There was a long pause, a tense one, like when the jury head out to consider their verdict.
‘I see,’ was all he said before getting up and going over to the armoire to find a clean T-shirt. He pulled it over his head and slumped into bed, rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands, always a sign he’s genuinely exhausted.
‘And for what it’s worth,’ he said, not able to help himself yawning as the tiredness finally caught up with him, ‘I can see where you’re coming from. Of course you have to go.’
I sat on the duvet beside him, scarcely able to believe how unbelievably easy that had been. How well he’d taken it.
Scarily well.
‘We’ll phone each other every day,’ I said, slowly beginning to allow myself to get excited now that I had his tacit approval. ‘And we’ll Skype. And maybe you’ll come over for a holiday, when you can get the time?’
‘Eh…yeah. Sure. That would be great.’
OK, so maybe we both knew that was a polite lie; Dan hasn’t taken a holiday or even a night off in three years, but I did appreciate him playing along. The mood between us had shifted a bit too; before it was tense, whereas now it was tender and more mellow. So much so that you’d nearly swear the two of us had knocked back a glass of wine each.
‘To be perfectly honest,’ he said gently, interrupting my thoughts, ‘I think a year away from here will do you the power of good.’
And of course, he’s absolutely right. It’s not just that I want this job so desperately; it’s that I need to get away. From Stickens, from The Moorings, from Audrey, from Lisa, from everyone and everything. From the whole lot of them.
Not forever. I just need a sabbatical, that’s all.
‘I haven’t seen you smile in the longest time, Annie Cole,’ he said quietly. ‘Go, find your smile again.’
And in that second I absolutely knew that everything would be OK. I got into bed beside him, leaned over him to switch off the bedside light and my hand brushed lightly over his chest as I did so. I half wondered if he’d reach out to hold me that night, maybe even if we’d make love, but no.
Two minutes later he was sound asleep and snoring.
I didn’t mind though, because somehow I’d found my smile again.
In, of all places, the National theatre.
Always the last place you look.
Chapter Five
Can’t remember the last new year that got off to such an amazing start! For the first time in I don’t know how long, I’m bouncing around the place, busy and buzzing, full of excitement about getting back into a rehearsal room again. It’s like I can see the world in colour again, having lived my life in black and white for so long. In fact, I feel a bit like Dorothy in the Wizard of Oz, when the screen suddenly goes from dull monochrome to glorious technicolour.
Don’t get me wrong though, it isn’t all fun and games. In fact, if anything, it’s massive pressure; we only have two weeks to rehearse up in Dublin, then we travel to New York for a week’s ‘get in’ where the set and lighting will have to be rigged at the Shubert Theatre on Broadway. After that, we’ve a full week of technical rehearsals and that’s followed by more than a full, exhaustive month of previews before we open on, of all the red-letter days, Paddy’s Day, March the seventeenth.
Rehearsals start at ten am sharp, so I’ve been on the motorway from Waterford since seven, but I’m feeling more full of energy than I have done in years and absolutely raring to go. In spite of all the passive-aggressive wailing phone calls I’ve had from Audrey since last night, bemoaning the fact that today is her grocery day and who’s going to do all her fetching and carrying for her, with me up in Dublin all week? That of course, led to a follow-on row involving Jules, who now has no choice but to start pulling her weight a bit around the place. The end result of which is that back at The Moorings, I’m about as popular as yesterday’s vindaloo. But am I bothered? For once in my life, no.
I’ve both apologised and explained to everyone that I’m not going to be around as much and shrugged my shoulders in response to all the cries of, ‘Oh, but, Annie!’ Sorry to have to be firm with everyone, but let’s face it, it’s a pretty good dress rehearsal for when I’m really, properly gone. Which unbelievably, is a mere two weeks away. So close, I think I’m developing yet another duodenal stress ulcer every time I think about it.
