by Daniel Stern
THE JOURNAL OF CARL WALKOWITZ
The snow has become more insistent. Hardly three or four hours go by without a flurry, however light. The flakes gather and stick, enghosting the trees in the little park across the street, as if the weather is determined to equalize everything—people, benches—under the indifferent cloak of white.
Wandering backstage at the theater … the all-important auditions about to take place and the actors and actresses waiting to perform, babbling their credits and their persistent hopes, some more confident than the others, some simply more forceful in their statements—a dreadful jungle of the human ego.
If all men are equal it’s no wonder the question of power arises. Such bland indifference from fate is difficult to bear. Almost, one hears a voice: “But wait—it can be rectified; I can prove I am better, less deserving of such indifference.”
“How?”
“By asserting my control over someone else.”
What delights lie waiting for the man who will not accept this insult from the empty skies, and what terror for his fellows. So, at last, enter the survivor—the director—and with him, all the possibilities of cruelty and pride.
11
JUD SAID, “JANET, WOULD you read the beginning of the scene on page twenty-three? The hospital scene.”
Janet moved with frozen poise. It was difficult to tell if it was competence or ambition that gave her such marvelous control over her muscles. Even the bored stage manager, who was to read with her, was impressed enough to sit up straight in his chair.
In the dimness to the rear of the stage, Dasha’s oval face gleamed darkly—a burning, opaque flame with bright eyes flickering over every aspect of the scene. When her turn came, she darted to where Janet had sat and stood next to the chair.
“Dasha,” Jud called out, “the way the scene is written, it would be best if you begin sitting down.” He glanced at his watch. It was eleven-thirty. He’d have to hurry things along. When he looked up, Dasha was still standing, ready to begin the scene, as she had been before Jud had spoken. Oh, my God, Jud thought, what am I in for? She actually burns. That glow she has comes from heat. He nodded to her and called out: “Keep the others quiet back there, please.”
Dasha did not return or acknowledge his nod. She began the scene.
“She doesn’t have talent,” Janet said, “she has hysterics. I’ll bet I’m in.” She sprawled on the sofa and registered secure relaxation for her mother’s benefit. Louise pursed her mouth in a smile of grave amusement.
“My awesome offspring,” she said, “when did you experience your last doubt?”
“You’re my mother. Doubts are your job.” Louise felt her good humor begin to drain away, and she turned to go before this happened. Janet added, “Except others. I know how to doubt others pretty good.”
“Pretty well,” Louise corrected automatically. “But if I were you, I’d start practicing doubts. They’re going to come in very handy.”
When they entered Sardi’s, Jud could see that Emmet Thomas was on his good behavior. He had a difficult assignment—to have lunch with and to please three people who could only be pleased by someone who didn’t care about pleasing, who would respect him only if he was honest himself. It wasn’t fair, Jud thought, as they threaded their way through the aisle behind Vincent’s suave back. He remembered his own days as an actor, trying to assess the producers, to sense what tone would create the desired effect. With the hacks and commercial businessmen of the theater it was easy. You assessed, you chose, you acted, and you either pleased them and worked, or you displeased them and didn’t. But he could sense the ambiguity facing Emmet when dealing with Paul, his own teacher; with Jud, a “serious” director; with Joe Lear, and the still undefined Walkowitz.
Jud caught Emmet’s glance. The actor cracked his thin, dry mouth into a smile. Jud thought, He’s decided to play sincerity.
“What’s the joke?” Rovic looked at Emmet in irritation.
“Nothing. Well, I was really remembering the look Janet gave that girl Dasha when she began to stray from the script.”
“Don’t be tactless,” Joe Lear said.
Sensing trouble, Jud said, “Forget it. Paul isn’t a stage father.”
“I’m not so sure. I thought my daughter was damned good.”
“She was.”
“Good enough?”
“What does that mean?” Jud said.
“It means there’s the other girl to consider,” Lear said. “Are we agreed that she has talent?”
“A big talent. Wild, but there’s no denying strength.” Jud asked Emmet, “How would you like to work with her?”
“Really? I mean we’re through playing games?”
“It’s too late for games.”
Emmet paused a second and then said, “I wouldn’t like it.”
There was silence.
“What’s wrong?” Jud asked.
Emmet laughed. “Translation: What’s the matter, Emmet, afraid of playing opposite a girl who’s a powerhouse? Scared she’ll take the play away from you?”
“That’s a loose translation.”
“Well, it’s a wrong one. She’s terrific and we’ll all look better if she does it. But she’s a nut. And we have enough problems in a production like this. She’s acting out some private fantasy, some image of herself that spills over onstage, offstage, probably when she’s in the kitchen or in bed, too.”
“You may be right,” Jud said carefully. “But I’m still interested.”
“So am I,” Emmet said. “But I wanted to have my honest say, first.”
Okay, Jud thought, you’ve demonstrated integrity. He was irritated with the actor.
“Look,” he said, “we’re all vulnerable in this thing. Janet is Paul’s daughter, Dasha is my cousin. Either way somebody’s going to be a son of a bitch. So we may as well all be as sincere as we can. Paul?”
“Under the gun?”
