By Saturday afternoon, fear had settled over them like a cloud. Because Jessica was not doing well. She stumbled over lines she knew perfectly well and had been practicing at home all week. She forgot cues; she forgot the new blocking and found herself lurching around the set because she thought she was holding up the others. They could not get through more than two or three lines of dialogue before they had to go back and try them again.
"A disaster," Edward growled backstage after the first rehearsal. "My whole life is riding on this play; I put my future in her hands and she's destroying it. I can feel it crumble; there won't be anything left."
Jessica heard him through the thin wall of the women's dressing room, where she was being fitted for alterations to her wardrobe. She looked down and met the eyes of the wardrobe designer, who was pinning her skirt.
"Fuck 'im," the designer said, making no attempt to lower his voice. "I saw you in The Crucible and you were fantastic. There ain't nothin' you can't do. You'll make him look like a horse's ass. Which of course everybody knows he is." Jessica laughed. "Now that's better," he said. "You hear him sounding off again, you come to me. There's always the other side, you know. Mustn't lose sight of it."
"Thank you," Jessica said gravely. "I think you're very wise. I'm glad you're here."
The trouble was, she could not get used to standing still on the stage and letting others come to her. All morning, she had instinctively sprung to her feet, or taken a step forward, propelled by the emotions of the dialogue, only to be brought up short, remembering. She felt like a stick of wood, propped like her cane against the desk, or stuck on the couch, or standing between two pieces of furniture.
And she thought the others were always aware of the differences between her and Angela, too polite to say anything, pretending not to notice that she was thin and stooped where Angela was tall and assertive, that she
looked older than her years where Angela had looked exactly the right age, that she could not use the blocking she herself had worked out, while Angela had been able to do anything.
Instead, they were being very kind. Nora had said, "Oh, I do like your hair. What a good idea." Whitbread Castle had said, "Very nice. You look younger, if I may be so bold as to say so." Edward had been surprised. "I liked the way you looked before."
Because, in Edward's melancholy world, no one should be good-looking.
"You look grim," Hermione said. "Relax. It will come."
"It should still be there. Like bicycle riding: once you know how to do it, you never forget."
"You're rusty, that's all. Out of practice. Loosen up, Jessie; you're making everybody as nervous as troops going off to war."
"That's what it's beginning to feel like."
But when they returned to rehearsal that afternoon, she masked her fear and frustration and concentrated on her lines. She stumbled less over words and phrases, but she had no vitality and the others reacted by walking through their parts as if they were automatons.
"Not great," Hermione said when they had struggled through all three acts. "But it's only Saturday. We have plenty of time. Are we coming back tonight?"
Jessica shook her head. "Everybody needs a break. Tomorrow at eight."
"I'll tell them. How about dinner tonight? Do you want to come over and laugh or cry or just talk?"
"No. Thank you, Hermione, I just want to be quiet." She drove home slowly, no longer hurrying to find a letter waiting for her. She unlocked her door and barely glanced at the empty fax machine. She took Hope's leash and walked outside with her, then came back, automatically looking that way again, though she had told herself not to. Finally, with Hope curled up beside her, she sat on the couch, nibbling leftovers from the refrigerator, drinking coffee, going over every line of the play.
What was wrong with her? It was more than being forced to stay in one place; more than self-consciousness about her looks. She knew her lines, her emotions, her expressions; she knew her moves, the few that she had. But the exhilaration she remembered so clearly—that moment, like a wrinkle in time, when suddenly she would break through a barrier and become her character—was not there. I've lost it, she thought. I'm like a
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dancer whose body can no longer do the stretches and swooping bends it once did. I had a talent, but I didn't nurture it, and it shriveled and died.
The telephone rang. Lul^e. Finally.
"Jessica?" It was Nora. "I hope you don't mind my calling, but I just wanted to tell you that I know how it feels to be doing badly, I mean, you know, not doing as well as you can, and you mustn't worry, because it will get better, really it will, and we're all sure you're going to be absolutely great."
"Thank you," Jessica said. "You're very kind."
When she hung up, she was smiling. The wonderful irony cut through her self-pity and frustration. Nora, she thought, who has done almost nothing in the theater, consoling Jessica Fontaine, encouraging her, telling her she'll be absolutely great.
Well, then, I will be.
She remembered something Constance had written when they were beginning rehearsals for Mrs. Warren's Profession. Bringing the box of letters to her lap, she scanned them until she found it, a quote from a director named Alan Schneider.
"There are no secret shortcuts, there are no formulas, there are no rules. There's only yourself and your talent and your taste and your choices."
The next morning— Sunday; only two more days —she arrived at the theater before everyone else. She walked across the dimly lit turntables, coming at last to the place at the desk where she would stay for most of the first act. She stood there for close to an hour, her thoughts floating free: she was part of the stage, part of the set, part of the theater. When the others arrived and Dan turned up the lights she blinked, as if awakening. "We'll go straight through," she said as they took their places, "but we'll stop whenever anyone has a question or a comment."
