Duke shuffled along with the slow-moving wave of sports fans.
He wore a celeste blue with orange stripes Dallas Tornado jersey that clung slightly to his chest.
Orange and blue face paint on his face, hiding his identity.
Strapped to his chest was a baby carrier.
Inside sat little Bradley, now 5 months old, wide awake and kicking his chubby legs.
The baby wore a miniature matching jersey, his cheek stamped with a small Tornado logo.
Around Duke, a team of disguised security guards blended into the crowd, wearing soccer merch, forming a circle around him.
Duke paused near a metal railing, looking down at the VIP section near the pitch.
It looked like a different world down there. Waiters carried silver trays of cold champagne to guests sitting in cushioned chairs behind velvet ropes.
He spotted Robert Redford leaning against the barrier, sharing a joke with Mick Jagger.
Just a few seats away, Andy Warhol held a camera, snapping photos with Barbra Streisand sitting beside him.
Spielberg was there too, speaking with Elton John who sat next to him.
Diane Keaton smiled under a wide-brimmed straw hat, with Secretary of State Henry Kissinger discussing something serious with Abe Beame, the Mayor of New York.
Suddenly, the crowd roared, Muhammad Ali had stood up and playfully threw jabs into the empty air.
The cameras flashed constantly around the VIPs, being treated like royalty, catered to by stadium staff.
Duke, meanwhile, stood anonymous in the cheap seats, feeling the plastic of his general admission chair.
Duke shifted his weight, letting out a sigh. He muttered 'to Russell, who was standing nearby pretending to arrange his keys.
"How are there still stadiums with no private suites?" Duke asked, shaking his head. "This is ridiculous."
Duke reached up to wipe a bead of sweat from his forehead. "I am the owner of a professional basketball team, and I am standing here in the general admission section, sweating..." He sounded more amused than angry.
Russell did not break character. He kept his eyes on the crowd, holding up a hot dog wrapped in foil.
"You wanted to blend in with the locals, boss," the security chief whispered back. "This is blending in."
Duke sighed again, bouncing Bradley gently against his chest.
The baby laughed happily, grabbing a fistful of his father's orange jersey.
"I know, I know," Duke whispered back, smiling down at his son. "AlthoughI really miss having a private bathroom."
A whistle echoed through the stadium, signaling the start of the match.
The New York Cosmos took the field, and the crowd erupted in a cheer.
They had Pelé on their roster, and the mere sight of the soccer legend caused cheers.
Whenever Pelé touched the ball, Duke pointed down at it, to a focused Bradley, with the baby staring wide-eyed at the green field.
At five months old, Bradley was remarkably alert, waving his fat arms in the air every single time the Dallas crowd roared.
Duke felt a rumble in his stomach and bought a hot dog from a passing vendor.
He ate it carefully while supporting Bradley with one hand. A thick drop of yellow mustard fell from the soft bun, landing right on his team jersey.
He looked down at the yellow stain on his chest and just chuckled, while wiping his mouth with a paper napkin.
The colors of the jersey were... questionable.
In the eyes of Duke, he had always liked strong colors, with jerseys from Liverpool or Chelsea being preferable to the eye than a Jersey from Manchester City.
The final whistle blew after 90 minutes of play.
After Dallas took an early 2-0 lead, but Pelé managed to engineer a comeback, securing a 2-2 draw with an assist and a trademark header.
Duke looked down at his chest, while getting up. Bradley had fallen asleep, resting his little cheek against Duke's chest.
The crowd began to shuffle toward the main exits.
Duke smiled, gently rubbing Bradley's back as they entered the car.
"I could buy the Dallas Tornadoes today but what could i even do? Americans have a lot of resistance to soccer," he said to himself, keeping his voice low in the car as he pondered.
Duke realized he didnt know nearly as much of soccer in this era as he knew about even Basketball.
At least for Basketball, after the 1980s, he knows almost every major event and several of the drafts, for football, he knew maybe a couple players. If they were not famous, he would not recognize them.
___
5 days later, It was June 20, 1975.
A theater on a busy boulevard, had a bright marquee glowing in bold letters that read 'Jaws'
The red carpet stretched down the sidewalk, packed tight with press members, and screaming fans.
Paramount had make sure that it was the biggest movie premiere of the summer season.
