“You look fine, Gladys,” I said, having already flashed Mother a reproving glance. “Most of the actors will have come straight from work. Anyway, costumes aren’t usually a part of Playhouse auditions.”
“I could unbutton my blouse a little,” the woman suggested uneasily.
“That won’t be necessary, dear,” Mother said, borderline obsequious now. “I’ll merely be introducing you tonight. We need not call upon your talents.”
Unbuttoned or otherwise.
Disappointment clouded the plump face. “I won’t be reading lines with the others?”
“Not until I’ve had a chance to see you in action,” Mother replied. “And we’ve had a chance to work together a bit.”
Probably a wise decision.
Mother went on, “So you’ll just be observing. Getting a feel for the Playhouse. Sizing up your fellow thespians.”
“Oh. Thespian is an actor, right?”
“It is indeed, dear. For now, just take a seat out front until I introduce you.”
“Okay. Anywhere in particular?”
“Somewhere toward the back. It will give you a panoramic effect. The full . . .”
Mother searched for the word.
“Monty?” I suggested.
She frowned at me. “The full Playhouse experience.”
Of people not in costume, on a bare-bones suggestion of a set, reading from scripts. Yup, everything but the chandelier falling in Phantom of the Opera.
Gladys hesitated, as if expecting us all to go inside the building together, but Mother stood her ground, saying, “Best you go on in the front way, dear. I don’t want to be seen as playing favorites.”
Gladys nodded, turned, and walked away.
When Mother’s acting discovery had disappeared around the building, we remained paused at the stage door.
Mother said, “Brandy, darling, I’m afraid this may well bring down the curtain on my directing days at the Playhouse.”
“Gladys may work out.” Or a year from now the Playhouse might just be a barn again.
Wearing a wicked smile, Mother said, “But I do have one ace up my sleeve.”
“What would that be?”
“Fire the girl opening night, gently of course, and play Olive myself.”
“A seventy-something sexpot.”
Her eyes flared behind the big lenses. “Well, that remark is both sexist and ageist!”
“You’re right,” I admitted. This would be her last Playhouse play.
Sushi, impatient to go inside, barked.
The stage door opened into a long corridor leading to the shop and maintenance room at left and dressing, wardrobe, and prop rooms at right.
We hadn’t taken but a few steps before Miguel—wearing his signature black T-shirt and jeans—entered the hallway, coming from the back of the stage.
“We’re going to be shorthanded,” he said with a frown. “Leon didn’t show up when he was scheduled, and he doesn’t answer his cell.”
Leon, the janitor, often helped out during auditions. Mother had gone out on a limb hiring the middle-aged man, despite his having a criminal record. By all accounts, Leon was now trustworthy, cordial, good at his job, and willing to do tasks outside his province.
“Knowing our janitor,” Mother said, “he must have been taken ill.”
“Which,” the stage manager groused, “doesn’t do us any good at the moment.”
Miguel had more to say, but I didn’t hear it. Because as soon as he announced they were going to be shorthanded, I began fading back with Sushi, slinking down the corridor to duck into the first door I could, which was one of the principal’s dressing rooms.
Nonetheless I could hear Mother boom, “Now where did that girl go?”
So I waited a full minute before sticking my head out.
“Close call,” I whispered to Sushi.
Mother had often roped me into helping at the Playhouse, and while most of the time I put up with it, this evening I wanted to watch from the audience. I was truly curious to see how Mother would handle an open audition in which she had already cast a key role, and done so with a nonveteran player at the Playhouse.
“What say we hide out in the prop room for a while?” I asked Sushi.
As soon as I’d said the words prop room, Sushi’s tail began to switch back and forth, because she loved that area as much as I did.
And why not? Where else could you find a shrunken head, a Roman helmet, fake snowballs, a gorilla suit, and a gun that fired flowers, all conveniently assembled in one place? And where else in a busy theater, bustling with the needs of a soon-to-be-production, could you hide away and take a nap?
