As Rachel had promised, putting my feelings in a letter was helpful. A few days later, I read her the letter.
You worked very hard to keep us fed and clean. And I appreciate that very much. You sent me to school. But you never checked to see if I was learning anything. Where were you, Mama? I don’t even remember you helping me with homework. Nor sitting and just talking to me about anything. You only demanded this, beat me for that, then went to your room. You just used us to serve you, to worship you. Like animals without souls. I had a soul, Mama. I was a child. You were supposed to love me, not beat me at every turn.
I’ve been wanting to write you for a long time. Talking on the phone about these issues doesn’t work for me because I slip into being a child. And the child in me is afraid of you. Because of the physical abuse and lack of compassion you imposed on me, Mama.
I knew that what I had to say to Mama would hit her hard. Our instinct is to protect our mothers, but therapy had eliminated those blinders and allowed me to see that Mama had a responsibility to deal with the truth.
She hated that I used the word abuse. She didn’t think of her tough love and no-nonsense discipline as abusing her child.
Our family had inherited Grandma Neil’s rage, Grandma Small’s rage—the ancestral memory of rapes, molestations, betrayal, theft, lies, and secrets. But, as Maya Angelou said, “When you know better, you do better.” Or you should at least try.
The letter went on:
I have suffered unspeakable neurosis and psychosis. I’ve been a manic-depressive for years. Your rage made me unable to have healthy relationships with anyone, let alone a man.
I questioned whether her motive for sending me off to school a year early was as much to get me out of her way as it was to assure that I would have a good future.
My words were harsh, but genuine. I saw her as a monster, and I used that word. I said that she “raised us like animals.” I went there, and it was hurtful, but in my mind it matched how she hurt me.
Something horrible must have happened to you, Mama. What? I now know many things, and I assume other things I don’t want to imagine.
You buried us in the Baptist Church, I wrote. And I talked about Pastor Heard. Surely if we’d ever had a mother, we lost you then. You poured your existence into this fucking man. Mama, did you know he, in different ways, tried to seduce or molest many of the girls at church? I accused her of being so desperate to be somebody to him and the church that she overlooked what he was doing to the women in his congregation. To this day you sit up in his church listening to this man refer to women as whores if they have sex before marriage. And yet.
I told Mama she should have gotten help, suggesting that she was emotionally and mentally ill as well. I didn’t consider that in the time and place I grew up, there was no mental health system, no social safety net. Even among educated people, psychiatry was suspect. Being mentally ill was something else you kept secret, if you could. If you couldn’t, you suffered on top of the condition, being shamed and treated even worse by your family and neighbors. Nobody wants to be called “crazy” for real.
Then I shared something that she didn’t know:
I became one of the biggest whores I could, Mama. I’ve slept with over sixty men. You see, I felt you gave me away to Heard . . . if you didn’t care, why should I? I threw away my life. I blocked my childhood. I numbed out to survive.
I told Mama that therapy had led me to an important realization about my career:
Every time I’d get close to success, subconsciously I’d sabotage it just to hurt you because my success would make you happy. Deep inside I hated you because I felt you hated me. Couldn’t you see how unhappy we were? Can’t you see it even now?
I’m just now getting myself together to start living, not just surviving; laughing and not pretending, learning and not running away from my problems. The process is painful.
I closed the letter with a plea for her honesty and respect.
When I finished reading, Rachel said, “Good work. Now, it’s your choice if you want to mail it. This is your work, Jenifer. Your decision.”
The letter was an incredible release, a breakthrough. I decided to send the letter. For more than two hours I sat in the parking lot at the post office holding seven letters: one for Mama and copies of the same letter for each of my siblings. We think we’re going to kill our parents by confronting them. But people, including our parents, are often very much able to hear the truth. They may not take it well, but nobody dies from honesty.
The first time Mama and I talked on the phone after she received the letter, she was subdued. She called back the next day and we wound up screaming at each other.
My siblings gave me varying responses. One sister didn’t have memory of a lot of the behavior I described and was not having it. She didn’t want anything bad said about Mama. A few of them agreed and were pleased I had led the charge because they weren’t ready to. Ba’y Bro didn’t want any drama and reminded me that “everyone was beaten in Kinloch.” He said, “You leave Mama alone, Jenny!”