Duke stood in the middle of the red carpet, a very unusual sight. Normally he wouldnt talk too much with the press.
Tonight was an exception.
Jaws was his film that he had poured his heart into directing.
Duke gladly discussed the stressful production of the film.
He talked about the ocean water, boats, and the mechanical shark that kept breaking down.
Even with the press in front of him, Duke maintained strict boundaries.
He kept the conversation focused firmly on the movie, actors, and special effects. He politely deflected any nosy questions regarding his private life.
___
Miles away from Los Angeles, a different scene unfolded.
There was a crowded audience of a modest movie theater in Ohio.
A 13 year old boy sat near the middle row, surrounded by a group of noisy teenagers.
His name was Thomas Cruise, a student of St. Francis Seminary in town.
He was studying on a church scholarship, trying to figure out his path in life. In his private life, he harbored a love for acting and even often performed in his school musicals.
Acting made Thomas feel alive, when he stepped onto a stage, he could be anyone.
He and his friends were sitting in this room tonight because of the advertising campaign for Jaws.
Duke's marketing blitz had worked, drawing in curious teenagers from every corner of the country.
Thomas's friend, a boy named Dave, leaned over the armrest. "I heard the shark in this movie is real," Dave whispered, "Like, a real trained shark."
Thomas nodded, clearly believing the playground rumors. "One of the older guys told me they actually caught a giant shark in the ocean and wired it up to move on camera."
Another friend, a girl named Julie sitting on Thomas's left, shivered in her denim jacket.
"I saw the commercial on television last night," she said, pulling her collar up. "The music alone gave me the creeps."
Thomas looked away from his friends and stared at the screen.
He thought about Duke Hauser, the enigmatic studio head had directed this film.
Thomas had read all about the famous mogul in various entertainment magazines.
To Thomas, Duke's biography read like an incredible adventure novel.
The man was a self-made man from Texas who was also a Vietnam veteran, a bestselling novelist, and a powerful Hollywood mogul. It seemed like a story protagonist.
But Thomas also knew the juicy gossip, everyone did.
It was common knowledge that Duke Hauser had never even finished high school, yet he still managed to become a millionaire before turning thirty.
Thomas leaned closer to Dave, whispering over the hum of the projector.
"Did you know Duke didn't even graduate high school?" Thomas asked, "He just dropped out, wrote a book, and made it."
Dave nodded, sipping his soda through a paper straw. "Yeah, I heard that. He wrote a book about a dead girl, my mom read it."
Thomas sat back in his seat, he was currently struggling with his own ambitions.
He wanted to be a famous actor, but the road ahead seemed a little impossible. He had no money, no connections, and no real plan.
He was also a bit puny for his age.
But thinking about Duke gave him a surge of hope. If a high school dropout from Texas could write books, and direct pictures, maybe Thomas could do it too.
His friend Julie leaned over, interrupting his thoughts.
"He's weird." she said, sounding a bit skeptical. "His movies are kind of weird at times. Love Story is just for girls who want to cry and Annie Hall is for old people."
Julie shrugged her shoulders. "The only movie of his I actually liked was Hacksaw Ridge. That one was super intense."
Thomas nodded in agreement. He remembered seeing that specific film since his seminary school had actually shown an edited version of it.
They watched Hacksaw Ridge during a history class. A pro-America, anti-war, and moving film.
The bright beam of the projector sliced through above their heads.
The iconic Paramount Pictures logo flashed onto the screen.
The film opens at a late-night beach bonfire on the fictional New England resort town of Amity Island.
A young woman named Chrissie Watkins leaves the party to go skinny-dipping with a drunk boy pursuing her.
While treading water, she is violently jerked around by an unseen force beneath the surface and pulled under, screaming.
The next morning, her partial remains wash ashore, the boy never entered the water so he accidentally survived.
Amity's new Chief of Police, Martin Brody, a man from New York City who ironically suffers from hydrophobia which is the fear of the water wants to close the beaches immediately.
However, Mayor Larry Vaughn overrules him.
Vaughn fears that closing the beaches right before the lucrative Fourth of July weekend will destroy the town's summer-dependent economy.
He pressures the medical examiner to change the official cause of death to a "boating accident."
The cover-up has tragic consequences.
