Deconstructing Paul Newman

 

There is a growing place for sadness as we age.  The illnesses and the passing of family members, friends and acquaintances plumb its depth.  Perhaps one reason I’m drawn to the movies on TCM, even if I’ve seen them, is the actors are frozen in time.  There is a sense of comfort and familiarity.

 

I am not a star-struck person, although during my lifetime I’ve casually met some Hollywood luminaries, such as Yul Brenner who was my seat mate on an Eastern Airlines shuttle flight, and once we attended the Academy Awards as my company published their annual index to those awards. 

 

But my more substantial casual meeting was with Joanne Woodward when we published Westport, Connecticut: The Story of a New England Town's Rise to Prominence.  In addition to her being a prominent actress (and wife of Paul Newman), she was very active in the Westport Country Playhouse and the Westport Historical Society and wrote the Forward for the book.  We had a publication party and I spent part of an afternoon in May 2000 with her, and toured the Historical Society with her as a guide, chatting about their early years in Westport and the coincidence that we were once neighbors, both with homes along the Saugatuck River, separated by Weston Road.  (Ann used to collect for United Fund in our immediate neighborhood and was assigned the Newman property, being warmly received by Joanne’s mother who lived in an adjacent house.)

 

During our three decades in Westport / Weston we saw Paul Newman in various venues, mostly restaurants.  Ann once selected apples across a large bin with him at a local farm.  We never bothered him.  All we knew was the guy on the screen.  Once he drove into our office parking lot in his modified VW Beetle with a Porsche engine.  Unfortunately, one of the women who worked for us spotted him from our second-floor office window.  And waited, along with others in the office for his return, and when he did, Ruthie (as I recall her name harking back to 1975 or so),  ran out the door as he got into his car and said something to the effect “Oh, Mr. Newman, won’t you wave to the others standing at the windows?” I understand he actually got out of the car and with a forced grin, waved. 

 

 

When he died, I wrote the following in this space:  “The town treated him pretty much like anyone else and that is the way he wanted it. He was just there, around town, and of course larger than life on the screen, and because of his extensive charity work, even on bottles of salad dressing. He was such a part of the fabric of all of our lives. I feel a profound sense of loss whenever I think of him, or see him on the screen or on those bottles of “Newman’s Own” which he funded to last into perpetuity for the benefit of progressive causes. He was iconic and an iconoclast at the same time, a true maverick who lived his life the way he wanted, not the way Hollywood normally dictates.”

 

But the point of writing this present essay is that I just finished reading his memoir Paul Newman; The Extraordinary Life of an Ordinary Man.  Also, I recently learned that Sotheby’s is set to auction “more than 300 individual items that the legendary actors assembled and enjoyed throughout their 50-year marriage.”  All of those items apparently come from their Connecticut home, the one Joanne and I talked about that afternoon.

 

Tragically, Joanne was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s sometime in 2007 and only a few days later Paul was diagnosed with terminal cancer; he died in 2008.  Since then Ethan Hawke’s “The Last Movie Stars,” a six-part documentary about them was featured on HBO, and Newman’s memoir was published.  The Sotheby’s auction is the last step in deconstructing lives which heretofore have been an enigma.

 

Paul Newman agreed to be interviewed by his friend Stewart Stern for the memoir and a substantial amount of oral history was transcribed, but Newman did not publish it during his lifetime and destroyed some and when Stern passed in 2015 some duplicate notes came in possession of the Newman Woodward family. 

 

Their father wanted his children and grandchildren to understand his remoteness in his early years, his alcoholism, and to separate the man from the myth of a movie actor who had swagger and startling blue eyes.  That demeanor was overcompensation for feelings of inadequacy, as he always felt his acting skills were suspect in getting parts – that it was his good looks alone that counted for his early success..

 

In compiling the memoir, the editor David Rosenthal relied as much on friends, family, and colleagues as he does on the transcript of Newman’s recollections.  Nonetheless, the sense of the man comes through.  What I quote below are Newman’s own recollections.

 

He recognized (and to some degree lamented) that “Newman’s luck” contributed to his success, being born white, with those baby blues, and the fact that when James Dean died, he got more opportunities to play roles that would have gone to Dean.  He self-effacingly admits I never got the sense that anything I did on stage was spectacular or even something very exciting. It may have been workmanlike or OK, but was I really a highly highly knowledgeable actor?  I was a kid with an attractive exterior, had a tremendous amount of energy and a lot of personality.

 

Corroborating what Joanne told me about their early years, some of it was a struggle.  She didn’t go into specifics but Newman does.  He and Joanne met on the set of the Broadway production of Picnic and their affair began while Paul was still married to his first wife.  As he recalls, when I first got the job in Picnic, I had a wife and child (with another one on the way), and only $250 in the bank.  I don’t know how long I would have been able to stay afloat without some financial cushion or if the play didn’t have a long run. I had even applied for a job at the Hillside Avenue branch of the US post office in Queens. Ironically, at the time that was my own neighborhood post office.

