“I know this matters. I’m going to show up every day down there, and I’m going to act my ass off. I’m going to listen to what you say and make sure others do as well. But I’m going to have fun, too. And so should you. I put up money for your dream because I love you and think you’re good at this. It’s not my bliss or greatness that got me on board. It’s yours. Ten years from now, of the fifty people you plan to bring to theater camp, maybe two or three will earn a living doing the stuff they are going to love doing with you for the next four months. You’re going to break more hearts this summer than you ever could imagine. Just fuckin’ relax and act your age. Be a kid a bit longer, for Christ’s sake. Because when that’s over, it’s over. This may be your game, but it’s my football. What do you have at stake? Some borrowed money which we would have to really fuck up not to pay back. If you get in my face, though, then I pass. I take my money and go home.”
He still held my face in his hands, but backed away so there was some distance between us. “Now these girls are coming over to join us and have some fun. I’m telling you to have some fun. Flirt, dance, and if you’re lucky, make out. Take someone home. The tall geek with the glasses likes you.” Then he looked into my eyes with a combination of fury and deep fondness and gave me the kiss of death.
I sat back in my chair dazed by alcohol and reprimand.
“Fuck you, Secunda! I have plenty at stake. There is more to me than chasing pussy and drinking. If we’re not good this summer, then why bother?”
“I work tomorrow. Tonight, I continue to play. Caring too much is just as bad as not caring at all, Sammy!”
The girl pack joined us, and the chorus boy brought the drinks. Secunda poured everyone a shot of Patron, and with glass held high he said, “To my friend Sammy. May he gain some perspective before exuberance is lost and life becomes a boring burden. Drink up, everybody.” They did.
“You too, Sammy.”
“Asshole,” I muttered and put the shot glass down.
After a moment and a deep breath, the jukebox came back into focus. I heard Eric Carmen singing “All By Myself ” loud and specifically for me. The nerdy-looking brunette walked over and sat on my lap. She had let her hair down, removed her glasses; she looked pretty damn good to me.
“Hey, Sammy,” she said. “My name’s Lucy. Dance with me.” I sat still, thinking about my exchange with Secunda.
I fuck up and I go home, I thought. Yeah, like that’s a win for me. Pick up shit forever while everyone else moves on to the next gig and I have one foot in the purgatory of failure. I sulked some more. Then I noticed that Lucy’s eyes were playful and full of late-night longing. Even through the bar smoke, I smelled a hint of perfume. Her tank top clung tightly to her body, and her firm breasts were at eye level.
“Come on, Sammy. It’s four o’clock. What do you have on your agenda that’s more fun than dancing with me?”
“I’ve got to work in the morning.”
“It is morning. It’s just up to you to know what to do with it.”
With that, Lucy walked me to the middle of the bar, put my hands on the cheeks of her ass and placed her head on my chest. I smiled weakly. The jukebox played “If You Leave Me Now.” Lucy rubbed up against me.
I had plenty of stakes in this game, more than anyone had yet to realize. Yet Lucy was right: the stakes would be there later this morning. For now, fun was beckoning. I pulled her closer, lifted her chin ever so slightly and kissed her. The music seemed to swell, I thought about Veronica, which was unfair to both girls, and was grateful that nine o’clock was no longer just a heartbeat away.
27
I pulled into the Cohen Auditorium lot just short of 8:30 a.m. It was a perfect late-spring morning. The air filled with a sweet combination of crisp clean grass and honeysuckle. A tall, gangly runner was doing sprints on the track while a couple of coeds ran leisurely side by side in serious conversation. There were fewer than a half-dozen cars about, and the early-morning sun was warming the day nicely. I hadn’t been to bed, but I felt alert and eager for the day to begin. I had stopped at the local convenience store to wash up and brush my teeth in their men’s room. I needed a shave, but so did many recently graduated college kids who were up early in Beantown under a budding May sun. Before heading over to the auditions, I stopped at the local diner and picked up a twenty-ounce coffee that I mixed with lots of heavy cream and seven sugars. I was ready to greet the day yet had nearly thirty minutes to spare. I sat on the steps outside the auditorium, opened the Globe to the sports section,and began to drink my coffee.
