Betty Schaefer: Perhaps the reason I hated "Bases Loaded" is that I knew your name. I'd always heard you had some talent.Joe Gillis: That was last year. This year I'm trying to earn a living.
The whole place seemed to have been stricken with a kind of creeping paralysis - out of beat with the rest of the world, crumbling apart in slow motion.
I just had to get out of there. I had to be with people my own age. I had to hear somebody laugh again. I thought of Artie Green. There was bound to be a New Year's shindig going on in his apartment down in Los Palmas. Writers without a job. Composers without a publisher. Actresses so young they still believe the guys in the casting office. A bunch of kids who didn't give a hoot.