NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Never Say Never – Joely Richardson Goes Solo

NEVER SAY NEVER: Joely Richardson Goes Solo

by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published Nov. 2014 in Long Island Woman magazine.)

It takes a bit of courage to do a one-person stage show.  The spotlight has nowhere else to point, and if you drop the ball, everyone’s there to see you fumble, but there’s no one you can turn to and ask for it back.  Of course, solo shows also offer great rewards: mastering the challenges that come with intense concentration and memorization, engaging viewers with an intimacy bigger plays and musicals can’t equal, and basking in the appreciation of a job the audience knows only you could have done.

To embark on such a journey, it helps if a performer has experience, poise, ego and humility in equal measure. It also doesn’t hurt to be rich, gorgeous, battened by both joyous and tragic life experience, accustomed to flashbulbs and controversy, and genetically derived from a family of actors spanning five generations. Add to that being a mom and a TV star, and you have Joely Richardson, glamorous daughter of “Tom Jones” film director Tony Richardson and Oscar-winning actress Vanessa Redgrave.

Propped by a long IMDB resume, stage experience in London and off-Broadway, and career-recharging success on the HBO series “Nip/Tuck,” Richardson can have her pick of theater projects.  Her choice: a revival of The Belle of Amherst, William Luce’s look at the life and writings of Emily Dickinson.  The 1976 play became something of a career-long touchstone for Julie Harris, who won a Tony for playing the pithy poetess and toured with the monodrama for years.  New York hasn’t seen the show since; however, and Richardson feels she’s the one to bring Dickinson’s inner light back to the footlights.

“I always swore that I would absolutely never do a one-woman show,” she laughs in our late-summer phone conversation.  “I thought only crazy people did that sort of thing.  Then I read the script, and I was like, `Oh, my God, I have to do this.  It’s so good.’  I actually felt jealously possessive of the role.  I know there are so many fabulous actresses out there who could do it, so I was so thrilled they thought of me.  My answer was, `Yes! Yes! Yes!’”

Asked what specific kinship she felt with the reclusive 19^th century author of more than 1800 works of verse, Richardson replies, “Weirdly, I just connected with the script.  Besides knowing of Dickinson and some of her poetry, to be honest, I didn’t connect immediately.  But the voice of this woman that I heard coming out of the script was so clear and so fabulous; it was that voice I wanted to play.  And then, as I started to research her, I just became more and more fascinated.  She was completely ahead of her time.  She was an eccentric.  She was, arguably, as [Poet Laureate] Ted Hughes said, one of the greatest of all time.  She wrote in secret for a large part of her life and was unpublished bar seven poems.

“Still, the thing that most grabbed me about her was her spirit,” Richardson continues, “this bright light that she shone.  I’ll never know what she was like to the people around her, but from her writing, it’s just this burning spirit.  Having a really vibrant, inner life – one that might not be connected to anything external or that other people would ever know.  Also her humor, she’s incredibly mischievous.  She believed in the sacred but not in God.  In fact, the sacred chapel for her was nature, and that would be my feeling, as well.”

“Nature?”  I counter, “not theater?  Isn’t that sacrilege?”  Richardson parries, “Theater is art, and art I’m completely fascinated by and intrigued by and excited by.  There are moments when I’ve seen great art in whatever capacity – the net’s wide – where I’ve been truly inspired and thought that it was sacred.  But my most peaceful, sacred moments I would say I’ve found in nature.  I garden, I walk.  Whenever I have a problem or an issue or just to pass the time of day, my treat, my exercise is to walk.”

That the actress would seek a tranquil place as refuge is understandable considering that the hectic world of performance has been a family business since great-grandfather Roy Redgrave stepped on the English stage in the late 1890s.  A generation later, three more Redgrave thesps were born: Vanessa, Corin and Lynn, with Vanessa and Tony Richardson siring not only Joely but sister Natasha.  When a career as a professional tennis player didn’t pan out, Joely, in her late teens, went to study at London’s Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, with significant film parts quickly following.

Regal looks may have given Richardson an easy entrée into such roles as Marie Antoinette in “The Affair of the Necklace,’ a Queen on “The Tudors” and Elizabeth I in “Anonymous,” but her vitae also lists everything from the John Goodman vehicle “King Ralph” to squaring off against Glenn Close in “101 Dalmations” to playing mom in this year’s remake of the teen romance “Endless Love” to being the titular (and occasionally naked) star of the Ken Russell-directed BBC mini-series, “Lady Chatterley.”

“One of the important lessons of my life has been `never say never,’ Richardson notes.  “There are so many twists and turns, I often find myself eating my own words.  And as far as acting, I was encouraged to do everything but.  But having said that, all my life I’ve acted.  I was just on vacation in France, and I went back to the house where we were little and we put on plays, and it was really funny to just stand on this little stone ledge where I started acting all those years ago.  Acting was my private world, in the same way that Emily Dickinson’s poems were her private world.  I know that sounds ironic because, whether you’re writing a poem or acting, you’re doing it for other people, but it comes from a secret place.”

Asked if she received any particularly valuable acting advice from her mother, whose great talent and loathsome political outbursts would certainly form a unique perspective on a life spent in the public eye, Richardson replies, “My mom gave me a great piece of advice during the first play I was doing professionally.  I was really struggling and not being very good in it.  She said, `Just share all your weaknesses with the audience because then it remains an open communication.  The important thing is not to shut down.’  I think that’s true on many levels.

“She is a staggeringly brilliant actress,” Richardson adds matter-of-factly.  “The first time we did a play together, years and years ago, when I saw her onstage, I was aware of all that she is, but I wasn’t intimidated because, well, she’s my mother.  Obviously, it’s a different relationship.  But onstage, watching her, I started to realize that that was where she truly existed.  That was as real to her as real life.  And I started to see the magic of what she does.  Other times I’ve worked with her – for example, on `Nip/Tuck’ – I felt more protective of her because television works so fast, and I thought, `I don’t know if she’s in her element `cause there are no rehearsals.’  Each experience together is different.”

Looking over her own career, Richardson, who turns 50 in January, says individual performances and films tend to fade from memory.  Instead, “It’s all a tapestry.  I just see the blanket, rather than the individual pieces of `this was better, that was better.’

Every decade is almost like closet space in your brain.  There’s so much you have to delete because there’ve been so many jobs since.  And that said, it’s not dependent on how well the film does whether you love it or not.  Working with people and the director often is the most satisfying thing.  I’ve worked on tiny, little independent films that two people have seen, but they were great, great experiences.

“People keep saying to me, `So what are you gonna do next year when you turn 50?’” Richardson adds, “and I say, `a one-woman play!’  That is my gift to myself, to think of all the years that I’ve worked.”

Nevertheless, Richardson admits that all the creative labor she’s done has sometimes stood in the way of leading a fuller life.  “I think I worked a little bit too much for awhile,” she concedes.  “I should be so lucky, but as a result, I really neglected my private life.  Yes, I have a huge amount of responsibilities, and I love my work.  But I’m nearly always traveling.  In the past year, I did a film in New Orleans, then a film in Budapest, then a film in Cuba.  I spend an awful lot of time on the road, so when I’m home in England or in New York (I live both places), I just try not to work back-to-back now.  Because reconnecting with all my loved ones is so, so important to me.  I’m lucky because I have many.  But it’s really important to me to make sure I do have a private life.  I did feel lonely and thought, `Right, I’ve got the balance wrong.’  And I re-addressed it.”

The actress, who was married to film producer Tim Bevan, has not lacked for companionship.  Years ago, had a scandalous affair with Scottish businessman Archie Stirling that broke up his marriage to Diana Rigg, and more recent rumors have had her romantically linked to “Nip/Tuck” co-star John Hensley and then the 30-year-old son of a Russian billionaire.  Declining comment, Richardson says, “Who I date is for myself.  I mean, I’m not married.  I was once; I’m divorced.  I suppose it’s back to the Emily Dickinson thing about really investing in your personal life plus your work.  I’ve found that despite the very tough things that have happened in my life, things have gotten better and better.”

Those tough things include a serious round of surgeries needed by her daughter Daisy, which pulled Richardson out of “Nip/Tuck” for a full season.  “They totally understood and gave me the time off,” recalls the actress.  “I never said I wouldn’t go back, and we just left it open.  Whenever they needed me, I was there.  And then the show ended.”  (Daisy Bevan, now healthy and 22, is – wait for it – an actress, though her parents forbade her going into the profession until she finished her studies at the NYU-affiliated Lee Strasberg Theater and Film Institute.)

Two greater hardships have marked Richardson’s life, however: the death of her father when she was still in her twenties, and the loss of sister Natasha in a skiing accident in 2009.  The media’s demand that surviving loved ones forever have a ready soundbyte for fans of the deceased can make the grieving process even more excruciating, but that, too, goes along with the demands of celebrity.  Five years after the tragedy, Natasha’s widower, Liam Neeson, who honored his pact with her by disengaging life support when there was no hope of recovery, recently told the Irish Independent, “Her death was never real.  It still kind of isn’t.  There’s periods now when I hear the door opening . . . I still think I’m going to hear her.”

For Joely, also, repercussions are ongoing.  “My experience is that grief is horrific,” she says.  “It is a condition, and you walk through it.  After a certain amount of time, you realize the person is still there and still as much a part of your life.”  When I prompt her for a memorable anecdote of an early, happy time she shared with her sibling, the actress replies, “I can’t go there right now.  Those things I tend to keep very, very close to my heart because they’re mine.  Her passing was so public, it was necessary for me to hold onto the private that much more strongly.”

That attachment to privacy is also likely a carryover from Richardson’s plunging into the mind of Emily Dickinson, who spent the last 20 years of her life barely even leaving her room.  Don’t expect the actress to become an austere shut-in, however, even as the big 5-0 looms.  “We’re brainwashed to think that aging is a bad thing,” says Richardson, “but we should celebrate it!  My attitude is, `how lucky that I get to have another year.  How lucky that I am still here.’  I know it’s harder for women, but I’m determined to completely embrace it.  We all got to be young once.  I did it; I lived it.  And now, how exciting that I get to be 50, and that will be wonderful.

“People say to me, `Oh, The Belle of Amherst will be a great success’,” adds Richardson.   “Well, it might not be.  Either way, I hope for the people involved that I can do it as well as I can.  I will do it as well as I can.  But there’s another thing I’ve learned from being that bit older.  It’s lovely when things are a success – I can’t pretend otherwise.  However, it’s all about the endeavor.  That’s my own personal reward: having the courage to do it.  Whether it gets thumbs up or down is completely out of my control.   But the fact that I dared to do it is my way of judging.  The real questions are: do we carry on extending ourselves?  Do we keep staying out of our comfort zones?  Do we keep pushing ourselves on all levels of our life?  That’s my present to myself as I turn fifty: to still be jumping out of my comfort zone and exploring new avenues.”

*

SOME QUICK QUESTIONS

Recent Books You’ve Read

Arianna Huffington’s “Thrive.”  “Just because it’s about not working too hard and re-addressing the other parts of your life.”

Jill Bolte Taylor’s “My Stroke of Insight.”  “I read a lot of psychological books just because it’s so much a part of acting.  This one’s about the medical side of the brain and how we all function.”

Emily Dickinson’s Selected Poems, Emily Dickinson’s Selected Letters, Emily Dickinson biographies . . . “My plate is full with Emily Dickinson right now!”

Recent Plays and Movies You’ve Liked

“Laurence Anyways.”  “That was quite brilliant.  But I’m a rabid movie watcher, and I’m incredibly eclectic – from the cheesiest romcom to a great drama to a tiny indie.”

A View from the Bridge by the Young Vic company in London. “It was contemporary and just sensational.  I’m an actor who loves watching other people’s work.”

Musical Tastes

“A friend took me to Katy Perry’s concert recently in London, which was amazing.  This huge butterfly flew over the audience.  But my taste in music is absolutely widespread, and I access it mostly through the radio.”

Worst Habit

Smoking.  “I’d give up for long stretches – years – and then I do sometimes have a moment where I indulge.  I’m ridiculously healthy in every other respect.  Drugs have never been a part of my life, and I don’t really drink.  So my vice would be chocolate and the occasional cigarette.”

Favorite Places in the World

London and New York.

Favorite Meal

Pasta.  “I absolutely love it.  It’s the Italian side of my upbringing.  Pasta or roast chicken; I’m simply pleased.”

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com), hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.org) on UNC Radio, edits the theater section of Stagebuddy.com, and recently completed his new play, The Miracle of Long Johns, which will hopefully be coming to a theater near you.