Secunda walked up from behind me and sat down. He carried a box of doughnuts and a large container of java. “I brought you some breakfast,” he said sheepishly.
“Thanks, but I already picked up some coffee.”
“Then have a doughnut. They’re fun. Can never have too much fun, you know. You have fun last night?”
“Yes, yes I did.”
“Too much?”
I thought for a beat and smiled. “No, just the right amount.”
“Have a fuckin’ doughnut. We have to start work soon or Jojo will have our ass.”
He held out the box, and I took a moment to choose one. I opted for a glazed. It was still warm. I took a bite. “That’s a damn good doughnut.”
“Made it myself,” Secunda said. “I looked something up for you this morning. It’s about Mickey Mantle. You heard of him?”
“Yes, Josh, I have heard of Mickey Mantle.”
“Did you know that he played eighteen years in the big leagues? He got up to bat more than ten thousand times. He struck out more than eighteen hundred times and walked more than seventeen hundred times. So do you know what he had to say about that fact?”
“No, but I’m sure you’re going to tell me.”
“Yes, I am. The Mick said that the average player gets up to bat five hundred times per year. Therefore, he spent seven years of his time in the big leagues never hitting the ball.”
“I can’t imagine Mickey Mantle ever saying ‘therefore.’ What’s your point?”
Secunda continued. “Do you also know that Mickey Mantle struck out more times than anybody who ever played?”
“Yeah, but he also hit more home runs than anybody but Aaron, Ruth, Mays, and Killebrew.”
“That’s right. Now let’s not be late.” He stood up, holding the remaining doughnuts. “You’re Mickey Mantle. You’re going to strike out some, but you’re gonna hit a lot of home runs this summer, many of which will head deep into the night and never come down. That’s what happens when you swing for the fences. Every time Mantle came to bat, he had stakes in the game. Just like you.”
Then he headed toward the front door of Cohen Auditorium. I followed. Just before we went inside, a strikingly handsome young man charged in front of us. Breathlessly he asked, “Do you guys know where the auditions for the Priscilla Beach Theatre are being held?”
“Downstairs in the basement,” Secunda told him.
“Thanks,” he said, and dashed off.
We went inside.
28
We began seeing people at nine sharp and worked without a break with the goal of concluding by five. We saw dozens of kids in all shapes and sizes. Some with talent and some that deserved a bus ticket home. We saw some people who wanted the gig so bad that we felt an institution would be a safer place for them to spend the summer. We saw others who were cavalier and seemed simply to be passing through on their way to someplace else. Best of all, we saw some terrific people. Dancers with long legs, flat tummies, and tight tushes who could hit the beat and then hit it again and again and again. We had singers who gave us goose bumps, who were quick learners and pitch perfect, and we had actors who could read the phone book and make it sound funny.
One of the first guys we saw was a kid from the Boston Conservatory of Music. To call him handsome was to say Linda Carter might turn a few heads doing that run in her Wonder Woman
costume. He was also cocky. His name was Zach Rush. Zach was more than six feet, trim and fit. He had perfect auburn hair that he combed straight back, yet it fell a bit with a perfect wave. With his neatly trimmed goatee, he could ride in on a horse singing “Camelot.” He was wearing a light, white cotton turtleneck and black slacks. His résumé listed dozens of great roles played at good schools, and his résumé picture was even better than the real thing.
“Would you like to sing first or read?” I asked.
“Sing, if that’s all right.”
“What did you bring?” said the good Dr. Elliot from his seat at the piano. Zach pulled a book from his knapsack some one hundred pages thick. “How about ‘Maria’ from West Side Story?” I found myself not liking this guy.
He was too good looking, too full of himself, and he told us that “Maria” was from West Side Story as if we didn’t know. What an ass.
He began. “The most beautiful sound I ever heard . . .”
The entire room went WOW. No one breathed until he was finished singing—in perfect pitch with perfect timbre. Ellie’s face was flushed when he was done, and I guessed that her underwear was damp from multiple orgasms. I hated the guy. Not because he wasn’t great but because he was so good I simply wanted to punch him.
