Chance = Change

...is one of the most awesome places I have ever spent a day, and today was that day! Woodlawn Cemetery....truly a fine and private place, even though the some 400 acres are picturesquely packed with some tens of thousands of graves, even more mausoleums, and countless memorials, many of which were designed by the finest artists and architects and sculptors in the world!!! It was also built (as an alternative to Greenlawn, which was too far away from the City to enable women to attend funerals easily)...it was built at a time when the concept of Pubic Parks and Gardens had not yet taken hold, and so Woodlawn is the prime example of rural design in cemeteries: it is as much a Park, a Memorial Park, as it is a cemetery. So, we really spent the day in one of the most sumptuous parks in America!

And the day was absolutely perfect for it! Sunny, warm with the sweetest of cool breezes, totally clear skies and gorgeous air. Glenn A.'s wife came home from her hospital emergency last night, and today is totally well and recovering, so he was able to join us, which we were all so glad about. And that made for a full FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE company, and we were happy to be there for so many reasons, not the least of which was we were all ready to spend a day, a beautiful day, outside, and really ready to try what we have been rehearsing in the actual semetery itself...so that is eactly what we did, sans piano: we rehearsed the play, scene by scene, outside the Leeds Mausoleum, to which we had been given the key (mausoleum keys are large and made of brass, and if I threw one at Joe K. as we had planned to do in the show, it would hurt! So we may change that....ANYWAY: before rehearsal started , Susan, the PR lady there, gave us a fabulous tour all over the place, for what seemed like miles! But we only really covered about 1.5 miles of the some 26 miles of roads and grounds. WHEW! Even so, we saw some wonderful and awe-inspiring things:

Irving Berlin's humble grave, surrounded by three graves of his beloved family members....Irene Castle's lovely site, topped by a graceful and artistic lithe figure of a woman dancing...the Woolworth Mausoleum: wow...Victor Herbert's stately manse....Duke Ellington's unassuming grave, surrounded by many of the musicians who played with him and wh insisted on being buried near him...Miles Davis...Antoinette Perry's stone (if I ever win a Tony, I will grace her stone with flowers!)...Otoo Preminger's lush building (though he prefers that no one knows he is there..I guess he got tired of taking phone calls in life, so...)...we walked and walked...gawked and walked some more....GORGEOUS!

Then, we were served a lovely lunch at the Jerome Street Entrance Offices, and after the healthy walk, food tasted great! There was plenty of it! ANd we lunched with several gravediggers and Security Guards who were full of the most amazing storied about the spirits and ghosties they had encountered while at work, and the adventures they had with various and sundry burials, funerals,etc. Terrific story-tellers these men,one of whom has been with the WoodLawn "family" for 16 years and wears a gold medallion around his neck portraying a skeleton and grave and shovel....very beautiful and ornate, and fashioned out of gold by his jeweler wife! His name is Ray and he had the best stories of all!

The luncheon was entertaining and informative, and helped bolster the experience we were all having that cemeteries are not such dull and deadly places after all! In fact, the entire WoodLawn staff was so good to us, it felt very full of life and rather like a party! And there is such a feeling of history and of thousands of lives well lead there, it is a spirited place, if you will...that far from dull, the entire place seems far more really alive than the busiest City street! A unique experience for all of us!

After a leisurely lunch, we took the key granted us and strolled over to the Leeds Mausoleum and got to work! A perfectly sunny, clear, not too hot and not too cool day...perfect for experiencing and felling all there was to feel and eperience...lovely perfect day...surrounded by man-made and natural beauty of all sorts!

We worked on scenes for hours, roaming the cemetery for just the right locations for each moment in the play....got the feel of how it is to walk the paths to and from various points....experienced the way the place feels, smells, touches...what those astounding marble halls do to the space around you...the glorious details...we sll took tons of photos ...I am enthralled by the place itself and want to take Peter there. It's hard to describe what this huge burial ground is like...how it sits on the rolling hills in the Bronx and IS what it is...unique.Fantastically gorgeous. Almost unreal, but very very real all the same.

We worked til 4:30 or so, then traipsed back to the Offices and received out Wood Lawn Cemetery goodie bags, complete with cup and pen and map of the grounds! Also, a wonderful book of the history of Wood Lawn, which in itself will be fun to read.

The Wood Lawn folks are taking full advantage of A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE at The York, and this can only mean good publicity for us, as well as audiences supplemented by the many employees and staff of the place and their families.
They are also partnering a Lobby display of historic photos and stories of the actual cemetery, giving our audience members a chance to put what they see onstage in a real historic context and place...i think this will be a fun addition to the experience we will be giving them. New Yorkers know Wood Lawn. It is a part of the family history of so many natives, and it is filled with the joy of lives lived. Miraculous.

...but, so...what's new, right? It's Wednesday, so of course, it started with my fabulous and wonderful Song Analysis Class down at Steinhardt...a central joy of my life...Bill Wesbrooks, the fine man who not only hired me, but has befriended me as well, and runs the most wonderful department of Musical Theater in the Vocal Performance School of Steinhardt, ...well, he and I had a great lunch on Monday, and as usual, the time was too short to spend with him, but enjoyable all the more so... we seem to be able to find countless, endless topics to discuss, and I never feel anything but inclusion and encouragement from him....it is never a stress, a defensive strain or a confrontation to talk with him...he is an easy and good new colleague...one of the most collaborative i have ever worked with....i find this to be true of all the Steinhardt teachers i have had to privilege to work with. Unlike other places I have worked, where one seemed always on some sort of defensive or other.