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NON-FICTION – ESSAY – HUMOROUS: Rabbi Sol Solomon’s Rabbinical Reflection #107 (9/21/14) – GWYNETH

RABBI SOL SOLOMON’S RABBINICAL REFLECTION #107 (9/21/2014): Gwyneth

aired Sept. 20, 2014 on Dave’s Gone By. Youtube clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AF1GwetYq3E, AUDIO: https://davesgoneby.net/?p=27564

Shalom Dammit! This is Rabbi Sol Solomon with a Rabbinical Reflection for the week of September 21, 2014.

Over this summer, I had my beefs with celebrities – some Jewish, some not – and their bashing of Israel over the Gaza War. Celebrities who are either misinformed or simply too damn dumb to know who their friends are in this world, versus who the enemies are. Who is creating a climate of death and destruction versus who is just trying to live without being hit by rockets every day? So fie on Penelope Cruz and Javier Bardem and Rihanna and that putz from Pink Floyd Roger Waters, and Chuck D, who’s been salting his lyrics with anti-Semitic slurs since day one. You wanna know what a Terrordome is, Chuck? Go live in Israel and be forced to live under an iron terrordome so that Hamas rockets don’t fall on your black ass. Why don’t you do that, Chuck D-spicable?

Meanwhile, other famous folk have been fabulous! Howard Stern, Bill Maher, Joan Rivers – she should rest in peace – Woody Allen, who gave a wonderful, insightful interview about the situation. He was the first one to say that if, back in 1948, the Arabs had treated Israel like a friendly neighbor instead of hornets’ nest, everything would be different. Notice: it’s all the funny people, the comedians, who see through the Palestinian PR poppycock. I guess it takes a humorist to shoot the arrows of logic through balloons filled with hot-air. Or, in the Arabs’ case, airplanes filled with terrorists. Thank God the funny people get it, because all these self-inflated “serious” actors and musical artistes – they look in the mirror and see Felix Frankfurter staring back at them – instead of the hot dogs they really are.

Even so, I come today not to vilify my enemies but to glorify my brethren and, in this case, sistren. In celebrity news last week, it was revealed that the Jewish people will be gaining a notable. The decades since World War II have seen our numbers chopped by the Holocaust, by assimilation, by intermarriage, by – you should pardon the expression – conversion (ptooey!). Now, the Orthodox are doing their best to reverse the trend. They’re shtupping and shtupping and being fruitful and multiplying, which has been heavenly to the cause, even as it’s been hell on the welfare rolls.

But we cannot rely merely on the horniness of our most devout cohorts to bolster our population. It is a delight, therefore, to report that yes, we’re getting one back. Someone who, if nothing else, raises the overall good-looks quotient of our nation by at least a percent or two.

Gwyneth Paltrow, a shikseh goddess if there ever was one – tall, blonde, willowy, pretty as a picture and pretty in motion pictures – Gwyneth Paltrow is converting to Judaism. Now, to be clear, she’s already halfway there. Her father was television producer Bruce Paltrow, a proud member of the tribe. Her mother, however, is the lovely non-Jewish actress Blythe Danner. She’s the one on TV commercials hawking Prolia, a pharmaceutical that helps weak bones, which is ironic because you don’t get nicer bones than Blythe Danner or her kid.

Little Gwyneth was raised in a home with both religions, which she found very nice. But in recent years, she’s been studying Kabbalah, which is a weird, mystical occult offshoot of Judaism. Kind of liked dungeons and dragons, only the dungeons are synagogues and the dragons have big noses and law degrees.

But Paltrow is not just being swayed by a cultish micro-sect. She’s done her homework. In 2011, she appeared on that TV show that delves into your genealogical history. She went into the Eldridge Street Synagogue on the Lower East Side and looked at pictures of her father’s father’s father – a great Rabbi. And his father, also a Kabbalistic Rebbe of note. With people like that in your lineage, what are you gonna be, a Presbyterian?

And Ms. Paltrow has said that she wants to bring her children up, quote, “in a Jewish environment.” Well, she’s in Hollywood, so she’s already there. But she’s got one kid named Moses – so come on, she might as well have named him Jewy Jewberg – and the other child she famously named Apple. Well, is there a more Jewish fruit? From Eve in the garden to the treat we dip in honey for a sweet New Year, the apple is a treasured food for our people – and it doesn’t clog up your tuchas like matzoh.

And speaking of eating, Paltrow has said that she loves to cook and feed people, making her a Jewish mother, and she has amazing genes, making her a Jewish princess. And hey, considering all the macrobiotic laboratory crap she eats, she’s a Jewish doctor, too!

Now, all of this could just be a star’s fad, or Paltrow trying to find herself after consciously uncoupling from her shaygitz husband of more than a decade. Whatever the reason, I hope it takes. I hope she finds in Judaism a beautiful way of life – not from all the rules, not from the mystical narishkeit, but from fully joining a people that has survived the worst the universe can throw at them and still turn to each other and say, “Really? Those shoes with that shirt?” 

Welcome, Golden Gwyneth, to the fold, and when your kids turn 12, look me up. I can have them chanting the Haftorah like Yossele Rosenblatt in three months flat, or your money back. Well, some of your money back.

This has been a Rabbinical Reflection from Rabbi Sol Solomon, Temple Sons of Bitches in Great Neck, New York.

(c) 2014 TotalTheater. All rights reserved.

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NON-FEATURE – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Queen for a Daytime (Queen Latifah)

QUEEN FOR A DAYTIME:  Singer & Actress Queen Latifah Takes on TV Talk Once More

by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published March 2014 in Long Island Woman magazine.)

 

Daytime TV is not always known for its grace and uplift.  From “you are not the father” to shrieking contestants to squawking hosts on “The View,” daylight-hour television can sometimes seem like one long ramp up to an Excedrin headache. Somewhere in the midst of that swirl are the talk shows, which can veer from spirited to silly to sensationalistic, sometimes from segment to segment.

New pretenders to the throne of Donahue, Oprah and Ellen appear every season, but rap star-turned actress-turned TV host Queen Latifah just might beat the odds – and do it in a kinder, gentler way. This is not her first go-`round with daytime talk.  Her first show, a decade ago, ran three seasons and featured such episodes as “Girls Who Date Dangerous Men,” “Sexy Mothers and Daughters Who Compete,” “Women with Paternity Issues Get Answers” and “All About Breasts.” But even then, Latifah made an effort to elevate the discourse, with many shows devoted to combating racism, gang violence and miscarriages of justice or honoring acts of kindness. Still, last September, she told USA Today, “I enjoyed the first show… but what it became wasn’t quite what I wanted it to be. It got a little too heavy, a little too serious. It started to feel like it wasn’t as `me’ as it should be.”

Her new program, “The Queen Latifah Show,” appears to be easing even further in positive directions, with more singing and dancing on her part, polite and lighter topics, and occasional kooky stunts that she’s always wanted to try.  “I think it’s a testament to some of the needs that needed to be filled in daytime television,” Latifah told journalists in a press-conference Q&A to promote her show.  “In terms of just entertainment, warmth, fun, a little bit of craziness, useful information — those things we always need.

“I didn’t base this show on creating controversy or a spirit of negativity,” continues the former Dana Elaine Owens, who chose the name “Latifah” (which is Arabic for kind and delicate) from a book given to her by a Muslim cousin when she was eight.  “If anything it was opposite of that. We need more entertainment and heart and fun.  That’s the space we want to live in. If people want to talk about controversial subjects, they should be able to freely speak.  And if there’s questions that we need to ask that people are curious about, we should be able to ask those questions. But everything doesn’t have to be done in a salacious way, you know, that stirs up controversy intentionally.”

“Positivity” keeps cropping up in Latifah’s description of her show, which also features “great stories about everyday people who are doing amazing things every day on the front lines — a message of positivity and hope that we don’t always get in the news. We get plenty of bad news, but it’s still great to bring some good news and cool people and fun stuff to people’s sight every day.  There’s a lot of great things going on in the world.”

Certainly it’s been a great journey for a woman who grew up middle-class in New Jersey, found herself beat boxing and rapping in the late 1980s, leading to a record deal and eventually a music career that has jumped easily from hip-hop to jazz and American-songbook standards.  Wider audience recognition came via her acting career, first on such sitcoms as “Living Single” and a recurring role on “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,” and later in the films “Bringing Down the House,” “Stranger than Fiction” and the aforementioned “Hairspray.”  The 2002 Oscar-winning film adaptation of Broadway’s “Chicago” even netted her an Academy Award nomination for playing “Mama” Morton, queen of the jailhouse.

Unlike some of her early musical peers, Latifah was far from a candidate for prison herself, though she did get booked for pot and gun possession in 1996 and was given three years probation following a DUI in 2002.  “There’s no such thing as a perfect show, a perfect host, a perfect person — for that matter,” says Latifah.  “So nobody is going to do the right thing all the time.  People make mistakes, and that just has to be something that’s accepted. If we can deal with that reality, then I think everything will be fine.”

So far, Latifah has enjoyed fine luck booking name guests, from Carol Burnett to “Hairspray” costar John Travolta to Will Smith (who, with his wife, executive produces the program).  Latifah notes that improving her interviews has been her biggest “learning curve” so far.  “I’m much more used to being the one answering the question as opposed to posing the questions that we ask our guests,” Latifah explains, adding that studio-audience members also enjoy interacting with her and the guests.  “People feel very comfortable around me. And they feel comfortable just responding and with a lot of our guests – who they’ve known through television or film or their career – for a long time. So they may ask a question or make a comment as if we’re all, you know, buddies.  Obviously, we have to edit some of it so that it works for our viewing audience at home. But our audience has been great, and our guests have been fantastic.”

Asked if she’s had a favorite guest so far, Latifah replies that Cloris Leachman was “one of the most fun ones.”  The octogenarian actress brought her daughter on the show, and both prepared a vegetarian dish.  “We got the inside joke that [Leachman] was going to do whatever she wanted to do that day,” recalled Latifah.  “So it was kind of funny trying to structure that for the TV audience.  But it was so much fun — and I think we were able to translate that.”

When one reporter asks Latifah what she might do if she, herself, were a guest on her own show, the host laughs and answers, “I would let her wear sneakers, first of all. And I would allow her to wear her jeans and her sneakers so she can be comfortable and not show off her fly shoes for everyone.  And she could do everything from rap to DJ to go to the gun range to taking a ride on her motorcycle and trying to do an interview like that.  We’d also talk about some serious topics that might be on all of our minds as Americans and citizens of the world.”

Regarding her appeal to a surprisingly wide cross section of races and genders, Latifah notes, “I guess that’s the absolute truth.  My father taught me that `when in Rome, do as the Romans’ kind of thing, so every place I went in the world as a young, 18-year-old rapper — from here to all these different countries and Europe — made me embrace those cultures rather than try to be like some of my friends who were on the road with me eating McDonald’s in every different country we went to.  I was curious about the world; I’m curious about people.  So maybe it’s given me an understanding of people, to a degree, and it’s made me comfortable in my own skin. I’m okay being judged among my own people, let alone other people.  I allow myself the freedom to change and become whoever I want to be.

“Maybe part of it is the fact that I’m a black woman,” continues Latifah, “but I grew up in a family that was very multi-cultural. I had a Filipino aunt, I had a white aunt, you know?  I mean I had a couple interracial couples in my family.  I had gay people in my family.  I had people who were on the right side of the law, people who were on the wrong side of the law. I had sober people, I had drug-addicted people. Square people and cool people and everything in between in my own family that I was exposed to at a young age.  So many different kinds.  I’ve found when you’re exposed to different things, you tend to open up your world and your lens gets wider.  At the end of the day people are people.”

Mercifully, no one in the press conference prods Latifah about her own sexual preferences, since she’s been steadfast in maintaining the privacy of her private life.  Yes, people have long speculated that her friendships with fitness trainer Jeanette Jenkins and, currently, choreographer Eboni Nichols, are more than BFF acquaintanceships, and GLBT activists jumped for joy when Latifah spoke at a 2012 gay pride rally and called the crowd “her people.”  But the actress was quick to deny making any statement about her sexuality one way or another.  “I’ve never dealt with the question of my personal life in public,” she said at the time. “It’s just not gonna happen.  To me, doing a gay pride show is one of the most fun things, [and] my first show that paid more than $10,000 was in a gay club on New Year’s Eve in San Francisco.  Tupac [Shakur] happened to be in town, so he came to kick it with me. This was the early ’90s. And the boys were like, ‘Take your shirt off, Tupac!’  He wasn’t doing that. But we had a blast in there.”

Asked by Long Island Woman about her idols and influences over the years, Latifah waxes almost rhapsodic.  “Oh, there have been so many, so many through the years that have shared their wisdom with me. I loved watching Pearl Bailey on TV.  I loved watching – one of the guests I just had the other day, Carol Burnett, who came on the show.  You know, her ability to be an actress of such variety and comedy and singing showed me that there’s no barriers, and Pearl Bailey did the same thing.  Teena Marie influenced me musically, and so did MC Lyte for that matter, as did Salt-n-Pepa, Boogie Down Productions.  People like them gave me wisdom early along the way.  Alfre Woodard, Angelina Jolie, Sharon Stone — everyone that I worked with, they shared a bit with me, taught me.

