My voice echoes around the cavernous auditorium that will be filled shortly with spectators for the final performances of The King and I, playing here before we take over. For now, the red chairs that become home at eight o’clock six nights a week to the buzz and hum of an audience are empty, except for us. The auditions are over. The callbacks are done. Patrick Carlson has left for the day, and we are sliding into the early evening with this debate.
My executive producer shrugs, an admission, or as much of one as I’ll ever get. “She was amazing,” he concedes, and his voice—it sounds like a tin can and I wish I could shake him, or really, shake some sense into him. “But she’s not Alexis Carbone.”
“That’s the point, Don. I don’t want Alexis Carbone. Alexis Carbone is a grade-A classic diva and a half. Not to mention she misses shows if she has so much as a sniffle.”
“All the better. She should rest her voice if she’s ill,” he says, and now he sounds prissy, and I would have half a mind to laugh if I wasn’t so damn angry.
Instead, I choose a different tactic. I try to speak in Don’s native tongue—dollars. “You know how she is. She missed one-third of her performances in Fate Can Wait. The running joke of the show was that it should be called Alexis Can Wait. Don’t tell me you’ve forgotten how many times theatergoers called the Logan Theater Company asking for refunds when she wasn’t performing,” I say, hoping that the reminder of how much money his competitors lost on Alexis’ last role will do the trick.
“We are not the Logans,” he says, folding his arms imperiously, as if that action can somehow distance himself from Alexis’ one Broadway flop. “That show was a mess. It had an awful title.”
“Yeah. It had a hideous title. But the point is we have a show that’s not a mess. Thanks to the incomparable Frederick Stillman—” I pause to gesture, dramatically, of course, to the bald, bespectacled theatrical genius next to me who has barely said a word because Stillman doesn’t have to speak, his work does the talking, “—and a show with a fantastic title, and score, and a sexy-as-hell storyline about love and loss and sex and art, the likes of which New York City hasn’t seen in years. Not since Rent. And you want to throw in a wild card? An actress who misses a performance if her cat has a hangnail?”
“She can open a show,” Don insists, and he might as well be digging his heels into the ground. He doesn’t get it. I’m ready to stalk on over to the stage and bang my head against the damn floor boards. Because that’s what talking to him's like. But he doesn’t stop speaking. “She has her own album, her solo concerts sell out, she was on that TV show about a Broadway musical, and she’s still regarded as the best damn Galinda in the last five years.”
I stand up, pace like a caged lion, walk to the side door exit to take a deep breath, then return to them. “Be that as it may. I don’t want to work with her. I want the best on stage for this. I want someone who is fresh and amazing and who is going to blow the audience away. I don’t want a diva. I want the next star. That woman. Jill McCormick. I want to read stories and see in Playbills for years to come that she got her first break, her first Broadway show, when she was cast as Ava in our show. She is going to be a star. I want to be the one who discovered her.”
“I want someone who is already a star.”
“We don’t need a star because we have the biggest star Broadway has ever seen—the newest Stillman show.”
I turn to Stillman. The stony look on his face gives nothing away. I dial back my anger, keeping my voice on the level. I respect Stillman far too much to talk to him as I talk to Don. “Mr. Stillman, you wrote this epic musical. You created this living, breathing, beautiful show. Who do you picture as your Ava?”
Stillman crosses then uncrosses his legs. He closes his eyes and hums while playing air piano in what I’m learning is his modus operandi of recalling actors, and replaying their performance in his mind. He opens his eyes.
“I want the Ava who will move the audience.”
I swallow, nod, and try again. Keep my voice soft, and calm, almost as if he’s a child. “Who would that be? Is that Alexis or Jill?”
Stillman stands up, smooths his pants legs. “I need to go to the little boys’ room.”
Then he walks out, and I believe I’ve just learned that Stillman might be a musical genius, but is passive aggressive as f**k. He has zero interest in decision-making or confrontations. I don’t possess that problem, so I return my focus to Don. “We need to start rehearsals in four weeks. The day after New Year’s. I would really like them to not suck.”
Don rises, reaches inside his jacket pocket, and removes a checkbook. “Does the name Julie Taymor mean anything to you?”
The mere mention of a fellow director’s name is his power play and I know what’s coming. The threat he’ll dangle of a fate like hers.
Kicked off the show.
“The Spiderman producers were happy to let their director go,” Don says in a biting tone. “I have no problem paying your exit clause. How much was it?”
The man knows a thing or two about brinksmanship, and he’s got the upper hand. Because he’ll walk and I won’t. I want this job too much. “Fine. Call Alexis’ agent and give her the good news. I will, however, be choosing the understudy and my choice will be final. Is that clear?”
Don nods, and that’s our tacit compromise. It’s hardly a compromise, but even so I’ll be hoping Alexis has a whole lot of head colds.