Burnt Toast. Teri Hatcher

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СКАЧАТЬ and untempered by all the pros and cons and second-guessing that take over our adult lives. But we suffer the consequences. I kept the cat. Kitty was her name. (Screamingly original right?) Kitty the Terror, the biting mean wild cat that I had to keep and care for all of her very, very long life. So I got my wish, but I felt the weight of my parents’ arguing and the burden of my responsibility. And that’s how our simple, childish decisionmaking evolves to a layered complexity. That cute kitten was more than she seemed. She was (for so many years) a living thing that stimulated conflict, required care, and inspired fear in the souls of the neighborhood dogs.

      Predicting consequences is part of growing up. But overpredicting and overplanning can become paralyzing. You get to the point where you forget what you want. Outside influences muddy the waters further. If the outside voices are louder than the internal voices, you have to learn to tune them out.

      When I was first promoting Lois & Clark, I went to New York for a press junket. It was the first time I’d ever been such a significant part of promoting a show. My girlfriend, Dana, and I flew the red eye to “the Big Apple” (just letting you in on the genuine cornball level of excitement I had going at the time). My first stop on the publicity tour was the notoriously raunchy Howard Stern show. (Can you believe that? Well, I guess it was a fitting way to get my media cherry popped.) Since it started taping live at 6 A.M., they flew us from JFK airport to Manhattan in a helicopter. Okay, wow. That’s just a big serious wow. I’m definitely not the first one to say, “Hey, let’s go see everything from way up there in the sky!” I’m afraid of helicopters. They seem as fragile as insects – as if they might crash at any time, swatted from existence by some giant hand. But I did have to be on air at a certain time, and it did sound like a grand entrance for a girl who only months before was driving a Ford Probe with no air-conditioning and real old-fashioned roll-down-handle windows, so I said yes to the copter. It was a September morning, and the sun was just rising. It was so clear and breathtaking that I asked the pilot to do a circle around the Statue of Liberty – and he actually did it. Can you believe that? This has nothing to do with the point of this chapter, but I had to tell you about it because it’s en route to my point. See, when an unexpected, magical moment happens, you’ve got to take it in, right down to the bottom of your soul. Because that’s what life is about, getting to live it. So we flew around her, that tall, tall symbol of freedom, of hope, of America, and I thought about how lucky I was to be there, to share it with my friend, and to not have had to walk up the ten thousand stairs to get the same view I was seeing now. (Okay, it’s really only three hundred and fifty-four stairs, but at six in the morning it might as well be a mile.)

      I got to Stern on time, and I think I held my own. Then Dana and I headed to the hotel to take a short break before the next set of talk shows. Talk shows are an interesting thing. I think it’s a big mistake to approach them thinking people actually want to hear you talk. No one wants to hear you “talk.” They want to be entertained. I’ve always loved the challenge and adrenaline that I get from trying to toss that comedic ball back and forth with some incredibly talented host. Anyway, we dropped our bags in the room, but it just seemed ridiculous to try to take a nap. So we went out walking and found ourselves in Central Park with hot-out-of-the-oven H&H bagels and some coffee. Then I did Live with Regis and Kathie Lee and Late Show with David Letterman. When it was all over we went to celebrate at Petrossian.

      Petrossian is a one-of-a-kind Russian caviar restaurant housed in a landmark deco building in midtown. We were celebrating, so we were ready for caviar, champagne, and vodka – a level of woo-hoo-hoo that sort of reminds me of that limo ride I never took, only now I was actually doing it. So we sat down and the waiter came over with menus. Did you ever see that movie Arthur with Dudley Moore (one of my favorite movies)? Anyway, our waiter was the spitting image of Arthur’s valet, Sir John Gielgud. (If you haven’t seen Arthur, well, maybe you need to put this book down and go rent it to really be able to appreciate the humor of this story. But if you are miles from a video store, he’s an older British man, with a dry, slow, even wit, and a deadpan expression masking loads of superior judgmental attitude.)

      So we were marveling over all the caviar options and their prices. Whew, wow, them there fish eggs is expensive. But you only live once, so we chose a decent champagne to start, followed by an ounce of Beluga and martinis. Well, unbenownst to me, fancy caviar is served with as much pomp and ceremony as wine. So when the time came, Sir Gielgud presented the caviar and then lifted this utensil with a silver handle and a round, flat end like a mother-of-pearl lollipop, and handed it to me. Puzzled, I looked at him and said, “What’s this?” With the aforementioned attitude and accent he said, “It’s a palette.” That didn’t really clarify anything for me. Seeing my still dumbstruck face, he added, “It’s for tasting the caviar.” Well, why didn’t he say so?

      I scooped up a little caviar into the palette (that I now know is made of shell because silver can ruin the flavor of the caviar – as if raw fish egg flavor can be made worse than it is, anyway). I tried it and said, “Uh, yes, that’s good. That’ll be fine.” Sir Gielgud paused for effect, then said, “I’m so relieved.” Remember the accent, which compounded the sarcasm: “I’m so re-leeeeeeeved.”

      Then as he was pouring our champagne, I asked, “Do you think we can get some of those chopped onions and egg and capers for the caviar?” Now I’ve always known I was fairly simple, but at that moment I knew how white trash I really was, because he just stared blankly. Then as he lifted the champagne away and screwed it down into the ice bucket, he turned back and sneered, “It’s your caviar. You can do what you want with it.”

      Gielgud was right. All the fanciness and rules and cultivated expectations of this world are ours to consider, accept, or reject. You really can do what you want with your life. You are presented with this choice all the time – to cave to what others want or think, or to know what you want and not be afraid to go there.

      Gielgud didn’t know it, but his lesson was a key one for me. One of the hardest work experiences I ever went through was the night after the Los Angeles reviews of my performance as Sally Bowles in Cabaret. I had been chosen by Rob Marshall and directed by him for four weeks before opening the show. It was an amazing Tony Award-winning show, with a great cast and a part that I was right for and loved. Sure, it was a risk to go from Lois, a moderately successful TV role, to the lead in a musical. I remember Rob telling me, “No one wants you to be good in this, but believe me, you are.” Well, not according to the LA Times critic. I swore I wouldn’t read the review, but when I heard the paper hit the door outside my rented room at 6 A.M., I just couldn’t help it. The review was harsh, and I cried all day long, as I’ve been known to do.

      I was backstage that night, only moments before my first entrance, thinking, I can’t do this. I’m humiliated. I can’t do it. Then of course I did it. I got through it, barely, and very emotionally – probably a little too much so, but, hey, that pain had to go somewhere. I had plenty of people tell me that the critic was a jerk and otherwise try to make me feel better. Then one person gave me an idea that I kept up through my entire seven-month run (which ended – I can’t resist saying in case that critic sees this – with an Obie nomination for best actress). I wrote “fuck ‘em” on my toes. F-u-c-k on one foot and e-m on the other. (I left the extra toes blank.) It was hidden under my tights and shoes. Sometimes I would write it in lipstick on my dressing room mirror – that was before my daughter could read. But I think the best part of it was when it was my little secret. No one saw it and I didn’t show it off, but I knew it was there and it reminded me that what mattered was what I thought, the sincerity of my work and effort, and the support of the people around me. I couldn’t let anyone take this experience away from me.

      But f-u-c-k-e-m isn’t written on my toes anymore, and I don’t always remember to have that attitude. Not long ago I went to a birthday party at a restaurant. Miss Gorgeous (who’s not just my hair and makeup guy, but a very close friend) was supposed to meet me there, but I got there first, alone. I came in, looked around the restaurant, and didn’t see СКАЧАТЬ