Drama Is Her Middle Name
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Table of Contents
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To every woman
who's doing it for herselfâmaking her own money, taking care of her health, holding down her position at home and at work (without tears).
Sisters, we are doing it for ourselves!
1
“I love you for listening!” Ritz signed off the air as she did
every evening. She quickly scooped up the papers she had
scattered on the desk in front of her and stuffed them into her
white crocodile Gucci bag.
“Um, Ritz, you have a couple of faxes here that I think you
should look at,” said Jamie, nervously handing the papers
over to Ritz. Jamie was the newest intern in a string to work
on the
Ritz Harper Excursion
âone of the most popular radio
shows in the country, syndicated from flagship station WHOT
in New York City. Jamie had outlasted the ten before her by
a month and counting.
“Do you want me to pick up your clothes from the cleaners?” she asked.
“Thanks, I'll get them myself. I have some time to kill and
the fresh air will do me some good. Chas, are you coming?”
“Uh-uh. I have to clean up some of the mess you made today, Miss Thing,” he said with his usual hint of attitude and
humor. “But wait up, I'll walk you downstairs.”
Jamie left to prepare for the next day's show. Chas grabbed
his mink-lined shearling and Ritz slung her white fur over her
slim frame. Winter white, head to toe. It was a typical Ritz
outfit. If she didn't have a fly fur or some other extravagant
accessory, she simply was not dressed.
She and Chas waited at the bank of elevators and rode the
thirty-nine floors down to the lobby without stopping, like an
express train. At this time of night, there were very few people left in the building.
At the lobby level, Ritz let her four-inch Jimmy Choos
clop on the marble floor. She loved the sound heels made on
marble, like a regal Clydesdale on a cobblestone road. She
also loved the way stylish heels made her feel. Ritz, who had
big doe eyes, dark sumptuous Godiva chocolate skin, a chiseled jaw, and Robin Givens-esque dimples, didn't always look
or feel stylish. She just started wearing heels regularly a few
years backâthanks to Chasâbut had mastered them to the
point where she could practically run a forty-yard dash in
anything under five inches.
“So what do you and Tray-Tray have planned for tonight?”
Chas asked.
“Nothing special, just some girl talk,” Ritz said. “We have
a lot of catching up to do. It's been almost a year.”
“I know! Homegirl just packed up and never looked back,”
Chas said. “I miss her. She would have enjoyed the past few
months of this ride, chile.”
“I know. I know,” Ritz said. “I'm just glad she's here for the
next event. I'm a little nervous about my first real television
gig. With her behind-the-scenes knowledge, she'll be a huge
help.”
“Don't worry about a thing, Ritzy! Papa Chas has it all
worked out,” he said, glancing at his watch as Ritz headed for
the revolving doors. Chas, whose given name was Charles
Bradley and would never be known as Chuck or Charlie, always took care of things for Ritz.
“Give Tracee a huge sloppy kiss for me on the lips!”
Ritz shot Chas a look. “Now you went too far with that
one.”
“Can't blame a brother for trying!” he said and playfully
pushed her toward the door.
“Bye! I'll call you later.”
“Be safe, sweetie.”
THIRTY-SIXTH STREET AND MADISON AVENUE,
MANHATTAN
Ritz Harper checked her frosty Franck Muller watch. It was
eight minutes past seven. She had some time to kill before
picking up her best friend, Tracee, at the airport. It was a
crisp thirty degrees. Ritz loved the winter because it gave her
a chance to luxuriate in the many kinds of fursâfrom chinchilla to mink, fox to ermine.
She decided to take the scenic route to her car and stop
by the cleaners before heading to Newark Airport. By then,
rush-hour traffic through Midtown and along the New Jersey
Turnpike would be clear.
New York City, usually known for its bustleâthe city that
never sleepsâhad a few pockets that were completely dead.
After Ritz left her studio on Thirty-fourth and Park, street
traffic amounted to just a few passersby. There wasn't the
usual horn-blowing, anxious-to-get-nowhere car traffic that
was found on the far West or East Side of town.
The Morgan Library stood out on the north side of Thirty-sixth. Its awesome white stone structureâbarren, abandoned
for nearly four yearsâwas a couple of years from re-opening.
