I confess that when my partner John first pointed out Carole Cook across the room at Café D’Etoile in West Hollywood, I didn’t know who he was talking about. Carole was one of those faces (and voices) people often instantly recognize without remembering her name. She had been on Broadway and in movies, and famously a good friend of Lucille Ball, who put her in many episodes of all three of her successful TV series. I would come to know Carole well. She and her husband, Tom Troupe, could not have been more welcoming and gracious when John and I approached their table that first night to say hello. We later learned that they dined regularly at the late, lamented Café D’Etoile and often regaled passersby (well, Carole did, Tom was more of a quiet “straight man” sidekick) with frequently ribald stories of Carole’s years in New York and Hollywood.
I was barely beginning at the time what would become a very long “development hell” story for my short film script THE GAZEBO, which I’d been hired to write and which chronicled the final moments in the lives of an elderly couple who, as related in an actual newspaper story, died trapped together in their stalled home elevator during a heat wave. Standing there (or soon after) I hit upon what a great idea it would be to feature Carole and Tom in the as yet uncast leading roles. Tom was almost as legendary an actor as Carole, but, as I said, in a quieter way: You can see him in many dramatic roles, especially on television, over decades of work. And I thought it would be a great hook to bring them together in my little movie project.
John and I were regulars at the restaurant also and seemed often to run into Carole and Tom, and during one subsequent encounter, I somewhat nervously pitched them THE GAZEBO, and Carole said, in her inimitable smoky voice: “Well, send it over!” And so I did, thinking, as one often does, that there was a distinct possibility I’d never hear anything back. But Carole called the next day. I can still vividly remember picking up the phone and hearing that voice. “So what we did was we thought: Let’s sit down and read it and see what this thing is,” she said. “And what we want to say to you first is: You are a VERY good writer.” Her graciousness and enthusiasm were infectious. They were very interested, and when I relayed the news to my producer/director, he was very interested, and I thought: Here we go.
In the movie business, I have come to learn, one should never think: Here we go. Here we almost never go. And I would also learn over the many years that script has stayed in “development” that one of the drawbacks of writing roles for eighty- and ninety-something- year-old actors is mortality. Carole, alas, passed away in 2023, and Tom Troupe died just this morning.
THE GAZEBO, meanwhile, has gone through more than a couple casting changes, but I’m happy to report that it is currently scheduled to shoot next year with two hale and hearty and vastly gifted actors in the lead roles. In the press blurb the producer/director describes the script, which I wrote for him more than fifteen years ago, as “a meditation on what we hold on to and what we must release.” The word “release” in connection with this movie, I have to say, has come to resonate almost mystically with all of us.
But as surely as I believe it is possible in Hollywood to run into someone as magical as Carole Cook in a restaurant and become her friend, I believe THE GAZEBO, which at last count had won twelve awards for screenwriting, will one day be filmed. Carole herself, I think, put it best years back, as I muddled my way through apologizing for the first of many delays in getting the project off the ground. “Oh honey,” she purred, stopping me with a hand on my arm, “we’re in show business.” Nuff said.