Continues the actress-host, “Different directors showed me different ways of using my skills. My director, Ellen Gittelsohn, who also directed `Living Single’ and first directed me on `The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air,’ was one of the people who took me under her wing and kind of showed me the ropes.  I was a rapper. I knew nothing about being a sitcom actress, really. She showed me simple things like how to hit a mark and timing and where the cameras would be.  I had to learn things from the ground up — and quick.  I’m a quick study, thankfully.  But I’ve learned a lot from people through the years.  Even my agent, Randy, and my business partner, Shakim [Compere], have taught me so much and been such big influences.  But ultimately, my mom is the biggest influence on me because if she’s cool with things, then I’m cool with it.  And she always has some wisdom to share with me — even in my toughest moments.”

Latifah’s mother, Rita Owens, has been a constant in her adult life, so it was a relief to hear the actress say that recent reports of her mom’s ill health were blown out of proportion by the tabloids.  “My mama’s good,” Latifah says. “That report in the National Enquirer was completely incorrect; my mom is not fighting lung cancer.  And that’s why you can’t believe the shit you read – excuse my language.  So we’re gonna deal with them on that!  But yes, my mom’s been doing pretty good (sic).  She has been facing some medical challenges, and she’s been doing pretty well.  So she’s here with me and I see her every day.  She watches the show every day, and she tells me the shows she really likes and ways that I could get better. So she’s still in my corner and holding me down.”

As for Latifah’s own health, she credits the TV show with reminding her of the importance of being diligent.  “There’s a lot of takeaway,” she explains.  For instance, I got a mammogram on Friday — the first one I’ve ever had.  I was scheduled to do this a long time ago, but because I’ve been working so much, it just got away from me. I had to be honest about that on television, and the only reason I shared it was because I felt maybe other people have busy schedules and have let something really important like this get away from them.  So just taking that step, having Dr. Kristi Funk (who did Angelina’s double mastectomy) on, and talking about that reminded me that I had to do it.  So I called my gynecologist and got it done.  Everything is clear; everything is great.  And I think the show was a motivation for me to get more conscious about my own health.”

It’s clear that finding a balance between work and life, while developing even further comfort with the studio audience and viewers at home, will be the goal of Latifah’s first season in talk.  “I live life in the real world,” she states.  “And I think I’ve probably been through a lot of things that people have been through that want to come on the show.  So there is a relatability, and it’s really just a matter of translating that to the audience that’s watching.  It’s about just being really comfortable – a comfortable chair, a comfortable outfit — things that allow me to relax and not think about what I’m wearing, what I’m doing.  Just to enjoy the person that I’m speaking to or enjoy the games we’re playing or the musical performances or human-interest stories that we get into — really connecting with people.”

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BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com), hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.org) on UNC Radio, edits the theater section of Stagebuddy.com, and co-created Shalom Dammit! An Evening with Rabbi Sol Solomon (shalomdammit.com).

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Cartwheeling with Andie MacDowell

CARTWHEELING WITH ANDIE MACDOWELL

by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published Nov. 2013 in Long Island Woman magazine)

 

Certain mysteries of the universe can never be solved, such as how the Egyptians built the Pyramids, or how the Drake’s people got cream filling into Yodels.  But a few legitimate explanations do exist for one cosmic mystery: how can actress Andie MacDowell still be so stunningly beautiful at age 55?

Genetics would be the first answer, of course, borne out by the fact that MacDowell’s two grown daughters, Rainey and (Sarah) Margaret Qualley, are both gorgeous actress-models themselves.  Another answer might be MacDowell’s workout regimen.  She’s at the gym daily, doing at least 30 minutes when she’s working and 90 when not.  “I do it for pleasure,” the actress says in our early summer phone conversation – and on a day when she started the morning on a row machine, followed by the elliptical and capped by a yoga class.  “The endorphins kick in, I lose my stress, and I relax.  I feel healthy and alive.  One guy I hike with – he’s 82, and he’s amazing.  He does these long hikes and stays in great shape.  For me, I like the opportunity to walk in the woods; it’s my favorite thing to do.  Or if I was in California, I’d walk on the beach.”

MacDowell does live on the West Coast, but not at the moment.  Instead, she’s in Vancouver shooting the Hallmark Channel TV series, “Cedar Cove,” based on books by Debbie Macomber.  “Hallmark has done a couple of TV movies from her books,” notes MacDowell.  “And the town is actually a character.  We’re shooting in an amazing location.  It’s a pristine area, very clean.  A healthy, salubrious place with interesting people.  And the show is very relationship-based.”

Doing what you love is another way to feel beautiful, and MacDowell explains that “Cedar Cove” came along at just the right time in her life, since the kids are now out of the house.  “Yes,” the actress says, “[Sarah] finished up NYU Tisch – and you have to be quite bright to get in there, so I’m very proud of her.  The most important job I’ve had is being a mom.  I wanted to get that right.”

Asked if she had any qualms about her Qualleys going into showbiz, the L’Oréal spokeswoman (since 1986!) replied that her three children grew up surrounded by the business.  “Rainey would have liked to act as a child, but I wouldn’t let her.  I made her wait until she was over 18 to make that decision.  Margaret went to professional school in the 11^th grade, and she just wore me down,” MacDowell laughs.

“It’s a great business,” she continues, “and you never stop learning.  It’s an ongoing process.  Being famous is the biggest deal.  Are you prepared to do that?  Because it comes with the territory.  You have to give a hundred percent and always be prepared, and care about the work.  You have to be thankful and respectful and have a generous spirit.  It helps that I enjoy people.  Like signing autographs – I don’t mind.  It’s part of what’s expected if you decide to do this for a living.  The hardest part is rejection, though.  You have to be willing to take it and work through it.”

Hard to believe, but MacDowell has had her share of hard times and rejection.  When her dad abandoned the family at age six, her mother slid into alcoholism, leaving young Andie to care for her until her mom’s death of a heart attack at age 53.  “There were years when I tortured myself about what I could have done,” the actress told the UK’s Daily Mail in 2011, “[but] it made me who I am – independent, driven and motivated.  It taught me not to rely on anybody else.

“So these were tough lessons early on,” MacDowell continues.  “Not much more could happen to a person than happened to me, so I’ve had to overcome some obstacles.  But people respect that.  I’m still working, and that says something.  I’m a hard worker, and I have fortitude.”  An example of that would be the actress helping publicize “Cedar Cove” when the show was first revealed.  “I tore my meniscus,” she recalls.  “And I had surgery the day before the Hallmark announcement and was on crutches the next day.  Still, I went to a cocktail party for Hallmark.  I’d put [the surgery] off for two years, and woke up feeling better – without pain pills.”

MacDowell’s early life and grit also gave her the backbone to deal with the vicissitudes of Hollywood, such as when, for her first major film role, her voice was dubbed.  In 1984’s “Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan, Lord of the Apes,” the producers thought the South Carolina-born MacDowell sounded too southern to be believable, so it’s Glenn Close’s voice you hear in the movie.  Still, MacDowell took acting lessons, and her career recovered to the point where her resume includes the popular hits “Green Card” and “Four Weddings and a Funeral,” Steven Soderbergh’s seminal indie calling card, “Sex, Lies and Videotape,” and the comedy classic “Groundhog Day.”  Asked at what point she knew that film would be special, MacDowell replies, “When I read the script.  You can tell right from a script; you can read it and go, `that was perfect.’  You didn’t leave it for a second.  And I loved working with [director] Harold Ramis.  He’s one of the nicest people, and there’s nothing about the experience I would change.  In fact, we also did the film, `Multiplicity,’ which I think is really underrated.”

Asked about working with other great directors, MacDowell recalled 1997’s “The End of Violence,” helmed by Wim Wenders.  “It’s like he’s making a painting.  With major directors, you can see while watching their movies that it’s them, without even seeing their name on the credits.  They are artists.”  The actress also calls the late Robert Altman (with whom she worked on “Short Cuts”) “incredible.”  In a 2012 chat with The Hollywood Interview, MacDowell noted that Altman would “set things up with his cameras on big cranes which would then track through all the actors and just sort of pick up bits and pieces of them as it moved. He just had incredible fluidity with the camera. Then he’d put everything together in one take.   . . .You know, I heard he smoked pot, but I don’t see how he did that and still was able to do such great work. I’m sorry, but most of the people I know who smoke marijuana are not very bright, and what they talk about when they’re stoned, they think they’re being really smart and insightful, but they just sound idiotic.”

To my own question about whether her mom’s drinking problem was a factor in being able to avoid the ever-available party accoutrements of L.A. during the 80s and 90s, MacDowell responds, “I had no desire.  I just don’t have that gene because I’m a nerd.  I truly am.  And my kids are nerds, too – which is great!  Margaret was a bookworm at NYU, very analytical.  And me?  I hike, exercise, do yoga.  Super-healthy things.  I go to bed early.  I’m just not a party girl.  Having to go out and party is miserable to us.  Instead, the idea of birdwatching appeals to me.  Things other people may think are not cool, but all that stuff is cool: reading, studying, learning, traveling, being healthy.  I’m even doing handstands now.  And I was thinking today how I want to try cartwheels – to be upside down and hold yourself that way.  I wonder how long I can do cartwheels.”

To an extent, religion also contributes to MacDowell’s holistic lifestyle.  “I pray every day,” she notes.  “I’m a faithful person.  It’s part of just who I am, although right now, I’m not in a church.  I was just talking to Rainey about acclimating myself in L.A. to get connected.  I haven’t had a chance to because it’s so big, but I’m contemplating joining a church, because it’s a good way to get a sense of the community.  I like [writer] Anne Lamott’s idea of a church in that it’s not a place to be judgmental.  It’s just people being there for each other.”

MacDowell also tries not to judge other folks on how they get by.  Websites speculate on whether the actress has had work done – be it botox or plastic surgery – and while MacDowell doesn’t quite answer definitively, she does say, “I don’t have issues with it.  And I wonder how many people who ask me if I’ve done that have done it themselves?  Everyone does it in Middle America.  In Asheville [South Carolina], most do it, because it’s easy and it’s accessible.  As far as plastic surgery, though, because I act, I have to be able to move my face.  And there are all kinds of new choices out there for people who want to keep their skin looking healthy and strong.”

Health and strength are recurring themes throughout the interview and, obviously, in MacDowell’s life.  Which invariably leads to the question of whether she’s sharing that life with someone?  In 2012, the twice-divorced actress told Town & Country magazine, “I’m in an unusual stage right now, because I haven’t dated in so long. The sense of isolation turns it all into a bigger deal. Just taking the risk of opening that door is really hard for me right now.”

That said, between being a mom and a working actress, life is pretty full and fine on her terms.  “I’m free to do whatever I want,” she says, wrapping up our chat.  “I’m a free woman and able to create my own life independently.  I now have a four-day week of long days.  But I like to work and be creative; it’s what I love to do.”

Still, the actress also indulges her playful side, at least mentally.  In the abovementioned Town & Country interview, MacDowell half-joked that her current fantasy involves getting into elevators – “those old-fashioned, really beautiful ones in Paris, and [to] start hitting on men . . . It didn’t matter what they looked like or how old they were. In some sort of sensual way I would hit on them. But only as long as they were in the elevator. And as soon as the doors would open, it would be over.”  No doubt, soon after her exit, the men would be turning cartwheels.

*

SHORT CUTS

What are recent books you’ve read?

A lot of Debbie Macomber.  Rick Hanson’s “Buddha’s Brain.”  Gillian Flynn’s “Gone Girl.”

What are some songs on your iPod?

Anything Beatles.

Do you have a guilty-pleasure snack?

Chocolate.

What actresses did you admire early on?

Elizabeth Taylor.  Diane Keaton.

Are there any film roles you were up for that you wished you’d gotten?

That’s a stupid question that I hear a lot.  I just don’t go there, I’m sorry.

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com) and hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.org) on UNC Radio (uncradio.com).  He is also the co-creator and director “Shalom Dammit! An Evening with Rabbi Sol Solomon” (shalomdammit.com).

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Wandaful World (Wanda Sykes)

WANDAFUL WORLD

by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published Oct. 2013 in Long Island Woman magazine.)

 

On TV, she’s one of the funniest sitcom ensemble players of recent years (“Curb Your Enthusiasm,” “The New Adventures of Old Christine”). On film, she’s a kid-friendly voice in cartoons “Over the Hedge” to “Ice Age: Continental Drift” and a sassy presence in such grown-up comedies as “Pootie Tang” and “Evan Almighty.” And onstage in front of a microphone, well, she’s Wanda Sykes, brave, honest, and funny.

