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Chapter 5--The Tempest With
almost everyone else returning to New York, Henry and Shoko decided to
stay at the lake, to avoid New York's chaos and enjoy their new son in
that relative tranquility.
49
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| But
her relationship to Christine had become increasingly close. At first
Christine liked to tell her how her mother had played a scene or spoken
a line. Marjorie always listened, sometimes saying, "Well, I might
be able to do that if I had your mother's talent, but have to make do with
what I have," then followed her own instincts, usually to the satisfaction
of Jack as director, and gradually won Christine over.
Marjorie sometimes came up to the lake, too, because Christine liked to rehearse there, where they could have the cabin to themselves, or walk along the lake and talk, and, for the recreation it offered, might bring her husband. She didn't swim, fish, or go water skiing herself, but did become close to Shoko during her pregnancy. Then, when the baby was born, she was delighted to help care for it. She'd even at times read to Henry, in her deep, rich voice, relieving Shoko at this as well. She and her husband-- they had two daughters, but grown and married, with families of their own, all of whom had been to the lake at one time or another--had been guests at the double wedding, as Randall Best had been, and were considered good friends. Helping Shoko and Laura put the cabin back in order after the shooting of Ben she told Shoko how she'd planned to come up and clean the cabin prior to their coming home, until she'd discovered the boys were still there. She'd watched Christine's relationship with these young men with interest, and had heard about some of Arthur's stories, but Charlie was the one she knew and liked--and wished well with Christine. When, shortly after returning from Japan, Jack and his family moved to New York to begin work on The Tempest, Jack began to wonder why Christine and Charlie, who'd been getting along well enough in California, seemed to be avoiding each other. Charlie was living with Ralph Reed-- "Montague in New York, but Capulet in California," as he liked to say--with whom Betty and Henry had stayed when 50
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| they first came to New York in 1957, still a friend with
a spare room. Ralph worked with the Players Company off and on, but
couldn't depend on the acting income, so worked part time for a theatre
publishing company as well. "I tried for fame and glory, and watched
Jordan and Betty attain it--but it's not my karma. I seem to belong
in the audience," he said. He was pleased to have Charlie staying with
him, however, and gave him the benefit of his years of experience in the
New York theatre. They hit it off very well, going to plays together
whenever they could.
Charlie told him that Arthur, who was living with his parents, had said that when he found an apartment Charlie could move in with him. Ralph advised against that, saying, "I know Arthur Cane pretty well, Charlie, have watched him with Jordan and Ben over the last few years, and wouldn't trust him around the block. In your case, you're likely to become competitors for parts in plays, and maybe, if I'm reading you right, for Christine's attention--and he won't play fair." "He's already way ahead of me with Christine, I'm afraid. He was telling some of the fellows at the lake how he'd introduced her to the wonders of sexual experience." "See what I mean. But I wouldn't believe anything he told anybody. She chose you for her Ferdinand in this play. I know it was her choice. I heard her talking to her dad." "But she was going out with Arthur in Los Angeles--was teaching him to water ski--while she hardly paid me any attention. And he got a better part in the play--Caliban." Ralph laughed. "Type casting! But it is a good part--which wasn't offered to me. But don't worry about moving out. After all, you can walk to the theatre from here, and you're helping with the rent--and the cooking. You're a better cook than I am--almost as good as Jordan was in England." "Call it California cuisine," Charlie said. "This 'chef's salad' is composed of things from the Salinas Valley, the greatest source of salad ingredients in the world." 51 |
| Laura
got plenty of feedback from Ralph, a good friend, but was still worried
about Charlie--and especially Christine. Talking to Jack after the first
read-through for The Tempest, she said, "I don't know what
to make of Christine and Charlie. He used to do things with her at
the lake, when he wasn't playing chess or reading Plato with Henry, though
she was more involved with Ben, her Romeo, I know, and Arthur, having worked
with both of them back here. So Ben's death must have come as a real
shock to her."
