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ONSTAGE & BACKSTAGE: Betty, Autobiographies and a Pot-Luck Disaster
By Seth Rudetsky
22 Oct 2007
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Seth Rudetsky and Jay Plotnick at Celebrity Autobiography
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| photo by Aubrey Reuben | Ouch! This was the week of accidents, injuries and regurgitation! Details to follow. First a chronological rundown of the week.
Monday night I did Celebrity Autobiography with some amazing co-stars, including Tony Roberts, Mary Testa, Jackie Hoffman (all from Xanadu), Karen Ziemba (doing an amazing Elizabeth Taylor), Richard Kind (whose child goes to the same school as my boyfriend's) and my good friend Jack Plotnick. It's the show where we read autobiographies verbatim. Elizabeth Taylor's written dialogue keeps randomly harkening back to the fact that she's Jewish, so when the section of the book came when Elizabeth runs into Eddie Fisher years after their divorce, Karen Ziemba was hilarious reading the part where Elizabeth politely nods to him at Sardi's and says, (with a 1940's accent), "Mazel Tov."
I loved reading the part of Star Jones' book where she differentiates between Star, who's the Diva, and Starlette, who's underneath it all. "Take away the wigs, the eyelashes and my fabulous clothes, and you'll find me at White Castle…feasting on a half dozen of those greasy, square burgers!"
Jack was so good at subtly busting Nancy Reagan's horrible treatment of daughter Patti Reagan. When Patti was a toddler, she wouldn't swallow her string beans, so the pediatrician advised Nancy to leave Patti in her high chair until she swallowed it all. Jack raised an eyebrow and slowly continued: "An hour and half later, they were still in her mouth…"
The show was a little intimidating to perform because "Saturday Night Live" producer Lorne Michaels was there, sitting with Alec Baldwin. My boyfriend, James, said that he's sure the show convinced Alec not to write an autobiography.
The show got out early enough for me, James and Jack to hightail it to Carnegie Hall and see the second act of Brian Stokes Mitchell's concert for the Actors Fund. There was so much Broadway in the audience! We were seated behind Tyler Maynard (from Altar Boyz) and Sarah Gettelfinger (from Dirty Rotten Scoundrels) and in front of Betty Buckley. Stokes sounded great, as usual, and the big orchestra was delicious, too. The last song was "Grateful" by John Bucchino, and it was sung right after Stokes described how the Actors Fund helps everyone in the entertainment field, not just actors. After the show I complimented the director, Richard Jay-Alexander, on the cool idea of bringing up the house lights during the song. It really drove home the point that we're all in it together, and the Actors Fund couldn't exist without the audience to donate. Richard said that the concert was going long and if it went into overtime, it would cost thousands of dollars. So, actually the house lights came on in the middle of the number to make sure people knew that they had around one minute to vacate. Out of necessity spawns brilliance!
After the show we all went to the Russian Tea Room for the party, and I posed for some photos feeling very A-list. I then saw one of the shots online and noticed that nobody opted to tell me that I had a post-performance t-zone shine that rivaled the lights of Broadway. Note to photographers: Just because you took the photo doesn't mean you have to post it online. And, retouching was invented for a reason. Oh, speaking of my t-zone, right before the bathhouse reveal in The Ritz, I have my hair 70's blow-dried by our hair person, Jun. As soon as I sat down, he said it looked like I hadn't washed my hair. I was outraged! I wash my hair eight times a week, Mary Martin-style, I haughtily assured him. I then did my first entrance, and while I was onstage I suddenly remembered being really tired in the shower in the morning. Could I have forgotten to wash it? I ran offstage and looked in the mirror and noticed my normally bouncy hair was plastered to my head. I had forgotten to wash it, and it was on the verge of a grease fire! I ran to the bathroom and did an emergency wash. I told one of the other hair people what happened, and he said that when he saw me at the beginning of the act, he just assumed I had put a lot of product in my hair, i.e. pomade, mousse, etc. No, I devastated-ly assured him, it was my own natural oils that gave it that sleek, shiny look.
So, here come the injuries. At the end of the show, there's a chase scene. A couple of nights ago, I was running through the audience, and as I was running up the stairs to the stage, I fell on all fours. First of all, right before that scene, Rosie Perez introduces me as a contestant in the talent contest named Sheldon Farenthold, and then I do a little number. Even though I'm introduced by name, there's no dialogue in the show where I'm actually called Sheldon. Well, right as I fell, Brooks Ashmanskas yells out, "Watch it, Sheldon!" Then as I'm on the ground I hear, "Sheldon, are you OK? Sheldon!" Both lines were said less out of concern for my well-being as they were just for the comedy of actually addressing me as Sheldon.
Anyhoo, I got up and felt fine. Cut to that night, my leg hurt so much it literally kept waking me up. I arrived at the theatre to see my understudy learning my number! I assured him that there was no way I wouldn't be going on. I saw All About Eve! And, unfortunately, a summer stock production of Applause.
I actually wasn't that outraged he was trying to learn my number because it was understudy rehearsal. Now that the show is open, we've finally started to rehearse. I cover Brooks Ashmanskas and learned his lines during previews in case I had to go on, but we just started officially rehearsing. Our great stage manager, Tripp, told us that because the run only goes through Dec. 8, there's a good chance we'll never go on, but we have to be ready just in case. We finished rehearsal on Friday and were about three quarters through learning the blocking for Act Two. I got to the theatre for the Saturday matinee and saw that one of our leading men, Terry Riordan, had injured his back and Billy Magnussen, his 22-year-old, just-got-his-Equity-card understudy, was on! It was shocking! It just goes to show how sudden it is when it happens. I assumed there'd be days of an actor complaining that he wasn't feeling well, a warning from the stage manager that it wasn't looking good, and finally an understudy told that he was on. Instead it was a terrifying, last-minute shocker. One afternoon Billy and I are in street clothes going through our blocking, the next minute he's in full costume about to make his Broadway debut in a leading role!
The good news is, he was on his gig! He got through everything without a hitch and was on for three shows! We all hope that Terry gets better, but the whole thing definitely added some excitement to the weekend shows. Although, what could top regurgitation? Let me explain. Continued...
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