Born in Virginia and raised in the suburbs of Washington DC, Sykes wasn’t exactly cracking jokes from an early age.  She was simply mouthy and blunt– perhaps too much so for her army dad and banker mom.  “When I was younger, I talked a lot,” Sykes confesses in our early summer phone conversation.  “I would say funny things that would get me in trouble.  It was being outspoken rather than being funny.”

But the approach, perspective and delivery would shift in junior high school.  “That’s when I knew I could make my friends laugh, my teachers and all.  I don’t think there was `a moment’ I knew I was funny.  I started making my peers laugh, and I thought, `Okay, I have something here going on.’  But I was a good student.  I didn’t want the title `class clown’ because I knew my parents would not be happy about that.  They would just think I was at school goofing off.  So I remember asking my classmates not to vote for me for class clown.”

Sykes did perform during her school years – but it was behind a drum kit.  “I was in a band.  Yeah, I used to play a lot,” she recalls. “I still have the drum set; it’s somewhere in a storage unit right now.”  The comedienne doesn’t remember much about her school performances except that she began playing in fifth grade and that one high-school production she was in was set in a nightclub, so her band was the actual group playing in the club.  Asked if she ever thinks of getting the snares out for a bash, Sykes, the mother of two children with her partner, chuckles, “With kids?  That would be dangerous to have a drum set around.  They would drive me nuts with that—the same way I drove my parents nuts.”

But music would not become Sykes’s calling.  In fact, like many teens, she was fairly rudderless after high school.  “I knew that I had to go to college,” says Sykes, who attended Hampton University in Virginia.  “But I had no idea what I wanted to do or wanted to be.  My plan was to be a college graduate, really!  So I just picked marketing and got a B.S. in that.”  When I joke that “b.s.” is a rather appropriate term for most marketing, Sykes chuckles but notes that the degree did get her a job with the National Security Agency as a contracting specialist.  “That was as close to marketing as you can get for the government, I guess,” Sykes says.  “And I bought stuff.”

Since we were chatting just days after news broke that former NSA contractor Edward Snowden had leaked classified documents and was shuttling through international airports looking for asylum in places like Russia or Ecuador, I couldn’t resist asking Sykes what she thought about the whole government leaks issue.  “I think the NSA does a great job,” she replies. “They’re a good group of people keeping our nation safe.  And I think Snowden – he’s a criminal.  He should be tried for treason.  `Cause when you sign the agreement, it says you’re going to protect our information.  He broke that.”

If it seems surprising that a black lesbian woman would take such a pro-government stance, keep in mind that Sykes will speak her mind, whatever political side that happens to be on.  In 2009, she became the first black woman, as well as the first openly gay person, to be the featured entertainer at the annual White House Correspondents’ dinner – an occasion she used to lambaste right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh.  “Luckily, everybody was laughing,” Sykes told Philadelphia Style Magazine in 2012.

Although that appearance caused some controversy, it was nothing compared to the worst – and creepiest – gig of Sykes’s career.  “I was at a club in New Jersey,” she recalls, “doing a little one-nighter.  It was me and two other comics.  We get there, and the place is just really seedy.  And I remember this guy; he bent over and a gun fell out.  The gun was just spinning around in the middle of the floor.  And the scary thing of it is that everyone checked to see if it was their gun!  (mimics)  `You have yours?’  Oh, is that your gun?’  `Yeah, it was my gun.’  And I was thinking, `Okay, everyone here has a gun but me.’  So I did a really quick set and got out of there.  Maybe five minutes, and I was out.”

Hellgigs are par for the course for comedians paying their dues, although Sykes’ very first attempt at stand-up comedy – a talent show sponsored by a local radio station – went really well.  She figured, “Okay, this is cool.  I have a bunch of strangers laughing, and it feels great.  I wanna keep doing this.”  Of course, ignorance can be a kind of blessing.  Sykes’ second gig was at a comedy club, and suddenly, there was more pressure and an understanding that the long haul demands more than a few good jokes and beginner’s luck.  “It was my first time ever going into a comedy club,” says Sykes.  “You get up, and there’s a lot of waiting around to get onstage.  And I watched a lot of comics going before me and just bomb.  So fear sets in, and you think, `Oh boy, this could go horribly wrong.’  So I wasn’t as loose the second time.  And even the third or several times after that.  It wasn’t like the first time; it took time.  It took a little while for me to go, `Oh, I see how this goes.’  But I knew I wanted to do it because I didn’t stop.  I just kept going on.”

Luckily, Sykes had a mentor or two to guide her out of the pitfalls and into professional work.  The emcee of the radio station contest, Andy Evans, “showed me where the comedy clubs were and worked with me as far as material.  He was my first coach.”  Soon, Sykes was writing for “The Chris Rock Show,” which was where “everything started for me,” the comedienne told Las Vegas Weekly.  “I learned a lot from Chris and HBO.”

For Sykes, the most important lesson – and the dividing line between comedians who killed and those who got killed – is gaining confidence.  “Of course, you have to have the material,” she allows, “but you have to be confident and not just rely on the material.  And you have to be into it.  You have to be likeable and make the audience feel comfortable so that they will laugh.”

Asked which performers influenced her work and desire to be a stand-up, Sykes, 49, cites television of the 1960s-70s as a comedy classroom.  “Growing up, we watched all the variety shows; there were so many of them.  We used to watch the Smothers Brothers all the time.  I loved watching `Sanford and Son,’ `All in the Family’ – pretty much anything Norman Lear did.  There was Moms Mabley, Flip Wilson, Bill Cosby.  And as soon as I got older, of course, Richard Pryor and George Carlin.”

That said, Sykes avoids watching current comics, simply because she doesn’t want to be thrown off her game.  “When I’m out working,” she admits, “I just don’t want to hear another voice in my head.”  Still, Sykes recently produced and hosted a comedy showcase of female comedians for the Oprah Winfrey Network.  “I had to go through all these tapes and pick the comics that I wanted to be on the show,” Sykes says.  “I really enjoyed the process, and the girls were all really funny.  So I guess, when it’s work, and it’s something I’m producing, yeah, I can watch a lot of comics.  But other than that, I’m not doing it.”

What Sykes will do is make sure her material stays fresh by constantly adding to it or changing it.  “I’ll think of something I think is funny,” says the comedienne of her process, “and I’ll make myself a little note – either on my phone, or I’ll write it down on a piece of paper.  (Now it’s more by phone, because I’d be losing the piece of paper!)  But the next time I’m about to do a show, I go through my little notes and just try it out.  I’m always trying out new material.  The best part is when I’m the middle of a show, and something just hits me.  I build on that piece or think of something onstage, and I do it right there.”

Spontaneity has also been a mark of Sykes’s personal life. Famously, she came out as a gay woman at a Pride rally. “That was after the passage of Proposition 8 in California,” recall Sykes. “And from then on, it was also in my comedy.  I mean, I was probably talking about it in my comedy beforehand, but people weren’t really catching on.”  Asked if she realized she was gay during her seven-year marriage to record producer Dave Hall, Sykes said, “No, I was a married woman.  I mean, I knew, probably, as a kid that I was gay.  But that’s not how you’re supposed to live.  So you just push all that aside and live how society says you’re supposed to live.  So I did that.  I wanted to fit into it, so that’s who I was.  It wasn’t until after that, that I said, `Okay, why aren’t my relationships working?  What’s going on?’  And then it was like, `Okay, I know.  I know what’s going on.’”

What’s been going on with Sykes in recent times is more film roles (this summer’s “The Hot Flashes”), tons of talk-show appearances on everything from “Ellen” to “The Tonight Show,” and, of course, stand-up gigs across the country (locally, she’ll be in Westhampton Beach this October).  Healthwise, she’s doing fine following her double mastectomy in 2011.  Noting the difference between her case and Angelina Jolie’s similar decision, Sykes tells Pulse, “[Jolie] tested positive for the gene.  And I think she did the right thing.  I was already diagnosed with Stage Zero – an early stage.”  Since breast cancer ran in her mother’s side of the family, Sykes chose to be proactive.  As for sharing the news with the public, Sykes joked with Ellen Degeneres at the time, “I don’t know, should I talk about it or what?  How many things could I have?  I’m black, then lesbian. I can’t be the poster child for everything!”

Though the big 5-0 looms for her in March, Sykes says she’s not obsessing about age.  “I’m way behind on trying to plan a party or celebration for the 50^th, but that’s pretty much what I’ve been thinking about, not the age itself.  What do I wanna do?  How am I going to celebrate?”  No doubt, as she always does, she’ll think of something.

*

SYKES IN SNIPPETS

Favorite Books as a Child

I read pretty much everything by Octavia Butler.

Recent Book?

Tracy Kidder’s “Mountains Beyond Mountains.”

Songs Now on Your iPod?

I love that Robin Thicke song, “Blurred Lines.”  And I always listen to Bob Marley – especially the “Legend” album.

Favorite Snack?

I love salt-and-vinegar anything.  Potato chips.

Favorite Pastime?
I love to bowl.

Gym Routine?

I don’t go to the gym.  I have a treadmill and elliptical in my house that I’ll use maybe two or three times a week. But I love to walk my dogs, Riley and Simon.

Favorite Routine?

I used to love doing that bit, “Drink Man,” although I haven’t done it in a long time.

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com), hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.org) on UNC Radio, and co-created Shalom Dammit! An Evening with Rabbi Sol Solomon. Read him at: https://davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/about/.

 

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Kristin Chenoweth – With Gratitude

KRISTIN CHENOWETH – With Gratitude, Without Judgment

by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published Jan. 2013 in Long Island Woman magazine.)

 

Broadway doesn’t turn out stars the way it used to.  The art form that gave us Ethel Merman, Mary Martin, Robert Preston and Bernadette Peters now only rarely produces a bona fide luminary – someone who not only sings, dances and acts but displays such unique charisma, the world can’t help but notice.  Sometimes lightning still strikes, however, and in 1997, Broadway got its first look at Kristin Chenoweth.  It had to look closely, because at 4’11”, Chenoweth was not your typical chorus girl.  But Theater World noticed her in Steel Pier and honored her with its newcomer awards, and only two years later, the diminutive knockout took home a Featured Actress Tony for You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown.  She played Sally, a role that wasn’t even in the original version of the musical but was designed especially for her.

Since then, Chenoweth has had her setbacks (a 2001 sitcom called “Kristin” that aired only half of its episodes) and triumphs (originating the role of Glinda in Wicked), while becoming a familiar presence on the big and small screen, as well as on Broadway (most recently co-starring with Sean Hayes in 2010’s delightful revival of Promises, Promises).  Surely, someone with Chenoweth’s work ethic and metabolism would be unstoppable, right?

Not quite.  Last July 11^th, the actress was on the set of CBS’s “The Good Mother” when a piece of lighting equipment came loose, hit her in the face and knocked her to the curb on which she hit the back of her head.  Knocked out cold, she then stayed overnight in the hospital and has spent several months since recovering from the concussion.  She seems her bubbly, voluble self in our early autumn phone conversation, but there’s no getting around that the accident has been a life-changer.

“I’m getting better and better,” Chenoweth chirps, “but it’s a long healing process.  I had a bad neck before, and now it’s really not good.  I still have to deal with headaches, and the brain-concussion injury can be kind of tricky.”

Asked if she suffered memory loss, the Wicked star explains, “Not quite amnesia.   In the beginning, I could think of the word, and there was some struggle to get some of the words out that I wanted to, but that’s gone.  I’m completely getting it now.  Otherwise, I’m usually good at multi-tasking; it’s taking me a little more time than I’d like to get back there.  But I’m happy to be easing myself back into life, and that can be very healing.  I’m a girl that goes at 200 miles per hour; I don’t do well at zero.  Let’s say, now I’m at about 30.”

Chenoweth laughs and continues, “I think your readers will appreciate this.  I am in real trouble with being still and quiet, but it’s necessary in life to have those times.  You have to hear that voice, that inner voice.  I believe it’s God, some people believe it’s other things.  For me, things had been getting so fast that I was brought to my knees, if you will, to hear what I needed to hear.  I just do my career and have a full life with my family and friends.  But there are many who do it all – mother and wife and career.  It’s a very difficult time in our world, so to find those quiet moments is very important.”

When I note that, in a recent Rolling Stone interview, Bob Dylan points to his 1966 motorcycle mishap as an almost necessary, even transformational event in his life – one that forced him to regain control, Chenoweth replies, “I understand that.  There’s the old me – where I go and go and go and do many different things.  But now I have been brought down to, `Okay, what’s really important in this life for you, Kris?  What do you really want to be doing in two years?  How do you see it going down?  Would you like to cultivate your friendships and stay close to your friends?’  Yes!  They’re always the ones that have to understand when things get too busy.  But I’ve had time to reconnect with friends I adore and love, and I realize just how much they enrich your life.  I’m a good friend, but I needed time to be a good friend.  And I needed time to hear what God was telling me.  Time to slow down.  So that’s what happening.  I guess Mr. Dylan and I have something in common.”

