by Cara Mentzel
Dee interjected, “I want you to have fun, babe,” and reached her hand out for a squeeze. “I don’t want you to worry about speaking up. Say whatever you want. Just be yourself.”
“Aw, thanks, Dee. I will.” I’d already given myself the “just be yourself” pep talk. I’d thought it all through. I would take in my surroundings and try to make the surreal feel real. I’d remain poised and, I hoped—given the height of my heels—upright. Dee may have wanted me to enjoy myself, but I also had a job to do. I was her date. By her side I was determined to be the calm and steady version of myself, but when I slipped into my flowing periwinkle gown I couldn’t help but feel like Eliza Doolittle on her way to the Embassy Ball.
As soon as we left the room, we started to see celebrities. First there was Kelly Ripa in the elevator. Then, Kristen Bell and Dax Shepard as we neared the official red carpet. Jessica Biel posed for photographers, and Dee and Kristen laughed as they encouraged each other to go next. “No, you follow Jessica. No, no, really, you should.” There was a hello and a hug from Kerry Washington—I had no idea she and Dee knew each other. There was Charlize Theron, Sandra Bullock, Jennifer Lawrence, Amy Adams, and Lupita Nyong’o. Dee gave interviews to Michael Strahan, Ryan Seacrest, Kathie Lee Gifford, and nameless others, definitely more than the three originally planned. It seemed as difficult for Dee to ignore an eager microphone on the red carpet as it was for her to ignore a fan begging for an autograph at a stage door. Even when we entered The Dolby Theater and thought we’d cleared the masses, we passed Naomi Watts, who stopped Dee to wish her luck and tell her how jealous her children would be when they found out that she’d met Idina Menzel.
And while I knew Dee worried that sometimes I followed behind her on the red carpet, or that I was shrinking in her metaphorical shadow, I couldn’t have felt less so. Idina Menzel had made it to the Academy Awards and I didn’t care where I stood, if I was trailing behind her long train or taking a cute selfie with Burt while she smiled for “real” cameras. I was her sister and I was there.
Dee and I took our seats in the center of a row six rows back from the stage. We watched Julia Roberts, Brad and Angelina, Bradley Cooper, and others in front of us greet each other and chat, smile, and laugh like normal people do. In fact, if their tuxes had been from the local rental shop or their dresses from Nordstrom, it could have been a high school reunion or an office holiday party. I was watching friends catch up.
The theater filled and eventually celebrities convening in the aisles ended their conversations and took their seats. Portia de Rossi and Ellen DeGeneres’s mom sat down right in front of us, and Bono took the seat at the end of our row. I’d almost forgotten that I was there for a show until the music started, the audience cheered, and Ellen, the host, made her entrance.
I’d sit next to Dee for only the first twenty minutes or so of the show. Even though “Let It Go” was scheduled as the last musical performance of the nominated songs, Dee needed to leave during one of the first commercials to warm up, change her dress, and adjust her hair and makeup. Heather would take Dee’s primo seat next to me.
From the minute Dee left my side, through all the awards and performances that led up to hers, she was on my mind. I thought about how little rest she’d been getting. Back in New York, Walker woke her up early every day. If/Then rehearsals kept her up late; she was in nearly every scene of the show. Then she had to fly across the country for the Oscars and those rehearsals and that prep.
She’d often laughed about “Let It Go” and how she’d opted to sing it in a higher key because she thought it more fitting of Elsa and her youth. Dee was well aware of how old—or young—her voice sounded. Years earlier she’d auditioned for Tangled, but was told her voice was too old for Rapunzel and too young for Mother Gothel. In fact, that audition was how she ended up becoming Elsa. She recorded “Blackbird” for one of Tangled’s casting directors and the woman loved the recording so much she listened to it over the years. When it was time to cast for Frozen, she suggested Dee.
Dee worked with Kristen Bell and the creative team for Frozen over the course of two years. During that time, Robert Lopez and Kristen Anderson-Lopez’s “Let It Go” helped inspire an unconventional Disney nemesis—not a powerful, evil ice queen with a cold heart but a powerful, complicated sister with a loving heart. Not so different from Elphaba. Not so different from Dee.