“So you can sing,” I said without emotion, and the room mocked me for my lack of enthusiasm.
“Yes, a little bit,” Rush replied with his big, stupid, perfect teeth smiling just right.
“Would you like to read?” I asked, almost hoping he would stutter. “Sure.” What was he so happy about? Didn’t he know it was early in the morning and show business was a bitch? “Side C?” he asked.
“Jojo will read with you,” I said. “Any questions?” I hoped he’d ask if he could leave now and forget we ever met. Instead, he took a seat across from Jojo and began the scene.
One must note that in the musical Company, this particular scene is the denouement of the entire show. It is between two friends, one a midthirties, uncommitted bachelor and the other a three-time bride in her early forties, rich, bitchy, sexy, and on the prowl. The scene needs confidence and nuance. It needs understated sex and a sense of danger. When the married woman comes on to the hero, we have to wonder if she means it or is just attempting to jolt him so he might join the game of life. It’s a tough scene to pull off even after hours of rehearsing with an actress, not just a stage manger reading lines. They began. Jojo read professionally, offering very little but keeping the cues coming. Zach Rush—Zach Fucking Rush—was electric. He was sexy and flirtatious, vulnerable yet tough. He had humor and a certain edge that made the whole thing textured, dramatic, and thrilling. The guy was great.
I looked at his résumé to see if he had played this role before and come in with a replica of a previous performance. The role of Robert did not appear.
I looked around the room. Everyone was dumbstruck.
Elliot stepped in. “Zach, would you mind singing something from Company?”
Zach couldn’t have been happier. He took center stage in the studio and then, with Elliot playing gracefully, Zach Rush sang “Being Alive,” my favorite show tune in the world, better than one could ever imagine.
“Well, Zach, that was all fantastic. Really great. Thank you,” I said. The others in the room tried to speak, making a series of indistinguishable grunts that sort of sounded like a herd of cows grazing.
“Thank you,” Rush said. “Thank you so much.”
“Zach, why do you want to come and work for us?” Elliot asked sincerely.
“Well, great parts. I have heard a great deal about you guys, and I saw your production of Follies, which was terrific. My folks live on the Cape, and my girlfriend lives here in Boston. Most important, I truly want to do something quality this summer and then kick off my career in New York.”
“Zach,” I asked, “and please don’t take this the wrong way—are you a dick?”
“What?” he said, the question carrying much more weight than you might imagine from a word with a single syllable.
“I’m sorry. I know it seems rude, but you are so good and we would want you with us so badly, unless you’re an asshole, you know, difficult, a diva.”
He laughed. “Wow, this is flattering, I guess. No, I am not an asshole. I work hard and I love doing theater, and I would like to be with you this summer. It would be a huge break for me. I have only one request.”
Here it comes, I thought. “What is that, Zach?”
“If possible I’d like my own room. I’ll take less money if I have to, but a private room would be important to me.”
“That’s it?”
“Yes, sir,” Rush replied with his big, stupid, perfect teeth.
“That’s just fine, Zach. We can make that happen. Jojo will call you tonight. Welcome aboard.”
Rush left the room knowing he’d be spending his summer on the Cape.
Jojo Backman got up from her chair and walked over to me. “‘Don’t mean to be rude, Zach, but are you a dick?’ Well, I don’t mean to be rude, Mr. Director, but you’re an idiot. Do you want bad people to work with us, or do you only want them to be good if they have big tits and long legs?”
“It’s not that,” I said, trying to hold on to a shred of dignity.
“Really.”
“The guy was just so good. I mean, he’s sensational. He’s gonna be a diva and I’m the one who will have to deal with it . . .”
The room erupted with a collective moan.
“It will be our problem,” Jojo said, her voice void of any warmth, “not solely yours. Let the guy show up before you dislike him. And grow up, you moron. You can’t cast all the parts with cute girls. Focus.”
I was humbled. I asked that we bring in the next person, before a trap door opened and I ended up somewhere subterranean.
