Unnaturally Green (29 page)

Expectations were high, and as each day passed I got more and more psyched to tackle a four-show weekend. 

But Friday morning, May 21, the feeling was back. The same throat tickle that came to call during my first week as Elphaba—a mossy inclination that could flourish into a bacteria bramble.

This cannot be happening!

Everyone from back east would be arriving that afternoon. Together they’d bought tickets that spanned all four shows. If I missed even one, I’d be letting somebody down. What would they think?

Into the laboratory!

Water, Neti, water, Echinacea tea, water, Neti, water, Vitamin C, water, Umcka, Oscillococcinum, water.

Lather, rinse, repeat.

“Do you want me to prescribe you antibiotics?” my dad asked that night as I greeted him in the hotel lobby, along with my mom and little sister Tessa.

“No, Dad, I need to build up immunity.”

“Because I
will
prescribe you antibiotics.”

(Parents show their love many ways; my dad showed his through antibiotics.)

(Oh, and snapping photos—but more on that later.)

Together we ate a quick dinner, during which my family told me about their trip (“Logan airport has a great food court”), what they thought of San Francisco so far (“lots of interesting people”), and how excited they were to see me for all four shows (“we got tickets to every one!”). To preserve my throat, I nodded or hand-signaled my replies, all the while rewrapping my nun’s habit around my head.

“And you said your agent is coming tomorrow for the matinee?” my mother asked.

I nodded.

“That will be nice to meet her,” said my dad.

There was an elephant in the room.

“I don’t know if I can do this,” I said.

It felt like I was confessing to a crime. The table fell silent.

“Yes, you can,” little sister Tessa said, punching my arm. “I saw you on YouTube!”

My family huddled in for a pep talk—like a football team before a play—and they each told me exactly what I needed to do: rest, drink water, take care of myself.

But that’s what I’ve been doing
, I wanted to scream.

By the next morning the bramble had only grown thornier.

Damn
.

Water, Neti, water, Vitamin C.

I was 50% there. And so many people had come to see me.

Water, Umcka, water.

Gulp.

Banana.

Against my better judgment, I went ahead with the matinee. It was a peculiar performance, to put it lightly; I spent the whole of “The Wizard and I” clearing my throat between notes and hocking up (then promptly swallowing) hard candy-sized loogies of phlegm, which I’d later re-hock and projectile shoot into the offstage trash can. After this, I would drape myself over whatever set piece was closest while Kathleen and Mark blotted my brow and blasted me with a handheld fan, like I was some gimpy green boxer who had all but lost on a TKO.

Whatever you do, don’t call out
, said my left brain.

Unlike my debut week, calling out had become an option—since as of May 22 Alyssa had completed her Elphaba understudy training.

You should definitely call out,
my right brain insisted.

But the thought terrified me.

Here I was, performing for nearly everybody I knew—my family, college friends, childhood buddies, and Ann my agent, who sat in seventh row center with her husband. Had they all traveled 3,000 miles to watch me belly flop into a pool of failure?

Failure! Failure! Failure!

A right-brain chorus sang out, in some weird musical Failure Canon. And the floodgates opened wide.

You’re going to embarrass yourself in front of everyone you know
.

Quiet.

And then somebody will post it on YouTube.

Seriously—shut up!

As I sat in the dressing room at intermission I remembered all the rumors I’d heard about past Elphabas. These were the
Wicked
urban legends—stories of So-and-So’s terrible downfall, whether from polyps, vocal cord hemorrhaging, or other serious injuries that went beyond my novice fears of cracking, forgetting a line, or going slightly flat.

In singing through sickness, was I risking my voice? Would I ever be able to sing again?

Failure! Failure! Failure!

(Shut up, right-brain choirboys! Your lyrics suck!)

Soon, Bryan hustled into the dressing room, adding to the already frenetic mood. The team was busy with my Act II makeup and hair, while I sat quivering like a wet puppy.

“How are you doing, sweetie?” said Bryan.

Dad, you came to my soccer game!

“Not so good,” I said.

