Villars Steakhouse is an exclusive Beverly Hills restaurant whose polished, mirrored dining room turns a private dinner into a public spectacle. The Ex-Athlete brings Norma Jeane Baker there on their first date; while other diners watch them in reflections, their evening is interrupted by a stranger pleading for help for his son.

Setting and first date

The couple arrive for dinner at 8:10 and remain until 11. They sit at a table surrounded by a bright, sparkling glow, in a restaurant so exclusive that other customers avoid appearing indiscreet by stealing glances at them through its many mirrors. The room’s reflective surfaces make watching possible while preserving the performance of not watching.

The Ex-Athlete is famous for saying little, and at first he communicates more through looks than words. When he orders, he repeatedly addresses the waiter in a formal, deliberate rhythm, specifying what is for her and what is for him. Norma Jeane, meanwhile, is beautiful but intensely nervous, as if she were a debutante on opening night.

A couple seen through reflections

The diners’ view of Norma Jeane is unstable. At moments her reflection seems to cloud over, as though obscured by vapor or mist, and at others she disappears from view altogether. When she laughs, her red, glossy mouth can become the only feature visible in the mirror. The room thus presents her less as a securely observed person than as a series of fragments caught in other people’s attention.

She wears a pale-pink jersey cocktail dress with a pleated skirt and a beaded bodice, its neckline more restrained than the plunging dresses associated with her public image. A white gardenia is pinned above her left breast. She repeatedly touches the flower and smells it, smiling shyly at the Ex-Athlete; the gesture gives the evening an almost school-dance innocence that contrasts with the diners’ scrutiny and the sexualized judgments some of them make about her appearance.

An interruption at the table

The date is disrupted when M. Classen, a 43-year-old landowner from Eagle Bluffs, Utah, suddenly approaches the couple. He towers over them, takes out his wallet, and shows them a color photograph of his freckled, smiling eleven-year-old son, Ike. Classen explains that the boy had been a natural baseball talent, but had begun losing weight and tiring easily; even slight contact left him bruised. A doctor in Salt Lake City had diagnosed leukemia.

Classen blames the United States government’s nuclear experiments, saying his property borders a restricted military testing ground and that the government refuses to pay for Ike’s blood transfusions. He emphasizes his patriotism and asks the celebrities to speak to someone influential on his son’s behalf. The appeal is cut short almost as soon as it begins: Classen is escorted away, and the maître d’, red-faced and wringing his hands, comes to the couple’s table to apologize.

Narrative significance

The restaurant concentrates the novel’s interest in celebrity as a condition of being watched. Its customers observe Norma Jeane through mirrors, while a stranger approaches as though her fame might give her access to government power. The interrupted date therefore shifts abruptly from the couple’s carefully staged intimacy to a plea about illness, nuclear testing, and public responsibility, exposing the distance between a famous image and the limited influence attributed to the people who embody it.