 

Newman’s life and my own emotionally intersect in the behavior of our mothers, his nicknamed Tress and mine, Penny.   When his father was dying in a hospital he just needed to get Tress’ agreement to his estate plan, but she refused to sign anything; Tress kept yelling at him on his deathbed, accusing him and vilifying him. She wouldn’t let him fucking die!  Although not exactly the same, that was essentially my mother’s reaction as my father died.

 

Another similarity was that his mother turned on his wife, as mine did on my wife.  Tress was convinced that Joanne hated her and sought evidence.  Joanne would occasionally go out with Gore Vidal (who was gay) to the theatre as Newman’s and Woodward’s relationship was still clandestine.   At the opening of Ben Hur which Vidal co wrote, Tress noticed Gore and Joanne holding hands, chatting. Tress came to visit us in New York when I was on Broadway. We were driving one evening in my Volkswagen when suddenly my mother said to me “I know why your wife hates me! It’s because she’s having an affair with Gore Vidal.“ I slammed on the brakes and said “get out of the fucking car.” There were tears and apologies, but I still dropped her at the corner of 18th St., 5th Avenue.

 

My mother was quite a dame. She had an internal drummer, and that drummer was not affected by other reasons; there was a song going on with her and she stuck to it; if she thought something was going on in a certain way that’s the way it was it didn’t make any difference what actually happened; to her it wouldn’t change. And I didn’t speak to my mother again for 15 years. 

 

Was it all because of what she said about Joanne? No, not really; but it was such a relief to use that as an excuse to escape from her. She represented all my leaden baggage, the parts of myself that I didn’t like, that sense of subservience, uncertainty, not knowing where the next attack was coming from or what the reason for it might be.

 

We too hardly spoke to my own mother for ten years, for similar reasons, the only way to protect my family.  I know that feeling of relief as well.

 

Their marriage went through some rocky times, the drug overdose of his son, Scott, Newman’s own alcoholism and feeling like a fraud.  But at his side, mostly always was Joanne, and he (they) battled through it and I think that with his 1982 film, The Verdict, in which he plays an alcoholic attorney, he finally got in touch with Paul Newman, the real person and real actor and his films and stage work from there on came from a different place.  He also became a passionate and competent race car driver, and that swagger became more self-confidence.  Then there was the development of his philanthropy, most prominent, his food enterprises, the profit from which goes to worthy causes and The Hole in the Wall Gang.

 

But even in his charitable endeavors he is self-effacing.  I can afford to be charitable; I’m not going to be that really affected. Why will I suffer when I give away $10 million? That won’t change the way I live. I won’t eat less well. I can still stick a Buick engine in a Volvo.  I’ve had the luck of the draw, living in a democracy, being of the majority color, having an opportunity for education, enjoying the Bill of Rights, the four freedoms, and everything else.  The easiest thing I can do, frankly, is to give away money.

 

Yet he did it in a substantive way, more than most of his colleagues, and the endowment he created will live on.

 

We shared some of the same places and times and after all those years of living nearby the famous film legend, I too have finally gotten to know him. They were a unique couple but, in many ways, had ordinary lives and heartbreaks like the rest of us.

 

As the Woodward Newman Family state about the forthcoming auction, “Our parents have dedicated their lives to pursuing the things that inspired them, whether personally, professionally, or as collectors. We hope the public takes as much pleasure from this collection that our family has cherished for decades, which offers further insight into who they were beyond their glamorous Hollywood personas.”

 

Hershey Felder BECOMES Irving Berlin in this One Man Tour de Force

The final performance at the Westport Country Playhouse of “Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin” was last night and we were lucky enough to be there.  It was a poignant and persuasive reminder that this nation is a nation of immigrants.   

It took a Jewish immigrant from Russia to write such classics as “God bless America “and “White Christmas” two of the top selling pieces of music of all time.

Felder traces Irving Berlin’s life having written not only the Book for this production, but he acts, sings, and as an accomplished concert pianist, accompanies himself.  It is a one man theatrical triumph with a beautiful set (a representation of Berlin's New York City Beekman Place apartment) and lighting by the Westport Country Playhouse where we’ve attended performances for more than 40 years during the summers..

