Secrets of a Soap Opera Diva

by Victoria Rowell

  The Rich and the Ruthless, number one for the past fourteen seasons, always got prime real estate. We bubblers took full advantage too, nestling our tightened and lifted derrieres into plenty of camera chairs. But what we detested almost as much as being on the “D” list with Hollywood casting directors was taking on the additional expense of a limousine whether we were nominated or not. The WBC network was too strapped and too cheap to pick up the tab. I decided to be my own chauffeur and kept the five hundred smackers in my bailed-out bank account.

  Coked-out, oversexed teen heartthrob Toby Gorman, a Brad Pitt lookalike, climbed onstage clad in a double-breasted John Varvatos slim suit. Toby played the on-again, off-again love interest of my TV daughter, Jade, on R&R. Southern belle Josie Lynn Walraven, leading lady on the low-rated sudser Obsessions, wobbled onstage with him to announce the Sudsy Award for Best Lead Actress in a Daytime Serial.

  Cameras zeroed in on all five nominated actresses: Judith Simmons, doe-eyed lead actress on Our Lives to Contend, nominated for seventeen Sudsys, winning eight; underappreciated soap legend Shelly Montenegro, the catty, drag-queen-esque gay icon on The Daring and the Damned; Lesley Francine, who to much fanfare had reprised her legendary role as America’s soap opera sweetheart for six weeks on Medical Clinic; scenery chewer Emmy Abernathy, a three-time Sudsy winner as Gina Chiccetelli on The Rich and the Ruthless; and finally me, Calysta Jeffries, the favorite to win for my portrayal of Ruby Stargazer.

  Too excited to breathe and feeling butterflies in my stomach, I closed my eyes laden with two pairs of false eyelashes, trying to think positive thoughts. Here goes everything.

  “And the Sudsy goes to,” Josie drawled for effect. She was actually from Hoboken, New Jersey. “Emmy Abernathy for Gina Chiccetelli, The Rich and the Ruthless!”

  The room erupted in a mixture of applause and shocked gasps as the voice-over commentator announced, “This is Emmy Abernathy’s fourth Sudsy win.”

  The haunting theme music for The Rich and the Ruthless played softly in the background.

  I sat there transfixed, in shock again, my eyelashes feeling twice their weight, teeth gleaming, yet on the inside something irrevocably broken.

  Leaning in, Augustus said, “I’m so sorry.” R&R’s creator had to appear gracious, so he stood up in his elegant Armani suit, along with his wife, Katherine, daughter, Veronica, and son, Auggie Jr., to greet Emmy before she passed.

  “Congratulations, Emmy.”

  “Oh my gawd thank you, Mr. Barringer,” Emmy exclaimed as Augustus kissed her on the cheek. The press whore accidentally-on-purpose stepped on my toe with her big-ass 10½ foot as she made her way up the steps to the stage. Wearing a cheap crimson see-thru dress so tight it looked like an Oscar Mayer weiner casing, and no panties as usual, Emmy enthusiastically waved and blew kisses to the mezzanine.

  Phillip McQueen whispered disgustedly to a bored Pinkey, “That’s what I call putting perfume on a pig.”

  Roughly grabbing the Sudsy from a stoned Toby, Emmy proceeded to the microphone.

  “I never expected to win again.”

  Breathe, girl, I told myself, suppressing the urge to stick my finger down my throat.

  “I don’t even have a speech prepared.”

  Seconds later Emmy plucked a crumpled piece of paper from her hoisted cleavage and read, “Oh my gawd this is truly amazing. First, I just want to thank L. Ron Hubbard. And I have to pause to say I cannot believe here I am once again on the same stage that stars like Helen Mirren, Hilary Swank, and, you know . . . um, the first African American to win, Halle Berry, all accepted their Oscars. Oh, wow, and they like all begin with ‘H’! And before I forget I want to do a shout-out to all my homies in Bed-Stuy-do-or-die. Holler! Now, I would like to say thank you to all the fabulous women I had the honor of being nominated with. No, you didn’t win, I did, but that doesn’t mean you guys aren’t really, really good actresses too in your own right, especially my costar and dear, dear friend, Calysta Jeffries! God bless Emmy Abernathy!”

  Narcissistic Emmy had no idea she’d just blessed herself. I struggled to maintain my composure, as the camera zoomed in close enough to count my nostril hairs.

