Take Your Shirt Off and Cry: A Memoir of Near-Fame Experiences (20 page)

“Well, of course,
I
know,” he smiled, leaning back in his club chair. “But my
wife
hasn’t a clue. She liked the show but thought you were trying to prove how smart you are by
referencing
someone as remote as Kerouac.”

I must admit, I was flattered; no one had ever accused me of being too smart, so I was feeling very win-win about this. On
the other hand, I didn’t want to seem pompous or turn anyone off so, nodding a nod of deep concern, I consciously unfurrowed
my baffled brow and widened my eyes so as to seem approachable to someone like this guy’s wife.

“I mean,” he continued, “you don’t wanna be turning someone like my wife off. She’s your audience! Know what I mean?”

I did know what he meant. A little. In an effort to build audience, Joel and I had procured the mailing list for the L.A.
production of
The Vagina Monologues
and sent out postcards to the hundreds of addresses on it. The mailing resulted in a fortuitous bump in ticket sales, predominantly
in the demographic of upper-middle-class women from Newport Beach. This group of women—referred to by my production crew as
“the Ladies from Orange County”—would prove to be extremely loyal fans. They would trek up to L.A. once, twice, some even
three times, returning with their mothers/sisters/friends, and request a post-per formance photo op with me. Beautiful, blond,
tan, fit—they were popular-crowd types, and their “you go, girl” fawning, sunny California smiles, and encouraging words were
so heartening that I would go back to my dressing room after they left each time and cry, telling my reflection in my dressing
room mirror how grateful I was, both for their kindness and for finally being in a place emotionally where I was able to receive
it.

So I was troubled by the idea that the producer’s wife thought I was pretentious. As far as I could tell, the Ladies from
Orange County either (a) knew who Jack Kerouac was or (b) were unfazed by the mystery. But I wanted to be open; he was a very
nice guy, this producer, and I was surprised and intrigued by his interest in me to begin with, and willing to see where it
could lead, if anywhere.

My Big Fat Greek Wedding
was in the movie theaters at the time and a huge hit. It too had started as a little solo show. Why not, the producer wondered
aloud, make my show more like that?

“Everyone in town is looking for the next ‘Fat Greek Anything,’ ” he told me.

My show was not even remotely similar in content or structure to
My Big Fat Greek Wedding
, especially the title piece about my breakup’s aftermath, my subsequent despondency, and the ensuing visit to a well-regarded
East Village witch. Upon reading my tarot cards, the witch proclaims The Jazz Musician and I soul mates and further instructs
that his dumping of me is “royally fucking the order of the Universe.” Her Rx is to give me a rather large, fire-engine-red
candle shaped like a penis to burn, along with a spell to bring about his return (true story). Instead of the Jazz Musician,
however, the magic conjures Kerouac himself into my Greenwich Village living room, who thereupon takes me on a madcap joyride
to exorcise the boyfriend and teach me a life lesson in the process (dramatic license).

As I sat in the producer’s office, I imagined my show as one of those transparencies teachers were always writing all over
in middle school. If I draped a transparency of my show on top of one of
My Big Fat Greek Wedding
on an overhead projector, what would the image look like? I was coming up blank.

“See,” the producer continued, “the
Fat Greek Wedding
is very
feel-good
, know what I mean? Your show is a bit more . . .
subversive
in some ways, especially with that giant giggling . . .
schlong
you had in the background—what was that again?”

“It was a shadow puppet of a dick candle on a scrim, lit from behind.”

“
Riiight
. . . so, see, things like that are, you know—I mean, it’s
great
, don’t get me wrong,
very
cool, very
New Yorky
, very
arty
. But I’m just—and I’m just thinking out loud now, you know,
riffing
, so bear with me—but is there a way that you could—like they do in the
Fat Wedding
—have more stuff about
family
?”

“Family?”

“Because
family
is just money in the bank. Everyone wants to see things about family and how, you know, in the end, that’s what we
are
and
who
we
are
and all that, you know?”