Dianna Heldman... I am especially fond of, and as her vocal studio is next door to my classroom, we have had the chance to really begin to know each other on the most congenial basis...she is head of vocal training there, and oversees her teachers with such a gentle yet insistent and humane hand...I trust her...and have been sitting in on her Friday afternoon Vocal Studios....an informal gathering of voice students from all over the department, getting to gether for some coaching...the gifted and dear James Cunningham is the pianist for the time, and he is, as usual, invaluable...she includes me in her coaching while I am there, and I am able to contribute in my own way...it's great fun. I hate missing it because of my rehearsals, since it gives me a good chance to get to know other Steinhard students not in my class , and i love love love watching Dianna teach...she is kind and deeply helpful...a fine vocal tech person...refined in her knowledge... I shall get back to her Fridays when my show opens.

Today, my students had their turn to perform at the Wednesday 2:00 Program Meeting that the whole school is required to attend...I could not be there because of rehearsal...but we prepped this morning for the afternoon and what they did for me left me feeling deeply moved and proud of how far they have each come...so far, the feedback from Bill W. and James C. has been really good...I look forward to hearing what the students themselves have to say about it...and i will hear all that next Monday...I really hated missing today...I was soooo proud of what they all did in class this morning...soooooooo proud. It's really a brave thing to do what we all have chosen to do for a living. And to be college sophomores, doing it in front of your classmates? Fuggeddabowdit! Now that is hard! But my kids were prepared and relaxed and filled with decisions they had made in class, plenty of them to concentrate on instead of being nervous! So, I deeply hope they found solace in the work they prepared!

At rehearsal, we kept "beavering" on and have completed our 2nd pass-through of the play, meaning we have blocked and now have spent rehearsal time refining and exploring that blocking. And we are all mostly off book and music memorized! This is a lot to accomplish in such a short time, leaving us with a luxury of time to really get used to the stage, and make the show our own. Plenty of time. That is IF we can get Glenn A. back: his wife mysteriously went into the hopsital today for some sort of emergency surgery and he had to rush off to her....and they have two kids in the bargain to also look after, so who knows what the next days will bring?
Obviously, we are all hoping all is well with him and his wife...this show is having more than its share of illnesses striking people down in one way or the other...

But I have grown incredibly fond of Glenn in the time we have worked together...my heart goes out to him....wish i could help...right now, no one seems to know much of anything...or even if we will be spending our day of rehearsal out at Woodlawn Cemetery tomorrow as planned...we are all waiting to hear if it's worth doing without Glenn...or even if they can change the date...

Our darling writer Eric H. is home from his hospital idyll...weak and pained, but on the healing end of a stomach operation! Lordy...I feel so tired...I had better go to bed and stay healthy!

More soon...dear readers!

Not much of a "Day Off" I have given to myself today....needless to say, I have little to complain about, but for some odd reason or other I could not fall asleep last night and so am draped with that grey fatigue that is woven when not only has no sleep graced your night, but there is that strangeness of having sort of stayed awake through it all....so am I coming or going? Awake or asleep? Do I care or not? Do I feel sad or happy? Without sleep it all feels the same, doesn't it?

And when I think about how little sleep the students at any college get, ie. my kids at NYU, I feel so sad for them all. I am meeting with one this morning, a man of tremendous talent, but who is so thoroughly defeated by his simple lack of sleep, it's hard to know what he can really do... yet, it is because of his enormous talents that he is constantly asked by all at the school to work so hard in so many projects, and is therefore his young self that does not know how to handle it all...add to that his natural ambition...his desire to do even more...and , well, you get a young version of me! I was that way: driven and indefatiguable! My saving grace was a husband who knew how to take care of me! True, we could not stay married, but that does not get in the way of his taking care of me still!

That being said, I will be kind in my meeting with this wonderful student this morning. But I must make it clear that he needs to rest and think...choose and choose well, for his further growth.

But, as I was saying, his meeting at 8:30 is only one way I have loaded myself down with things to do on what is supposed to be my day off from A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE...class, of course...then I will (or wll not) go to an on-camera audition for something Abrams Artists has asked me to do...I probably would not be able to shoot it anyway....we will be close to tech rehearsals by then...but we shall see...

And then, Alex T. , a favorite student of mine recently booked in HISTORY BOYS on Broadway, understudying 4 or 5 roles needs help this evening, and of course that will be a pleasure. A total pleasure.He is superb. And at least I will be home!

Then, Peter will need some sttention for his audition tomorrow...gladly given...the attention, I mean..

And , whoops...all of a sudden: tomorrow will be here, and an all-too-soon 10 AM call! We are into review of our total blocking, and it is wonderful! The show is so rich. And Gabe is helping us make it richer. No question but that the script is benefitting from al the attention Gabe is encouraging us to lavish on it!

I am amazed yet again how intelligence, investigation, following of instincts and well-placed exploration can unlock so much in a page of well-written script. Like the unfolding of the flower that can only be called "human".

Whew! I feel better just thinking about the privilege of it all.

....by 7:30 yesterday morning, after a brisk walk down 42nd Street in a far-too-cold-wind blowing stiffly off the Hudson River, I was in the warm white Expedition, driven by a very nice Production Assistant named Kelly, en route to the location in New Jersey where the Mt. Vernon film (named by script: HOUDON, after the French sculptor who did the most famous bust of Washington's head, and about whom my story tells in the film)...anyway, we got lost a few times, as they do not believe in putting up street signs in New Jersey, but finally made it to the lovely historic house where the crew was setting up my morning shot in an upstairs bedroom...I spent my entire shoot in that room, at a little tea table set up by the windows...