  “Calysta, this award, my award, is for you too. Thanks for being such a phenomenal screen partner this past year. You were in every one of the scenes I submitted for Sudsy consideration. I seriously wouldn’t have been able to snag another one of these babies without you. You really raised the bar.”

  Shannen cupped her hand over her mouth and asked, “Didn’t you tell me your Grandma Jones said liars run the risk of being struck by lightning?”

  “Yeah, that’s why there’s nothin’ but silicone and cheese up there,” I replied out the side of my mouth.

  Edith Norman and everyone at The Rich and the Ruthless knew how Emmy really felt about me. She’d been furious when she learned she’d be sharing tube time with someone she secretly envied more than despised. Girlfriend had to be on her game to play with me.

  There were two things Emmy and I had in common, unhappy childhoods and a soap opera. She was a tough New Yorker, daughter of a crack addict, who fought like hell for everything she wanted, and so did I. Truth be told, I actually got a kick out of acting with the muffin-eatin’ heifer. But after the word “Cut” all bets were off.

  A RICH AND THE RUTHLESS OFFICE FLASHBACK . . .

  “There’s no way I’m working with that freak,” Emmy said.

  She’d stormed to Randall’s office seconds after reading the first script.

  “She’s some kinda psycho robot, man. She never flubs a line and knows everyone else’s too! And have you noticed how she just has to win every scene? It’s creepy.” Emmy shuddered. “I’d rather work with that cow Alison.”

  If philandering was an Olympic sport, Randall Roberts would take the gold every time.

  “Isn’t there anything you can do, Snuggle Bunny?” Emmy asked, stroking Randall’s head and sitting in his ample lap, stretched out by beer and Chinese take-out.

  “Sorry, Emmy, it’s a done deal. Augustus wants the storyline, but since you’re already here, you think we could squeeze in a quickie?”

  BACK TO THE SUDSYS ALREADY IN PROGRESS . . .

  “I’m not joking up here, people,” Emmy continued with her backhanded praise also known as a compli-dis. “Working with Calysta Jeffries is like taking an intense five-day-a-week acting workshop. She’s such a mentor. Let’s hear it for Calysta Jeffries!”

  To thunderous applause, disguising my contempt, I rose to the occasion, blowing kisses and mouthing Thank yous into the camera for millions of viewers at home and around the world. If Emmy thought she was going to make an ass out of me on prime-time television, she had another think comin’.

  Raging on until two in the morning, a steady stream of inebriated bicoastal bubblers partied on to pulsing music and animated industry chatter at the lavish Rich and the Ruthless post-Sudsy Awards shindig at the legendary paparazzi-filled Roosevelt Hotel.

  Navigating overstuffed furniture and humongous melting R&R ice sculptures, popular gossip columnist Mitch Morelli finally caught up with me.

  “I think it’s a goddamn shame you didn’t win tonight, Calysta,” he bluntly stated. “This was your year, and this toxic industry knows it!”

  My every instinct told me to say what I’d said for the last fifteen. That Emmy or someone else had the better reel, or that it was an honor just to be nominated, but something inside me couldn’t, no, wouldn’t let me lie about the network’s scandalous secrets one second longer: the block voting, the notorious sexual campaigning, and the money-hungry power struggle between the Barringers and the WBC.

  “Damn right it was my year, Mitch! But considering how certain vicious bubble-troublemakers who call themselves peers vote for whoever campaigns with Starbucks and Krispy Kremes as opposed to actors who turn in solid performances, I’ll never win, ’cause, honey, I don’t do doughnuts. You can print that, every last word!”

  UH-OH SPAGHETTIOS, S
udsy lovers. On-set spies tell The Diva there is trouble a-brewing on the set of daytime’s numero uno soap, The Rich and the Ruthless.

  Calysta Jeffries, who all but had the Sudsy in the dish, once again lost out to her costar Emmy Abernathy, and boy oh boy, was Miss Calysta p.o.’d! Here’s what she said to Cliffhanger Weekly’s soap columnist Mitch Morelli:

  “But considering how certain vicious bubble-troublemakers who call themselves peers vote for whoever campaigns with Starbucks and Krispy Kremes as opposed to actors who turn in solid performances, I’ll never win, ’cause honey, I don’t do doughnuts . . .”

