I'm Not Dead... Yet! (32 page)

(We learned that although Streptokinase was approved for use in cardiac hospitals, the doctor was required
to be there
and a special nurse had to be brought in.)

I arrived and Viv’s sister Marilyn flew in from Illinois. Vivienne had finally stabilized and we all were able to follow the ambulance transporting her to UCLA. This was the hospital that had saved my life. My cardiologist would take care of her; my brilliant surgeon was here. We were all feeling relief.

Karla helped Viv out of bed to use the bathroom and she said with a laugh, “Oh my Karlie, I thought I was a goner!”

We all kissed Viv goodnight and went home with plans to see her first thing in the morning.

As soon as we got home the phone rang. My doctor called and told us to come back immediately. Two days after her first attack, Vivienne was having a
second
heart attack at UCLA. They were taking her to the Cath Lab.

Waiting in the family lounge, I kept watching the clock… it got later and later but the tiny seconds-hand schemed and deceived. I was now a healed heart patient at UCLA, healthy and alive, living a normal life. The seconds continued to tick. I watched Karla, exhausted, trying to sit up in the waiting room, but eventually closing her eyes, unable to keep herself awake after three days without sleep. The clock refused to stop. Marilyn was reading every magazine in the waiting room, nervously. Time kept moving forward. I looked at Lyric, now three, playing quietly with hospital toys, her life moving forward.

I heard the hospital P.A. system announce, “Mayor Koch to the Cath Lab. Mayor Koch to the Cath Lab, stat!” Mayor Koch—no ‘Code Blue?’ Was this an attempt to avoid startling loved ones? Tick, tick. I stared at the clock. I was hypnotized by the seconds moving forward, life continuing, patients in the hallway recovering, men and women walking with purpose but seemingly unaware of the clock—their lives, second by second—on a collision course to their last tick.

I stepped out of the waiting room and looked down the hall. My cardiologist was walking toward me. He did the oddest thing. About fifty feet from me, he stopped (no urgency whatsoever) and took a drink from the water fountain. I remembered the day he told me I needed open-heart surgery. Before he told me, he took a sip of water from a paper cup.

My body froze. I managed to get Karla—not knowing what to say, except that the doctor was walking our way. I exchanged a look with Marilyn, a look I’ll never forget: we both understood the tragedy unfolding. I was born with a creative mind and I used that mind to guide me through life. This scenario didn’t require creativity—it was already too obvious and awful.

I can’t remember what the doctor who helped save my life actually said to us about Vivienne’s death, except near the end they cut Vivienne’s chest open and gave her a ‘heart massage’ in a last-ditch effort to save her life. That visual was unbearable: the pain and vulnerability Vivienne, only 60 years old, must have been feeling, all alone in the hospital, away from her home in Illinois, lying on a cold table, surrounded by strangers, knowing she was dying…

I held Karla, Lyric and Marilyn tightly. Lyric cried because we were crying. We all went to a private office where we kept asking the same questions every family asks when something tragic and finite happens. The sounds we all made were sounds I never want to hear again.

We visited Vivienne’s body. We collected her belongings. And Karla lost her mother… September 2, 1986.

There was no reason for any of us to stay
in L.A. I wanted to be with Karla but she urged me to go back to Ohio to
Patent Leather Shoes
because the show was going to open the next day without its lead... Karla and Lyric flew with Marilyn to Illinois, with plans to join me in a few days.

Karla was at Vivienne’s condo organizing her mother’s belongings for her brothers, crying and cuddled with a sleeping Lyric on her bed. The TV happened to be on the
Lifetime
channel. A program about advances in heart care came on, telling all about Streptokinase—the ‘clot buster’ drug—and how it could save lives when administered within 30 minutes of a heart attack. Dumbfounded by the irony, Karla realized if she had seen the program a few days day
before,
it would have saved Vivienne’s life.