Not that I was planning on a nap. I’d just stay in there long enough for technical problems to get solved. Then, after the actors arrived, Sushi and I would go sit in the dark in the back row of the theater. Maybe we’d keep Gladys company.
In the prop room, I played with a small hand-control-operated Audrey II from Little Shop of Horrors, while Sushi attacked the large black toy dog with horns and glowing eyes from Mother’s all-female-cast version of The Hound of the Baskervilles. (She had played Sheryl Holmes.)
About ten minutes after six, I scooped Sushi up and departed the prop room, using an exit into the lobby that allowed me to slip into the theater through the main auditorium doors.
We settled in the back center row, as planned.
The stage was empty but for a couch and two chairs, to accommodate a scene between the characters of Sally and Bill, as selected by Mother for the tryouts.
She was down in front of the orchestra pit, facing a group of hopefuls who had spread themselves out in the first several rows. The group was on the smallish side for an audition—about a dozen local actors—because of the small cast of only three characters. Well, two characters now, but they didn’t know that yet.
Mother addressed them, coming in and out of her pretentious British accent. “Thank you one and all for coming out to the thee-ah-tah this evening. This is going to be a groundbreaking production of Voice, because of some innovative changes I am implementing . . .”
Miguel was standing off to her right, and even from the back row, I could see his body stiffen, indicating all of this “innovation” was news to him.
“. . . but first,” the grand dame went on, “I must make an announcement regarding the role of Olive, which, no doubt, will disappoint those of you hoping to audition for the part.” She paused, then said, bringing gravitas to her words, “It has been filled.”
Mother’s natural bent toward the overdramatic made the situation worse than it already was. This brought unhappy responses from some of the women, and the stage manager moved closer to Mother, with an expression that was nearly a scowl.
“Why was I not informed?” he demanded.
“I’m informing you now, dear,” Mother replied.
“And just who has the part?” he asked.
“Miss Gladys Gooch,” she said, her eyes searching the auditorium seats, as she called out. “Gladys, please stand, darling.”
I hadn’t noticed her, well off to my right. As the potential sexpot got to her feet, heads craned for a look.
“And what else exactly has she done?” Miguel asked Mother.
Very bad form for Miguel, who should not have been confronting the director that way, even if she deserved it. Which, of course, she did.
“Why, what hasn’t she done!” Mother responded rhetorically. “Miss Gooch just moved here from Wisconsin and is a recent graduate of the Theater of Performing Arts of . . .” And here Mother paused, because she had great difficulty not giving a Jerry Lewis spin to the following word. “Sheboygan.”
And completely failed. She might as well have added, “Laaaaaddeeee!”
Recovering, she waved a dismissive hand at a slightly bewildered Gladys. “Thank you, dear, you may be seated.”
She did.
Miguel grumbled something I couldn’t make out.
Mother, ignorin
g him, said, “Those of you here to audition for the part of Olive are welcome to do so for the leading role of Sally.”
This did not appease several actresses, who got irritatedly to their feet and headed to the exit door, stage right. One snapped, “What’s the point? It’s gonna be Kimberly, anyway.”
Kimberly Summers, seated front row center, was a pretty blonde in her midtwenties who had recently advanced from ingenue parts to leads and was a favorite of Serenity audiences. My money was on her, as well.
Mother, anxious to move on, cleared her throat to get the actors’ attention back where it belonged: herself. “What will make this production unique is that it will not be set during World War Two, rather present day. Therefore, the character of Bill is on leave from Iraq or Afghanistan, which will mean changing some of the dialogue. For example, in act one, scene two, Bill talks about his time in spent in Paris—”
“You can’t do that!” Miguel said.
Mother arched an eyebrow. “Do what, dear?”
“Rewrite the dialogue!”
Mother faced him. “I certainly can. I’m also mounting it as a musical version, introducing a few songs, which I’ve already written.”
