Willing to Face a Bullet

Moshe Alon is nothing at all like Kevin Costner, the sweet-faced boy who starred in the movie “The Bodyguard.” Far from being as cute and lively as a high school song girl, he’s a solid, somber, dark-eyed practitioner of the business Costner played at. Alon, who rarely smiles and almost never bounces, guards bodies, and some of them are the best bodies in Hollywood.

I met with him the other day after seeing Costner’s movie, in which Kevie climbs into the sack with Whitney Houston, the person whose body he is supposed to be guarding, although not quite that closely. I wanted to know with what fidelity Costner portrayed a real bodyguard, so I turned to Alon.

He’s a former agent for the Israeli Secret Service, a nondescript kind of guy in a dark suit coat and mismatched trousers, who speaks in an accent better understood by another Israeli. At 38, he’s been guarding somebody in one way or another most of his adult life.

“We live in an age of paranoia,” he was saying between rounds of target practice at an indoor range. Bullets from his 9-millimeter Swiss hand gun ripped holes in the target’s center with terrifying precision. “There’s a reason for the paranoia. The crime rate is up. Anything can happen.”

His job, and the job of the 40 personally trained bodyguards on the staff of his Professional Security Consultants, is safety in many forms. “A bodyguard produces something vague,” he says. “He is a success when nothing happens, and maybe nothing would happen anyhow.” He shrugs and aims. “That’s the way we want it.” Bam, bam, bam! . . .

We drive through Beverly Hills. Alon never stops looking at what’s around him, as though to miss anything would place us in jeopardy. His stare is intense. It scans, locks on, shifts, locks on, moves, locks on. . . .

The movie “Bodyguard” has faults. To begin with, you never climb into bed with the person you’re guarding. “It happens,” Alon says, “but it’s not professional.” He comes close to a smile and adds, “But with Whitney Houston, who knows?”

What is accurately portrayed in the movie, however, is the inclination of assistants to the stars to get in the way. “After awhile,” Alon says, “they begin to think they’re the stars. They get possessive and demanding. A bodyguard must deal with the main subject, no one else.”

Alon has been Elizabeth Taylor’s bodyguard for 10 years. She is the only current client he will name on a list that some say is an international who’s who. Past clients have included Armand Hammer, Michael Caine, Goldie Hawn and three of the cast members of “Beverly Hills, 90210,” the teen-age television triumph of hormones over IQ.

Liz Taylor attracts crowds wherever she goes, and at times prefers to avoid them. One of those times was her prenuptial party at a hotel near Santa Barbara. To fool a mob of reporters gathered around the hotel, Alon used a limo and a Bentley as decoys, around which the media hovered, and brought Taylor there in a little red van, around which no one hovered.

There is more to being a bodyguard than being big, burly and able to use a gun, Alon says. “This is the main tool of our trade.” He taps his head. “You’ve got to be able to think. But if necessary, you also must be willing to jump in front of a bullet.”

Alon checks his clients closely before accepting them. He won’t protect those on the dark side of society, including drug dealers, although some have asked. And he won’t be anyone’s status symbol. If the person doesn’t require security, he’ll tell him so.

“I won’t create importance for you. I won’t be your German shepherd.”

Surrounding one’s self with an army of bodyguards is a sure way of attracting attention. The opposite is walking around in a sweat shirt and jeans with no advance publicity and only one bodyguard in plain clothes.

Alon took Goldie Hawn to Tel Aviv once in just that kind of manner and the closest she came to recognition was the casual comment of a passerby: “That girl looks just like Goldie Hawn.”

That something might happen to a celebrity is unlikely. But it does happen. Actress Rebecca Schaeffer was murdered four years ago by a crazed “fan” who stalked her. Actress Theresa Saldana was almost fatally stabbed in 1982.

Moshe Alon has never had a serious problem with any of his clients, but realizes that in an age of danger, anything could happen. It takes only from two to five seconds to pull a trigger. “If it does happen,” he says, solemnly articulating a kind of bodyguard credo, “I want to be there.”