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Authors: Shirley Maclaine

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BOOK: It's All In the Playing
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“Hitch?” I said excitedly.

“Quite right,” said Tom. “He’s decided to help you now, remembering that he was not what would be considered pleasant in certain areas when you worked together. Correct?”

“That’s right, Tom. In some ways he was very hard on me.”

“Yes. Well, he’s trying to make up for that by helping you with suspense in this spiritual screenplay. He has worked in thirty-year cycles with you. He was present at a critical turning point in your life thirty years ago when you began, and he is returning as you enter a new phase of expression with your TV miniseries now. Though he is having a bit of a teeth-gnashing time over here at the moment.”

“Why?” I asked.

“Because, the law of karma being perfect, some of the actors he abused when he was in the body are now directing some of his old classics for the new Hitchcock television series—and not very well in his opinion. If he had any hair left he’d be pulling it out by now.”

Colin and I slapped our thighs, Hitchcock stories being familiar to both of us. He had nothing but contempt
for actors, said we were nothing but cattle. And now look: Tony Perkins and Burt Reynolds, among others, were directing Hitchcock remakes. Evidently Hitch wasn’t turning over in his grave—he was gnashing his teeth on the astral plane as he was working out karma with actors!

“But he sees the humor in it all,” said Tom. “He was, after all, one of your great practical jokers who loved elaborate pranks. Well, now God has done him one better—prank-wise.”

“Well,” I said, “tell Hitch I’m sorry I couldn’t make it to his funeral.”

“Oh,” said Tom, “he wouldn’t have noticed. He wasn’t there either. You know how he felt about funerals.”

By now I was calculating how I could include what was occurring in our channeling session on the screen. I didn’t want to waste it. But a thought occurred to me.

“Before you go, Tom, I assume you’ll be wanting billing and credit on the show?”

“Quite right,” said Tom. “I am a professional. Shouldn’t everyone be included?”

“Yes.”

“Well, then,” said Tom with commanding dignity, “I would like my billing to say Tom McPherson appearing as Tom McPherson.’”

“Oh,” I said. “Okay. What about John?”

“One moment, please,” said Tom.

He returned in a moment.

“John,” he said, “would like to be called John, son of Zebedee.”

“Oh,” I said. “Okay.”

Then it occurred to me.

“Wasn’t John of Zebedee, John the Beloved?”

“Quite right.”

“Well, isn’t that the same guy who wrote Revelations?”

“Quite right,” said Tom. “You may say that we
entities simply play ourselves, if you must. I must be going now. Saints be looking after you.”

And he was gone. Kevin returned to consciousness and the three of us went out onto the balcony to watch the waves. Kevin wondered why the calves of his legs were sore. I told him he had been doing an Irish jig.

   The following day I parked my car in the parking lot attached to ABC Circle Films. As I stepped out of it I noticed a man walking by with a pink script under his arm. The face was familiar. The man was Tom Hulce, who had just lost the Academy Award to his co-star, F. Murray Abraham, in
Amadeus.

“Hey, Tom,” I heard myself say, “you’ll win some other time.” Tom smiled and hugged me. “What are you doing with that pink script?” (When Stan had asked me what color I wanted our script to be, I had said pink.)

“It’s yours, dear girl. Don’t you even recognize your own script?”

I was perplexed.

“But why do you have it, Tom?”

“Because I read it and liked it and my agent asked if I’d like to come in and do a reading with other actors just for the fun of it. Don’t you want to see how it plays?”

Well, indeed I did. But I never expected an actor of Tom Hulce’s stature to do a reading for the fun of it.

Arm in arm we walked into the ABC building. Then I experienced one of the genuinely thrilling moments of my life. On a par with having my baby, winning the Oscar, and meeting Clark Gable! I saw SCRIPT READING: OUT ON A LIMB on the rehearsal-hall door. I opened the door, walked in, and found Colin, Stan, Dean O’Brien (production manager), two assistant directors, and a long table surrounded by actors who would re-create what I had lived and written about. The past five years flooded back. No one who hasn’t experienced such an evolution
in expression could possibly understand the impact of seeing your life and its characters about to spring to life in a professional environment. For a moment I felt like Sally Field. “You take me seriously—you like me. You like me,” I wanted to blurt out. But it was much more than that. This room was full of people about to rehearse a script that seriously and respectfully treated trance-mediums, extraterrestrials, disembodied spiritual entities, and UFOs as an alternative reality to traditional reality. It wasn’t a Spielberg fantasy. It was real. It was happening to me. And suddenly it hit me. Brandon Stoddard and ABC had thirteen million dollars’ worth of faith and belief invested in the credibility of my spiritual search.

