In the spring of my Freshman year I was cast as Lemuel T. Thwackbusher in O. Henry’s The Cop and the Anthem. Apparently this part was a big inspiration for Red Skelton. However, I didn’t get it. I couldn’t draw a bead on the character. Mr. C wanted me to play it as W.C. Fields. I was familiar with Fields as a cultural reference, but I couldn’t do a decent impression to save my life. The closest I’d come to the legacy of W.C. Fields was a giant headed statuette behind my stepfather’s bar back in Illinois.
I became frustrated with my inability to grasp the part. Yes, I know how that sounds. I was 14 and this was just a school play, not summer stock. At the time it felt important. Plus I was feeling Mr. C’s frustration as well. He always said “even though this is high school drama, I don’t ever want it to look like high school drama!” I took that to heart. We all did. And since I was fucking it up, I finally just bailed. We had an in-service day off one Friday but Mr. Campbell insisted we all come for rehearsals that afternoon. I just didn’t go. When I walked in the school doors Monday, Mr. Campbell was waiting for me. I could see he was pissed. I told him I couldn’t get a ride. He asked why I hadn’t called him – he would’ve picked me up. I tried to think up another excuse but he finally just asked, “are you in this show, or aren’t you?”
I don’t even remember what I said exactly. I might have said nothing. But I vividly remember him simply saying “that’s all I needed to know.” And he walked away.
It seemed pretty apparent my days on the school stage were over. I’d shot myself in the foot. I acted like I didn’t care, as people tend to do when they realize they just fucked themselves. Inside I felt like an enormous horse’s ass. And I was. But as I’ve already said, I was in 7 shows.
The following fall, the sign went up for auditions. This time the show was Our Miss Brooks. I didn’t even consider trying out. That ship had sailed when I pissed all over the bow. And I felt the anchor in my gut. I wanted to act again so badly. So imagine the day before the audition when, as the bell rang and I followed the heard filing out of Mr. C’s biology class (don’t think for a moment he made being in his class any bit comfortable) he called out for me to stay. That heavy object in my stomach was about to find its way into my underpants.
“Are you going to be at the audition tomorrow?” he asked after the room emptied.
“The dog ate it . . . wait, what?”
I hadn’t expected that. I didn’t even know how to respond. Was he fucking with me? Was he rubbing it in?
“I didn’t really think I could,” I said.
“If you get a part,” he said, “will you be committed this time? Or will you drop out again when things get too tough?”
“I, uh, I will be committed,” I answered. “I won’t quit.”
“Good,” he said. “See you tomorrow.”
And that was it. It never came up again. Maybe he just needed guys for the cast, as is often the case. Maybe, just maybe he actually thought I had talent. I didn’t care. The slate was wiped. The next day all was forgiven, and I got the part of the school principal, Mr. Wadsworth. It was the third male lead, but honestly the best part. After all, he was the closest thing to a villain the show had. He got all the best laughs, even if at his own expense. I did stick it out. The show was another school hit. Admittedly the character was easier for me, as he’s just angry all the time. Something I was good at, naturally.
That show helped me find a scrap of self-confidence in other ways as well. Even though I’d had a girlfriend since the year before, I always felt I was a shlub with no game. She was away and things were rocky and I was thinking if it ended, I’d be a lonely loser. That’s when I met Jackie. She was a mousey, pale skinned brunette with beautiful blue eyes. She was a glorified extra in the show, but she had taken to always being around me backstage. Every rehearsal she’d be right next to me, talking to me in the wings, laughing at anything I said or did. One night just before I had to rush out on stage I realized we were just staring at each other. It was the first time I felt that feeling. The one that just lets you know it’s okay. You can go for it. Fortune favors the bold. I pulled her to me and pressed my mouth against hers. We stood there in the shadows, behind the heavy merlot curtain, making out. As I was kissing her, I heard my cue and pushed off right into the stage lights. And I’m pretty sure I rocked it out there, new found mojo coursing through my veins.
The weirdest thing was, we never discussed it. It went on throughout the rest of the production. Every night, when the coast was clear Jackie and I were backstage, tongues intertwined, my hands planted firmly on her ass. We never acknowledged outside of that theater. Never even considered taking it to the next level. Maybe I was her dirty little secret. I was okay with that! Strangely enough, even with her in my arms, my eyes were watching someone else. That play was also where I first met Trina. She was this goofy, beautiful freshman with think, tendrils of brown hair and giant, mischievous eyes. Her mother was actually my favorite substitute. She’d been in real show business once, as a cast member on Hee Haw. She worked alongside Roy Clark and Richard Dean Anderson (that one really blew me away – she knew MacGuyver!)
But I was more fascinated with her enigmatic daughter who captured my heart and imagination all at once. Trina was loud, sarcastic, athletic and at once self-assured yet a little awkward (which made her even more attractive.) I would pine for that girl for the next 3 years. But as much as I loved her, I was terrified of her. She was sharp in with and tongue and could cut anyone down in an instant. That mojo I had with Jackie evaporated the minute I was anywhere near Trina. I convinced myself if I dared reveal my feelings, she’d not only throw up in her own mouth, she would surely proceed to torture me publicly the rest of my high school career. To Jackie’s benefit I suppose, as I began inching us closer to view some nights when Trina was on stage, in some twisted hope she’d see and find herself strangely jealous. Don’t think she ever saw, and I’m pretty sure she never was. Of course at the ass-end of my senior year, literally days before graduation, I was talking to Trina’s mom. I decided to just put it on Front Street and I told her how I felt about Trina. Her response was something to the effect of “you dummy. You should have told her. She would have said yes!” I’m not entirely sure that was true, but I did feel like a jackass. As usual, my neurosis sabotaged me.
Earlier I said Mr. C never brought up my dropping out again. That isn’t entirely true. He referenced it one more time during the four short years we were in each others’ lives. I graduated in the spring of 1993, and there were five of us who had been in that first play as freshman who walked that gymnasium together. Five very different people, and I the only guy. But we were bonded as our own little team, having fought side-by-side for four years. And before I left that school for good, Mr. Campbell called me to his classroom and gave me something. It was the poster of our last play, The Miracle Worker. He’d laminated it, but not before writing a message on the back:
Bart,
It has been a real pleasure watching you grow. From the days of “Blazing Guns”, to your good attitude after being kicked out, to your final (and without a doubt your best) play as Capt. Keller, you have grown tremendously.
Your example and leadership on stage helped a lot as others saw what good acting was to be.
I know that if you put the effort into other areas of your life that you put into acting you will always succeed. Please do so! I want to be able to say “I knew him when . . . “
Remember always do it for the Lord and you will never fail.
In Jesus
Mr. C
Ok, so while I believe he has the facts about my departure from that show wrong, I’ll let it slide. It wouldn’t be the last time in my life there was a question as to whether I quit or was fired! Regardless, even reading that again as I write this, I am moved and amazed by that man and the impact he had on my young life. There are many areas where I disagree with Mr. C but they’re insignificant. He’s a hero to me. Always will be. And while he could be a stern task master who could sniff out bullshit in an instant (usually my greatest weapon), he was in many ways what I think of when I hear the term Christ-like.
Yes, this is supposed to be about my time at a Christian liberal arts college (such a contradiction!) But without Mr. C and my time on the HCHS drama club instilling in me a belief that I was actually good at something, I might never have found myself part of the incoming freshman class at Euphegenia College in the fall of 1993. That and a fateful friendship I would strike up during one high school production.
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