and looked at the ceiling. "The pink one was dirty so I brought this one instead," she explained wearily. Sarcastically, she added, "I'm so sure Mrs. Kennedy would wear a dirty dress!"
Rolling his eyes, young Mr. Kennedy finished slipping into the costume he would wear in the fatal motorcade. "The real dress was pink," he muttered as he adjusted a clip-on necktie decorated with the image of a hand-painted bass. "I hope you're satisfied when the teacher penalizes us for bad costuming."
After cameras, costumes and props had been stashed in the trunk, our six-person crew piled into the deathmobile and headed for our date with destiny. Wherever that was. Sitting in the seat next to me was "Jack Ruby," a hyperactive young fellow, who, when he wasn't preening in the rearview mirror or playing with the tape deck, winked, waved and clowned around for the benefit of passing female motorists.
"Where are we headed?" I hollered at Jack Ruby over the car radio.
"Just go somewhere that looks like that place where Kennedy was killed."
"Dealey Plaza?"
"Yeah, let's go there," he answered. "Is that downtown somewhere?"
I hoped he was kidding.
We drove around aimlessly for another half hour, scouting a variety of sites that weren't quite right for one reason or another. ("Do you want the teacher to kill us?" asked JFK after I unsuccessfully lobbied to stage the assassination under a billboard touting "Goldberg and Osborne, the injury lawyers.") While the drive was not a total waste--I was fascinated to learn that "the one who smell't it, dealt it"-- this information shed little light on the problem at hand.
It was time for a production powwow. And as much as I hated to break up the spirited slugfest going on in the back seat ("Lee Harvey Oswald," Jackie and the film's narrator were having a serious difference of opinion as to exactly who had "dealt" it), I hit the brakes.
"Read my lips," I said slowly. "Where are we going?"
JFK fidgeted. "Don't ask me!" he barked. "Do I have to do everything on this project? You guys haven't done anything!"
"Just take us downtown," ordered Lee Harvey Oswald, evidently suffering from an itchy trigger finger. "I need to get up in a tall building so I can shoot down at the car."
"Over my dead body," I replied. Calmly and patiently, I explained that in a world run rampant with senseless crime, some people tend to get nervous when they see a kid running across a rooftop with a rifle.
Jack Ruby tossed me a withering glance. "This gun isn't even loaded," he said. "The safety is on. What could happen?"
I didn't want to find out. Instead, I had a brainstorm and made a beeline for the Camelback Arboleda, an east Phoenix office complex that appeared to be deserted for the weekend. Surveying the tree-shaded drive that would prove to be JFK's Waterloo, the awe-stricken cast immediately stopped squabbling and bickering.
While the scenic Arboleda didn't bear any resemblance to Dealey Plaza, the location was ideal for our purposes. The kids oohed and ahhed over an elevated walkway between the office building and an adjacent parking garage that would enable them to film the assassination from the air.
Better yet was a cavernous garage that served as our "Texas School Book Depository." Mapping out Lee Harvey Oswald's flight from the crime scene, the now-enthusiastic crew used the building's multistoried stairwells to create a dramatic escape montage worthy of Starsky & Hutch. While the crew lugged camera equipment upstairs to the overhead walkway, JFK enthusiastically outlined plans for the Arlington National Cemetery sequence that would conclude the film.
"Someone's mom is going to take us out to a graveyard after school on Wednesday," JFK explained. "We're going to get a cardboard box that looks like a coffin, only you won't know it's just cardboard because we're going to cover it with a flag. If Jack Ruby's dad will do it, we're going to have him come out and play `Taps' on a trumpet. Then Mrs. Kennedy walks by and it's over."
JFK smiled. "It will probably only take about half an hour. Simple, huh?"
It sure didn't sound like it to me. (And with several days of filmmaking experience under his belt, JFK eventually had second thoughts, himself: In the final version of the movie, the Arlington sequence consists of a quick shot of a Glendale cemetery while, on the soundtrack, Whitney Houston warbles "The Star-Spangled Banner.")
One of the crew members hollered from atop the walkway. We were ready to shoot the shot heard 'round the world.
On cue, I was to slowly cruise up the driveway while JFK and Jackie waved to the "throng of thousands" the narrator was describing in voice-over. After hearing a rifle shot, JFK would slump over, Jackie would scream and I'd peel out of the driveway. Meanwhile, diners at nearby Duck & Decanter wondered what the hell was going on as a shrieking teenager in a pillbox hat repeatedly whizzed by their picnic table in a convertible.
"Cut!"
During the first run-through, Jack Ruby, doubling as camera operator, discovered that the pint-size performers were sitting so low in their seats that it was impossible to see JFK fall over after being shot. To heighten the drama, he ordered the pair to sit up on the back of rear seats--like beauty contest winners. An inspired suggestion.
The rest of the shooting went relatively smoothly, although multiple retakes became necessary when Jackie and Lee Harvey Oswald giggled their way through some of the most harrowing moments in American history. (Actually, one of the most convincing performances was delivered by Jack Ruby during an off-camera lunch break: He successfully conned an Ed Debevic's waitress into bringing him a free hot fudge sundae by claiming it was his birthday.)
After declaring "It's a wrap!" we rushed back to JFK's apartment to view the day's "rushes." Everyone agreed that we had a winner on our hands--in fact, it moved most of the cast and crew to tears.
Eyes watering up as he watched the silent images moving across the screen, one pupil finally exploded with rage. "Stupid!" he screamed as a collective groan ran around the room. "Who forgot to turn on the microphone?!"
THAT NIGHT, JFK called me with good news/bad news.
The good news? While loading the tape into the VCR to view the rushes, someone had accidentally pushed the MUTE button on the television. The microphone on the videocamera had actually been working all along!
The bad news? While trying to figure out what was wrong with the microphone, the group had inadvertently taped over most of the scenes we'd already filmed.
Was I available for retakes the next morning?
Now seasoned pros, we managed to knock out the airport scenes in eighty cents instead of two dollars. And no one crabbed when we returned to "Dealey Plaza" and discovered the office complex was abuzz with business activity that made shooting impossible.
Instead, we simply moved to the empty parking lot of a Department of Economic Security building on East Washington.
The rest of the day's filming proceeded uneventfully, give or take the inevitable foul-up. Witness the trickiest shot in the entire picture, a complicated manuever in which the camera operator and the narrator perched on the hood of the moving car while filming JFK and Jackie in the back seat: "When I cue you, start reading the script," the camera operator directed the narrator as the car started moving. But the narrator remained silent even after we'd driven several car lengths.
"Cut! We're going to have to do it again!" the camera operator hollered. Then he turned to the narrator. "When you read the script this time, try doing it out loud!"
MAYBE IT WAS my imagination, but after a day behind the cameras, the youngsters seemed older, wiser, less quick to point a finger of blame at the one who'd "smell't" it. Had re-enacting the fall of Camelot forever doused their youthful naivete?
I decided to pose that question to Jackie Kennedy, who sat on a curb licking a leftover dollop of sugar-based stage blood off the tip of her finger.
"Have you learned anything from this project?"
Jackie stared pensively into the foreground for a moment, then nodded.
"Yeah, I learned something," she said languidly. "It's a mistake to get involved in a group project--especially one that's all boys. I should have done a poster project by myself."
Somewhere in the distance, a shot rang out. I smell't the death of innocence.
We piled into the deathmobile and headed for our date with destiny. Wherever that was.
A shrieking teenager in a pillbox hat repeatedly whizzed by the picnic table in a convertible.
Jackie Kennedy and Lee Harvey Oswald giggled their way through some of the most harrowing moments in American history.
"When you read the script this time, try doing it out loud!