I actually expected harsher blowback because where I come from, you can’t talk about people’s mamas unless you’re playing the dozens, and then you better be superfunny.
But at some point you have to tell the truth.
The letter did accomplish a few things: first, it ushered in a new level of respect among me, my siblings, and my mother. It opened new lines of communication and the family began to have meetings to air out repressed secrets and emotions. I joined by phone. The letter was a big accomplishment for me, proof that I was learning to feel the fear and do it anyway.
Mama didn’t change at all, but she did at least listen to what we had to say about the whole matter. Months passed before I was back in Missouri for Christmas. I was grateful that no one brought up the letter. I had relative peace in my mama’s house during the visit. After all, how much can we all take at the holidays? They’re stressful enough.
ELEVEN
DISMISSING THE DIVA
Within the year, my sessions with Rachel increased to twice weekly. As the hours of therapy added up, I was becoming better at identifying and managing my feelings. My sex addiction lessened. When I’d begun therapy, my lovers were Tim, Adam, an actor named Sam, who, let’s just say, liked it from the side, and Roger. I still enjoyed sex but felt less compelled to use it as a way to feel better.
I relished being more in control of myself. I had relapses. No trajectory is straight and we fall back on bullshit excuses, fear, and confusion. Rachel called it “dropping the ball.” I would also throw the occasional pity party for myself.
JOURNAL ENTRY: I have no baby, no man, no show, fuck ’em.
On the other hand, I was determined to get well. As proof of my resolve, I kept my resolutions for the New Year. Starting in January 1991, I went 19 days without a cigarette and 167 days without sex. By the end, I felt hopeful. I was doing hatha yoga twice a week, played racquetball, and doing aerobics at the gym. I worked on myself, but it was a circuitous journey. I still sobbed at night and had nightmares about Pastor Heard wanting to fuck me on a piano stool. Having Rachel in my corner made a huge difference, but it was clear to us both that I had a long way to go.
I went to a party at Marc Shaiman’s house and got drunker than I had ever been. Bette Midler was there, and I sort of swaggered over to her and breathed red wine fumes in her face. Real loud, I said, “Why don’ ya take c-c-care of yer Harlezz, Bette?” Needless to say, she left the party immediately. It was horrible. I was rude, loud, and ridiculous. I did a lot of apologizing the next day, to many, many friends, especially Bette. She definitely did not deserve to be on the receiving end of my acting out.
Living with my own bad behavior was painful enough, but then I was obliged to tell Rachel about the incident. Openness and honesty with your doctor is crucial to healing, but it can be so damn hard. “How much did you drink?” Rachel asked. I didn’t admit to her how much I really drank at that part
y. I couldn’t. She cut me no slack on what I actually did admit to her. She helped me to further understand how to avoid a repeat of the situation; to recognize the warning signals. We discussed how I might shortcut my insecurities before they led me to do something I’d regret and dig myself into an emotional hole. I was so ashamed of myself.
I was pretty good to my body, eating clean, working out. As an actor, my body is my instrument, and with that in mind, I practiced a healthy lifestyle during the week. But I was challenged by the lack of structure a nine-to-five kind of job provides. Actors work long hours when we’re working, but we have lots of time to fill between jobs, without always knowing how. Idle hours made room for too much drama, getting into everybody’s and your own shit. You get in trouble. And when you find yourself in trouble and causing trouble, you still have to come clean and tell the truth to your therapist. Feel the fear, and tell the truth to yourself.
During the two years that I’d been in treatment with Rachel, she had shown herself to be a sensitive and compassionate person. Yet I was unable to look her in the eye when we talked. I had trust issues and fear. I was afraid that my wounds were so deep that no one, certainly not me, could heal them. I was slowly warming to her, but not completely. Some sessions were better than others.
On my good days, I was talking more and more, exploring issues of intimacy, or rather the lack of intimacy I had growing up. I was self-reflective. I learned that feelings of omnipotence and displays of grandiosity occurred because inside I felt unworthy much of the time. I pondered my pattern of selecting men to date who were really sad little boys. I guess the reason was that I was a sad little girl.
