by E. Lockhart
Nanette: No one ever pinches me.
Demi: I’ll pinch you.
Nanette: I don’t want you.
Demi: Why not?
Nanette: I want a hetero boy to pinch me.
Lyle: Want me to go downstairs and find you one? I can do it. I know for a fact that Frankie lives on the top floor. It would take me like forty seconds to get him to come up here and pinch you.
Nanette: No! No!
Lyle: Prime hetero pinching from Frankie. What more are you asking for? I can deliver it right away!
Sadye: We’re degenerating, seriously.
Nanette: Do not go and ask Frankie to pinch me.
Lyle: Okay, okay. I was just trying to help.
Sadye: Nanette, you don’t need pinching. I’ve got no pinching. Look at me!
Nanette: What?
Sadye: We don’t need pinching. We can be happy without boys.
Nanette: Aw, come on. If Theo pinched you, you wouldn’t be anti-pinch. You be totally pro-pinch.
Sadye: Well, that’s Theo. That’s not generalized pinching. That’s Theo pinching.
Nanette: What’s the difference?
Sadye: The difference is you’re not supposed to want general love. You’re supposed to want love from someone in particular.
Nanette: Is that feminism?
Sadye: Maybe. I don’t know. Isn’t it just self-confidence? Like, you don’t need a man.
Lyle: What, Sadye, don’t you need us? We need you!
Demi: Since when is pinching the same as love? Pinching is not the same as love.
Sadye: It is in this conversation.
Nanette: I don’t care if I’m supposed to want it or not want it. I just want it. Love from hetero boys, love from audience members, love from the world.
Lyle: But not from Frankie.
Nanette: That’s right.
Sadye: We love you, Nanette. Isn’t that enough?
Nanette: No. I want hetero boys and the whole world.
Sadye: I better turn this recorder off before we say anything more incriminating.
(shuffle, click)
NANETTE could cry on cue. “I taught myself after I made this straight-to-video movie,” she told us at lunch one day.
“Wait, you were in a movie?” Demi asked
“Oh, yeah, but it was a little part and it sucked,” said Nanette. “It’s my sister who’s going to have the movie career, probably. At least that’s what my dad says.” She drank some cranberry juice and went on. “Anyway, the director was this complete jerk, and this boy and I had a scene where we had to cry because our mom was dead—it was like a mystery thriller—”
“Who else was in it?” Demi wanted to know.
“Oh, that guy from TV, Michael Rapaport; it doesn’t matter, I didn’t get to meet him,” said Nanette. “I was just in the one scene. Anyway, we had to cry and whatever, I was like twelve and the kid was only six, and I guess this director didn’t work with kids a lot, because we weren’t crying, and we weren’t crying—I mean, we tried, but we couldn’t—and the boy started laughing, and the director just yelled and screamed at us, telling us we were awful actors and bad people and he was disgusted by us—until we both started to cry for real. Then he rolled the cameras, got the shots he needed, and told us we’d done a great job.”
“That’s horrible.”
“Whatever. It happens all the time on films.” said Nanette. “Because they need the shot, and you’re wasting everyone’s money if you can’t do it. So then I spent like a million hours looking in the bathroom mirror and learning how to make myself cry on cue. So now if they ask me to cry, I say, ‘Which eye do you want?’”
“How do you do it?” asked Demi.
“I used to think about how my brother died—I had this brother who died when I was like four and he was six—but now I just think Cry—and I do.”
“Do it,” said Demi.
“Yes, do it!” I pushed.
And Nanette did. She wiped her mouth delicately, stared into space, and then her face crumpled and tears started dripping down her cheeks.
Then we felt bad. Or at least I did. I mean, Nanette has spent most of her life being a trick pony for grown-ups. She didn’t need to be a trick pony for her only friends.
STILL, when Morales announced in class that we were going to spend a few days working toward crying on cue, I was interested. I thought, if I can do this, then I’ll know I’m an actress—and none of the badness of this acting class will matter.
