Unnaturally Green (17 page)

“Hey, everyone!” she sang, arabesquing her way to the far wall of dressing room mirrors, chatting with a gaggle of girls. In moments, she was standing behind me, beaming into my mirror with unjustifiable glee.

“So, how was your first week?” she squealed.

I half-expected her to start French braiding my hair or playing Patty Cake with the side of my face.

“It was great!” I said. “What about you? Is your put-in next Friday?”

“Yes, I think so. It’s been nice having Glinda rehearsal since playing it on tour.”

“Totally.”

I considered bringing up the fact that I was about to fly to New York to audition to be Elphaba standby, but I felt weirdly nervous mentioning it.

We chatted a bit more about where the two of us were living, our favorite restaurants, our hometowns—that sort of thing.

“Well, break a leg,” I finally said, in that way you do when a conversation is about to be over. (My giddiness hourglass had all but emptied to its last small-talk grain.)

“Byeeee!” said Libby, practically pirouetting out the door.

This could be my future
, I thought.

Help
.

Ninth Avenue was familiar but strange, a ghost city resurrected from a past life. That Thursday evening, I stalked along the sidewalk, bleary-eyed from the six-hour flight, past my old apartment. It was odd to be so close to home, yet unable to return there—like I’d come back as a different person.

I ducked into a restaurant for a solo dinner of spaghetti, searching for comfort in carbohydrates. As I was finishing, I gave best friend Becky a call.

“Hey, son!”

“Son! I am in New York!”

“I cannot believe I am out of town! Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, just kind of wandering. My audition is early tomorrow. I just met with my pianist friend Zak at a studio, and we ran the Elphaba songs. Then I bought a pair of really expensive boots.”

“That is amazing! Why did you do that?”

I told Becky about how our current Elphaba standby, for whose spot I was auditioning (since she had been promoted to Elphaba on one of the tours), had late last night advised me to put extra effort into selecting appropriate footwear. She had explained that high heels were off the character-mark, whereas strong, sturdy boots would be best.

“Be sure to look long and lean!” she’d admonished, as if this could be accomplished with a shoe.

Even if the advice sounded silly, as an overachiever cramming for the exam I would take any and all advice in stride. (Literally.) So sturdy boots it was.

“So I have these new shoes for maybe no reason. Now I just hope I can, like, hit the notes.”

“Son, it’s in the bag. Just do your thing,” said Becky.

We chatted some more as I detoured into a corner deli, picking up three giant bottles of water, a packet of spearmint gum and, of course, a banana.

That night, I couldn’t sleep, but could only hear, rolling in my head, over and over,

“Unlimited…”

At the audition the next morning, I strode through a foreign land, conspicuously lacking the seizure-inducing green wall and Un-Funhouse doors. After consulting a digital board, I found my way to the assigned studio.

Not having slept a wink, I was running on adrenaline, nervous fumes, and the starchy potassium-filled bulk of one banana, consumed an hour before my 11:20 a.m. appointment. Through the perception-bending door I heard, of course, someone singing “Defying Gravity” absolutely perfectly. I closed my eyes, tightly, as if this would shut out the sound.

In doing so, I felt a dreadful wave of exhaustion. From my sleepless nights with Marshall to my flight to New York, the count of hours I’d gone without rest had begun to rise—like a dangerous riptide.

Last night the Mayfair Hotel had made the Hotel Whitcomb look like a French chateau. My room had been so cramped that its walls could have been the bed’s four posters. The mattress felt like a slab of rock, while every object in the room—from the wallpaper, to the bedspread, to the window treatment—was patterned in a blue print of a man hunched over a sheep, holding a shepherd’s staff and a rope. This was either meant to be pastoral, or taboo erotica.

I opened my eyes, hitting my hand against the side of my face. Just then, the door opened and out walked a lithe, black-haired, eerily familiar girl. At first I thought that the strains of sleep deprivation would make anyone look eerie, if not familiar.

Then it hit me.

Edvard Munch!

She was one of the two girls from my dance callback—the one who’d been as horrible at dancing as I was!

We looked at each other and exchanged stiff smiles.

Soon the door swung open with a frightful clap, and casting director Craig appeared (as was his habit) telling Edvard Munch she was free to go—which meant I was next.

Hadn’t I been here, twice before? The déjà vu was back, but this time it was the dream-sequence version. The air felt gluey; the light was hazy.

Inside the audition room, I saw Paul-Alan-Nick, whose real name was Paul, with his searing blue eyes; along with Lombardo, whose name, it turned out, was Dominick; along with some others, many of whom had actually come to San Francisco to visit the cast and hold rehearsals over the past few weeks.
Wicked
was a huge operation, so the New York creative team, including the people who sat before me, would occasionally beam down to Broadway’s various satellite companies (like San Francisco) to make sure all was in working order. Then they’d beam back to the mothership.