Dee loved Elsa. She always gravitated toward the misunderstood, powerful female characters. She enjoyed exploring the relationship between fear and sadness, insecurity and strength, anger and power in the context of formidable women. For the same reason, she also loved “Let It Go.” Furthermore, as a veteran perfectionist and a relatively new mother, she understood the importance of letting go. She’d often been encouraged to lighten up on herself and to stop perseverating on minor missteps. But no matter how relatable Elsa and “Let It Go” were to Dee, even she couldn’t have predicted the song’s success. How could she have known that “the storm would rage on” and on and on with its demanding high note day and night for talk shows at 6 A.M. and 6 P.M. and performances—including the performance that very night—televised for millions? She didn’t know, though that probably wouldn’t have stopped her from changing the key and doing right by Elsa—high notes never bothered her, anyway.
Finally, it was time for Dee’s performance. I watched her walk onto a dark stage and plant herself comfortably in the middle. I pictured the hardy platform heels hidden behind the hem of her dress. They weren’t elegant, but it didn’t matter because no one would see them. Dee preferred to feel sturdy and grounded when she sang, like she drew her power from the earth beneath her. John Travolta walked out to a small portion of the stage off to the left as the Pulp Fiction theme played, and I could feel the adrenaline in my body, the sudden awareness of my heartbeat, my breathing, and then the distracting sound of Mark’s voice in my head: “Plugs, he’s totally got plugs, right?” and I had my own private chuckle at Mark’s fixation on celebrity hairlines. The lights and television cameras were squarely on Mr. Travolta as he read from the teleprompter about his love of the movie musical.
“Here to perform the Oscar-nominated, gorgeously empowering song “Let It Go,” from the Oscar-winning animated movie Frozen, please welcome…” I waited in my seat and Dee waited, standing straight ahead of me in the dark to hear her name announced for the whole world, “… the wick-ed-ly talented, one and only, A-del Da-zeem.”
Who? I leaned over to Heather. “Did he just…” I was going to say, “speak in tongues,” but she cut me off.
“Shhh, not now,” she said. The theater went dark except for a spotlight that shone down on Dee in her cream-colored lace dress and the blue light that lit up the sheets of crystals behind her. The first gentle piano notes of “Let It Go” began and an entire audience of furrowed brows and cocked heads set their confusion aside in deference to my sister, my sister who I’d later learn was clearing a mental path through about ten seconds of what-the-fuck, poor-me, did-that-just-happen, with a deep breath and a focus on Walker, to whom she’d earlier planned to sing.
Dee began. She started out soft and deep, taking her time, her voice like warm maple syrup. With the next verse she shifted into a more hopeful, bright sound, and as she neared the chorus, her intensity grew until there she was in all her glory, belting out that anthem like only she could, sending a shiver up my spine and emotions swirling through the theater. On and on she sang, her voice still building, not Elsa, but Idina. The Idina that doesn’t fit in a box, that’s neither Disney nor Broadway nor pop. Not exclusively fit for the screen, or the stage, or the radio. But Idina who is all of the above. Holding nothing back, she sent the final high note swiftly into the mezzanine, and after she claimed that the “cold never bothered me anyway,” she let her arms drop to her sides. The audience rose to their feet and cheered. It was a drop-the-mic moment. There was a subtle look of satisfaction on her face, followed by a bow. She was poised, but I suspected—or maybe I hope
d—that her inner truck driver had a few choice words for a certain actor whom I didn’t remember seeing at the rehearsals the day before.
Heather grabbed my hand and said, “Let’s go. I’m gonna kill John Travolta.” We sidestepped our way past the neighbors in our row, but when I got to the end, I realized I was face-to-face with Bono and his rose-colored glasses. In the fever and haste that filled the minute after Dee’s performance, and the stardust that filled the few inches between his face and mine, I forgot about being calm and steady and instead I blurted out, “Mysistersaysthankyoufortheflowers,” as if the sentence was one long, multisyllabic word. I threw a wide uncomfortable grin across my face and then took off down the aisle, trying to keep up with Heather. I left Bono behind, probably wondering who the hell I was and why I felt it was appropriate to shout in his face.