  Those sound like fighting words to moi! Wow, who knew Krispy Kremes were such a good career investment? A little birdie tells me execs at WBC and The Rich and the Ruthless are not too happy with Miss C. Be sure to keep checking back to SecretsofaSoapOperaDiva.com as this explosive news and dirt develops!

  The Diva

  CHAPTER 2

  “Never Trust Anyone

  Who’s Had a Happy

  Childhood,” the Saying Goes

  Well, don’t just stand there leaving me in suspense, Thelma, what’s the child’s name, for heaven’s sake?”

  “She goes by Calysta and is a natural for sure. Just like that feisty actress on my soap, Yesterday, Today and Maybe Tomorrow.”

  “Calysta what? She must have a last name.”

  “Well, all right, her real name is Beulah Espinetta Jones, lives right here in Greenwood, but no one’s supposed to know according to the director. She’s half black and from where I sit at the piano during rehearsals, quite attractive, and talented too.”

  Grandma Jones could hardly believe her ears as the two pale society ladies chattered away in their Delta drawl. Having licked her last stamp, she jotted down the details before leaving the post office.

  Later that evening, the only black person in the audience, she nervously sat in the last row of an improvised theater in Carrollton, intensely watching me act up a storm.

  During the curtain calls she made her way to the back of the building and asked for me.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am, but you must be mistaken, there ain’t nobody in this here production named Beulah Jones,” the stage manager responded.

  Giggling and puffing on a shared clove cigarette, I heard, “Beulah!”

  A buzz kill for sure; I didn’t need to turn around to know who it was. I exhaled the smoke through my nostrils like a defeated dragon, dropping the butt and grinding it beneath my sneaker.

  We rode home in deafening silence in Pride-All Taxi Service. The frozen expression on Grandma Jones’s face made her chin dimple like a pocked orange skin.

  Arriving at the front door, exasperated, she searched her bottomless black pocketbook, her painted fingernails scratching the polyester lining for the key. And as she opened it she looked dead at me, saying, “You not too grown ’n’ I ain’t too old, now you get you a switch ’fore you come in, and don’t be steppin’ on my strawberry patch either. No dilly-dallyin’.”

  After washing my mouth out with soap, Grandma found the hidden strength all women possess, no matter how old, to whup any lick of disobedience or theatrical fantasy out of me.

  Not daring to look up past her knee-highs, I cried out, “Grandma, please stop! I promise never to do it again.”

  She continued swingin’ with her J. C. Penney coat still on, a hard staccato rhythm in her voice as if in a trance, saying, “Only-freaks-and-strange-folk-want-to-be-on-stage-and-TV-and-you-let-that-boy-kiss-you-all-over-your-mouth-for-everyone-to-see-if-I-evah-catch-you-hitch-hikin’-or-actin’-up-on-a-stage-again-so-help-me . . .”

  As I lay in a cold sweat, the merciless ringing of my telephone rescued me.

  “Ms. Jeffries?” asked my answering service.

  “Huh? I’m sleepin’.”

  “I’m sorry to disturb you, ma’am, but your agent is on the line.”

  “For crissake, what does he want? Never mind, put him through,” I slurred wearily with a splitting hangover, gulping down a bottle of Evian next to my bed.

  Weezi—my agent, manager, publicist, legal counsel, confidant, financial adviser, and escort—barked into the phone, “What the hell are you trying to do to us?”

  Never signing a contract, we were each other’s first clients, during the lean years, ever since I stepped foot in New York City a zillion years ago.

  He always managed to irritate the hell out of me, like the time I met him for lunch at Chateau Marmont, a favorite Hollywood haunt for A-list movie stars. Weezi insisted on introducing me to De Niro, never mind that he didn’t know the man, who was minding his own business, incognito at a neighboring table. Putting on a thicker than usual New York City accent, Weezi shamelessly asked, “Yo Bob, how ya doin’? Loved ya in Raging Bull, ma’ man. My client Calysta here is quite the actress on the number one sudsah, The Rich and the Ruthless. I’m sure ya hearda’ it.”

  What came next trumped all. Weezi brazenly slipped his business card onto De Niro’s table, a glossy picture of himself on the back.

  Cringing, I wanted to evaporate. The A-lister took another sip of espresso before peering over his shades, saying, “I don’t do soaps,” and walked off leaving Weezi’s card and a half-eaten biscotti.

  As much as I swore I was firing Weezi after that embarrassing episode, like thousands of times before, I knew I wouldn’t, ’cause pastures just ain’t greener on the other side. I tolerated him the way he tolerated me, one day at a time.

