Peggy watched with mounting alarm as name after name was checked off, and still Paula’s parents did not appear. Catching her expression, the airline official paused in his paperwork.
“Say,” he said, “you’re not waiting for Mr. and Mrs. Blackstone, are you? Because if you are, I got word that they had canceled, and your trip out here would be for nothing.”
“No,” Peggy said, “not Blackstone. Why?”
“Because everybody else is on board already!” he replied. “Sure you have the right flight number?”
“I certainly hope so!” Peggy said. “Please, may I see your passenger list?”
“Sure. Help yourself.” He moved aside from the desk to let her look.
At the top of the list stood the names of Mr. and Mrs. Dean Andrews.
“This is the right flight, all right,” Peggy said. “We’re waiting to see Mr. and Mrs. Andrews—and they surely didn’t come on board!”
“Not when you were looking,” the man said with a grin. “Sorry, kids, but you’ll have to collect your autographs some other time. Mr. and Mrs. Andrews were allowed to board before the other passengers, just so they could avoid being noticed. It seems that everybody wants Stacy Blair’s autograph, and she had a headache or something. Tough luck!”
“We’re not autograph hunters,” Peggy said, “but we have to see Mr. and Mrs. Andrews! Can we please go on board? It’s very important!”
The man shook his head. “Sorry. It’s strictly against the rules.”
“But—”
“You sure are a persistent girl,” he interrupted, “but it’s not going to do you any good. Now why don’t you just run along and chase some other movie star? Mrs. Andrews asked to be left alone, and we’re going to do everything we can to see that her wishes are—Hey!”
Realizing that further discussion would be useless, Peggy decided that the time had come for direct action. She simply ran through the gate and out on to the field. Before the uniformed man could get around the railing and start in pursuit, she had already covered half the distance to the waiting jet.
“Stop!” She heard a shout behind her. Still running, she turned her head in time to see Randy grab the man by the sleeve to hold him back. Hoping that Randy wouldn’t get into a fight or in any serious trouble, she ran straight on and up the steps of the boarding ramp where a stewardess with a startled expression stood waiting for her.
Knowing what the answer would be to any explanations she might make, Peggy simply dashed past her, muttering, “Excuse me!” before the surprised girl could stop her.
In the softly lighted cabin, all that Peggy could see were the backs of heads. She knew that she must find Mr. and Mrs. Andrews in a hurry, or she would be put off the plane before she ever got a chance to speak to them. There was no time to go quietly from seat to seat looking for the familiar features of Paula’s mother. Peggy drew a deep breath, looked once around her, and shouted:
“Mr. Andrews! Mr. Andrews! Telegram!”
There was a sudden silence in the plane, then a murmur as heads swiveled around and saw a young girl standing in the aisle, nervously biting her lip. Among the heads was the beautiful but worn and strained face of Stacy Blair. Peggy ran down the aisle, the stewardess close behind her.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Mr. Andrews began angrily. “Who are you, and what do you—”
“Please!” Peggy interrupted, almost whispering. “It’s about Paula!”
The airline stewardess reached them, grabbed Peggy’s arm, and said, “I couldn’t stop her, Mr. Andrews! I’m sorry, but—”
“Wait, please!” Paula’s mother said, as the stewardess started to force Peggy away. The girl relaxed her grip. The famous actress looked at Peggy and said, “What about Paula?”
“She’s right here in New York,” Peggy whispered, conscious of the surrounding passengers, whose attention was riveted on the strange, dramatic scene. “I’m her friend, and I came to stop you from going to Europe. I’m sorry I caused such a fuss ... but they didn’t want to let me on the plane, and—”
“Wait, please,” Mr. Andrews interrupted in a quiet voice. “This is no place to talk.” He turned to his wife. “Stacy, we’re not taking this plane. Don’t say a word now. We’ll talk where it’s more private.”
Paula’s father instructed the baffled stewardess to see to it that their luggage was removed, then shepherded his wife and Peggy out of the plane, leaving behind a cabin full of puzzled, buzzing passengers.
“Are ... are you sure about this?” Paula’s mother said to her husband.