Still, Chenoweth notes that a slowdown is not a halt.  In the months following the accident, she hosted the Hero Dog Awards on the Hallmark Channel and flew to Toronto “to mentor some girls for Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber’s show about finding the next Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz.  Flying, for me, isn’t great.  But the actual mentoring was very gratifying and healing to me.”

The actress remembers well when she was the hopeful ingénue, and the effect an audience could have on her.  “I grew up singing in church,” Chenoweth recalls.  “I remember the first time I got a solo and the reaction to it.  But the very first time I discovered that I had to be onstage and an actor was in ballet.  In Oklahoma, we have a professional ballet company, Tulsa Ballet Theater.  I was doing The Nutcracker.  I auditioned, and I was too little to fit into most of the costumes except for the mouse.  Now the mouse’s job is to merely sit next to Clara in Act Two and watch the dancing.  In the middle of the “Sugar Plum Fairy” or one of the other dances, there was a vine prop.  One dancer dropped it and then ran offstage.  And the next section of dancers were getting ready to come on.  I remember thinking in my head, `What would a . . . what would a mouse do?’  So I ran out and got the vine, put it in my mouth and hopped back.

“Now this is a ballet audience.  This isn’t a rock concert.  This isn’t church.  The audience clapped.  It’s Tchaikovsky and they’re clapping!  And I remember thinking, `I’m supposed to do this.’  And I was probably about seven.  So that is when I knew.”

Still, whether in ballet or on the theater stage, Chenoweth had to cope with being just a little different from the other talent around her.  Recalls the actress, “My piano teacher wanted me to major in music and piano.  My dance teacher said, `You should change your major to dance; you can do all kinds of dance.’  My voice teacher at Oklahoma City University, who is my mentor still today, said, `You’re not just one kind of singer.  You have the capacity to do a lot of things, and we’re going to hone it, and work on it and craft it.’  I didn’t understand what she meant then because I was 18, and I didn’t know.   But she said, `You are petite.  You do have an interesting speaking voice.  Those are the things that are going to make you different.’  I think that’s the key: things that are going to make you stand out and be special.

“I definitely didn’t get some jobs because of my height, for sure.  I didn’t fit into the chorus.  I never fit the costumes.  When you come into Beauty and the Beast and it’s year three, you gotta be somewhere close to sizes, and I just wasn’t.  But I was a very well-trained, classically trained singer, actress, musician and dancer.  I believe God had a big hand in that, but I think that made me more right for original work.”

Chenoweth points out that her roles in Wicked and You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown benefited from her uniqueness.  “Even shows like The Apple Tree, which wasn’t revived for 40 years because, according to the composers and writers, they didn’t have the right person.

Things about me that could have been detriments – I had people in my life that said, `No, those are what’s making you different and special.  Yeah, you’re short.  You’re little.  Your speaking voice, yeah.  But let’s concentrate on what makes you different and what can make you great.’  I’m very grateful that I’ve had those kinds of encouragers in my life.”

Among her strongest supporters, Chenoweth counts her parents, who adopted her when she was five days old.  This has made her a strong advocate for adoption, and she’s done a lot of work with the Dave Thomas Foundation (of Wendy’s) to encourage adopting children, especially older kids.  “People forget that the average age in the United States for a child to be adopted out of foster care is nine.  Really, it’s closer to 14.  But we have so many kids that need homes.  I just think there are a lot of kids who just want someone to call `em before they go to bed and say, `Hey, I love you.’  Those are three powerful words that, I think, in their formative years, kids need to hear a lot.”

Regarding the mystery of her own birth parents, Chenoweth is in no rush to find them, but she has become more curious about her origins:  “When people asked if I wanted to know, I used to say, `I don’t even know anything different, so, no.’  But the older you get, the more you go, `Hey, my family is tall and brunette, and they don’t sing.  They’re engineers!’  Definitely, I’m the different one in my family.  So I do wonder where the petite-ness came from.  Where the music came from?  What is my family medical history?  I would be telling a lie if I said I don’t wonder about those things.  Getting those answers could be wonderful, but at the same time, I am who I am.  There’s a certain DNA I got from the bio-parents, but environment had a way bigger influence on who I am.  And if I could ever meet my birth mother, I would just tell her, `Thank you.  Thank you for making the decision because I won the lottery, really.’”

Certainly, Chenoweth doesn’t apologize for making the best of her brains, looks and talent, especially since beauty pageants supported her education.  “I grew up in the South, where basically, we come out of the womb ready to be in a pageant.  I, myself, did not do pageants as a child.  But I put myself through college by being Miss OCU, and by being Miss Oklahoma, I was able to pay for my master’s degree in opera performance.  I guess it’s how you utilize the experience.  A lot of times when I watch `Toddlers and Tiaras,’ I wonder if the child is doing this or if the mother’s doing this.  I see a lot of the fun being lost from that kind of thing.  But that goes for any kind of competition – dance competitions, singing competitions.  I think it’s better to be a little bit older so that you can decide if that’s truly what you want to do.”

Tulsa ballet.  Beauty pageants.  Church.  Not exactly the background of most New York or Hollywood actresses.  This leads to the question of whether Chenoweth’s small-town sensibility and strong Christian values put her at odds with, well, everyone west or east of Oklahoma.  “When I lived in New York,” laughs the actress, “it was more about environment.  Like, `Wow, people are really loud here!  People don’t say hello to each other!  What’s a bagel?  This is a real bagel?  Wow, this is good!’  Of course, later in my career, you meet more people, and they do not believe like you.  My beliefs are mine, and they’re very personal, as is my relationship with the Lord.  If a person’s an atheist, and if that’s how they believe, who am I to judge them?  If I’m a true Christian, and I practice what I preach, I can’t judge someone for their faith, background, religious beliefs, orientation – you cannot judge people, because you do not walk in their shoes.  Therefore, I would like the same in return.”

Being judged by other people is one thing, but Chenoweth has also been faced with decisions that test her own limits.  Yes, she once appeared on “The 700 Club” (to her regret), but she’s also appeared in musicals by and about gay people, had plans to star in a biopic about bisexual singer Dusty Springfield, and even posed in a two-piece bathing suit for FHM magazine.  Asked if such secular and sexy activities ever gave her pause, Chenoweth replies, “I’ve had those moments for sure.  Certainly the FHM cover was one of those moments.  I’m not saying I make decisions that my family always agrees with!  But I look at it purely as a business decision.  I can do Playboy – been asked to do that – or I could do FHM.  So I have to very carefully walk the line.  A lot of people who believe like me would say, `You know, those weren’t the best decisions, Kris; maybe you shouldn’t have made that one.’  But again, I’m the one walking in my shoes.  I’m the one that has to be able to put my head on the pillow at night and feel okay about it.

“Also,” adds the actress, “I’ve never seen the gay issue as a sin.  Even as a small child.  Maybe that made me different in the Bible Belt.  But I figured, God makes people the way they are.  Just like I’m short.  There’s gay people in this world.  There’s straight people in this world.  That’s where I know a lot of my extreme right friends would disagree with me, but that’s okay.”

As for her own love life, Chenoweth, who has been twice engaged and once dated screenplay whiz Aaron Sorkin, describes herself as “single and dating and sort of enjoying that.  I’ve been a runaway bride twice, and I’ve had great loves in my life.  But when your career has been first for so long . . .  One thing this accident did was make me understand that I need to pay a little closer attention to the personal thing.  All of this is wonderful, and the little bit of success that I have had is amazing.  But I definitely want to share it with someone.  That being said, I don’t wanna share it with the wrong person.  So I am a little bit picky I guess you could say.  The person that I’m with is gonna have to understand my life and be willing to go along for the ride and love me for me and not the person onstage.  Because the person right now needs to shave.  I just worked out and did my physical therapy, so I don’t really smell that nice.  I need to get my roots done, and I have a little bit of PMS.  So the guy has to be in love with that person; not just the one who can get up there and sing onstage and act and all that stuff.  That’s what I’m looking for.”

*

SIDEBAR SHORTIES

Three favorite showtunes?

“`My Funny Valentine’ (from Babes in Arms), the big and bombastic `Rose’s Turn,’ (from Gypsy), and `Dividing Day’ (from The Light in the Piazza).”

TV shows you loved growing up?

“The Carol Burnett Show,” “Dallas.”

The first play/musical you ever attended?
The touring company of A Chorus Line.  I was a little girl, and I remember that on the bad words, my mom would cover up my ears.

The first Broadway show you ever saw?

City of Angels.  I was on a college trip, and I remember thinking Broadway was just as great as I thought it was.

Most recent book you read?

Embarrassingly – “Fifty Shades of Grey.”  It is not Shakespeare.  It is not even close.  So what does that say about me?  I’m not sure.

Do you have to pray after you read every chapter?

I do a lot of things after I read every chapter.  Let’s just leave it at that.

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com) and hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.com) on UNC Radio. He is the co-author and director of the stage show, “Shalom Dammit! An Evening with Rabbi Sol Solomon.” Read more at: https://davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/about/.

 

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Wendie Malick’s Three Hot Spots

WENDIE MALICK’s THREE HOT SPOTS: Cleveland, Causes and Career

by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published Sept. 2011, in Long Island Woman magazine.)

 

Much in the way you can’t go three blocks without passing a Starbucks, try flipping cable channels without seeing a sitcom featuring Wendie Malick, the tall, striking actress who, along with Christine Baranski, has become television’s go-to girl for regal and sarcastic working women with just a hint of craziness.  Her ubiquity on the dial actually belies the fact that she hasn’t been in a hit sitcom since “Just Shoot Me” stopped shooting in 2003.

The relative dry spell (she’s done dozens of television episodes and guest shots in the intervening time) ended last year, however, with the arrival of the TV Land series, “Hot in Cleveland.”  The sitcom, featuring “Frasier” alum Jane Leeves, “One Day at a Time’s” Valerie Bertinelli and living goddess Betty White is now entering its third season with no cooldown in sight.  For Malick, “Cleveland” might as well be paradise.

“I’m very, very lucky,” she says in our early spring phone chat as she drives to rehearsal.  “Just to be able to work at the thing you love is a gift in itself, and to actually get to work with great writers who do wonderful things for you.  Remember that my career took off late; I’m sort of a late bloomer.  I had done theater in New York and then took five years off to model.  Then my career very slowly started to build, but it was incremental.  I was almost 40 years old when I did `Dream On,’ the HBO series.  I was not a great ingénue; I didn’t quite know what to do with that.  So I didn’t really hit my mark until I became a character actress, and that was my strength.  Once I had a chance to have a strong point of view, it changed everything.”

Still, the revelation was as much about doing comedy as it was about moving into more mature roles.  “I think [comedy] was in my bones,” notes Malick, “but I never really worked as a comedienne until I did `Dream On.’  Before that, I had been kind of typecast because I was tall and brunette and, I guess, somewhat imposing, so I was often the lawyer/doctor/ex-wife/murderess – things like that.  I did a lot of drama, and on `Dream On,’ I started as the straight woman for Brian Benben, but during the first season, they found out I was funny, so they allowed my character to become a lot more neurotic.

“I love doing comedy,” continues Malick, “and it’s something you can never take for granted because comedy is not easy!  I think right now, more than ever, everyone needs to laugh every day because the world is getting increasingly bizarre.”

Speaking of bizarre, our phone chat is briefly interrupted as Malick runs her vehicle through a car wash.  “I have an event to go to tonight,” the actress apologizes.  “And after so much rain the past few weeks, the car is covered in mud.  You probably never interviewed anybody going through a car wash before, have you?”

After replying that I hadn’t and overhearing her thank the attendants, I asked Malick whether being famous is a burden when you’re simply trying to get your daily chores done.  Malick laughed, “I still consider myself a mid-level celebrity.  And I can move through my world pretty easily without being recognized – unless I open my mouth, and then people recognize my voice.  But I would have to say that 95 percent of the people who come up to me are lovely and just want to thank me for making them laugh before they go to sleep at night.  Or they’ve been touched by something.  Or for the work I do for the Humane Society.”

Thanks to Malick’s husband, Richard Erickson, that animal advocacy organization is only one of the many charities to which the actress lends her time and money.  Perhaps the most personal involves assisting villages in Africa.  “My husband’s parents were missionaries in Congo,” Malick explains, “so he spent about seven years there as a child.  And he loved the people and has stayed in touch with a lot of them.  We have one good friend whom we still see every year; [Richard’s] father helped him get an education, and he’s now an eye surgeon.