We learned from the autopsy Vivienne only had one artery with atherosclerosis, but because that doctor let her lie there without any intervention at Tarzana Hospital, a clot did irreparable damage to her heart muscle. At UCLA she was taken off Heparin (a blood thinner) in preparation for an angiogram within a few days. Without the Heparin, another clot formed causing the second heart attack and the heart muscle, so damaged two days before, virtually shredded. Vivienne’s death changed the protocol for taking heart attack patients off Heparin at UCLA.

Karla did not rant and rave like a lunatic to get attention; she didn’t throw a fit or hurl curse words or even raise her voice. She behaved with the respect her mother had instilled in her; she did everything she possibly could do to get someone to pay attention to Vivienne’s chest pain—
without being an asshole.

I’m here to tell you, sometimes
we have to be assholes
.

Why are many of us afraid to ‘make waves’ or ‘step on someone’s toes?’

... as patients, as caregivers, as loved ones. We cannot afford to be victims, because in this game, losing means death.

And please,
learn
from our mistakes. This was a very new time in our lives. We had weathered so many changes, many of them life-altering. This was a time to reflect; to think; to ask myself, ‘Why was I the lucky one when it came to my heart and not Vivienne? Could it be because I was a popular actor and got better and more attention when I needed it than she did?’ Unfortunately, the answer to that question will always be ‘Yes.’ That should make all of us reflect. That’s just… wrong.

Valuable Life Lesson
: It was about this time in my life where I realized,
every little thing
is a ‘Valuable Life Lesson.’ I began to comprehend that valuable life lessons were not sentences of wisdom that came in fortune cookies. Every breath is a journey into my sponge-like spirit if I manage to keep my eyes open and actually see what I’m looking at. Every blink of the eye is a chance, a golden opportunity to become more educated, compassionate, selfless, overwhelmed with the bigness of it all. I’ll refuse to understand the word ‘boring’ from this day forth.

Out of the blue,
I got a phone call from Burt Reynolds asking me if I’d go to Italy with him and be in his film with Liza Minnelli,
Rent-A-Cop
.
(Man, when it comes to show business, that phone is a blessing.) He said he’d send the script over immediately. Work! Yes! Script! Oh, no…! I didn’t know what to do. Burt was one of the greatest friends anyone could have, but this was just… awful. And it took place in Chicago in the dead of winter. I had no idea where the romance of making a film in Italy came from, but it wasn’t anywhere on the pages.

I called Burt. Before I could say anything, he told me how much fun we would all have in Italy. Me, Karla, Lyric, him… I eventually hung up thinking I must’ve missed something. Somewhere. When did we go to Italy? I reread the script at a turtle’s pace trying not to miss anything. Chicago. Chicago. Chicago. And the script wasn’t getting any better.

“Burt, there’s one thing I just don’t understand—you keep saying how we’ll all go to Italy, but the film is set in Chicago.”

“Oh—I forgot to tell you, it’s actually cheaper to build the interiors in Rome at Cinecitta Studios than it is to shoot them in Chicago.”

“Oh.”

“We’ll do the exteriors in Chicago and all the interiors in Rome. So, are you in?”

“Karla and Lyric will have tickets to Italy, too?”

“Of course!”

“I’m in.”

Work… with my friend. And since Karla’s mom had just passed away, this might be a good thing for all of us. (Man I wish life were that simple…)

And so we went to Italy, where I promised Lyric we would see ‘The David’ in Florence, and the inside of the Sistine Chapel in Rome. We took Lyric everywhere. I would pick her up in her stroller, carry her up and down the Spanish Steps, and all the way up the cramped circular stairwell to the
Cuppola
of St. Peter’s Basilica.

I did all of this with the new frame of mind that there was absolutely nothing wrong with me or my heart. We had a blast. Because my schedule was so light, we went to Venice and Florence and took the bullet train. It was grand. All was well.

All was so well that when the production finally came back to Chicago, Burt, Bernie Casey and I were invited to a Bull’s game with Michael Jordan, and I was asked by the management of the Bulls to throw up an ‘honorary jump ball.’ I was told that the players loved
One On One
and coach Doug Collins was the biggest fan. Of course I said ‘Yes.’

