Pretty Mess Read online

  Peters brought in dancers from Los Angeles to be the featured performers, but they took the best from the dance and musical theater departments at Northside High to back them up. We had all been in shows before, obviously, but this was the first time any of us were seeing a real production with a big bankroll behind it. At the time, working with Michael fucking Peters was just about the coolest thing a dance kid could imagine.

  In addition to having a touring show that performed at home and abroad, we would also regularly stage musicals locally. We performed them at the Woodruff Arts Center, a huge complex in Atlanta. I was a natural as Val in A Chorus Line, and I still remember all the words from her signature song, “Tits and Ass.” (It was very on brand for Erika Jayne, even before she existed.)

  By the time my senior year rolled around, I was over high school theater. I had already decided that I was moving to New York to start my career and had mentally checked out. There was a lot of internal politics about who got cast and what roles they would have, and I was tired of playing that particular game.

  One thing about me is that when I’ve had it, I have had it. It’s over. Mentally, I was planning the next step in my life. I didn’t audition for the spring musical, which that year was Pippin. Well, Mr. Densmore decided to call Renee.

  “Why hasn’t Erika tried out for the spring musical?” he asked her.

  “Listen, Billy,” Renee said, since they were on a first-name basis. “I can’t force this girl. She decided she didn’t want to audition, and she’s not going to.” My mother often called me unruly, but at the end of the day she always had my back.

  “The girl I cast in the role of Fastrada isn’t working out, and I’m going to cast Erika in the role instead,” he said. “You know that I can hold her diploma if she doesn’t do this part for me?”

  “I didn’t know that, but I’ll be sure to tell Erika,” she replied.

  If musicals aren’t your thing, or you have never had a child in a musical theater program anywhere in the country (because they all do Pippin), Fastrada is the wife of Pippin’s father, King Charlemagne. She has a creepy, somewhat incestuous relationship with her son, Louis. Fastrada gets one solo at the end of the first act in a song called “Spread a Little Sunshine.” It’s a cute waltz of a song, but the double entendres definitely hint that the sunshine she spreads beams out from between her legs. Even before I could legally vote, I was already being typecast as a temptress.

  Being cast against my will just made me mad. I hadn’t even auditioned, and I was forced to take this part. That meant rehearsals and everything else I didn’t want to be doing. With Mr. Densmore and my mother both breathing down my neck, I decided I would give in. I had worked hard for that diploma. If playing the sexpot in the most seventies musical imaginable was what it would take to graduate, I would have to do it.

  Then, after pulling this stunt with my mother, Mr. Densmore wouldn’t get rid of the original girl in the part—he made us split it. There were four performances. She got opening night and the third night, I got the second night and closing night. Since we had the same size feet, I even had to lend her my shoes, which were the boxy high heels that every actress wears on Broadway. When I wasn’t performing as Fastrada, I was in the chorus in the opening and closing numbers.

  I wasn’t thrilled about any of this, but I was going along with it to keep the peace and graduate. During the cast meeting for the third performance, Mr. Densmore told the cast that the other girl was going to be playing Fastrada in the third performance as planned and on closing night, which was supposed to be my night. He was just using me to scare the girl he had cast in the first place to bring her A game. I was his insurance policy. Now that he didn’t need me, I was getting sidelined in a musical I didn’t even want to be in!

  That was the final straw. I played it cool and waited until everyone was in costume. I even put on my own opening number costume, a gold lamé bandeau top and a gold lamé skirt slit up to my hip. I pretended like everything was fine. Right before the curtain went up, the lights dimmed in the theater. Everyone was taking their place on the stage, but I turned, pushed the backstage door open, walked out, got in my car, and drove off—in costume, looking fabulous. I didn’t perform that third night or come back on the fourth night. I’m sure my sudden departure screwed up the spacing in the chorus, and no one on stage was quite sure what to do when there was no one to deliver my scant few lines. Too bad.

