As hard as I try to get off the memory train, every time I sit down at the keyboard, the train chugs to life and the whistle and steam and sound of the rails is too much. I can't think over the memories.
So today's jaunt is back to Planet Houston in 1990. I was a wildly unsuccessful acting student at UH, getting cast exactly never on the main stage, and instead celebrating my success as a writer and learning all I could about directing. I had pretty much given up auditioning at the age of 24, and figured I was too old, anyway. As an older student, there is a lot of baggage we carry around, particularly at a school that boasts a thriving dorm life. Added to my JC Penny baggage was the fact that my husband had moved back to Denver, and I had chosen to stay behind to study with José Quintero (Very Big Deal, go ahead and look him up: I'll wait). On the heels of the Albees in the spring, which I also did sans spouse and living with a grad student and her daughter, I was in a true "state". I had no idea if I was supposed to stay in Houston and finish my degree, or move back to Denver. I decided to move back to Denver but wanted to audition for Quintero's class, fully expecting to hear nothing at all back. When I walked backstage a few days after the audition, I walked right by the class list, I didn't even register it had been posted. A grad student seated on the couch looked up at me and said "HEY! Guess you're gonna stay now, huh?" That's how I found out I'd been accepted into the class. Long story short TOO LATE, it was during this class that I stumbled into The Rocky Horror Show.
There were several students at UH who worked outside of school, both as actors in some of the smaller theatres, and tech at The Alley Theatre. I was just trying to stay sane. I had five classes, worked weekend days at the B. Dalton in Friendswood, and worked Friday and Sunday nights from midnight to eight am shelving books at the Book Stop. I was sick a lot, a never ending sore throat and sinus infection combo that was likely due to stress and lack of sleep. I had no intention of acting in any shows, as clearly there was no time with my schedule, which was a convenient excuse and sounded better than "I can't get cast". As a theatre student, you're also working costumes or lights or something for the Main Stage shows. You live at the theatre, period.
Sometime in August or September, I heard that one of my classmates had been cast as Janet in The Rocky Horror Show at Kuumba House theatre. I had seen a show there previously with many of my classmates in it, an original piece about racial relations, so I knew the space. I also knew it identified as a "Black Theatre", so I was confused when my white classmate was cast. It left my head as soon as I heard about it. She was something of an annoying braggart, and we had taken our "I Hate You Bitch" show to many cast parties, getting drunk and simultaneously yelling our perceived hateful faults at one another. Because...well, Theatre. Her name was Gina, and she grabbed me one day in the theatre lobby to ask if I'd come audition for RHS. I said no. I honestly had no idea there was a stage show, I thought It was just the movie and I'd already played the "Stand In Front Of The Screen" game in high school. No thanks. She clasped her hands and did her best to beg (she was not a very good actor). I said yes, as long as it meant she'd leave me alone and I didn't have to do anything difficult. I auditioned at the home of the director with a few other cast members in attendance. I sang and did not dance, he just asked if I could tap. I said 'Not really, no" and he nodded. Then I left. Buh bye. When he called to give me the role, I again stated my lack of dance skill, as he wanted me to be Columbia. He said it'd be fine. So I said I can't rehearse, ever, because I work two jobs with school. He said he'd work around it, and the gig was paid (remember that for later). He seemed desperate, which is usually how I get roles, so I sighed and said yes.
The young man who was playing "Rocky" was at my "audition". He was in his twenties and as skinny as a rail. While I was singing with the music director, the director greeted another man at the door who was clearly a bodybuilder. By the second rehearsal I attended, the first young man had been busted down to ensemble, and the bodybuilder--whose name was Steve and would become my friend because he would swing dance with me--was now Rocky. I thought that was kinda shitty, and it made me a bit jumpy.
We were weeks into rehearsals and standing outside the theatre when a young woman approached us. She had tap shoes slung around her neck and sheet music. She asked if this was Kuumba House, and of course it was. I looked at "Frank N Furter" (Scott) and he went pale. We were all white, by the way, all but Eddie, and the actor who had arrived was a person of color. So for him to go further white was impressive, as he clearly had information I did not. I watched her walk in the door and he said "She's auditioning to be your understudy." I shot back "Like Steve was what's his name's understudy?" He had been behaving like the big brother I never wanted. He'd wanted to be Frank since he was in the eighth grade, and at 30 he was finally living his dream. He was battling HIV and the AZT made him sick occasionally, but that was not going to stop him. He had attached to me early on in rehearsals, and we just clicked. In short: I Loved Him.
"Look," he said, towering over me (did I mention he was 6'3"?)you're a great Columbia. When you showed up at your audition I asked who that little white girl was, and made fun of you cause really, you're too skinny AND I thought we were looking for a person of color. Then you sang and I was like 'OK then, she's cast'. You're fine. They're just panicking because we're all white and they really wanted more people of color in the cast. But I guess they didn't audition. Everyone who showed up when I auditioned was white. They pulled Eddie out of the band."