“No,” he said calmly, “but we can’t leave here until we are sure, one way or the other.”
At the passenger gate, they found Randy—uncomfortably under the guard of two airport policemen. The official who had tried to stop Peggy was sitting on a stool with an angry expression and what looked like the beginning of a classic black eye.
“This is my friend, Randy Brewster,” Peggy said. “He drove me out here, and it looks as if he had to do some fighting to see to it that I got on the plane.”
Randy grinned sheepishly. “Nice to meet you, Mr. and Mrs. Andrews.”
Mr. Andrews smiled at Randy. To the policemen he said, “Let him come along with us, please.”
“I dunno, Mr. Andrews,” one of the policemen said. “I think Mr. Watkins here wants to hold him on an assault charge.”
“I was just trying to protect you, Mrs. Andrews,” the official said, “but if he is a friend of yours, as he says he is, I suppose I ought to apologize instead of pressing charges.”
“Yes, he’s a friend,” Mrs. Andrews said, adding under her breath, “at least I think he is!”
“Well ... no charge, then,” the uncomfortable Mr. Watkins said.
Randy was released and fell into step alongside Peggy and Paula’s parents as they walked down the corridor.
“This had better be on the up-and-up,” Mr. Andrews said darkly, “or I’ll see to it that both of you face a good deal more than a simple assault charge as a result of it!”
He cut off Peggy’s protestations, saying that he didn’t want to say one more word until they were seated in privacy in the airport restaurant. The next minutes until they reached their destination were spent in uncomfortable silence.
Once seated, after introductions and assurances that Paula was safe and well, Peggy recited the story that had by now become as familiar to her as her lines in the play. Carefully, omitting nothing, she explained what Paula had tried to do, and how things had gone wrong. She explained her own part in Paula’s life, and how she had decided, on May Berriman’s advice, to disregard her friend’s wishes and call her parents. Then she told of her fast detective work in tracing them to the hotel and the airport, and of the final dash for the plane.
“So there was nothing I could do but stand there and yell,” she concluded. “I’m sorry it caused such a fuss, but I didn’t know how else to find you before they put me off the plane. Anyway, that brings us to here.”
“It’s quite a story,” Mr. Andrews said. “Both of us are very grateful to you, Peggy, for the care you’ve taken of Paula and for your concern about us. And we’re grateful to you too, Randy,” he added.
“We are,” Paula’s mother echoed, a smile lighting her face. “Now, my dear, will you please take us to Paula?”
“I ... I was afraid you’d ask that,” Peggy said. “I will, of course, if you really insist on it, but I wish you’d think about it awhile first. Paula has gone through so much—and put both of you through so much, too—just to prove something to herself. If you go to her now, her whole effort will have been wasted. I think you ought to let her stay in obscurity for just a few days longer until we open the show, and give her the chance she wanted.”
“I understand your point of view, Peggy,” Paula’s mother said, “but can’t you understand mine? All I want is to see my daughter and be sure that she’s safe and well!”
“Can’t you take my word for that, please?” Peggy begged. “You’ve waited so long, what does it matter if you wait another three days until opening night? If you do that, then Paula will get the chance she wants, and I won’t feel so miserable about having called you when she asked me not to. I just want everybody—you two and Paula—to be happy. Won’t you please wait and give her a chance to prove to herself that she’s as good as we all know she is?”
“Is she good?” her mother asked fervently.
“She’s wonderful!” Peggy and Randy said in chorus.
“I knew it! I knew it!” The famous actress beamed. “Iknewall those good reviews weren’t just because of us....”
“Then you had your doubts too, didn’t you, Mrs. Andrews?” Randy put in quickly.
“Why ... why, not really,” Paula’s mother answered, taken aback. “But, still....”
“But still, even though you were sure Paula is a good actress, you never knew for a fact that the critics sincerely thought so too!” Randy said.
“In a way, I suppose you’re right,” Mrs. Andrews said.
“Then you can understand Paula’s view?” Peggy asked.
“Yes. I can understand.”
“Peggy,” Mr. Andrews said, “I’m willing to wait a few days to see her, if you really think it’s best—and if my wife agrees. But what harm would it do for us to call her on the phone?”
