My Life: The Musical (26 page)

Her mother’s voice came back to the phone.

“Anyway, that’s where we’ll be. I expect we’ll see you later. Emily, I hope whatever it is you’re doing in the city has turned out exactly the way you want. We love you!”

Click.

Emily turned to Philip. The houselights were starting to go down.

“Fiddler on the Roof,”
she said, in awe. “My whole family’s going to see
Fiddler on the Roof
.”

“What?”

“Tonight. Right now.” Emily’s eyes were big as moons.

“They’ll love it, Emily.” Philip squeezed her hand. “It’s a great show.”

The first notes of the overture to
Aurora
began to play.

Emily looked around the glorious, gilded house of make-believe called the Rialto Theatre and turned back to Philip with a smile. “Yes,” she whispered. “It is.”

Then they turned their eyes to the stage, where the lights were just beginning to come up.

Stevie Stephenson and Delacorte Press Present

MY LIFE: THE MUSICAL

BY MARYROSE WOOD

STARRING

EMILY PEARL
In a few years Emily hopes to be attending Yale University or someplace just as good. She will major in English, with a minor in theology. Love and thanks to Mom, Dad, Rabbi Levin, Uncle David, and Grandma Rose, and to her best friend, Philip.

PHILIP NEBBLING
ran for treasurer of the Eleanor Roosevelt High School drama club and won. He plans to be a theatrical producer someday, and has recently begun to date.

LAUREY AND STUART PEARL
were so touched by the final scene of
Fiddler on the Roof
(in which Tevye’s inability to forgive his daughter Chava for marrying a Russian soldier prevents him from bidding her a proper farewell, even though they may never, ever see each other again) that they resolved at once to forgive their daughter Emily for what, after all, were fairly harmless transgressions.

ROSE PEARL LEFKOWITZ
thought the Tevye in the drama club production of
Fiddler
was not bad. (“He was no Zero Mostel, but what do you want?” she commented. “He’s just a kid!”)

STANLEY LEFKOWITZ
was quite relieved when the State of New Jersey declined to prosecute that little misunderstanding at the truck stop. He was equally relieved that he and his new bride, Rose, honeymooned at a nice hotel in Florida and not in a Winnebago.

DAVID PEARL
now runs Uncle David’s Broadway Treasures, an eBay-based marketer of theatrical memorabilia. A judicious culling of Emily’s and Philip’s vast signed Playbill collections easily repaid all monies owed to Mark, but the one-of-a-kind “Albert Smeave” program was deemed much too special to sell.

ALBERT SMEAVE
was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama for his epic nine-hour musical,
Fiddling While It Burns,
depicting the fall of Rome. Weak ticket sales were further marred when disgruntled customers believed they had purchased seats for a sequel to
Fiddler on the Roof
. He sold the film rights to
Aurora
for a ridiculously large amount of money.

MARLENA ORTIZ
was unavailable to reprise her star turn in the title role in the film of
Aurora
due to schedule conflicts. She is currently launching a European tour to promote the release of her first solo album, called
Marlena, Herself.
Her role in the film will be played by a former
Aurora
chorus dancer named Stephanie Dawson.

CHARLES HENDERSON
received an Eleanor Roosevelt High School Teacher of the Year award for his ongoing dedication to the drama club. He has not yet decided whether
Aurora
would be a suitable choice for next year’s spring musical, but it’s certainly possible.

MARK NEBBLING
After being dumped by Stephanie Dawson (her budding film career required her to take a “more strategic approach” to relationships, she explained), Mark had what he describes as a “personal awakening.” To his mother’s amazement, he gave Mrs. Nebbling enough money to pay off the last of her student loans, got a haircut and a part-time job, and is now attending community college—including the occasional acting class—on a much more regular basis.

LORELEI CONNELLY
With her ankle in a cast, Lorelei Connelly bravely performed the role of Hodel in the Eleanor Roosevelt High School drama club production of
Fiddler on the Roof
. Not surprisingly, she brought down the house.

STEVIE STEPHENSON
Lackluster ticket sales scotched plans for the Lanerick Rep. With the two stars under contract, however, Stephenson quickly regrouped by mounting a pair of out-of-town revivals: Matthew Broderick will tour midsized American cities in
How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying,
while Nathan Lane will assay the role of Tevye in a Las Vegas production of
Fiddler on the Roof
. Despite its stature as a classic of stage and screen,
Fiddler
has been trimmed and revised for the Vegas production. “Ninety minutes, no intermission, and no Cossacks!” notes Stephenson. “Why? Because the public
always
prefers a happy ending!”

AUTHOR’S NOTE

Writing
My Life: The Musical
has been incredibly special for me, because the world of Broadway musicals was so much a part of my own teen years and remains very near to my heart.

You see, I was cast in my first Broadway musical when I was eighteen years old. As it turned out, it was my last Broadway musical, too. But what a show to be part of! It was called
Merrily We Roll Along
(1981, music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by George Furth), and it was directed by one of Broadway’s most legendary and innovative directors, Harold Prince.

Quite an auspicious beginning for a drama club geek from the suburbs! I mean, what were the odds? How could a second-year acting student at NYU, with no agent or connections or professional experience, become part of such an illustrious project?

