It's All In the Playing Read online

  I thought of how I would review a show based on material that I believed was twilight-zone mumbo jumbo. I concluded that I would dismiss it as frivolous and silly if I had never thought about such things. However, if I had my own entrenched religious beliefs relating to spiritual matters, and found metaphysics offensive, I would probably find it impossible to separate being offended from artistic objectivity. And finally, if I was a left-brained, eloquently cynical skeptic who was convinced that God and Cosmic Justice were myths and that man was involved in a spiral of tragically negative proportions, ready to blow himself up out of conflict and despair, I would probably attack a karmically spiritual point of view with violent anger because it would offer an explanation of the human condition that would leave me without an identity—an identity defined by limitations and anger and despair rather than by idealistic hope and positive individual responsibility based on the law of cause and effect (karma).

  I looked for a long time at the ocean. Did any of my qualms really matter? Was I going to keep who I was in a closet? Did it matter what anybody else thought? Conviction and personal principle weren’t based on public or critical acceptance.

  I leaned over the balcony, and as I focused on the foam-capped waves of the rising tide below, I heard myself say: “You’ve lived your life in public. Why stop now?” I walked back inside.

  Chapter 4

  The following week we did a rehearsal with Kevin and his entities. I had given Kevin the screenplay so he could learn his lines. The entities, Tom and John, would scan Kevin’s subconscious so that they could study their lines also.

  Colin and I met Kevin at my apartment in Malibu.

  Kevin put Colin and me through a meditation that entailed isolated focusing of the seven chakkras (energy centers along the spine). With each focusing we hummed the corresponding note on the scale. There are seven notes on the scale, seven colors in the color spectrum, and seven chakkras to the human body. Each note on the scale has a vibrational frequency that matches the corresponding color in the spectrum. When one hums “OM” (considered in Hindu scripture to be the first original sound of language) along with visualizing the color that matches each chakkra, the energy in the human body becomes perfectly aligned. Kevin said three people in a meditation were easy to balance because each represents mind, body, and spirit.

  After the meditation we prepared for our first informal rehearsal with Kevin and his entities. Colin and I decided I should go right into the scene when the entities came through, as though we were reenacting our first meeting.

  Kevin went into trance. We waited. Pretty soon, John came in as he always does and said, “Hail. Please state the purpose of your gathering.”

  Word for word, as Colin and I had written the script, I introduced myself as though we had never met before and we proceeded to rehearse the scene of our first meeting. I had the script in front of me. John was accessing Kevin’s subconscious and was letter-perfect in the scene, with even an added touch of biblical dignity. At exactly the correct point, per script, John said, “Pause. Entity desiring to speak.”

  I waited just as the script called for and in a moment Tom McPherson was in.

  “Tip of the hat to you. How are you doing out there?” he said perfectly.

  I acted a laugh, behaving as I had the first time Tom showed up, and he said—as he had then—“I hadn’t expected a reaction like that quite so soon.”

  As the script indicated, I laughed again. Tom began to cough, per script. He asked for a mug, which I fetched for him. I placed it in his hand and he put it to his lips, then said, “There will be something in this to drink when we actually play the scene, will there not?”

  I cracked up. He had broken character just like a regular actor.

  “Sorry,” he then added quickly. “I don’t mean to pad my part, even though I can see that the instrument [Kevin] has padded his body!” (Kevin had put on fifteen pounds.)

  I laughed again. By now I was completely out of character—well, out of phase, anyway. I was in my own present-day character rather than the person I was ten years ago. It’s really weird passing back and forth between one’s selves, as it were.

  “I hope,” said Tom, “that you will play your part more authentically during the screen test. You were nothing like this when we first met.”

  “Neither were you,” I countered.

  “Quite right,” said Tom.

  I waited for him to take his imaginary sip from the mug so I could say my next line referring to it. He didn’t.

  “Sip your tea, Tom, so I can say my line.”

  “There’s no stage direction,” he said, “that says I should sip my tea here.”

  “Yes, there is. Read the script.”

  “I couldn’t. I could only scan the instrument’s mind. He’s not much for stage directions or for anybody telling him what to do.”

  “Okay,” I said, “let’s go on.”

  I went on to the next line of dialogue and Tom performed the rest of the scene perfectly. He hit the high points and the low points and even embellished his part a bit. When the scene was over, Colin and I applauded. Tom thanked us and reminded us that he had done a great deal of Shakespearean street theater in his day, in between picking pockets, but these days he much preferred to pick the brains of people than pick their pockets, much better for him karmic-wise, too. After the rehearsal we sat and chatted.

  “Listen, Tom,” said Colin, “will you stick to the script even if you get bored doing it over and over?”

  “Yes,” said Tom. “Besides, I have my new accent to keep my interest. How did you like it?” Colin and I looked at each other and winked. Tom was behaving like any actor eager to do his best, yet conscious that he was laying himself on the line, risking public humiliation if he bombed.

  “I used this accent,” Tom went on, “when I was twenty-five years of age. It has a more joyful frequency to it. I would prefer to be joyful in this show of yours rather than the thirty-five-year-old attitude which I usually use when we speak. Would that be all right?”

