Trifucta Redux

Second in a three part series of…

The Three Most Awful Things I’ve Done in the Pursuit of Thespianism
(or How Rude Can One Girl Be in Rehearsal or Onstage?)


I'm actually well-behaved in the workplace. Okay, so I play pass the sausage. Okay, so I break onstage, or as the Brits would say, I corpse. Something goes slightly wrong and so do I. I even have this belief that if I lift my arm and stick my head in my armpit, the audience won’t realize that I’m laughing.

Oh, I’m laughing.

But I actually BAKE for colleagues…chocolate chip cookie pie. Just to share the joy and bond over insane sugar highs. And…to make people love me. I’m bad mommy.

But I think I actually bake because…

I hit a colleague once. Onstage. During a performance. I seem to have missed the kindergarten lesson, “Lil' Tizzy, use your words, not your fists.”

And I even loved him. I did. This love probably (definitely) aided in the death of the Stanford Economist relationship. Still love him. Not, not the economist…the actor. Brilliant actor. Brilliant friend. But he didn’t want to be on the…uh…Poseidon Adventure tour anymore. Neither did I. We sadly handled our similar situations tres different-les. I tried harder. He tried less.

Waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay less.

For two weeks straight he didn’t play with me at all. This, for me, is the equivalent of a parent withholding love because I’ve been naughty. (Therapy anyone?) And when he finally looked at me onstage, threw up his hands and said, “Fuck it,” I went a skoche postal.

I elbowed him in the stomach, doubled him over and jogged my jolly way. I don’t think I meant to hit him quite so hard but since I was boxing, bench-pressing 100 pounds and squatting 300 (yeah…that’s right…300), I perhaps did not know my own strength.

Imagine the backstage scene (always better than the real show)…

“Why the fuck did you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Hit me.”

“Ummm…that was an accident.”

I obviously do not make my living in improv.

Bless his wife. When he told her of the blow, she said, “What did you do wrong?” I hit him and he gets the blame—ahhhh, the talents of the baby of the family.

We never used our words. It was never mentioned again and we played in the sandbox harmoniously until our tearful farewell.

And I take my rage out on pastry.

Slice of choco-chip pie anyone?