In addition to those two classics previously mentioned, Felder’s bio-musical tells Berlin’s story in a score of songs, including “Alexander's Ragtime Band",” My Wife's Gone to the Country - Hooray! Hooray!” (Seriously, Berlin could make up a song just about anything and Felder engages the audience with this one, allowing us to sing the “Hooray! Horray! refrain), ”Oh, How I Hate to Get Up in the Morning”, “A Pretty Girl is Like a Melody”, “What’ll I Do?”, “Blue Skies”, “Say It Isn’t So”,”Puttin’ On the Ritz”, “Supper Time” (a song about racial violence, sung by Ethel Waters) and “There’s No Business Like Show Business” from one of his most memorable and enduring Broadway hit musicals, Annie Get Your Gun (which he was enlisted to write at the last moment by the Gershwin Brothers as the intended composer, Jerome Kern, had died).  Incidentally, Felder does a great Ethel Merman imitation!

Felder traces Irving Berlin’s life in chronological order starting with his birth somewhere in the Russian empire, his family’s escape from the Russian pogroms and their arrival at Ellis Island when was only five years old, and his beginnings in music as a singing waiter.   

He had two marriages, his first wife dying soon after their marriage, and his second from one of the wealthiest families in America -- a marriage to which her family of course strongly objected.  He lost his only son in his infancy and had three daughters.  These facts are woven into the incredible musical accomplishments of his life.   

The evening is further enhanced thanks to the astute direction of Trevor Hay who cleverly embeds scenes from movies, still photographs and other emotionally relevant images and sounds on a large “mirror” and wall behind Felder.

But foremost is Felder’s spirited and talented portrayal of Berlin – in song, in piano performance, and acting, capturing the essence of the man and an era, underscoring the importance of Berlin to the Great American Songbook.  Indeed, as Jerome Kern said “he IS American music.”

Remarkably, his composition and performance abilities were all self-taught.  He wrote all his songs in F Sharp and they had to be transposed for most performances.  It is a most unlikely story, the immigrant songwriter who couldn’t read music and ultimately wrote some of the most iconic American songs.  Felder’s story emphasizes his contributions to both the WW I and WW II war efforts.  Simply put, he loved America!  

Berlin’s times, of course, had its own societal afflictions and horrors, and except for a few brief moments here and there, referring to the depression, and racial segregation and prejudice, and a little about anti-Semitism from his father in law, Felder mostly avoids those issues.  But this is meant to be more of a “feel good” bio-musical, and the author/performer sticks to his mission.

Felder’s ability to tell this story as an integrated musical performance has, I think, matured over the years.  About 15 years ago we saw him perform his first bio-musical Gershwin Alone at The Cuillo Centre for the Arts in West Palm Beach which ironically has now been transformed into the home that Dramaworks now occupies.  We loved that show as well, but I recall it was not so much a biographically integrated theatre piece as this one of Berlin as it was more reliant on Felder’s considerable talent as a concert pianist.  His Irving Berlin show tells the life story seamlessly through his acting, singing, and playing.  In other words, it meets the test of the modern Broadway musical although only one person, but, oh, what a remarkably talented person he is.

The thousands of songs Berlin wrote during his long career, which included more than a score of Broadway shows and Hollywood musicals tapped into feelings and tunes that appealed to his generation and succeeding ones, and Felder frequently engages the audience to sing along.  As he said after the show in a casual Q & A, there are basically three players in his piece, he, the piano and the audience.

After more than 1-1/2 hours without intermission and a standing ovation, he still had the enthusiasm and energy to spend another half hour with the audience amusingly fielding questions.  It was like talking to your best friend, but one with exceptional gifts.

We look forward to his future works, including a new play featuring the music of Sergei Rachmaninoff.  Sign us up!

And so after such a satisfying evening we followed the winding roads of Westport back to our boat as a thunderstorm was gathering in the west.  Luckily, we beat it “home.”

Another Week of Wonder

How Samuel Pepys was able to keep up a detailed daily journal for some 10 years is incredible.  He was the Lou Gehrig of bloggers.  Not that I’m in competition, but his observations were all over the place, ranging from the profound to the commonplace, very personal as well as observational on significant developments during his time.  In an age of social networking though, with attendant privacy issues, I continue to walk the line.  And, as I am but one of an endless number of bloggers, I increasingly find myself writing more for my own needs, a form of an auxiliary memory bank.

Right now I’m sitting in a hotel room on NYC’s Upper West Side. The last entry was written while still on the boat.   Lots of water under the proverbial hull since then, one wave in particular, but I’ll take this temporally. 

Before leaving the boat we returned to the Westport Country Playhouse to see The Understudy by Theresa Rebeck.  This is a three handed farce / comedy which I would wage actors LOVE to perform.  In this production are Eric Bryant, Brett Dalton, and Andrea Syglowsik (who plays the little appreciated stage manager, a function many of us theatre goers take for granted, perhaps as important as the Director).  It’s a play within a play, supposedly an adaptation of a Kafka short story but in fact a Kafkaesque portrayal of life in the theatre itself.  Wish I had photos and more time to spend on this production, but if the play comes your way, or if you are in the Westport area, see it (through Sept 1).