  Mr. Densmore had already threatened to withhold my diploma and gotten Renee all panicked, and now he’s going to take my closing night? If he wouldn’t hold up his end of the bargain, why should I hold up mine? Like I said, when I’m done, I’m done.

  You want to know the worst thing? That girl still has my shoes! These specific shoes were rather expensive, and I had only worn them once. She never gave them back. It’s been decades, and I’m still mad about those shoes.

  I did receive my diploma. That’s all that really mattered to me. I also learned that I was never again going to let people hold power over me. I was so mad that I had to compromise for this man. I hated that he was in a position to hold something over my head.

  Mr. Densmore died years ago. He was important to my education and my career, and I still regret not talking it out as adults and making peace with him. I haven’t been back to Northside since I graduated. As corny as it sounds, I still have dreams that take place in the musical theater room. I spent four years there, which seemed like an eternity at the time. It was a big U-shaped room with three-tiered elevated seating, so the chorus could sing on risers. Mr. Densmore played his grand piano in the center.

  In my dreams, I’m sitting in this room, talking to my friends seated all around me. It’s almost like I’m reliving rehearsals for shows. It sounds so crazy, but it’s like I’m catching up with my friends as though we never left. As if we could get up and break out singing “One” from A Chorus Line, in perfect unison and hitting every note and remembering every step. I’m fifteen again, and we’re all coming in and out and moving around the room. I don’t have that nightmare some people have, where I’m performing and haven’t rehearsed. My dream is the rehearsal. That is where I’m at my happiest, working with the people I love and who can relate to me. Getting ready to do my favorite thing in the whole world, which is putting on a show.

  2

  CLASSIC RENEE

  My mother named me Erika, after her favorite soap opera character, Erica Kane on All My Children, played by Susan Lucci. When I was born she was eighteen and living in Atlanta, Georgia. She says that Erica Kane was everything that she wanted to be at the time: a smart, independent businesswoman. And a brunette.

  My mother’s name is Renee. My middle name, Nay, is based on “Nay-Nay.” Allegedly, that’s what my father used to call my mother as a pet name for Renee. I never tell anyone my middle name, because I hate it. It makes me sound so incredibly country. It also reminds me of my father. He married my mother when they found out she was pregnant, but then he left nine months after I was born. He was never a part of my life.

  I always called my mom Renee because I felt like I was on a level playing field with her. It was never meant as a sign of disrespect not to call her Mom (which I still did occasionally). It was a reflection of the way I viewed our relationship. It was like in a past life we were friends, and somehow we ended up coming back as a mother and daughter. I wasn’t going to call a peer Mom.

  Just like my relationship with my middle name, my relationship with my mother has been complicated. She’s been one of the closest people in my life, but no one can infuriate me the way she does.

  I think I came along at a very difficult time for my mother. She was a natural blonde with a perfect bombshell body. She was eighteen and seeking magic. Instead, she ended up with a young child, a husband who took off, and a lot of difficulties. She dreamed of a future as a painter and concert pianist. Despite being artistic enough to succeed at either, instead she ended up as a bank teller who taught piano on the side. This
was the South in the early seventies which was still very conservative and not forward thinking. After having a child and a failed marriage so young, she was just considered finished.

  Renee always had a level of anxiety, which was often related to bills. She worried about having enough money for the both of us. She didn’t have the kind of freedom or career she dreamed about when she was young. I bore the brunt of a lot of that stress. She was short with me, hard on me, and irritable. She would snatch my ponytail, dig her nails into my arm, and step on my feet. And that was in public. At home she got me with the belt. She was never a lot of fun to be around. In short, she could be a real ass.

  The thing I heard her say more than anything else was, “I’m miserable.” And it showed. I don’t really remember my mother smiling or laughing a lot. I don’t remember much joy there. She was disappointed and angry, and I think we would both agree that I got the brunt of it.