If I can do this, I’ll know I belong here.
“There are four approaches to crying for the actor,” Morales announced, striding back and forth in front of us as we sat on the floor. “One. You call up a miserable life experience in your past. You imagine it, focus on it, until you feel like crying. This might be useful for film actors who have to do a reaction shot, but it’ll take you out of the moment when you’re playing a part onstage, because when you’re onstage you need to stay in character. That’s why I don’t believe in the Method, and why I don’t teach it.
“Two. A variation on the first one. You imagine your mother dead, your dog dead, your best friend. Not something that happened, but something hypothetical. You do it with intense concentration until you cry. I have problems with teaching this approach, as I have problems with the Method approach, because it takes you out of character. But you can see that it involves some imaginative projection, rather than dredging up memories, so it is closer to acting, as I see it.
“Three. You learn what crying looks like. The lower lip quivers. The crier clamps the lips together as if trying to stop. He looks down. Blinks back the tears. You take some time to look at yourself crying and you note the expression so minutely that you can mimic it on demand. Very often tears will follow once the rest of your body is there.
“Four. You enter so deeply into a character’s inner life that you weep because your character weeps. You feel the emotions of your character and cry because he needs to cry.
“So: I posit that if we begin with the second approach—and you cry, then we can take a moment and study ourselves in this state. We can master the particular physiognomy of our own tears—what do the shoulders do? What do the facial muscles do? Where do the hands want to go? And begin to replicate them, as one does in approach number three. Practicing this imaginative projection and then self-observation will make you more fluid, more open to the emotions you’ll need for a character who’s going to cry. Then we’ll take that fluidity and we’ll work on new monologues for the rest of the summer, so you guys can get to the point of approach number four, where your character’s emotions can take you to that point. Got it? Good.”
He dimmed the lights and had us all lie on the floor. Then he took us on a guided visualization—like those Reanne had done at the start of Midsummer rehearsals—only this one was designed to make us weep. We were at war, he said. Our homes were vandalized by enemy soldiers. We were to picture our own homes, our own parents, our living rooms.
And then our furniture trashed, our belongings set fire.
Our parents murdered. Our bodies violated.
Our dogs and cats strung up by the neck.
Within ten minutes I was crying, half from the visualization, and half from a mad and frustrated urge to run out of the rehearsal room. It felt so wrong being trapped in there and forced to imagine these horrible catastrophes. I longed to stand up, yank open the door, and walk out of Morales’s classroom forever. Just to go into the sunlight and the air, away from this fabricated horror.
“You may sit up now,” said Morales. “I’m going to raise the lights a bit, and I want you to move over to the mirrors and find a space for yourself. Look at your face. Look at your backs, your legs, your shoulders, your hands. Feel the rhythms of your breath, remember how your throat feels. Sense memory, people, sense memory.”
I got up and walked to the mirror, tears still streaming down my face. I could see that some people were crying and others were not, but I didn’t f
eel the sense of accomplishment I’d thought I’d feel if I managed to cry.
I felt manipulated and angry. Trapped.
Because I had to stay. If I walked out now, how could I come back? It would be like walking out on my dream of being onstage. Admitting failure just when I’d finally had a glimpse of what it felt like to be part of a decent show.
And yet, I hated what Morales had made us do. It wasn’t anything I’d ever wanted, to have my emotions jerked around like that by someone I didn’t even like. It wasn’t what I’d meant when I’d asked him how to get there.
I sat, crying and staring at myself in the mirror.
Finally he brought up the lights and asked us to discuss the physical qualities we’d noticed in ourselves, whether we’d actually wept or not. People raised their hands and said stuff. I wasn’t listening.
As we filed out of class, Morales tapped me on the shoulder. I stayed while everyone else went out. “You made progress today,” he said. “You should be proud of yourself.”
