by Gail Rock
As soon as we sat down, I launched into my request about the acting lessons, telling her that we would really appreciate it very much to have a chance to be exposed to someone artistic like her.
She looked startled, then laughed an odd laugh and said she didn’t think she was the kind of teacher we ought to have, and anyway, she had to get back to New York.
I was very disappointed at her refusal. “Boy,” I sighed, “I wish I was going with you. I hate it here sometimes.”
“You don’t know how lucky you are to live in Clear River,” she said. “New York can be a terrible place!”
“I bet I’d love it!” I said.
She smiled. “You probably would.”
I realized then that she really understood. She was the only person I had ever mentioned my daydreams of New York to who didn’t seem opposed to the idea. She actually knew that I was serious, and she knew I’d like it.
“Maybe you’ll get to go someday,” she said.
“Not if my dad has anything to say about it,” I said. “He thinks I should get married or be a schoolteacher or something. He never wants me to do anything that’s exciting!”
“Well, parents are like that. They worry about you. They want you to be safe. My parents were the same way. They didn’t want me to go on the stage.”
“That would have been awful!” I said. “Think what you would have missed! You couldn’t have been a famous actress if you’d stayed here.”
“Well,” she said, “there are other things in life …”
“That’s what Dad always says, every time I talk about being an artist or going to Paris or New York. He acts like it’s going to the moon or something!”
“He just wants you to be happy.”
“Staying here wouldn’t make me happy in a million years,” I said. “I mean, I like it, but I just don’t want to sit around here and do nothing for the rest of my life! I want to see what’s going on in the world! I want to visit every country and eat every kind of food and see every museum and read every book and do something that’s never been done before! I don’t want to be like everybody else!”
I stopped, amazed at myself making that big speech to her. I realized that even though I didn’t know Constance very well, I had told her a lot of things I had never discussed with anyone else. I think she knew that.
She looked at me quietly for a moment and then she said, “I guess I owe you something for what happened yesterday. If you really want me to give you a lesson, I will.”
“You mean it?” I said, excited.
“Sure,” she smiled.
I jumped up and gave her a big hug, then pulled out the two dollars in change we had collected and dumped it on the table in front of the sofa. I said I knew it wasn’t much, but it was all we could afford for the first lesson, and she could teach us all at once in a group. She tried to give the money back to me and said she wouldn’t charge us, but I insisted and said we wanted it to be strictly professional.
I said we would be there at four that afternoon and ran out before she could change her mind again.
Chapter Five
At four that afternoon, we were in Constance Payne’s living room, ready to become great dramatic actresses. She was dressed in a plain blue suit with a white blouse, and she had brushed her hair back neatly and put on makeup. I had been afraid that she wouldn’t take us seriously as students, but on the contrary, she talked to us about acting with great intensity and seemed to believe we really wanted to learn.
We had all been prepared to start out with a big death scene or something equally dramatic from the latest Broadway hit, but much to our surprise she asked us to do something that sounded like a children’s game to us.
Carla Mae and I were to pretend that there was a big spring dance approaching and that I was trying to get Carla Mae to double-date with me. I would go with my favorite boy and she with hers, and the object was for Carla Mae to hesitate to accept and for me to insist on it.
Constance called this “improvisation,” and it seemed rather silly to us … just playing “let’s pretend” like little kids. But just before we started, she whispered something to Carla Mae that the rest of us couldn’t hear. Then she told us to behave just as we would if the circumstances were real, to talk to each other as we usually did.
Carla Mae and I began our imaginary conversation.
“Hi!” I said, not quite sure how to start. “Heard about the big spring dance next week?”
“Yeah,” Carla Mae answered. “Sounds neat.”
“I’m gonna invite Billy Wild, so you wanna double-date, you and Delmer Doakes?”
The others giggled when I mentioned the boys Carla Mae and I liked the best.
“No, thanks,” she answered.
“How come?”
“I just don’t want to, that’s all.”
“Well, why not?” I asked.
“I just don’t.”
“Well, you have to have a reason.”
“Says who?”
“We always do everything together,” I said. “Why wouldn’t we go to the dance together?”
“Well,” she said slyly, “maybe I’ve made other plans.”
“What other plans?”
“Never mind.”
“What is this?” I asked, getting annoyed. “We have a pact not to keep secrets from each other!”
“This is different,” she said.
“Why is it different?”
“You’ll find out,” she said smugly.
“Well, that’s just dumb! Why can’t you tell me?”
“I just don’t want to,” she said.
I was losing my temper. “This is just dumb!” I said, turning to Constance. “We’re supposed to talk to each other like we really do, but she would never do that.”
“Are you sure?” asked Constance, smiling a bit.
“Yeah,” I said, not really very sure at all.
“Keep trying,” said Constance. “Maybe you’ll find out what’s going on.”
I turned back to Carla Mae. “OK!” I shouted right in her face. “Once and for all, what’s going on?”
“I’m not telling,” she said frostily, and sat on the edge of the sofa. The others were snickering.
“All right for you!” I said. “You can just forget about being my best friend.”