Before the teams were announced, someone from the Bulls came and got me and had me wait at the scorer’s table—court-side. My adrenaline was pumping. As a ballplayer, I thought it was pretty lame to throw up a jump ball—that was so ‘Hollywood’—so I asked if I could take an honorary free-throw. That was more… ‘Indiana.’ Not New York, but still, not American Samoa.

“Sure, why not.”

They finally introduced the teams, but it all came down to introducing Michael Jordan. And when they did, I felt what it must be like to be Michael Jordan. Standing on the basketball floor with the lights suddenly off, the arena dark and the sounds beginning to rumble, all at once a light-show began and as thrilling as it was, there was an energy of thousands of fans beginning to pulsate and it felt as if the entire building was shaking. The plangent cheers for Michael Jordan were so loud I thought he could go deaf from the decibel level—louder than all heavy metal bands combined. And Michael Jordan and company heard this every night. Wow, game after game.

When the lights came up the crowd was still in hysterics and already a bit drunk. The P.A. announcer mentioned my name, “...from
One On One” was all I heard,
and then he said the words, “...honorary free-throw.” There were boos and cheers, but all I heard were the boos. I thought, ‘Yeah, I’d probably boo, too. Honorary free throw, that’s so… well, now it seemed so ‘Boston.’ Screw that. I walked toward the free-throw line, took a dramatic step back, then back again to the 3-point line. Now, that was so… ‘New York!’ The first thought in my head was, ‘Robby—you haven’t really been playing any kind of ball since your surgery. Your chest is tight. Your shoulders have been pulled forward by the scar; your basketball posture is bad. What are you doing?’

‘Shut-up,’ my New York self said to my now Duke subconscious. Actually it would be more like UNLV - but this is a strange basketball mentality that only hard-core players will understand.

And then I felt the basketball in my hands. I felt the leather. I became one with the ball. I remembered the most important thing about being a shooter: a shooter shoots. We don’t ‘chuck’ the ball up, we ‘feel’ the shot. We ‘reel’ in the basket from the 3-point line until it is inches from our face; we focus and visualize the ball going in—we never get tight. The better the shooter, no matter the distance, it has to be effortless. And confident.

Then I heard John Paxson laugh and say, “Oh… preeeeessure, Robby. Pressure.”

I looked at the Bulls Stadium basket as if it were in the playground at P.S. 199, reeled in the basket until it was inches from my face, and the next thing I knew, I shot the ball… effortlessly… and… swish. Nothing but net. And as I used to say to Karla when I would practice and after every ‘swish’, “Isn’t that the most beautiful sound you’ve ever heard?” Nothing but net.

The crowd went berserk. So did Doug Collins, Paxson and the rest of the Bulls. But the supreme compliment came when Michael Jordan ran over and slapped me on the butt. I went back to my seat with Burt and Bernie as the conquering hero, but all I kept thinking was: ‘Michael Jordan patted me on the butt.’ I now had a golden butt. If nothing else, I possessed the butt M.J. slapped.
My
butt. Oh, yeah. “Oh, by the way, Burt and Bernie? Michael Jordan patted me on the butt.” I don’t think I’ve ever seen Burt Reynolds happier. And he was happy for me.

I was invited to testify
before the Senate Appropriations Committee in Washington D.C. in the spring of 1987. I spoke on behalf of the National Institutes of Health for heart research funding and education. Representing the American Heart Association, along with Surgeon General C. Everett Coop and Senator Ted Kennedy, I also spoke in support of the ground-breaking Kennedy-Hatch Bill attempting to ban the promotion of cigarettes to minors and prevent tobacco companies from advertising at sporting events. (Bye-bye, Joe Camel.)

I didn’t really like to do things outside my realm of comfort,
and Karla and I were not partygoers, but if Burt Reynolds asked us, we went. He was the man, to me—also, Hollywood ‘A-list’—and Hollywood at its finest.