“It would be the same thing,” Peggy said. “She’d know that you’re in town, and she’d start to suspect that you were doing things for her again. Besides, it might throw her into such a state of excitement that she wouldn’t do her best on opening night.”
“Perhaps you’re right,” Paula’s mother said thoughtfully. “Nerves do get on edge close to opening, and from what you tell me, I can’t imagine that Paula’s are in the best of shape now.”
“Then you’ll wait?” Peggy asked.
“Yes, Peggy, I’ll wait. If only as a favor to you. Heaven knows, we owe you a favor for all you’ve done. Do you agree, dear?”
Mr. Andrews looked thoughtful. “All right,” he said at length. “But we’re going to be at the opening! We’ll sit in the back of the house so she won’t see us. My wife will have to wear a veil or a false mustache or something, but you can bet we’re going to be there!”
“We’ll put you in the projection booth!” Randy said. “You’ll have a perfect view, and nobody will see you at all!”
“Fine,” Mr. Andrews agreed. “And what do you want us to do until opening night? Shall we just hang around New York, or shall we lie low somewhere?”
“It does sound like a conspiracy, doesn’t it?” Peggy laughed.
“It is,” Paula’s mother said. “And Mr. Andrews has a point. We two are considered to be—well—newsworthy, you know. And while it’s not much of a story just to leave for Europe, it would be considered a story if the papers found out about our sudden cancellation of the trip. If that gets into the papers, and Paula sees it, she’ll know we’re in town, and she’ll probably be more nervous than ever. Shouldn’t we go somewhere?”
“We should,” Mr. Andrews said, getting up from the table. “And before we waste any more time, I’d better get hold of those policemen and that Mr. Watkins and see that they don’t start talking to any reporters about tonight.”
He returned somewhat later, looking pleased with himself.
“Come on,” he said. “I’ve taken care of them, and I’ve rented a car. We’re going to do something we’ve both wanted to do for years, and haven’t had time for. We’re taking a nice, leisurely sight-seeing trip by car. We won’t come back till opening night, and then we’ll go straight to the theater!”
Final plans were hurriedly made for the trip, and for the timing of their arrival on opening night, as Peggy and Randy walked Mr. and Mrs. Andrews to their waiting car. Good nights and thanks were exchanged once more.
By the time that Randy delivered Peggy to the doorstep of the Gramercy Arms, the first light of dawn was showing in the east. It was nearly five in the morning. Through the kitchen windows at street level, Peggy could see May Berriman, Amy, and Greta, surrounded by coffee cups, doggedly waiting up for her. It would still be awhile, she knew, before she would get to bed.
First Night!
A magic phrase and a magic moment to everyone in show business! The glitter, the jitters, the excitement of a first night are the same everywhere—for the big new Broadway show, with its stars, its lavish sets and costumes, its important audience in formal dress, as well as for the smallest theater in the smallest town in America. In high school and college auditoriums, in summer tents and barns, in tiny converted carriage-house theaters in the back streets of Greenwich Village, the glamour comes as always, and with it, the feverish excitement.
Last-minute problems suddenly arise, as suddenly are solved. Something is wrong with the second row of baby spots; they’re out of focus. Did someone move the lighting bar? Fix it! An important door, vital to certain entrances and exits, gets stuck. When you try to pull it, the canvas wall in which it is set trembles. Brace the canvas! Plane down the door jamb! Oil the hinges and the door latch! Better? Fine!
“Where’s the ladder? How can I fix those spots....”
“Who has some blue thread? This darned blouse....”
“I’ll never make that costume change in time! We’ll have to open the back and put in snaps, but there has to be a dresser to help me or....”
“Who took the tennis racket from this prop table? Come on! This is no time to fool around!”
“Where’s the ladder?”
“Mal, did you change the position of that sofa in Act Three, or am I just imagining it? If you did....”
“Yes, I restaged it in last night’s rehearsal. I thought it would....”
“Well, why didn’t you tell me? Now I have to relight the whole scene! You directors think that all you have to do is tell the actors! There are other people who are important too....”