“So my husband is a great influence on me in that area,” continues Malick.  “He has built a medical center in Congo and has gone back every two years to see what else they needed.  My first summer with him, we took motorcycles over to the infirmies (the nurses in this small Eastern Congo village).  So I’ve been involved with him there as well as starting some micro-lending to the women in that village.  Very small loans.  The idea is that they can start a small business that might be going into a bigger town and bringing back things they can trade or sell.  And then they pay back what you loaned them, and it goes on to the next woman.  It’s the idea of `paying it forward.’”

Malick had been married previously to screenwriter Mitch Glazer, a union that lasted seven years.  “We were young and just grew in different ways, but he was a great guy, very talented,” says the actress, who divorced Glazer in 1989 and married Erickson in 1995. “I met Richard when we were building houses in Tijuana,” Malick recalls.  “I met a number of my dearest friends to this day on that trip.  I think oftentimes you meet the most interesting people when you’re out there giving of yourself.”

Asked for reasons her second marriage has run 15 years and counting, Malick laughs, “Oh man, I don’t know the answer to that, but I think kindness is at the core.  Kindness and humor.  You can’t take stuff back, so be mindful of that when you’re pissed off.  Take a deep breath before you say anything because you could really wound those closest to you.  Also, don’t sweat the small stuff, and, as my grandmother said, `Never go to bed angry.’”

Regarding the delicate question of children, Malick replies, “It just didn’t work out for me.  I wasn’t able to, and maybe that’s why the animals in my life are so important.  As a child, my older `sister’ was a collie.  Plus, I used to rescue seagulls from the beach in front of our summer house and take them to the neighboring doctor.  Now, Richard and I have three horses, donkeys, and two dogs that we rescued.  But we also helped to raise my niece.  She’s my brother’s daughter who lives with us part time and goes to school in our little town.  So there are always children in our lives, and we have wonderful godchildren.  I think that whether you’re an actual parent or not, the option for helping to raise children is always there.  Of course, my hat is off to every mother out there who ever raised a child.  I am absolutely stunned by the amount of patience, and love and generosity it requires.  It’s really extraordinary, and it’s been a great, great lesson to me in trying to be a more patient human being.”

That patience is coming handy now that Malick has taken on a new role in Hollywood: producer.  “I’m involved in producing my first movie,” she explains, “and it’s a very interesting new hat for me to wear.  A friend brought me an amazing book, `Mustang: The Saga of the Wild Horse in the American West.’  As a big animal advocate, I’m very concerned about our last remaining wild horses being rounded up.  We’re soon going to lose them.  This story is about a woman who started the fight to save them.”  Malick hopes to shoot the film during her summer hiatus from “Cleveland.”  “I’ll produce, executive produce and star as Wild Horse Annie,” adds the actress/producer.  “We have a budget, but we’re probably gonna need some more money, so that’s part of [my job], too.  But we hired a screenwriter who’s supposed to be handing [the script] in this week.  Then we have to cast it and find the director, so we have our work cut out for us!”

When I ask how Malick made the jump from performer to producer without the usual actors’ siren call of “wanting to direct,” she notes, “I have directed some plays and staged readings.  And it was really fun; I didn’t know I would like it so much.  So that still is a possibility.  But I can’t imagine wearing two hats, at least not initially.”

Certainly acting has been a constant in Malick’s life since her high school years in Buffalo, New York.  In fact, her first professional summer gig was at Bellport’s 70-year-old Gateway Playhouse where she played Hope Harcourt in Anything Goes.  “I think it was 1973 maybe?” mulls Malick.  “I’m 60 now, so it was when I was 22.  It was after college and after doing my internship in Washington, D.C.”

Continues Malick, “I had always wanted to act.  I minored in theater in college [Ohio Wesleyan University], so I knew that was where I was going.  It was either that or being a veterinarian.  But I sucked at science, so that decision was made for me.  I also took a year off to work for Jack Kemp; he had been our congressman and asked me if I wanted to come try it after college, which I did.”  To this day, Malick remains politically active and lobbies often for federal funding of arts and education.  “It’s how I got my start in high school, through a great music program,” she notes.  “And I lobby on behalf of animals and animal welfare, as well as being very pro-choice, so I have been a spokesperson for Planned Parenthood, as well.”

Still, for all the causes and contributions, Malick could never stay away from the spotlight for long.  After her D.C. days, she returned to New York “and worked in theater – where you make $75 a week,” she recalls.  “Someone approached me and said, `Would you be interested in modeling?  Would you come and meet Wilhelmina?’  I did, and I ended up for the next five years working between New York and Paris and Milan, seeing the world and having a great ol’ time.  But I knew it was only a finite departure and that I would come back to acting.”

And waiting tables.  “I was trying to be a working actor,” notes Malick, “but I had to supplement my income with waitressing.  Then I got my first full-time job, on the soap opera, `Love of Life.’”  Fans of “Hot in Cleveland” can appreciate the connection, since on that show, Malick plays an Emmy-winning former soap star.  “I actually went back and did a day on `All My Children,” recalls the actress.  “Susan Lucci was a guest on our show, so I went back and did a day as Victoria Chase, my character, on hers.  It’s mindboggling to think about it.  I think they shot over 100 takes in one day.  It’s like a factory where they go, `boom boom boom’ – so much work.  They cover so much ground in so much exposition every day.

“On our show,” continues Malick.  “we have five days to put on a little play in front of an audience.  So we really get to hone our craft.  It’s great fun, and I love it.”

 

SIDEBAR: WENDIE

ON HEALTH

I’m very blessed.  My dad is 92 years old and going strong.  And my mom is in good shape.  She walks her dog twice a day, every single day.  And she lives in Buffalo, NY.  (laughing)  It keeps you honest.

ON DIET

I’m a pescatarian, so I eat fish, but otherwise I just eat vegetables, fruits and raw nuts.  I gave up the whites: white flour, white sugar.  I do drink wine and an occasional martini, so instead of dessert, that’s my vice.

ON EXERCISE

I exercise almost every day and feel so much better when I do.  I do Pilates, I ski.  I love to feel in touch with my body because the older we get, the more you really have to not let it slip. It’s much harder to get it back.  We’ve got dogs and horses, so I have critters I have to get out anyway.  Having animals is a great enforcer of exercise!

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com) and hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.com) on UNC Radio, where he serves as programming director. Read him at: https://davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/about/

 

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Shirley MacLaine: “Over” but not Out

SHIRLEY MACLAINE: “Over” But Not Out

 by David Lefkowitz

(This article was first published May 2011 in Long Island Woman magazine.)

 

“I have an investigative nature, and I’ve been so privileged to travel. I’ve met an awful lot of incredible people, and I’ve really had an extraordinary life.”

Any reasonably lucky and active person should be able to say something similar, but when actress and author Shirley MacLaine makes a statement like that, well, the words “incredible” and “extraordinary” almost seems inadequate.  This is a woman who lived briefly with a southern black family during the Civil Rights era, got smuggled into Leningrad in 1962, watched boxers fight to the death in Thailand, and made a pilgrimage across Spain.  This is also a woman who palled around with some of the most famous actors and directors in Hollywood and had relationships with such notables as Danny Kaye, Robert Mitchum, Yves Montand, Andre Konchalovsky and the foreign minister of Australia.  Oh yes, and she’s also the “kook” who has long believed in reincarnation, numerology, astrology, chakras and spiritual energy aligned with a Godforce.

“I think mathematics is the universe,” MacLaine noted in our late winter phone conversation. “I would not live my life by the numerological signs, but I think it’s an ancient art and important to include.”  The Oscar-winning actress then explained how math is both poetic and perfect – even as it allows for imperfection and flexibility in such cases as pi, the never-ending number.  Since our 40-minute chat would be woefully inadequate to even scrape the surface of MacLaine’s mystical beliefs, she puts a simple button on the topic by adding, “I think there are realities beyond our imagination.”

That said, those interested in pursuing her long-advocated theories can find a whole smorgasbord of New Age topics at her official and quite elaborate website, shirleymaclaine.com, while the layman may prefer perusing her sprightly new volume, “I’m Over All That: And Other Confessions,” published this month by Atria Books.  The author of “The Camino,” “Sage-ing While Age-ing” and “You Can Get There from Here” didn’t realize what her latest book would be until she sat down with her editor who asked, “What do you want to write about next?”  “He started suggesting things,” recalled MacLaine, “and I just said, `No, I’m over all that.’  He suggested something else, and I said, `No, I’m over all that.’  And he said, `Well, that’s a title; now write the book.’ That’s actually how it happened.

“When you get to be a certain age,” continued the actress, who turns 77 April 24th, “I feel very much like going over things and discarding the things that no longer attract my attention.  I thought they were important in the past; they’re not anymore. Some of the things I completely ignored I now look at.  The other thing I’ve noticed as I get older is that it really is true that almost everything in life is show business. I don’t know if I made that concept clear enough in the book. We have the theater of the Egyptian Revolution; we’ve always had the theater of war, the theater of politics, the theater of everything.  And we are, in my opinion, writing our own script every single day.  So maybe I’m in the right business after all: show business. But then it dovetails into life.”

In her book, MacLaine needles Hollywood types who live in a bubble and believe their own p.r. She quotes an oft-told L.A. adage: “Never marry an actress – she is too much more than a woman. Never marry an actor – he is so much less than a man.”  But in our talk, the author is just as quick to defend her colleagues. “The idea of show business being life is not bullshit.  We all live in the illusion of what we create; Hollywood people are just a bit more sophisticated about what illusion is. And about the fact that we are creating every single thing every single day.  We write our own scripts, and wear our own wardrobe, and finance and distribute our truth.  That’s what we do in show business.”

It should be noted that for all MacLaine’s deep thinking about the universe and the seeming resignation and crabbiness the title of her book might convey, she actually has a very playful nature and a motto of “rolling with it” that serves her well, especially at this stage of her life.  Erma Bombeck may have titled her famous book, “If Life is a Bowl of Cherries, What am I Doing in the Pits?”, but MacLaine heads her website with the more optimistic: “Life is a bowl of cherries, never mind the pits.”

It is this attitude that allows her to ruminate philosophically on topics that might lead others to knee-jerk rage and despair.  For example, though she believes strongly in karma, she dismisses any talk of heaven, hell, devils or cosmic revenge.  “When we talk about Al Qaeda, Hitler, Charles Manson, what we’re asking here,” she said, “is the question, `is there such a thing as evil?’  But one person’s evil is another person’s liberation.  I agree with Gandhi that the devils are the ones rattling around in our own hearts.  But I like to go deeper and ask, `What is the learning experience from these people we consider evil?’  I’m intrigued by what Einstein and astro-physicists are looking for – a unified field theory.  Are we basically all one?  I do think we all go to the same place and that hell is just a conceit, a fear-mongering punishment for those we don’t agree with.”

Since we detoured into the subject of terrorism, I asked MacLaine about a passage in “I’m Over All That” in which she admits that she’s weary of traveling, mainly because our concessions to national security have made airports such arduous, dehumanizing places.  “On the one hand, you say we need to guard against letting ourselves be treated like sheep,” I note, “but on the other hand, you yourself are capitulating.”   MacLaine acknowledges the paradox: “I travel when I have to, but frankly, I’ve done so much of it.  And it’s different now; traveling has lost its majesty for me.  Not just that whole theater of pain-in-the-assdom, but because the world is overpopulated and too violent.  What’s happening everywhere in the world is a kind of consensus of authoritarian behavior to make people lose individual identity.  And as [scientist] Paul R. Ehrlich used to say, it could be a result of just having too many people.

“The one thing that will continue,” continues MacLaine, “is that more people will be born than will die, unless we have some kind of Malthusian event where millions of people do die. I hope not, but who knows?  We need to have a balancing, that’s for sure.”

The lure of stability seems crucial to MacLaine, whose dog, Terry, now gets much of the attention she once lavished on an array of lovers.  “I don’t worry about having a boyfriend,” she states. “I don’t want to settle.  I’m totally fine without one person.  I’d be shocked to the stars if I met my twin soul or someone I thought was my soulmate at this age.  But if I did, I would go with it.”

Asked if her very active love and sex life of the 1960s was a rebellion against her conservative upbringing, MacLaine retorts, “Why do you say the 60s?  It was the 60s, the 70s, the 80s, and the 90s!  But I wasn’t doing it because that was when everybody was doing it.  I was doing it because I was attracted to whoever the man was.  I was a serial monogamist.  I didn’t have affairs too often, but I did once or twice.  But I’ve learned that when you’ve got the sexual tension out of a relationship, or when it tames down, you’re more honest about things.  So I have relationships now where sex is still nice, but it’s not as intense as it was when I was younger.  That makes it possible to establish more equal honesty in the relationship.”

