What Happens When You Recruit Famous Actresses to Read Your Work
I'm heading into the second week of my book tour for I See You Made an Effort: Compliments, Indignities, and Survival Stories from the Edge of 50 and as always, each book tour is its own unique and unusual animal.
One of the first surprises was the event I'd planned to be the big book launch in New York. I'd been invited to launch the book at Second Stage Theatre and had invited a gaggle of well known actresses to perform excerpts from the book and at the same time we were raising money for the theatre- I love a good cause. As the evening approached, actresses fell in and out of the night, some were working, on the wrong coast, had the flu, it was an adrenaline rush, on top of that, it turned out that the evening we picked was night of a thousand benefits on Broadway, so we had Gina Gershon who needed to be shuttled back and forth to and from another event that evening and Tony Award winner Tonya Pinkins who was going to have come after the show started, always a terrifying proposition as you never want to start a show when you cast isn't in the house, nonetheless, that was the deal.
That night as the actresses assembled, I had no idea what to expect, we'd never rehearsed. Gina arrived late, we rushed her backstage and then made a last minute decision to bump her from the opening of the show to second position so she could locate her reading glasses (!!) have a diet coke and relax.
Tony Award winner Alice Ripley took the stage. I'd never met Alice and was standing in the wings after introducing her wondering how she would interpret the chapter When Brown was Going to Be the New Black. When Alice reached the lines about facing the end of your fertility and even if you didn't want to have more children you can experience this as a huge loss, she was weeping. It was one of those moments you can only dream of as a writer, to see your words connect with someone, it was just astounding. It's really surreal when you've spent so much time writing alone in a room and you hear your words being read out loud, I am so grateful to all the actresses who read and the warm reception that night was just the icing on the cake. Tonya Pinkins came on stage and announced that we'd known each other since we were virgins and now were going through menopause together, that brought down the house. She read from the chapter about the assisted suicide I participated in, 828-3886. I was going to read after her, but to be honest, I just didn't think I could follow her, she is such a powerful performer. I'm still not sure I made the right choice.
I'm going to share that I think I spied a pair of spanx under Gina Gershon's glamorous dress, but who cares, when I saw her I thought of that line from When Harry Met Sally- I'll have what she's having- she is making 50 look amazing. I'm sitting a hotel room today in Nashville preparing for an evening at The Nashville Library, hoping that the adorable waiter who served us dinner at City House last night who happened to be a Dinner and a Movie fan will come to the evening they have planned tonight.
One of the first surprises was the event I'd planned to be the big book launch in New York. I'd been invited to launch the book at Second Stage Theatre and had invited a gaggle of well known actresses to perform excerpts from the book and at the same time we were raising money for the theatre- I love a good cause. As the evening approached, actresses fell in and out of the night, some were working, on the wrong coast, had the flu, it was an adrenaline rush, on top of that, it turned out that the evening we picked was night of a thousand benefits on Broadway, so we had Gina Gershon who needed to be shuttled back and forth to and from another event that evening and Tony Award winner Tonya Pinkins who was going to have come after the show started, always a terrifying proposition as you never want to start a show when you cast isn't in the house, nonetheless, that was the deal.
That night as the actresses assembled, I had no idea what to expect, we'd never rehearsed. Gina arrived late, we rushed her backstage and then made a last minute decision to bump her from the opening of the show to second position so she could locate her reading glasses (!!) have a diet coke and relax.
Tony Award winner Alice Ripley took the stage. I'd never met Alice and was standing in the wings after introducing her wondering how she would interpret the chapter When Brown was Going to Be the New Black. When Alice reached the lines about facing the end of your fertility and even if you didn't want to have more children you can experience this as a huge loss, she was weeping. It was one of those moments you can only dream of as a writer, to see your words connect with someone, it was just astounding. It's really surreal when you've spent so much time writing alone in a room and you hear your words being read out loud, I am so grateful to all the actresses who read and the warm reception that night was just the icing on the cake. Tonya Pinkins came on stage and announced that we'd known each other since we were virgins and now were going through menopause together, that brought down the house. She read from the chapter about the assisted suicide I participated in, 828-3886. I was going to read after her, but to be honest, I just didn't think I could follow her, she is such a powerful performer. I'm still not sure I made the right choice.
I'm going to share that I think I spied a pair of spanx under Gina Gershon's glamorous dress, but who cares, when I saw her I thought of that line from When Harry Met Sally- I'll have what she's having- she is making 50 look amazing. I'm sitting a hotel room today in Nashville preparing for an evening at The Nashville Library, hoping that the adorable waiter who served us dinner at City House last night who happened to be a Dinner and a Movie fan will come to the evening they have planned tonight.
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On: Making an Effort
F##king Fifty was the original title of my forthcoming memoir. I think of this book as a mid-oir, a mid life memoir, I started writing it at 49 and was shooting for the book to come out when I turned
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