If The Glass Slipper Fits...

I've been remiss in keeping up with this blog, due to a whirlwind of other activity. However, a friend recently asked me to contribute to his theater blog... so while it's a bit of a cheat, perhaps, to re-post what I wrote, that's what I'm doing. In this forum, I may have some family members who will add to/correct/recall additional anecdotes on this piece... about my very first time acting. On another note... this is my 100th post here on Bethweek... enjoy, and happy Thanksgiving, y'all!

"If The Glass Slipper Fits..."

Barefoot children, dirty tear-stained faces, and a girl marrying her own brother.

A sordid new soap opera, “Days of our Over-Stereotyped Incestuous Young Hillbilly Lives”?

Nope. My first play.

The year: 1987. At the ripe old age of six, I was the eldest actor in the show. The director/narrator/costume designer was my mother; the assistant director/seamstress/harried producer was our neighbor; my co-stars were my two little brothers and the neighbor’s two kids; the show was “Cinderella,” and because someone up there has it in for me… yes, somewhere in the deepest recesses of my parents’ archives, there is video footage.

I was playing the title role, cast not due to any particular talent, nor really due to nepotism, but simply because a) I was one of only two girls in the gaggle of neighborhood ruffians, and b) none of the other kids could read yet. Public service announcement: literacy pays off, kids.

My mother had the brilliant idea that our two families should have their kids rehearse a play, then videotape the final performance and send it off to our various scattered relatives as a truly meaningful and original holiday gift. She scouted a location – we would rehearse, perform, and film the performance in the neighbor’s mother’s country home. M & M’s were purchased to bribe any resistant children into becoming thespians. My mother then rented a video camcorder approximately the size and weight of Texas, and we were good to go.

The cast was as follows:

· Cinderella – me

· Evil Stepmother – voice of my mother (offscreen)

· Evil Stepsisters – my little brother Adam (age 2) and the neighbor’s son (age 3)

· Evil Stepsister’s Feet (for camera close-ups of the epic “shoe doesn’t fit” scene) – my mom and the neighbor

· Fairy Godmother – neighbor’s daughter (age 4)

· Horses – Adam and the neighbor’s son

· The Prince – my little brother Jake (age 4)

The play kicked off with me sweeping the hearth, learning of the ball, being told by my sobbing evil stepsisters (some bitter dispute between the neighbor boy and my brother over M & M’s led to them bawling throughout every scene they were in) that I was not allowed to go to the ball. When they exited, I sat on a chair and cried “Now I shall never go to the ball!” with appropriate melodrama – completely upstaged by my underwear flashing the audience.

(Let’s recall that this is all caught on film. My parents threaten that when I bring home a fiancée, they will break out this VHS, and if he can watch our “Cinderella” and still want to join the family/hold my hand, he will be officially vetted.)

But then, of course, came the fairy godmother. In our production, however, the benevolent spirit was a petulant little girl who screamed each line at the top of her lungs. As in: “I AM YOUR FAIRY GODMOTHER! I HAVE COME TO GET YOU READY FOR THE BALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”

Then, completely deaf but in a beautiful dress, I went out to my carriage – a Radio Flyer wagon with puffy-paint and glitter-glue decorated cardboard cut-outs enhancing its “carriage” look. The carriage was drawn by two horses – my brother and the neighbor kid in sweatsuits, with yarn-manes and yarn-tails stapled to them, howling over some M & M injustice. Arriving at the ball, the prince (a.k.a. my other little brother, very bitter about having to be involved in this production) grabbed my hand and began yelling at me. This provided me with very little motivation to look sad when the bells began to toll and I told him, flatly, “Oh no. I must go.”

Kicking my foot furiously to make sure I left a shoe behind, I raced off. My prince/brother shouted, “Wait!” and went to pick up the shoe, then decided it hadn’t been dramatic enough, so put down the shoe, backed up, yelled “Wait!” again, and picked up the shoe for a second time as the horses wailed in the background.

In one of my all-time favorite “This American Life” episodes, Ira Glass dissects the meaning of “fiasco” – and, appropriately, uses the story of a community theater production of “Peter Pan” gone horribly wrong to illustrate just what a “fiasco” entails. My “Cinderella story” truly is more aptly dubbed a “Cinderella fiasco” – but more than two decades later, it’s interesting to note where that cast and production staff has landed.

