I Blame Dennis Hopper (10 page)

From
Easy Rider
to easy living! An Oscar winner's version of food stamps.

“Always ride a unicycle. Because it's hard, and not everyone can do it.”

That's what Peter Sellers had said to me on the set of
Being There
. What did it mean? Or have I always known what it meant but was afraid to face it?

I have always looked for signs in my career. When you have no money, you live on dreams and magic signs that foretell where you're going, signs that promise you something to eat when you get there. When those dreams and magical signs actually come true, it keeps you going through the rough spots. Here's a prime example.

The first movie I remember seeing with my Italian grandmother (my mom's mom) was
Paint Your Wagon
. My grandmother was not in show business, but she should have been. The closest Annie got was being a stand-in for the silent film star Theda Bara at Astoria Studios in Queens, New York City, which is where she grew up, one of ten children whose parents had come to America through Ellis Island. My grandmother and I shared a passion for going to the movies, something that began that magical night she took me to her favorite movie palace, Radio City. She had been a tap dancer, and her dream was to become one of the Radio City Rockettes—a dream cut short when she got pregnant at sixteen and got married. Annie was a pistol. She would say things such as “Fix your hair, so we can get free beer” or “Your father isn't so bad. He has his good faults.” All of my comedic timing comes from her. The infamous reference to Miami I made to Lorraine Bracco in the movie
Goodfellas
—“It's like I died and woke up in Jew Heaven”—was her line, a reference to her brief stay in a retirement village in Florida. Annie visited me on many sets, asking Jennifer Aniston on
Picture Perfect
, “Are you the hair-and-makeup girl?” She danced until 3
A.M
. at the after-party for the premier of
Stir of Echoes
, and made many lasagnas for Martin Scorsese. She even fulfilled her dream of being on TV with Regis Philbin when she appeared on
Live! with Regis and Kathie Lee
. “Now I can die,” she said. Luckily for me, she lived for many more years after that.

All that I remember about seeing
Paint Your Wagon
with my grandmother is Lee Marvin's face, fifty feet high, singing “Wand'rin' Star.” Still, in that moment, I fell instantly and hopelessly in love. I could actually feel my heart ache when Jean Seberg chose Clint Eastwood over him. It was the first time that I remember feeling an emotion, and that emotion was love. Now, maybe a psychiatrist could explain why I chose Lee Marvin as the object of my desire, and not young and handsome Clint Eastwood. But those first movie images of Lee Marvin became implanted in my brain and were interwoven with romantic notions I carried for years to come.

We had a four o'clock movie on TV in those days, and it seemed to play
Cat Ballou
or
The Dirty Dozen
in constant rotation just for me. I would sit in front of the TV and imagine kissing my precious Lee Marvin.
The Dirty Dozen
is a war movie, but I've seen it so many times I could be called upon to be an expert on the film—from a purely romantic point of view.
The Big Red One
, directed by Sam Fuller, was another film that starred Lee Marvin, which I made my grandmother take me to again and again. Years later, I met Sam Fuller, and he was so impressed that I could speak so eloquently about the effect this WWII film had on me. (Secret weapon, Sam: it starred Lee Marvin.)

Cut to early one morning in New York, in 1982. I was walking up Madison Avenue on my way to acting school. When my grandfather was alive, he had hoped that I would be living with him and going to Juilliard. Yeah, me too. But he passed away in 1981. I certainly didn't have the funds to go to Juilliard, but I desperately wanted to move to New York, so I regrouped and found an affordable acting school I could attend. I will kindly just say that this acting school … was no Juilliard. But it did take me to New York City, give me lifelong friends and memories, and, thankfully, it eventually led me to another acting school.

It was the end of a school year that had been memorable for all the wrong reasons. I was—contrary to my own opinion of myself—not considered to have much of a future as a thespian. This made no sense to me, since back in Connecticut, post–Hartford Stage Youth Theatre, I had been getting paid to act in various amateur productions, in the chorus of such classics as
Gypsy.
And, well,
Gypsy
! (It was a popular show at the time in amateur theater.) I had also worked at the Camelot Dinner Theatre personally assisting Rudy Vallée! Still, the teachers at my acting school were not impressed.