"And must bring back terrible memories. The best thing will be to get to work on the play--it always worked with Betty . . . and with me, I suppose." "It's not that easy, Jack. But this thing with Charlie puzzles me most. They're hardly talking to each other." At that same time, however, Christine and Charlie were talking together, for the first time since they'd come East. Charlie had asked Christine to go for a cup of coffee, saying, "I thought it might be time to talk." Sipping her coffee, Christine said, "I didn't know whether you'd be there at the read-through tonight or not, though Arthur had told us you were staying with Ralph." "I came to New York the morning after our adventure at the lake, as I was scheduled to, not wanting to get caught up in things at the lake." He paused. "After I heard that first shot, I was running up to the cabin, and when I saw you come running down, so upset, I did think you might have shot Ben." "No, he'd just done his 'fast draw,' and fired a shot into the ceiling . . . like I had once. That was too much for me. So I ran." "Well I was still running up to the cabin to see what had happened when I heard the second shot." "Then, when you came running back, I thought you might have shot him . . . especially after I heard how he was found ." "I never saw Ben, but when I heard the second shot I was sure he must still be alive. I knew he liked playing with that gun 52 |
| and that we'd better get out of there, so I ran after
you down to the car--and that's what we did."
"But we left three cars there--so other people, too. When Mr. Brown got there, not long after that, evidently, there were no cars there, just Ben's dead body--with two bullet wounds." "I thought I heard a third shot as we were backing out." "I don't recall a third shot, but they say they found a bullet in the ceiling, and two in Ben, so there might have been. Anyway, you know I didn't shoot him." "Yes, but I'd still prefer not to have to testify. Do you think anyone knows I was there?" "Laura knows. Knows you picked me up and brought me back--then disappeared. But I don't believe she's told anyone . . . even Dad. They all saw how upset I was, and assumed I'd been there. So I told the police the truth--if not the whole truth--that I went to the cabin, at Ben's request, to tell him what I expected to be good news, that we wanted him to play Caliban. But he'd been drinking and began cursing, accusing us of trying to freeze him out of the Players Company--then he showed me that gun, and how he could draw and fire it, which alarmed me so much I ran." "You were running all right." "That detective assumed I'd driven there, and home, in the Ferrari--so I let him. I told him about the other cars, when he mentioned tire tracks, but said I hadn't seen anyone . . . which I hadn't." "Some of Ben's friends, I suppose--who then got out of there. But one or more of them may well have seen us." "Since I'd loaned Ben the Ferrari, I'd expected it to be there. As I told you, the main reason I agreed to meet him there was that I had hoped to drive it home. And the next day, there it was--at Shangri La. But if Ben was killed, and we know I didn't take the car, how did it get there?" "That's a good question--again, maybe one of Ben's friends--but, unless I have to, I won't complicate your testimony by raising it. My mother sends me items from the 53 |
| Los Angeles papers, and as there were front page articles
on the shooting of Ben, they were always connected to the film. One
headline asked, 'Did Juliet Shoot Her Romeo?' But there was no mention
of me, and no one came looking for me, so I thought I'd just stay out of
sight, like the other Players who were once out there, but are now back
here."
"Well, they certainly had plenty of questions for me, and I'm sure that Lieutenant Carlson still suspects me," Christine said. "I think he may still suspect me of shooting Mother and Jordan. But I know I didn't, and you know I didn't." "And will so testify, if it becomes necessary . . . which I expect it will." "Dad says the best thing is to get involved in the play." "I'm willing to try that." Charlie took Christine home--then, still thinking about her, in her bedroom, returned to Ralph's apartment, not far away. Later, talking to Ralph, Laura asked, "What kind of relationship did Charlie have with Ben? I don't remember seeing anything at all intimate. And if Ben thought Charlie was beating him out of the part of Ferdinand by becoming Christine's boy friend, for example, it must have been Ben's paranoia working overtime." "I can't imagine Ben seeing himself as competing with Charlie," Ralph said. "Not as an actor--he knew he was the better actor--or as Christine's boy friend. If he had lingering jealousies, it must have been with Christine over Jordan." "Right now I'm happy Charlie's living with you." "I like Charlie, and might be willing to make it permanent. I sure hope he wasn't involved in Ben's murder." Christine felt that, as well as playing Miranda, she was now in charge of the company, as she read the terms of her mother's will--which was all new to her. She was pleased that her father was there to help, and he was pleased that she had agreed to cast him as her father, as Prospero--the star of this show--now that Jordan was dead. 54 |
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Jack
was becoming conscious of what he'd undertaken to do, in fact, play a major
Shakespearean hero in New York--thanks to his daughter's influence--but
he was beginning to find the Prospero in himself. Christine would
tell him things Jordan had said about the character, but saw that he seemed
to be finding his own way, and wanted him, of all people, on her side in
what she, still in rather nebulous terms, hoped to do beyond this--following
in her mother's footsteps.