“Why not? It’s not a poker game.”
Walkowitz leaned back from the table as if to separate himself from the group for a moment. “It’s not?” he murmured.
There was laughter, and Rovic gazed at Walkowitz brooding over the conference like an ironic deity. Jerking his head at Walkowitz, Paul said, “What opinion does the Gray Eminence have?”
Joe Lear paused in the act of painting mustard over a slice of ham. “Who was the Gray Eminence?” he asked in his nervously inquisitive manner. “Pope Pius?” Then he frowned. He didn’t like to ask questions of fact in public.
“No,” Paul said, “it was Cardinal Richelieu.”
“The Gray Eminence will be heard from later,” Jud interrupted. “The principals will speak first. Paul …”
The older man hunched over a little and touched the bridge of his nose with a judicial forefinger. “First of all,” he said, “this seems like an election, but it’s not, since Jud has full authority on casting. However, since we each have advisory votes, I’d like to request that this be, in effect, a secret ballot.”
Jud said, smiling, “All agreed? Good.”
Paul continued. “Janet’s reading was very good, very professional. She’d do a fine job.” His voice dropped, as in a cadence.
Jud crowded him. “And Dasha?”
Paul shrugged hopelessly. “Terrific!”
“Is that a vote?” Joe Lear asked. There was an edge to his voice.
Paul nodded. “A secret one.”
Jud didn’t give Lear a minute. “How about you, Joe?”
“I don’t like her. Oh, she seems to be damned good, but she could be a mess of trouble. Like that business when she wouldn’t sit down. We’ve got a tight rehearsal schedule.”
“If I had been more sensitive I wouldn’t have directed her to sit down, especially so brusquely. But we were rushed …”
“We’re always going to be rushed. Janet’s a pro. You can count on her.”
“It’s her name,” Walkowitz said, “isn’t that it?”
Lea
r did not look directly at him. He joined his hands at their manicured fingertips and gazed at them. “You said it, not me. It’s a very important point.”
Jud spoke quickly. “The floor is not open for debate. We’re voting.”
“Janet,” Lear said.
“In that case my vote decides,” Jud said. “I want Dasha.”
“All right,” Lear said, flatly.
“I can handle her, Joe.”
“You’ll have to. Paul and I will be busy handling the other backers and the theater parties. It’s not going to be a sleigh ride.”
Jud was still pacing the meeting, and he avoided this last challenge. “Okay,” he said. “We’ll hear from the co-star and the Gray Eminence—advisory opinions, that is—then back to the wars.”
Emmet straightened his trouser leg and glanced toward a nearby table where a gossip columnist was chatting with an actor. “Just take my earlier remarks and add that I think she’s great.”
“Carl.”
“Do you think it will be difficult for you to direct a member of your own family?”
“Note the Richelieu-like subtlety of the Gray Eminence. He answers a question with a question. No, I don’t think so. She’s only a cousin. And we haven’t been that close.”
“In that case, I think she’s excellent.”
Jud signaled for the waiter. “I’ll tell Larry to arrange for a press release right away.” He was breathing easier now. The pressure was off, for the moment anyway. But as he signed the check, his sense of victory began to fade, replaced by half-defined fears, uncomfortable feelings that refused to clarify themselves but whose emotional tone placed their time setting in the past—perhaps in California, where he and Dasha had lived as part of the same family. Jud was so preoccupied that he was brusque to the gossip columnist when Emmet maneuvered an encounter with him on their way out. He was angry with himself for this self-indulgence, as he went to find Dasha and tell her the happy news.
12
“SO, HERE YOU ARE, after all.”
“Yes,” Marianne said coldly. “I took a chance that you’d be in. Isn’t that nice?”
“Why did you come? I’ve still got the mark of your hand on my face. Invisible, of course.”
“You wouldn’t understand it. I’m not sure I do.”
“Try me.”
“‘Try me,’” she mimicked. “What is this, a game? Testing your will over Jud by being understanding to his wife?”
“No, it’s not a game.”
“I’m sorry. It’s just that—it’s so difficult to explain. To you and Jud there’s nothing to explain. It’s simply real to both of you.”
“Both?”
She ignored this. “And the outsiders, who don’t know, most of them don’t ever want to know. Why should they?”
“That’s right.”
“Only I’m in the middle. I’m not outside. And I’m certainly not inside. Maybe it’s the actress part, wanting to know my role all the way. No, that’s not fair to me. In some ways—if it didn’t sound so self-righteous I’d say that, in some ways, just because I wasn’t there, it’s harder for me. Is that awful?”
“No. The camps were … well, what they were. But the imagination, nothing can equal that. Especially when all you’ve heard is that it was unimaginably horrible in there. Incredible, et cetera. That gives the imagination free reign.”
“Then I’m not crazy?”
“That’s hardly the first reaction one has on meeting you.”
She looked at him. Then she looked away and said, quietly, “I sometimes wonder what Jud thinks …”
“I see what you mean. I don’t quite see Jud sitting down to a heart-to-heart chat about life in merry old Auschwitz.”