Terri Randall, the wonderful director of the project, was there and she was discussing the viability of using no artificial lights in the shot, since we had plenty of natural sun pouring in through the bedroom windows, and to get a more natural look to the film, that is just what we did: shoot in totally natural light...it looked gorgeous! I so very much like this Terri Randall. I found out that she is actually an Oscar-nominated documentary film director and writer, and her rep in the business is very good I had no idea. I do hope I can see some of her other work, since she promised to send or give me some copies over tea one day. We enjoyed working with each other a lot. And that made it very relaxed and easy.

Also, the entire shoot,production staff, set-p, atmosphere and scheduling was relaxed and thoroughyl handled, so of course that made the job very easy. Joe, the cameraman was wonderful, and believes in deep breaths before each take to get the most relaxed performances...also, since he was shoulder-holding the camera, he had to legilate his breaths while filming...another reason for the deep ones before ACTION was called...Michael , the AD, was very purposeful and kind, and kept us all in line...he held the script and helped me with lines, thought we shot in such small, digestible segments, i had no trouble remembering easily...that was aided by a script very well written and logical...it enabled me to relax into the story telling with ease and fun.

I dressed in the period undergarments and dress made specially for me, and had my hair done simply,with a large chignon at the nape of my neck...minimal make-up, and off we went! It felt good. I am looking forward to seeing it all come together. What I saw in playbacks was very beautiful looking, and i must admit, i was a spirited "Nellie Custis"...even I liked me! Terri framed everything like paintings fromthe actual period...so there was a warm painterly glow to the scenes. As I said: beautiful. Warm.

And I was actually able to get a good night's sleep last night, so I was not as worn out for my class this morning as I feared i would be...

Tomorrow, back to A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE....we will read our biographies and show our baby pictures...! I just finished going through my boxes of old photos...wow...a life...any life...is so bewilderingly full of moments...and we truly do forget most of them, don't we? If it were not for photos, and writing down our memories, we would be so bereft of recollection...I realize it's all light and shadow , anyway, but a photograph is at least some form of realler vapor than mere memory...something at least a bit more solid...though nothing really ever is...solid, I mean.

But looking through old pictures...childhood pictures...pictures of just yesterday..proves we have existed...proves all our nightmare phantoms of growing up were actual...and that lends the mere slips of shiny printed paper a sort of magic, right? Like an artful witch, the camera captures...keeps...glazes a moment of breath...and the we, humans, have the capacity to save the magic and re-experience those moments anytime we want to years later...is a powerful thing.
Also, magic.

It's all so blastedly magic!

Who needs it, when, after Spring Break, one can comeback to a class like I had this morning? My Song Anaolysis Class at NYU/Steinhardt is soooo lovely...and today, after having brief conferences with each of them, I know them a little better now...and I like them. Admire their work as it has grown, and appreciate where they each are in their lives...

After my class, the first one in a week, I cabbed up to rehearsal at The York, and worked for a few hours...Christianne N.is back from her weekend of concertizing, and it was nice to hear her voice again, as lovely as it is...I will not see them all again, since i will be shooting the Mt.Vernon film tomorrow all day...and Wednesday is the FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE day off...I do go back to class on Wednesday morning, but having time off from rehearsals will help me no doubt catch up on needed rest...I am sad that I was unable to at least attend the Project Shaw reading tongiht of HEARTBREAK HOUSE (I wish I could have accepted David's request to be Narrator again, but...) I do need to be at the pick=up point for the film tomorrow by 7:30 AM! So tonight, I rest!

Peter is down at the Players Club helping David S. out technically...he is such a good guy that way.

A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE is shaping up well, and I sense it will be a good show.
Pity that dear Eric is hospitalized, and unable to be there at the rehearsals he so cherishes...but the important thing is he get well and recover totally...no doubt, script changes and needs will be well addressed by him, even from a sickbed....it is our job to honor him with the best work possible, and under Gabe Barre's guidance, this stands a good chance of happening. I really really like the way he approaches the work....I am stunned pleasantly by his sensitivity....I trust it.

And Milt Granger is just a plain all -out good Musical Director....thorugh and caring. Punctilious and demanding, with opinions that are informative. He is also one hell of a nice man! I do hope I a giving him and Gabe what they want.

Actors, even old ones like me, are soooo funny...really.
To open oneself in the work is important, but then ,well...one is left open and vulnerable and...well....feeling! I had forgotten about this part of the work.
But to do otherwise, anything other than open up, is unthinkable, so..once more unto that particular breach, dear friends...! One's soul!

Well, to bed...I awake in a few hours! An actors work.....who the hell ever said it was glamorous? WHere ARE those limousines when you really need them?

More soon....

So, our darling book and lyric writer, Eric Haagensen, whom I have known since forever, is now in ICU at St.Vincent's Midtown...I just talked to his mate Joe McConnell, and all is fixed and on the mend, but Eric did have major abdominal surgery yesterday at 4:00pm, and has a long road of recovery ahead...it seems he had somehow tied his writer's stomach up into knots! And though it is not a usual thing, it is a condition not unheard of before...they had to cut him up, go in and untie the knot by cutting a bit here and there...so he is temporarily the owner of a disrupted digestive tract....after healing, they will go back in and reconnect..but for now, he is out of the woods and into the land of recovery!

Thank God....at least it was something fixable! Whew! And he has a world-class husband in the form of Joe M. who knows how to take care of business and is by his side like glue! So, that is reassuring....man, I tell you....Life gets you coming and going right?