Regarding her relationship with her daughter, Sachi, MacLaine says that, as it has been for many years, the rapport is “more like friends than mother and daughter.  We go through our ups and downs, but it’s very nice.  She would probably have a whole different opinion of it – like most daughters and children do of their parents.”

Rolling with life is also helping the actress cope with the inevitable slowdowns of age.  “I am not afraid of getting older,” says MacLaine.  “I am sometimes shocked when I can’t walk up a very steep mountain like I used to.  I also have short-term memory problems that drive me crazy.  But I try not to let it bother me.  I try to live in the present and have it be all right.”  Asked if she misses being a dancer, MacLaine laughs, “I’m so glad it’s over with!  I couldn’t possibly get through a [dance] class.  Even a beginner’s class because those are usually harder than the advanced, because you have to take the balance and the extension, and the pain is slower.  Still, I am basically a dancer; that is my psychology.  If you’re in trouble, and you’re in a fox hole, you want a dancer in there with you… It means I’m a team player, and I never pull any diva trips.”

Which shouldn’t fool anyone into thinking the divine-guided Miss M. is a pushover.  She walked off “Terms of Endearment” mid-shoot when personality clashes became unbearable, and, during filming of “Steel Magnolias,” she took director Herbert Ross to task for his bullying of co-stars Dolly Parton and pre-superstar Julia Roberts.  “I called him on his cruelty,” MacLaine recalls, “and he knew it was true.  He also knew that I knew him because we’re fellow dancers.”  So why was he being a meanie?  MacLaine thinks a moment and then laughs uproariously.  “Because he was a choreographer!”

On the same subject, MacLaine notes that Bob Fosse was a taskmaster, too, but not a vicious one. “He had an accurate compass on energy,” she recalls. “And I was proud of `Sweet Charity’ because I had an infected tooth on that whole picture and did the whole film basically with 106 fever.”  The actress has fond memories, too, of Vincente Minnelli, who directed her in “Some Came Running.” “Minnelli used to direct the furniture – and the curtains and the interior decoration.  He didn’t direct people, but that was his genius.  He would cast perfectly and then let us do what we do best.”

Alfred Hitchcock, also, was mostly hands off when it came to guiding performances.  “Hitch used to say, `The only thing that’s important is the script and the first preview.  Nothing else matters,” recalls MacLaine.  “But to tell you the truth, working with Hitch was an eating experience.  He would lose a lot of weight before a movie, and then, on a movie – because the studio was paying for it – he would gain the weight back.  Now, on `The Trouble with Harry,’ I had just come off being a chorus girl in Pajama Game and was nice and thin and lithe.  But two or three weeks into the picture, the president of the studio called me and said, `What do you think you’re doing? You’ve gained ten pounds, and the cutaways in the scenes don’t make any sense!’  I told him, `Well, Hitch wants me to eat with him three times a day – and I love it!’”

The image of MacLaine eating and gabbing with gusto jibes with her current lifestyle, where having a meal with friends and more platonic relationships with men proves more satisfying than the hurly-burly of her previous decades or the siren call of cyberspace.  “Frankly, I don’t think I will ever do email,” MacLaine says. “If that puts me out of touch with the entire population, I don’t care.  I do use my cell phone all day; I’d be lost without it.  But that keeps me in contact with the other person’s emotions, their mood, their space between words.”

Also fulfilling her need for contact is live performance, so MacLaine tours with her one-person, autobiographical show. “I put together a whole composite of film clips, television, singing and dancing, wall-of-life pictures.  I use a remote-control device to stop [the clips] and then tell stories about my life.  People enjoy it and can ask any kind of question they want from the audience.  In fact, recently one woman stood up and said, `Did you know that your father proposed to my mother?’  She told me the name, and it was true!  I asked, `Did they sleep together?’  And she said, `No, according to my mother, they didn’t.  Your father was very conservative, and my mother was, too.”  And then my dad went on to marry someone else.   But it came out of the blue; it was so adorable.  She asked me some more questions until I said, `Let me tell you: I had sex with your father!’  Of course I was joking, but it was funny. That’s what happens when I do these shows, it’s hilarious.”

That said, offstage and off camera, MacLaine prefers serenity.  “I lived in New York City for 20 years, and I was on Long Island every weekend in the summer.  If I was gonna live back east again instead of New Mexico, I would live on the Island all year and come to the city on weekends. But my favorite thing on Long Island is the winter.  The summer is full of the elite that meet, greet and eat.  Winter is more isolated.  It’s wilder and more of itself.”

*

SIDEBAR:

Some fun quotes from Shirley MacLaine’s “I’m Over All That.”

“I call it cosmic humor when people make good-natured fun of me. I’ve finally come to realize everything is God’s joke anyway. I’m just one of the characters in the comedy.”

“When a woman my age says they need to find a man, I tell them to get a dog.  There’s no more loving and satisfying way to live than if you are content with yourself and your freedom.”

“Once at a party, the hostess served coke in a silver bowl. I thought it was Sweet and Low and put a silver spoonful of it in my coffee.  Somebody later told me it was hundreds of dollars worth.  That was the last time I was invited to her house.”

“I am an overachiever with a sometimes bulldog-like work ethic, but when I walked across Spain by myself, begging for food and sleeping in shelters, I soon learned the art of surrender and allowance.”

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com) and hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.org) on UNC Radio, where he serves as programming director. Read him at: https://davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/about/. ▲

 

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY: Lucie Arnaz – On Mom, Dad, and the Muse

LUCIE ARNAZ ON MOM, DAD, AND THE MUSE

 by David Lefkowitz

 (This article was first published Sept. 2010 in Long Island Woman magazine.)

 

“I’ve done television and movies and nightclub acts and national tours of Broadway shows. I’ve raised a family. And throughout it all, I always embraced the relationship with both my folks while I was doing my own thing.”

These could be the triumphant words of anyone who’s made a career in show business without neglecting their heritage. But typical as these sentiments may sound, this time the come from the offspring of a very atypical marriage: Lucie Arnaz, whose parents, Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz, were both television royalty and creators of one of the most enduring situation comedies of all time. Daunting as that legacy sounds, the actress takes it in stride. “I’ve always told my kids, `This whole thing about your grandparents: it’s real estate. Imagine you had a great piece of property somewhere. You want to take care of it and make sure the right houses are put on it. Don’t cheapen it, and it’ll always stay as valuable as it is.”

Though Lucie and brother Desi Arnaz, Jr., have relegated the administrative nuts and bolts of the Lucy-Desi empire to a licensing company, there are still daily decisions to be made. “It takes a lot of time,” says Lucie, “and I know Desi doesn’t enjoy it too much, so I do most of it. My daughter [Katharine] will likely take over someday, since she seems to be the one who’d care enough to stick with it and take care of it. We might say, `Yes, you can put mom’s face on a purse or a poster. Yes, you can have a Lucy-Desi museum in Jamestown, NY, because she leved there and because they need the business.’ My mother and father’s legacy will stay alive no matter what we do, but it’s good to function as the DesiLu police to make sure the wrong things aren’t done.”

Guarding her parents’ memory, while far from Lucie’s full-time concern, has nonetheless been an ongoing source of pride and exploration. In 1993, she produced the Emmy-winning documentary, Lucy and Desi: A Home Movie, not so much as a gift for fans but as a way of learning about the people who raised her. Recalls Lucie, “I tried to answer, `What was my mother like when she was a kid?’ So I asked my uncle Fred, who was her younger brother, `What did you do when you played? What kind of stuff did you do just for fun?’ Because my mother was not a particularly playful person. I find that hard to believe, considering the I Love Lucy shows, but those were written by four other writers; they were not autobiographies of her life.”

Uncle Fred’s sobering answer caught her off-guard. “`We didn’t play,’ He told her, ‘we worked. My father died before I was born, and my mother had to go away to work. So your mother and I were in charge of the house, the cooking, the animals, the cleaning. We worked 18 hours a day. Weekends, too!’”

That explanation proved a major lightbulb moment for Lucie. “I got it. She wasn’t at home with her mom, because her mom was off making a living. So my mother didn’t have the innate instinct of what it’s like to be sitting and playing mommy-daughter games. And when she grew up, what my mother knew how to do really well was work. When she needed to calm down or feel better or run away from an emotion, she worked. Whether it was at the studio or cleaning silver—she worked. To sit on the carpet and just play with the kids didn’t come naturally. Which was really interesting because I didn’t find it natural, either. So you start to see the cycles, and you think, `Somebody’s gotta throw a monkey wrench in the cycle, or else it’ll go on like that forever.’

“These aren’t hideous, terrible things,” notes Lucie, “but they have to do with bonding and what your children take from you. My kids started to act out kind of weird around four-to-eight. I thought I’d been spending an enormous amount of time with them—way more than my parents were with me. I had a nanny and help, because I was a working actress and my husband [Laurence Luckinbill] is a working actor, too. But I took the kids to the doctors, I drove them to school, I made their dinners—most of the time it was me. But could I say that I was literally only with each of them, alone, for 15 minutes a day? Really focusing on them? What I learned later from a wonderful child psychologist is that’s what children need. Just 15 minutes alone with you every day. That little pay-attention-to-me time. `It makes them feel worthy of love,’ he said, which is the most profound th8ing I’ve heard in a long time. It seems like all the problems in the universe stem from some human being who somehow doesn’t feel worthy of love.”

Admits Lucie, “I think my oldest child got the worst of it because the older they are, the less they’re going to benefit from the changes you make. So my daughter benefited more than my two sons, who are playing a bit of catch-up in their relationships and their ability to know what they want to do with their lives.”

Certainly, Lucie’s own early adulthood had its stutter steps. At 20, she married Phil Vandervort, a young actor who went on to produced documentaries and serve as associate producer of The People’s Court. “It was a ridiculous, stupid thing to do,” sighs Lucie. “He was a lovely man, but I was way too young to make that move. So I extricated myself from a bad mistake and eight years later met Larry [Luckinbill].”

Considering the marriage has lasted nearly 30 years and counting, it was a match made in New York theater rheaven. “Larry and I were both on Broadway at the same time in two different Neil Simon shows. He was starring in Chapter Two; I was in They’re Playing Our Song. We were with mutual friends when we met at Joe Allen’s restaurant. Larry came in to meet the lady who was taking over as the lead in his play because at the time, his wife, Robin Strasser [of One Life to Live witchery fame], was co-starring—and they were getting a divorce! Marilyn Redfield took over, and she was a friend of mine. So, we were having lunch one day, and she said, `Oh, I’ve gotta hang around here because Larry Luckinbill is coming to give me some pointers on the script. You know Larry, don’t you?’ I told her I didn’t, and she said, `Oh, well, he’s going through this terrible divorce, and he’s so depressed.’

“Seconds after she said that, in he walks. And he was really handsome and smart—and kind of subdued, as one would expect under the circumstances. But I immediately thought, `Boy, he’s so unlike anyone else I’ve ever met.’ I invited him to hang out with this group I put together called `The Matinee Idles.’ It was for people who were by themselves on a Saturday between shows, so they could eat with other show people. Larry joined the group, and we because really great friends for four or five months, and then we started dating. The rest is history; we’ve never looked back.”

Though she’s two years shy of 60, Lucie feels scant trepidation when looking forward to the years ahead. “It’s hard for me to believe I’m anywhere near the age I’m at,” she says. “I look pretty darn good. I feel great, and I’ve never had more fun as a performer than I’m having right now. It’s the old joke: 60 is the new 30. My big concern is that my husband is a tad older than I am, and I just want us to keep on truckin’ for another 15 years.

“I don’t understand the whole Hollywood `get your face done, youth youth youth thing,: she adds.” With television and film, if it’s all you’ve got, and you’re terrified they’re not gonna love you anymore if you don’t take the wattle out of your chin, that’s a horrible way to live. My mother couldn’t have cared less. She wore bigger sunglasses and higher collars, but she didn’t get her face done.” When gently reminded that her mom was photographed through hilariously gauzy filters for her 1974 turn in Mame, Lucie counters, “That’s the friggin’ film business again. I blame my stepfather and the cinematographer—the ones who said, `You gotta make her look like this.’ But as a human being at home with me, she didn’t give me the impression that she had to go under the knife to make sure her face looked a certain way.”

For her part, Lucie chooses exercise and a reasonable diet as her font of youthfulness. “I don’t do a lot of aerobic work anymore,” she confesses. “In 2006, I was in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels on Broadway, and they had shoes made for me with arch supports because they thought it would make it easier to dance, but they popped out my knee, so I had to have a meniscus surgery. It’s fine now, but the knee’s never been quite the same, so the jumping-up-and-down aerobics class doesn’t work well for me anymore. I don’t tap dance like I would normally. But I drive all the way to the city to work out with my friend, Jon Giswold, who’s written two books on fitness. He’s kept me going and in shape, though I have to say I’ve weighed exactly the same for the last 20 years. No matter what I do—if I drink like a sot on New Year’s Eve, or if I starve myself for two days, I’ll go one pound up or one pound down, but my body is what it is. Still, these days, I really pay attention to what goes into my body. I follow Joel Furman’s diet and go by how much nutrition is in the food. There’s nothing I wont’ eat, but I eat more things that are used up in my body quicker.”