“Yeah, I can hear it in your voice,” he said.

I took a deep breath, then blurted, “I don’t think I can do tonight’s performance.”

Bryan’s eyes grew wide, and so did mine, once I knew I’d made a decision without really realizing it.

“Okay, I’ve got some work to do,” he said.

And with that, he dashed out the door. Presumably, he was off to inform Alyssa of the news. As understudy, she was the backup plan’s backup plan.

Thank goodness for Edvard Munch.

She was ready just in the nick of time, too, having had her Elphaba put-in the night before. Like me, on the first day she was eligible to play Elphaba, she would have to swoop in and rescue the show.

(
GREEN.
9.
untrained; inexperienced:
a green understudy.
)

Hopefully, she’d brought her pen and paper to take notes on Life Lessons 101, the same lecture I’d heard on that fateful March Tuesday:

LL101:
You can’t always plan. The universe may intervene.

Decision made, I rose from my chair, donning my thirty-pound Act II dress, witch’s hat, and shawl. Walking to my post in the wings, I began running “No Good Deed” in my head—knowing it was the last remaining Song of Death. On top of its melody, the Failure Canon played in dissonant counterpoint, so loudly that I wanted to scream.

What was happening?

Here I’d thought I had overcome my fear of failure—only to find that it still sat with me, on my shoulder, whispering (or in some cases, singing) powerful words of discouragement. And amidst the chatter—the cacophony of doubt—one phrase rose loudest, above all the others.

Help me.

At the stage door that afternoon, I saw Marshall, my family, college and childhood friends, and my agent.

“That was killer!” said Ann.

“Thanks for coming,” I said as I gave her a hug, silently wishing she’d seen any of the other shows in which I wasn’t hocking up loogies every thirty seconds. Next, I turned to Marshall who, without words, scooped me up in his arms and lifted me many feet in the air, twirling me around and giving intermittent squeezes.

Then came my mother. “You’re looking at one proud Elphamom,” she said as she pulled me in for a full three-minute hug, while my dad snapped photos from all possible angles.

I was grateful for all of the support, but it was totally weird to get praised for a performance that had made me want to crawl inside a hole.

I walked over to greet the fans, signing programs and taking photos. A few
Wicked
regulars had come to the matinee; I’d mentioned something on my blog about the Elphaba dates, and many people had apparently bought tickets.

“A bunch of us are coming back to see you later,” a woman in a windbreaker said. “Will you be on tonight?”

“Uh,” I looked at Ann, then my mom, then all my friends. I had to fess up. “No, not tonight.”

The woman frowned. “Everything okay?”

I pointed to my throat. She nodded in compassion.

“Get some rest, then. And don’t worry about it,” she said.

I thanked her for the kind words, signed more autographs with my silver Sharpie, and rounded up my family to head down the sidewalk. As we walked from the theater, the toothless coffee-snatching lady appeared out of nowhere and demanded we give her something. My family cowered, while I looked her in the eye and spoke the truth:

“Sorry, my friend. I got nothing.”

At the very least, taking off the evening meant I could enjoy a dinner feast with my family. Being of robust Italian descent, my father, Tony Ricci, had long insisted that going to a restaurant should be like a trip back to the Old World. Luckily I knew just the place—a restaurant in North Beach that played Italian movies while you dined.

My parents, little sister, Marshall, and I filed into our seats along a large banquet table, while
Ciao, Professore
played on a flatscreen mounted on the wall. Tacked next to it were strings of garlic and saucepans, while everything else in the vicinity was red, white, or green.

Having lived in Italy, my dad speaks the mother tongue fluently—and never misses an opportunity to do so. Like clockwork, in the first few seconds after sitting down, my dad asked where the waiter was from. And,
molto bene!
He was authentically
Italiano
(accented and all), which was great news for everybody since the quickest way to my father’s heart (and a massive tip) was to speak in broken English and later confirm, when asked, that you did indeed
parlare italiano.