I have rehearsal at 12:30, a six-hour straight-through affair, since iwe get such a late start (the church does not let actors in until after 12 noon on a Sunday), so I am luxuriating in my free morning, after a lazy slug of a day yesterday...although i did get a few things done that were on my list of "necessary things", like getting food into the house! But mostly, with Peter's hurt ankle (he will play basketball and run about like a boy!), we laid low and watched movies....STAR WARS 3, REVENGE OF THE SITH was really good! And so was MUST LOVE DOGS, a cute comedy...I also indulged in hours of needlepoint, my harmless addiction...and here we are.

At least I do feel really rested for the on-slaught of activity ahead...

But for now, the news is Eric H. and his unexpected tummy troubles.
May he heal and be well!

....and all goes well...in fact, working with Joe K. is remarkably powerful....something that, due to the nature of the shows we had worked on toegether so far in our careers, we've never had a chance to explore together...he is a powerful, emotional actor. And so as we worked on our argument scene (called "The Argument", in the music it's set to), we really had fun as we blew each other away to various sides of the room with our explorations! He is a fun man to work with, and I guess I am not all that surprised, as he has had one of the more consistent and distinguished New York musical careers...I am just happily reminded, as we work hard on building the relationship between Rebek and Klapper...I love that he is so handsome and still such a viably attractive man...when we did the show 16 years ago, I don't think it ever dawned on me that Rebek and Klapper were anything other than 2 old altekackers (a Yiddish word for old people)...clearly since I am older, I realize they are so much more than that..and Joe makes it easier to fulfill that realization...

So does Gabe B.....what a kind, creative and supportive director he has developed into...he is all about collaboration, and listens intently when an actor has a contribution to suggest...and , much to my delight, he wants the most solid emotional truths to support the story of this play as we tell it...it feels to me, again and again, that he and I are thinking the same thoughts about certain moments of rehearsal...it feels so sympatico...it is certainly a lovely way to work, and we all feel so taken care of....

St. Patrick's Day yesterday , with its attendant Parade, but ever since I saw two teenage boys pissing on the side of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, against the Temple of Dendur's window's, ( I was passing by in a cab, cutting through Central park), I have hated St.Patrick's Day and the Parade...a day of senseless alcohol consumption and stupid adolescent behavior, highly over-rated...ever since that afternoon years ago, I try to stay as far away from the entire thing as I can, and yesterday I managed to do just that...except for a minor detour in the cab home, due to some totally arbitrary-seeming street closing...but instead of going home, I had the cab drop me at Paul and Steve's, where Peter joined me later for a nice family dinner: celebrating the birthdays of both my niece Rachel and Steve's daughter Christine....it was good, though I was tired. As usual, Steven made wonderful food...and there was a large chocolate cake....! We really do have a NYC family here, and Steve sees to it we gather as regularly and as often as we can...I like that.

Day Off today and much needed...tomorrow we resume rehearsals...Monday,I resume teaching at NYU (it has been Spring Break Time), and continue to rehearse...Tuesday, I shoot the Mt. Vernon film , and so starting early, (a 7 am pickup Midtown), I must assume the persona of Geroge Washington's grand-daughter Nellie Custis! Then early morning teaching again on Wednesday, and I can come home and collapse, since Wednesday is our day off next week! So, today I really must store up some extra energy! And so I shall!...so I shall!

Bye for now...

.....maybe a little more, we first did A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE at Goodspeed...hard to believe that many years have intervened...anyway, the pleasure of this current adventure with it is that I get to bring 16 years' worth of experience and knowledge and growth to a project that not only can bear it, but will be even richer for it, and this growth and enriching is best reflected , so far, in the work Milt Granger has been doing with me on the songs I thought i knew....I am deeply enjoying re-discovering, and in some cases, newly discovering elements of "Klapper" music that thrill me....little things i was either too young or too arrogant to see before, or that were not pointed out to me...things ike dynamic markings, actual notes of the songs as written as opposed to how I "interpreted" them...the careful crafting of each musical statement, so passionately but cavalierly thrown away by the younger artist that was me.... I like what I'm learning. It makes the job not only more interesting, but also more fulfilling on deeper levels. Also, I am a better singer now than I was then, and I am enjoying the actual singing more.

Today, a quick industrial film audition dowtown at House Productions, then to rehearsal. We stage and explore my first Act Oone scenes with "Rebick" and "Michael" today...watching Glen Allen work yesterday, I was moved by his talent...the opening scene, where "Michae;" discovers he is actually dead and lying in his coffin... and he does this through a great song...Glen is gifted...(I have to ask him if he spells his name with one or two "n's"...).

Our day off this week is this coming Saturday, due to everyone's various schedules...I will do a massive grocery shopping with my husband on that day! Our cupboards are bare!

toodle-ooo for now...xxev

...after a warm and productive Day Two of A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE rehearsals...wow! We have a really terrific group gathered for this production...and I am speaking not only of the actors, all of whom are so wonderful, beautifully voiced and warm..there is a genuine quality of warmth in this company which can only serve the play....that, along with a diverse and genuine sense of humor....this all bodes well for this lovely script...

We began yesterday with a half-hour union meeting, as required, and I volunteered to be the Equity Deputy..I like being Deputy and have not done it in a long time, since I haven't done a show in over a year(!) so, I was glad to ask for the position...I will use this chance to re-familiarize myself with the Off-Broadway rule book,....though I have no sense that it will be needed at the York...they all seem to be very fair and concerned with doing it all the "right" way...and they have been doing it for a long time, so i anticipate no problems from either cast or management...