Anyway, for my part, I’ve pretty much spent the entire Christmas holiday reading the script frontways and back-ways till it’s worn, battered and ragged and now, it’s time to ‘get it on the floor’, as actors say. It’s early January, but bright and crisp as I arrive into Dublin, all set for day one. Town is just as packed as it was before Christmas, but this time with all the sales shoppers going demented at the sight of red ‘reduced to clear’ stickers in the windows. I smile to myself, loving the atmosphere and the people-watching and the buzz that’s like a stun gun to my soul and think: if this is how exhilarating it is here…wait till I get to New York!
I find parking in a car park close to the National and, as I’ve got time to spare, nip to the little coffee shop across the road to grab a herb tea to go. Anything to try and calm my jittery nerves a bit. Then onto the theatre and…it’s just extraordinary. Like I’m already part of the team. The lovely receptionist at the stage door greets me with the brightest smile and a big, ‘Hey, Annie, Happy New Year! You got the part, congratulations!’ I thank her warmly and tell her that I feel like I’ve just cashed in on the Euromillions Lottery of Life. We’re not rehearsing on the stage, she patiently explains to me, as it’s getting rigged for the next production; instead we’ll be working upstairs in the rehearsal room, at the very top of the building.
So up I troop, all five floors of the way and arrive panting and sweating and needing pints of water and several Kit Kats to recover. And sitting there, all alone and cool as a fish’s fart is none other than Jack Gordon. It’s just him and me alone in the rehearsal room, no one else has arrived yet and it comes back to me in a sudden blood rush just how elegantly cool and utterly laid-back he is.
He’s in a dark navy suit today, with an open-necked shirt on underneath it and is looking so dapper and well put together that you’d nearly swear he was gay, or at the very least metrosexual. Groomed like James Bond, as played by Daniel Craig, if you’re with me. Anyway, as soon as I puff and wheeze my way into the room, he’s on his feet and strolling lazily over to me to plant light air kisses on each of my cheeks. He smells of expensive cologne and with his smooth, perfectly moisturised skin, it flashes through my mind that he probably has more expensive products and takes better care of his face than I do with my own.
(Simple soap and Nivea are my preferred products of choice due to severe budgetary restrictions in the Ferguson-Cole household.)
‘Annie!’ he says smoothly, in his deep, twenty fags a day voice as he looks me up and down. ‘Welcome aboard. Good to have you here. Broadway, here we come, eh?’
Yet another attack of Saint Vitus’s dance of the mouth as I gush on about how happy I am to be here and how much this job means to me, blah-di-blah-di-blah, but he waves me silent.
‘The pleasure, I can assure you, is all mine,’ he grins, this time giving me a full panoramic view of his perfect, nuclear-white teeth. No messing, he has one of those smiles that should nearly come with a ping! sound effect.
‘From the minute you walked through the door at your first audition,’ he says, sitting back down again and casually folding one leg over the other, ‘I knew I wanted you. I knew you were just perfect for this part. Apologies for the call-back and for the inordinate delay in getting back to you, but I just had to be certain. You see, I’m a firm believer that shows stand or fall on casting alone.’
Next thing, the most senior cast member comes in, one Blythe Arnold, a sixty-something, silver-haired legend of the theatre and TV scene around here and overall national treasure. In short, our country’s answer to Judi Dench. I’ve seen her in dozens of shows over the years but have never actually me
t her properly and as we shake hands, I’m struck by the twin illusion of familiarity and strangeness. One of the hardest-working actors in the business, Blythe also appears in a Dublin-based soap opera, playing a wise but loveable granny who’s also the local cornershop keeper and who doles out salt of the earth advice to all the younger characters from beneath the rollers she permanently wears. Honest to God, you never heard so much life-wisdom come out from under the same hairnet. Her character is called Nana Hughes and the temptation for me to call her that is just so huge, I have to keep biting my tongue. But she’s absolutely lovely, warm and welcoming and says that she’s really looking forward to working with me.