We took our seats. We all introduced ourselves. Tom was the only actor I knew, but each of the others was an experienced “working” professional.

For me the reading was an event, the personal satisfaction notwithstanding. For the first time Colin and I heard the rhythm, the hidden comedy, the tension of the love story, and whether the interpersonalization of the characters worked. It did. There was more work to be done—but in the main it was all there. For me to play a love scene with an actor who was depicting a real man whom I had loved was an exercise in double vision. It was then that I knew I’d have no trouble re-creating myself or allowing another actor to portray a real-life character in my life with freedom. From that day on I began to come to work and get into the character of who I had been ten years earlier. That was the separation I needed. It was essential that I play “Shirley” with the skepticism and confused disbelief that had been part of my early spiritual learning process ten years previously.

Soon after that realization, I did the screen test with Kevin—except that I stepped out of character with very unpleasant results as a consequence.

Chapter 5

   K
evin and I arrived at the taping studio soon after lunch. There were several arrangements of flowers waiting for us from Stan and company.

Kevin sat in the makeup chair. The makeup artist didn’t realize she was making up a trance medium until fifteen minutes into the procedure. I think that was because Kevin mentioned that Tom McPherson might smear his eye makeup with a blindfold. When she asked who Tom McPherson was, Kevin actually told her. She was so fascinated she took three hours to “complete” his makeup. And all it consisted of was base color!

The entire taping crew was prepared for visitors from outer space or, at the very least, a tap-in from
Poltergeist.
It was the first of many times that I’d notice a kind of respectful silence prevail on the set whenever the presence of beings from the other side was expected. It was endearingly humorous, because as jaded as some of them were, each of them had a healthy respect for the possibility that it just might be true. Either that or it was Hollywood people doing what they do best—covering
their bases. Knowing how the butter for their bread spreads … “stay with the money.”

The crew was ready. So was Kevin. He had been studying his lines diligently and so (according to him) had Tom and John. The crew, of course, didn’t know what to expect.

Bob Butler seemed quite comfortable on the taping floor. I wondered how he’d be with a film crew instead. He directed from the booth, and fairly soon Kevin became accustomed to the voice above him instead of an actual face in front of him.

Everyone was set. Kevin went through some motions with his hat and coat, since he had an entrance to make through my door in Malibu. It was funny and dear to observe the vanity of even so unassuming an individual as a medium who allowed other beings to use his body without regard for how it looked.

Bob gave the countdown to tape rolling and then we began. Kevin walked through the door and began his lines. He was nervous. I in turn became immediately supportive. With my prompting he acted out his lines. He told “Shirley” what to expect, explaining that he was really acting as a telephone for disincarnate beings to speak through. I snuck a peek at the dumbfounded crew. No one blinked. (Hollywood crews have seen it all.)

Then I forgot my lines. Someone handed me a script. By now I was definitely out of character.

Kevin went into trance, as per script. The crew didn’t know what was going on. They waited. A few of them adjusted the lights.

John of Zebedee came through and said, “Hail. Greetings. State purpose of gathering.”

Several members of the crew very gently backed up. I chuckled to myself. John proceeded to play his lines letter-perfect—not with any great dramatic flair, mind you, but with precision. When he paused and said, “Pause. There is another entity desiring to speak,” there was
another almost palpable reaction from the crew. I heard one of them murmur, “Should this guy get the Academy Award or is this real?” I found myself whipping between playing the scene and watching the crew react to an honest-to-God channeling. It was really difficult for me to get the concentration I needed.