.So after the Equity Business meeting, we all gathered, including as much York staff as could be there, and there was an introduction, some opening words by Gabe , who opened the floor to Eric Haagensen and Richard Isen to talk about the journey of the piece...I had forgotten so much of its development history...and i was reminded that we did it at Goodspeed 16 years ago!!!! Good Gracious!!! How can that be? Anyway, it was fun to hear how it got to where it was, and it's gratifying to realize that if someone believes in what they do , as Richard has believed in this show, the world will recognize and reward it....and i am referring to the fact that finally A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE is getting a New York "airing" after having done all the usual round of "proofs", i.e. The O'Neill Center, Goodspeed,etc....it took the faith of its writer, who had to drop out of show business to earn enough money to finance its promotion, to get it finally recognized by even this small (but important) NYC company! Other shows have sunk into comfortable obscurity because no one believed in them as much as Richard Isen has believed in this show...this , to me, is a commendable and noteworthy thing. Lessons to be learned there...

So, we all met and chatted and designs were shown us...Jim Morgan has designed a clever and beautiful graveyard, full of possibilities for optical illusions and ghostly doings, and it should look lovely while serving the show well....by the way, James is also the Producing Artistic Director of the York Theatre, so I admire his energies and intentions...I can only imagine his life and schedule...but he has given our show a truly beautiful place to live.

After all official introductory stuff was taken care of, we began a full read-through of the show, talking rather than singing the lyrics, and it read well...I was reminded of what a lovely story it is, and how well the music serves it, especially lyrically, as we read the lyrics like they were dialogue and they revealed so much! I was surprised and happy at things we discovered along the way.
There is much to re-discover here. And I believe the way Gabe is setting th etone for rehearsals, a lot of good human discovery will naturally happen. I am appreciating his approach, his gentle and specific requests, his preparation for the work ahead. He has asked us all to write full character biographies. This can only serve us all well. I am excited to get to work on "Gertrude's"...I think she has a lot to tell me as I open my imagination and let her life enter it.

After a good read, we worked on the 2nd Act quartet, and the combination of voices is swell....Milt Granger knows how to work with singers and he immediately got a sound out of us that will develop into our company signature sound. It was impressive. But then again, Joe , Christianne, Glenn and (I guess I have to include ) me sounded strong together. And each person is as strong a story-teller as singer, so the songs not only sound good. This was fun to find out!

Then, LUNCH! Then back to do another quartet. Richard's music is making so much more sense now that I have 16 more years of analytical experience behind me! And i see how each phrase serves the characters...fascinating.

We worked well and hard yesterday, and I look forward to more music work today.
I had forgotten how much fun my profession can be. In the way of process, I mean.
More tomorrow,if I've the energy. But for now: bye...

How else is time measured? My few hours over at the York rehearsal were easy and fun, and Milt Granger is very good at what he does! He was patient with me as I tip-toed back into this lush and complex score, and we worked easily together. I met and hugged the tall, gorgeous-voiced Christianne Noll (seems like such a really nice person) and spent a few valuable minutes with old pal and colleague Joe Kolinski before he got down to work...He looks wonderful and seems so happy , with his beloved wife and (amazingly) 12-year old daughter Jordan,,,,from her photo, she looks like a true beauty...but how could she not be with Joe as her Daddy? Gabe Barre, another old friend, was warm and welcoming, and the entire York organization seemed to be a-hum with activity and purpose....it felt creative and alive. Today we work from 9:30 to 6:30...starting with our Equity meeting at the top, then a read-through....So the day was positive and whetted my appetite for more, Today, I will also work with Glen Allen who I happened to miss yesterday, and the entire production team will be there as well, I assume.

I am curious to know what the designers think of how "Gertrude Klapper" should look...I keep seeing women on busses and subways that look like how I envision her, but I have trouble imagining what my "Klapper" will look like. When I first played her, I was so young, all I played was some sketchy version of an older Jewish woman, but now, I want her to be more specific and truer to me. So that will be a fun conversation.

So beginnings....and now to endings.


To Alice, with Love, From Evalyn:


Memory is architecture. And….

A life’s memories are like a city’s skyline, with elements short and tall. Each person’s life is unique in its architecture because every human being’s memories are their own.

Alice White was one of the tall landmarks of my life, and without her, it feels like looking at the skyline of New York City and seeing how the World Trade Center is not there anymore. And, like the Twin Towers, it still doesn’t seem right that such an important piece of architecture is missing. In fact, somehow, it seems unbelievable.

I have known Alice White for over 30 years, and have known her as only another tall NYC actress of a certain age can know another: we basically lived the same passions, ate the same daily bread of striving and disappointment, enjoyed the same ecstasies when things went our way. And finally, some 25 years after our first job together (me as the Good Fairy, she as the Evil Fairy in SLEEPING BEAUTY at LONG WHARF THEATER) we finally got to create some real art together at the Barter Theater. And for that, there are no words for my gratitude. Because it was through our shows together at Barter, after she had struggled with her cancer for a few years, that we really shared what life had brought us together to do.

First, on the porch of the Barter Inn, over ceaseless cups of tea, sitting next to the many red geraniums she kept planting on the porch, we shared the stories of our lives as they had brought us to Barter. We cried together over her struggles, and we cried together over mine…we laughed until we cried over the many wonderful things that had happened to us as well….and then:

We went across the parking lot and started rehearsing! What was our first Barter show together? Ah yes: how could I ever forget? DIVORCE SOUTHERN STYLE!!!! Sidekicks , again,at last, and getting paid for it! Not only did we adore working together, painting our faces with facial goo and going for the laughs, but I had the rare pleasure of learning from a mistress of the art while being on the same stage with her…sometimes I would metaphorically lay back and watch her do the impossible: get three large laughs out of a single line! No one could do it better, and by the time that show ended, she had become my unwitting teacher. I definitely got the best part of that deal! Elma Blue and Eleanor ruled the waves that season! Alice and Evalyn. Thank you Rick. For me, unforgettable.

