by Anne George
“And you’re being tacky. But we’ll meet you in front of the Alabama at quarter to eight.”
After I hung up, I remembered that I hadn’t told her that Mitzi had dirty-boogied with Elvis. It was going to boggle her mind.
Three
The Alabama Theater is one of the great old movie palaces built in the 1920s. To enter it is to enter a Moorish castle, Alabama style. Every inch of the wall is decorated with plaster moldings of curlicues and flowers and gilded lattice grillwork entwined with lacy vines that look suspiciously like kudzu. Electric candles flicker in niches and when the lights dim, the gilded sky still glows with a pinkish light. Red carpeted stairs like those Rhett carried Scarlett O’Hara up soar from the Hall of Mirrors (the lobby included a concession stand with the best popcorn in the world). Rhett would surely have dropped her halfway up or had a heart attack, though. People huff and puff just getting themselves up those steps. But the principal attraction for Mary Alice and me, when we were children and Mama would take us to movies there, had been the lounge in the basement that had been decorated in someone’s idea of a harem. We spent more time in the lounge perched on the round, red velvet seats inhaling secondhand smoke than we did watching the movies. A lot of times the show was more interesting there. And the dialogue, too.
One thing we never missed, though, was the Mighty Wurlitzer. The lights would dim, a spotlight would come on, and the organ would rise like a red-and-gold calliope on great chords of music and applause. One o’clock in the afternoon, but Mr. Wurlitzer (we really thought that was his name) would have on a tux and would even invite us to sing along with the bouncing ball on the screen. Pure joy.
Like Vulcan, the Alabama fell on hard times. Fortunately it’s in the process of being restored. It’s not quite as bright as it once was, but the Mighty Wurlitzer once again rises in the spotlight and everyone’s hearts beat a little faster.
Mary Alice and Virgil were waiting for us under an old movie poster advertising Love Letters, starring Jennifer Jones and Joseph Cotton. Beside them stood a buxom young blond woman wearing a green jacket and white flannel slacks.
“That’s got to be Tammy Sue,” I said to Fred.
“Tammy Sue looks corn-fed.”
“She’s pretty.”
“I didn’t say she wasn’t. I said she looks corn-fed.”
I gave him my schoolteacher look that, after forty years, bounces right off.
“What?” he asked. “What’s wrong with being corn-fed?”
One more schoolteacher look and then we were smiling and shaking hands with Virgil, who looks like both General Norman Schwarzkopf and Willard Scott. A few tendrils of hair still cling to the top of his scalp; his face is etched with years of military service, including two wars and several awards that Mary Alice says he won’t talk about, as well as almost twenty years as the sheriff of St. Clair County. Well over six feet tall, Virgil is a commanding presence with the sweetest smile I’ve ever seen. Holding his firm grasp, I thought that Mary Alice had herself a prize.
Tammy Sue had her father’s smile. She had a round face and pink cheeks that begged to be pinched. And she was probably a natural blonde with just a little drugstore help. The sunflower bridesmaid dress wouldn’t do her in.
“Isn’t this wonderful?” she said, gesturing at the crowd. “It’s a sellout.”
“I know,” I said. “My next-door neighbor tried to get tickets this afternoon and couldn’t.”
“Larry, that’s my husband, and Buddy, that’s my brother, are going to be nervous wrecks.”
“They’ll be fine,” Virgil said as we started into the theater.
“But there are two new guys who haven’t practiced nearly enough. It has to be synchronized.”
“Synchronized” came out as “thincronized.” On her, it was cute.
“So Virgil, Jr., is ‘Buddy’?” I asked as we worked our way through the crowd.
Tammy Sue nodded. “My mama always said he was her best buddy.” She glanced at Mary Alice and Virgil, who were in front of us. It was a curious look, and I tried to remember how long Virgil had been widowed. Three years? It didn’t matter. Tammy Sue would have mixed emotions.
She gave a slight shrug and turned to me with a smile. “You wouldn’t believe the seats Larry and Buddy have gotten us. They’re in the front row.”
“That’s wonderful. How did they manage that?”
“Larry’s a theatrical agent. He booked half the people who are in the show tonight. Cock Fight is his biggest act.” Tammy Sue beamed proudly.
Fred, who was holding my arm and listening, leaned around me and said he thought that was illegal.
