Post 597 - April 13, 2024
A million years ago I was standing in line to buy tickets to a movie on the East Side. I don’t remember when this was, maybe while I was still in college, and I don’t remember which movie it was, but I do remember that the ticket seller was extremely slow.
The guy behind me was even more impatient than I was. “Come on, come on, come on,” he muttered under his breath. I turned to look at him and saw that it was O.J. Simpson.
This was long before the murders of Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman. It was also long after the peak of his career as a running back for the Buffalo Bills. He was famous enough that I knew who he was and not so famous as to be intimidating. I rolled my eyes and smiled in sympathy with him for our wait. He ignored me so I turned back around and didn’t give him another thought.
It seemed to me at the time that he was hoping to be recognized. When I didn’t give him that satisfaction I ceased to exist. At least that’s what I told my friends later when I recounted the story.
I’ve never wanted to be famous. There have been times when I’ve imagined what it might be like, but those reveries always make me grateful that I remain mostly anonymous. My job as a stage manager often ends up with me being well-known to a group of about a hundred at a time. In that circumstance, it’s easier for the group to remember one of me than it is for me to remember a hundred of them.
Often, I will get recognized by somebody who remembers my name and I can only dimly recall who they are. It doesn’t help that I’ve worked with a lot of kids over the years who are now adults with children of their own. Some don’t change at all, but some are unrecognizable in their adult forms. They might not think they look any different, but they really do.
Sometimes people can recall that I was the guy they went to when there was a problem, but they might not be able to come up with my name. There are also plenty of folks who I worked with for whom I was only ever a functionary, never an individual so when we run into each other they have no idea who I am.
When you all started reading what I was writing, I started to develop a very slight level of fame from people I’ve never met. The pieces I publish all get sent out into the world without me. I am sure my book is lying around in some very strange places. It was thrilling to see it on the shelf at the Drama Book Store when it first came out. It was kind of an out-of-body experience.
These days when I am walking past a bookstore with used copies being sold for a buck out front, I always scan the titles to see if it’s there. I can’t wait to be remaindered. It seems like the perfect and inevitable end to a publishing arc.
There are probably a couple of thousand people at best who are aware of my existence on levels that range from my being well known to them, to my name or face dimly striking a distant bell. O.J. Simpson, on the other hand, is someone whom billions of people recognize and have an opinion about. Billions.
When he got into the white Ford Bronco on June 17, 1994, and began that slow and steady chase down the 405 in Los Angeles with his friend Al Cowlings, he changed our history. Humanity was riveted. He is now an indelible part of our popular culture.
I cannot begin to imagine what his post-trial life was like. It’s one thing to be celebrated for your accomplishments but something else entirely to be reviled by the world for something you did in a fit of passion. Simpson was acquitted of wrong during in his criminal trial but then found responsible for the murders in a civil trial. I didn’t have to look that up. There are things in my memory that I need to confirm or clarify but that isn’t one of them.
Throughout my working life, I have been on projects with people of varying degrees of fame. Most of the people I find myself with these days are adored by their legions of fans but almost unknown to people who are unaware of what is going on in theatre. I find myself having to explain who they are by referring to their film and television careers. “Mandy Patinkin was Saul on Homeland and Inigo Montoya in The Princess Bride.” “Oh yeah,” they’ll say, “I love that guy. He can sing?”
Brooke Shields was Sally Bowles when I took over as the stage manager of Cabaret on Broadway. She might be the most famous person in terms of popular culture that I’ve ever worked with. When she was on Cabaret she was nowhere near as well-known as she was when she was younger. She still, however, had a legion of stalkers that law enforcement had to make sure that all of us at the theatre were aware of.
My family grew up watching the television series All in the Family. Jean Stapleton, who played Edith Bunker, was in a production I did of Harold Pinter’s The Birthday Party and Mountain Language. Edith Bunker was an indelible character. It was hard to look at Jean and not think you were talking to Edith. The character of Meg in the Birthday Party while different from that of Edith was still somewhat similar. Jean, herself, shared some aspects of herself with those characters but in other ways was nothing like them. I found that I had to unlearn what I thought I knew about her and relearn who she really was.
