Stage Mum

by Lisa Gee

  1 As Joal Ryan reports in her book Former Child Stars: the story of America’s least wanted.

  2 Early Havoc, by June Havoc pp. 174–5.

  3 Early Havoc, pp. 129–34.

  SOMETHING GOOD

  DORA HAD SETTLED well into Year 2. She tackled school and homework industriously, enjoyed Mrs Arin’s teaching and played with her friends and her cousins, Millie and Freddie, who we visited most Saturday mornings. There were the usual rounds of play-dates and sleepovers. She rode her scooter to school most days (I rode it home) and arabesqued happily around her dance classes. It was a fairly busy routine, but she still managed to fit in plenty of telly-watching. Life would be like this for another week.

  Monday, 18 September, I was up bright and early for our trip to the Really Useful Group’s offices. It was only when I found myself standing stretching my formerly black, now a sophisticated shade of dark grey, Fenn Wright Manson silk top (bought circa 1990) over our ancient wobbly ironing board and pressing the button so an extra spray of steam and limescale burst through the base of the cracked iron that I should have replaced years ago, showering everything with white chalky stuff, that I realised how excited I must be. I only iron on really important occasions: posh parties, job interviews and live music – doing it for the latter being a complete waste of time as it’s always really dark anyway. Mostly I wear casually creased trousers and even more noticeably distressed t-shirts (you’d be distressed if you spent most of your time crumpled up in an overstuffed drawer). Dora was sporting her trademark almost-even bunchies – my technique was improving – together with jeans, pink t-shirt and trainers.

  After much pleading from Dora, I’d recently started reading Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone to her at bedtime. We were still near the beginning, but, like millions of others, were both already engrossed in Harry’s story. Realising that, on the journey into town, I had a choice between reading aloud from it, potentially irritating the other passengers who didn’t care what happened to Harry, Hermione et al., and Dora playing a game where she tries to rearrange my face by pulling and squishing my features in different directions, I plumped for irritating the other passengers. The journey passed without us needing to count the stops, and at the end my nose was still in its usual position. We weren’t the first to arrive at the Really Useful offices, but there were only a couple of other people there when we arrived – an older boy sitting quietly with his mum on one of the sofas. They’d come from Birmingham, and Jack, who was going to play Kurt, and had done lots of other theatre work, would be staying with a friend in London for the duration of the show.

  It wasn’t long before the room filled up, and there were soon nineteen excited, chattering children, and about the same number of perhaps even more excited, chattering parents. The atmosphere was quite different from the last time we were there: all the adults were introducing themselves to each other, and one mum – Lynn, whose daughter Grace had filled the Brigitta gap on the last team list – was passing around a printout of the kids’ names for us to fill in our contact details. I was impressed. She was obviously very confident, organised and experienced in the stage mothering department. It was only months later I found out that I was completely wrong. It was Grace’s first professional stage role, and Lynn had been terrified at the prospect of meeting the other parents. ‘I thought everyone would know each other already and be really pushy,’ she told me. Adrianna – the first person we’d met at the first audition we’d been to – had been cast as a Gretl, and had both happy parents with her, and there were a few others I recognised, including Yasmin and her mum Wendy, the people who Dora had invited herself to move in with at the final audition. It was lovely to meet everyone under such relaxed conditions.

  Jackie – the mum with two daughters in the show – wasn’t there, but had already got in touch with me via www.notapushymum.com. She was very excited, but also anticipating a wearying few months, as her girls had been put in different teams: which meant she, her husband and the other family members who’d be helping out with taking and fetching the girls would be spending an awful lot of time travelling to and from their home in Tonbridge and hanging around waiting for rehearsals and performances to end. But the excitement massively outweighed ‘the shock of how my life is over for the forseeable future’. She was at work that Monday – she is a teaching assistant at her younger daughter’s school – and her husband Scott, a landscape gardener, had taken a day out to accompany his girls to the sorting.