My mother, the strung-out young director chasing young children around a makeshift set, is currently writing the final pages of her dissertation on youth theater. No joke – with four kids grown and living on their own (one of whom was not even born at the time of the now legendary ’87 off-off-off-off-off-off-off-Broadway Cinderella revival) she’s finishing up a Ph.D. in theater. My sobbing horse/step-sister brother, A, is pursuing an acting career in Chicago. I’m still a theater junkie, usually involved in some production and constantly trying to write the next great American play.

We all start somewhere. My first play might have been a fiasco, and could have been a one-shot-deal, a good childhood story that never led to anything… but that’s not how this tale ended. Because for some of us, theater never becomes a pumpkin – it’s always that magic carriage (or Radio Flyer wagon decorated with glittering cardboard). It’s what keeps taking us to the ball, the prince, the next happily-ever-after we share with the next audience. We get to be the fairy tale. What’s better than that?

To Kill A Mockingbird

Harper Lee's "To Kill a Mockingbird" is one of those books that I remember reading as a child. I don't just mean I remember the book itself, the plot, the characters - I mean, I remember reading it: fighting against sleep at night to stay up and read it, devouring paragraphs in the way-back of the family station wagon until I got motion sick, curling up on the couch and turning page after page. I was probably ten or so when I first read "Mockingbird." There were so many things I learned from that book: like the child narrator Scout, I didn't know what rape was, what injustice really meant, what "social mores" were until I encountered that story. Tonight, I saw a production of the stage show for the first time, and encountering that story again, it made me wonder: how far have we come?

The surface answer, of course, is very far. Our schools are desegregated. A "jury of our peers" does not mean "limited to white men." We even have a mixed-heritage/African-American Democratic candidate for president. As a nation, we are more "tolerant."

But that's only the surface answer.

This post is not an endorsement for any particular candidate, but as we're heading into an historic presidential election, with this Tuesday looming near, my only plea is this: don't let hate, fear-mongering, and latent fear of "the other" dictate your vote. More than that - whoever you're supporting, take a stand the next time you hear someone make the election about fear and intolerance. Because the undercurrent, and sometimes overt use of such fear-mongering, is what really scares me - particularly because of how much attention children, our own contemporary, real-life Scouts, are paying to this election.

I have seen several posts on Facebook, as well as comments on blogs and YouTube, from kids I know to be as young as eleven, saying terrifying things. Calling Obama a devil-worshipper, for instance. Saying that anyone who doesn't "vote Christian" isn't a "good American" - upsetting on so many levels. These statements from such young people are perpetuating such old, dangerous ideas. And what's most unsettling is that so many of these young people, because they hear these falsehoods from adults and find "evidence" online and all around them to support them, really believe that they have accurate information. Here's a post someone who identifies himself (herself?) as "too young to vote" left in response to a silly Hockey-Mama-for-Obama Youtube video:

"dumb bitch why don't you study up on politics. I'm not old enough to vote but i know for damn sure i did more homework on this election. OBAMA IS A TERRORIST. Send his punk ass back to Africa."

This sounds like one angry kid - one angry kid utterly confident in his/her opinion being not only right, but also based on "fact."S/he can certainly find plenty of similar sentiments online, "evidence" to back up these claims (though it's all about how you run the search: go to Fact Check, Snopes, or any number of other political OR apolitical sites and the race/religion/anti-American/fear-based rumors about Barack Obama are pretty instantly disproved). Bias exists on both sides, and if you only want to confirm what you think you know, it's easier and easier to do so.

My politics are no secret, but as I stated earlier, this isn't an endorsement post. I have many dear Conservative friends who will be supporting McCain/Palin, and when it's because they agree with their policies, I can respect that. However, when I run in to people who are voting for the Republicans because they are "terrified of what would happen if That Obama gets elected" - it makes me shiver.

All the more so when I hear and see hateful messages from those too young to vote. It is our responsibility to be better role models. Having two major political parties is one thing; fostering violent divides, and fanning the flames even more when race/religion come into play, is flat-out dangerous. When adults encourage children to think of people who don't share their skin color, or go to the same house of worship, or attend the same schools, as being separate and unequal from them, we are teaching a terrible lesson. So please, don't take us backwards. Don't let difference continue to divide. Let's remember to be United, not stratified; let's do it for every Scout waiting to see how the jury will respond.