My family popped into my head. I saw us all together at Christmas, the one time a year when everyone got together. I saw everyone
as usual barely able to contain their contempt for one another, trading obligatory gifts, insults, and hostile remarks while
pill-popping downers or tossing back drink after drink to numb out. I thought about how on these visits it was impossible
not to notice how interminably uncomfortable the beds in our old bedrooms were. Lumpy mattresses, hard pillows—it was as though
my mother didn’t want anyone to get too-too comfy, psychically short-sheeting us out of extending our visits. No sooner would
our bags be placed in the foyer than she would ask, “What train are you taking back?” I thought about how my parents made
my mother’s grossly overweight sister “dead to them,” and how they didn’t speak to my mother’s parents at all. I thought about
the fact that my hippie uncle ran away to India and wrote us a letter saying he wasn’t related to us anymore. I thought about
how my eighty-year-old grandfather was almost given the boot from his assisted-living facility when he got caught getting
a blow job from a brain-damaged woman half his age, incapacitated due to a massive aneurysm. I thought about how my mother,
without telling me, had our two golden retrievers put to sleep so she could “redecorate the basement,” and how, when I became
hysterical after arriving home a month later from college to find the dogs dead, she very pointedly informed me that I was
not to “ruin everyone’s Thanksgiving” with my “goddamn theatrics.” I thought about how no one got along or particularly liked
one another, about how often they told me I sucked as a daughter/sister/aunt and how much I silently thought that they sucked
right back. As all of this flashed through my mind, sitting in that office, I had to wonder, could I ever shoehorn any of
this
mishegoss
into “feel-good”?

“Do you have some wacky characters in your family? Maybe throw those in the mix and focus on the boyfriend-breaking-up-with-you
story and, you know, change the title to something a little more commercial? You said the boyfriend was fat, right? Maybe
My Big Fat Stupid Boyfriend?
Not
that
, but, you know,
like
that . . .”

Toward the end of the run of
Kerouac
, we produced a breast cancer benefit, which entailed a per formance of my show followed by three
Playboy
Playmates reading excerpts from
On
the Road
in bikinis. The day after the benefit, Miss October called me, out of breath and excited.

“My manager wants to meet you! He thinks you’re great! He’s really nice and cool, and he used to represent Beverly D’Angelo!
I think he’s interested in repping you! Here’s his number. Call him right away! Good luck, Nancy!”

I thanked her and called the manager, and we set up an appointment for the next afternoon.

“I always thought Beverly D’Angelo was hot,” Joel said as we wended our way over to her former manager’s office for the late-afternoon
appointment.

“
Vacation
,
Hair
,” he continued. “I could see you doing stuff like that . . .”

I don’t know how we decided Joel should accompany me to this meeting or why. Looking back, it seems interesting that he was
there, as if we both knew that this was something we would later be glad he was there to witness.

Aside from Miss October, I didn’t know of anyone else the manager represented; his Beverly D’Angelo association had been over
for almost twenty years. Still, I had high hopes; he had been getting Miss October guest spots on TV and in films, and a producer
I knew spoke highly of him, saying he had connections with major talent agencies.

“You know,” Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager had told me during our brief phone conversation, “you remind me of Beverly.”

Arriving at his “office”—a stucco-walled prefab condo on a nondescript, unchicly-south-of-Olympic block in West L.A.—we met
Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager. He was a grizzled guy on the north side of sixty-five, lazing about his living room in
sweats and a stained undershirt, eating whitefish salad from Junior’s Deli on Stoned Wheat Thins. He offered us some Clamato,
which we politely declined, and then the three of us sat down for the meeting on a scruffy pleather playpen sofa strewn with
head shots, copies of
Playboy
, and dusty videotapes. Throughout the ensuing conversation, Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager would continue to partake of
the whitefish salad–cracker combo, whitefish dribbling off here and there, further imbruing his already soiled top and spackling
the deep folds around his mouth.

“Thanks for coming,” he said, cheeks full and vibrating, taking the head shot and résumé I handed him. There was some uncomfortable
silence, but not so uncomfortable that it was un-known to me; this was the space that I had waited out hundreds of times before
as someone got to know me via a single page of typed credits wherein the gaps between gigs were presented in that seamless
way that insisted it was all intentional. Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager chewed and read and read and chewed, all the while
breathing through his nose, which made a faint whistling sound, like a faraway train on a dreamy trip, destination unknown.
A few moments and a sip of Clamato later, Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager finally spoke.

“So. I saw your show, and I was very, very impressed. You are, without question, extremely talented.”

“Thank you,” I said, pleased. “Thank you very much.”

He paused for a second, considering me. Then, looking back down at my head shot, he regarded it for another moment before
flipping it over to once again peruse my résumé. A few more seconds and then:

“You’re talented, you’re pretty, and you’re funny,” he pronounced finally. “So, I have just one question for you.”