Tammy Sue giggled. “It’s a rock band, Mr. Hollowell. But not far from being illegal. They get pretty outrageous sometimes.”
“Sounds interesting.” I turned and smiled at Fred. “And we’re in the front row.”
He smiled back and mouthed, You owe me.
“I’ll pay.”
Mary Alice and Virgil were doing a great job of running interference through the crowd. Sister’s good at this. Her formidable size and elbows have opened a lot of paths for me. “Don’t be so damned polite,” she’ll say, snatching me along. “And why on God’s earth didn’t you eat and grow?”
Sister is convinced that there are no small genes in our gene pool. Therefore, I must be anorexic. Sometimes she’ll poke me in the ribs like the witch did Hansel and Gretel and say, “Pure bone.” Which can be scary and may, subconsciously, be the reason I haven’t plumped up.
The Alabama has a large stage. When it was built, vaudeville was still popular and no one had dreamed that the screen that was rolled down for the movies would ever be the main attraction. Our seats were so close to the orchestra pit that we could lean over and see the musicians who were tuning up and the Mighty Wurlitzer with its red top and gold music rack. The man we still called Mr. Wurlitzer, though surely there had been dozens of them, had on a white tux and was reading a paperback book while he waited to rise to the heavens.
“This is so exciting,” Tammy Sue said as we settled down. She was sitting in the middle, between Sister and me. With her lisp it came out “ekthiting.” She laughed and put a finger to her lips. “Exciting.” She leaned around Mary Alice. “Did you hear that, Daddy?”
“I heard it, darling.”
“Poor Daddy spent a fortune on speech lessons for me, and I still mess up when I get”—she paused—“excited.”
I could learn to love Tammy Sue. As a teacher, I knew how much teasing she must have received. Virgil and his wife deserved a lot of credit for raising this happy, self-confident woman.
Sister was being unusually quiet. I was facing her as I talked to Tammy Sue and saw her glance around at us several times. But she didn’t attempt to join in the conversation. Not like Sister at all. She was even wearing a black pantsuit, and the rinse Delta Hairlines had put on her hair kept it from being quite as orange as usual. Hmm.
“No, Larry and I don’t have any children yet,” Tammy Sue was saying as the lights dimmed. I leaned over, saw Mr. Wurlitzer toss his paperback off of his platform and sit up straight. And then the magic words, “Ladies and gentlemen, the Alabama Theater proudly presents Henry Taylor at the Mighty Wurlitzer!”
I was a child again as he rose into the spotlighted air, feet pumping the pedals, fingers pressing the keys. The organ gleamed. Mr. Wurlitzer gleamed. Hot damn. Hello, my honey. Hello, my baby.
The audience was his and we sang along. He was the warm-up act, but if there had been nothing else, the audience would have been satisfied. He segued from “Take Me Out to the Ball Game” to “Stars Fell on Alabama,” and we went right with him. He finished with “God Bless America,” and half the audience, confusing it for a moment for the national anthem, stood.
“Irving Berlin and Kate Smith would be proud,” I told Tammy Sue, who had jumped to her feet and sat back down slightly embarrassed.
“Who?” she asked.
“He wrote it. She sang it.”
“Oh. Okay.”
Mr. Wurlitzer began to sink into the orchestra pit as the audience belted out and held the last “home.” I glanced over, saw him turn off the lights on his music stand, give a little wave to the orchestra leader, and hop off his bench even before it had totally reached the bottom. Then he grabbed his paperback and disappeared through a small door under the stage.
The applause died down when the gold curtain began to rise. We were greeted with a night scene. A full, bright moon shone against a backdrop of dark sky and against that moon a girl was silhouetted. Slowly she began to dance as a spotlight gradually lit a male figure on the stage watching her, reaching for her.
“Larry didn’t book this act,” Tammy Sue whispered into my right ear.
“Looks like ballet,” Fred whispered into my left ear.
Whatever. It was lovely. And by the time the two were moving toward each other for an embrace, I was totally lost in the dance and unprepared for the whack against my head.
I jumped. Sister was reaching around Tammy Sue and hitting me with her program.
“What!” I was in no mood to be disturbed.
She said something I couldn’t understand.
“What?” The couple met. He lifted her lightly.
Tammy Sue translated as the couple embraced.
“She says that’s Dusk Armstrong.”