It just so happened that May 22 fell one week after my 24th birthday, so as our waiter went off to fetch San Pellegrino
con gas
, I watched as my family hoisted several tissue paper-filled gift bags onto the table. Enclosed were patterned Victoria’s Secret onesie pajamas, and two different versions of an Elphaba doll they had found on the internet. As I dangled the two dolls together, shaking them so they were having a conversation, the waiter exclaimed something in the mother tongue that made him and my dad laugh hysterically. Moments later, the waiter was kneeling by my side.

“This is
Wicked
, yes?” he bellowed, inches from my ear, pointing to one of the Elphaba dolls.

“
Si!
” yelled my father from across the table.

They yelled a bunch of other Italian stuff, after which the waiter put his arm around me and my dad took out his massive paparazzi lens, attacking us with the flash.

“I told him you were the star of
Wicked!
” he said, snapping away maniacally.

“Dad, I’m not the st—”

“Please-a, will-a you please-a sign?” said the waiter, handing me a
Wicked
program. Someone in my family must have chucked him a Playbill in the strobe-light-flashbulb confusion.

“Don’t worry,” my mother called to me, “we’ve got lots of extras.”

“Good, because I
was
worried,” I said.

I still had my silver Sharpie handy, so I inscribed the cover with my signature sign-off, “Wickedly Yours, Felicia Ricci,” which I felt wasn’t fully appropriate until I added, “
Ciao!
” below it.

The waiter thanked me, bowing his head as he backed up into the kitchen.

“Wasn’t he adorable,” said my mother.

“Yeah, he was all right,” said a teeth-gritting Marshall.

“Don’t worry, I only have eyes for gladiators.”

“Do you want me to punch him, though?” said Marshall.

“Nah, not this time.”

Who were we to punch the waiter? After a year and a half,
Wicked
had become a huge part of the San Francisco theater scene. It was hard to walk a few feet downtown without seeing a
Wicked
ad on the side of a bus, dotting the underground BART stations, or waving on Union Square flagpoles.

After Fossil store guy, I’d been recognized for my job more than I’d expected. It was the
Wicked
effect: once I mentioned that I’d played Elphaba, I was suddenly important in people’s minds, worthy of complimentary desserts, bonus spa treatments, or VIP tickets to tourist attractions. I, myself, wasn’t a celebrity—but I was
part
of something celebrated—a cultural phenomenon, a chapter in history.

Sure, I was one of its footnotes. But I was there. You just had to look hard.

The waiter reappeared with our heaping plates of gnocchi, pizza, and other carbohydrates. “And a special a-treat for-a the star of
Wicked!
” He walked over and placed a champagne flute before me.

I’m not the star, I wanted to say. I felt my pulse quickening.

AT THIS PERFORMANCE THE ROLE OF ELPHABA WILL BE PLAYED BY FELICIA RICCI
.

When standbys went on, their names were displayed on signboards in
Wicked
’s lobby. These signs spelled “once-in-a-lifetime chance” for the cast member—and “certain disappointment” for the audience. If (against all odds) people saw us and liked us, without secretly wishing they could get a partial refund, then bully for everybody. But on the softball team of
Wicked
, the standbys were its benchwarmers.

This wasn’t my self-pity talking; this was the painful truth.

In the restaurant, if circumstances had been different, I wouldn’t have minded the waiter’s special attention. Maybe I would have
liked
basking in the warm glow that
Wicked
cast on me. But that night, it felt less like a glow and more like a spotlight on my shortcomings.

Welcome to the Wonderful World of Wicked
.

At the end of the meal, my dad stood once more to capture a final picture-perfect frame: the waiter leaned over my shoulder, and together we toasted my evening of getting sick, as I smiled and pretended to sip the champagne I couldn’t actually drink.

I wanted to hide. But like a good actress I sat up straight, struck a pose, and smiled for the camera.

Then, as my dad clicked away, I felt something inside me snap.

On the walk home, Marshall tried to take my hand, but I wriggled it away.

“You okay?”

I picked up my pace, now several strides ahead. I felt the wind bite at my ears, turning icy as it whipped around my hair, which was still damp from my dressing room shower.

“Hey, slow down,” he said.