Then I had the privilege of sharing the same stage with her in Ron Osborne’s beautiful play: FIRST BAPTIST OF IVY GAP and there was never , in my career, a stronger, more dramatic experience. Alice was vibrantly equipped to plumb the depths of the saddest women ever written, and to be in the thrall of THAT energy onstage is indeed a rare and wonderful thing. She was one of those actresses who made everyone else’s job easier because she was deeply, thrillingly alive and THERE every moment onstage. She never let down. She always cared and strove to make every performance better. She was a true craftsman. I admired her so.
I still do. Now if only she were here , so I could act in more plays with her!

If only she were here so we could poke awful fun at the foibles of people all around us…..and laugh til we cry….

If only she were here so , we could both hate the Republicans out loud together and get angry as the world we love goes to hell!

If only she were still here to always be the indefatigable one who would take care of recycling, take care of all stray cats, and take care of us too!

If only Alice was still here. We would wear red dresses and sit among the petunias and drink tea ‘til dawn, with maybe a little something poured into it….we would laugh our deep -throated laughs (I always tried to copy hers), and remember how brief our lives really are, and we would be glad for ours.

Alice was my friend, my cherished colleague, and -in case I forgot to make it clear- my favorite stage actress.

So, in honor of Alice, let’s find laughter where there may seem to be none ….and let’s laugh long and loud…let’s laugh til we cry….for Alice.

....of the rest of our lives...true! BUT, it is also the FIRST DAY OF REHEARSAL for A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE at the York Theater....and it will be a music review day, at least for me, since I pretty much am acquainted with the music, having done both the show and the CD of the show....still, it will feel good to meet with Milt Granger, the MD ...I hear he is extremely wonderful at what he does, and i look forward to his instruction and in-put on this gorgeous music....also, to hear it sung by such lovely talents as Joe Kolinski., Christianne Noll. and Glen Allen....that will be a bit of a thrill....and it'll be good to see dear Joe again after such a long long time....not since Les Mis....wow...Joe K. and I were in one of my very first shows together here in New York City: HIJINKS, at the Chelsea Westside Theater, directed by Bob Kalfin, who incidentally directed the original production A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE at the Goodspeed Chester Theater....talk about circles!!

All York rehearsals are held at the theater itself over on the East Side at the Citicorp Center, where the York has rented its space for years now, from the Church that is one of the main tenants of that huge complex....The York has a nice comfortable basement residence, and has had it for years...it is a well-established presence on the NYC theater scene, and has always striven to do ambitious work within its limited budget...I have always admired what they do...their mission has always been clear and specific, to take care of American Musical Theater from both ends of its historic spectrum: the past and the future....doing revival readings of old interesting shows in their MUFTI SERIES,(I did The Girl Who Came To Supper there years ago with Nancy Anderson) and fostering productions of new works, such as the one we start today....

FANNY HILL, by Ed Dixon, just closed there last night (two weeks early, I hear, due to serious lack of audience interest), but the production was gorgeously done, with love and care, for which the York must be congratulated. The fact that they were willing to extend FH's run longer than their usual subscription run spoke well of their trust in the piece, but their partner producers failed to uphold their end of that bargain and so the show had to close early....I am not sure, but I don't think AFPP has that same arrangement with the York...our run, I believe , is much shorter. I do hope people come to it, though....it is a swell piece of thought-provoking and emotionally satisfying theater....and , as I said, gorgeous music...unique and definitively "new"...I sense good things ahead for this project.

At Barter today is the Memorial Service at the Main Stage for Alice White...tomorrow I will print here in the blog what Peter and I recorded for the service in the way of a personal reminiscence...I wish I could be down South today.

Darling Alice,I dedicate today's beginning rehearsal to you.

...had it together! Somehow, every now and again in the history of man, (or in the infinitesimal history of one individual such as myself), there are those thinkers/writers/philosophers who "get " the illuminated notion that time IS after all a river that we all swim in and that, indeed, we ARE all made of the same stardust...and that yes, life IS a mad whirl of repeated sightings and shared memory...Nabakov would write of a character in an early chapter and then, so like life, that same character would turn up in a later chapter, even just in passing, and you are reminded of the influence that particular character had on our hero or the development of story....even seeing a feather in the hat of that person, a bright red feather or an unbuckled shoe, can transport us back decades to a memory of deep importance....the human mind is a catalog, a video camera with infinite time on its tape, a Venus flytrap of experience, devouring and digesting every moment we exist...I am awash in highschool memories, moments and secrets...my dear old school chum Chip (the adult Olin that I am getting used to calling Olin) just left after a two-day visit, and I am filled with amazement and an odd sort of happiness!

WHY? Really...why? All it is is memory....a trip down Memory Lane...yeah sure...

...meaning several things...this past week was filled with history...both my own personal and my getting cast in something that has to do with our nation's....

First of all, I got offered a role in a Mt.Vernon Park film I auditioned for a couple of weeks ago, and that made me so happy...I will play "Nellie", the great-granddaughter of General George Washington!...There is an adorable scene with me alone talking about my memories of Mt.Vernon, and my time as a child with my famous great-grandfather! It is a swell long speech, a cute scene really....and I will shoot it somewhere at a stately home in New Jersey on March 21st,for which i had to get out of A FINE AND PRIVATE PLACE rehearsal for that day....and today I have a costume meeting concerning it, where measurements will be taken..I guess I 'll be in full 19th century costume....and wig, I presume...we shall see...in any event, it will be an adventure and fun I am sure! And whoever goes to visit Mt. Vernon can push a button on some exhibit somewhere there and see me! ANd it's a healthy day's wage as well!