Then onto the main event.  Our son, Jonathan, was married last Sunday to the daughter we always dreamed of having, Tracie.  It was an elegant but simple affair, the ceremony overlooking the water where we have spent countless days.  It was an informal, non-denominational event, casual, no jackets, and no ties.  This is the way they wanted it and we wholeheartedly approved! 

The wedding deserves its own detailed entry, and for that we must await our return to Florida.   It was a wonderful day, sharing it with family, old friends, and new friends, and Tracie’s parents, Alan and Pat.  More later.

After the wedding we were going to go home, but why not use the opportunity to spend some time in our old neighborhood of the upper West Side?  Two weeks in paradise, our hotel at 79th and Amsterdam, not far from where we both lived when we worked in the City.

There is a cornucopia of little reasonably priced al fresco restaurants here with a sea of humanity passing by, every ethnic group, young people, babies galore, dogs shitting on the sidewalks, but people picking  up after them, the blaring of horns, long walks early in the morning while Ann is having her coffee and getting ready for the day’s activities.

I’ve walked over to Central Park and up and down Columbus, Amsterdam, and Broadway.  Love the pulse of the upper WS and the fact that some markets are open 24 hours.  I could live like this.  I have recaptured my NYC walking gait of almost 50 years ago, maintaining the necessary speed to traverse cross-town blocks without having to wait for a red light.  I know that might sound silly, but it’s imprinted in my reptilian brain.  When I lived here I wish I had known that it was my moment, but time seemed endless and this neighborhood was not yet gentrified.  One lived here just to go to work.

It is impossible to recount everything we’ve done since being in the City this last week, but I’ll reference a few highlights.

Last year we focused on the theatre, but this year more on sites and museums.  Nonetheless, one of our first nights here we saw The Band’s Visit.  No time to do a “review” but I can well understand its several Tony Awards.  It had such an inspirational message, with the power of music to unite.  It starts slowly and gathers momentum.  Musicians perform on stage and in the pit.  Although the music is decidedly Middle Eastern, I could detect stains of melodies which reminded me of some of those in the movie La La Land.  Just a few bars here and there and when I’m home and at my piano, I intend to identify them.

One day we took the B train (subway hasn’t changed much since we lived here decades ago, other than the price and they’re now air conditioned) downtown to Grand Street. 

The D train went by as we waited for the B.

There were three reasons for this day trip.  First was to tour the Lower East Side Tenement Museum, choosing their Shop Keepers tour as it focuses first on my German heritage, and then on Ann’s Jewish heritage.  Their site on line provides all the details so I am not going to go into them, other to say one could make this an all day visit with the other available tours.

Some time ago the Tenement Museum had contacted me about recreating my great grandfather’s photography studio which was established at nearby 143 Bowery in 1866.  Unfortunately, nothing came of that.  But while downtown I wanted to see the building which is still there today, although under constant renovation. 

It was strange standing in the vestibule, probably on the very floor my great grandfather walked.  The photography business survived some 120 years although it later moved to 100 5^th Avenue.

Then, how could we not have a late lunch at Russ & Daughters while there?  Here I’ll supply some detail, having shared a pickled herring trio on pumpernickel, potato latkes with sour cream & applesauce, a scooped bagel with nova smoked salmon, cream cheese, tomato, onion and capers and finished with blintzes with fruit compote & sour cream. 

While Ann drank a white Spanish wine with the meal, I could not resist the beverage of my youth, a chocolate egg cream.  Ironic, there is no egg and no cream in the drink, just some chocolate syrup, a splash of milk and lots of seltzer.  As a kid it was what you ordered when you couldn’t afford chocolate malt, which was most of the time.

Yesterday we went to Downton Abbey: The Exhibition which is soon closing.  We had watched each and every episode over the last few years and even visited the castle in Scotland where their initial Christmas show was filmed.  Now we understand there will be a movie to continue the series.  Can’t wait.

The exhibit is incredibly thorough, on three floors, holograms of the major actors speaking to you, and virtually every costume designed for the show, as well as much of the furniture.  I was particularly impressed by the detail, right down to telegrams that were read on the air, but existed in the exact form they would have appeared at the time.  Here we are “with the family.”

Afterwards, we ate an early dinner / late lunch at the nearby Brooklyn Diner, sharing a pastrami sandwich -- as it was made in the days of Ebbets Field, exactly the period the Diner tries to capture.

As this is undoubtedly the last entry for this month, a brief political observation about Mr. Manafort and Mr. Cohen.  They can’t possibly be guilty as Trump appoints only the best people!  At least 33% of the public still believe that.  Add to the pot the admission of the National Enquirer about their role.  Their influence was as pernicious as Russia’s on the election, all condoned by an unknowledgeable, self-centered “celebrity” WE elected President.  How much longer will the GOP allow him to go on before destroying our country and any sense of respect for the office of the President?