For a second I thought, Oh, thank goodness he’s noticed me. He thinks I’m improving. Tamar must have told him I’m good as Rumpleteazer. I’m improving, I’m an actress; Mr. Jacob Morales thinks well of me.
And then I remembered how I felt, and I said, almost without meaning to: “I had a problem with the exercise, actually.”
“What?”
“Your actors might trust you to direct a play, because you’re very good at what you do—”
“Of course they do,” he said.
“I admired you so much when this all started,” I said. “A real Broadway director, someone who can make a show click. But now—maybe this exercise works when a group of students has terrific trust in a teacher, maybe it works when people aren’t afraid to walk out if they can’t stand it, but you—we’re terrified of you.”
“Pardon me?”
“All I could think about while I was lying there was that it gave you some kind of joy to make all of us cry.”
“What?”
“You were manipulating us, like puppets. And none of us had the guts to leave, because you control our lives here.”
“You can’t deny it had an effect on you.”
“Maybe it did—but you can’t take a whole group of kids who are scared sick of you and then make them feel like their parents are dead and their pets are strung up by the neck. It’s not right. It’s not acting.”
Morales held up his hand to stop me. “That’s enough. This is not your place.” He walked to the door. “Your place here is to study and learn. I’m sorry to see you’re so blocked and so angry, Sadye, but it’s none of my concern.”
And he was gone.
Thing was, part of me felt happy that he knew my name.
I WANTED to talk to Demi about what happened. I ran out to look for him, but he’d already gone to his singing class, which was different from mine.
I went through the rest of the day with this strange adrenaline rush from my argument with Morales. Went to lunch with Nanette and Candie, Midsummer rehearsal, Restoration Comedy, dinner with the girls from that class, and an hour of Cats rehearsal, eight to nine p.m.
They let me and Jade out to make room for another group of dancers, and we went back to the dorms. None of my friends would be back from rehearsal for an hour or more. I took a shower and changed into regular clothes.
Then I went outside with the intention of going up to the boys’ roof with a flashlight and a book until everyone else got free.
Before I reached the stairs, though, I ran into Theo.
“Hey,” he said. “I thought you were at Cats.”
“Got out early.”
Theo smiled. “I heard you talked back to Morales.”
I nodded. I had told Nanette at lunch, and Nanette could never keep her mouth shut. I changed the subject. “Didn’t you have Midsummer principals?”
“Reanne let us out.” He shrugged. “She wants to work Bottom and Titania. That girl still has no idea what she’s talking about.”
“Titania?”
“Yeah. I wish someone would explain to her what her speeches mean.”
“I tried.”
“Really?”
“I think I was nice about it. But she was unamused.”
“That’s our Sadye.”
“What?”
“Poking in the nose.”
“What, am I obnoxious?”
“Maybe.”
“I am?”
“A little.”
“You think I’m obnoxious?”
“That came out wrong.”
“What right way is there to tell someone she’s obnoxious?” I asked, hurt.
“I didn’t say obnoxious. You said obnoxious,” answered Theo. “I mean . . .” He sighed. “Here. Come walk with me. Don’t be mad, you’re not obnoxious.” He took my arm and walked us out of the dorm and down the path toward the dance studios. “You care, right?” he said. “You speak up. That’s why you complained to Morales about that acting exercise, that’s why you kvetch at Reanne, that’s why you try and help Titania. All this stuff matters to you. I don’t see anyone else caring that much.”
“Reanne thinks I need to be more of an ensemble player,” I said. “She said maybe I shouldn’t be an actor if I need to be irreplaceable.”
“Nah,” Theo said as we walked into the open dance studio where we’d first met. “You have strong opinions. That can be good in a lot of contexts.”
“But not in this one.”
“I don’t know.” Theo sat down at the baby grand and played a few chords. “What do you want to hear?”
“How about ‘Seasons of Love’?”
“Ah, Rent. Yes, I can play Rent,” he answered. And launched into it.