  “Huh?” I asked groggily, forgetting I’d tucked myself in with a bottle of Moët and a tin of Godiva. I attempted to hold the phone to my throbbing head, CNN’s Nancy Grace blaring in the background.

  “Those quotes you gave Morelli,” Weezi reminded me. “You’ve caused a goddamn firestorm. The network is pissed and so is the show!”

  “Oh . . . that?” Hadn’t thought much about my conversation with Mitch until that very moment. “Maybe I went a little overboard, I was fired up. It’ll blow over.”

  “A little overboard? Your stunt is being talked about all over the place. Cliffhanger Weekly, Soap Suds Digest, SecretsofaSoapOperaDiva.com, Daytime Confidential . . . you name it. And not just soap press, Access Hollywood, Nelson Branco, even Perez!”

  “Wow, Perez? I finally made it.”

  “This isn’t funny and it ain’t good,” Weezi griped. “The network’s scrambling. A reporter from Black Enterprise has already requested an interview with you and the WBC’s head of diversity, Josephine Mansoor, concerning alleged unfair practices on your soap.”

  “Oh boy,” I said, sitting up, clearing hair out of my eyes.

  “You’ve caused quite the commotion.”

  “And that’s a bad thing? You know how many times I’ve been up for that doggone Sudsy. If it sheds some light on this screwed-up, narrow-minded industry, good.”

  “Calysta . . .”

  “Thanks for the wake-up call, I have thirty-three pages today.”

  “You mean thirteen.”

  “No, I mean what I said, thirty-three. If only I got paid by the page like that diva in Britain.”

  “Calysta . . .”

  “I know, keep dreaming. Later, Weezi.”

  I hung up and dialed Grandma Jones.

  “Hey baby,” she replied on the second ring as usual. “What’s wrong?”

  “How’d you know?”

  “It’s six thirty in the morning out there in Hollywoodland and you’re supposed to be gettin’ ready to tape my story.”

  “Grandma, I swear the devil’s at my heels. I have had it!”

  “What happen’ this time? And before you start, Beulah, I hope you didn’t go ’n’ pop that Gina Chiccetelli in the lip even though I don’t like how she’s been tryin’ to take your man again.”

  “Grandma, first of all, that’s her storyline, second, she’s paid to be a floozy. And third, no, I didn’t go ’n’ pop Gina in the lip. It’s worse than that.”

  “Beulah, ain’t nothin’ God and your grandma can’t fix; now
you tell me with a quickness what’s goin’ on out there!”

  I hated my birth name, Beulah Espinetta, with a passion. I changed it the moment I boarded the train from Greenwood to New York City with blurred stars in my eyes, twenty years earlier.

  “I didn’t win the Sudsy again, Grandma.”

  “Is that all?” She dismissed me. “Sugah, that’s yesterday’s news. Been knowin’ since last night, but wasn’t gonna bring it up ’cause I know how you let that mess bring you down. But you sure did hold your own, Beulah, I don’t care what anybody says. Made me just as proud, the way you held up your head even though you didn’t win and kept right on smilin’, blowin’ kisses into the camera and everything, and I know that was just for me. You gave new meanin’ to ‘Folks push you back only as far as you let ’em.’ Made all of Greenwood feel good, sure did.”

  “What?”

  “Chile, I had the whole neighborhood over here. You coulda’ canceled Christmas. Couldn’t tell a soul you wasn’t gonna win that Sudsy. No sah-ree. Sister Whilemina made fried chicken and greens, Miss Bessie made mac and cheese, and I made my monkey bread and a Sock-It-To-Me cake that wouldn’t quit. Tongues was lickin’ brains, baby . . . lickin’ brains. Plus I made my special Manischewitz punch with bananas to wash everything down real good.”

  It was bad enough that I’d lost, but to find out the whole town was watching!

  “Chile, folks was yellin’ at the television somethin’ fierce when those imps gave the Sudsy to that Gina Chiccetelli. She can’t act her way out a brown paper bag nohow. Doggone shame you didn’t win that trophy.”

  “You can say that again, Grandma. Emmy’s got four Sudsys to my none. One thing’s for sure, she’s been doin’ a lot more than actin’ all these years.”

  “Ms. Jones, tell Calysta she was snatched like all get out last night!” a voice yelled in the background.