  In fact, the atmosphere in the waiting room that day was rather like the first day at Hogwarts. The Really Useful boardroom was buzzing with the same kind of excitement and anticipation, a similar sense of impending magic as when the witch-and-wizarding newbies are sorted into Gryffindor, Slytherin, Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff, only with more parents and without that sumptuous start-of-term feast. Shame. Still, on the upside, we were provided with complimentary tea, coffee, juice and water which, I realised on reflection, were probably more suitable for that hour of the morning.

  The kids were called into another room, and when they’d gone, Jo Hawes explained a bit about what would be happening. There was, she told us, a huge buzz around this production, a lot of excitement, and there would probably be a lot of publicity. The Gretls would, she said, get the most attention – at which point I broadened my grin and deliberately crinkled my laughter lines to make sure no one could tell that my stomach had been showered with small sparks of envious regret that Dora had been cast as Marta. Jo went on to tell us that she’d managed to organise it so that she would probably have some – most likely about ten – top price tickets available for parents for each show. They couldn’t all go to one family, but would need to be shared around, and we’d have to follow her system to the letter, because she was very busy and was doing it as a favour. She’d set up this arrangement because parents with kids in Mary Poppins had ended up having to queue outside the theatre at 8.30 a.m. so as to watch their children perform – ‘and I didn’t think that was on’. She wouldn’t be able to confirm which seats we’d have (or, in fact, that we’d actually get any at all) until the day of the performance, but they would be good seats, ones that the production company would be holding for VIPs.

  She also made it clear that whilst the children would have a fantastic time, we parents wouldn’t, and that while they were in the show we would have to strictly limit all their other extracurricular activities, so they could save all their energy for school first and The Sound of Music second. Tech week – when they’re rehearsing the show intensively in the theatre and making sure that all the sound, lighting and stage sets work – would be sheer hell, and before the end of it at least one of us would be on the phone screaming at her about how terrible it all was. ‘I want to stress,’ Jo continued, ‘that I will say “no” if anyone asks if they can go on holiday. So in case you’re brave enough to try, please just be aware that I will refuse.’ Oh, and could we all please make sure we checked our emails last thing at night, as she might not be able to get vital information about the following day’s schedule until the creative team had talked over that day’s rehearsal, returned home, eaten dinner and then called or emailed Jo to tell her what she needed to tell us. Any questions?’

  Bethany’s mum Rachel had told me how the kids in Les Misérables finished at the end of the first half and so only got to do the curtain call on their last night. Would the von Trapp children, I asked, mindful of the licence condition saying they had to leave the theatre by ten o’clock or half an hour after the show finished, whichever was earlier, get to take a bow? Yes, she said. They couldn’t have a curtain call without them, as they were central to the show. How would expenses be paid? someone else asked. By cheque, in arrears. When would we know the final teams our kids would be in and the dates they’d be performing? ‘As soon as the creative team decides and tells me,’ Jo responded, ‘but it may well change after today.’ What was the schedule for rehearsals? She’d let us know as soon as she knew. And so on. />
  After Jo had finished, we settled down to chatting amongst ourselves: which child belonged to us, what, if anything, had they done before, what part they’d be playing, how old they were – there were, it transpired, some very experienced young actors and actresses amongst the cast: several former Jeremys and Jemimas from Chitty Chitty Bang Bang, a Jane Banks or two (Mary Poppins). I discovered that Dora was the youngest there by a few months, and worried slightly that all the girls who were playing Gretl were older than her. The team were hoping to cast four or five Gretls as the girls playing the part would be so young, but they weren’t planning to cast more than three Martas – and my daughter was the youngest of all. Was she, I wondered, mature enough to cope with doing more shows than some of the older children? We’d soon find out, I thought, and she did look like she had more physical reserves than the sylph-like Gretls.