It might surprise readers to know that for all her Broadway and TV experience, of late Lucie’s been much more connected to her father’s musical leanings than her mother’s comedic ones. “As a musician and a singer,” explains Lucie, “these (Latin) rhythms have always been very moving to me. It cuts me deep and gets me where I live. After my father died, I found three little cassettes in a plastic case that a fan had sent him. They were recordings of my father’s music live from Ciro’s in Hollywood, taken from radio broadcasts in the 1930s and 40s. It encouraged me to make my own concert and club act.”

This past January at the 92^nd Street Y, Lucie served as artistic director for a celebration of Latin Music as seen through the tunes and arrangements of the Desi Arnaz Orchestra. “We did five performances of The Big Babalu Show, featuring Valarie Pettiford, who’s a jazzy, velvet-throated singer and an amazing dancer; Raul Esparza, the finest leading man on Broadway today—who just happens to be Cuban, too—and me. One night, my brother Desi came in and played percussion, which is a rare event because he doesn’t like to travel around and do that stuff. We got an awful lot of comments afterwards about, `When are you going to do it again? Can you travel with it?’ We’re trying to do another limited run in New York, but it’s hard to find the right-size stage, so we might tour it to Florida first.”

A studio CD of the material, “Latin Roots,” was released Feb. 9 and even features a song,  “The Music in Your Heart,” composed by Joe Luckinbill. “My son, Joe, has a band in L.A.,” says Lucie. “He’s on his way, but he’s struggling. Musicians—oy!—how do they make it? But he sent me a tune that I loved, and I ended up writing the lyric. It was so much fun to do the song together. It ended up being about the muse in you. In this particular case, it could be his grandfather and his musical ability; it could be me when I’m not around, it could be himself or his own heart, or how you’re never alone because that path is always in your heart. `I’m in the air you breathe in…I’m always gonna be with you.’ It’s a very good sentiment, and I like the song a lot.”

*

FUN FACTS ABOUT LUCY, LUCIE, & LARRY

* On I Love Lucy, though Lucille Ball’s pregnancy coincided with Lucy Ricardo’s, Little Ricky was not played by Desi Arnaz, Jr., but by Keith Thibodeaux.

* In her 1985 sitcom, The Lucie Arnaz Show, Lucie played a radio therapist—at just the time Frasier Crane was starting to appear on Cheers (although Frasier wouldn’t trade his couch for a microphone until 1993).

* In 2006, Lucie and daughter Kate co-starred in the last play produced (to date) at Florida’s Beleaguered Coconut Grove Playhouse, Sonia Flew. “As a matter of fact, the marquee was up for a year after that,” recalls Lucie.

* Lucie’s most recent Broadway appearance was replacing Joanna Gleason in Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

* The Arnazes no longer own I Love Lucy or DesiLu. In 1953, Lucy and Desi sold CBS the rights to their sitcom so they could buy RKO Studios and create DesiLu. After Desi died, Lucy sold DesiLu to Gulf+Western, which is now Paramount and also part of CBS. The Arnazes do still own Here’s Lucy, which is currently being released on DVD.

* Lucie’s daughter Kate is named for Katharine Hepburn (same spelling). The day Kate was born, Hepburn sent this note: “I’m so honored to be a member of your family, but poor girl! That `A!’ At least it’ll teach her to fight.” ▲

*

BYLINE:

David Lefkowitz co-publishes Performing Arts Insider (TotalTheater.com), hosts Dave’s Gone By (davesgoneby.org), and serves as Programming Director of UNC Radio. Read him at https://davelefkowitzwriting.wordpress.com/about.

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NON-FICTION – FEATURE STORY PROFILE: Carrie Fisher – She Moves On

CARRIE FISHER: She Moves On

by David Lefkowitz

Note: This article first appeared in Long Island Woman, Oct. 2009.

When I heard the voice on the other end of the phone – thick, slow, fogged – my heart sank. “Oh Jeez, what is she on?”

“She” being Carrie Fisher, the actress once known as the daughter of Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds, then known as the heroine of “Star Wars,” but for the past two decades best known as a woman telling the world about her status as a mentally ill, drug-addicted alcoholic.  She’s been clean for three years, but wouldn’t it just be my luck to reach her on Day Zero of the next round?

“I’m stoned out of my mind,” she admitted as the conversation began.

“Oh,” I replied.

“I’m dealing with this head cold I just got yesterday.  It’s awful.”

“Oh!” I said, trying to recall if I’d ever before been so thrilled by another person’s flu. I asked Fisher if she preferred to delay our interview hyping the release of her latest memoir, “Wishful Drinking” [Simon & Schuster], but she replied, “No, it’s fine. If I don’t talk and just lie there, I wheeze, which is worse. I don’t like being sick.”

Tempted to respond with the obvious, “Who does?”, I held myself in check, remembering that I was talking to a woman who’s dealt with other kinds of sickness for a very long time.  “I was told I was hypomanic when I was 24,” Fisher explains.  “In my teens, I knew something was the matter with me.  A psychologist even asked if I was hyperactive. But I was always an incredibly intense person. Then, we moved to New York when I was 15; mom was on Broadway doing Irene, and I was in the chorus. That’s when my personality changed dramatically. It was the first time I’d gone to a psychiatrist – mom had a hard time accepting that because she thought I’d just blame her all day. But what I told the doctor was, `I wanna stop trying so hard.’  And he was great. Right away he said, `You’re not a victim. And it’s not about blame – that’s just “injustice collecting.”’ He took that away from me intellectually to say, `it’s all so-and-so’s fault.’”

Asked the chicken-and-egg question of which came first: showbiz or bipolarity (i.e., did fame have a hand in her madness, or does it take an already crazy person to be an actor in the first place), Fisher offers a qualified response. “It’s in your genes.  It’s a physical thing, although people can be de-stabilized by events. Yes, I’m a product of Hollywood inbreeding, and I don’t have a conventional sense of reality. But my shrink said, `Carrie, if you hadn’t had celebrity parents, if you were a check-out girl, you would have been institutionalized.’”

Actually, she was.  “I’ve been in mental hospitals.  Lots of them, in Connecticut and London.  People have an image.. I mean, nothing could ever be as bad as the words, `mental hospital’ or ‘institutionalized’ if someone commits you. But they’re not country clubs.  They’re places you go because you’re a danger to yourself – as with drug addiction – or you display suicidal behavior.  My judgment was impaired, and I was taking a lot of drugs. But for me, it wasn’t about killing yourself; it was just as a way to turn off your mind.  `Anywhere but here.’ That’s what you wanna feel. Because you have no insulation; everything hurts you so bad. And it takes an alcoholic to always think the solution is booze.”

Sober “off and on” for 28 years, Fisher credits opiate blockers for helping with her addictions and electroconvulsive therapy for staving off a recent deep depression. “ECT has this very heavy stigma,” notes Fisher. “And it’s not deserved, in my opinion.  It does have a dark history and a reputation that’s been brutalized by Hollywood, pill companies and talk therapy. But I’ve found it’s a really good way of managing my bipolarity.  Once every six weeks, it gets me off my back.”

Prescription medications are also in the mix, of course, though the downside of Prozac and Seroquel is obvious to anyone seeing a recent picture of the actress who once did for metal bathing suits what Bo Derek did for braids. “It makes you fat,” Fisher says flatly.  I’m on three meds that are brutalizing me. I hardly eat anything, and I do exercise, so it’s really cruel.”

Asked if her physical changes are extra difficult because so many people still see her as Princess Leia, Fisher turns philosophical. “It makes sense for people to feel that way.  I was in a fairy tale, which is a very rare thing.”  Rare but a tad creepy.  Fisher opens “Wishful Drinking” with an anecdote about shopping in a Berkeley store where the salesman confesses that after seeing “Star Wars,” he thought about her every day from when he was 12 to 22. “Every day?” “Well, four times a day.”

In a 2008 blog, Fisher also demystified her sexy “Star Wars” garb.  “The biggest problem with the metal bikini was that it wasn’t metal.  Not that metal would’ve been an improvement over what it was actually made of, which was kind of a hard plastic. Whatever it was, it didn’t adhere to one’s skin. My skin. My young, soon to be popular, unlucky skin.  So, when I was relaxing leisurely against Jabba the Hutt’s gigantic, albeit grotesque, stomach…the actor standing playing Bobba…could see beyond my yawning plastic bikini bottoms all the way to Florida.”

If only her relationships had been as transparent.  Writing of her connection with first husband Paul Simon, Fisher notes that although she served as the muse for such songs as “Hearts and Bones,” “Allergies,” “She Moves On” and “Graceland,” “Paul…had to put up with a lot with me.  I think ultimately I fell under the heading, `Good Anecdote, Bad Reality’. …when it came to day-to-day living, I was more than he could take.” The marriage lasted two years, though they dated a long while afterwards.  In the early 1990s, she lived with casting agent Bryan Lourd, who fathered her daughter, Billie.  “Bryan took really, really good care of me,” Fisher writes, which is why it stung badly when he left her – for another man.  “I did an interview with Catie Couric,” Fisher recalls in our chat, “and she said, `shouldn’t it feel better that he didn’t leave you for another woman? He wasn’t rejecting you; he was rejecting your entire sex.’ I said, `ha ha ha,’ but I felt stupid and blamed myself.  When Bryan left, my daughter was the same age as I was when my father left, so everything kicked up more.”  In her book, Fisher quotes Debbie Reynolds putting it this way:  “You know, dear, we’ve had every sort of man in our family – thieves and alcoholics and one-man bands – but this is our first homosexual!”

On a more serious note, Fisher makes no bones about her absentee father likely having bipolar disorder as well, so I ask if she’s worried that Billie, now in her teens, might be prone to the same problems. “My daughter is a very strong girl,” Fisher replies, “and much more self-aware than my mother or myself ever were at her age.  People know now if you have a parent who’s alcoholic, there’s a 50 percent chance of doing that as well. But my daughter’s very confident, works very hard and is a great student. And she’s not exhibited any signs of being bi-polar.”

Asked if writing about her life has served a therapeutic or even cathartic purpose, Fisher says, “It can be, but more often it goes from inclination to obligation.  I didn’t even start writing until I was 30 because it’s hard to muster up perspective until you’re that age.  Still, I have to find in me what I relate to, so everything I write is somewhat autobiographical.”  If “Wishful Drinking” reads as more of a monologue than a memoir, there’s good reason: Fisher has been performing the material as a solo act since its 2006 premiere at Los Angeles’ Geffen Theater. Since then, she’s toured the show to Boston, Washington DC and Seattle, and in September she’ll bring the piece to Broadway’s Studio 54 as part of the Roundabout Theater Company’s fall season.

“That’s a great, great victory,” she notes. “If you can take something that’s completely not funny – in fact, it’s painful, devastating – and find the funny part, the gallows humor, and make an audience laugh, that’s magic. The darker the stuff is, the more essential it is to find the funny. Of course, if you look hard enough, there’s a funny thing in everything.  Literally everything.”

SIDEBAR:

BRUSHES WITH GREATNESS

On Cary Grant

“My mother was upset that I was doing drugs.  I admitted I was doing acid, so she did what every normal mother would do: she called Cary Grant.  He had a reputation of doing acid under a doctor’s supervision, which always fascinated me.  So Cary Grant called me and talked to me for well over an hour. And later on, when my father went to Grace Kelly’s funeral in Monte Carlo, he met Grant there but didn’t know what to say, so he said, `My daughter’s addicted to acid.’  So Cary Grant called me again. He was a very nice man.”

On Mike Nichols

“He wanted me to write the screenplay for `Postcards from the Edge,’ and I said, `I can’t do this. Get someone professional to do it.’ But he said to me the times I felt like quitting were when I did my best work. So I did it and was there throughout the filming. He’s an incredibly creative, brilliant man.”

On Bob Dylan

“[In the 1980s], someone from his office called my business office and asked, `Can we give Bob Dylan your phone number?’ And I wanted to say, `No, you keep that stalker away from me. I don’t want any more Sixties icons fucking up my life!’  But of course, I took the call.  He’d been asked by a perfume company to do a fragrance called, `Just Like a Woman.’ He didn’t like the title but liked the idea of a cologne.  What is it about me that made him think I went around making up cologne names?  Anyway, I gave him, `Ambivalence – for the scent of confusion,’ `Arbitrary – for the man who doesn’t give a shit how he smells,’ and `Empathy – feel like them, smell like this.’”

– 30 –

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