Roundabout
can writer, looks like a ■ decided to disguise him- self self as a retired English colonel. The Russian Jew who has camouflages a The moustache mild authority. eyes bulge with mouth that could be testy. The teeth have obviously clenched long and hard at briar pipes. The trousers are khaki faded with the dust of old campaigns. He sat in the natural habitat of retired colonels —Brown's Hotel—and sedately drank afternoon tea. 'Yes, I'm the son of immigrant Russian Jews,' he said and two old ladies near by bent farther over their toasted tea-cakes. If you want to be portentous I suppose you could say that so many Jews are comedians and humorists because as a race they've been kicked around so much. But don't describe me as a humorist. That's an appalling profession to admit to. I'd like to de- scribe myself as a writer. In the Twenties I started out by doing cartoons for magazines like Judge and the old Life—not the present abomina- tion. I used cliché jokes and then kidded the joke along with drawings that had nothing to do with the joke. I got interested in design arid used collage : some of the stuff was almost as sur- realist as the things Max Ernst was doing in Paris. Then I found a catalogue from Gamages with steel engravings of ladies' boots and corsets. And I incorporated those with drawings.
`I lived a schizophrenic life, drawing and writ- ing. Then I decided to stick to writing. I write very slowly. I have a great lack of facility. By now, I make a great thing of it,' he chuckled. 'It takes me about two weeks to write a New Yorker piece. Success hasn't mellowed me. I burn with a very short fuse. I write to get my own back. I write by a process of accretion—a sentence at a time. You have the reader's patience for only a short while and it takes very little to bore him.'
Perelman has written many film scripts, includ- ing Around the World in 80 Days. 'Todd was a megalomaniac who thought he was twenty-four feet tall. After 80 Days I'd had him. The London scenes were written in this hotel. I visited the Reform Club for the film and I'm now an honor- ary member of the club. I like England very much and that's why the lampooning of the English in 80 Days was any good . . . the best parodies are done with affection. I know that my parodies of Chandler have this quality. I'd read his books so often : he was much more than a thriller writer.'
Mr. Perelman adjusted his disguise and stalked out of the lounge. And the two old ladies returned to the drab business of listening to each other. THE INSIDE OF the Royal Festival Hall was papered with fluttering Union Jacks. Red, white ,and blue squares waved to the tune of 'John Brown's Body' as the armoured phalanx of organ pipes rumbled and the little man dressed like an umpire con- ducted in slow time. Three thousand five hundred jolly, young voices in holiday mood then changed to 'If You Were the Only Girl in the World' as they roared their way through flag-bedecked Daily Express song sheets.
There was a pause and the audience stamped and cheered and clapped themselves, the platform party, the conductor, the organist and themselves. The leader of the community singing was Mr. Arthur Caiger, DCM, who leads the Cup Final crowds in 'Abide With Me.'
He said he was very proud and pleased to be there and looked forward to meeting the Prime Minister. He had had the honour of meeting the Prime Minister before and he greatly admired the Prime Minister—`Mr. Macdonald.' The audience sucked its breath in what was surely boneless wonder. `Mr. Macdonald . . .' went the cheery, indomitable Mr. Caiger, `Mr. Macdonald had ...' The silence was deafening. '1 mean Mr. Macmil- lan, of course . . . ha, ha."Ha, ha,' went the Young Conservatives like an echo from beyond the horizon. The men from the Central Office relaxed their frozen smiles. And the rally jogged jauntily on. It was the only faux pas of the after- noon.
Over the loudspeakers a nervous bespectacled commentator announced the arrival of the heads of the delegations from every Young Conservative area. They carried banners and were bathed in spotlights. The organ played the local folk tunes. And the commentary unrolled its awestruck, travelogue clichés: .`gateway for trade, symbol of London pride . . . tall buildings, pillars of peace . . . industry and farming locked together with history.'
Then when the cheers seemed at their peak the doors at the side of the hall were flung open. The entire crowd on its feet broke into 'Land of Hope and Glory.' As Mr. Macmillan arrived on the centre of the platform they roared out the ultimate line 'Make Thee Mightier Yet.'
It was a triumph of organisation which Mr. `Big Jim' Farley would have envied. And all abso- lutely unrehearsed and spontaneous. Even the League of Empire Loyalists were overawed. They made only two tiny piping protests and allowed themselves to be led from the hall like the polite, nice-mannered, middle-class youngsters that they undoubtedly are.
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