My Mother Was Nuts

  Fuck.

  There went my chance at achieving perfection.

  I still smoke. I know I should quit. I think the reason I haven’t tried to quit again is that I’m bad at prioritizing my problems. Take today: I asked myself, should I quit smoking or try to finally figure out how to use my DVR?

  I feel like I have a better chance with the TV, but I don’t know. I’ve been struggling with the fucking remote for two years. The frustration might kill me before the cigarettes.

  CHAPTER 46

  Five More Minutes

  Penny on Santa’s lap in 1948

  Marshall personal collection

  Penny with her daughter, Tracy; Tracy’s husband, Matt; and their children, Spencer, Bella, and Viva, in 2011

  Marshall personal collection

  SO THEN WHAT? Like anyone, after hearing the words cancer, malignant, and metastasized all in one sentence, I wondered not only how much time I had left but what I was going to do with that time. (As you know, I sent for White Castle burgers.) A year later, after I began to hear the words remission and cure and we’ll check you once a year, I found myself asking similar questions. What was I going to do with the rest of my life?

  Bucket list time, right?

  Wrong.

  I had every kind of list you can imagine—to-do lists, lists of calls I needed to return, lists of thank-you notes I needed to write, lists of books I wanted to read and movies I wanted to watch, lists of invitations requiring a response, lists of things in the garage I wanted to get rid of. I had lists coming out of my ass. But none of them were bucket lists.

  Were you supposed to have one? Apparently that memo never got to me. My bucket list, if you can call it that, had started and stopped fifty-seven years earlier when I got my own bedroom. Mission accomplished. Everything that came afterward had been gravy. My own phone? Check. Marriage? Double check. Motherhood? Check. Grandmotherhood? Check. Three times over. Good, lasting friendships? Check. Work I love? Check. Floor seats at Lakers and Clippers games? Check. Motorcycle through Europe? Check. Giving back to others less fortunate? Check. Losing weight? I was down thirty pounds, so mostly a check. Jumping out of an airplane? No thanks, I don’t like heights so much.

  I worked a day on my brother’s movie, New Year’s Eve, and then guested on the IFC comedy Portlandia with Portland Trailblazer LaMarcus Aldridge playing my boyfriend. I hosted Thanksgiving dinner for Garry’s, Ronny’s, and my family. Joe Pesci arrived late, as always, and played guitar and sang. I read movie scripts, watched TV series that inquired about me either directing or acting, and cheered the Lakers and Clippers through disappointing efforts in the 2012 playoffs. There’s always next year, guys.

  I’ve also enjoyed being a grandmother to my three grandchildren, who range in ages from 20 to 6. Surprisingly, it’s a role I like. Not surprisingly, I go about it in my own way. I’m not blind like my grandmother was, but their school performances usually start a little early for me. They send videotapes, we talk on the phone, and Tracy brings them to see me. They’re good kids, and Tracy is a terrific mother—much better than I ever was.

  But I would ask myself, is this enough? Should I be doing more with my life?

  I didn’t know. One day I got on my computer and searched for “What do people do with their lives after surviving cancer?” Nothing came up. Apparently people didn’t do anything. I guessed they either dropped dead from trying to pay their medical bills or they went back to whatever they had been doing before, because what the fuck else is there to do when, as in my case, you like your life?

  Indeed, one day Dennis Rodman called and asked me to make a documentary about his life. He said I could talk to all of his family, friends, ex-wives, girlfriends, teammates, and opponents. No door would be closed, he insisted. He had already written three books, though, and given God knows how many interviews. What was there left to say?

  Well, we had a long talk about what he was doing and why he wanted me to undertake such a project and it boiled down to him knowing that he was fucked up. He drank and had money problems. I think he was scared. He wanted to have his story told. He wanted others to tell it. I think he knew it would come out sounding like the character he had created if he told it himself, while others would talk about the real Dennis. That Dennis had been in the NBA for years before he had his first drink, was pathologically shy, worked incredibly hard, did many nice things for people without needing to publicize them, and ended up in the Hall of Fame.

  Dennis came to my house, where I sat him in front of a camera and did the first of three in-depth interviews. In between, I interviewed his family, his former teammates, opponents, coaches, referees, announcers, and writers. I interviewed everyone, and along the way Dennis would check in. I came to realize that he had enlisted me to help him figure out his life.

  It was ingenious of him. Somewhere along the way, we all want to—or at least try to—figure out why we’re here and what all the fuck it means, you know? I was doing it for him, but also confirming a few things for myself, starting with the fact that I didn’t have to figure out what to do with my life.

  I was doing it.

  When my mother was little, her mother showered her with praise and told her she was incredible. She hated it. It made her nuts. She swore that she wouldn’t make the same mistake with her children. Well, it worked. I thought being rag monitor in eleventh grade was pretty good, so I guess I surpassed expectations, hers and mine. When I look back, I see that I did it by sticking to the rules I learned when I was a kid and trying to make each day a good one, whether I was sneaking off to the Parkway to be with friends or directing a movie. People call me a trailblazer, but as far as I’m concerned, the only Trailblazers I know play basketball in Portland. I don’t think about the awards I haven’t won or been nominated for. I don’t get that stuff. Neither does my brother. We aren’t that kind of family. We just do our best to entertain people.

  My mother knew that was important. Maybe she wasn’t as nuts as we thought. I don’t know. What I do know after living sixty-eight years is that one way or another everything works out. How else does a girl whose life was about hating dancing school and hanging out on the Parkway fence end up with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame? Or even better. Jermaine, the paralyzed kid I met a few years ago in New York and helped out, recently came to my apartment and fixed my Wi-Fi. In a small way, that’s also an example of things working out.