“You can’t do that, either! Not without the playwright’s permission.”
“Well, I’m certainly aware of that,” she huffed. “But contacting the playwright would be rather difficult, considering that John Van Druten is long gone. Perhaps you have a Ouija board handy?”
“That he’s no longer living does not matter,” Miguel said tersely. “You still have to contact the play’s publisher, who will notify Van Druten’s estate for their approval.” He paused. “All that will take time, and I doubt it will be allowed, in any case.”
Mother, hands on hips, lifted her chin regally. “It’s a moot point, my dear Miguel. We’re talking about a three-week-run that will be over with by the time any publisher or the estate hears about it and demands a cease and desist. Besides, I’m doing them a service. Generating new interest in a severely out-of-date property.”
Miguel guffawed, then said flatly, “You are doing John Van Druten a service? The man who also wrote Bell, Book and Candle?”
“Not him, dear,” Mother replied, “the estate. Were you aware that for the first time in six decades The Voice of the Turtle has failed to make the top ten list of community theater productions? That translates into lost revenue for the late playwright’s heirs.”
Her words seemed to be lost on Miguel, who pointed a scolding finger. “If you go ahead with this, Vivian, then you will take full responsibility for any repercussions.”
“Agreed,” Mother said, nonplused.
“Fine,” the stage manager said. “And I intend to go on record with the Playhouse board.”
A male in the audience waved a hand. “Mrs. Borne, will Bill have to sing?”
“Yes, he will.”
“But, uh . . . singing wasn’t indicated as a requirement. And it’s just not part of my skill set.”
Mother shrugged one shoulder. “Neither could Rex Harrison in My Fair Lady, but he won the Academy Award for Best Actor.” She clapped her hands twice. “Now, any other questions before we begin?”
Sushi squirmed in a way that told me she had urgent needs. Which was my fault, because I hadn’t properly given her time to tend to business before we’d left home, Mother being in such a hurry.
I retraced my steps into the lobby, through the door leading to props, wardrobe, and the dressing rooms, then out the stage door.
The night was chilly, and I’d left my coat in the car, but figured Sushi wouldn’t keep me out too long . . . but I was wrong. After she’d trotted to a patch of grass and squatted, she scampered off toward the storage building. Calling her to come back would be futile, so I ran after her.
The windowless building, bathed in a security light, had a front entrance door and, on the side, a double-size garage door, which was where Sushi was heading for some unknown reason.
Before I could reach her, the little rascal flattened herself and crawled under the garage door, which hadn’t been closed completely.
I went to the front entrance, found it locked, and returned to the partially raised door.
Down on my hands and knees, I yelled into the void. “Sushi! Come here!”
No doggie. I hollered again. Still no Sushi. In anger, I pushed upward on the garage door, and it opened high enough for me to crawl under.
Inside I fumbled in the dark for a wall switch, found one, and flicked several lights on. Then I stood, amazed at the amount of stuff that had been amassed over the years. Even Mother’s trash-and-treasures garage at home was no competition.
Furniture pieces were stacked on top of each other, chunks of dismantled sets leaned against walls, and fake potted ferns and small trees made a forest in which lurked big props like the grown Audrey II and a full-size Santa’s sleigh. The prop room paled in comparison. No wonder Sushi wanted inside.
Pathways took me here and there, sometimes leading to dead ends, and all the while I kept calling to her.
Frustration was turning to worry when something touched my shoulder, and I yelped.
“What are you doing in here?” Miguel asked gruffly.
I had to wait a moment until my heart stopped pounding. “Trying to find Sushi.”
“What made you think she’s in here?”
I told him that the garage door had been partially open and she went in under it. And I had pulled the door up enough to squeeze under myself.
“You better find her,” the stage manager said. “Since the weather turned cool, Leon’s put poison out for the rats that have come in from the cornfields.”