There were metal and wood scaffolds and orange construction barricades surrounding it. The construction crew cleared
out a little after five-thirty. The apartment buildings across
the street seemed like mini abandoned museums themselves.
Many of the residents were either in for the night or out partying. The street was quiet. The only illumination came from
a dull streetlight near Park Avenue on Thirty-sixth.
Ritz loved this neighborhood. Ever since she began working in the city five years ago, she imagined living on the
Upper East Side and on nice days walking down Park Avenue
before her shift, catching lunch at the Four Seasons, even
shopping at the expensive stores and of course, being hounded
by adoring fans wanting her autograph. It was a fantasy that
Ritz had had since she was a little girl. It was a fantasy that
she was now living out. But the reality didn't quite live up to
the fantasy. Ritz didn't realize how much she loved her privacy and how shocked she would be to have people come up
to her while she was eating or strolling the streets and ask for
an autograph. Some were much more rude than she could
have imagined, but for the most part, Ritz enjoyed the fame.
She loved connecting with her peopleâwho in some ways
had become her family.
By the time Ritz left the glass and steel building that housed
her studio and headed northwest toward the cleaners, about
a dozen people stopped to speak, wave, or get an autograph.
“Heyyyyy, Ritz!” a very loud young woman squealed from
across Park Avenue, jarring Ritz out of her thoughts. Ritz was
growing to understand that her relationship with her audience was so intimate that people felt totally comfortable with
herâas if they really knew her.
A portly woman in her mid-forties yelled out, “Ritz, you
go! I listen everyday!” Ritz smiled and waved. On her walk up
Thirty-fifth toward Madison, a woman in her early twenties,
who was walking with two friends, asked for an autograph.
“Sorry, sweetie, no time,” Ritz said. “I have to run. But I love
ya!” Ritz picked up her pace as she passed the Community
Church of New York.
For every block and wave and hello, a beige Nissan followed Ritz.
A couple more fans greeted her and someone in a black
Jeep Cherokee beeped his horn and yelled out, “Will you
marry me?!” as he made a right onto Madison, past Ritz, who
gave a bright smile.
“I imagined this,” she said to herself remembering the fantasies of adoring fans, autograph hounds, and paparazzi. “But
I never imagined
this.
” For four years Ritz had languished in
abject obscurity on WHOT doing nights. She was good,
that's why she kept her position. But she wasn't quite good
enough to break out. One night Ritz did something different,
and it changed her life. This was the night her fate shiftedâ
her career literally exploded. She and her camp referred to it
as “the Bomb Drop.” The Bomb Drop also disintegrated the
career of the nation's most respected and famous newswoman
and changed the face not just of Ritz's career but of radio itself. The gloves came off and everyone became fair game.
Stations like WHOT, which previously were committed to
playing the hottest music in the country, started looking for
“personalities” instead of “announcers.” They wanted jocks
like Ritz who could be bigger than the music. Ritz was an
“overnight” sensationâfour years in the making.
“This ain't no fifteen minutes of fame, baby,” she would
say. “This is for keeps!”
That's why she enjoyed the days that she drove into the
cityâwhich were becoming fewer and fewer. Usually the station would send a car to pick up or drop Ritz off. She had so
many appearances to make during the week that they didn't
want her to worry about catching a cab. She was treated like
a queen. But some of the perks kept her from the thing she
enjoyed mostâinteracting with
her
people.
Ritz was rarely alone anymore. Chasâher producer and
the mastermind who turned her into a real diva and took her
radio game to the next levelâusually escorted her to her car
after the show. He parked in the same garage, and during
their “wind-down” walk, they would discuss the day's show
and plan for the next day.
The February air was crisp and cold. Ritz pulled her white,
calf-length mink tighter. She was known for her furs. She had
even rocked a midriff fox in the dead of summer for an MTV
Award red carpet. Ritz adjusted her Gucci frames carefully,
keeping her weave in place. Sun or no sun, Ritz always had
her frames on. She liked her new look, which Chas had urged
her to make. She was about twenty pounds thinner, and had
new hair and a new attitude. She even bought a brand-new
Aston Martin V12 Vanquishâa gift to herself with her first
bonus check for coming in first place in the afternoon drive
time in the last Arbitron ratings book. Chas had finally convinced the once-frugal Ritz that if she was going to be a star,
she had to have the “tricks of the trade.”