“Sorry. Really, I am. Must have slipped my mind.”
“Slipped your mind? Well!”
“Please! This is no time for a quarrel. Here, let me show you....”
“Where’s that ladder? I have to have that ladder!”
“Who wanted blue thread? I found the sewing kit on top of the switchboard!”
“What time is it?”
“One ladder, coming up!”
“I wanted blue thread—but this is the wrong color blue. Do you think it will show from out front?”
“It’s seven o’clock!”
“Hold still, Peggy! I’m cutting the back open now, and I don’t want to hurt you. Do you turn your back to the audience at any time, or can I fake this hem, do you think?”
“Do I turn? Let me think ... No. You can fake it. But it has to look all right in a profile, because I cross a lot. Will I have a dresser right here?”
“I’ll be here, and we have a screen right by the switchboard ... or we should have one. Joe! What about that dressing screen off right?”
“As soon as you finish with that ladder, may I please....”
“All right, Peggy. Take it off now, and I’ll sew it up. Plenty of time!”
Peggy stepped behind the switchboard and slipped off the blouse, which now came off like a smock. The snaps in back would keep her from having to unbutton the whole front and then having to button it up again—a saving of at least a minute. And a minute is a long time. She put on a lightweight bathrobe, handed the blouse to the wardrobe mistress, and stepped out into the confusion of the stage, to see what was going on now.
On top of the tall extension ladder, Sam Marcus, the electrician, was fixing the position of the three end baby spots in order to light the sofa properly in its new position. Below him, Joe Banks, chief stagehand, was waiting impatiently to carry off the ladder as soon as it was free. Amy, on her hands and knees in front of the troublesome door, was tacking down a hump that had suddenly appeared in the canvas groundcloth, and which threatened to stop the door from opening. As Peggy approached her, she looked up and managed a grin, despite the fact that her mouth was full of long carpet tacks.
“Why, Grandma, what big teeth you have!” Peggy said, looking down at her friend.
“Mmph!” Amy said. She pounded in two more tacks, took the remaining few from between her lips, and surveyed her handiwork. “Think that’ll do?” she asked.
“It looks good to me,” Peggy replied. “Now let’s see what’s going to go wrong next!”
“There isn’t much left to go wrong that hasn’t already done so and been fixed at least twice.” Amy laughed. “Now, if everything will just be kind enough to hold together through tonight, I’ll be most grateful to Fate.”
Randy suddenly appeared through the door, which worked smoothly this time.
“I’m not worried about the costumes and sets holding together,” he said, “as much as I am about the play holding together. I suppose it’s just first-night jitters, but I have the terrible feeling that the whole play ought to be rewritten from beginning to end. But Mal won’t let me change so much as one single word now.”
“Randy! The play is beautiful,” Peggy said, “and I don’t think there’s a word in it that should be changed. Besides, you shouldn’t say things like that out loud, even if you feel them. Some of the cast might hear you, and they’re already nervous enough, without having to worry about the quality of the play.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Randy said moodily. “And anyway, it’s too late. How are the actors holding up? Are they really nervous? You look as cool as an orchid on ice.”
“I’m not,” Peggy said, “but if I’m going to fool the audience into thinking so, I have to start by fooling myself. The rest of the gang seem all right, too, except that their good-humored kidding around sounds suspiciously on the edge of hysteria!”
“How’s our leading lady?” Randy asked cautiously. “She looked a little strange when I saw her last, about an hour ago.”
“I don’t know,” Peggy said slowly. “She seemed ... strange ... to me, too. She wasn’t nervous, and she wasn’t kidding around with the rest of the cast, and at the same time, she didn’t seem cool and calm. She just looked sort of distant and detached. I think she’s collecting her strength, in a way—preparing herself tobeAlison, rather than just to play her.”
“That’s the way it seemed to me,” Randy said. “It’s as if she has written a sort of pre-play ... you know, the action that takes place before the play begins. She’s figured out what Alison’s frame of mind must have been before she arrived at the resort, and that’s the part she’s playing now.”
