Voice Lessons

by Cara Mentzel

  I bragged to my colleagues and friends about Dee’s pending Academy Award performance and they usually responded by asking if I would be going with her. “I don’t know,” I replied each time. “I’m sure there’s a ton to consider.” And there was. Dee had a million things going on both professionally and personally. More than I was even aware of, I’m sure. If/Then was slated to open on Broadway at the end of March. She was doing press for Frozen and performing “Let It Go” multiple times a week. And as always she prioritized Walker, focusing on him as her marriage continued to dissolve.

  I waited for Dee to call for what felt like forever, but realistically it was probably a week or two from the time the nominations were announced. It took a conscious effort to prevent my hope for an invite from deteriorating into a fear of disappointment or, worse, entitlement. I wished I could be the kind of person—the kind of sister—who would pick up the phone and call or text Dee without giving it a second thought. I’d ask, “So what’s the scoop with the Oscars?” and she’d tell me—no big deal. But I wasn’t like that. I was a thoughtful sister—full of second thoughts and third thoughts, and then some.

  Then Dee sent me a text. Simple. Direct. “Want to go to the Oscars?” I can’t recall what I did first, sigh or scream. I was relieved and excited. I wanted to reply, “I thought you’d never ask,” like a coy schoolgirl, but coy doesn’t play well over text so instead I wrote, “Fuck yeah,” which also accurately captured my sentiment. I sensed that Dee was proud. I don’t know how I knew what she was feeling. It was only a text. There was no intonation, volume, or emotion to interpret. Still, it felt like Dee knew she’d made me happy and was proud that she was able to. She texted a laughing emoticon. I texted, “What do I wear?” She texted, “I’ve got it all taken care of. XO.” I trusted she did. “XO.”

  A couple of weeks later, Dee explained that I didn’t necessarily need to fly out to New York City for a fitting, that it was sufficient to send my measurements via e-mail to her stylist who, in turn, would send me pictures of possible gowns. But then someone mentioned that a personal fitting could streamline the process and Dee liked the idea because she thought it would be fun to try dresses on together. I didn’t need any arm twisting. I wrote substitute notes for my class and a few days later I hopped on a plane to LaGuardia.

  It was late morning the following day when Dee, her stylist, and I arrived at one of Vera Wang’s studios and met a beautiful woman with long dark hair and even longer skinny legs. Every square inch of her was meticulously put together, so much so that I wondered if the few stray hairs that lay in front of her shoulder instead of against her back were intentionally placed, or if they’d simply lost their way during her walk to work. With her were two handsome gay men, designers of some sort. They immediately led Dee, the stylist, and me over glossy white floors, through a curtain, and into a dressing room. Then one gentleman rolled in several gowns that hung from a rolling rack, and referred to them as her dresses. Dee leaned in to me and quietly asked, “Are you all right if I go first?” which had evidently been the assumption.

  “Of course,” I said.

  “It’s my second fitting. It’ll go fast,” Dee added.

  “Of course,” I repeated. “I’m dying to see what they’re working on for you.”

  With six of us in there, even the oversize dressing room was a tight space. I took a seat out of the way on a built-in bench that faced a three-way mirror. Dee stripped down to her thong without hesitation. Thanks to years of performing in theater, she was used to being dressed and undressed and too busy for modesty. I watched the men drape dark green fabric across Dee’s chest and hips. The color evoked images of lush foliage and marshy waters, like a bayou at dusk. They adjusted the fabric, a little tighter here, a little lower there, and pinned it in place. They periodically stepped back to assess their work directly or in the mirror.

  There was some oohing and ahhing over more dresses and one pink fabric that was “to die for,” according to her stylist, Leslie; “Gawjus, just gawjus,” she said. Leslie was an attractive middle-aged woman whose thick New York accent, slightly brusque attitude, and passion for the materialistic could make a room feel like a high-end New York nail salon.

  After approximately forty minutes they finished up with Dee and it was my turn to try on dresses. Two of the ladies stepped out of the room and one of the gentlemen asked me to get undressed so he could take my measurements. Dee browsed the rest of the dresses on her rack. She pushed some to the side to expose a red gown and said to me, “This one’s pretty, isn’t it? You should try this one.”