“Fine!” she retorted.
“This is really stupid!” I said, leaning over her and trying to intimidate her. “I don’t see how we’re supposed to do this scene if you don’t cooperate!”
“Well, I am cooperating!” she shouted, rising and trying to tower over me. “Constance told me to pretend I already invited your boyfriend myself, and I didn’t want you to find out about it. That’s why I wouldn’t go and wouldn’t tell why.”
Tanya and Gloria howled with laughter, and I groaned and flopped down on the sofa.
Constance laughed. “Now, did that argument seem real to you?” she asked.
Everybody agreed that it had.
“Why do you think it seemed real?” she asked.
“Because,” I said, still burned at being tricked. “She really was keeping a secret from me, and it made me mad.”
“Right,” said Constance. “You weren’t just playing ‘let’s pretend.’ You were really arguing, yet you were doing it in pretend circumstances. Understand?”
“I guess so,” said Gloria, sounding vague.
“You don’t act something,” Constance said. “You do something. You do something real in imaginary circumstances.”
Suddenly I understood what she was talking about, and my anger evaporated. “I get it!” I said excitedly. “That’s neat!”
We were all fascinated with the illustration she had just given us, and I began to believe that there was a lot more to acting than I had ever imagined.
Constance then set up an improvisation for Tanya and Gloria, in which Gloria would describe a new boy she liked, and Tanya would disagree. It worked out very well, with Tanya ge
tting all hot under the collar about how awful the boy was, and Gloria defending him until Tanya tried to end it by pointing out that he wasn’t even a real person, just imaginary. Gloria shut her up by asking if he was only imaginary, then why was Tanya arguing about him. That sent us all into a fit of giggles, and Constance told them they had done very well.
“I didn’t know acting was so easy,” said Gloria.
“Well, it isn’t really,” said Constance, smiling.
“Yeah,” I said. “We’re just making up our own lines so it seems real. What do you do when you hafta read someone else’s lines?”
“Yeah,” said Carla Mae. “Like Shakespeare, that’s so hard!”
“Well,” said Constance, “it’s really the same thing.”
“What do you mean?” asked Gloria.
“Well, you were trying to tell Tanya how much you liked the new boy,” said Constance. “How handsome he was—that he was neat and cute and a sharp dresser. And it’s the same thing when you’re doing something in Shakespeare.”
She paused for a moment, thinking of an example.
“For instance,” she went on, “Cleopatra says that Antony’s ‘face was as the heavens; and therein stuck a sun and moon, which kept their course and lighted the little O, the earth.’”
We were all watching her intently. None of us knew anything about Shakespeare, because in Clear River you didn’t study that until you got into high school, but we knew who Cleopatra was, and we were fascinated with what she had to say about Antony.
“‘His legs bestrid the ocean,’” Constance continued. “‘His rear’d arm crested the world. His voice was propertied as all the tuned spheres, and that to friends; but when he meant to quail and shake the orb, he was as rattling thunder.’”
She said it fiercely, and we watched wide-eyed. She seemed really caught up in it, and I could actually imagine Cleopatra talking about Antony. Certainly Constance was only acting, but somehow what she was saying seemed more real than any of our “improvisation.”
“‘For his bounty,’” she went on, “‘there was no winter in’t; an autumn ’twas that grew the more by reaping: his delights were dolphin-like; they show’d his back above the element they lived in: in his livery walk’d crowns and crownets; realms and islands were as plates dropp’d from his pocket. Think you there was, or might be, such a man as this I dream’d of? … if there be, or ever were, one such, it’s past the size of dreaming …’”
When she had finished, she looked over at us almost as though she had forgotten we were there. We had been spellbound.
I wasn’t quite sure what all the words had meant, but I knew that I had just heard something very special and moving. She was the first real actor I had ever seen, and the experience of watching her become another person in front of my eyes was something I would never forget. I sensed that Constance had within her that same creative secret that I would have to uncover in myself if I were ever going to be a real artist.
The next day, we trooped back to Constance’s house for our second lesson. We were all caught up in the thrill of being actresses. I had been practicing at home in front of the mirror, trying to walk like Constance and trying to copy her British accent. I wrapped my old blue chenille bathrobe around me and swept dramatically up and down my bedroom, pretending I was wearing her black and red kimono.
She didn’t answer when we knocked on the door, and we wondered if she had forgotten that we were coming. Finally, I realized that the door was open, and we went in. We called out to her, but there was no answer.
We tiptoed quietly down the dark hall, thinking she might be asleep, and peered cautiously into the living room. Constance was lying on the sofa, and a bottle of liquor and a glass sat on the table in front of her.
“Hi,” I said tentatively.
For a moment, she didn’t stir, then she turned her head and looked at us. She looked bleary-eyed and pale, as though she were exhausted. “What are you doing here?” she asked.
“It’s time for our lesson,” I said.
“Go on home,” she said irritably. “Haven’t got anything to teach.” She started to sit up and lost her balance, almost falling off the edge of the sofa. She put her hand out toward the table to steady herself.
