I was officially a hypocrite. I wanted to blend in and disappear yet be noticed doing it.
Before I knew it, I was answering questions into a microphone.
“What is the one beauty item you can’t live without?”
Shit. I didn’t know the answer to that one. I mean, “concealer” was the truthful answer, but what was the right answer?
“Lip gloss.”
I hate lip gloss. I hate anything on my lips, but it sounded right. It sounded pretty and feminine and like something boys would find attractive; big, goopy lips, moist and inviting. Next . . .
“What is your must-have fashion item for the season?”
Shit. I didn’t know fashion at all. I didn’t read magazines and I wasn’t really interested. I wished Kali were there; she would’ve known the answer to that question. In fact, a few months ago she’d wanted Chanel ballet flats . . .
“Chanel ballet flats.”
My answer took a little long in coming, and the interviewer could sense it wasn’t going to get any easier, so I was dismissed from the interview with a “Thanks for stopping to talk to us.” I was surprised by the questions I was asked. Most of the interviewers didn’t care about my character or the show. All anyone wanted to know was who I was wearing and what my beauty tips were and how I stayed in shape. As I walked away from the news crews, I heard the last reporter ask my publicist, “What’s her name?” The reporter didn’t discreetly whisper the question to my publicist in an attempt to save me from having hurt feelings, she yelled it. She had just been interviewing me like I was important enough to tell the public my thoughts about the increasing number of actresses who wore their hair down to the Emmys and yet she had no idea who I was. The answer came over raucous screams announcing Lara Flynn Boyle’s arrival so she asked again as if she wondered if she’d heard correctly. “What’s her name?”
I was embarrassed and a little afraid. I was often embarrassed to tell people my name because I had made it up. I had a deep fear of someone discovering the truth, that this exotic name wasn’t mine—that I’d borrowed it like I had borrowed the dress and the diamonds, that it was a little too fabulous for me to own and at some point I was going to have to give it back. Portia de Rossi. A fabulous name. A name that belonged to a celebrity.
I made it up when I was fifteen. I was illegally in a nightclub when the club’s manager took me into his VIP room to award me with a coveted all-access, never-wait-in-line medallion. I knew I couldn’t give him my real identity for fear that he would discover my age and never again allow me back in the club. I was flustered coming up with a name on the spot, but I knew I had to do it. Not only was he offering me a key chain medallion to flaunt, a sliver tag announcing to the world that I was in with the “in-crowd,” he was offering me a job. I could be a hostess for the club, and all I had to do was show up twice a week. All that—if I could come up with a name other than Amanda Rogers, the name that belonged to the fifteen-year-old kid that stood before them. I could be a VIP if I could come up with the right name.
I hated my birth name. Amanda Rogers. It was so ordinary, so perfectly average. It had “a man” in it, which annoyed me because every time I’d hear someone refer to a man, I would turn my head, waiting for the “duh.” I’d toyed with changing it the way most kids do. When I became a model, my modeling agents suggested I change it, as reinventing oneself was pretty common practice in the modeling world in the eighties. Sophie became Tobsha, and Angelique became Rochelle. What Amanda could become was something I was still fantasizing about until I heard one manager in the VIP lair say to another, “What’s her name?” as he hovered over a book of entries with a black fountain pen.
“Portia . . . de . . . Rossi.” The words came out slowly but with certainty. I really wanted that medallion.
“How do you spell that?”
I wrote the name in the air with my index finger behind my back to see whether a small d or a big D would look better. I got Portia from The Merchant of Venice, and de Rossi from watching the credits of a movie. The last name stuck in my mind among a million names that flew by. In a sea of a million unimportant names, I saw de Rossi. I put it all together in that room, got my medallion, a job, and walked out in shock. I had changed my identity. Just like that.
As I walked into the Shrine Auditorium where the Emmys were about to take place, I freaked out about how caught off-guard I’d been, how unprepared I was for the biggest test of my life—the test that required me to show them all why I was special and chosen. I made a mental note to buy fashion magazines and start caring about beauty items and perfume and exercising. I needed to find answers to these questions if I were going to feel confident next time. It was time Portia de Rossi earned her name.
9
AS I drove to work, my thoughts kept returning to my wardrobe. For Day One of the scripted days in this episode, I wore the black pencil skirt and long jacket. That would be okay because the waistband on the skirt was a little roomy, unlike the jeans I was currently wearing, which were cutting into my flesh and making my stomach fold over the top of them. I took my right hand off the steering wheel and grabbed my stomach fat—first just under the belly button and then I worked my way over the sides in repetitive grabbing motions. For fun I did it in time with the music. In a way it felt like a workout or a kind of dance of self-hatred. The fat extended all the way around to my back—not enough for a handful, but enough to take a firm hold of between my thumb and forefinger. As I looked down at my cavernous belly button I couldn’t help but wonder if I was getting away with it. Did I still look like the girl they had hired? Did people notice? Obviously, my costume designer was aware of my weight gain over my first month on the show as she watched the weekly struggle of trying to pull up a skirt over my hips or straining to clasp the waistband. If pretending not to notice is the kind thing to do, then she was very kind to me. She always blamed the zipper for getting stuck because it was cheap or not properly sewn into the item of clothing even if she had to call her assistant in to hold the top of the zip as she put some muscle into trying to move it.