The next thing to do with history was my fun dinner with my two old chums from Atlanta, North Fulton High School days, my fellow Clef Dwellers: Britt Dean and Chip Dodsen! We met at Joe Allen and ate and drank the night away, remembering and laughing about a lot of stuff I thought I had long forgotten...Britt came armed with photos of us from those days, and i dragged two Highschool year books with me that had more photos and inscriptions as well in our adolescent hand-writing! It was a pretty amazing night. And the stories of our lives are so deeply dramatic compared to anything i ever could have ever imagined at that time..when we are that young, there is no way we can imagine the breadth and depth of human life eperience and the many different roads it can take us down, so I spent most of the evening with my jaw dropped open in amazement...and it was fun. And also mildly miraculous that after some 40 years, we still "know" each other, and have the capacity to appreciate that!

Chip (whose grown-up name is Olin) is spending a night or two here at our place, as Britt returned home to Atlanta today and Chip has stuff to do here still...so i offered the Purple Room! He'll be here tonight and tomorrow night, I think.

THE CLEF DWELLERS....North Fulton High School...Atlanta, Georgia..singing in the USSR with the Special Choir under tha directon of Robert S.Lowrance ,Jr. Also singing at North Fulton Highschool Bulldog Pep Rallies! We were such celebs! And now Britt has grandchildren!!!! HELLO! We all look exactly as we used to look, except grayer, more lined, and slightly filled out...we have the faces of well-travelled livers of life! And our eyes know more than they used to know...naturally. We are all still tall, and looking at our old photos of the trio, it's easy to see that they were (are) us.....we look like our own parents! I can hardly believe this is true..that she is me...that I am now me....that 40 years (40 years???) have flown by ....good god.

One thing that stuns me is how many more memories both the guys have than I have of those days...I barely remember much of anything of that time really...And they remember so much! So many small things...I had absolutely no idea the sort of strong difference I was making in their lives...I had no idea...because i was deeply occupied taking care of my own self then, and it was like I had blinders on in so many ways...I was driven and heading for a certain destination: theater, being an actress, taking care of me....wow...my memories are few, really.

So there is much to write about.

...and an outpouring of admiration and support for those particular young actors, singers, dancers who I have had the privilege to get to know throughout my years as a teacher.

And i use the phrase "get to know" because I have begun to realize that , for me , there is no true teaching unless there is a process of genuine "getting to know" going on between teacher and student. Therefore, the courage that it takes for anyone to allow themselves to be known, really known, is praiseworthy in itself....and to allow oneself, at a tender age, to put one's trust in another with the authority to guide and lead them is pretty awesome, when you get right down to it.

The older I get, there are two ways one could develop as a teacher: one is to take for granted that everything one does and says is the "right" way...and that the student who does not listen and do what the teac says is "wrong"...this way lies disaster, of course.
The other way to grow, is to open more and more what the Shambala writers call "the tender heart" and listen with it..to hear what even the quietest student has to say, must say, even if they don't possess the means with which to say it presently. Lately, I have learned so much this way.

A person once warned me to never write about my students in my blog...that it is an act of disrespect for some, even if i do not mean it to be...that young actors are hurt easily, and if i praise one, another might take offense...etc. But this was warned to me by someone who is afraid of their own life. And because I loved this person, I listened respectfully. But now I understand something else.

Young actors and actresses need to be praised. And they need to be encouraged in even their meagerest strivings. The smallest act of courage needs to be acknowledged and supported. Sometimes to simply get out of bed in the morning is the largest life gesture a young one can make, and that, in its way, is as large and brave as booking a Broadway show. And because WE ARE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER, ALL OF US, and what we need to do is a public sharing committment, I must not be afraid of stating what I mean to say in support of the young actors who work with me. They need to know, as does the world, that what they are doing matters.That the smallest steps in the process , the quietest lessons they are learning, the boulders that move only an inch when they need to move miles, all these small awarenesses, all these little openings, need to be praised and recognized! Like the magical healing, overnight, of a cut ....one day it's a wound, the next a scab, then, as if by magic, you forgot where the hurt was....it has, of its own organic nature, healed. And all you did was wait it out! This is how some of the best performing artists I know have come to their destinies.

So, this is not a horse-race...it is ahuman one...and I will praise my people!
My Alex T. Who just booked HISTORY BOYS on Broadway...My Liz K. who strives to put her brilliant talent into audiiton rooms...my Jesse F. who graces the world with his voice every time he sings and dances and acts...my Leah D. whose passion is bubbling over to make a difference...and on and on...these young beauties teach me and my life something everytime I come near them...they bless me each time.

...trimmed in gorgeous fur, from Tibet...with the cunning red ribbon bow at the back...my pretty yellow hat is gone.....SWIPED ...STOLEN...PILFERED!

Honestly, someone stealthily swiped it from my side on the subway yesterday...it was placed on the seat next to me, as I rummaged through my bags for something or other, and when I went to put it back on my head, it was gone...irretreivably, irrefutably gone. It took me many minutes of searching every inch of me and my belongings to really let it sink in: I was the victim of petty theft! MY HAT NOW BELONGS TO SOMEONE ELSE....and I miss it. I am sad for it. I yearn.

I also fume!

If I should happen to see anyone every wearing that hat (I will know if it's mine) I will , without thought, rush to them, grab it from their head! And give them a good nose-twisting in the bargain...How dare they steal from me?!

All kidding aside, I feel strange about the theft and loss of this hat.

Strangely violated, and in some sort of phantom way, cold. Oh, I've got plenty of hats....no doubt of that...even one exactly like the one stolen, except it's blue not yellow....unlike many who live on the streets of New York, I will not go cold because of its loss....no, the chill i feel is real, but also metaphorical: I feel "less than" ....diminished by the loss of that hat.

