by Erika Jayne
A minute later, out of the darkness emerges a shape walking toward the car. It was like a phantom coming out of the night. “Oh, it’s the police,” the driver said, a bit concerned. It was my son in uniform.
“Don’t worry, I got it,” I told him. As my son approached the car, I rolled down my window to say hello.
“How was the party?” he asked.
“It was good,” I told him. “What are you up to?”
“You know, just working,” he said. “Mom, I think what you’re doing is great. I just want you to know that I’m proud of you.”
When I moved to California, I always knew that my son would eventually come out and live with me. Little did I think it would be under these circumstances, with me living this insane life and him a grown man on the police force. If you ever see me in an alley in Hollywood talking to a cop, know that everything is just fine. There have been quite a few men in my life, but there will never be one more special than him.
6
THINKING GLOBALLY
New York is a brutal bitch. When I got to the city in 1989 at age eighteen, I wasn’t prepared for what making it in show business was really all about. I’m not saying I fell off a turnip truck, but still I wasn’t ready for the pace of New York City.
I was forced to grow up quickly. It was such an adjustment from the South. In the Big Apple, everyone is constantly on the go, and no one—especially casting directors and talent agents—has any time for anyone. I wasn’t expecting them to roll out the red carpet, but I didn’t anticipate an abrupt slap in the face, either.
I had taken more dance classes than I could count. I had some experience in commercials as a kid. And I’d had a great performing arts education that honed my singing, dancing, and acting chops. What I didn’t have was a clue. In high school, the focus was on the craft, not on the business of how to find a manager and agent, or join the Screen Actors Guild, or any of the logistics of becoming successful. Looking back on my education, the practical side of performing arts was definitely missing. If by the time we all graduated we had learned how to network into a job, it could have been a big game changer.
I started looking for work the only way I knew how—by pounding the pavement. Like every other wannabe performer, I’d check all the trades and go to anything that seemed like it might be a good fit. One audition that didn’t seem like a fit was when my girlfriend Justine tried to get me to go with her to the open audition for the In Living Color Fly Girls at the Palladium. I didn’t think I was right for that show, but one girl on the stage that day who was right for it is named Jennifer Lopez.
The New York audition scene was brutal no matter what time of year it was. Any aspiring actress has to look like whatever part she’s auditioning for. If it’s a commercial, she needs to look clean, perky, and cute. If it’s a sexy or pretty role, she wants to be that fresh-faced girl who can land a leading man. I couldn’t show up to any of these auditions looking like I had just rolled out of a Times Square Dumpster. Even at eighteen, I needed money to look good.
I was living with my mother on the Upper West Side and would take the subway to get around. God knows I didn’t have the cash for cabs. In the summer I was walking around in the heat. It’s boiling underground in a subway station that smells like rodent and sewage stew. By the time I arrived at auditions, I would be such a wrecked, sweaty mess that I could barely focus on getting the gig.
In the wintertime, it wasn’t any better. That wind would just cut me in half. I would rush, shivering, from the subway to whatever building was holding the audition. I’d always look like shit, with my red, runny nose, watering eyes, and dry skin from the apartment radiator. In either season, it was like a setup for failure.
When I look back on it I wonder what the fuck did I think I was doing? Only an eighteen-year-old child with big, stupid dreams would attempt this. You’d have to be the most hopeful (and maybe naive) person to think that this was ever going to work.
I didn’t get the chance to go to college, so I made my New York experience kind of like my college—getting out there, socializing, auditioning, getting work, not getting work. Even the experience dancing in go-go bars in Jersey was educational. It taught me a lot about people, both inside and outside of business. When people refer the school of hard knocks, I know exactly what they’re talking about. I graduated from it summa cum laude.
I did have some successes, though. I went to a lot of auditions for all-girl groups, which were popular at the time. Think less the Spice Girls and more like Exposé. One of my first jobs at eighteen was singing with a group called The Flirts when one of their members was on a leave of absence. They had a hit with the song “Jukebox (Don’t Put Another Dime)” and there was always a three-girl lineup, but it changed a bit. I filled in to record a couple of tracks with them.
I didn’t think much of the people who managed the group. Still, I was excited to have the work. We were recording at Quad Studios, which is top of the line (and would later become infamous for being the place where Tupac Shakur was first shot).
The other two girls were Trish and Tracy. Trish was a beautiful blond singer/songwriter. We spent a lot of time together and became close friends. Later, she and Tracy were both bridesmaids at my wedding.
Tracy had a degree from the London School of Economics. She was very bright, so I have no idea why she was messing around with this group. She was from a wealthy family, and her stepfather owned a huge estate in Southampton called Cryptomeria. I knew it was fabulous because it had a hedge maze. Former New York mayor Michael Bloomberg purchased it in 2011.
Anyway, Trish, Tracy, and I would go out there in the summer and hang around for a special treat. We even did a photo shoot for the group when we were visiting once. Tracy’s stepfather, a big shot in the financial industry, told me, “Erika, if you ever do anything, make sure you think globally.” Remember, this was the eighties. Greed was good.