“Really?” I looked at the beautiful spotlighted girl with interest. Mary Alice and I have an acquaintance, Bernice Armstrong, who has three daughters born ten years apart. Dawn was the first, then Day ten years later. That was fine. But Bernice obviously lost her mind when she had the last one or was sending not-so-subliminal messages to her husband, Jerry, when she named the baby Dusk. Dawn is a former Miss Alabama and a model; Day is an assistant manager of a Regent’s Bank. Our prognosis for Dusk’s occupation had never been optimistic. Fortunately we were wrong.
Great, I mouthed back at Sister.
“Here comes one of Larry’s acts,” Tammy Sue exclaimed.
The Briquettes danced onto the stage and did a reasonable imitation of The Supremes. I hoped Larry wasn’t planning on making a living as their agent, but the audience gave them a good round of applause.
It was during this act that Fred dozed off. He missed the jugglers, the tap dancers, Miss Jefferson County, and Miss Point Mallard’s duet. But there was no sleeping through Cock Fight.
All of the lights went out. Total darkness. Then one spotlight popped on to a single man center stage. He was dressed as an eighteenth-century dandy: tight white pants, knee-high stockings, waistcoat, and even a white wig. He stood still for a second, and then he did a slow bump and grind—ending with his pelvis stuck so far out it was unbelievable.
“Ready for loooove.” He moaned.
The audience squealed its agreement. Then pop, pop, pop. Other spotlights on other guys about as ready for love as they could get.
“It’s stuffing,” Tammy Sue explained just before they blasted into an unrecognizable song with, for me, unrecognizable acoustical instruments. I slapped my hands over my ears and looked up nervously. That was old plaster up there on the ceiling. Vibrations like this could cause an avalanche.
Fred’s eyes were open and he wasn’t moving. I poked him with my elbow and motioned for him to put his hands over his ears.
He pulled my left hand down.
“Have I died and gone to hell?”
“Not yet.”
He nodded and covered his ears.
Next to me, Tammy Sue was jumping up and down, squealing, and clapping. Beside her, Mary Alice and Virgil seemed as stunned as Fred and I were. We looked like four hear-no-evil monkeys connected by a jack-in-the-box. Then the spotlights changed colors and I closed my eyes. Thank God our cousin Pukey Lukey wasn’t with us. His motion sickness, which he has never outgrown completely, would never have survived this.
Fred pulled down my hand again.
“What?” I screamed.
“Are those men for real?”
“They’re ‘ready for loooove.’”
He looked so crestfallen, I took pity. “Tammy Sue says it’s stuffing.”
“Pass the word to Virgil.”
But I clasped my hand back to my ear. Let Sister reassure Virgil about his masculinity.
The man who I supposed was the lead singer since he seemed to be the one doing the most strutting, began to rip the brass buttons off of his waistcoat and throw them into the audience. He squatted and tossed one gently to Tammy Sue, who looked as if she might faint. Then he rose, straightened his stuffing, held out his arms, and sailed into the orchestra pit.
The audience gasped. All of us in the front row leaned forward or jumped up to see if he was all right. The orchestra pit was dark and empty. The other members of the rock band didn’t seem perturbed, though, that one of their members had departed, quite possibly for good. They were making as much noise as ever.
“Reckon he’s okay?” I screamed to Tammy Sue.
“Probably. That’s Bobby Joe.”
Bobby Joe, being a rock star, was immune to injuries?
As in answer, he strutted back onstage, a gold-tinsel halo bouncing above his head. The audience went wild.
“I thought for sure he’d broken his neck,” Fred said. He sounded disappointed.
There were fifteen more long minutes. And then, thank God, it was time for intermission.
Tammy Sue’s face was flushed. “Weren’t they wonderful? Can you believe that Larry’s their agent?” She held up the brass button that Bobby Joe had thrown to her and looked at it as if she were a jeweler appraising a valuable stone.
“Must have been paying the preacher,” Fred said.
I put my hand on Fred’s cheek and turned his face toward me. “Enough.”
He grinned and stood up. “I’m going to the bathroom.”
“Take your time.”
“He seems very nice,” Tammy Sue said as he left.
“He usually is. Rock bands just aren’t his type of music.”
“What is?”