“That’s just what it is,” Amy said. “I know, because I talked to her about it last night, and she told me that the hardest part of acting for her was what she had to imagine for herself before ever coming on stage. I’ll bet by now she’s completely forgotten that she’s Paula Andrews and an actress, and that nothing is real for her but the character of Alison. That’s what makes her so good.”
“She is good,” Randy agreed, “and she certainly is Alison. I only hope she doesn’t completely convince herself that she’s living this rather than playing it, or she might start making up her own lines! And, at that,” he added gloomily, “they’d probably be a lot better than the ones I wrote.”
With a theatrical gesture of mock despair, he backed through the doorway and gently shut the door.
“Here, Peggy! Try this on now!” It was the wardrobe mistress, back with the blouse.
“Amy! You’d better get changed and start to get the ushers ready!”
“Where’s that ladder now! Why can’t I ever find....”
“What time is it?”
“Try number four dimmer down and number three up at the same time, and with your other hand....”
“Who has the ladder?”
“It’s seven-forty!”
“I only have two hands, you know!”
“Did somebody call for the ladder? Who wanted that ladder?”
“No, no! Number four down and number three up, not number three down and number four up!”
“What time did you say?”
“Did anybody see the first-aid kit? I cut my finger on this gel frame.”
“Give me a hand with the ladder, will you? Just set it right here, under....”
“Look out! Don’t bleed all over the sofa!”
“It’s seven-forty-five.”
“Ouch!”
With all the past weeks of preparation, Peggy thought, you’d suppose that nothing at all would have to be left till the last moment, but somehow, no matter how well you planned, there was always something left undone. Or something that had to be redone. Less than an hour before curtain time, it seemed as ifCome Closerhad not the least chance of opening that night. But she knew that it would open, and she was sure that it would go smoothly and well. At least she hoped that she was sure.
Peggy went down the circular iron stairway to the dressing room she shared with Greta. It was time to start putting her make-up on. Greta was already applying the base, and the tiny room, no bigger than a closet, was perfumed with the peculiar odor of grease paint. Every inch of wall space except for the mirrors was covered with clothing—their own and their costumes—hanging from nails and hooks. A few garments were even suspended from some of the pipes that crisscrossed the low ceiling. The room was so narrow that when Peggy sat at the dressing table, the back of her chair was touching the wall behind her. The dressing table itself, a rough board counter covered with plastic shelving paper, was littered with bottles, jars, tubes, powder boxes, puffs, make-up brushes, eyebrow pencils, eye-liners, grease crayons, hairbrushes, combs, sprays, hairpins and other odds and ends.
Looking at the cramped, messy little room, Peggy suddenly thought of a movie she had seen, where several scenes took place in a star’s dressing room. It was an enormous room, she remembered, with a carved Victorian sofa and chairs grouped around a little marble tea table. At one side of the room had been an elaborate make-up table surmounted by a gold-framed mirror. On it were a very few bottles and jars. A pleated silk screen stood nearby, concealing an immense closet which held row upon row of costumes. Overhead was a crystal chandelier.
Peggy laughed out loud when she thought of the chandelier.
“What’s funny?” Greta asked.
“Oh, nothing,” Peggy said. “I was just thinking that the best thing about being an actress is the glamorous backstage life!”
“Five minutes!” called Dick Murphy, the stage manager. “Everybody ready in there?”
“All ready!” Peggy and Greta sang out.
“Five minutes!” they heard him call at the next door.
“Let’s go up,” Peggy said. “I’m dying to see what kind of house we have!”
“Murphy doesn’t want us up until he calls for places,” Greta said doubtfully.
“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” Peggy said. “We’re both on within five minutes of curtain, and our places in the wings aren’t in anybody’s way.”
“All right,” Greta agreed, knowing that she was as eager as Peggy.
At the stage level, a few stagehands were making last-minute adjustments. Mal stood to one side, seemingly watching nothing at all. There was hardly a sound, except for the chatter of the audience, muted by the curtain that separated them from the stage. The hundreds of voices of the audience merged into a single sound, as the splashes of thousands of wavelets in a single wave combine to become the murmur of the sea. Peggy put her eye to the tiny peephole in the curtain. Almost every seat was already filled, and the ushers were leading a few last-minute arrivals down the aisles.
