Carol’s Column

The Liz Taylor of Parkwood

YOU get Raquel Welch, Charles Bronson, Frank Sinatra, Jane Fonda and Joffee.

Who might you ask, is Joffee?

Joffee is the latest in a glittering line of scintillating, avante garde greats that fill and thrill our celluloid screens.

A modest, unassuming kind of an actor, one would never guess he's about to become famous.

That he'll be the hottest thing around since macaroni cheese and pepperoni sauce.

Surrounded by slightly lesser, but equally talented stars of stage and screen, Joffee for the past two weeks has been standing on my front lawn enacting a tense drama.

Dressed for the part in a debonair tartan cap, with purple long Johns peeping out from beneath his fashionably tattered denims, (even great stars feel the cold), he has reluctantly fought the elements and repeatedly grabbed the leading lady in a passionate embrace.

"Cut!" The command is fierce as director Lisa Blecher shakes her head and weeps into her fleece-lined anorak.

Co-director Ian Patrick comes over heavy: "Listen you guys — wake up! Put your thinking into it! You're not being imaginative!"

"So who wants to be imaginative — all I want is a hotdog," grumbles a bit player in red.

Take 3: Cameras whirl again. "Cut!"

Half the cast is missing.

"Aviva, Estelle, Linda! Where are you?"

"Locked in the loo," comes a disembodied voice from way off-stage.

"C'mon, move it — we're on a tight budget, every cent counts."

Strong words these from director Patrick.

The actors are once again in position.

Take 3 (again): "Cut."

The above scene is taking place, not in Hollywood as you might imagine, but in Parkwood.

It started this way.

"How's school?" I asked my oldest son as we met casually in the bathroom a few weeks ago.

"Great, just great," he remarked flexing his pectorals and grinning at his reflection in the mirror.

Then slowly he turned his head from side to side.

"Have you got a stiff neck?" I asked concernedly.

"Aw Ma, I'm testing the angles."

"Angles?"

"I've got to get my best angle."

"Why?"

"For the film."

"What film?"

He gave me a long, John Travolta stare, flashed his dimple and smiled.

"Would it be OK if a few friends popped in tonight for a short while?" he said, deftly changing the subject.

"Sure, sure," I replied enthusiastically.

It's always reassuring to know your child has a friend — it gives a parent a feeling of security.

He had said a few friends.

They started streaming in.

All 27 of them, carrying sleeping bags, lights, cameras.

Trailing wires and boxes full of props.

"What is this?" I shrieked to my oldest son by now in his permanent position glued to the record player, jaw chewing rhythmically in time to Adam and the Ants.

"Oh," he said casually, "I forgot to tell you we're filming."

"Filming?"

"For English — we have to make a film. It brings the subject alive."

Snapping his fingers he jerked his way out of the lounge shouting: "Loudspeakers, where are the loudspeakers?"

Things have definitely changed.

School was a dried-out affair when I was young.

Our maths teacher had flat feet and buck teeth. He was at least 73 years old and looked like a pilchard without the sauce.

There was a rumour that the science teacher had been mortally wounded during the Boer War and then resuscitated.

And our English teacher, Miss Crumpet, used to hit us on the head with a ruler to ensure we stayed alive while she recited Shakespeare in a lower double-bass monotone.

And today kids make films to liven up lessons.

They started at 6pm and filming continued through the night.

Oh, there were problems.

Like the 10-metre bonfire for the torrid campfire scene that nearly burnt the oak tree down.

Or — "how the hang does this camera work?" said the one camera man — known artistically as "Juice" to the other.

Who replied: "You think you've got problems? I've lost the film."

Pushy mothers aren't nice so I stayed in the background looking suitably restrained in my pink satin tights, false eyelashes and Marilyn Monroe wig.

I made the camera range twice — it was just unfortunate that Juice hadn't removed the lens cap for those particular shots.

One mother arrived two days early to fetch her daughter.

"Isn't this exciting," she giggled. "school is such fun these days — they do such wonderful, creative things."

Then — "Which one is your son?", she asked.

"He's the Robert Redford look-alike draped around your daughter," I replied proudly.

"He looks more like Al Debbo wouldn't you say?" she murmured.

The razzle-dazzle excitement of the film world is catching.

Why, only this morning I was testing my angles in the mirror.

"Don't you think I look a lot like Elizabeth Taylor?" I asked my husband.

"You do remind me of somebody," he replied.

I fluttered my eyelashes and preened modestly.

"Spencer Tracy," he said.

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