A portion of the backlot at Universal City Studios,my home for eighteen monthsI was 23 years old, at loose ends, per usual, had hammed it up in Junior High School plays, my mother had been a showgirl during the 1940s, I looked okay and I lived in Los Angeles. Clearly, the cinema was aching for my presence.I huddled with the General Manager of Universal Studios, a friend of one of my father’s cousins by marriage, to plot a career-launch strategy. After grilling me on what I thought about the symbolism in Nicholas Roeg’s Don’t Look Now and perusing my very...