  In the brief pause after Dee spoke, I heard conspicuous whispering beyond the dressing-room curtain and it made me uncomfortable. I was half naked when Leslie came into the room and explained that there had been a misunderstanding and no one had pulled any dresses for me.

  “Oh,” I said from the bench, looking up at her in my underwear.

  “You can get dressed,” the assistant added.

  “Don’t you still need my measurements?” I asked.

  “We don’t need them. You’re a sample size.”

  “Can she try on some of the gowns on this rack?” Dee asked. She was in protective-sister mode. “You know, so you can get a sense of her figure and what kind of cut would look good on her?” But the assistant said no. I was embarrassed and I didn’t know why. I’d done nothing wrong—though it didn’t help that my leggings were still down around my ankles. What exactly did the woman think I was going to do in those dresses, throw a tantrum until they let me have one?

  I felt tears well up, and I wished they wouldn’t. I didn’t want to make trouble for Dee. I didn’t want to seem ungrateful. And I definitely didn’t want to be the topic of discussion later in the day: “Oh my god, Idina Menzel’s sister totally cried today because we wouldn’t let her try on the couture gowns.” Of course, the latter statement wasn’t true. I didn’t feel like crying because of the dresses, but rather because I’d been forgotten, or not worth considering, and because there was something about the earlier whispering and the subsequent tone of the assistant’s voice that felt dismissive and insulting. I suspected that I was the favor someone had brokered; “We’ll even throw in something for Idina’s date,” someone must have said. That’s probably how these red carpet things work, I told myself. I was well aware that I wasn’t a celebrity, but that didn’t mean I was a nobody, and that’s what I felt like. Nobody.

  But when you’re lucky enough to be Idina Menzel’s sister, and you’re going to the Oscars, and Vera Wang is going to let you wear one of her dresses, you don’t get to be upset. You pull up your big-girl pants, keep your mouth shut, and smile amiably. I pulled up my pants, kept my mouth shut, and smiled amiably.

  A few minutes later, Dee and I learned that the Vera Wang would be joining us for a post-fitting lunch date. Lunch with the ageless, hyperactive Vera in a fur hat with ear flaps helped soften the day’s earlier blow.

  * * *

  The Friday before the 86th Academy Awards Ceremony, I arrived at LAX. It was after 10 P.M. when my driver pulled up to the entrance of the Four Seasons at Beverly Hills. A few patrons walked through the portico where tendrils of crystal chandeliers cast a shimmering light on the fronds of potted palm trees.

  “I’m here!” I texted Dee.

  “Come on up,” she replied with her room number.

  The driver pulled my roller from the trunk and I handed him a twenty-dollar bill. I didn’t know if I was supposed to tip him or if the tip was included or if he was one of Dee’s regular drivers and she’d take care of him. It seemed standard practice to tip a driver, but Dee’s world wasn’t standard and I wasn’t certain how to navigate it, especially in Beverly Hills. And so I worried that my twenty-dollar bill was a lot like the five-dollar check Grandma used to send me on my birthday—cute.

  I rolled my way over the lobby’s marble floors, into the elevator, and up to Dee’s room. A pretty woman in her midtwenties answered the door and beyond her I cou
ld see Dee at the end of the short entryway. She was partially clothed in a pink dress, her elbows out a little, while a man with just the right amount of product in his perfectly styled hair stuck pins in the fabric.

  “Hi, Ca. How was your flight?” Dee asked.

  “Piece of cake.”

  Dee turned to her guests. “Have you met my sister, the taller, skinnier version of me?” That’s how she liked to describe me, like someone stretched her out from head to toe—even my eyes, nose, and lips were narrower.

  I rolled my eyes at Dee for calling me “skinnier” and then smiled at the faces in the room. I knew a couple of them. Her manager Heather, her friend Shawna. I gave kisses and hugs. Leslie was there, too, with her assistant, the young woman who had opened the door.

  “Are you hungry?” Dee asked. There was a platter of hummus, pita chips, and veggies on the round glass dining table along with a bottle of champagne.

  “A little,” I answered and ran a chip through the hummus.