As she watched, the house lights began to dim, and the floods came up brightly. An expectant hush came over the audience. She felt a hand on her arm, and turned to see Dick Murphy, looking comically stern. He silently gestured with a nod of his head, to indicate that it was time for her to leave the stage. She took her place in the wings with the other waiting actors. They were silent and outwardly calm, but she could feel the tension in all of them.
A little behind them, seated on a suitcase that she would carry in with her, was Paula, wearing an expression that gave away nothing.
“Okay,” she heard Dick Murphy say. “Places!”
Alan Douglas and Betsy Crane stepped out onto the empty stage and sat in two widely separated lounge chairs. Alan spread his newspaper to read, and Betsy began to knit.
“Curtain!” Murphy said.
And the play was on.
“I was awful! I just know I was awful!” Peggy moaned. “I never felt so stiff and scared in my life! I think I must have walked like a mechanical doll! Oh, Greta!”
“You were fine,” Greta said. “I mean it. You know I’m too good a friend to lie to you. You were as natural as....”
“And I muffed two lines!” Peggy went on, as if she hadn’t even heard Greta.
“What lines?”
“Didn’t you notice? Two of my lines came out all wrong, and if Alan and Paula hadn’t picked them up and gone on as if nothing had happened, I don’t know what I would have done!”
“I never noticed,” Greta said. “And I guess that means the audience didn’t either. And they seemed to like it. That was one of the best first-act curtain receptions I ever heard. If they like the rest of the play as well, we’ve got a hit on our—”
“Don’t say it!” Peggy said. “It’s bad luck! Oh dear ... I don’t know how I’ll ever get through it!”
“You’ll get through it beautifully,” Greta said, “the same way you got through the first act.”
Reassured by Greta’s calm, businesslike manner, Peggy pulled herself together with an almost visible effort. “How much longer before we go on?” she asked. “Amy said she’d come back between acts with a report from out front. She should be here by now.”
“She is here,” Amy said from the doorway. “And the report from out front is great. You were both wonderful, and the play is perfect, and everybody in the whole cast is grand!”
“Amy, I’m afraid that as a reporter, you’re a good friend,” Greta said. “I’m glad you think it’s so good, but what I want to know is how is the audience reacting? What’s the intermission talk like?”
“I’ve just come back from the lounge,” Amy said, “and I couldn’t ask for better talk! Everybody is intrigued with the play, and they all seem to think the production is a sure hit. And they’re wild about Paula! I’ve never heard such talk in my life! Even the man from theTimesand the man from thePostwere smiling and talking about Paula!”
“I knew that Paula would make a hit,” Peggy said warmly. “Isn’t she good?”
“She couldn’t be better,” Amy agreed. “I just hope that she comes out of this between-the-acts trance of hers when the play is over.”
“She’s still doing that?” Peggy asked, concerned.
“Good!” Greta said. “As long as she keeps it up, I have a feeling that the play will go. Don’t worry about it. It’s just an especially strong case of character identification. She’ll be herself again when she reads the reviews in the morning.”
The lights flickered on and off.
“Oh-oh!” Amy said. “I’d better get back out front. See you between the acts again!” With a wave of her hand she was gone.
“Let’s go, Greta,” Peggy said. “We’re on.”
Peggy felt calmer, somehow, in Act Two than she had before. The first feelings of stage fright had left her, and she fell into her lines with a practiced ease. No longer worrying about the words or about the stage directions, both of which had been so drilled into her as to become second nature, she became aware of the audience in a new and pleasant way.
The faceless crowd out front was suddenly transformed for her into a large group of friendly people. They were not hostile. They were warm and eager to be pleased, interested in the play and the players. For the first time, she felt a communication between herself and them, and as she felt it, she realized that she was acting better, playing the part as she had never done in rehearsals. Her confidence grew, and with it, her pleasure in her craft. Peggy was learning how it really feels to be an actress.
The second act went smoothly and well. The cast was sharp and alert; no cues were missed; no lines were muffed. The timing was sharp and professional, and remained so as the pace increased to build to the shattering second-act curtain.