  I found the mum of the girl with whom Dora had had her oval face/round face contretemps and apologised for my daughter’s lack of tact. We settled down for a chat. I’d seen Nicky at the final audition with two identical, Gretl-sized girls: one had got in and the other hadn’t. How did she – and they – cope with that? ‘I’ve got four kids performing,’ Nicky told me, ‘the triplets and their older sister.’ The triplets!???! The three girls (two thirds of the triplets and their big sister) had all auditioned for The Sound of Music; Haydon, the third triplet and the boy who was, a few months later, in Cranford, being too young to try for Friedrich or Kurt. ‘If they want to do it,’ she said, ‘they have to be able to cope with one of them getting a part and the others not. It is tough,’ she continued, ‘but that’s the deal. Otherwise they can stop. It would,’ she conceded, ‘have been harder if two of them had got in and the third hadn’t. But there you have it.’

  Nicky seemed extremely nice, very grounded, businesslike and sensible. Not remotely the kind of person I’d expected to meet in this glitzy showbiz world. How, I wondered, had she ended up like this?

  ‘Oh, my eldest was into it and I ended up taking her to Young ’Uns – that’s the Sylvia Young Theatre School agency,’ she added, realising I wouldn’t know what Young ’Uns was. ‘Anyway, because the triplets were really young they went everywhere with me. When Kirsty (her oldest, who’d played Jemima in Chitty Chitty Bang Bang) was called in for her audition, they wanted to know who was making all the noise in the background, so I explained and apologised, saying they were too young for me to leave behind. They called the triplets in and signed them up as well.’

  As we were chatting, the door swung open and Connie Fisher came in, accompanied by her agent, who was busy on her mobile making arrangements. We all looked up and started clapping and cheering. Connie looked slightly taken aback: it’s unlikely that anyone had explained to her that the room in which she would be waiting to meet the director and choreographer would already be packed with over-excited stage mothers and fathers. How Do You Solve a Problem Like Maria? had only finished the previous Saturday and Connie had spent most of the thirty-six-odd intervening hours being interviewed and recalibrating her life.

  Given that I don’t like to think of myself as the starstruck type, Connie Fisher’s entrance had an embarrassingly strong effect. I suddenly found it very hard to concentrate on my conversation with Nicky and, like most of the other Sound of Music parents present, found my attention irresistibly drawn towards Connie. It was the traditional reaction to someone you’re familiar with watching on the telly. Having, like everyone else in the Really Useful boardroom that morning, followed her progress through the competition with significantly more involvement than we generally invested in our own job-seeking efforts, I felt as if I knew her. It was the same sensation as being a soap operaholic, bumping into the actor who plays your favourite character when you’re out shopping, and accidentally saying hello and asking how he is, before you register that, in real life, you aren’t on meet-and-greet terms as he doesn’t have a clue who you are. The pull towards Connie was so powerful, I felt like I was about to regress to those bizarre mid-teenage years, when, with some equally hormonal friends, I hung around after the men’s doubles finals at Olympia, and, after everyone else had left the arena, collected the plastic cups that the tennis stars drank out of and spat into, took them home, labelled them carefully with the name of the hunk who’d drunk out of and spat into them (I didn’t wash them out) and kept them until I was old enough to be embarrassed at having done so. Fortunately, on this occasion, I managed to suppress my inner adolescent long enough to continue my chat with Nicky, who, being a seasoned stage mum, and considerably more sensible than I had just discovered myself to be, had glanced up to see what all the fuss was about, smiled, then returned her full attention to our conversation.

  This wound down fairly soon after that, partly because it had come to a natural conclusion, and partly because it was obvious that I was being magnetically drawn to the boardroom table where Connie was now sitting. Shana and Darren – Adrianna’s parents – had struck up an easy conversation with her: they had people in common and were discussing their various connections. I sat tongue-tied on the other side of the table, before eventually asking Connie if she’d managed to get any sleep over the past week (I’d thought she looked slightly tired and stressed on the final programme). She shrugged off my concerns. It had, she replied, been a busy time, ‘but I always sleep like a baby’.

  A few minutes later the kids wandered out of the sorting room. Dora was holding hands with another bunchied little girl wearing a white t-shirt and dungarees. They looked very cute. They let go of each other’s hands and Dora came to find me.

  ‘I’m going to be Gretl again,’ she announced.

  ‘Are you really?’ I asked, suspicious that there was no accompanying grown-up endorsing the change.