“You have to look like a star and live like a star,” Chas told
her. “You have to have star shit!”
Ritz's first thought after adding the car, one of the final
pieces to her reconstruction, was “Wait until Tracee sees
me!” Tracee was not only Ritz's best friend, she was the one
person who was truly happy about Ritz's success. There was
no jealousy, no cattiness, no phoniness with Traceeâjust
sheer friendship and sheer joy. That was a rarity for Ritz, who
had very few female friendsâand very few friends, period.
“She is going to fall out when she sees this Vanquish!” said
Ritz, who was with Tracee when she bought her Lexus convertible two years before. The two of them drove around
Manhattan with the top down, heat blasting. It was last year
this time. They were shivering and screaming with laughter
the whole time. Ritz had so much to share with Tracee, who
seemed so distant latelyâand it had nothing to do with the
twelve hundredâplus miles she'd moved away. So much had
changed. Ritz had changed, too.
Ritz smiled and tingled with excitement thinking about
reconnecting with her friend. She was so caught up in her
own thoughts that she never noticed the beige Nissan that
was still trailing her. Ritz didn't see the Nissan slow down as
she stopped for the light, crossing the street between Thirtyfifth and Thirty-sixth. She didn't spot it as it waited midblock
while Ritz ran into the cleaners on Thirty-sixth and Madison. Her only reason for taking this route was to make sure
her pink gown was ready. She was making her debut on Monday on her very own red carpet, hosting the Grammys for E!
She'd had to have the dress taken in to make sure it fit like a
snake's skin. She couldn't wait to get Tracee's feedback on
the dress. And if didn't fit, she had all day Saturday to find an
emergency tailor to fix it.
Ritz was mentally going over her checklist of things to do.
She even had activities mapped out for Tracee even though
Tracee hated planned activities. There would be a day at the
spa at the Hilton in Short Hills. Ritz could afford the Ritz,
the Peninsula, Bliss, or any upscale spa, but she wanted to stay
close to home. The Hilton also held special memories for Ritz
and Tracee. Before Tracee moved, the two would meet there
at least once a month for a massage.
“You have to take care of yourself,” Tracee would say. “You
have to beat all of that stress out of your body.”
The Hilton in Short Hills was affordable and close to
Ritz's home. Traipsing off to New York on the weekend would
be counterproductive to the stress relief she was seeking.
Tracee would usually stay over, and they would either watch
a DVD and eat popcorn or plot their next move. The two
shared their dreamsâRitz of taking over radio and Tracee of
taking over the music business.
Two years later, Ritz had fulfilled most of her dreams, and
Tracee had done a one-eighty from hers.
It was during one of their girls-out weekends when Tracee
confided in Ritz that she was tired of the hustle.
“I just believe God has other plans for me, Ritzy,” she
would say. “I feel like every day I stay in this game, I am losing part of my soul. I just feel it draining away, like it's being
siphoned off. I can't do it anymore.”
One month later she was packing up and moving off to
Florida.
“Damn, girl, you could have at least moved to South Beach
or some fly-ass place like that,” Ritz said. “Ain't nobody in
Winter Garden but some old-ass retired people who can't
drive. What the fuck?”
“That's exactly what I wantedâminus the bad driving,”
Tracee said. “Peace and quiet.”
Ritz missed her friend. She spent five hours a day, five days
a week, talking to millions over the airwaves. But talking
to Tracee was something that nothing could replace. She
couldn't wait to wear her out at her favorite mallâThe Mall
at Short Hills, directly across the street from the Hilton spa.
She could finally let her hair down and tell someone how
scared she was at everything that was happening to her.
Ritz had developed an on-air style that titillated, thrilled,
and pissed people off all at the same time. And it was contagious. Even those who hated herâand the list was growingâ
could not turn the dial when she was on. It had been less
than six months since she debuted in the afternoon drive
spot on WHOT, but Ritz's audience and her salary had
tripled. Ritz Harper was the undisputed queen of the radio.