Here I was, a skinny little kid in New York trying to make my showbiz dreams come true, and he’s telling me to think globally. I wasn’t thinking past next month’s rent. However, when it came time to name my business and we wrote up the incorporation papers, I told Tom I wanted to name it EJ Global.
“Why Global?” he asked me.
“Because Tracy’s father told me back in the eighties that if I ever did anything, to make sure it was global,” I explained.
“Okay, Erika. Yeah,” Tom replied.
I can remember being in the recording booth with The Flirts for the first time, really having to pull out some clean vocals. I worked through not being able to hit notes, not being able to hear properly, and bad timing. It was nerves more than anything, but it felt really good when I got it right. I enjoyed those days a lot.
A few months later, I was walking by a record store. I heard the song “Danger” that we had recorded coming out of the shop. The weird thing was that I only heard Trish’s vocals. It’s like they didn’t use anything from me or Tracy. That sucked, because I know I sang the hell out of the pre-chorus.
About a decade later, while driving my car in Los Angeles, I heard another track we recorded. It was on a throwback show on KRRL, 92.3 The Beat. I called the radio station and asked where they had gotten the recording because I wanted a copy for myself. I told them I sang on the track they just played, and they put me right through to the DJ.
“Hey, what was the name of that Flirts song you just played? I’m one of the singers on it,” I told him.
“Really?” he replied. “Do you want to come back and be on our oldies show?”
Oldies show? I wasn’t even thirty! I was slightly insulted.
I also worked with another three-girl group called the I-Dolls. I got to fill in when one of the girls was out. (Maternity leave? Visa dispute? Prison? I don’t remember.) I never recorded with them, but we did live gigs all over New York, even at really big, iconic venues like Red Zone and Roseland Ballroom. Sadly, both of those stages have since been razed to make way for luxury condo bu
ildings.
Both of these groups were already formed by the time I showed up on the scene. It was very clear I was just stepping in for somebody who was away, and that was fine with me. I needed a job and this was a great way to get in and meet people and do some things. Most important, it was a chance to do what I loved most and had trained to do: perform.
I also booked a few acting gigs in New York. One of my first was on the very first episode of this tiny little TV show that no one ever heard of called Law & Order. This was in 1990 with the original police officers: George Dzundza and a pre–Mr. Big Chris Noth.
The episode is called “Prescription for Death.” It was “ripped from the headlines” of the case of Libby Zion, an eighteen-year-old girl who died from cardiac arrest in the emergency room. Overworked intern physicians had given her a prescription drug that caused an adverse reaction to an antidepressant she was taking.
I played Suzanne Morton, the first person ever to die in an episode of Law & Order. (This wasn’t the pilot of the series, but it was the first episode to air.) John Spencer, who went on to play Leo McGarry on The West Wing, played my character’s father, who insists on an investigation after I die. Pretty much the same things happened to my character that happened to Libby Zion, except that the doctor in charge of my character was accused of being drunk on duty instead of overworked.
I got a big death scene on screen, but for all of my hard work, I’m not even on the episode’s IMDb page or its Wikipedia page. Of course, since Law & Order still airs around the clock on cable, occasionally people will recognize my bit part and send me pictures of my scenes on social media. How they recognize my much younger face, I’ll never know.
A few years later, I appeared once again on Law & Order. They resurrected me, this time as a crack addict. I don’t think I even had any lines this time, but fans will still recognize me when it replays on cable. I can’t believe Law & Order cast me twice as a woman on drugs. What are they trying to tell me?
After we got divorced, I put my career on hold for a bit. A year later, I was back on the audition circuit. Once again, I was trying to get my career off the ground.
I auditioned for an independent movie called Alchemy, and I got the part. My character was married to an artist who was having an affair with another artist who looked like me. He died, and she knew about me, but I didn’t know about her. She sought me out, and we became friends. It was a fun role, but it was a bit of a stretch for me. I don’t think I was mature enough. Yes I was a mom at that point, but to play someone who has lost a husband . . . Frankly, I’m a good actress, but not that good.
What I remember the most about it is that we filmed in Delaware, of all places. It was fucking gorgeous. This was right before Halloween, so the pumpkins were out and the leaves had turned, but it was still warm. I remember it was just so beautiful. The movie only ever played the Hamptons Film Festival, but I really enjoyed making it.
I was also in this tacky gangster movie called Lowball, which one of my friends made. He basically wrote a small part for me and asked if I wanted to be in it, and I said yes. I played the wife of a drug-addicted police officer. Apparently, in the early nineties, all anyone wanted to make movies or TV shows about was drugs! It was my friend’s first feature. The movie wasn’t that bad, but the set was chaotic, like no one knew who was in charge.
Like that of any performer struggling in New York, my early career was a litany of near misses, tons of rejection, and occasional quiet encouragement. Juliet Taylor, the well-regarded casting director, would always have me come in to read for parts, though I didn’t get any of them.
Another casting director was always on the hunt for my big break. He would say to me, “This part is just not right, but I’m going to keep looking and I’m going to give you a job one day.”