  Now that I’m older, I can recognize that I always had a high level of anxiety as a child. Because of my mother’s situation, I never knew when the bottom might fall out. I took on the role of thinking, Oh my God, are we going to get kicked out of this house because we can’t afford it? What if she loses her job? What will we do then?

  It was just the two of us. I was a child and totally focused on her. When she was a wreck, it affected me, too. I felt isolated, with no one to turn to, play with, or talk to. It takes a toll in stressful times when you have no one to lean on. My grandparents were a stable influence, but we didn’t live with them all the time. Imagine the anxiety of seeing the one and only person who can take care of you upset and crying because you don’t have enough money.

  Renee is also incredibly indecisive. “Well, I don’t really know,” she would drawl whenever I asked her what we were going to do. This would be about everything, from the major stuff, like moving to New York, to the minor things, like what she wanted to do that weekend. She always seemed rudderless. To this day, ordering a meal with her drives me crazy.

  “Well, I don’t really know whether to have the steak or the pasta,” she’ll tell the waiter.

  I want to scream at her, “Just pick one, Renee! It’s one meal. We’ll have thousands more in our lifetime. Just make up your mind.”

  She treated me like an adult when she really shouldn’t have. I think she expected me to understand or process certain situations in a more adult manner than I was able to—especially when it came to work and money. There’s a fine line between keeping kids totally in the dark and telling them the adult truth. I don’t think she got that balance right, and she erred on the side of telling me more than I could handle. Because she was under tremendous pressure, I think she collapsed slightly in on herself. She had a hard time finding her strength. It was almost like she needed me to get us both through the tough times.

  Being with that kind of mother made me grow up very fast. She always made me shake people’s hands and look at them in the eye, even as a kid. I was expected to act and present myself like a miniadult rather than a young child.

  When I was small and working with a talent agency, she would make me call the agent and book all of my own appointments. That also meant that I got to show up and pick up my own checks at the agency. Eventually, I was doing it all myself. Partly it’s because Renee didn’t have time. But she also gave me the same work ethic she inherited from my grandparents.

  My mother was raised by Depression-era parents. They taught her—and me—that the world is difficult and often disappointing. We were told that life is hard. It is always going to be difficult, but if you work hard enough, you can have something—but probably not, so don’t get too disappointed. It was almost as if they were instilling in us the sense to stay in our place. We could dream—but not too much.

  I was motivated as a child, but not by positive circumstances. I wasn’t aspiring to good things as much as I was trying to avoid the negative consequences of not doing something.

  When I was little, my grandparents owned a lake house not far from where we lived. They had a powerboat that we would take out for waterskiing. I loved being in the water, and I was athletic as a kid. But when I was learning, I had a hard time getting out of the water and up on the skis. My mother was frustrated that I wasn’t getting it. Finally, she told me that I had to get up on my skis because there was a water moccasin in the lake. Right quick, I figured out how to get up on those skis. That little fib did the trick. But from then on, I was always worried that the lake was full of snakes.

  My grandfather, Hollis, was the best speedboat driver. He’d have some shots of Wild Turkey and a few beers, then he’d just whip me around that lake. Eventually I got so good I would put on my ski and jump directly from the dock. I would never even have to get in the lake. Because, you know, snakes.

  Renee’s influence on my performing career was equally complicated. On the one hand, she always made sure that we had enough money for dance lessons, costumes, and anything else I might need for the children’s theater productions I was in. She made sure that I got rides to and from all of those things, and that I had all the tools necessary to succeed. I will always be grateful that she taught me that I could do anything I wanted to do.

  On the other hand, she could be incredibly cruel. In middle school, I was in dress rehearsal for a production of The Wiz. Or maybe it was The Wizard of Oz, but had songs in it? I don’t remember, but I do remember standing at the front of the stage in my costume, a light blue jumper. I was going over my solo for the show. Renee was sitting in the audience. This particular song sat in the break of my voice, the middle register where I have a hard time singing. It was challenging to seamlessly blend a heavier chest tone into a lighter, airier head tone. When I was getting to the high note, I switched into a falsetto voice to hit the note, and I heard Renee’s laugh echoing around the room. I stopped singing immediately.

