Spector Witness: Clarkson's Attitude Got Her Fired

Phil Spector's team is now looking to portray Lana Clarkson as an actress who believed life was over at 40 if you hadn't yet hit it big.

An aspiring playwright who once cast Clarkson as Marilyn Monroe in a play he wrote called Brentwood Blondes, and then fired her a month later, testified for the defense Tuesday that he gave her the boot because she was too demanding.

Scribe and part-time bartender John Barons said that Clarkson enjoyed acting and showed up "eager" and "ready to go," but was more passionate about acquiring fame.

"Lana's career was everything to her," he said. "Fame was the same thing. That was her goal."

"We talked about making it in Hollywood and what it took. She said if you don't make it in this business by the time you're 40, you might as well give up," said Barons, who hired her in December 2002, barely two months before her death on Feb. 3 2003, at Spector's Alhambra home.

The erstwhile star of Roger Corman's Barbarian Queen also said, according to Barons, that she "might as well find a bridge" if her career prospects didn't improve.

"I'm sure she was kidding," Barons said. He also testified that he hired Clarkson because Corman appeared in a video portfolio she had made for herself called Lana Unleashed.

"It was shallow of me," he said. "I thought she could bring attention to the play."

When asked what made Clarkson hard to work with, Baron said that she demanded that changes be made in the script and she had a habit of intimidating both and other actors in the production. He fired her shortly after she announced that she had rewritten the play, he said.

Clarkson seemed shocked by the dismissal, but didn't fight him on it, Baron recalled.

"I felt really bad," he said. "I wondered what would have happened if she stayed with the play. Maybe none of us would have been here."

Barons then said that he's considering rewriting the play as a drama about famous women who were allegedly killed by famous men.

Deputy District Attorney Patrick Dixon asked Barons if he thought that Clarkson had been killed by a famous man.

"No, I don't know what happened," the writer said.

Later, the defense called TV writer David Schapiro, a former friend of Clarkson's, to the stand, where he testified that he had seen her break down in tears over the state of her career and finances, and that she borrowed $30,000 from a man in San Francisco to produce Lana Unleashed.

In an email sent to Schapiro in 2000 and read aloud by defense attorney Roger Rosen, Clarkson wrote, "I'm going to tidy my affairs and chuck it because it is really too much for this girl to bear."

"I felt badly and possibly that it was a bit overdramatic," Schapiro said when asked how he reacted upon receiving that email.

Schapiro said that his refusal to loan Clarkson $200 for rent money put a strain on their friendship, which he described as purely platonic.

Deputy D.A. Alan Jackson pointed out another email the actress wrote to Schapiro, which read, "I guess I'll have to bite the bullet and start doing amateur strip contests. Yeehaa!"

Jackson asked whether Schapiro interpreted that communiqué as a suicide note.

No, the witness replied.

Outside the presence of the jury, Los Angeles Superior Court Jude Larry Paul Fidler granted the prosecution a private hearing into the D.A.'s Office's investigation into upcoming defense witness Raul Julia Levy, the son of late actor Raul Julia and a former boyfriend of Clarkson's.

Levy, a recent addition to the defense's witness list, is expected to testify about his intimate relationship with Clarkson, as well as her alleged use of drugs and alcohol and knowledge of firearms.

Jackson told the court that his side needed more time to investigate Levy.

Meanwhile, Rosen objected to being barred from the hearing, with Fidler saying that it sound as if Rosen were implying that the judge was playing favorites with the prosecution.

"I take umbrage at that, your honor," Rosen said.

"Take all the umbrage you want," Fidler countered.