One teacher said to me, “Some people
are
sexy, but it's like you're Lucille Ball trying to
be
sexy.”

I actually landed in a “remedial” acting class taught by the tough headmistress of the school. When I first auditioned for the school, after hearing my monologue, she had said, “And … have you thought about what you will do if you
don't
make it into the school?” In remedial class, we were supposed to go around the room and validate
why
we thought we had ended up there. I thought it was meant to break our spirits, so when she got to me I said indignantly, “I have no idea why I'm here!” She insisted that I had a bad attitude toward learning The Method, which was Lee Strasberg's Actors Studio technique. It emphasized sense memory and place more than meaning of the text. She went on to mock a scene I had done as Lady Macbeth, saying, “Illeana, after you walked through the imaginary wall of your castle, I didn't believe a word you said.”

The Method seemed contrary to everything I had learned working at the Camelot. There was never any time at the Camelot to think, Why are you doing
Godspell
? You were there to entertain an audience who had paid $19.95 for dinner and a show! In my opinion, I had learned more per week watching bus-and-truck tours break down and put up a show at the Camelot than I ever would by practicing The Method. I learned more about acting watching Rudy Vallée perform in his eighties, sweat dripping down his face for a crowd of strangers and still getting solid laughs with pretty creaky material. When he sang “For I'm just a vagabond lover / In search of a sweetheart it seems / And I know that someday I'll discover her /The girl of my vagabond dreams,” he had that audience in the palm of his hand. Nothing in my memory was as solitary and beautiful as that. It was the essence of everything I wanted to be able to do. Still want to do. In a word: pathos. But that was long ago and not much help when dealing with imaginary walls or pantomimed steaming-hot coffee cups.

But back to that morning in 1982. After a rocky year, I was going to be performing what they called “final scenes” for the faculty. Their reaction would determine whether or not I would be “asked back” for another year. I was pretty nervous, and I asked the universe for some sign that I would have a chance.

I was walking up Madison Avenue toward my destiny when suddenly, I couldn't believe my eyes. There, taking a morning stroll, without a single person aware of who he was, was my lanky, silver-haired movie star from
Paint Your Wagon
. There was my childhood sweetheart. My first love. There was Lee Marvin! This wasn't a sign; it was a billboard!

I know what you're thinking. Poor Lee Marvin. Minding his own business, in town to promote his film
Death Hunt,
taking a nice little early morning walk, probably hungover, and now all of my hopes and dreams rested on his shoulders. Broad shoulders. (Sigh.) I could barely breathe as I stepped into his path. “Mr. Marvin,” I said. “I'm sorry to interrupt you…”

The next part came out in an emotional jumble, but the odds of ever seeing Lee Marvin again were scarce, so I wanted to get everything in. “You were in the first movie I ever saw with my grandmother,
Paint Your Wagon
at Radio City Music Hall…” Then I went on to list his credits—you know, in case he forgot—all the movies I had seen him in, the number of times I'd seen him in them, how much they had meant to me.
The Dirty Dozen
,
The Big Red One
,
Pocket Money,
which I had seen on TV
. Pocket Money
was a very obscure reference; was he possibly impressed?

In the same breath, I continued, “And I'm an actor, and I'm on my way to do my final scene, and I asked the universe for a sign, and here you are, and it's meant to be, and I am going to be an actress, and is there any advice…” I was about to keep going when Lee Marvin—bless his heart—gently held up his hand to stop me. He smiled his wry Lee Marvin smile, and in that velvety, gravelly voice, he said, “Young lady, if you have half as much energy on the stage as you do off—you ought to do very well.”

Then he asked me my name. Lee Marvin had come off the movie screen and appeared to me, and he was now asking me my name. “Illeana,” I said.

He leaned down and kissed me on the cheek. “Good luck, Illeana.” All those years I had practiced kissing him into my pillow, and now he was finally kissing me back.