Fame is, of course, fleeting. People my age have difficulty believing that younger people may not have a clue who Paul Newman was. “Oh, you mean the salad dressing guy?” That’s what a dancer in West Side Story said to Michael when Michael asked him if he knew who Newman was.
If the impatient person standing behind me at the movie theatre was just a civilian, I wouldn’t have remembered anything about that day. Nothing about the experience would have lodged in my memory. Because the guy was even marginally famous, though, I’ve remembered it.
When I had my encounter with O.J., he was in the public eye because of a series of commercials he did for Hertz car rentals. He was a handsome man. Even more so in person. If Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman were still alive, though, I might not have been able to dredge up the memory. Perhaps if someone had said something about O.J. it would have jogged the memory, but I might never had the occasion to revisit it.
As it was, when the media circus around Simpson and the murders started, I couldn’t stop thinking about him being behind me. I still can’t.
We meet people all the time or maybe just pass them in the street who go on to become famous and we might never realize it. Walking around the streets of New York as much as I do, I am constantly passing people who look familiar to me. It becomes a game for me to see how many blocks it takes to remember their names.
The reports of O.J. Simpson’s death say that he was surrounded by his kids and his grandkids when he died. I can’t help but wonder what they think of him. Do they think he murdered the two or do they think he was innocent?
As hard as it must have been to be O.J. during those final years, what must it be like to be part of his family? Those folks are only famous by association. They didn’t do anything at all. They were just born. I don’t envy them at all.
I ended up at Hugh Hefner’s 70th birthday party because my ex was working on a screenplay about the Playboy empire. It was at the mansion in Los Angeles and every D-level celebrity you could possibly imagine was there, including Kato Kaelin, a witness in the O.J. trial. At the time, the trial was still fresh in everybody’s minds hence he got the invitation. I am guessing that most people had forgotten about him until he resurfaced a couple of days ago when Simpson’s death resurrected all the coverage of the trial.
At the time, Kaelin tried to parlay the public’s awareness of him into something of a career. It didn’t quite work. The simple association he had didn’t generate enough interest for anything to happen. On the other hand, O.J. Simpson’s defense attorney, Robert Kardashian’s involvement probably helped spawn his family’s rise to fame as social influencers.
I have no idea why the Kardashians are as famous and visible as they are. It doesn’t seem to me that anyone is going to remember them after their strange burst of fame has fizzled out.
O.J. Simpson’s fame, on the other hand, has now landed him solidly in history. Even if he only endures as a footnote, I think his memory is going to endure.
We had a concert last night in Palm Desert. Backstage, the walls are covered with the signatures of everyone who has ever played there. Under Patti’s signature, the rest of our group also signed our names and put the years we’ve been there after them. This was my fourth time playing there. I have, though, been there more than that. I was there at least once with Jersey Boys and maybe once with Mandy, too.
Bill Cosby played there once and signed the wall above a urinal in the men’s room. He traced the outline of his hand and added his name below it. A few years ago, the theatre painted over his name. Cosby is almost as infamous as Simpson, but his notoriety didn’t captivate the world in the same way. We were riveted by O.J., but Cosby just disgusted everyone. If O.J. had been there, they might have left his name up.
My own personal level of fame is way more than enough. I would never want to feel that I couldn’t just go outside unnoticed and take a walk. Unless I murder someone in a truly spectacular and unique way, the chance of me entering the consciousness of popular culture is almost non-existent.
That you all have a slight awareness of me I can deal with. I am grateful for that. We are about to head to the airport to fly to San Francisco. Patti’s level of fame is sometimes extremely helpful in getting us through the gauntlet of checking in and navigating security. I have no problem riding through on her coattails.
I’m not sure I will ever forget that O.J. stood behind me. Nothing whatsoever happened that day beyond that, but now that I know what the future had in store, that brief encounter has crystalized in my memory. I have a vivid picture in my head of the expression of impatience on his face. It pops up in the strangest of times.
May Nicole Brown Simpson and Ron Goldman rest in peace.