About to leave for the Carousel of Hope Ball with our pal, Kathy Griffin

...but here they are.

This afternoon, I drove down to Long Beach where Maria Shriver had a huge march to end Alzheimers.

Jane Lynch from 'Glee' and Leeza Gibbons, who emcee'd the march

With Jane and Peter Gallagher, event co-chair

some of the 1000s of marchers that I photographed through the fence

With my long time pal, Jake (as in Body By Jake) and the Amazing 1st lady, Maria Shriver

Elizabeth Lesser, Sally Field, me, Maria Shriver and Jane Lynch

I'm hugging Jane Lynch after we went onstage together to warming up the crowd. She made it very funny.

Sally Field with author Gail Sheehy

...and Gail with my dear friend, Carol Gilligan

drummers and dancers along the march route

What? They were going in different directions?!

Tomorrow, begins the two-day Women’s Conference, Maria Shriver’s last as first lady. The day is titled “A Day of Health, Wellness and Transformation.” I will do a speech in the evening in what’s called “The Village”, an informal setting where many 1000s of women gather to network and listen to various speakers, buy books and network. During the day I plan on attending the workshops of Sally Field and Elizabeth Lesser and, later, Carol Gilligan and Donna Karan.

I look forward to whatever the First Lady decides to do with her next chapter. She is the most effective, charming, astute, kind, thoughtful woman imaginable and, whatever she does, you can be sure she will make a difference—for all of us

Richard’s been here this week and it’s been weird getting emails from our friends and family saying the NY gossip rags say we’re getting married. Ted even emailed me to say that Martha Stewart (who was at his ranch in Montana doing an interview about bison) told him Richard and I were marrying. Let me say right here that this is not true. Okay? You heard it from the horse’s mouth. If I ever get married again (which I doubt) you’ll be the first to know (after my family). Marriage aside, we have had a good time here. Richard seems to love the ranch, the house, the river. He didn’t seem to love fly fishing all that much. IT is very hard until you really get the hang of it which requires lots of practice and it’s unlikely Richard will get lots of practice. Guess he’ll just have to like to watch me fish cause I really love it. I’ve caught some big rainbow and brown trout here…26″, 28″!!!

Yesterday I listened to 4 radio programs done several years ago for the BBC Radio about the span of Richard’s career. It was narrated by Patti Labelle. It was interesting to learn more about the enormous diversity of talents he’s worked with….having top albums and singles in every possible category from pop, to R&B, to country western etc with stars ranging from Streisand, Carly Simon, Diana Ross, Fats Domino, Rod Stewart, Ringo Starr, Harry Nilsson, Randy Travis, Ray Charles, Ella Fitzgerald, Art Garfunkel, The Temptations etc. No one, I don’t think, has ever had such success with so many different kinds of talent.

Tomorrow we go to LA where I am committed to concentrating on my writing, and seeing Troy and Simone and other friends like Sally Field, Carrie Fisher, Elliott Gould. Gotta save time for the writing, though.

See you next time.

So, I said that today I’d write about my fellow actors. I have come to really love and appreciate actors from doing this play with these seasoned performers. They’re not in it for fame or money. It’s in their blood and bones. They are totally reliable, steadfast, loving, funny and sooooo talented. I know this is one of the things that drew my Dad to theatre.

I have the great pleasure of standing next to Don Amendolia every night before the show starts. Both of us are usually in our places in the wings before places are even called. I am dressed in a sharp contemporary suit and he, as a rising music publisher in the mid-1800s, is dressed in a snappy, velvet jacket and ruffled shirt. Two different centuries side by side about to appear on stage together. It is his character, Anton Diabelli, who wrote the original waltz that inspired Beethoven to write his 33 variations. For 200 years Diabelli’s waltz was considered mediocre and my character, the musicologist Dr Katherine Brandt, is obsessed to find out and write a monograph about why Beethoven did this at the end of his life when he was going deaf and was ill and writing his most famous, important works-the Ninth Symphony and the Mass-why devote 3 years to all those variations on a mediocre waltz.

Don’s home is in New Jersey but right now, for this run, he’s here in the city. He can sing (beautifully), dance and do many styles of acting. In this play he is wonderfully over-the-top as he pantomimes his frustrations to Beethoven who is going deaf. I am often in the wings waiting for an entrance, watching the scenes and Don always makes me laugh. On top of all that, Don is also a director.