Next to drift in is Alex O’Hara, who’s playing the spa therapist and who’s about twenty-two in real life but looks even younger still, almost child-like because of the oversized tracksuit she’s wearing which her tiny, wiry body is just lost in. Short, spiky, low-maintenance red hair and not a scrap of make-up, like her DNA is approximately twenty per cent male. With a sinewy, gym-starved look about her too. We both have the same agent and have met each other socially, so meeting her isn’t quite as scary as meeting Blythe. She gives me a shy hug, welcomes me on board and says nice complimentary things about a show she remembered seeing me in, oooh, about a hundred years ago.
I like her already.
Then last of all, there’s Chris Gardiner, who’s playing my older sister and who’s probably in her late thirties in real life, with alabaster white skin and long Indian-straight black hair all the way down to her bum. I later discover that apart from myself, she’s the only other married woman in the cast – Blythe has long since separated from her husband and Alex and Liz are both single.
Chris and I bond a bit chatting about this, swapping stories about how stressful it was to tell our husbands that we’d be gone for a full year. Turns out her position is far more enviable than mine though; her fella’s also an actor who’s not working right now, so he’s going to come to New York with her and hang out there for as long as his visitor’s visa will let him. She’s got a little boy too, who’s just turned four and he’ll stay with his dad while she’s working.
‘And will your husband come over to the States to see you in action?’ she asks me politely. And of course I lie and say that although he’s really busy, yes, I’m sure he’ll try to find the time, etc. etc.
God, if only it were true. But if I’m being honest, I envy Chris and if it doesn’t sound awful, I’m starting to half-wish that I was married to someone unemployed too.
Finally Liz bounces in with bed hair, in her leather and lace, early Madonna gear in spite of the fact that it’s freezing outside and apologises for being late. ‘Overslept!’ she laughs at the room, all attitude and laddered tights and I catch the slightest hint of an eye roll from Jack, which makes me think that this might be a fairly regular occurrence. Later on, while we’re all standing round looking at a model of the slightly expanded set we’re using for the Shubert Theatre, Liz whispers to me that she intended getting an early night last night, but then she got a phone call at the last minute and ended up hitting the town for a few drinks instead.
‘Never thought vodka and beer would be such happy bedfellows,’ she hisses in my ear, ‘but I was happy to be there at their birth. Please say that you’ve got Solpadeine in your bag, Annie? Dear Jaysus, my head’s in agony. I swear, there isn’t this much pain in the burns unit of an A and E.’
Anyroadup, Jack settles us all down and we sit around a table to do a full read-through of the play. Which is mostly for my benefit and must surely be a massive bore for everyone else here, given that it’s only Christmas week since they finished performing it, but Jack is insistent. Then he talks through a few of the plot points and scenes that he feels could benefit from some extra work and everyone throws in their tuppence worth. I’m the new girl, so I just sit quietly, eyes wide open, mouth shut tight.
Interesting though, being a relative outsider and observing the group dynamic. With Blythe, everyone is respectful and courteous; with Alex, they all seem to josh and slag her off the whole time, which she takes good-naturedly enough. Chris is one of those women who demand respect and tend to get it from all around her, while the entire room just laughs at Liz, like she’s the company’s very own Tina Fey. The only person who treats everyone exactly the same is Jack. And as for me? Well, my role appears to be as the straight man to all of these fascinating, scintillating objects whirling around me.
After the read-through, we’re straight up onto the rehearsal room floor, which has practice chairs and sun loungers dotted all around it for us to rehearse on, exactly like the set proper. And so we start ‘blocking’, which basically involves being told where I come in, where I stand and when I sit, etc. Tedious as arse for everyone else, all of whom can recite the play inside out, but in fairness, not one of them makes me feel like I’m stuck back in remedial acting class. I frantically scribble down all my moves and try to get it right and not bump into the furniture…easier said than done with my nose shoved into a script, which I’m frankly clinging onto for dear life.
However, if the others thought they were in for a dossy, jammy day while the new girl got broken in this morning, they had another think coming. Jack goes through the opening scene with a fine toothcomb, honing it down finely and coming back to parts of it that he wants to try differently. Over and over again we play just that one opening scene, till by lunchtime, not only have I got all the moves down pat, but I’m pretty much off the script as well.