  Yes, it was a struggle, but I had hit the note. Instead of trying to help me or be encouraging, Renee often laughed at me. There was always a dagger in her comments about a performance I gave. She would say, “That could have been better,” or, “I didn’t like that.” She ripped me to shreds all the time, but this was the first time that she ever did it in front of other people. To this day, whenever I’m on stage or in the recording booth, I’m constantly paranoid about being on key. I’m always visualizing the constant criticism from Renee.

  That’s what was so odd about her. She would enable me to perform in this show, but then she would tear me down as I did it. She would never miss a performance, but if I did something she didn’t like, she’d say, “That’s stupid, why did you do that?” It was a total mindfuck.

  When I was in the Musical Theater Department at Northside High School, we were doing a talent showcase where students could select any number they wanted. It was like the sort of talent shows other high schools would have, which was unusual for us because we were accustomed to more structured performances. Renee got wind of this performance and put her two cents in, acting as my creative director one more time. She was convinced I should perform a song from The Phantom of the Opera.

  “I shouldn’t do that song for two reasons,” I explained. “First, there’s a really high part that’s not a fit for my voice. Second, it’s not going to be that kind of night. I think I need to do something with a much more pop feel.” I knew that I was going to get buried because the other students were going to do cool stuff, nothing as corny and stiff as The Phantom of the Opera.

  Renee was relentless. She badgered me until I finally gave up and sang the piece she selected just to keep her happy. The night of the show, she came with her girlfriend. From the stage, I could see exactly where she was sitting in the audience. I got on stage wearing silver lamé pants and a matching top, with big shoulder pads and my hair to one side. I was trying to add a little sparkle to this number.

  As I predicted, I gave a very average performance of the song. The response from the crowd was tepid at best. I could see my mother and her friend making
faces while I tried to get through a number I didn’t even want to do.

  I walked off stage where my classmate Mildred, who sang “And I’m Telling You I’m Not Going” in that year’s tour show production, was sitting on some sound equipment with her feet dangling over the edge. As I walked by, she shook her head and said, “Man, that was fucked up.”

  “Yeah, I know. Thanks,” I said.

  After the show, I pointed out to my mother that my number hadn’t gone very well. “Yeah,” she said. “While you were singing it, I was sliding down in my seat.”

  My mother was so young when she had me, and my grandmother—her mother—was such a maternal figure in my life that Renee and I could behave more like competitive sisters than mother and daughter.

  My junior year in high school, I had a solo in Northside’s tour show. I sang “9 to 5” and dressed like Dolly Parton. That Halloween, I went ice skating at an indoor rink with my boyfriend and his family. I took a freak fall and slammed the back of my head on the ice and passed out. My boyfriend’s father was a doctor at Piedmont Hospital, and he was worried I might have a concussion. They put me in the back of their van and drove me to the hospital.

  When I got to the hospital, someone called my mother. I was having a hard time staying awake. I was really out of it. When they asked me to touch my nose with my right hand, I touched my left ear. I got out of the MRI and my mother was there. She was wearing my Dolly Parton costume from the tour show. She had on the big platinum wig, the denim shirt that ties in the front, the skintight jeans, cowboy boots, everything—including my fake giant Dolly Parton triple Ds. I was lying there with the neurologist when she walked in with her friend Cheryl who was dressed as Reba McIntyre. I slurred, “Are you wearing my Dolly Parton costume?”

  “Yes,” Renee said. “We went out to the club for Halloween, and I needed a costume.” I was so embarrassed. Here I was with a head injury bad enough to keep me in the hospital for several days, and my mother showed up in my costume with her best friend looking like they were about to go on stage at the Grand Ole Opry.