Next was a redhead. Frizzy hair. Big voice.
Leggy wonder from Harvard. Pass. She should go to medical school. Beefy character actor. Huge voice.
The one girl I was ever truly in love with came in and sang “Adelaide’s Lament” from Guys and Dolls. I listened to her sing and turned to goo. She’d never noticed me when we were in school and she offered complete indifference today, but she had shown up. I was going to cast her.
Handsome guy. Pretty boy. Dark features. Hired.
Big heavyset girl. Good voice. Funny. Wants to dance with the other chorines. No way. Her ass needed its own zip code.
Janet Kessler. Enough said. Hired.
A kid all the way in from Philly. Looked like a rock star. Tenor. Amazing. Really cute dancer from BU. Great voice. Really bad skin. Sorry.
Alan S. Kopit—ASK—from Tufts was a great friend of mine through my four college years. This morning, Kopit was wearing a canary-yellow golf shirt, navy Bermuda shorts, and moccasins with white socks. If he were carrying binoculars you’d think he was out bird watching. Atop his thick head of hair he wore a Cleveland Indians cap that he must have owned since he was six. It was faded and worn and gave him an aura of gravitas. Kopit was short with a big, easy smile of Chicklet-white teeth. He looked like a cross between Howdy Doody and Peter Noone of Herman’s Hermits. He had been in several shows we had done over the years and loved the musical theater. Yet he was a less than an adequate singer, moved awkwardly, and had the comic timing of a broken watch. But through it all his enthusiasm shone through, and the fact that he was having such a good time on stage projected across the footlights and made the audience share his joy.
He sang. He read. We all needed to discuss the boundaries of friendship when we made our final choices a bit later in the day.
New gal. Eat a salad. New guy. Take a shower. New gal. Marry me.
Next. I’m quitting the business. Going to law school. Next. Kill me.
Next. Wash your hair. Next. Is that hair?
Kill me. Marry
me. Is it five yet? What was I thinking?
She’s awesome. He’s great.
Our good humor was waning. We had seen so many good people I knew we would have more options than we could have ever hoped to find. Jojo told us we had ten more minutes and then we were going to take a short break and come back and cast our shows.
Then a mom walked in. She might have been a grad student or on the GI Bill, but I was certain she was a mom.
“Hi,” Jojo said with a welcoming and curious smile. “Can we help you?”
“Yes, I hope so,” she answered. “My name is Elaine Feston. My son Ronny is outside in the hall. We drove up this morning from Long Island. Ronny is finishing his junior year in high school and wants very much to audition for you. I wasn’t sure if you’d see him because of his age. So I came with him to let you know that if you choose him, well, I will be one hundred percent behind him and you.”
Wow, I thought. Even if he’s any good, would he fit in? Would it be legal?
What about the pot heads?
“We’d be delighted,” Jojo said.
Ronny Feston looked like a high school kid who’d never seen the sun. He was slight, yet stood straight, and if he was nervous you could never tell. He wore crisp, pressed blue jeans, brand new unblemished Keds, a pink, cotton button-down with a polo pony on the breast, and a black tie with comedy and tragedy masks embroidered in silver. He had a mop top of curly locks. Without a word, he brought his book over to Elliot at the piano. He went through the music, gesticulating for effect, telling when to punch it or slow down. He could have been Dean Martin talking with his musical director.
Feston walked to the center of the room, gestured for his mother to take a seat, scanned us all, and said, “I am Ronny Feston. Thank you for seeing me today. I am thrilled to be here. I’m going to sing ‘Trouble’ from The Music Man.”
He nodded to Elliot at the keyboard, and Elliot played the intro to one of the great songs in the canon of American musicals. Then Ronny Feston sang. He had grace and confidence, nuance and humor. He had the body of a dancer and moved on all the right beats. He held galvanizing eye contact and made you hear the story of the song like it was the first time. Ronny Feston was a star. A bright, shining star that makes the sky sparkle, the theater a place to visit, a nugget of gold one might find in the rolling rivers of Northern California.
Little Did I Know Page 13
