“If I was getting married again, I’d wear those in a heartbeat.” Debra points to the Flora. “But this isn’t about what I like. It’s about our character.” Debra picks up the Gilda. “I think it’s this one. It’s breathtaking. And a mule could fall off.”
“That’s the one my husband designed in 1950. So you are historically accurate.”
“And you, Mrs. Angelini, are the best-kept secret in shoes.” Debra smiles for the first time. I don’t know if it’s from relief or the shoes, but she’s pleased.
Gram has a look of complete satisfaction on her face. Nobody messes with Gram when it comes to shoes. She is the expert.
“These are size sevens,” Debra says, looking inside the shoe. “How much do we owe you?”
“I’m afraid we never sell the samples.”
“Well, you have to.” Debra’s smile disappears. “This is an emergency.”
“Actually, maybe you could just loan them to us? We would fully acknowledge your services in the film’s credits,” Julie offers.
“That would be fine.” Gram shakes Julie’s hand.
“Megan, wrap them up and meet us at the costume trailer,” Debra commands. “Mrs. Angelini, we’ll need you to come to the set, too, of course.”
“Me? Why?” Gram is confused.
“We’re shooting the scene now. If there are any problems, you’ll need to be there to address them. I can’t take a chance with that”-she points to the Fougeray-“happening again.”
Gram looks at me. “May I bring…”
“Bring, bring,” Debra says impatiently. “Megan will show you the way.” Debra pulls on her coat as they move to the door. They go as quickly as they came, like the lightning from the storm that pierces the room in a flash and then is gone. I grab Megan’s sweatshirt out of the dryer. She pulls it on.
“I could find Our Lady of Pompeii with my eyes closed.” Gram throws her hands up. “Grab my kit, Valentine. Let’s go.”
There’s always some television show or movie filming on the streets of Greenwich Village. The forty-seven versions of Law and Order are shot in Manhattan, so it’s rare when there isn’t a crew somewhere, filming something. We’ve become accustomed to waiting on corners until the cameras stop rolling, then tiptoeing over snakes of cables and wires, past trailers as crew members talk into headsets and check their clipboards.
When Gram was young, there was a magical place called Hollywood where movies were made. Now, movie stars walk our neighborhood streets like ordinary people. It ceases to be magic when I see Kate Winslet three people in front of me in line at the Starbucks on Fourteenth Street, so close I can see she wears Essie’s Ballet Slippers nail polish. They’re not icons when you can bump into them while running errands. Gram never saw Bette Davis at her bodega or Hedy Lamarr at the hairdresser’s.
“Follow me,” Megan says, motioning to us as Gram and I enter Our Lady of Pompeii Church. She turns and smiles shyly. “I forgot. You guys know this place better than me.”
The scent of spicy incense hangs in the air from last Sunday’s High Mass. The polished marble floor is covered by boxes of lighting instruments and wheels of cable. The table where the Sunday bulletins are fanned is filled with bagels, plastic coffee urns, and heaps of snacks. How strange to see the old Gothic church so out of context. Its rich carved pews, stained-glass windows, and baroque altar went from being a house of God to being a movie backdrop in no time.
“I can’t believe Father Prior let them use the church,” Gram whispers.
“Even the Catholic Church likes good publicity,” I whisper back. “And a hefty rental fee.”
I pick out the star of the movie because she’s wearing a wedding gown.
“That’s Anna Christina,” Megan tells us. “She’s an unknown until this movie comes out, then she’s Reese Witherspoon after Legally Blonde.”
Anna Christina appears to be barely twenty years old. She is tiny, with an hourglass figure. Her oval face is framed by waxy black curls that create a startling contrast against her flawless skin. Her lips are cherries in the snow, a true red that says 1950. Debra is on her knees next to her, fussing with the shoes.
“They’re too big.” Debra stands, looking like she’s about to blow. Standing next to me, I can practically feel Megan’s blood pressure skyrocket.
“Let me see.” Gram sails through the chaos toward the actress, but needs to grip Debra’s arm in order to kneel down. “Damn knees,” I hear her say as I thread through the crowd and kneel next to her. Gram presses the toe and the vamp of the satin mule then gingerly slides it off Anna Christina’s foot. Gram looks at Debra. “Which shoe comes off in the scene?”
“The right one.”
“Give me the cotton batting,” Gram says to me. “We’re going to sew it in.”
Gram unspools the cotton and cuts a square gently with a small pair of gold work scissors. I thread the needle and make a quick knot. Gram places the batting in the toe of the shoe and slips it back on Anna’s foot. It’s still loose. Gram takes another square of cotton batting and makes an arch in the vamp of the shoe. After another quick fitting, Gram hands me the shoe and the batting. “Sew it.”
I push the delicate needle through the fabric and into the cotton from the vamp to the toe. I stitch a tiny seam anchoring the cotton. I do the same on the other side of the shoe, in essence, making a shoe within a shoe. Gram takes the slipper and places it back on the actress’s foot.
“Now it’s too snug!” Debra cries. “It will never fall off.”
“We aren’t done,” Gram says in a tone of voice I haven’t heard since she caught Tess and me drawing on her bedroom walls when I was five. The set falls into a hushed silence. I look up and see the director, a young man in a baseball cap and a down vest, pacing as though he’s awaiting the birth of quadruplets. Gram hands the shoe back to me. “Make a gusset on the left side.”
I sew a seam, tightening the fabric over the instep. I hand it back to Gram.
“Give me the wax pencil, Val.”
I give Gram the pencil from the kit. She slides the wax over the interior of the insole, softening the leather and making it pliable. Gram slips the mule back on Anna’s foot. “Now, Anna, when it comes time to lose the shoe, just lift your toes and pull your foot out. It should slide right off. Try it.”
Anna does as instructed, lifting her foot off the floor and pressing her toe against the top of the vamp. The shoe slides off. “It works!” Anna says, smiling, her relief as palpable as my own.
Suddenly, the crew, who were standing around sending poison rays of worry our way, spring into action. They move to their positions, shouting orders, as the director settles into his seat and stares into the monitor.
Megan pulls Gram and me back into the shadows. We watch Anna Christina as she pushes the mahogany church doors open with two hands, then runs in her duchess-satin wedding gown through the vestibule, and outside, onto the landing of Our Lady of Pompeii. On cue, she loses the rigged Gilda mule as she steps onto the top step.
“It’s a tracking shot,” Megan explains. “One continuous movement.”
In what seems like the tenth time they film the sequence, the shoe falls off on cue, as it has every time. Gram and I breathe again. A man standing next to the director hollers, “Cut. Moving on.” The crew fans out, toting, lifting, pushing equipment all around us. Debra goes to the director, who has a few words with her. “You saved our asses,” Megan says, smiling. “He’s telling her he got the shot.”
Debra pats the director on the back and comes over to us. “Fougeray out, Angelini in.”