Interesting, watching the mighty Jack Gordon at work too – he may give the surface impression of being laid-back and cool, but he’s actually an obsessive, ferocious perfectionist; trying things this way and that, ruthlessly throwing out anything that doesn’t work even if some of the cast protest that they’ve ‘always done it that way before and it’s never been a problem’.
I can detect elements of a bully in him too, but unlike most bullies, it’s not rooted in malice or in sheer bloody mindedness, it’s because he just cares so passionately about the show and desperately wants it to be as good as it can be. Chris in particular tries it on with him a number of times, constantly standing up to him, challenging him and bossily demanding to know why he’s changing things that are working perfectly fine as they are.
‘I don’t get it, Jack,’ she says to him loudly and sternly, arms folded, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.’
Silence around the rehearsal room and although Jack doesn’t actually lose his temper with her, the eyebrows knit downwards, giving him that slightly dangerous, satyr look. And a mightily pissed off satyr at that too.
‘Except that it didn’t quite work, did it, darling?’ he flung back at her, the eyes cold and mocking. God, he can even caress the word ‘darling’ and still manage to make it sound like a veiled insult.
No, Jack Gordon is not someone you cross. The only person in the room he leaves alone is me. For the moment.
Come lunchtime and everyone drifts off their separate ways for the hour-long break. It was my intention to run out, grab a sandwich, then come back here while the rehearsal room was quiet and get stuck into some more line-learning on my own, but Liz stays glued to my side. So the pair of us stroll to the deli across the road, grab some take-out grub, then head back to the rehearsal room; Liz tucking into her bacon sarnie hungrily, as only someone with a crucifying hangover can.
God, I miss being young and carefree like her, when all it took to put the world to rights was an all-day breakfast roll, a packet of crisps and a cappuccino.
‘So what do you make of our Jack, then?’ she probes me between stuffing her face with mouthfuls of the bacon and cheese sarnie.
‘Jack? Well…I’ve a feeling that he’s just going easy on me for the minute,’ I half-grin back at her, ‘but I’m pretty confident my turn in front of the firing squad will surely come.’
‘No, you’re getting me wrong,’ she says, gulping the cappuccino. ‘I meant did you think he was attractive or not
.’
There is just no right answer to that question, so I say nothing, just munch innocuously away on a ham sandwich. She’s looking at me expectantly though, so with my mouth full and making um-nom-nom-nom noises I rummage round for the right thing to say, then eventually mumble, ‘Seems very charming.’
‘Runs in the family. His grandfather was a snake.’
‘Stop taking the piss.’
‘Reason I ask is because I always think he’s one of those fundamentally unlikeable guys that women always seem to end up falling for,’ she goes on. ‘It’s hard not to, he’s just so completely sexy. Even I can see it, and I’ve just about zero interest in the guy. But come on, I mean paint him blue, stick a tail on him and he could ride a horse in Avatar, don’t you think?’
I don’t answer her, just wipe away a blob of mustard from my chin.
‘Personally though,’ she goes on, ‘I think he has nothing but disdain for all women. He excels at saying things that he doesn’t mean. Like, “I’ll call you.” Tell you something, if I could have a proper chat with that little one from the box office he’s supposedly going out with, I’d tell her that the surest way to get the Jack Gordons of this world eating out of your hand is to treat them like shite under your feet. That’s the only proven way to guarantee that they’ll come running back for more. Which is why men like Jack always end up with such complete bitches.’
‘Listen to you, the dating oracle.’
‘Jack, let me tell you,’ she says, burping out loud then laughing, ‘is on my top ten list of guys that I categorically don’t fancy, who don’t fancy me back and yet I can see, clear as day, why they’re attractive as hell to other women. Oh, here’s a good one for you, name this one if you dare: “the first time you view a house, you see how pretty the paint is and buy it. The second time you look to see if the basement has termites. It’s the same with men.”’
Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow Page 11