I sat on the piano bench next to him, watching his fingers move across the keys. Wondering what they’d feel like if he ever touched me. Listening to this music about time passing, looking at all the ways we measure our lives—in minutes or moments of connection, cups of coffee, bridges burned. In love.
I didn’t want the summer to end. Even after what happened with Morales.
After “Seasons of Love,” Theo played the intro to “Sue Me” from Guys and Dolls. “Sing,” he told me.
I shook my head.
“Why not?”
“Because. If there’s anything I’ve learned in my time here, it’s that when people ask me if I sing, my answer should be no.”
“Aw, I’m not asking if you sing,” Theo said, vamping on the piano.
“Yes, you are.”
“No.” He took his fingers off the keys. “I’m asking you to sing.”
“Oh.”
“You know you love it. You should see the look on your face when music starts.”
“I go flat,” I told him. “And I don’t have a lot of range. I was told to lip-synch the Hot Box numbers.” I had never confessed that to anyone before. Not even to Demi.
“So?” Theo seemed unconcerned.
“So, I’m not a singer.”
“This isn’t an audition. This is you and me and the piano.”
I remembered how before I got to Wildewood, Demi and I used to burst into song with zero encouragement. We’d sing on the bus, in the drugstore, walking down the street in Cleveland, jumping on his couch. I’d sing in the shower or while washing dishes. We’d sing along with movies on the DVD player. But here I had stopped. Of course I had to sing every other day in class, but that was always in a group. We did vocal exercises and learned harmonies. We never had to sing alone.
And anywhere but Singing, I had been silent. Making other people serenade me, directing them, dancing while they harmonized. Because I didn’t want people to hear. All those people who could really sing.
Maybe my problem wasn’t what Morales and Reanne implied—that I lacked humility. Maybe my problem was that I lacked confidence.
“Sadye, I’m vamping here.” Theo was playing the introduction to “Sue Me” again, waiting for my Miss Adelaide to swin
g in with her list of lovelorn complaints.
Not that confidence would make me a singer when I didn’t have the voice. It wouldn’t. I would never have the voice.
Theo started singing the Adelaide part himself in a comical squalk. “Okay, okay,” I said, shaking myself out of contemplation. “If you’re that desperate to sing a duet, I suppose I can oblige you.”
“I’m desperate!” he yelled. “My kingdom for a duet!”
“Shut up!”
He started over with the vamp. “No, you. Shut up and sing.”
And so I sang.
And Theo sang.
We sang together, easily, ’cause we’d heard the song a thousand times during rehearsal.
Then we sang “Money, Money” from the movie of Cabaret, and “Anything You Can Do” from Annie Get Your Gun, though we messed up the lyrics.
It was so, so fun. I missed the high notes, and at first I was embarrassed, but then I didn’t care.
When we finished “Anything You Can Do,” I pretended to collapse on the floor from exhaustion. “It’s nearly curfew,” I said, pointing to the clock on the studio wall.
“Nearly, but not.”
“Demi and those guys will be wondering where I am, up on the roof.”
He shrugged.
“Do you wanna go?”
Theo shook his head. “Nah, I’ll stay here. You go along.”
What? Why wouldn’t he want to come? After we’d just had such a good time. “I can’t figure you out,” I finally said.
“What? I’m an open book.”
“No, you’re not.”
“What do you mean?”
I stood up and paced the room. “First you offer to come back to my dorm with me, then you won’t even dance with me. Next you walk with me in the moonlight and then sprint off like I’ve got cooties.
Then you show up at the cast party with Bec.”
“Sadye—”
“I’m not done,” I said. “After that, you come up on the roof a couple times, tell everybody you’re single, and for some unknown reason, never show up again. And now you tell me I’m obnoxious, then drag me out here in the middle of the night.” I folded my arms. “I can’t tell what you think of me, Theo,” I said. “And I have to say, I’m tired of worrying about it. Like me, don’t like me, but don’t play around with me.”