Dee’s dressing room was packed with people, and it wasn’t long before we realized two things: One, John Travolta’s flub might give Dee more exposure than performing at the Oscars alone. Social media was already busy trying to come to an agreement on exactly what Mr. Travolta had called Dee and how to spell it phonetically. I thought Twitter and Facebook were jumping the gun. I still entertained the possibility that he wasn’t saying Dee’s name at all but rather had been body-snatched by aliens trying to get a message to a compatriot in a nearby galaxy. And two, we realized that “Let It Go” had just won the 2014 Academy Award for Best Original Song. It was a good night!
Dee had to make a red-eye flight back to New York. The previews of If/Then were starting that week and she needed to be at tech rehearsal the following day. We had limited time to attend after-parties but managed to stop in to the Vanity Fair party for about an hour, just enough time to learn that Anne Hathaway is more beautiful in person than on screen and that celebrities really are just like us, because even the ever-so-elegant Jenna Dewan Tatum had to pump milk for her baby in a public restroom.
It was around 1 A.M. when Dee and I sat in our big black Escalade in front of the hotel and I helped her unclasp her diamond necklace. We had signed insurance documents for our diamonds the night before and been educated about their “chain of custody”—a term that sounded familiar to me only because of my addiction to poorly scripted television crime dramas. I signed what papers I was asked to without asking why. I did, however, pay close attention to the plan for the jewels’ safe return, and unfortunately, the responsibility was largely mine. I was instructed to put Dee’s jewels in my purse before she left for the airport and then take them, along with my own, back to the safe in my hotel room, where Leslie would pick them up from me the next morning.
Dee handed me her ring and then her earrings. When I went to put them in my purse we looked at each other quizzically. Now that the moment had arrived, putting the jewels in my purse seemed like a severely flawed plan. There was no zipper, no snug pocket inside, no way to ensure they wouldn’t fall out. Dee and I started to laugh. What the hell were two sisters from a little townhouse in Woodbury doing on Oscar night in a million-dollar-diamond predicament? How had we gotten from there to here?
“Wear them!” she shouted, and I remembered the time she’d said, “Taste it!” back when I was three and she offered me dirt. This time she offered me diamonds, but we easily could have been in the leaves of that backyard in New Jersey because we were wide eyed, playful, and together.
After she put the necklace on me and I slid on her ring, she placed her earrings in my hand and I held them tightly in my fist. Dee was beaming. It made her happy to take care of me, to make me feel like a million bucks, to pull me into the spotlight with her. When Dee expressed concern that I wouldn’t be able to undo the elaborate clasps of the necklace and bracelet on my own, I assured her that it didn’t matter because I didn’t plan to take them off.
“I’m no dummy,” I told her. “I’m totally gonna sleep in them!”
She cackled.
Soon we stood next to the open car door to say our goodbyes. She’d taken her shoes off and I’d recently put mine back on. With my heels on and hers off, I felt like a giant. No one could tell who was the big sister and who was the little one.
I said thank you and she kissed me on my lips.
I said it had been one of the best nights of my life and she wrapped her arms around me.
I said I’m off to case the joint and return the jewels, and she laughed.
I said I love you, and she said I love you too.
And then she left and I was alone again.