"That makes me feel not better at all, thanks."
I went through the next week of rehearsals expecting this other actor to show up and take my role. If you noted in my opening paragraph, I had quite enough stress in my life and this was not helping. I did not know the director well enough to ask, so I just lived in fear until opening night. My anxiety was heightened when it became clear that the director wanted me to be "spooky", and I was not being "spooky". He would waggle his fingers and go "OOOOOHHH, you know, spooky" with his thick British accent. I had no idea what that meant, as they show is mostly sexy and campy, and everyone else was doing sexy and campy, but he wanted Trixie/Columbia to be "spooky", at the same time choreographing and costuming me to look like Madonna down to grabbing my crotch. So I would grab myself and then waggle my fingers like he did and he thought I was mocking him, because he said "Never mind." I was clearly a panic casting choice, and I was not working out. I have no idea why I remained in the show.
Directing and Producing Lessons
I learned volumes about How Not To Direct and How Not To Produce A Show on this one production. The director wanted us to "loosen up", and held a Saturday afternoon rehearsal where alcohol was provided and he wanted everyone drunk. Scott did not waver on his heels, which made him skyscraper tall, but when Steve tried them on he face planted. Everyone was an idiot, and dangerous, and unprofessional except for me. I know, I know, but I've always been like that. Rehearsals are a job. You do not drink before them or a show, ever. So I had an opaque plastic cup with a straw that I insisted had "jungle juice" in it, so the director wouldn't harass me, and I made sure nobody actually fell off the stage or their heels or threw up. In my memory, the guy who played Brad was also either faking or only lightly partaking, and we sat in the house together watching everyone else. I seem to recall having to give Gina ride home, getting her into her apartment and to bed.
We also did not get paid, as our contracts stated that we would. That became clear by the second week of the run, and Scott had rolled his eyes like the true pro he was and said "Like any of us believed we would." I did. There had been a lot of juggling for me to make it work, but thankfully I kept both of my jobs. I would leave the show Friday night, get out of makeup and costume, grab a burrito at Taco Bell (that was my budget) and go to the Book Stop to shelve until 8 am. I was not relying on the pay, as a few others were, but it certainly would have been nice if they had followed through.
As Columbia, I was also "Trixie", who opened the show with "Science Fiction". This is done by Richard O'Brien's lips in the movie, but in the stage show it's a person. A person who had to do a preshow speech about being a live person, in fact we are all live people, so please don't throw shit at us. I got clocked in the thigh by a Jolly Rancher and had a bruise for a week.
When producing a stage show that spawned a cult movie, don't. Just don't. People don't understand it's not the movie, and the rights are exorbitant. And do not host a fundraiser for your stage show by buying out the house of the movie and expect that to go well.
STORIES ABOUT THIS SHOW THAT I LIKE TO TELL
As it is The Rocky Horror Show, everyone is in varying degrees of lingerie. The costumer was lovely and committed, she took everything home nightly to launder and had it on hangars by 4 pm the next day. One night, Scott could not find his underwear. His corset was there, and his fishnets, but not his drawers. Again, being the consummate pro, he did not panic. The show frankly does not go on without him. He dressed from the waist up, put on his makeup, and then sat in his dressing room with a cigarette, waiting for someone to fetch some unders. I stopped in to ask what was going on, and he flatly stated "Someone has pilfered my panties." To this day I can hear him, and see his impossibly long legs crossed in front of him, his lanky fingers holding a cigarette. Did I mention I loved him?
Scott, as previously stated, had wanted to play Frank since he "was in diapers". He had memorized the song "Sweet Transvestite" years ago. We had been out in the community to promote the show (because it was the stage show, not the movie, people needed a bit more information) and we always performed "Sweet T", as we came to call it. On opening weekend, Scott made his entrance for the number as usual, strutting through the audience and nailing every note and step. When Magenta and I joined him, he opened his mouth and sang, clear as a bell "I'm just a TWEE TWANS SEXBITE!" Without missing a beat, Magenta and I repeated the wrong words "TWEE TWANS SEXBIIIIIIIIITE, " and the show went on. At intermission, I ducked into his dressing room to see if he was OK, concerned he had suffered a stroke, and was greeted by a wall of ice. Apparently, the rest of the cast had already been by to congratulate him on his brilliant rewrite of the lyrics and he was quite done with all of us. To this day, when I watch the movie, I sing Scott's origina lyrics and laugh and remember how much fun that was and what a nightmare that show was but how much fun it was.
** I included a snap of one of the publicity shots. I look at it now with wonder and remember the director saying "Spooooky", and telling us to look like the Addams Family.
"I never had friends later on like the ones I had when I was twelve. Jesus, does anyone?" ---Stephen King.
Scene
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