  ‘Yes. They made us all stand in lines and I was between the Martas and the Gretls. They said maybe I could learn two parts! Everyone laughed, but I could, couldn’t I?’

  ‘Look who’s here,’ I said, pointing over to where Connie was coping admirably with the swarm of smiley children that had landed around her, all talking at once. ‘Why don’t you go and say hello while I ask Jo if you’re going to be Marta or Gretl.’

  Dora looked reluctant, and went to find her new friend before sidling shyly over to stand near where Connie was sitting. I cornered Jo Hawes to ask if it was true that Dora’s part had changed. She went off to find out and returned to tell me that Dora’s report was accurate. She was, in fact, going to be a Gretl.

  I was delighted. It wasn’t that I wanted my daughter to play the role that would attract the most attention. At least that’s what I told myself. Firmly. I was pleased, the good-parent part of me purred, because Dora was so young, and the change of role meant that she would be doing slightly fewer shows, which would be better for her welfare. However, my inner stage mother was cartwheeling around my vital organs with excitement at the prospect of my little girl getting the part with the biggest ‘aaah’ factor. I crossed my fingers and hoped that my inner stage mother and inner adolescent never managed to join forces. I wasn’t sure that the rest of me would prove strong enough to prevent them triumphing. There was no telling how much embarrassment I might cause myself. Or, more importantly, Dora.

  It would be okay, I figured, were I entirely devoid of self-awareness. Then I could act appallingly without troubling my conscience. I could boast about my daughter’s brilliance, acknowledge any other child’s achievements in a slightly off-hand and patronising way that made it clear I considered them vastly inferior to my child’s, and blame any ill will generated by my behaviour on other people’s envy of my super-talented daughter. It would, of course, impact badly on Dora, but hey, I would also be completely unaware of that too, and when she grew up and either disowned me, or descended into a hell of drink and drugs, I could just scream, ‘How could you! After everything I’ve done for you!’

  But sadly, because I have some self-awareness – not enough, it’s true, to prevent me saying or doing the wrong th
ing at the wrong time and place on an embarrassingly frequent basis – this was not a practical option. The problem is, every mistake I make generates acute and extended bouts of guilt, embarrassment and self-recrimination, which tend to be completely out of proportion with the wrong doing that preceded them. That’s an awful lot of time spent feeling ashamed. To limit that, I do at least try to do the right thing.

  After we’d said our goodbyes and see-you-next-weeks, Dora and I headed back to Covent Garden station. I wondered vaguely where they’d found another Marta at such short notice. I guessed it must have been at the auditions for the last Louisa and Brigitta, where, apparently, they’d also checked out an additional Gretl or two. Maybe they’d also done an extra sweep at Sylvia Young’s, or something like that: perhaps the producers had a special relationship with the stage school, like the one between the US and Britain. As the Really Useful Group seemed unlikely to invade Iraq, I couldn’t see much harm in that.

  It was only after rehearsals started that I found out the answer. Emily, who had landed the part of Marta, had been begging her parents to allow her to audition. Her father, David Ian – one of the show’s producers – had, eventually, given in and called Jo Hawes, saying, ‘I’ve got this daughter who sings and dances, but I don’t know how she’ll be compared to the drama school kids’. Jo asked him how he wanted to handle it, and David said: ‘If she auditions, she does it the same way as everyone else.’

  ‘Emily did two or three auditions,’ Jo Hawes told me, ‘and then came in to meet Jeremy and Arlene. It was not until she was just about to be cast that they discovered who she was.’ Emily had been hoping to join the production with the second cast of kids, in the spring, but was called in early when the creative team were rethinking their Gretls and Martas. According to her mum, Tracy – a former dancer, singer and actress – the director, Jeremy Sams, was a bit surprised that he hadn’t known who Emily was during the audition process. ‘But it would’ve been wrong if they’d known she was David’s daughter. We were happy for her to be in the show – but only if she was really good enough. Also, we insisted that she didn’t get any publicity. She just had to be one of the kids.’