| The Great Juan Caper (p. 3) | |||
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Things Take a
Turn |
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| At almost the
last minute, Mounsey breathlessly dashed in with a new script. The
lawyers had caught wind of the caper and were appalled. They forced script
changes, but by now the prank had legs and gone too far to stop.
Despite all the efforts at secrecy, word reached the street that Juan was no "youth from out of the beyond," but a radio disk jockey. Two years earlier, using the air name Dale Kelly, Juan had worked at a radio station in Rome, NY, scarcely 90 miles from the Tri-Cities. No one would believe the story, but the radio stations became suspicious. |
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| The night of the great
unveiling of the Great Juan and Catrina La Paz was surreal. The
Imperial Room at the Thruway Motel was the size of a sports arena, and
it was jammed with revelers, who, in a later decade, would have worn
pink-and-chartreuse polyester pantsuits. The media were sharpening
their fangs and burnishing their talons. Microphones festooned the stage.
All was ready. At nine o'clock, the lights dimmed and the hotel manager
took to the stage to introduce the Great Juan.
The skinny blonde kid (actually from Pennsylvania), dressed in a trademark black suit and gaucho tie, stepped up to the lectern and slipped the script in front of him. It was an uncomfortable moment. He hadn't fully memorized the new version. Worse, he could barely see it. He was forbidden from wearing his glasses in public. ("Makes ya look too American," Mounsey had grunted.) |
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