  Oh, I also know something else to be true.

  Perky is overrated.

  A few years ago I did a Vanity Fair magazine “Proust Questionnaire.” Among the questions they asked was what I disliked most about my appearance. “You name it, I hate it,” I said. They asked what my greatest regret was. “That when I was a size 0 there was no 0,” I said. They also asked what or who was the greatest love of my life. “Pizza and my daughter,” I said.

  As you can see, I haven’t changed much over the years. My friends are still my most treasured possessions, just as they were when I was a kid. If you were to ask my greatest accomplishment, I would start naming names—and it would take a long time, too, because I keep up with everyone from NBA players to the kids I grew up with in my building in the Bronx. The only thing that has changed about me is that I don’t worry as much about getting asked to the dances.

  I’ve been given my five minutes … and then some.

  Acknowledgments

  My brother, sister and I are 110 years old, but we still refer to our parents as Mommy and Daddy, and I want to put them at the front of the thank-you portion of this book. Although I was an accident, it worked out good for me, and so to my mother, who was nuts, and my father, who was my father, thank you. I also want to thank my brother, Garry, my sister, Ronny, and my extended family, all twenty-four of them, especially my daughter Tracy, my son-in-law Matt, and their three children, Spencer, Bella, and Viva, who have given me immense pleasure in life while having to put up with … well, I don’t want to know. There are probably more times than I wan
t to know about when Tracy has sounded like me and said, “My mother is nuts.” Like my mother, though, I choose to ignore it. At least we’ve had a lot of laughs, and continue to have a lot of laughs.

  I want to thank Carrie Fisher, my friend and partner in crime for more than 30 years. We’ve lasted longer than all of our marriages combined. Our crazy lives have meshed perfectly. We’ve always said it’s because we never liked the same drugs or men, but I know there’s more to it. I want to thank my two ex-husbands and my boyfriends: Mickey was and always remained a very good guy, and without him I wouldn’t have my daughter or grandchildren. Rob was a lot of fun and like me recognized when it wasn’t, and yet we still remain friends. How could we be anything but friends after having gone through those extraordinary years together? It should be known that when I called him up to talk about this book he reminded me of stories and asked, “Did you write about when Tracy burned my new Mercedes with the cigarette lighter?” More proof that it’s always better to laugh.

  I want to thank Art Garfunkel, who showed me the world and was still himself just the other day when we spoke. I thanked him yet again for never letting me do heroin, and he worried that I was going to make it seem as if he based that off his own prior experience. He didn’t. He was just smart.

  I want to thank my assistants over the years, Amy and Bonnie, both of whom became producers, Nicole, Kristin, Jon-Michael, and Terry, who is the best. I want to thank all my doctors, who helped me dodge a bullet, the nurses who helped me recuperate, and Ronald Perelman, who has made sure I have received the best care because he just knows those kind of things. He is the friend everyone wishes they had. And also thanks to his family and staff.

  I want to thank Cindy for being there with me back in the ’70s and still being with me in our 60s. I recently (as of this writing) went to David Lander’s 65th birthday party and had a great time, seeing him and his wife, as well as Carl Gottlieb and Larry Hankin and others from The Committee. I also saw Fred Willard, Ed Begley Jr., and Peter Elbling. They are all people who appeared on Laverne & Shirley.

  I want to thank all of them and everyone else who made me laugh. There are a lot of dead people I still like, and I want to thank them, too. They include John, Ted, Jerry, Harvey, Britney, and Monica.

  I need to thank my friends Carlene W., Wendi L., Paula H., Sheila J., Joann L., Jimmy and Mark W., Chris D., Big Al, the Mullins, Christopher G., Joe S., Joe P., Beverly D., Dwight M., Lorraine B., Sara C., Ken R., Chico B., Valorie A., Jane W., Patti S-M., Jimmy R., Michi, E, Jon L., Tom H., Paula R-S., Caren G., Robert A, Joel P., Steve G., George P., and Kori B.

  I also want to thank everyone in my old building on the Grand Concourse and my neighborhood, all of my friends from JHS 80, Walton High School, UNM, and everyone I knew at Camps Odetah, Onibar-Geneva and Diana-Dalmaqua. Then there is everyone from my mother’s dancing school. Even though I complained, those were good times—and I hope all of you are doing well. I haven’t mentioned a few guys that I slept with over the years, but thank you, too. I have to thank the casts and crews of the movies I directed and produced. I want to thank Dick Clark for American Bandstand. Ringo Starr once recognized me at an airport. That was cool. So thank you. Dennis—thank you for being crazy. Rosie, love you, and thanks. Marcia, get well and stop driving people to airports. And to those I left out, I’m sorry. I have to thank my two dogs, Larry Bird and Magic. But they should thank me for not sending them “to the country.” They have it so much better at my house.

  Last but not least, I want to thank my manager Alan Iezman of Shelter Entertainment Group and my literary agent Dan Strone at Trident Media Group for creating the opportunity for me to do this book. I also want to thank my assistant Susan Yi at Parkway Productions, and Dan’s assistant Kseniya Zaslavskaya at Trident, and Alan’s assistant Martha Sanchez for facilitating so much. Then a special thanks to the talented team at Amazon Publishing led by publisher Larry Kirshbaum, editorial director Julia Cheiffetz, publicity director Katie Finch, marketing director Kiwa Iyobe, and also Carly Hoffmann and Katie Salisbury.

  Finally I want to thank my collaborator Todd Gold, who let me blow smoke in his face but never up his … Thank you very much.