April 6 2005 Thursday
Alice got offered to do a series of shows on Access TV Tucson. First she planned to do it on bands, she had worked in the music business back in NYC, and she began asking the guys at our club if they had a band. Then she decided to switch it to women. So I told her I write short stories, but I don’t want to be on TV, I want someone else to read them. And Alice said fine.
When Ruthie was swimming in next lane from me I asked Ruthie if she would be willing to read my stories on Alice’s TV show. Ruthie said she loves to read out loud and she would be happy to do it, so I was overjoyed.
Ruthie works full time and the date which Alice had rented the studio at Access, Saturday, was the day Ruthie was helping her friend with huge yard sale. So we decided we would all go to Alice’s house on the previous Saturday, which was last Saturday, and Alice said she would ask her friend Roy to work the camera. Roy has his own show with Access, “The Roy Show,” but they take turns working the camera for each other. So Alice gave me and Ruthie instructions on how to get to her house.
Tucson is an odd town. Because you drive practically to Tucson Mall, which is the busiest part of all of Tucson, but before you get there, you make a right, and then another right, and then follow a dirt road till the end, and there is Alice’s house. And it is like a little house in the country. Completely quiet there, with doves and quail in her backyard. And a hawk who hangs around, and marches himself into Alice’s house and preens his feathers for her. Alice’s house is not like a suburban house, it is like a little house someone built themselves a long long time ago. And it is in an old part of Tucson, it was there way before the Tucson Mall was there, and way before Tucson had turned into thriving metropolis. It is also near Oracle Road because Oracle used to be the main drag back then, it is still is, which is why it is the busiest part of Tucson.
I didn’t see all of Alice’s house. I saw the little living room and the little kitchen. And next door to it, she had built a studio. When we arrived (Bill drove) we went into the living room, where Alice’s paintings in frames were wall-to-wall up on living room. They are great paintings with beautiful color. In a huge white gallery with enough space to set off each painting, it would be thrilling sight. Bill came in for just a few minutes and was excited to see her paintings. He did not stay. Two basketball championship games were on back-to-back that afternoon, and he was going to watch them at our swim club.
Roy was sitting and smoking a cigarette on chair by the couch. He looked like very nice man. So I lit a cigarette and sat down next to him. Ruthie rushed out of the room then because she said she is one of those people who doesn’t like smoke. Roy said “tell me about the story Ruthie is going to read.” And I said “it is an experience of mine.” When I said that, his eyes glazed over. But there was no way to describe the story, and beside he was going to hear it when Ruthie read it.
So Roy played two shows for us he did (two episodes of “The Roy Show”) so we could see what access shows look like. In the first one a woman dressed up in clothes she thought Emily Dickinson would wear and enacted a poem by Emily Dickinson. She didn’t read it from a page, she stood up and dramatized it. I found it very interesting. I know nothing at all about Emily Dickinson and was surprised to discover she was a bitch. Maybe that is too strong a word. As far as I could make out Emily was saying how much she enjoys freaking out the neighbors. I applauded when it was over, it was dramatic and held my interest.
The next show was Roy reading article from Tucson newspaper about a murder. Apparently a doctor who had 17 girlfriends was stabbed 13 times. The Medical Examiner could not determine when it was done within a 24 hour period. But the Prosecuting Attorney, who had someone on trial, insisted it was done during the one hour period he had the person on trial for. It appeared to have happened in a restaurant. It was quite confusing. It was Roy and Alice sitting at a table discussing it. And Alice pointed out “how did he know it took place during that one hour period.” I applauded when that show was over because it was so much fun watching Alice poke all those holes in the DA’s case.
Then we went into Alice’s studio where Ruthie was going to read my story. It began with Ruthie and Alice sitting together and talking, but each time it started Roy stopped the camera and said “move an inch to the right.” So each time they built up a head of steam, it was stopped. Finally Roy decided he got it right, but by then they just said two sentences to each other, and Alice stepped out of the frame and Ruthie read the story.
She did an OK job. It is hard when someone doesn’t know the story. As a writer you put in a lot of teeny details just to flesh it out. They are actually irrelevant but are what bring a story to life. Ruthie gave a lot of emphasis to all these teeny details, and they were meaningless. And some parts which had meaning, she didn’t get, so the meaning didn’t come across. But it was OK job. I felt if I wasn’t willing to do it myself, and Ruthie was willing to do it, that I was grateful Ruthie did it. And there were moments when the story did go along fine. “Good job, Ruthie” I said, and I meant it. I thought she did fine job. Both Alice and Roy were totally dismayed, and said “Ruthie, you better look at it, and see it for yourself.” Ruthie assumed she had done a terrible job. She said “I never saw myself on TV.” And she sat in front of the screen and looked at it. When it was over she said “I like it, I think I did fine.” She was surprised but I knew she had done fine job. So they said “do it again Ruthie, but this time don’t drop your voice so often.” I thought that was good direction. Dropping her voice didn’t work, it took energy out of the story. Ruthie said “Oh good! Direction! I want direction!”
So Ruthie did it again. Roy’s cellphone rang in middle. It was just 5 musical notes, but he had her do that whole part again. And when it was over I realized Ruthie had left out one part which changed the meaning of what came next. And I would have liked that part to be done again. But Roy said “the light has changed, and there is not enough film left.”
So the 3 of them got stoned on pot. And got into an hour long argument. I think Roy did not like it that the two women were talking to each other and ignoring him. Because as soon as he finished putting his camera away he said something very inflammatory. He said “Alice left the country and lived in Mexico for 25 years and then came back and she should not have been allowed back and had her citizenship taken away from her. Because for 25 years all her productive work had gone to Mexico not to USA.”
I thought the idea was ludicrous, and especially senseless since clearly Roy and Alice are friends and collaborate together. How can Roy say Alice should not have been allowed to return home when he enjoys collaborating with Alice artistically now. He is saying something he does not mean. But both girls really went for it. They got in passionate argument and their feelings got involved. After that all Roy did was land more incendiary bombs, and the girls went for it like a shot. And by the time we went in to eat, Ruthie refused to talk to Roy.
We sat at Alice’s round table in kitchen, even tho it had been so nice sitting outside her studio on steps in sunshine as Sun was going down. It was totally nice sitting there under the sky except for the senseless argument going on around me. Alice’s house was like those tenement apartments back in East Village in Manhattan. Maybe that is why it felt so comfortable and familiar. Her house is very homey. We sat at round table in her kitchen and ate Alice’s delicious food and fresh arguments started up again. And then Ruthie drove me back to the club where I was to meet Bill.
In the car ride back to club, Ruthie had a lot to say about Roy. I think Roy was attracted to Ruthie, and Ruthie said she had made it clear to him she was not interested. I had found it funny that Roy had joined Access TV because his friends had told him it was a way to meet hot young babes. Roy is 44. But clearly Roy would never have carried on this way with both Alice and Ruthie (who are my age) if he didn’t want both of them. And when Ruthie had said something about Janey coming, Roy was on it like a flash. “Who is Janey? Why didn’t you bring Janey!” Seems to me Roy likes Alice, he likes her friend Ruthie, and he wanted Ruthie’s friend Janey to meet too.
The next day I got phone call from Alice saying Roy had acted so obnoxious after we left she had to send him home. And also he told her if she doesn’t have sex with him, he won’t give her the videotape he made of Ruthie’s reading, and she had said “I am not a whore.”
So now we all have to meet Friday at the TV studio and do it again. Even tho Ruthie only has 20 minutes because it is her lunch hour.
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