A few days later, a great white shark attacks a crowded beach in broad daylight, killing a young boy named Alex Kintner.
Alex's grieving mother places a $3,000 bounty on the shark, sparking an amateur frenzy that draws hundreds of hopeful hunters to Amity.
During a chaotic town meeting in which Bruce Lee and Bolo Yeung are in the back doing a cameo as Shark Hunters.
A local professional shark hunter Quint a hardened mariner interrupts the arguments by dragging his fingernails down a chalkboard.
He offers to catch and kill the shark, but only for $10,000. The town council balks at the price.
Oceanographer Matt Hooper arrives from the Oceanographic Institute to investigate.
Meanwhile, a group of amateur fishermen catch a Tiger shark, and the town celebrates, believing the nightmare is over.
Hooper insists the bite radius on the Tiger shark doesn't match Chrissie's wounds and asks to cut the shark open to check its stomach contents.
Mayor Vaughn refuses, wanting the positive press to stand.
That night, Brody and Hooper secretly dissesct the tiger shark themselves, finding only fish and a tin can.
No human remains.
Realizing the killer is still out there, they go out on Hooper's boat to search the waters.
They discover the half-sunken vessel of local fisherman Ben Gardner.
Hooper dives into the dark water to investigate, finding a huge shark tooth wedged in the hull, but drops it in terror when Gardner's severed head suddenly floats out of the wreckage.
Despite Brody and Hooper's warnings and lack of physical evidence, Mayor Vaughn insists on keeping the beaches open for the Fourth of July.
The beach is packed with nervous tourists.
A prank involving two kids with a fake cardboard shark fin causes a mass panic and draws the police boats away.
While everyone is distracted by the prank, the real shark slips into the shallow, supposedly safe waters.
It kills a boater and nearly kills Brody's eldest son, Michael, who goes into shock.
Facing the undeniable reality of a monster in their waters, a devastated Mayor Vaughn finally authorizes Brody to hire Quint at his $10,000 asking price.
Brody, Hooper, and Quint set sail on Quint's worn-down fishing boat, the Orca.
The dynamic between the three men is tense.
Quint constantly mocks Hooper's wealthy background and scientific gadgets, while Hooper is appalled by Quint's reckless, old-school methods.
Brody, entirely out of his element and seasick, tries to keep the peace.
While Brody is reluctantly tossing chum (bloody fish parts) off the back of the boat, the huge 25 foot great white shark unexpectedly rears its head out of the water.
A terrified Brody backs into the cabin and delivers the film's most farmous line, "You're gonna need a bigger boat."
Quint harpoons the shark with a line attached to a buoyant barrel, designed to tire the beast and keep it near the surface.
Incredibly, the shark pulls the barrel underwater and disappears.
That night, the three men bond in the cabin, drinking.
The mood shifts from lighthearted to chilling when Quint delivers a monologue about his experience surviving the sinking of the USS Indianapolis during WWII, where hundreds of his crewmates were eaten by sharks over several days while awaiting rescue.
The next day, the shark returns, heavily damaging the boat's hull and engine.
Over the course of the battle, Quint manages to attach three yellow barrels to the shark, but the beast is so powerful it drags the Orca backward, flooding the deck and disabling the engine completely.
The boat begins to sink.
With their options dwindling, Hooper gets into a shark-proof steel cage and is lowered into the water to stab the shark with a spear filled with lethal strychnine.
The shark violently attacks the cage from behind, smashing it to pieces and dropping the spear.
Hooper narrowly escapes by hiding in the ocean floor.
The shark leaps directly onto the sinking Orca.
The boat tips to a side, and Quint slides down the bloody deck directly into the shark's jaws.
Despite a desperate struggle, he is birtten in half and dragged underwater.
Brody, now completely alone on a sinking vessel, shoves a pressurized scuba tank into the shark's mouth as it rams the boat.
He scrambles up the sinking mast with Quint's M1 Garand rifle.
As the shark swims straight toward him, Brody takes aim and fires.
His final shot hits the scuba tank perfectly, blowing the shark to pieces.
Hooper surfaces, having survived the cage attack and the two exhausted men grab a pair of floating yellow barrels, laughing in disbelief, and paddle back to Amity Island as the credits roll.
___
Difficult to write chapter cause i was busy all day