Frances Kay’s three siblings each helped their pecuniarily precarious sister as best they could, but by 1989, with the need for a hip replacement for Carly Ann (who was born with a compromised acetabulofemoral joint), Frances Kay watched as her financial situation became even more dire. Frances Kay’s ex-husband, Burt, was of no help; though recent re-releases of the films Fame and Flash Dance revived customer interest in leg warmers, especially those using non-traditional fibers, none of the income generated by these sales went to Frances Kay, and she had not the wherewithal to seek legal redress.
In early March, the four sisters gathered in Columbus, Ohio, to celebrate their mother’s seventy-fifth birthday. The mother, Eunice, lived in a nursing home there. She was not an official resident, however, but only pretended to be a resident; Eunice Ludden worked undercover for a watchdog group formed to gather evidence on nursing and convalescent home patient abuse. To protect her anonymity, she never used the last name Ludden, but was, instead, Mrs. Luden. Like the cough drop. And she asked that her daughters come to see her wearing disguises that would protect their identities as well, given that one of the most popular programs viewed in the television room of the Olentangy Manor Extended Care Center was the syndicated rerun version of Augie Rausch’s Variety Hour. The geriatric residents had their favorites among the show’s regular performers, who often could not be remembered by their actual names, but were referred to, in the necessity of the moment, as the “Accordion Man,” “the Happy Married Couple Who Sing about Jesus,” and “The Tap-dancing Negro.” But the Ludden Sisters (or “Those Four Pretty Girls with Angel Voices”) were the most beloved and revered among Olentangy Manor’s television-viewing inmates.
Eunice greeted her four daughters in the home’s dining room, where the staff had baked her a large birthday cake. Frances Kay’s plane ticket was paid for by her eldest sister Patricia. (All of Eunice’s daughters had flown in.) Frances Kay was especially happy to see her sisters. It had been quite some time since they had all been together, and this was a good thing for another reason: Frances Kay had a proposal to make — something that she had been thinking about ever since Irv Miller first mentioned it.
Infomercials.
According to Irv, infomercials were where it was at, baby. Everybody was doing them. Even he had been offered the chance to pitch the new Flowbee Vacuum Haircutting System, though he was forced to turn the offer down because the concept of using the family vacuum cleaner to trim hair unsettled him. “But late-night infomercials are the way to go, darling. You could do a Christmas album with your sisters and sell it in time for the holidays. You need to get something new out there, something that will put a little dough-re-mi into your pocket, darling. A little? Who am I kidding? You’ll make a mint! And you can get yourself and that verkakta-hipped daughter of yours into a much nicer place. The Oleander Arms — it ain’t for you, darling! You got life in you yet. And such a voice! I hear that voice through the wall when you’re singing in the shower or sitting on your commode, and hand-to-God, it’s just like an angel came all the way down from Heaven just to take a shit in your bathroom.”
The four sisters and their Nellie Bly of a mother ate cake and shared it with some of Eunice’s fellow residents. No one recognized Eunice’s daughters as the world-famous Ludden Sisters; the disguises, made up of various wigs and funny eyeglasses, seemed to be working. After everyone had wandered away and given the Luddens some privacy, Frances Kay made her move. She explained infomercials, though her sisters had seen them and had a fairly good idea of what they were. She reminded Patricia and Janet and the “baby” Brenda how many people still remembered them and loved them, and how much their fans especially enjoyed the old Christmas shows. Frances Kay was exactly right — Augie’s special holiday broadcasts had been ratings gold for CBS. Because of the sisters’ popularity, each of the new, original carols they sang on the air shot straight to the top of the charts and quickly earned prominent placement in the holiday canon: “Bless this House on Christmas Day,” “Santa and the Manger,” and “Merii Kurisumasu,” which the sisters performed in kimonos fringed with bright silver tinsel. A comical offering in the early ’60s, “Uncle Bob Ain’t a Masher Tonight, ’Cuz There’s Mistletoe Overhead,” was covered by Eartha Kitt, Annette Funicello, Michele Lee, Bobby Rydell, and the Brothers Four.
“It certainly isn’t the worst idea in the world, Frances Kay,” said Patricia, who was looked up to by her sisters as the voice of wisdom and authority for the foursome, “but we’re all retired. I don’t think any of us has time to do a new album, let alone try to sell it at two o’clock in the morning. Who’s watching television at two in the morning anyway?”
“I’ve seen them,” said Janet, who was wearing a particolored clown wig. “Sometimes, when I can’t sleep. And remember, Patricia: when it’s two o’clock on the East Coast, it’s only eleven o’clock in Sun City, California.”
“Our fans go to bed at eight,” deadpanned Brenda.
“She’s right about that,” added Mrs. Ludden. “By nine, everybody in this place is fast asleep. Even the nurses. Excuse me for a moment, girls — there’s a male orderly at the other end of the room throwing Mr. Rothman into his wheelchair as if he were a sack of potatoes. I must document.”
Mrs. Ludden left. Her four daughters grew quiet. Frances Kay, sensing resistance to her idea, kept her eyes on her half-eaten wedge of birthday cake, not moving her fork.
Janet sighed. “Although, it would be a kick for all of our fans.”
Frances Kay looked up and nodded.
Brenda and Patricia nodded too. Their hearts went out to their sister Frances Kay. All of the sisters were close and it was a hard thing to be cruel to the one who had been the least blessed among them.
Finally, Brenda said, “I serve on the board of an orphanage in New Haven. So many unwanted children, and so, so many of them foundlings. Fetal alcohol preemies. Crack babies. My heart breaks in two every time I have to go there. Let’s say we do this holiday infomercial. What if—” Her face brightened. “What if during the infomercial we were each to hold one of these sad little babies in our arms?”
“You want each of us to hold a crack baby while we’re trying to sell our Christmas album?” asked Patricia, not quite understanding.
“Well, I thought we might sing to them. Most babies like to be sung to, even at-risk ghetto infants.”
“You do have a point, Brenda,” said Janet, nodding with interest. “What would you want us to do — just hold the babies while we sing or should we rock them in our arms and serenade them like we were singing them a lullaby?”