There were no questions or comments. It went more smoothly; everyone felt it and a few times they seemed to relax. Jessica had laid the new blocking diagrams in key spots on both turntables, and simply knowing they were there helped them remember their moves. And, as their movements became more natural, they could concentrate on their lines and on the way Jessica spoke hers. She still stumbled over words, and missed cues, but fewer than before, and they were all so absorbed they barely noticed it. What they did notice was that they responded to Jessica differently from the ways they had responded to Angela, and because of that they heard new
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meanings in their lines and discovered new ways of relating to each other. By the end of the second run-through, though they still were having problems, they all knew that the play was becoming richer and more intriguing than at any time before.
"I'd like to go through it again this afternoon and after dinner," Jessica said. "Does anyone mind?"
"No," Edward said, surprising them all. "It's getting quite interesting."
On Monday— the day before we open —the morning rehearsal went almost without a hitch. "We're getting there," Whitbread said outside the dressing room. "I think we're definitely on top of it."
"Jessica is not good," Edward said, his voice despairing. "She's not alive. She seems distracted and—oh, God, I don't want to believe this— afraid."
Once again, Jessica met the eyes of the wardrobe designer, who was making a final alteration on the sleeves of the evening gown she would wear in the third act. "Assholes never learn," said the designer sadly. "Greatness works slowly. If I had to design a dress in half an hour, what would it look like? A lunch bag with a buttonhole. Don't they know you need time?"
We have today, tonight and tomorrow morning.
"Forget that you're the director," Hermione said as they finished lunch. "I'll be the director. I'm sitting in the fourth row counting the times you blink."
"I'm blinking a lot?"
"Not more than usual. If you
do I'll let you know. Now listen carefully. I want you to forget everything but Helen. That's what you always did before, isn't it, thought of nothing but your part? Well, how did you do it? You and Constance: how did you do this transformation you're always telling me about?"
"I don't know. At some point it just happened."
"Then do that now."
"Do what?"
"Let it happen."
"But—"
"You're blocking something. Maybe you're still hung up on how you look. Maybe you're afraid you'll be wonderful because then you'd agonize over why you wasted all those years. But those years are gone, Jessie, this
362 ~ Judith Michael
is now, and you are going to be Helen. Let it happen; let the past go."
"But we never completely get rid of the past. That's the theme of this play."
"Then use it. Use your past to make us believe in Helen. Damn it, you ought to be able to do that. That's your job. That's what you're good at."
They began again, a little before two in the afternoon. This was a full dress rehearsal, with makeup, lights and props. In the third act, Jessica wore an evening gown of deep red satin, closely fitting, flared at the hem, the long sleeves ending in lace that lay lightly over the backs of her hands. When she took her place, Whitbread rushed up to her. "My God, Jessica, I am stunned. I mean, the makeup, the dress, your hair ... I am stunned. No wonder Helen impresses everyone. Such an impressive woman!"
"Not bad," said Hermione complacently. Before she took her seat in the audience, she whispered to Jessica, "If you're as free of your fears as you look, we haven't got a thing to worry about."
Jessica watched the others take their places. Free. That was what the theater was all about. The freedom to explore new worlds, to learn more about human nature, to discover and rediscover the wondrous variety of life.
The freedom to grow from the past to the present.
And she knew that, for the first time, that was how she felt. Free.
The opening lines of the third act were spoken by Edward and Nora, in their apartment. Then Jessica spoke, standing beside the couch in her apartment, talking to Whitbread. And that was when, in an instant, she caught fire, and became the Jessica she had been. And became Helen.
It happened so easily that it was a few seconds before the others reacted. But then Nora said, "Oh!" in a short gasp and Edward dashed from his set to Jessica's, to see her face.
"Places!" Hermione said sternly from her seat in the fourth row.
Edward half turned to her. "I just wanted—"
"We're rehearsing," Hermione snapped. "Jessica, as soon as Edward is ready, would you repeat your last line.?"
With frustrated backward glances, Edward returned to the other set. Jessica had not moved; she still faced Whitbread, her body holding the sense of urgency it had had when she had begun. And, as Hermione was the first to see, her stoop seemed almost gone. Somehow she had moved her shoulders just enough to give the illusion of standing straight, her head high.
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Thank you, God, Hermione breathed. She wanted to do a dance, she wanted to shout, but she sat still, her clipboard in her lap, and scrawled HALLELUJAH across the top sheet of paper. Backstage, Dan Clanagh and the wardrobe designer grinned at each other. The lighting director, in his booth high up in the back wall of the theater, nodded, as if he had known all along that everything would work out down there. And from that moment on, it did not occur to anyone in the theater that the woman standing by the desk had a stoop and a limp, that her face was thin and lined and her body frail. As the play moved to its conclusion, all they saw was Helen. And they believed in her.