I would hear no over and over, and it was hard. Then I would get a job and think, Okay, it’s working out. Then I wouldn’t get anything for months. I’d go out for a million auditions and a million dance calls, and then some other girl would get the part. I would be frustrated all over again. As human beings, we want at our core to feel acceptance, love, and acknowledgment that we’re on the right path. We want confirmation. I didn’t have to get every job, but I needed small victories along the way to keep prodding myself in the right direction.
I felt like the powers that be were keeping me offstage. It was horrible. I had to continuously remind myself why I chose my art and why I loved it. Why I chose to navigate this incredibly difficult and brutal business. I did it because I loved the work, the artistic process, the connection. I loved doing it so much that when I didn’t get to do it, my spirit was slightly crushed.
Looking back, the entertainment business is for the birds. Striking it big is like winning the lottery and often makes as little sense. As we all know, talent doesn’t always equal success. I’ve watched as some of the most beautiful voices, the best dancers, and the most incredible actors lost parts to others who didn’t seem as deserving. I would never begrudge anyone their success, but I know the process of constant rejection can be hard for everyone, even the biggest stars on the planet.
After being told no for so many years, I started to wonder what I was missing. Looking back, I finally know the answer. The missing key was a sense of self. I didn’t have the maturity and New York was teaching me these things. I was so full of anxiety, anger, and frustration from constant auditioning, looking for work, and questioning myself. It wasn’t great at the time, but the grinder of New York was exactly what I needed. Without it, I would never have found the confidence and maturity I needed to really blossom later in life.
I really think everyone should try living there for a few years when they’re young and resilient. It will teach them a lot about themselves, their character, and whether they really have the drive that it takes to turn their ambitions into reality.
After the birth of my son, things got even harder for me professionally. My mom would babysit for me, because I didn’t have any money to pay a sitter. I was a woman with a high school education who didn’t know anything other than the performing arts. I would go on auditions, and I wouldn’t get the part. I had a son to take care of. I couldn’t just switch gears and become an unpaid intern somewhere. I couldn’t afford to work some dead-end entry-level job. Like at every point in my life, when I hit a wall doing things the traditional way, I found my own way to do things.
Moving to LA was both the hardest and the gutsiest decision I have ever made. It was difficult to be apart from my son even for a short time. But I knew the only hope he had of living the life he deserved was for me to take this incredible risk. I knew our future wasn’t in New York.
Once settled in LA, I returned to New York regularly. When I became financially stable, my son became bicoastal. He would spend summers, spring break, and alternate Christmases and Thanksgivings with me.
While my son was with my ex-husband, my mother, and my ex’s mother in New York, I was furiously building our future in Los Angeles. This was not some hasty decision. It was much discussed and planned out.
Neither was this move about finding a rich man to support my son and me, no matter what some haters are bound to say. There are more billionaires in Manhattan than in any other city in the world. If that’s what I was searching for, I could have stayed right at home.
Even as I struggled, I always took solace from something a casting director once told me. He said, “You have a big enough personality that one day producers will say, ‘Go get me someone exactly like Erika.’ Don’t change your voice, don’t change your look. There’s something so individual about you. No one has what you have, and someday everyone will want it. But that day is a long time away, and it’s going to be very hard to get there.”
Turns out, he was right about everything.
7
THE LITTLE GENERAL
When I announced to my family that I was moving to LA, everyone was supportive. But no one was as supportive as my grandmother Ann
. I always called her Gramby. “Grandmother” was a struggle for me when I was very young, and “Gramby” is the sound that came out, and it just stuck.
I flew from New York down to Atlanta, and Gramby bought me a used red Toyota Celica convertible. She agreed to drive across the country with me. We went to AAA and got the route all mapped out for us. We spent four days driving across the country with the top down. It was one of the best trips of my life. We talked for four days straight and never turned on the radio once. It was the first time we’d been alone together since I was a kid.
We would stop and do all of that corny shit on the side of the road that you encounter on Route 66. We stopped by the giant meteor crater in Arizona and spent a night in Vegas before making the final leg to Los Angeles. Those stops hinted at the new life I was headed toward in LA—as deep, alien, and unknowable as that crater; as neon tinted and risky as Vegas.
Gramby had the faith that I could pull it off, though. She knew I was resilient and that I could manifest whatever vision of the future I had. She knew I was tough. Hell, she was the one who made me so tough.
When we arrived in LA, she helped me find my first apartment in Hollywood before she flew back home to Atlanta. In those early years, Gramby would come out and visit me from time to time. My apartment was small, but cute. She would share the bed with me. I remember one time I had a big audition while she was there. It was strangely rainy for LA and we sat inside and she ran lines with me all afternoon. When we drove over to the audition, it was just like the old days when she would cart me all around Atlanta to auditions, dance classes, and rehearsals.
She was so supportive of me because she had taken a big leap into the unknown, just like I was doing. My grandmother grew up in a rural town in South Carolina. She and her sister wanted to get out and find opportunity in the big city. As teenagers, they made their way to Savannah, Georgia. From there, they rode the Nancy Hanks train line to Atlanta, where they lived in a boardinghouse.