“All right.”

“Why haven’t you made it?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean just what I asked:
Why haven’t you made it? Why
aren’t you successful?”

Time stopped; the question hung in the air. He continued.

“I saw your show, I’m looking at you now, and I’m baffled. You had all the ingredients. But now—I look at this résumé, filled
with junk, old credits, nothing that anyone gives a shit about, and I have to ask:
WHY
?”

Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager leaned in to me, as if imploring me to untangle it all for him.

“Why aren’t you more successful?” he entreated before adding piteously, “What happened to you?”

At first, not knowing what to say, I didn’t answer. Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager continued with the blandishments about
how I really could have “done it,” and after the initial stunned silence, a lame attempt at a reply tumbled across my lips,
after which I found myself suddenly floating, looking down at the three of us from the vantage point of the broken track lights
above. Joel and Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager continued to talk, positing theories, speaking in generalities, concluding
nothing. The meeting thus ended, the same way most meetings had, with vague plans about “keeping in touch” and the promise
of future meetings that we all knew, deep down, would never be scheduled.

Several weeks later, my show closed. Beverly D’Angelo’s Whitefish-Encrusted Former Manager never called; the south-of-Olympic-condo
episode became yet another appalling showbiz tale I’d tell over multiple glasses of over-oaked chardonnay. I would relish
relating the story, as usual, painting myself as the unwitting victim of the unspeakable terrorism waged by Shit-Heel Hollywood
Men, hell-bent on pissing on my parade.

“If only you’d had the presence of mind to say x, y, and z . . .” friends would supportively cluck, shaking their heads in
bemused amazement at yet another one of my messes. Publicly, I would milk the story for laughs; privately, I hid behind my
outrage, numbing myself with booze, Xanax, cigarettes, repudiation—whatever was around—until I felt nothing at all. But then
a funny thing happened. I started to see Beverly D’An-gelo’s Former Manager everywhere: in my head when I was running on the
treadmill, in the mirror when I was brushing my teeth, in my dreams.

Why aren’t you successful? What happened?

It wasn’t that he was taunting me; he was just insisting that I not dismiss him, looking expectantly at me to continue the
conversation I had hastily abandoned. But this time, there would be no escape—Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager refused to
let me go.

For a while, it was easy to hide behind my indignation. “Such an asshole,” I would say to myself. How dare he?” Insulted,
ego wounded, I tried to dismiss the affront as nothing more than the bitter ramblings of a has-been flesh peddler, a slob
whose claim to fame was that a million years ago he represented someone famous. But there was a small part of me—very small—that
recognized that this was one of those moments in life when something or someone appears out of the ether, Yoda-like, to confront
you with that which you fear most. There, in that stuffy condo on the wrong side of Olympic, far from home, far from myself,
I was face-to-face with the question I had been avoiding for as long as I could remember.

Why aren’t you successful?

Beyond the tawdriness and the shirt stains and the stench of subpar deli fish spreads, there was something to be gleaned from
this low-rent Buddha. Perhaps his question was not to be taken literally or as an insult, but more as a riddle or koan: not
answerable rationally per se, but understood on an intuitive level to inspire a process of further questioning. In my defensive
fluster, I never once considered the actual
question
; I was far too caught up in the
answer
I thought he expected. There may not have been any one specific answer, but what did I understand of the question at all?
Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager may have thought I was a failure, but what did
I
think? What did
I
think of success? Did it mean fame? Did it mean making tons of money? Did it mean respect as an artist in a world I longed
to be included in? Did it mean being happy? How much of what happened or didn’t happen with my career was within my control?
Did I want it—to be a successful actor? I thought I did. But if so, to what extent? Allowing the question to subdivide, I
was able to, as the Zen masters say, “shock my mind into awareness,” but still I couldn’t quite know then what it meant, only
that it meant more than I was able to, at that moment, see. The Beverly D’Angelo’s Former Manager sightings continued sporadically,
and then one day, instead of running or tuning out or looking the other way, I decided to simply stare him down. He didn’t
really have any power; he was only a ghost. And then I remembered that while most ghosts come to haunt seeking retribution
or, perhaps, rectification, some have had their sleep interrupted by the excessive grief of the living. Beverly D’Angelo’s
Former Manager didn’t deserve an answer to the queries he posed sitting on that
farkakte
couch. I, however, did.