“You talking about Fred?” Mary Alice leaned over and joined in our conversation. Virgil, I noticed, had joined the crowd streaming up the aisle. “Last I heard he was into Tommy Dorsey.”
“Oooh, I love Tommy Dorsey,” Tammy Sue exclaimed. She turned to me. “Is Mr. Hollowell a good jitterbugger?”
“Absolutely,” I said, smiling sweetly at Sister.
She smiled back just as sweetly. “You ever heard of the Hollowell Jive of Fifty-Five, Tammy Sue? Fred originated that. Of course, that was back when his joints worked.”
Tammy Sue looked from one of us to the other. “Y’all are kidding me.”
“Now, would I do that?” Sister asked.
“Yes.”
“And you’d be right.” Sister stood up. “Do either of you want to try for the bathroom?”
I shook my head. No way I was going to stand in the line to the ladies’ room which I knew would be snaking up the steps.
“I don’t want to miss the second half,” Tammy Sue said.
The three of us nodded in agreement. Damn men architects.
“I wish I had a choice. Oh, well.” Sister gave a little wave. “See you later.”
“She seems very nice,” Tammy Sue said. “I know Daddy’s crazy about her.”
I nodded. It was going to be interesting to see how Tammy Sue and Mary Alice worked out their relationship. I hoped Tammy Sue wouldn’t be intimidated by her new stepmother.
“Do you think they’re going to get married?”
I had forgotten that Mary Alice and Virgil hadn’t told his children yet. That explained Sister’s unusual quietness tonight. She was nervous about breaking the news. A new role for Sister.
“Maybe,” I said.
“Well, maybe it’ll work out. Daddy’s been needing someone. And Mary Alice seems so easy to get along with. I really like her.”
Easy to get along with? Lord have mercy.
“I just hope, if th
ey do, that it’s a little wedding, and that she’s not planning on me wearing a bridesmaid dress. I’m done with that. Last time I was in a wedding I had to wear the most god-awful yellow dress you ever saw, and I said to myself, ‘No more, Tammy Sue.’”
Oh, joy. Welcome to the family, Tammy Sue.
We had a wonderful fifteen minutes of conversation. I told Tammy Sue about Haley and the baby. She told me about her job as a realtor, that she and Larry had been married for five years, that her brother, Buddy, was still drifting, she thought. An Elvis impersonator? Get real. It was fun for Larry, but sometimes she thought Buddy really believed he was Elvis. He needed to settle down, get a good job, and find a nice girl to marry.
Members of the orchestra began to wander back into the orchestra pit. Fred and Virgil came down the aisle.
“Did you see Mary Alice?” I asked.
Virgil nodded. “In the line outside the ladies’ room. You ought to see that line.”
“We see them every day,” Tammy Sue said.
Neither man looked concerned. Hah. Nicholas and Alexandra hadn’t been concerned, either. Soon the great bladder revolution, boys.
The lights dimmed and the Mighty Wurlitzer rose from the floor again to begin the second half of the show. The organ was so well lighted that the women trying to get back to their seats weren’t having too much trouble. By the time we sang “Cuddle Up a Little Closer,” “Alexander’s Ragtime Band,” and Mr. Wurlitzer had segued into what he announced was the hymn du jour, “How Great Thou Art,” the audience was settling down—even Mary Alice, who was breathing heavily and fussing, “Who the hell’s idea was it to put the bathrooms in the basement?” as she stumbled over Virgil’s feet.
Fortunately the audience was belting out the last line of “How Great Thou Art.”
Tammy Sue patted her on the arm sympathetically.
We sat back to enjoy the rest of the show. There were the usual jugglers, comedy routines, one spectacular group of contortionists that Fred said it hurt him to watch and which Tammy Sue said was one of her husband Larry’s acts. And then, according to the program, it was time for the dancing Elvises.
The music was “Jailhouse Rock,” and fifteen Elvises came from each side of the stage, thirty Elvises in all. They were short, tall, skinny, paunchy, but still eerily alike with their black hair, sideburns, and white jump-suits. They danced onto the stage with a sort of sidestep, then joined arms, bowed to the audience’s applause, and then broke apart. We soon caught on that there were four stars who got to come to the front of the stage and do their version of Elvis dances. One turned cartwheels and did splits, which I had never seen Elvis do, but he was good at it and got a round of applause. One was wonderful, dirty-boogying and sweating.