Watching it from the wings, Peggy was entranced with Paula and all the supporting cast. If she had thought that this scene was already worked to perfection in rehearsals, she had been mistaken. Now, in the presence of the audience, a new life and vigor suffused Paula, and a new note of urgency was felt. At the climax of the scene, when Paula collapsed in tears and the actors standing round her seemed almost to flicker from one personality to the other, the silence in the theater was electric.
The curtain descended and, a moment later, the audience burst into thunderous applause. Peggy, limp with excitement, watched in almost shocked surprise as Paula rose from the stage. She had half expected her to remain sobbing on the floor as she had done in rehearsals, but now, when Paula stood up, Peggy saw that her face was suffused with a smile of pure girlish delight. She was good! The audience knew she was good ... the cast knew she was good ... and—most important—she now knew it herself. Radiantly, she came to Peggy and said, in a quiet and controlled voice, “I think we’re doing well, don’t you?”
Then both of them laughed aloud, knowing beyond all shadow of a doubt that this was the understatement of the evening.
A few minutes before the third act, Randy knocked at the dressing-room door.
“Come in,” Peggy said. “We’re decent.”
“You’re more than decent,” Randy said with a grin, “you’re marvelous! Both of you,” he added, with a nod to Greta.
“Thank you,” Greta said. “And now, if I know anythink about anything, I think I’d better leave you two alone!”
“Greta!” Peggy said in confusion. “I don’t know what you mean by....”
“You tell her, Randy,” Greta said, edging past him. “But don’t take too long. We’re on in a few minutes.”
“She’s ... she’s just being silly,” Peggy said, blushing.
“Is she?” Randy asked innocently. “I thought she was making perfect sense!”
Peggy began carefully to inspect her make-up and touch up her eyebrows.
“Don’t get so shy all of a sudden,” Randy said. “Besides, I didn’t come here to ... well, I mean, I had no intention....” He paused awkwardly. “Anyway,” he finished, “at least not now, I didn’t. I really came to tell you that I’ve been to see Paula’s parents in the projection booth, and I’ve never seen two happier people in my life. If they glowed any more than they’re doing now, they’d throw the whole lighting plan out of kilter!”
“Then they don’t mind having waited to see Paula?” Peggy asked.
“Not at all. They feel sure now that you were right. Mrs. Andrews said that she wouldn’t have done anything that could have hurt Paula’s performance. And what a performance!”
The lights flicked off and on, warning them that curtain time was near.
“I’d better go,” Randy said. “I just wanted to tell you I’d seen them, and also to tell you that we’re all invited to a party they’re giving after the show. They want to wait up for the first editions of the papers to see what kind of reviews we get.”
“Will we get reviews in the first editions?” Peggy asked. “I thought only the first-string critics did that, for important show openings.”
“That’s right,” Randy said, helping Peggy up the circular stair. “And we’ve got the first-string critics! That’s the one piece of ‘interference’ that Mr. Andrews indulged in. He called the newspaper reviewers and told them that he had heard of the show, and that it would be worth their while to cover it themselves, instead of sending assistants the way they do with so many off-Broadway openings. Apparently a word from him is all it takes, because they’re all out there ... and a lot of other important people, too!”
“Oh dear!” said Peggy. “I wish you hadn’t told me! It’s going to make the whole thing difficult all over again!”
“Places!” Murphy called.
“So long!” Randy said, and left, but not before he had quickly placed a kiss on the back of Peggy’s neck, where it wouldn’t spoil her make-up.
Peggy was writing a letter to Jean Wilson, her friend back home in Rockport, Wisconsin. She was already on the third page.
... so Paula’s parents agreed to stay out of sight until after opening night. As you can see from the clippings I’ve enclosed, the play went off wonderfully. Every paper loved us—and the whole audience, too. At the final curtain, they wouldn’t let us off! We got curtain after curtain, and I thought the applause would never stop for Paula. She got seven solo curtain calls! (I shouldn’t brag, but I got two myself.)