It was a part of my personal real estate...the fur trim, black and soft, was comforting in the way a beloved pet is comforting...the snappy yellow silk crown...and that insouciant sassy red silk bow...that hat spoke for me, silently but with style...it was MINE....and someone stole it from me.

The odd thing is (and I was deep into my bag-rummaging , so I could have missed a passer-by), the only person I observed being next to me, since the train was sparsely populated, was a tall, elgant woman, well-dressed in black and self-possessed....surely SHE is not the culprit! Yes, my hat would have looked gorgeous with her black coat, but still....a woman of obvious means, is she one of those slightly psychotic New York city dames who shoplift and steal from others on trains?
Though she clearly could have afforded to spend her own hundreds on a newer version of my hat, did she, instead, zero in for the kill and wallow in the prideful act of having successfully stolen form another? Will she shamefully reveal her secret to her Park Avenue therapist (whose hourly fee could have paid for her to buy my hat from me rather than steal it?) And will she not even wear it, but stow it away in some closet along with other ill-gotten gains?

I weep if that is what she'll do, for my hat needs to be walked daily in the chill winter air or it will be a very sad hat.

As I am a sad, mournful ex-owner of said hat...goodbye hat..I hope you at least warm the head of someone who actually needs you, though it is hard to imagine you gracing the head of anyone who might be wearing a polyester, downfilled jacket or coat.

So I am torn: on the one hand, I hope you had a fashionable thief, one whose wardrobe supports your soft and perky beauty...on the other, I wish for you a life of service, so that even if you have to top a shabbily-dressed, ill-washed street preson, that you do it with pride of purpose!

You are, you always will be, MY yellow hat...I am sad and I will miss you. I do miss you. Fare well.

And damn the person who stole you from me!!!!!

...is what this weekend shall be officially called! Because i am buried beneath a mountain of paper receipts (Broke Tax Mountain,dare I dub it?) and am sorting and listing and adding and catagorizing, all for our meeting with the inimitable Trudy D. on Tuesday! She is our friendly tax accountant lady, and I have been her client for many years now (ever since starting Les Mis...she is tax lady to Broadway folk), and now Peter had joined her ranks, as we file as a "married couple"! So here I sit, avoiding the inevitable....i really must get back to it soon...but for now: a blogging catch-up time......ah!

The Academy Award Ceremony is tonight....we shall have it on the tv, even though I have real trouble sitting and watching it in any steady way... I dunno....maybe it's the all too human display of ego....all that money spent on gowns that could be feeding some starving people...i wonder what it would take for one of the major stars to take her gown off, revaling something decent underneath of course, and announce that the money she spent to wear the dress would now go to feeding a family she personally will sit down to dinner with! A display would follow that gives new meaning to "they took the shirts off their backs to help us"!! Now THAT'S an Academy Awards Show I would be glued to watching!

What composes the inner nature of a person who is bound to succeed in theater?

Why do some people "make it" and others do not? We all know it's not talent.

What is that "thing" that keeps a person sticking to their goal and actually achieving it?

Why is it easy for some and the hardest thing in the world for others?

Someone please answer these questions for me.......at least attempt to do so.

You'd think , after all these decades I have been working in this biz, that I would know more than i do about the above questions. But, alas, I do not. So....

HELP! ANSWER! SEND ALL THOUGHTS! WRITE ME THE "TRUTH" AS YOU SEE IT! Please?

...and once more, from our 9th floor windows, it feels like we are living in a large exciting snowglobe! The snows are flying sideways. Actually very pretty!
i woke up feeling better today than I have felt in a few days, rested, less nasally clogged up, not head-achey as i have been , and i can only attribute it to several possibilities: that wonderful class in Buddhism last night, and the attendant 30 minute sitting meditation before it started...the Sudafed I wisely took before going to bed....or to the fact that for the first time in several days, i did not stuff and thereby destroy my body with sugar and chocolate!!! I do not know where I get off thinking I can get away with that sort of eating! SO this morning, bright and bushy-tailed, I feel swell! PROTEIN: YES! SUGAR: NO!!!!
And I have personally experienced and known about the ravages of sugar for years now, and yet i let myself gorge on it, as if nothing will happen to me. Well, the past few days have been awful...I have felt awful...so i am relieved i feel somewhat better. In fact, a whole lot better. And ready to head out for the Yoga Class i could not drag myself to on Tuesday! Only a block away, and I could not get there! In any event, feeling good is whole lot better than feeling ill, so the next time a box of chocolate cookies shows up in one of my classes, I'd best remember what those delicious lethal things do to me, and like the mature adult I am, restrain myself!
Just had a nice long IM session with darling Ed Dixon. who is down in DC doing THE PERSIANS at the Shakespeare Theater. It's a production he has done before, with the same director. From there he goes right over to the Kennedy Center production of MAME with Christine Baranski, (He's playing Lindsey Woolsey) and he will be wonderful and earning, I hope, lots of money! Darling Ed.....I hope to get down to see him in something down there.
Good gracious. The snow continues to blast across the urban landscape. For those of you reading this, and who came to this blog from my web-site , you will know what I'm talking about when I say: Peter has done a swell job re-designing the site! So colorful, yet professional looking...the way I did it was indeed colorful, but so disorganized and really not properly built...I was "winging it" with what little knowledge I had...but Peter has really begun to put it into shape, and I am so grateful. There will be a sort of formal launching of the site once it really is done, but already it 's so lovely, and we both get new ideas for it everyday. So we will continue to work on it. So grateful to Peter for his help.