Excerpt from The Kid Stays in the Picture:
Here’s how his relationship began with Ali MacGraw, whom he ended up marrying (not to mention making her a star).
But needless to say, from the following excerpt, things did not begin well. He had to wine and dine her to get her to agree to do Love Story, and she wasn’t a star yet, it was Love Story which catapulted her into mega-mega stardom. At the time of the casting of the film, she was a hippie model, living in New York City. Yet her ego was enormous, and she told Robert Evans she wanted to approve her co-stars, and was also furious about the director Evans had chosen.
Here’s the story of their lunch:
I set up a lunch date with Love Story’s mentor and star, MacGraw, at La Grenouille. By the time dessert was served, I would have made the phone book with her. Would you say she got to me? I sure in hell knew I didn’t get to her. With all my props, my position, my “boy wonder” rep, she was as turned off to me as I was turned on to her. My competition was a model/actor she had been living with for three years, sharing the bills in a 3 1/2 room apartment on West 77th Street. Almost purposefully, she kept on interjecting how in love she was. Leaving the restaurant, I hailed a cab. As it pulled up she gave me her last zinger.
“Hope we shoot in the summer. Robin and I are getting married in the fall. We plan to spend October in Venice. Ever been there?”
“Nope.”
“Then wait. Only go there when you’re madly in love.”
That’s it. I grabbed her arm, whispering, “Never plan, kid. Planning’s for the poor.”
She tried to snap back. “No way–”
“Let me finish, Miss Charm. An hour ago, Love Story was even money to end up in the shredder. You win, I lose. Got it? Stop being Miss Inverse Snob, will ya? It doesn’t wear well. Don’t turn your nose down to success. If anything goes wrong with you and Blondie between now and post time, I’m seven digits away.”
I love it: “Never plan, kid. Planning’s for the poor.”
Ever read her biography. She really had an unhappy life. Today she is scrambling for money to live on.