Karla and I were always the youngest people on the guest list. Making an appearance with Karla clutching my sweaty hand helped me get through my fear of social events. We went to remarkable parties at Burt’s where most of the guests were Old Hollywood, people we ‘knew’ from black and white films, coming to life before our eyes
in color
: like the great Fred Astaire.

Karla and I went back to another sold-out summer tour for John Kenley. Even Lyric had a part as our flower girl, and Cliff Bemis co-starred and directed. Cliff possesses a powerhouse voice and great comic timing. He had been a stalwart star at the Cleveland Playhouse, Cleveland Opera—he was virtually the ‘king of Cleveland.’ Karla and I convinced him to move to L.A. after the last tour and he has been our best family friend ever since. He slept on a pull-out bed in our living room for his first three months in Los Angeles. He was the best houseguest we ever had and we all cried when he he finally moved out. Cliff took Lyric on her first ‘date’ at three. She told her pre-school friend, “He’s big and I’m little, but we don’t mind the difference.”

At this point in my career,
I realized I would have to re-invent myself. The scripts I was being offered were not the kind of projects I wanted to pour my heart and soul into. I tried. I did my best but coming home from a straight-to-video faux sex thriller made me feel like I was a whore, prostituting everything I believed in, ruining every title that came before these films. But I had to make a living and I literally knew nothing else but the arts. Instead of whining about it, I decided to be proactive.

Maybe I could go back to school. I never took a break for college; I went from film to film after I graduated from high school. I dreamed of going to Harvard, in pre-med when I was in high school. Maybe I should really take a different path.

I had success as a screenwriter, but wasn’t sure if I could make a living at it full-time. I knew, for some reason, an actor with a heart problem was an out-of-work actor, but a
director
with a heart problem was usually a respected director. Strange, I thought.
Perception
. I would somehow have to make the jump from actor to director if I were to continue with a career in the arts.

One of my favorite directors and mentors, George Schaefer, was the Chair of the Theater and Film Departments at UCLA. Maybe I’ll contact him and ask for his advice, I thought. When we did speak, Mr. Schaefer suggested another option: he encouraged me to
teach
—eventually hiring me to give master classes for a semester at UCLA.

I initially passed on another lurid story
of drug dealing and nude scenes with body doubles: “Hi, this is Amber. Amber get naked and sit on Robby’s face.” Nope—I just couldn’t do that again. It may sound like fun but believe me, it’s like the families at Disney World trying to stop their children from crying while the husband and wife fight. Something was pathetically sad and all screwed up at the happiest place on Earth.

I was offered the lead and could barely get through a script first entitled “Crack in the Mirror.” The producers asked if I would reconsider if I
directed
the film as well. To be honest, it was a no-brainer. I love the education that goes with everything we do in the arts, and one of the most glorious aspects is that we are all students until the day we die. Without hesitating, I took on the role as the lead and as the director. This was my chance to ‘step up’ as we say in the business. Maybe I really could begin my career re-invention by directing this film. If so, I would have to do one helluva job with this script...

White Hot
has the dubious distinction of being the first film to be shot on High Definition Video in North America. Which makes me an asterisk in a book of ‘Triviality’ as the first director to direct a feature in North America on High Def.
At that time, the camera was the biggest hunk of electronics I had ever seen—kind of like a Mitchell Camera, but on steroids and camera growth hormones. Aside from its heft and bulkiness, it was permanently tethered to a truck with technicians calibrating and recalibrating each and every set-up, so I couldn’t just say, ‘Let’s move over here and grab a cut-away before lunch.’ Making a move with that equipment meant ‘lunch’ turned into dinner and then overtime. Every move was science and history in the making. I kept telling the producers that no one is going to come to the movies to watch the technology—they just want to see a good film... err, video. “Can’t you guys find a better script?” For some unknown reason, they stuck with the words in between Page One and ‘The End’ and it was my job to bring it to life.