Here’s how: I showed up at an open call with a resume I typed the night before (yes, on an actual clackety-clack type-writer) and a photo of myself I paid a dollar for in the passport photo booth in Penn Station. I waited all day with the hundreds of other starry-eyed wannabes who’d shown up.

At the end of the day, no closer to auditioning than when I’d arrived, I tossed my resume and photo into a big black plastic trash bag that the stage manager used to collect head shots from all the kids who hadn’t been seen. Tired and defeated, we went home.

Some weeks later, my then-boyfriend, Tom, received a letter in the mail. It was from the
Merrily
casting office. His photo had been plucked out of the trash bag, and would he please come in for an audition on the following Thursday?

What?
Him and not me?
They must need boys,
I told myself. I wished him luck that Thursday morning, and off I went to tap class. I was a very poor tapper, mind you, but I liked tap class because I could kid myself that tap wasn’t actually dance, but math, since it involved a lot of counting. Dancing I wasn’t so hot at, but math I could do.

An hour later I emerged from class, sweaty and gross. The receptionist of the dance studio called me over to his desk and handed me a slip of paper with a phone message on it. The message was from my boyfriend, and I will never forget what it said.

“They want you at the Sondheim audition. Get here before six. Love, Tom.”

What could this mean? Was I going to waste time wondering? No! I raced home to my skanky studio apartment in the East Village, where the halls ran thick with roaches and the mailbox was perpetually broken. I showered, dressed, grabbed some sheet music (I only knew one song; it was “I Wish I Were in Love Again” by Rodgers and Hart), and hauled my tapping toes back uptown to a rehearsal studio in the theatre district.

I made it, I think, by five. It still seemed likely that the phone message was some kind of sick joke, but nevertheless I walked up to the person who looked like she was in charge and introduced myself. She laughed heartily—merrily, one might even say. “Maryrose Wood! We’ve been looking for you!”

(Later it was revealed that I too had been sent a letter offering an audition, a letter that had never been delivered due to my perpetually broken East Village mailbox. A phone message had been left as well, on my answering service, but I never got it because, impoverished acting student that I was, I was behind in my monthly fees and the service was holding all my messages.)

So, to fast-forward a bit—many callbacks later, after I’d sung “I Wish I Were in Love Again” fast, slow, funny, sad, sexy, goofy and every other way they could think of to ask me to sing it, I was one of about two dozen young actors, many of us still teenagers, who got cast in this can’t-lose, surefire Broadway hit.

So long, NYU! I was on Broadway now. Could stardom be far behind?

Oh, yes. So very far. Sadly (at the time of its original Broadway production, at least),
Merrily
was a flop. I mean,
flop!
The audience was bewildered, and a steady stream of people walked out during the second act.

The show received some brutal reviews.
New York Times
theatre critic Frank Rich wrote that it was a “shambles,” and with the exception of some of the leads, “the rest of the cast is dead wood.” Friends joked that I should be glad, because at least he mentioned me by name.

Merrily
closed after only sixteen performances. At the last show we sobbed ourselves hoarse during the final number and then showed up at RCA the next morning to record the cast album. (It remains a terrific recording of a marvelous score that has earned a well-deserved “cult” status, and I bet those of you who are ardent musical theatre fans know it well.)

Merrily We Roll Along
was a show about how idealistic young people are sometimes forced, and sometimes choose, to abandon their dreams and ideals over time. Some dreams, however, don’t die. Twenty-one years after
Merrily
’s Broadway debut, the entire original cast reunited for one night only on the stage of LaGuardia High School. Thrillingly, Stephen Sondheim and Harold Prince were there as well.

After only a few days’ rehearsal under the direction of Kathleen Marshall, we performed a concert version of the show to a sold-out audience who went absolutely bonkers with joy. Twenty-one years of history rewrote itself in a night. They loved us, we loved them, and we all loved each other. We were, finally, a hit.

Writing a book is a lot like acting: you get to play all the parts and experience everything your characters feel. For me, working on
My Life: The Musical
and reliving Emily and Philip’s over-the-top idealism and their fierce, unconditional love for the theatre was like being given the gift of time travel—the chance to go back, just like the character of Emily in
Our Town,
and look one more time on the sweet innocence of the past, when shows ran forever, everything was bound to be a hit, and stardom was just around the corner.

Life isn’t always exactly like a musical, but so what? Idealism is a candle we shouldn’t ever let go out. I know Emily and Philip wouldn’t, and I hope you never do, either.

May all your dreams come true to *thunderous applause*—

Maryrose Wood

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

While still a teenager, Maryrose Wood made her Broadway debut in the chorus of
Merrily We Roll Along
(1981, music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by George Furth). She went on to act, dance, sing, direct, improvise, and write her way through many plays and musicals. Her work as a lyricist and book writer has made her a three-time winner of the prestigious Richard Rodgers Award for new musicals, which is administered by the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Maryrose wrote
Sex Kittens and Horn Dawgs Fall in Love
and
Why I Let My Hair Grow Out
. She lives in New York with her two children and a rather theatrical little dog. And she still sings—in the shower. Visit her at
www.maryrosewood.com
.

Published by Delacorte Press
an imprint of Random House Children’s Books
a division of Random House, Inc.
New York

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.