While I didn’t think Sushi’s rarefied palate would include eating poison, Miguel’s words nonetheless did cause alarm. So I resorted to a ruse with Sushi that I used only sparingly, for fear it would one day no longer work.
“Cookie, cookie, cookie,” I called out.
She might have been prowling nearby—I’m not really sure—but suddenly the doggie was at my feet.
Both relieved and mad, I scooped her up, and when she saw I had no cookie, her little jaw jutted out accusingly. I’d have to make sure all my shoes were up and off the floor at home.
I thanked Miguel for his warning.
“Lucky I was out for a smoke,” he said, “and saw the light on in the building.”
An awkward silence.
“How are the auditions going?” I asked.
He grunted. “They’re over already. Most everyone left after Vivian announced it was a musical.” He paused. “But Kimberly and Zefross stayed, and got the roles.
No surprise with the former; the latter was an interesting choice. Zefross Jackson was an African American actor new to the Playhouse, and so far had been limited to small supporting roles. But I thought he had potential and knew Mother felt the same.
“Anyway,” Miguel was saying, “your mother’s waiting for you. And I’d like to lock up and get home . . . it’s been a trying day.”
He escorted me, with Sushi in my arms, out through the building and its aisles to the entrance, then stayed behind. He had a faulty garage door to tend to.
Mother was standing by our car, her face bathed in the security lighting and bearing a disagreeable expression, as the overcast night sky grumbled.
As I approached, she was grumbling too. “Some help you were! I could have used a little support.”
“You seem to’ve done fine without me,” I said, adding disingenuously, “and I think you’ll have a production people will be talking about for years.”
Mother took that the way I figured she would. “I feel the same! We must make interesting casting choices to keep up with changing times. So I forgive you, dear. Now, I want to check on our usually trusty janitor.”
“Leon? Let’s not bother with that. I’m sure he’s all right.” A few sprinkles from the sky fell on my face.
“The sooner we check,” she said emphatically, “the sooner
we get home.” Then she strode to her side of the car.
Muttering, I climbed in behind the wheel and handed Sushi to her. Some days just didn’t want to end.
Leon Jones lived about a ten-minute drive from the Playhouse, in a trailer Mother had found for him, making for an easy commute to his janitorial job.
Since I didn’t know the way, she directed me along several gravel country roads, then down a pitted dirt lane that snaked through a heavily wooded area. By this time, the raindrops had evolved to a fine mist, and ground fog had begun creeping across the roadways, often obliterating them.
The ten-minute trip had turned into twenty when I finally pulled the C-Max up to a shabby-looking single-wide mobile home sitting in a clearing of tall pine trees, a propane tank squatting next to it like a prowler. No lights could be seen through partially drawn window shades.
“His truck is gone,” Mother said, referring to Leon’s battered Ford pickup.
“Then he’s away somewhere,” I said. “Let’s go before this weather gets worse.”
“Let me try him one more time,” she said, cell phone in hand.
I had been staring at the darkened windows when I suddenly saw a flicker of light. The light seemed to pulse with the ringtone coming through Mother’s phone.
“He won’t answer you,” I said, and told her why.
“Now that’s odd,” she said. “Who goes and leaves their cell phone behind?”
“Maybe he doesn’t want to be bothered,” I replied. Just as Mother sometimes left her cell behind when she wanted to investigate secretively.
“I’m going inside,” she announced, reaching for her purse on the car floor.
Mother carried lockpicks in every purse she owned, like some women always make sure they have aspirin or lipstick along.
“So you’re going to break in,” I said.
“I’m the sheriff,” she announced, as if I hadn’t heard that before. “I have probable cause.”
“What cause?”
“Cause for worry.”
“Is that a legal thing?”
She ignored that, got out, then ducked her head back in. “Come, I’ll need you to hold the flashlight while I work my magic.”
I sighed, turned off the car, and exited into the mist, Mother leading the way, Sushi trotting behind her, me bringing up the rear while keeping the flashlight’s beam on the metal steps to trailer’s door.
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