actresses (three of whom I knew at Juilliard) who act, direct, or act and direct for experimental, dirt-poor theater companies; me. Una Rose Cavan. Soap Opera Actress Extraordinaire. I am the only person in the room who wears new, expensive, matching leotard and leg warmers. My leg warmers have gold threads in them. The neckline of my leotard plunges so that the beads of sweat between my full, pale breasts gleam in the harsh light.
The camera is not kind. If I gain a pound in life, it looks like two on television. I must move with extreme grace, with perfect posture, as if I had a bowl of raspberries balanced on the crown of my head. Right on the crown. I must not spill one piece of fruit. I envision the bowl: it is blue-and-white Canton china, made in a dynasty so long ago that the bones of its maker have turned to dust and sunk to the center of the earth. If you try to dig to China, that is what you will find.
Dance class helps me make the grace, the posture, the thinness possible. Plus it fills the hours between six and eight when I should be sitting at a cozy candlelit table, gazing into the eyes of a loved one.
One of the people I knew at Juilliard is still my friend: Susan Russell. The other people I knew there have not exactly renounced me. Their replies to my inquiries about health, career, family, etc., however, could be described as “curt.” Susan has spent much of the last year and a half out of work, but next spring she will have the lead role in a wonderful new play at the Charles Place Theater. She will play the sister of a woman accused of witchcraft in Salem.
Susan Russell: tall; skinny (always thinks she’s fat); gently frizzy brown hair; hazel eyes whose myopia she corrects by wearing untinted contacts; loves the idea of living on Nova Scotia; loves her husband, her parents, Princess Diana, and me. Beside my sisters, Susan Russell is my best friend in the old-schoolgirl sense of best friends. We tell each other everything, and we are envious when the other does better in the profession or has lunch with another woman. Susan dances beside me. She is five inches taller, she wears a black leotard with balls of gray fuzz all over it, and I can hear her breathe out but not in.
Who would
you
say is doing better?
S
, who struggles daily, who waits and hopes for a great part or even a terrible part, who once every twelve months or so gets a part, only to have the play close after a short run, but not until she’s gotten good notices and given her husband a chance to tell her she’s the best? Or
U
, who was grabbed out of drama school by the producer of one of TV’s hottest soap operas just because she had the right pale, red-haired, vulnerable Irish looks, who must speak essentially the same melodramatic lines on each episode, who makes a veritable fortune for her troubles, who is recognized at least twice every waking hour on the streets, and who goes home alone?
Think carefully before you answer
.
Susan and I showered side by side in the smelly locker room. I stared with unbridled envy at her long, thin rib cage. “Don’t look at me that way,” she said, turning her back to me. “I’m fat.”
“You are not fat. Quit saying you are. Do you still throw up?”
“Not often. Don’t talk about it.”
“Okay. How is your part coming?”
“Really great.” She squeezed water out of her hair, which started to fluff the second she stepped out of the shower. We dried ourselves on the threadbare pink towels supplied by the dance studio. “My character isn’t sure herself whether her sister is a witch. But she has to find out—not that it will make her feel different or change their relationship in the long run.”
“Witches,” I said.
“I know. Louis and I are going to Salem in October, just to walk around and get the feeling. I remember going there on a school vacation with my family. I wrote reports about it for the next three years.”
“Places like that are haunted.”
“I know. Just
The camera is not kind. If I gain a pound in life, it looks like two on television. I must move with extreme grace, with perfect posture, as if I had a bowl of raspberries balanced on the crown of my head. Right on the crown. I must not spill one piece of fruit. I envision the bowl: it is blue-and-white Canton china, made in a dynasty so long ago that the bones of its maker have turned to dust and sunk to the center of the earth. If you try to dig to China, that is what you will find.
Dance class helps me make the grace, the posture, the thinness possible. Plus it fills the hours between six and eight when I should be sitting at a cozy candlelit table, gazing into the eyes of a loved one.
One of the people I knew at Juilliard is still my friend: Susan Russell. The other people I knew there have not exactly renounced me. Their replies to my inquiries about health, career, family, etc., however, could be described as “curt.” Susan has spent much of the last year and a half out of work, but next spring she will have the lead role in a wonderful new play at the Charles Place Theater. She will play the sister of a woman accused of witchcraft in Salem.
Susan Russell: tall; skinny (always thinks she’s fat); gently frizzy brown hair; hazel eyes whose myopia she corrects by wearing untinted contacts; loves the idea of living on Nova Scotia; loves her husband, her parents, Princess Diana, and me. Beside my sisters, Susan Russell is my best friend in the old-schoolgirl sense of best friends. We tell each other everything, and we are envious when the other does better in the profession or has lunch with another woman. Susan dances beside me. She is five inches taller, she wears a black leotard with balls of gray fuzz all over it, and I can hear her breathe out but not in.
Who would
you
say is doing better?
S
, who struggles daily, who waits and hopes for a great part or even a terrible part, who once every twelve months or so gets a part, only to have the play close after a short run, but not until she’s gotten good notices and given her husband a chance to tell her she’s the best? Or
U
, who was grabbed out of drama school by the producer of one of TV’s hottest soap operas just because she had the right pale, red-haired, vulnerable Irish looks, who must speak essentially the same melodramatic lines on each episode, who makes a veritable fortune for her troubles, who is recognized at least twice every waking hour on the streets, and who goes home alone?
Think carefully before you answer
.
Susan and I showered side by side in the smelly locker room. I stared with unbridled envy at her long, thin rib cage. “Don’t look at me that way,” she said, turning her back to me. “I’m fat.”
“You are not fat. Quit saying you are. Do you still throw up?”
“Not often. Don’t talk about it.”
“Okay. How is your part coming?”
“Really great.” She squeezed water out of her hair, which started to fluff the second she stepped out of the shower. We dried ourselves on the threadbare pink towels supplied by the dance studio. “My character isn’t sure herself whether her sister is a witch. But she has to find out—not that it will make her feel different or change their relationship in the long run.”
“Witches,” I said.
“I know. Louis and I are going to Salem in October, just to walk around and get the feeling. I remember going there on a school vacation with my family. I wrote reports about it for the next three years.”
“Places like that are haunted.”
“I know. Just
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