Alone, but with a mission, and with the theme to Mission Impossible playing in my head—dun, dun, dah-dah, dun, dun, dah-dah, dunananaa…” I felt for the thick necklace around my neck and confirmed it was still there, then squeezed the earrings in my other fist. I walked over the slick marble floors of the lobby, past a conversation among a small cluster of people, and around a corner to the elevators. A young gentleman in a suit had already pressed the Up button. I smiled at him and then looked down at my feet until the elevator doors slid open. I could feel every diamond on my body as if each one held a weight equal to its worth. My droplet earrings hung heavily from my earlobes. The ring on my index finger felt like a boulder. The necklace resting on my clavicle like a medieval chest plate. The doors opened to my floor and I walked briskly to my room, where I changed my mind about sleeping in the diamonds. I went straight to the safe, removed the jewels, and carefully set each one on the velvet tray, reviewing the inventory to ensure nothing was missing and then locking them away with my favorite four-digit code, 8-0-0-8, or BOOB—I never forget it.
I put on some comfy clothes and lay on the bed with a full face of makeup and my journal. Then, as I often did, I imagined where Dee was at that very moment. Had she made it to the jet yet? It was a lot of work for me to leave my boys and my students in Colorado, but unlike Dee, I was in no hurry to get anywhere that night. Between then and my afternoon flight the next day, my biggest undertaking would be getting the product out of my hair.
If Dee had made it to the tarmac, I knew it was only a matter of minutes before she was asleep and miles away from me once again. But whether miles or that metaphorical centimeter, what did it matter? I always seemed to be aware of a distance between us: physical or emotional or some combination of the two. Was I just a glass-half-empty kind of girl? Always seeing what’s missing instead of what’s there? I hated to think of myself like that, but recalled that the last time my glass was completely full I didn’t even want it; I abandoned it next to a puddle of vomit.
Walking the red carpet and attending the Academy Awards had to fit someone’s ideal of something—glamour, stardom, success? Though I’d never take my experience that day for granted, even attending the Oscars wasn’t perfect. Dee was stressed about staying healthy and skinny. She was working overtime, sleep deprived, and single-parenting a toddler. She was negotiating a divorce and just when she thought she knew what to expect, frickin’ John Travolta happened. For my part, I’d had my dress taken in too much at the waist and could only take shallow breaths when seated, my shoes were tearing up my feet, I was other-than-charming with Bono, and I didn’t get to spend a whole lot of time with my sister.
In my ideal world, Dee and I are neighbors. I pop over in the morning for coffee and we chat briefly about how one of the kids wants to quit martial arts, or painting, or college. She gets a call and realizes she has to be somewhere and I offer to take Walker to school, because I can, because I’m right there and I know where his school is and what time he needs to be there. And a couple of nights later, she swings by my place with a bottle of wine and says thank you and we plop ourselves down on the couch and fall asleep watching Rachel McAdams and Ryan Gosling kiss each other in the rain, until one of our husbands shows up with take-out Chinese. Why can’t life with Dee be that simple?
Before Elsa’s image was on tissue boxes, T-shirts, and waffle irons, I had a freckled first-grade girl in one of my reading groups who asked me about my sister. I played a YouTube video of “Let It Go” for her aft
er group one day. She looked at me and said, “But I don’t get it, Ms. Mentzel. What is she letting go of?” I didn’t know how to respond. Should I lead her into existential waters; the song is about what it means to truly be yourself? Do I tell her that Elsa is letting go of anything and everything that was getting in the way of her being proud and confident? That she was letting go of perfectionism, of whatever it was that made her think she needed to hide, needed to conceal her power? She was letting go of fear? Fear of what other people might think of her, fear of her own strength? Or do I tell her that as we grow up we all have things we’d benefit from letting go of and they’re different for each of us? I wasn’t sure I even knew the answer—not exactly. But I was a teacher and good teachers know that having the answer isn’t always the same as having the understanding, and deep understanding is usually earned through experience.
The answers I could propose to “What is she letting go of?” are the results of my experiences, of having spent my life identifying with strong and complicated women. Women on and off the screen. On and off the stage. Women whose relationships required work, who became better people for having known each other. Women who were similar and different, flawed and funny, but whose relationships compelled them to be their best. Women who were lovers, friends, enemies, sisters, or—like Liz and Beth—two facets of the same woman. Women like Maureen, Elphaba and Glinda, Anna and Elsa. Women like my grandmother. My mom.
Women like Dee and me.