  “That’s okay,” said Colin. “Just don’t make it too Abbey Players. Okay?”

  “Quite right,” said Tom. “They came much later.”

  “Any more ideas?” I asked. “We don’t want you to feel restricted.”

  “Well,” said Tom, “would you like me to get up out of the chair and use the instrument’s body? I could perform a slight Irish jig for ya. Ya know. As a matter of fact, you and I used to perform our jigs together on shipboard during my pickpocket incarnation. You wouldn’t be remembering it, but we had some rather wild and woolly times together.”

  “I was a friend of yours then?”

  “Yes.”

  “Why didn’t you tell me before?”

  “You never asked,” said Tom.

  “Oh, yes. That’s right,” I remembered. “You only answer what we ask.”

  “Quite right,” said Tom. I smiled mischievously at him, wishing I could “see” him through Kevin’s body.

  “Okay,” I said. “Can you use Kevin’s body all right to do a jig?”

  “Oh, yes,” said Tom.

  Then he leaned down and looked at my carpet.

  “However,” he added, “a hard deck is much easier than this carpet. I’ll miss some of the footwork. Would that be all right?”

  “Yes. That’s all right. Let’s see what you have in mind.”

  Tom moved his head from side to side. Then slowly he rose from the chair. “Allow me,” he said, “to adjust my vibrational frequencies to that of the instrument a bit more closely.”

  He walked away from the chair.

  “Would you have a blindfold about, please? The sunlight in here is interfering with my capacity to see the light frequency of the floor.”

  Tom stood still. I ran to get a scarf. I returned with it and tied it around Kevin’s eyes.

  “Oh,” said Tom happily, “this is infinitely better.”

  Tom then proceeded to take Kevin’s body a
cross the floor of my living room. He put his hands on his hips and jumped up and down, crossing his feet and performing an impeccable Irish jig. And all the while he was dancing, he told stories about incarnations that Sachi and I had had with him. He described how we were pirates, how he had taken Sachi in one incarnation as a ward of his, how I had saved his life in another, and so on. He jigged and jagged and laughed and dramatized until he ended the whole display with the final line in my new book Dancing in the Light (which Kevin had not read!).

  “Oh, yes,” he exclaimed. “The dance and the dancer are one!”

  Tom really tickled me. When the jig and the drama were over, he went back to his chair and sat down.

  “Well, now,” he said quite breathlessly, “what did ya think? Could ya use a bit of any of that?”

  Colin and I applauded.

  “Well,” I said, “I guess a lot of that will be up to Bob Butler.” (In fact, when the scene was filmed, it was shot as it had originally happened—without Tom’s shenanigans.)

  “Oh, of course,” said Tom. “You know your Mr. Butler is certain he’s the only sane one on the project. He was an English magistrate when I was a pickpocket. By the by,” he added, “did I effectively point out the Akhenaton influence with your Stan man? I thought that might make him pay attention. Did it?”

  I laughed ironically. “Of course it did, Tom, and you know it. Why are you even asking?”

  “Quite right,” he answered. “I like compliments. Will there be any inquiries before I take my leave?”

  “No, thank you,” I answered.

  Then something did occur to me that had been bothering me for weeks. It had to do with a feeling that I was being guided to include a certain scene in the screenplay because the “guide” (whoever it was) felt the screenplay needed more suspense. I explained that to Tom and asked if I really was feeling a guide or was it all just coming from me.

  “Well,” said Tom, “if you really want to know, what you were feeling was your old friend Alfred Hitchcock.”

  “Hitch?” I said excitedly.

  “Quite right,” said Tom. “He’s decided to help you now, remembering that he was not what would be considered pleasant in certain areas when you worked together. Correct?”

  “That’s right, Tom. In some ways he was very hard on me.”

  “Yes. Well, he’s trying to make up for that by helping you with suspense in this spiritual screenplay. He has worked in thirty-year cycles with you. He was present at a critical turning point in your life thirty years ago when you began, and he is returning as you enter a new phase of expression with your TV miniseries now. Though he is having a bit of a teeth-gnashing time over here at the moment.”

  “Why?” I asked.

  “Because, the law of karma being perfect, some of the actors he abused when he was in the body are now directing some of his old classics for the new Hitchcock television series—and not very well in his opinion. If he had any hair left he’d be pulling it out by now.”

  Colin and I slapped our thighs, Hitchcock stories being familiar to both of us. He had nothing but contempt for actors, said we were nothing but cattle. And now look: Tony Perkins and Burt Reynolds, among others, were directing Hitchcock remakes. Evidently Hitch wasn’t turning over in his grave—he was gnashing his teeth on the astral plane as he was working out karma with actors!

  “But he sees the humor in it all,” said Tom. “He was, after all, one of your great practical jokers who loved elaborate pranks. Well, now God has done him one better—prank-wise.”

  “Well,” I said, “tell Hitch I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to his funeral.”

  “Oh,” said Tom, “he wouldn’t have noticed. He wasn’t there either. You know how he felt about funerals.”