  “Take a look in the bedroom. You have to take a look in the bedroom.” She pointed me toward it on her right.

  I could see inside before I even stepped through the French doors. Heels of varying heights and in shades of white, black, nude, and blush lined the perimeter of the cozy room. Clutches, more than thirty of them, some beaded, some alligator skin, in bright colors and muted colors, with gold or silver finishes, mostly rectangular, but a few oval, were spread out in an orderly array of rows and columns over the whole of the king-size bed. Between the bed and the armoire was a rolling rack of gowns.

  “Think you’ll be able to find something in there?” Dee asked and cackled. (I love when she cackles.)

  “Ya think?” I said, rifling through the dresses.

  “Just wait ’til the jewelry gets here,” Leslie added.

  “The jewelry?” I popped my head out the bedroom door and looked at Dee, then Shawna. All three of us stopped in our tracks. Leslie explained that earlier in the week she had shopped the jewelry of several designers to borrow and the items she liked were being delivered to the room that evening so that we could decide which jewels looked best with the gowns. I took a sip of champagne. This could be a long night, I thought. And I hope it is.

  In the hour that followed, three different gentlemen knocked on the door and delivered jewels, then waited outside our hotel room with security officers. We set a white terry towel over the coffee table for better viewing and so we wouldn’t lose anything, and carefully laid out each necklace, earring, bracelet, and broach until the table looked like it belonged at the end of a pirate’s treasure map.

  I think Dee was first to ask about the value of the jewels in our possession.

  “A few million?” she guessed, looking at Leslie. Leslie reached for a diamond ring off the table and said, “This ring alone is over a million.”

  “Oh for crying out loud,” I said, sounding like my dad. “That’s insane.”

  “What about this one?” Dee asked, sliding a chunky, ruby filigree statement ring onto her index finger. Let me guess … $80,000?”

  “I’m guessing $95,000,” Heather said.

  “I’m gonna go higher, $125,000,” Shawna chimed in.

  “I agree with Shawna,” I said.

  Dee flipped her hand over and looked at the price on a tiny tag that hung from a piece of white thread. “I was wrong. But only by a little.” She laughed. “It’s $185,000. It almost looks like costume jewelry, don’t ya think, like it could hang on a display in a department store?”

  “Noooo,” Leslie said. “No, it doesn’t.” By the look on Leslie’s face, you’d think Dee had mistaken the ruby stunner for a ring pop.

  “Take a picture. Someone please take a picture of this table,” Dee said. She liked to take frequent reality checks. She never wanted to take anything for granted. “Always stop and take in the moment” was something she had learned from Jonathan Larson and was determined to remember.

  We played “Guess How Much” and drank champagne while I tried on some dresses. We narrowed the dress choices down to a low-cut canary-yellow gown and a periwinkle tulle gown that crisscrossed over my chest and gathered together at a silver beaded broach at my mid-back.

  “Nah, you know what,” Leslie said, “the yellow’s too Golden Globe. The periwinkle is Oscar.” In my life away from Beverly Hills and its jewelry-delivery services, there weren’t varying degrees of black-tie occasions. You either needed a gown or you didn’t, and usually you didn’t. Luckily, the vote for the periwinkle dress was unanimous so I didn’t have to worry about showing up to the Oscars like I thought I was going to the Golden Globes. How embarrassing would that have been!

  The following day, Saturday, I joined Dee and her posse—her managers, Burt and Heather; assistant, Daphne; and voice coach, Tanya—at rehearsal. We entered The Dolby Theatre through a private entrance a few steps behind Pink and her people. Pink would be performing “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” in honor of the seventy-fifth anniversary of The Wizard of Oz. We stopped at security on our way in, where I took a quick picture for my badge, then walked the hallways backstage and convened in Dee’s dressing room. Dee always preferred the acoustics of bathrooms for her vocal warm-ups and had scouted out a good backstage bathroom the day before. So when Dee left, I took a walk with Burt and Daphne into the auditorium, where we sat for a little while and watched the rehearsal.

  In the orchestra section many of the seats were occupied by large foam-board posters on which the name and portrait of each expected celebrity attendee was printed. From a distance they reminded me of oversize old west Wanted posters and I chuckled for a second, wondering what the reward would be for capturing all those celebrities.