However, from the time they began to work on the play, she was complaining to Jack that Miranda was not a very demanding part after Juliet. He laughed, telling her how he'd first met her mother. "She'd had in mind getting a major role in Shakespeare's Julius Caesar, but, as they were casting, had decided there were no good parts for women in the play, so came to see me--and the rest is history." "Quite a history!" Christine paused, contemplating that. "You always loved Mother, didn't you Dad? As you like to say--as no other woman--from the time you first saw her coming down that aisle to audition for Pygmalion, before she ever spoke to you." "That's true. I love Laura, too, but it's different. And I love you. You remind me so much of your mother, particularly working on a play. You are so like her, and becoming more so all the time--but that, too, is different." "Yes, part of that history is that you did get her pregnant, with me. But didn't you feel cheated, that you loved her so much more than she loved you?" "No." Jack shook his head. "Let me offer you this piece of advice, my darling daughter, then look around you and see if it isn't true. It's much better to love someone more than he loves you than to be loved by someone more than you love him. It's a profounder experience. I loved your mother from the time we first met--passionately under Hester's scaffold, in despair when she left me to go to New York with Henry, high again at Shangri La and when we were making the movie of 55 |
| the countess's life, low again when she left again--and
I was devastated when she was killed at the lake. I knew how much
I loved her every time I looked at her for twenty years . . . am reminded
now every time I look at you. I wouldn't trade that for anything.
On the other hand, to be loved by someone you don't love in return can
be quite a nuisance." He paused, then said, "as I sometimes knew
I was to your mother . . . whenever I wasn't serving her ambition."
"Yes, she often seemed to be using you just to promote her own career." "There's some truth to that, but that over-simplifies your mother, too. She glowed with her own love. She loved the theatre. Being on stage was what her life was about. When I could help her step on stage, I was part of what she loved. And when I saw her excitement in taking possession of a new role, and how she touched my imagination when she was on stage, that was part of what I loved in her. No, I didn't feel cheated--not even when I played George to her Martha in Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, and knew how much she dominated me. I was pleased to experience something of that with you in your best scenes as Juliet. It's part of why I love you, too, my dear. I'm also a man of the theatre, you know." Christine gave Jack a big hug. Jack beamed. "See how lucky I am. Speaking of what your mother discovered with Julius Caesar, there's only an average of 4 women to 23 men in Shakespeare's 37 plays. Do you know why?" "Because all the roles had to be played by men--the women usually by boys." "Can you imagine a boy playing Juliet, or, even more amazing, Cleopatra? They must have been pretty good. It was easy for Jordan to see himself as a Shakespearean actor, for almost every play gave him a major role, but if your mother thought of herself as a Shakespearean 56 |
| actress, or if you do, you have to be selective.
The Tempest was a great play for Jordan, but not one of the
best for you--had no role for your mother . . . unless she were to play
Ariel."
"Do you think Ariel is a woman?" "Most of the clues point to Ariel being a male sprite, but women frequently play the part--as more spritely, I suppose, unless you get a very good young male actor." "Brad, the young fellow we've cast, isn't all that spritely," Christine said. "But what about Laura? I'd like to see what it's like to be on stage with her." "Have you talked to her about it?" Jack asked. "I just thought of it when you said Ariel could be a woman. I'll talk to her this evening." When Christine raised the question, Laura said, "Oh no you don't! I'm not getting between you and your father. When I did that with Betty she always won. Look for a 'more spritely' actor in your Players Company, or go out and recruit someone." Later, talking to Jack, Laura said, "Christine asked me to consider the part of Ariel, which would never have occurred to me. I told her, 'No! I'll cheer from the sidelines.' It's true, Ariel is the character Betty would have wanted to play, but I certainly don't want to overshadow Christine on stage. I'd be suggesting, halfway through rehearsals, as I did with A Doll's House, that we should change roles--and I know I don't want to play Miranda." The next day Christine said, "I was looking forward to playing Miranda to Jordan's Prospero. We had already started rehearsing, were discussing those scenes on our drive out to California. I was delighted--because he had chosen me, and, as you were explaining to me, I was in love with him more than he was with me. But now I want to do more. So what if I play both Miranda and Ariel? I think that's what mother might have wanted to do." 57 |
| Jack
laughed. "And probably Prospero, too--on alternate nights.
But aren't there scenes when you're both on stage together. That
first scene I have with each, for example."
