Needle Park, West 72nd, Tweeds, Home Sweet Home!

I am watching yet again Al Pacino in Panic in Needle Park. I lived right across the street in a hotel room when it was filmed. I had arrived from the streets of Chicago, where I was on my own from my 13th birthday. I was a Midwestern juvenile delinquent hence somewhat of a square, committed to always working straight jobs even at low pay. I commuted three hours a day to a job in Queens. I could barely make the rent. I was dirt poor for many years to come. That was just the way things came down, and I did not think I had in any way been cheated, although now I realize  I could have become President if I were raised in a "normal" home, as miserable as that might be. Maybe I should not have run away. I soon learned on the streets that human beings are flawed everywhere. Some are terribly corrupt, from the dregs of society up to the social elite whose material goods do them little good. I knew both ends and the in betweens.

I''ll never forget that particular room across from Needle Park. It was without a bathroom in the hot and humid summer. Only New York existentialists from Russia without air conditioning can understand what the heat, humidity, and grime in the air can do to you in New York City. At least I had a window fan.

Ah memories of the Good Old Days! A kitten crying in the rain to be let in. I remember a girl pounding on my door and crying out my name when I was dead asleep. I managed to put some clothes on and run outside in the pouring rain to find her, not even knowing who she was though she had cried out my name in desperation. She was not there, in Needle Park or anywhere around, much to my everlasting guilty feeling because it was my naïve belief that, if a woman calls in an emergency, a man should answer, no matter who she happens to be; otherwise, he is not a real man.

A block away, at 253 West 72nd street, was where that poor girl featured in Looking for Mister Goodbar was murdered. I knew her from W.M. Tweeds across 72nd. Screw Magazine published a story on it, and the owner, Steve Resnick, threatened to sue. All the cool people hung out there. She liked to sit on the first stool, at the front end of the bar, tucked into the corner by the wall. That was my favorite spot too; one could hide there and watch The Scene. She was a compassionate woman who helped deaf children. She was mischaracterized in the movie. She was not any more neurotic or promiscuous than the men I knew. After all, we were at the peak of the sexual revolution started some time ago by Henry Havelock Ellis, who loved women enough to want them freed, and we liked to behave like rabbits in that regard. Men did not have to take the initiative. If a guy looked dejected, a girl might just "mercy fuck" him to cheer him up.

My best friend, a concert musician with the philharmonic, lived in that building too. He eventually took so many drugs, especially horse tranquilizer, that he became psychotic and wound up jumping off a floor in back of the Beacon Hotel--the theater downstairs was known for its famous concerts. He left a note saying he was going to the beyond to be with Madame Blavatsky, identifying himself as a guru of the East. He supposed, while listening to Richard Strauss'' Also Sprach Zarathustra, that I was going to be the guru of the West. Well, that was an assignment I fled from, to Hawaii, and there I took care to become as square as I could and deny and lie about my past.

If you watch Panic in Needle Park, I assure you that it is true to life. The Golden Rule for me was Stay Away From Needles. The Colombian weed was amazing. I refused to snort heroin. I tooted some cocaine but I concluded it was a bad joke compared to Timothy Leary''s therapeutic LSD. Acid really came in handy because it tamed me down and I was able to drink heavily all night and go to the Metropolitan Museum when it opened in the morning, to meditate on the sarcophagi in the Egyptian wing. Those trips saved me from H and coke. Swami Prabhupada had showed up in the Sixties to spread the word about Krishna and save kids from drugs. He was teaching at a place on 72nd with a few dollars to begin with. Chant Hare Krishna, eat vegetables and sweets, so what is not to like? Well, he thought we should only have sex to procreate, not to have fun several times a day as we were wont to do if only we could.

Panic in Needle Park is monotonously limited in scope. I could write a much better film script with great characters, from the dregs to members of the upper class. I''m sure Blacks, especially the Uncle Tom''s and pimps and Panthers, would love some of the characters.

I don''t know why this particular movie fascinated the public, limited as it is to prostitution and drugs and a pathetic Romantic plot line. Al Pacino of course was a big attraction with his fine acting skills as well as those of his co-star, Kitty Winn, and the supporting actors were great too. Indeed, the characterizations in general are nigh on perfect. Method Acting relies on experience, so I expect they were closer to the reality of The Scene than we know.