Tom McPherson, in all the glory of his Irish brogue, came through. “Tip o’ the hat to you,” he began and proceeded to introduce himself and launch into
his
portion of the scene. He was as letter-perfect as John. Kevin had had trouble remembering his lines—the entities had no problem. “Earth plane anxiety,” Tom would explain later. “When the director yells the word
action,
the aura of every person on the set goes muddy. What are they so worried about? All of life is a movie, not just the one you’re making.” Sure, Tom, and we all wear IT’S ONLY A MOVIE buttons, too.

Tom then proceeded to pad his part a little by turning to the crew and saying, “I’d like to encourage all of you out there to enjoy having a body. I haven’t had one for four hundred years. I miss it. When you’re floatin’ around up here you’re like a saint or somethin’. All you can be is good, gooder, and goodest.” Some of the crew laughed.

Tom explained his identity per script, Irish pickpocket and all. The crew gaped. How could a pickpocket be a spiritual guide? “He’s working off his karma,” said one of the guys with long hair and an earring. I made a note of his identity—we should definitely take him to Peru, I thought.

We were well into the scene when Tom suddenly reached over and took my hands. I felt a surge of warm, almost liquid, electricity go up my arms and through me.

“Would you like to do an Irish jig now, lassie?”

“Oh,” I said, startled and completely out of character.

“Well,” Tom went on, “help an old pickpocket to
his feet. You have an advantage over me up here. Just get me to my feet and I’ll be fine, don’t ya know.”

I helped Tom to his feet. He looked down.

“Good floor,” he said. “It’s not the hardwood deck of shipboard, but it’ll do.”

With that, Tom began to direct me in an Irish jig. He held my hands loosely and told me about the incarnations we had had together as pirates. I wondered how much karma he would have to work off before he was done with it.

I was laughing as Tom improvised even more lines. Then I began to be aware that I was becoming nauseated. It wasn’t the physical activity. It was something else. I really began to feel terrible, as though I would throw up right on his hardwood floor.

“Tom,” I said, “I’m getting really sick. I have to sit down.” I looked around at the crew. They thought it was part of the scene. Nobody did anything.

“Yes, lassie,” said Tom. “We must be sittin’ then.” He guided me to my chair. The crew was mesmerized. I started to hyperventilate. I heard a crew member say, “These two are really good.”

Tom sat down opposite me.

“How’re ya feelin’ now, lassie?” he inquired, quite concerned.

“I’m really ill, honestly. Why? What’s happened here?”

“Well,” he said, “if you really want to know the truth, I thought you’d be playing your part from the emotional frame of reference of ten years ago. That carried with it a lower frequency in your being. You’ve been out of character for the last fifteen minutes and I didn’t pull back my frequencies in time. I thought you’d snap into character when we danced. But you didn’t, so when you came into physical contact with my frequencies it was too much for you. I’m sorry.”

The crew shook their heads in disbelief.

“Oh,” I said, understanding what he meant. “I’m sorry too.”

“Yes, lassie,” he added. “I thought we were dealing with professional acting here. Forgive me, but if you had stayed in character this wouldn’t have happened.”

One of the guys in the crew lit a cigar.

“Okay,” I said. “I get it. You don’t have to humiliate me in front of the crew.”

“Oh,” replied Tom, “a little humility never hurt anybody. Keeps your feet on the ground, as I am constantly reminded myself.”

I pushed him in the shoulder and retracted my hand quickly. I didn’t want to risk any more contact just now.

“Shall I be goin’ then?” said Tom. “Or will ya want to be doing it all again?”

I was really nauseous now. “I think we’d better quit for a while, Tom. If we need to do it again, I’ll talk it over with Kevin.”

“Saints be lookin’ after ya, then,” said Tom. And he was gone.

The lights went off on the set. The crew just stood there. Kevin rolled around to consciousness. “How’d it go?” he asked with his familiar curiosity.

The guy with the cigar walked up to him and very politely said, “Excuse me, mister, but where were you during all this?”

“Where was I?” asked Kevin ingenuously.

“Yeah.”

“I was asleep, I think you’d say.”

“Asleep?”

“Yes. That’s what it feels like anyway. My own personality moves put of the way for other personalities to come through me. That’s why they call me a medium.”

BOOK: It's All In the Playing
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