“Is that so terrible?” Marianne flared up quickly. “It’s better than—”
Walkowitz smiled at her confusion. “Better than what I do, you mean? Acting it out for their edification. Rubbing their noses in it? Didn’t you see Joe Lear’s face the other night? Nice, safe and sound Joe Lear with his heart and his money all in the right place, who wants to do a play about it but doesn’t really want to know …”
“It’s only that sometimes, between Jud and me, I feel so closed off; an invisible separation. A little like the way Jud wants to hang those gates, in the play. Almost melting into the background, but always there.”
He looked at her steadily. “Why should you want to break through it? Not everybody would, you know. I think I understand. But I want you to tell me.”
She allowed herself to perch, nervously, on the edge of a torn stuffed chair.
“Do you know what I used to do? I’ve never told anybody. I used to read every book I could find about them. There are only a few. But all that happened was I got physically sick. Also, I didn’t come out knowing any more, really, than before. It had to be personal. The other way was like a horror movie.” She watched her cigarette dying to a wisp of ash. “I think the only way I can say it is by making up a sort of story. Now, you will think I’m crazy. But let me try to make you understand this way. Imagine—now don’t laugh—but imagine a man who marries a girl, a fine, healthy American woman, and they’re very happy together. They have their troubles, but they’re all very workable troubles, and they have a lovely child, too. Now, imagine also, that the husband suddenly finds out—or else he’s known all along, I haven’t worked this part of it out too well—that three or four years before he married his wife, she was raped. Jud tells me you’re a writer”—she ignored his disclaiming gesture—“so use your writer’s mind for a minute. Imagine the husband thinking to himself, that night and every day and night afterwards: What did the experience of such violence, such personal, intimate violence, do to her? How horrible was it? Has she really escaped so easily, with nothing except maybe a bad dream now and then? Will some delayed reaction crop up, some day? Is there anything he can do, as a husband who loves his wife, anything to help her either now—or against any future time when she might need it. And—”
Her pause was so long and so heavy with tension that Walkowitz said, “And—”
“Silence. Gentle and loving, but still, unshakable silence. Now just substitute character A for character B, mix well, and you’ve got my story, by Marianne Broderick Kramer. There will be a short question period.”
He stood over her and looked down. “Don’t mock,” he said, in a tone that made Marianne look directly up at him. The voice hardly sounded like his at all. “I understand how that must be,” he said, “so don’t mock yourself, or your feelings, to me.”
He let his hand touch her cheek. She wouldn’t have thought a clump of a hand could have such a light soft touch. When he bent over her and touched his mouth to hers she reached up, unseeing, and clung to his shoulders.
After a moment he moved back a little. “No slap this time?” he said.
“If you understand,” she said, “then don’t you mock me, either. Please.”
His nod was almost imperceptible as he bent toward her again.
13
DASHA WAS GIDDY WITH joy. She darted across the avenue, weaving her way through the massed cars flecked with blackened snow, and hurried toward Grand Central Station. It was twilight, the same time of day at which she’d arrived in the city, and it seemed appropriate to leave it in the same blurry half-light. She didn’t bother to buy a ticket, leaving that for later when she was on the train, but went right to the platform and stood breathing the smell of iron, wet clothing, and an acrid burning.
Jud’s legs ached. He was out of breath as he crossed the waiting room that led to the trains. Then he saw Dasha standing on the platform, her flight bag beside her feet. She looked flushed and lonely in the artificial dimness of the station. When he reached her she was idly turning a woolen hat with a yellow pompon around in her hands. Her clothing was full of the gray remnant of snow. Jud took her arm. He could hardly catch his breath.
“Dasha,” was all he could manage to say. “Dasha.”
“You’re
out of breath,” she said coolly. “Relax.” Her mood of excitement was gone now.
“Where are you going?” Jud asked. “Sandy, the stage manager, he told me you were going home.”
“Then you know where I’m going.”
“But you’re in the play now.”
“I got the part. It’s what I wanted.”
“Well—”
“So now I can go home.”
“You’re crazy.”
“Maybe I won’t ever become an actress.”
“You can’t become an actress. You are or you’re not.”
“Did you like the way I did the scene, Jud?”
“I picked you for the part, I fought the other people in the production, and I almost had a heart attack catching up with you.”
“You’re sure it’s not for auld langsyne?”
“Oh, Jesus, my whole life is on this play and she’s flirting.”
“I’m not flirting. You don’t understand.”
“I understand more than you think, my dark, Biblical beauty. For one thing you’re afraid.”
“Of what?”
“New York, the play, me.”
Dasha stared at Jud angrily. Then she said, “Jud, I’m so tired and I’m still cold. I haven’t been able to get warm since I came here.” She leaned against him, a soggy mass of cloth and girl. She had a heavy but natural-smelling perfume.
“Jud,” she said again.
14
BY EVENING THE SNOWFALL was heavy. Rovic entered the apartment reluctantly, certain that the news of the selection had preceded him. The expression on Louise’s face told him he was right.
“Where’s Janet?” he asked.
“She has a date. Give me your coat. It’s wet.” Rovic slipped his arms out of the sleeves and felt a great weariness come over him.
“Who’s she out with?”
“You never remember their names, anyway.”