Tuesday morning the final dress rehearsal did not go well and Jessica called it off at the end of the first run-through. "We've overdone the rehearsing; we need to get away from here. Go home and relax. Take a ferry ride. Do yoga in the park. Meditate in the Chinese Gardens. Think about anything but the play. I'll see you back here at six. I think you're all wonderful and we're going to give a splendid performance tonight."
"We think you're wonderful," Nora said. "You're so exciting to watch, Jessica: the way your voice changes, and how you stand and sit, even the way you put your hand up—you know, like this—and brush back your hair ... I mean, I've never seen you do that."
"Because that's something Helen does," Edward said. He touched Jessica's arm. "Dear Jessica, we have so much catching up to do. I'll call you early tomorrow and we'll take the whole day, go somewhere private, get to know each other again. We've been apart much too long."
She looked at him blankly. What was he talking about? But as the silence stretched out and she saw the folds in his face deepen, his lips tightening and pulling down, she knew she could not risk tonight. Tomorrow he would be on his own, but for tonight, she could not risk anything. Tonight they needed Edward at his best.
"We'll talk in the morning," she said softly. "After Sydney discovers its newest actor, tonight."
"We could have dinner first." He took her hand. "We've waited a long time."
"I never eat before a performance. I suggest you don't either. Unless you don't get nervous before going on."
"I do."
"Then it's better to have an empty stomach." She smiled at him and
364 ~ Judith Michael
went to join Hermione, who was waiting in the wings. "I hope you don't mind that I sent them all home. We were—"
"Stretched too thin. I know. You did exactly right. What are you going to do this afternoon?"
"I think I'll go to a movie."
"What a good idea. Would you mind if I tagged along.?"
"I'd like that."
"By the way, I won't be back here at six. Do you mind?"
"No, it's not necessary."
"You haven't asked, but the fact is, I have a date."
"On opening night?"
"I got him a ticket."
"That's nice," Jessica said absently. "We're sold out, aren't we?"
"We are sold out for four weeks. Between Varden's review and the theater parties, we're into April. Which makes all us investors very happy. What movie are we going to see?"
"Let's get a newspaper and throw darts. Whichever one we hit."
It turned out to be an American film, a deafening jumble of machine guns and bloody cries of pain, bodies smashing through plate-glass windows and an occasional lull for the lead actor and actress to tumble into bed. "Good sex, lousy story," Hermione said as they drove home. "Reminds me of an affair I had once. Why do filmmakers think people like all that mayhem?"
"Because a lot of people do like it."
"Probably reminds them of their home life. Are you nervous?"
"Yes."
"You're terrific, you know. Have I told you that? There's something magical about the way you turn into Helen; you'll have them on their feet: standing ovation, cheers, applause, the whole thing."
"It's bad luck to say that before a performance."
"They won't move, they won't applaud, they won't even clap politely."
Jessica laughed. "I love you, Hermione. I couldn't have done anything in these past months without you. Go home to your date; I hope you have a very sexy dinner."
Hermione pulled up in front of Jessica's house. "You know you're a lovely lady. I've never had as good a friend or anyone as fine to work with. This is going to be your night, not mine—"
"Our night."
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"—and you deserve it. You deserve all the good things in the world. You're the best person I know, and a great actress." She kissed Jessica on both cheeks. "I'll wish you luck now. Or is that bad luck, too.?"
"Not coming from you." She watched Hermione drive away, then went into her house. She glanced at the empty fax machine and felt a sharp pang of loss. She wanted Luke to be there. The excitement of yesterday had not been perfect, because he was not there to share it. Oh, damn, damn, dam
n, Luf{e. Why couldn't you be here?
A cup of tea, she thought. A hot bath. Then a book or a magazine, or just staring out the window, gathering strength. And then the theater.
I've done it so many times. It's just a routine by now.
But by the time she arrived at the Opera House, very early, and parked in the underground garage, she was trembling so that she could barely walk. The next two hours were a blur. She did her makeup, with help from the expert Hermione had hired; she dressed and organized her other clothes to make sure they would be ready when she needed them; she checked props to see that they were all laid out; she spoke to the cast, encouraging them, helping them with a line or phrase they suddenly could not, for the life of them, recall because they were gripped by fear. But she was barely aware of any of it, until Dan went through, calling, "Places for act one, everybody."
She stood in the wings, waiting for the houselights to go down so that they could move onto the set, in the dark, and be in their places when the stage lights came up. Her breathing was quick and shallow, her stomach was a knot of fear. To distract herself, she looked through the small opening in the wall, invisible from the other side, to see if the house was indeed sold out, and if the audience was settling down.
And she saw Luke.
He was sitting in the sixth row, on the aisle, in animated discussion with Hermione. His profile was to Jessica, so familiar but so strange: his sharp features and heavy eyebrows, his deep-set eyes and wonderful smile. In one hand he held the program, in the other the insert that announced Jessica's starring role.
She stared at him. She could not believe he was there. Why had he come, without telling her? I have known him for one week, she thought, and I love him with all of my being. But maybe I don't know him at all. Why is he here? Why didn't he answer my letter?
Hermione knows.
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Acts of Love Page 43