When Paula was handed an enormous bouquet of roses somewhere along about the third or fourth curtain call, and when she saw that the card on them was from her mother and father, I thought she was going to fly around the stage like Peter Pan! She managed to keep her head, though, and they kept out of sight in the projection booth until all the critics and everybody else had left the theater. They didn’t want Paula to think that their presence had any effect on whatever it was the critics were going to write.
I don’t think it would have mattered, anyway. When I saw Paula right after the final curtain, she said that she had lost all her silly fears, and that she didn’t even care about the reviews, because she knew for herself what she was worth. I’m glad she finally figured it out!
After it was all over, Mr. and Mrs. Andrews gave a party for the cast—and you’ll never guess where! It was at Sir Brian Alwyne’s house! It seems that they’re old friends of Sir Brian—as I told you, he’s really interested in the theater—and that explains why Paula wouldn’t go there for the audition. Sir Brian has known her since she was a child, and he knew that she was supposed to be in Europe. When she heard that the audition was to be at his home, Paula just panicked. She didn’t know what to do, so she ran.
Sir Brian was very charming to me at the party. He said that although he was pleased that Paula had played the lead, and although she had done a magnificent job, he had been looking forward to seeing me in the part. I thought it was very sweet of him.
It was a wonderful party. We stayed up almost all night, until the early editions of the papers came out, and then we sat around reading the best phrases out of each of the reviews, and repeating them to each other endlessly.
We owe a lot to Paula’s parents for getting the top critics down to see us. And we also owe them a lot for getting other people to come too. The play has been running for a week now and we’ve actually had to put up the S.R.O. sign (“standing room only,” you know). Let me tell you about a few of the good things that have happened.
First, Paula. After the opening, she got two major movie studio contract offers again, and right now she’s in the process of deciding which one to take. She has all the confidence in the world—as well as all the talent—and she has definitely decided to go into the movies. But she has told both the studios that she won’t be available until the play is over, because she wants to play out the entire run at the Penthouse Theater. It’s darned nice of her, because we have no run-of-play contract with anybody in the cast. Still, looking at it honestly, and in as practical a light as I can, I guess she does owe us something. But not as much as we owe her for being as good as she was! (And is.)
Next, Randy. One of the biggest Broadway producers (I’m not allowed to say who) has bought an option on Randy’s next play. That means that, if he likes it, he’ll produce it in a Broadway theater! Not only that, but he wants Mal to direct it, because he says that Mal is a wonderful director, and has an obvious sympathy and understanding for Randy’s work. Just think, Jean, my friends may be the new celebrities of the theater world!
Then there’s Greta. She’s been offered a leading role in the national company ofMoonbeam, which is the biggest hit on Broadway today. They start on tour in two months, so we’re going to have to find a replacement for her. I’ll miss her, but it’s a wonderful break, and she’d be wrong to turn it down.
Some of the other cast members have done well, too, but I don’t want to bore you with a lot of details about people you don’t know, and don’t really care about. It’s enough to say that we all feel that we’ve hit a jackpot.
Finally, there’s me. I don’t have any real offers yet, or anything like that, but I did get some really good notices—you’ll see when you read them—and two producers have sent me nice notes asking me to come to see them when I have time. But I did get one very important thing out of it already. I have an agent!
That may not sound like much, but the good agents won’t even talk to a beginning actress. I have been signed by N.A.R. (National Artists’ Representatives) and they’re nearly the biggest in the business! Randy says that being signed by them is almost a guarantee of steady work, so I guess I can really start to call myself an actress now! It’s a good thing, too, because school is coming to an end, and unless I want to go back to Rockport and college, I’m going to have to keep acting and making a living at it.
Don’t misunderstand me, Jean. I have nothing against college. In fact, I really miss it sometimes, the same way I miss you and a few of my other good friends. But it just isn’t acting, and for me, nothing will ever be as good as being on stage!
I wish you could come to New York next week with Mother and Dad when they come to see the play, but I know how busy you are with school. If we’re still running by summer, will you make the trip?
But of course we’ll still be running by summer!
We’ve got a hit! And we know it! and there’s nothing better than that!
More next time, fromPeggy