  By now I was calculating how I could include what was occurring in our channeling session on the screen. I didn’t want to waste it. But a thought occurred to me.

  “Before you go, Tom, I assume you’ll be wanting billing and credit on the show?”

  “Quite right,” said Tom. “I am a professional. Shouldn’t everyone be included?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, then,” said Tom with commanding dignity, “I would like my billing to say Tom McPherson appearing as Tom McPherson.’”

  “Oh,” I said. “Okay. What about John?”

  “One moment, please,” said Tom.

  He returned in a moment.

  “John,” he said, “would like to be called John, son of Zebedee.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Okay.”

  Then it occurred to me.

  “Wasn’t John of Zebedee, John the Beloved?”

  “Quite right.”

  “Well, isn’t that the same guy who wrote Revelations?”

  “Quite right,” said Tom. “You may say that we entities simply play ourselves, if you must. I must be going now. Saints be looking after you.”

  And he was gone. Kevin returned to consciousness and the three of us went out onto the balcony to watch the waves. Kevin wondered why the calves of his legs were sore. I told him he had been doing an Irish jig.

  The following day I parked my car in the parking lot attached to ABC Circle Films. As I stepped out of it I noticed a man walking by with a pink script under his arm. The face was familiar. The man was Tom Hulce, who had just lost the Academy Award to his co-star, F. Murray Abraham, in Amadeus.

  “Hey, Tom,” I heard myself say, “you’ll win some other time.” Tom smiled and hugged me. “What are you doing with that pink script?” (When Stan had asked me what color I wanted our script to be, I had said pink.)

  “It’s yours, dear girl. Don’t you even recognize your own script?”

  I was perplexed.

  “But why do you have it, Tom?”

  “Because I read it and liked it and my agent asked if I’d like to come in and do a reading with other actors just for the fun of it. Don’t you want to see how it plays?”

  Well, indeed I did. But I never expected an actor of Tom Hulce’s stature to do a reading for the fun of it.

  Arm in arm we walked into the ABC building. Then I experienced one of the genuinely thrilling moments of my life. On a par with having my baby, winning the Oscar, and meeting Clark Gable! I saw SCRIPT READING: OUT ON A LIMB on the rehearsal-hall door. I opened the door, walked in, and found Colin, Stan, Dean O’Brien (production manager), two assistant directors, and a long table surrounded by actors who would re-create what I had lived and written about. The past five years flooded back. No one who hasn’t experienced such an evolution in expression could possibly understand the impact of seeing your life and its characters about to spring to life in a professional environment. For a moment I felt like Sally Field. “You take me seriously—you like me. You like me,” I wanted to blurt out. But it was much more than that. This room was full of people about to rehearse a script that seriously and respectfully treated trance-mediums, extraterrestrials, disembodied spiritual entities, and UFOs as an alternative reality to traditional reality. It wasn’t a Spielberg fantasy. It was real. It was happening to me. And suddenly it hit me. Brandon Stoddard and ABC had thirteen million dollars’ worth of faith and belief invested in the credibility of my spiritual search.

  We took our seats. We all introduced ourselves. Tom was the only actor I knew, but each of the others was an experienced “working” professional.

  For me the reading was an event, the personal satisfaction notwithstanding. For the first time Colin and I heard the rhythm, the hidden comedy, the tension of the love story, and whether the interpersonalization of the characters worked. It did. There was more work to be done—but in the main it was all there. For me to play a love scene with an actor who was depicting a real man whom I had loved was an exercise in double vision. It was then that I knew I’d have no trouble re-creating myself or allowing another actor to portray a real-life character in my life with freedom. From that day on I began to come to work and get into the character of who I had been ten years earlier. That wa
s the separation I needed. It was essential that I play “Shirley” with the skepticism and confused disbelief that had been part of my early spiritual learning process ten years previously.

  Soon after that realization, I did the screen test with Kevin—except that I stepped out of character with very unpleasant results as a consequence.

  Chapter 5

  Kevin and I arrived at the taping studio soon after lunch. There were several arrangements of flowers waiting for us from Stan and company.

  Kevin sat in the makeup chair. The makeup artist didn’t realize she was making up a trance medium until fifteen minutes into the procedure. I think that was because Kevin mentioned that Tom McPherson might smear his eye makeup with a blindfold. When she asked who Tom McPherson was, Kevin actually told her. She was so fascinated she took three hours to “complete” his makeup. And all it consisted of was base color!

  The entire taping crew was prepared for visitors from outer space or, at the very least, a tap-in from Poltergeist. It was the first of many times that I’d notice a kind of respectful silence prevail on the set whenever the presence of beings from the other side was expected. It was endearingly humorous, because as jaded as some of them were, each of them had a healthy respect for the possibility that it just might be true. Either that or it was Hollywood people doing what they do best—covering their bases. Knowing how the butter for their bread spreads … “stay with the money.”

  The crew was ready. So was Kevin. He had been studying his lines diligently and so (according to him) had Tom and John. The crew, of course, didn’t know what to expect.