But being able to stand next to him every night before the show starts is a real pleasure-and reassuring. He’s a glass-half-full kind of guy, a perfect antidote to my tendency to fret about how the house (audience) looks, etc. He seems to almost chomp at the bit so eager is he to get out on stage. “Oh, I’m going to have such a good time tonight!” Like me, he likes to know who’s in the audience and as I can’t see as well as he can and am always complaining that I can’t find a particular friend or celebrity, he gave me some opera glasses last night and I had a ball scanning the crowd. (This totally shocked Sally who doesn’t like knowing who is out there.)

Right before the house lights go down, we look across the stage and there, regular as clockwork, silhouetted against a blueish light, is Colin Hanks, waving overhead to us. Sometimes Samantha is there to. But always Colin. And right before we go on, Don and I whisper “En bocca del Luppo” to each other: “In the mouth of the wolf.” The opera’s equilvalent to “Break a leg. We haven’t missed this little routine once in the 2 months we’ve been performing.

At the top of the second act, I make an entrance from back stage center and walk slowly down to the footlights. I’m usually in my place early and so most of the other actors cross behind me to get into their positions. First Don with an upbeat comment about how great the audience is or what a fun time he’s having. I tell you, I kvell at the sheer joy he derives from his profession. It’s contagious. Then comes Colin, squeezing behind me (it’s a narrow space) who usually whispers, “See you in Bonn,” because in the second act that’s where he has come so he can be of help to my daughter (Samantha Mathis). Colin plays a male nurse. Last, comes Susan Kellerman who plays Gertie, the keeper of Beethoven’s archives in Bonn. She gently pats my shoulder as she passes and says “Give ‘em hell” or “You go girl.” (Usually in her character’s German accent)

There are some scenes that I’m not in but that I get to watch from off-stage while I wait to make an entrance. I try to get there early so I can watch most of the scene and see the different audience responses. It’s amazing how very different they can be and how that doesn’t necessarily predict what the curtain call will be like-on their feet cheering or more subdued. There are some scenes that make me laugh so hard I’m afraid the audience can hear me.

Like when Samantha and Colin bump into each other early in the play while they’re waiting to get their computers repairs. Or the scene in the second act when Susan tells Samantha she wants to find me a male prostitute, “I think he should be a Turkish man, zey are very gut with women. Zay take zere time.”

That’s all for now. I’m going to nap with Tulea. Oh yes, turns out I lent “Man on Wire” to Don and he forgot to return it so today the kids and I watched “Himalayas”, an award winning movie that showed the terrain I will trekking through in a year and a half. I dropped the kids back off with their mother who is in a media training session at the Women’s Media Center. When we left, my apartment looked like a cyclone hit it due to the grandkid’s fondness for making forts using every pillow, bolster and blanket in the place. “Man on Wire” will have to wait till Sunday.

See you next time

Sally Field (photo: Micheal Rudd)

I want to write about my fellow actors in this play and our little rituals and such. This social life-part of theatre life takes up too much time but I know my blog friends enjoy hearing about it. Tomorrow I will do it.

Ah, tomorrow, I will spend the day with my grandchildren. I’ve been saving the documentary “Man on Wire” to watch with them. I saw it once already and adored it. I am so excited to see them. It’s been since January 4th-the infamous breakfast with James Andrews when he (and the father of my grandchildren, Matt Arnett) persuaded me to begin blogging. Seems an eternity ago. Malcolm, the older (10 years) won’t talk to me by phone. He says he doesn’t like to talk unless he can see people. He’ll change.

My niece is out of the hospital, weak but better. Alas, she must return to London Saturday so can’t see the play. She looked so beautiful last night with her lovely face against the hospital pillow. A classic beauty. I didn’t dare ask to take her picture. It didn’t feel right. I do have some principles, after all.

Don who plays Diabelli, bought me a pair of opera glasses so tonight I will really be able to scan the audience from behind the bookcases before the show starts.

Me and Larry Rinder. We became friends when he currated the Gees Bend Quilts exhibit at the Whitney. Now Larry is currator at the Berkeley Art museum. (photo: Micheal Rudd)

Laura Heery and Helen Weeks (photo: Michael Rudd)

Wolf Girls of Vassar College (photo: Michael Rudd)

T-shirt with Mugshot 1970 (photo: Michael Rudd)

See you next time.