As I grew and learned, my inner diva was summarily dismissed and effectively humbled. My new reality informed the title for my new one-woman show, an autobiographical comedy and music show, The Diva Is Dismissed. There were never enough opportunities for me in the industry, so when they didn’t call I wrote my own stuff. I wanted to work, tell my story, show what I could do. I enlisted the help of my brilliant and talented friends, writer-director Charles Randolph-Wright, Mark Alton Brown, and music director Michael Skloff.
The show was about the search for self, about removing the diva mask and becoming an authentic person. It chronicled my failed relationships, my journey from New York City to Los Angeles, and my difficulties transitioning from live performance to television and film. Ultimately, the diva character, who is me, acknowledges: “I didn’t want to hurt anybody. I wanted to be somebody.”
Lyrics for the show included I’ve got to climb this mountain. It’s big, scary, and tall. I don’t want to fall. . . . No child should have to stay inside and think.
We opened at Off Vine, a lovely, turn-of-the-century bungalow that had been converted into a relaxed, yet elegant restaurant in Hollywood. We chose a nontraditional venue because we wanted the show to feel sort of underground—something special, something different. It was a great success with audiences and critics.
After a few months, we took the show to the Hudson Backstage Theatre on Santa Monica Boulevard. We ran there every Sunday evening for about seven months. The production would never have made it to a theater like the Hudson without Gay Iris Parker, one of the gentlest and purest people I’d ever known. Gay was a publicist for the Pasadena Playhouse. She saw my show at Off Vine and then pulled some strings at the Hudson. I was very grateful for what she did for me. Gay became a close friend, a confidante who loved my crazy ass through seventeen years of sisterhood until she passed away.
My one-woman shows have earned me my most loyal fans over the years, especially among my fellow artists. When Sidney Poitier saw the show, he said, “My daughter told me that you were wonderful. My dear, that was an understatement. You are fucking magnificent.” Thank God someone was there to catch me when my knees buckled.
We sold out every Sunday night. People crammed into the ninety-nine-seat theater. There were nights when I heard the stage manager say, “They’re fighting over the seats out there.” I lost track of the many celebrities and actors who saw the show: Lee Daniels, Chris Callaway, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Jackie Collins, Sandy Gallin, Mavis Staples, Sheryl Lee Ralph, Rosie O’Donnell, Bebe Neuwirth, Denzel and Pauletta Washington, Carol Lawrence, Bette Midler, Phylicia Rashad, and Bea Arthur all came out to see me.
Some of the show-business big shots who saw what I could do offered me work. Director Lee Rose was in the house one night and went on to cast me in three of her movies.
Seeing Lena Horne in the audience one evening, I didn’t even exit the stage when I finished. I just ran into the audience and hugged her so tight! She whispered in my ear, “You are the fucking best I have ever seen.” Hmmm, seems the word fucking comes up a lot when people describe me.
My friend Attallah Shabazz, the eldest daughter of Malcom X and Betty Shabazz, brought Nina Simone backstage to meet me. Miss Simone was draped in what looked like a monkey coat. She extended her hand, and in her deep, rich tone said, “Hello, I am Nina Simone.” I grabbed that monkey arm and pulled her close. “Bitch, I know your name. I know every lick on every fucking album you’ve ever made. I am you. You made me.” Miss Simone drew back, and Attallah interjected, “It’s time to go.” I was deeply distressed, thinking I had somehow insulted this goddess whom I revered with my total soul. Later that evening Attallah called and said, “Nina praised your performance the entire way home and pledged that she would come out of her retirement and return to the stage because of what she had just witnessed.”
Paula Kelly, who had starred in Sweet Charity with Shirley MacLaine and Chita Rivera, was in attendance one Sunday. As I started to sing a Stevie Wonder song, “They Won’t Go When I Go,” I could hear her humming and singing along with me. I looked at her in the audience and smiled. It was a cue to all the other gypsies and singers in the audience to join me. They knew I was singing about the many people we’d lost to AIDS. Never in my life had I experienced something so loving and supporting, so uplifting and beautiful. I was supposed to climb some stairs at the end of the song, and let’s just say their harmony made me believe I could fly.