  Some of the orchestra seats were filled with unknown actors hired to play their more famous counterparts. While I waited for Dee to take the stage I took an empty seat in the dark. I watched celebrity presenters rehearse their lines off the teleprompter, then fumble with an envelope and say, “And the winner of the 2014 Fake Oscars for this night only is…” At that point, the fake winner of a category, that is, the actor playing the actor who might win the following night, would jump out of his or her seat and kiss those around him. He’d make his way onto the stage and proceed to ad lib an acceptance speech. (For some, pretending to be an Oscar-winning actor was a bigger stretch than for others.) Occasionally a whole group of people would “win” a category and they’d huddle up in front of the microphone, beaming, or jumping up and down, or whispering, “I can’t believe it,” with hands to their hearts, as if they’d really won. There was no half-assing it at the Fake Oscars.

  Eventually, it was Dee’s turn to rehearse. Earlier, I’d learned that Dee needed two dresses, one for the red carpet, the green one, and one for her performance onstage. It was a secret, but Dee would be performing in front of a backdrop of hundreds of thousands of cascading Swarovski crystals, and needed a gown that would work well with that set and lighting. She was still vacillating between two gowns and needed to make a final decision at rehearsal, where she could see how the colors would play on set.

  Then, of course, there was the song to rehearse. By the second verse of “Let It Go” I knew Dee was holding back. She often did during rehearsals. I thought of the people listening, including the production staff, other celebrities, agents and managers, and how maybe they didn’t know that Dee was “saving it” for the next night. Maybe they thought that was the best she could do. Part of me wanted her to belt out the chorus so no one would doubt her, which was silly because she gave a beautiful performance. I was reminded of the nitro button on the cars in street-racing movies, the extra propulsion, the next level of speed. I was eager for Dee’s nitro button, for her to show the world the difference between super and supernova. I only needed to wait one more day.

  Dee spent the morning of the Oscars in rehearsal at the theater again, while I spent the morning in the care of her hair and makeup guys. I wore a loose off-the-shoulder cotton shirt so that when it was time to ge
t in my dress, I could pull it over my head without ruining all their hard work. Earlier, Dee’s hair stylist, Roke, had raised his hands into the air, framed my face like a portrait, and said, “I’m seeing Linda Evangelista circa 1990.” By the time Dee returned from rehearsals, my short, curly hair was straightened, pulled back off my face into a wavy pompadour, and slicked back with a product so thick and greasy that it required special removal instructions. My makeup was straight out of a Coco Chanel ad—eyebrows dark and dramatic, eyes smoky, lips soft pink. When Dee walked in and saw me she was ecstatic.

  “Oh my god. You should wear your hair like that all the time!”

  I laughed. “Right, like Roke’s gonna get me ready for Foothill Elementary every morning. By the way, those flowers arrived for you.”

  Dee sat on the couch and opened the card. “Holy shit!”

  “What? What?” I asked.

  “They’re from Bono!” she squealed. “‘Idina, Wishing you the very best for this evening, proud to share the stage with you … sing your royal heart out.–Bono, Edge, Adam, and Larry.’” U2’s “Ordinary Love” from the movie Mandela: A Long Walk to Freedom was nominated for best original song alongside “Let It Go,” Pharrell’s “Happy,” “Alone Yet Not Alone,” from the movie of the same name, and “The Moon Song” from Her. “Those guys are class acts,” she said with a starstruck glow.

  Dee and I switched places. I sat on the couch, picking at some scrambled eggs and strawberries, while she sat in the chair facing the natural light of the windows that lined the far wall of the hotel room. It was Dee’s turn for hair and makeup. Roke trimmed Dee’s split ends while her publicist talked us through the plan for the red carpet. We would take a short walk there instead of taking a car. She and Dee discussed what interviews Dee would do—only a select few they’d agreed on. Dee had to be careful not to strain her voice before her performance by doing interviews all along the red carpet. This is also when I was instructed to memorize the designer of my jewels, clutch, shoes, and dress just in case someone with a microphone asked me.