And on and on it went from Olive—day after day. So much gloom. So much doom. She was a tireless Cassandra, constantly reminding us that ruin was right around the corner, even as we were all intoxicated with victory.
“Be careful, Olive,” said Billy. “Make sure you don’t enjoy a minute of this good fortune—and don’t let anyone else enjoy it, either.”
But even I could see that Olive was correct about one thing: our ongoing success with the show was all due to Edna, who never stopped being extraordinary. I watched that play every night, and I can report that she somehow managed to reinvent the role of Mrs. Alabaster each time. Some actors will get a character right and then freeze the performance, just repeating the same rote expressions and reactions. But Edna’s Mrs. Alabaster never stopped feeling new. She was not delivering her lines, she was inventing them—or so it seemed. And because she was always playing with her delivery and changing the tone, the other players had to stay attentive and vibrant, too.
And New York City certainly rewarded Edna for her gifts.
Edna had been an actress forever, but with the wild success of City of Girls, she now became a star.
The term “star,” Angela, is a vital but tricky designation that can only be bestowed upon a performer by the populace itself. Critics cannot make someone a star. Box-office receipts cannot make someone a star. Mere excellence cannot make someone a star. What makes someone a star is when the people decide to love you en masse. When people are willing to line up at the stage door for hours after a show just to catch a glimpse—that makes you a star. When Judy Garland releases a recording of “I’m Considering Falling in Love” but everyone who saw City of Girls says that your version was better—that makes you a star. When Walter Winchell starts writing gossip about you in his column every week, that makes you a star.
Then there was the table that came to be held for her at Sardi’s every night after the show.
Then there was the announcement that Helena Rubinstein was naming an eye shadow after her (“Edna’s Alabaster”).
Then there was the thousand-word piece in Woman’s Day about where Edna Parker Watson buys her hats.
Then there were the fans, deluging Edna with letters, asking questions like “My own attempt at a career on the stage was interrupted by the financial reversals of my husband—so would you consider taking me on as your protégée? I believe you will be surprised to find out that we have much the same style of acting.”
And then there was this incredible (and very out of character) letter, from none less than Katharine Hepburn herself: “Darlingest Edna—I have just seen your performance, and it drove me insane, and of course I shall have to come and see it about four more times, and then I will jump in a river, because I shall never be as good as you!”
I know about all these letters because Edna asked me to read and respond to them for her, since I had such nice handwriting. This was an easy job for me, now that I didn’t have any new costumes to design. Given that the Lily was running the same production now, week after week, there was no further need for my talents. Aside from mending and maintenance, my duties were over. For that reason, in the wake of our show’s success, I more or less became Edna’s private secretary.
I was the one who turned down all the invitations and pleas. I was the one who arranged the Vogue photo shoot. I was the one who gave a reporter from Time a tour of the Lily for an article called “How to Make a Hit.” And I was the one who escorted around that terrifyingly acerbic theater critic Alexander Woollcott, when he profiled Edna for The New Yorker. We were all worried that he would savage Edna in print (“Alec never takes a nibble out of somebody when a chomp will do,” said Peg), but we needn’t have been concerned, as it turned out. For here was Woollcott on Watson:
Edna Parker Watson possesses the face of a woman who has lived her life in a state of upward dreaming. Enough of those dreams have come true, it appears, to have kept her forehead unlined by worry or sorrow, and her eyes are bright with the expectation of more good news to come. . . . What this actress now possesses is something beyond mere sincerity of feeling; she has an inexhaustible catalogue of
humanness
at her disposal. . . . Too spirited an artist to limit herself to Shakespeare and Shaw, she has recently donated her talents to
City of Girls
—the most dizzy-headed and heel-kicking show we have seen in New York for quite some time. . . . To watch her become Mrs. Alabaster is to watch comedy transmogrify into art. . . . When a breathless fan at the stage door thanked her for coming to New York City at last, Mrs. Watson replied, “Well, my dear, it is not as though I have
so
many claims on my time just now.” If Broadway is wise, that situation shall soon be remedied.
—
Anthony was becoming a bit of a star, too, thanks to City of Girls. He’d got cast in some radio dramas, which he could record in the afternoons without interfering with his performance schedule. He’d also been hired as the new spokesman and model for the Miles Tobacco Company (“Why sweat, when you can smoke?”). So he had good money coming in now, for the first time in his life. But he still hadn’t upgraded his living arrangements.
I’d started leaning on Anthony, trying to convince him to get his own place. Why would such a promising young star still be sharing quarters with his brother in a dank old tenement building that smelled of cooking oil and onions? I was pushing him to rent a nicer apartment, with an elevator and a doorman, and maybe even a garden in the back—and definitely not in Hell’s Kitchen. But he wouldn’t consider it. I don’t know why he so resisted moving out of that filthy fourth-floor walk-up. All I can guess is that he suspected me of trying to make him look more marriageable.
Which was, of course, exactly what I was doing.
—
The problem was that my brother had now met Anthony—and needless to say, he did not approve.
If only there was a way to hide from Walter the fact I was dating Anthony Roccella at all! But Anthony and I were pretty obvious in our lust, and my brother was far too observant to have missed it. Plus, since Walter was now staying at the Lily, he was easily able to see what was going on in my life. He saw it all—the drinking, the back-and-forth flirtations, the rowdy repartee, the general depravity of theater folk. I’d hoped that Walter might get pulled into the fun (certainly the showgirls tried to lure my handsome brother into their embraces many times), but he was far too straitlaced to take the bait of pleasure. Sure, he’d have a cocktail or two, but he wasn’t about to cavort. Instead of joining us, he seemed to monitor us.
I could have asked Anthony to tone down his carnal attentions to me so as not to stir up Walter’s disfavor, but Anthony wasn’t the sort of guy who was going to change his behavior to make anybody feel more comfortable. So my boyfriend still grabbed me, kissed me, and slapped my bottom just as much as ever—whether Walter was in the room or not.
My brother watched, judged, and then finally delivered this condemning analysis of my boyfriend: “Anthony doesn’t seem very marriageable, Vee.”
And now I couldn’t get that weighty word—marriageable—out of my mind. I should say that I had never before even thought of marrying Anthony, nor was I sure that I would ever want to. But suddenly, with Walter’s disapproval hanging over my head, it mattered that my boyfriend wasn’t seen as marriageable. I felt insulted by the word, and maybe a little challenged by it. I felt that I should take this problem on and solve it.