Today, I’d been invited aboard, for a brief and privileged hearing.

A woman named Lisa sat in the center, with a furrowed brow and unruly curls the color of sand. She was the associate director, and spoke first.

“I like your shoes,” she said.

“Oh, thanks,” I said.

Booyah
!

I glanced down at my army green wedge-heeled Stuart Weitzmans, smiling like I’d just given birth to them, adding,

“They’re industrial, and yet feminine.”

(Exorbitant callback boots: priceless.)

“Let’s start with ‘The Wizard and I,’” said Lisa.

I nodded to the pianist, who began those infamous rolling chords.

Be specific!

As I prepared to sing, through my sleep deprivation I noted that if there were a movie version of my
Wicked
experience, it would absolutely include three or more slow-motion montages set to this confounded music. Meanwhile, I’d be riding horseback on the beach in a white flowy dress, alongside Richard Gere, who would be brushing strands of hair from my face. Because that’s what happens in movie montages.

Okay, focus!

The room had flooded with sound.

We’re holding hands. And we’re all…green.

11. NOW WHAT?

A
nd thus began seven days of waiting—also known as the Week I Didn’t Poop.

Back in San Francisco, I was hard-pressed to take my mind off of the audition. Something about the high drama of the ordeal—being whisked away on a plane, not sleeping, re-auditioning, but maybe dreaming it all—made me so tense that my bowels had become completely paralyzed. Not even guitar man or mattress lady—amidst other chaotic, crazy-person displays on the streets—could startle my intestines into working order.

(TMI—I know. But remember what I said about it being a memoir?)

“You can’t let your nerves get the best of you,” cautioned Marshall, as we lay awake in bed. “I think you might be putting too much pressure on yourself.”

“You think?” I snapped back. It was 3 a.m., and tonight’s tossing-and-turning match had reached epic, WWF proportions. We’d reached a temporary truce, but genuine shuteye was still far off.  I lay flopped on my back, my legs and arms jutting out like a bug that had been squashed while doing a jumping jack.

“I’m sorry,” I finally said, huffing and puffing through an exhale of an apology.

“It’s okay, Fel,” Marshall said, massaging his temples. “You just need to think about this whole standby thing as a win-win.”

He propped himself up on one elbow. I could see in his face that he was about to give me advice, and I was too exhausted to object.

“Here’s the thing,” he began.

I leaned in on my elbows to listen.

In addition to “committing to the bit,” Marshall was one of the most rational people I’d ever met, and that night I caught my first glimpse of him in action. With an unwavering can-do attitude, Marshall could break down any high-pressure situation into simple steps—like an Ikea manual for life.

“If you get the job, that’s awesome,” he said. “You’ll be getting a promotion, and you’ll be first in line to play your dream role. If you don’t get it, you’re where you were before this whole ordeal: performing in an amazing musical. There is no way to lose.”

Marshall’s rational assessment stirred me. I turned on my left side to face him.

“I see what you mean,” I said, biting my lip. “But still…I guess…I just don’t want to fail.”

As soon as the words came out, my face got hot. I had never admitted out loud how potent my fear was.

I am afraid of failing.

So much so that my body was refusing to let me poop.

(Okay, if you’re so squeamish about natural human functions, just skip to the end of the chapter.)

“You’re so hard on yourself,” Marshall said. “Failure is an event, not a state of being. It doesn’t mean anything. Why are you so afraid of it?”

“I don’t know,” I said.

Had I, throughout my life, been collecting achievement chips, as a kind of currency for self-worth? If so, I hadn’t realized it until now. But it all made sense: I was a classic overachiever, who’d crammed her way into an Ivy League school, then set her sights on success or bust. Had professional theater become the next frontier?

When it came to
Wicked
, I’d never been tested so many times or through such extremes, and the process had begun to take a toll. My old, horseshoe-wielding friend Luck wouldn’t lay off the aggressive spankings. In my mind, this meant certain, spectacular failure.

Is that how achievement worked? That the more you accomplished, the worse you felt? That the higher you soared, the longer and farther you could fall as soon as the letdown arrived?

I peered into Marshall’s face, his thick mass of eyelashes complementing his strong, Superman-like jaw. I was afraid of professional failure—but was I also confusing it with another fear?

They don’t call it “falling” in love for nothing.

We talked through the night. Marshall’s words helped, but I still couldn’t shake the feeling of dread. How much further would I have to go—traveling down this long, winding, yellow brick road? Would I lose myself amidst so many challenges?

I had no choice but to press on, through the sleepless, poopless week.