“She’s drunk as a skunk!” Tanya said in a loud whisper.
“Shut up!” I said, knowing Constance had heard. I turned back to Constance. “Are you sure you’re all right?”
“Just go away!” she said angrily.
“C’mon, Addie!” said Carla Mae. “She’s drunk! Let’s get out of here.”
“Oh, go on!” I said to her, and the three girls all ran quickly to the front door and left.
Constance seemed unaware that I was still there. She reached for a cigarette and sat slumped on the sofa as she lit it. She held the match in her hand a moment too long until it burned her fingers, and she dropped it quickly.
I ran over to her. “Are you all right?”
I had startled her, and she turned angrily toward me.
“Leave me alone!” she said.
“I was just trying to help,” I said. “Maybe I should fix you some coffee or something.”
“Coffee!” she said sarcastically. “I don’t need coffee, I need another drink.” She took the bottle and started to pour more liquor into her glass. I could tell she really wanted to be left alone, but I wasn’t sure I should go. I felt it wasn’t right to just leave her there like that.
I reached for the bottle and tried gently to pull it back from her.
“Let go!” she said.
“But you’re sick … you can’t drink any more,” I said, and desperately tried to pull it out of her hands.
For a second we struggled with the bottle, then suddenly she thrust it toward me. “Take the damn thing!” she shouted, and it slipped out of my hands and shattered on the floor.
“Look what you’ve done!” she shouted. “You stupid little brat!” Her remark hurt me, but I knew she was not herself.
“I didn’t mean to.” I said quietly, and tried to pick up some of the pieces of the broken bottle.
She moved away from me and stood near the fireplace with her back to me. “You shouldn’t be nosing around here anyway,” she said angrily.
“We came for our lessons,” I reminded her. “You told us to come at three.”
“Lessons!” she said sarcastically. “I could give lessons for a hundred years, and it wouldn’t make any difference!”
“You said we were doing good!” I replied, hurt by her remark.
“Good?” She laughed harshly. “It’s pathetic! Not an ounce of talent … couldn’t get a job sweeping the stage!”
She seemed nervous and very distraught, almost out of control. It scared me, but somehow I knew from the tone of her voice that she was just rambling on and that I shouldn’t pay attention to what she was saying. I moved toward her. I thought maybe I could convince her to lie down or eat something.
“Constance,” I said.
“Go away!” she said, her back still to me. She said it in a weary voice, pleading with me to leave her by herself.
I reached out to touch her shoulder.
“Leave me alone, you scrawny little brat!” She turned on me suddenly and threw her drink right into my face.
I was so stunned that for a moment I just stood there, frozen to the spot, liquor running down my face and stinging my eyes. She stood staring at me, empty glass in her hand, as though she couldn’t believe what she had just done.
Then I turned and started to run for the door. Halfway across the room, I turned back to her. “I’d rather be a scrawny brat than an old drunk!” I said, near tears. Then I ran out the front door. As I fled down the steps, I heard her call my name, but I didn’t turn back.
I ran all the way home and burst in the kitchen door. Grandma was baking my favorite chocolate cake, and ordinarily that would have diverted me from almost anything. This time, though, I just threw myself down in a chair and started to
cry all over the kitchen table. Grandma stopped beating her cake batter and wiped her hands on her apron and came over to me. “For heavens’ sake, what’s the matter, Addie?” she asked.
I tearfully told her what had happened and said that I hated Constance and thought she was the most awful person I had ever met.
“She was like a witch!” I said.
“Now, Addie,” said Grandma. “I don’t want to hear talk like that. Even if you’ve got a right to be mad, don’t go sayin’ mean things.”
“I was just trying to help her, and she blew her top! It was awful!”
“Well,” Grandma said, going back to mixing her cake. “I guess she can’t help herself.”
“She was so nice to us yesterday when we had our first lesson. Today she was like a different person. I think she’s crazy!”
“Drinkin’ can make people crazy.”
“Then why do they do it?” I asked angrily.
“Well, I suppose they got somethin’ they just can’t face up to, and liquor helps ’em forget for a while.”
“I just couldn’t believe she was so mean.”
“You mustn’t let such a thing hurt your feelin’s. You just remember that Constance must be hurtin’ a lot worse than you to go and behave like that.”
I knew that Grandma was probably right, but I was too angry to feel charitable. “I think Dad was right,” I said. “She’s just trash!”
“Now I don’t want to hear talk like that. Your Dad’s pretty smart, but he gets some funny ideas sometimes. He don’t show much sympathy for weakness, and he can’t understand people who don’t walk the straight and narrow just like him …”
“Well,” I interrupted angrily. “Nobody should behave like her!”
“It ain’t right to go around judgin’ other people’s lives,” Grandma continued. “That’s the Lord’s business and not ours. You have to learn to be a little forgiving. You can dislike what a person does and still like the person.”
“I wouldn’t ever go near her again!”
“Well,” she said quietly, “maybe you ought not to. But it’d sure be a pity if she didn’t have any friends at all.”