In 1992, a horrible thing happened: 704 Hauser. It was a late spinoff of All in the Family, about a black family that was to occupy the row house the Bunkers had lived in. Television legend Norman Lear, who’d seen The Diva Is Dismissed, said he wanted to cast me in the lead role. I worked with Lear on the script and the character, even going to his home. I started to see him as a father figure; I just knew he was going to make me the next Maude. But lo and behold, he gave the part to Lynnie Godfrey, with whom I’d done Eubie! on Broadway. He offered me a small role, which I declined. It was a cruel Hollywood nightmare.
George C. Wolfe saw The Diva Is Dismissed in Los Angeles and invited me to do the show at the esteemed Public Theater in New York City. We opened in October 1994 to rave reviews. Variety wrote: “Jenifer Lewis could no more give up diva-hood than she could give away her big, rich voice.” Stage Review said: “Lewis commands the stage . . . not only with her explosive personality and infectious humor, but with a glimmering jewel of a voice . . .”
This was an amazing time. Everyone from Morgan Freeman to Ashford and Simpson to Josephine Premice and Madonna—everybody showed up to see me at the Public. I won the NAACP Theatre Award for The Diva Is Dismissed, and I won an Ovation Award for the production later on.
Norman Lear heard about my success in New York and called to congratulate me. I proceeded to tell him, “Please don’t ever call my phone again.”
I would swim every evening before the show. My diet had to change completely in order to deliver the goods at the theater. This was not TV or film. This shit was live and in person. You either step up or it will eat you alive. I thought about seducing the hunky lifeguard at the pool, but then I would have had to tell Rachel. Bitch.
I was throwing tantrums in my phone sessions with Rachel. I was getting tired of analyzing every goddamn thing I did. I was working hard on my abandonment issues during this time. The grind
of Diva was taking its toll on me. I only had a few more weeks, but it was cold in New York and my voice was starting to go. And damn if I didn’t catch an all-out flu. I slipped into a full-blown “woe is me” depression.
One day, I believe for the first time in my life, I just couldn’t get myself together mentally, physically, or emotionally to get to the theater. It was really a bad day for me. I called Rachel from my apartment and told her, “I just don’t think I can do it.” She said, “Yes, you can.” I walked out into the freezing cold. I had always walked to the theater at a fast pace to warm up my lungs. This time I walked two blocks and my legs felt heavy. My heart sad. My will faltering. Every three blocks I had to stop at a phone booth to call Rachel for more encouragement to keep moving and get to the theater and do my job. I knew better than anyone in the world that the show must go on. I applied my makeup through tears that evening. The standing ovation did not uplift my spirit.
New Year’s Eve was closing night, and what a late Christmas present to have Ruby Dee and Ossie Davis attend! I apologized to Ruby that my voice had been hoarse. She said, in her fabulous Ruby Dee slur: “Well, I didn’t have anything to compare it to. I thought it was wonderful.” I joined Phyllicia Rashad and few others and a few others for the New Year’s Eve celebration at Café Beulah. I went to the ladies’ room, and as I rejoined everyone at the table when I returned, I asked them, “Are you guys talking about the show?” Lynn Whitfield said, “Jenifer, I’m going to tell you like I tell my daughter Grace, ‘It’s not always about you.’ ” I looked at her and whispered, “Oh, yes, it is, bitch. And happy New Year to you, too.”
Back on the West Coast that spring, I was doing my act at clubs like Nucleus Nuance and the Rose Tattoo. In the early ’90s, lots of New York gypsies had moved to Los Angeles to take advantage of the surge in black sitcoms. They all showed up for my shows.
The political climate got hot in Los Angeles. Rodney King, a black man, was beaten by police on video. It became international news. Riots broke out in the South Central area in the aftermath when an all-white jury acquitted the cops involved in the brutality. Like so many people, I was deeply concerned by what I saw on that video and how the authorities handled the matter. It was stressful to say the least. My urge was to do something to help. The horror of that incident and everything else I was going through in my life caused me to break out in hives. Even with all that itching, I was determined to go to South Central; it was the least I could do to volunteer to help clean up the rubble left by the rioting. It was me and five young white kids sweeping together. At some point, a homeless man approached us and screamed, “You motherfuckers never come down here for nothing else!” I stepped to him, “Get the fuck on where you going.” I felt bad. He could’ve been my own daddy.
The Mother of Black Hollywood Page 17