"You talk to me, then I'm supposed to be asleep while you talk to him--or her--then you wake me up to talk to me again. Suppose I just go into the cave to sleep--quick costume change and I'm back as her. I've looked at it, and that should work. At one point Ariel sings a song while I'm on stage, but that's voice-over, and could be recorded. I really like the idea . . . as the sort of thing Mother would have done . . . and it lifts me back to co-star status. Let's try it this afternoon, to see, then, if it works, try it out on the rest of the cast at rehearsal tonight." They did, and Jack not only saw that it would work but that Christine was so delighted he couldn't deny her the chance. "If, later, it becomes too much for her, Laura can find us an Ariel," he thought. But Christine was perfect--she was a sprite--and it was soon obvious that she brought out the best in Jack, too. Charlie had been satisfied as Ferdinand, Miranda's prince, for this was his first real experience in live theatre, and here in New York. But playing Ariel as well had re-directed Christine attention, leaving him paired with her as Miranda, peripherally, and she gradually became as standoffish with him as she'd been with Ben. Christine had planned to start participating in some of the other things the Players Company was doing--as Charlie was. Since the part of Miranda wasn't going to be a great burden, she'd begun to work on Ionesco's The Lesson, in three languages, as Jack had suggested, and she had told Nakamura Nobuo about. But, once doing Ariel, she abandoned that idea, saving it for later--when she'd be able to reaffirm the commitment to experimental work that had been so important to Betty, as performing Shakespeare had been to Jordan. 58 |
| Charlie,
only on stage as Ferdinand, would often watch her from the back of the
theatre. Christine worked so well with Jack that, not having known
Jordan, he couldn't imagine anyone doing Prospero better, and was fascinated
by how naturally her Ariel flitted about the stage, a part that gave her
so much more opportunity for expression--as challenging as Juliet.
For something more to do, he volunteered anything anyone else needed help
with--gaining him many friends among the Players.
Charlie had gotten a portable chess set like Henry's and would play with anyone who'd play with him. He played with Ralph sometimes. Christine never wanted to play, was too busy, she said, but really didn't care to play at all, so Charlie's most frequent chess partner became the young woman he'd earlier done the reading of Miss Julie with, Marcella Martin. Marcella said she was most interested in Charlie for his California movie connections, aspiring to be a movie star herself, but she might have had other designs had he not been so obviously enamored of Christine. Still, he was teaching her chess, reviewing objectives of the three phases of the game while teaching them to her. He always beat her, as Henry did him, and at first suggested moves, but she was making good progress. She also began reading the Republic, since Charlie was, and was more interested in discussing that with him, too, than Christine was. Laura was a good agent, and, in part because of his previous television experience, got Charlie two commercials on national television in those early days in New York. In one telephone call his mother told him she'd been surprised to see him advertising Hertz rental cars on television in Los Angeles, so his father and she had decided he must be in the big time now. Jack never thought of himself as Jordan's equal on stage, but by the time of performance was comfortable as Prospero, and 59 |
| with working with Christine, whether as his daughter
or as Ariel. And, while, when they first began working on the
play the lines he was reciting rang in her ears as Jordan had spoken them
riding across country in the Ferrari, Christine, who had never seen Jack
on stage before, came to see him as a greater Prospero than Jordan would
have been, and that was the image of him that stuck--while for him she
was still Juliet, or, perhaps more often, still her mother as he had first
known her.
One day Christine said to Jack, "I didn't expect you to match Jordan, as I didn't expect Marjorie to match mother, yet, surprisingly, each of you came to seem temperamentally better suited to the role. As Prospero you are perhaps a little more pompous, a little more philosophical--a little more yourself, my father--than Jordan would have been, but," she laughed, "that is Prospero!" "That's the way with Shakespeare, Jack said. "How could women as different as Betty and Marjorie play the Nurse, when Betty dominated you on stage and Marjorie made a point of letting you dominate her." This same principle was operating when Jack was playing Prospero. Christine's relationship to Jack was enough different that she was not satisfied being subordinate, as she was to Jordan, so, for example, insisted on playing Ariel as well. Jack said, "If you see two different versions of any one of Shakespeare's plays, or two different actors in any of the major roles, you see two different plays. I've seen half a dozen high schools do A Midsummer Night's Dream--a different play every time--and for no play is this more notoriously true than Hamlet, why all the great actors want to play Hamlet--why it was Jordan's ambition." Christine said, "I still want to do Ophelia . . . for Jordan. But I'll need a Hamlet." "Well I can't help you there," her father responded. 60 |