And then he continued walking. I watched his back disappear up Madison Avenue. No one recognized him. No one turned to look. Just me. I touched my cheek. You know how people say “I will never wash that cheek again?” That's how it felt. Lee Marvin had kissed my cheek, and I was sure he had passed his movie magic onto me. Some of that magic faded when half of my classmates reacted by saying “So what, who cares” or “Who's Lee Marvin?” But I was on cloud nine. I did my final scenes assured that Lee Marvin's “Good Luck, Illeana” was not only a sign; it was an omen. I was bouncing off the walls. Final scenes indeed! I was a shoe-in to be asked back.

After the performance the headmistress came up to me and shook my hand. Clearly she was impressed, I thought. Her opinion of me had changed. I waited for her compliments. “Goodbye, Illeana,” she said. What? That didn't sound good. Where was Lee Marvin when I needed him? He could have punched her out. Or at least explained to her about my marvelous offstage energy! Two weeks later I got a letter informing me I was not being “asked back.”

Where is the sign? Is that what you're asking? Well … I was pretty angry about not being asked back. I was convinced that they were wrong, and that Lee Marvin and I were right. So, I decided to prove it. I applied to another acting school called The Neighborhood Playhouse. It was there that I found the teachers—Sanford Meisner, Richard Pinter, and Phil Gushie—who were right for me. At the end of that first year, I was once again required to do my “final” scenes. There was no Lee Marvin in sight this time. But right before I went onstage, my teacher Richard Pinter said he wanted to talk to me. “Remember everything you used to do before you got here? Everything you learned doing musical and dinner theater?” he asked. “Do it now.” I smiled. I knew exactly what he meant. I was a serious actor now, and I hadn't thought about the Camelot Dinner Theatre or musicals in a while—and even though I hadn't actually ever been on its stage, when Richard Pinter told me to remember the Camelot, I knew that he understood me. That was the sign I needed.

But back to Peter Sellers and riding unicycles—and how that became another influential sign in my life. I had just about forgotten his words of wisdom, when, twenty-five years later, Peter Sellers himself reminded me of our exchange. But I'll get to that.

My grandfather invited me to watch him at work—on the set of
Being There
. It was the first time I had seen my grandfather on the set of a movie. I knew he was important. I knew he made movies. But most of the time he was just Grandpa, and I was his only granddaughter. He had been amused when I told him “I'm going to be an actress. Like Ruby Keeler.” She was the adorable tap-dancing star of many Busby Berkeley musicals. I was almost fourteen now and wanted to be a real actress, not just Ruby Keeler, so inviting me to the set of
Being There
was his way of acknowledging that he knew I wanted to follow in his footsteps. We shared a special bond, and the bond was simple. He took an interest in me when no one else did. I think he knew it, and for that I will be forever grateful.
Being There
permanently shifted my view of movies from outsider to insider. Before, I had been on the outside looking
in
at a movie. Now I was going behind the curtain, inside the movie looking
out
. I would never be the same.

When I was growing up, my grandparents' rambling apartment, at 77th Street and Riverside Drive in New York City, with its servants and maids, was a stark contrast to life at The Studio with its goats and hippies. The guest room had a double bed and a view of Frank Sinatra's yacht on the Hudson River. There was also a friendly doorman to hail you a cab or help you with your groceries. Your fingers never even came close to a door of any kind. It was always opened for you. We dressed for dinner. My grandfather would ring a bell and food would be served. Ring another bell and it would be taken away. I couldn't believe people lived this way … and that I didn't!

Staying with my grandfather, I learned the concept of ordering food for delivery. I would watch in amazement as he would call a place named Zabar's—which sounded magical—and tell them what he wanted: eggs, bread, coffee, etc., and then a man would deliver it! Sometimes my grandfather would give me a piece of paper with just his signature on it, and I would walk around the corner to Zabar's, show someone there the piece of paper, and a nice man would help me get whatever I'd asked for.

“What else for you?”

“Um … Häagen-Dazs?”

“What else?”

I loved this guy! He'd pinch my cheek, and there would be no bill. They'd just put it on the account: Melvyn Douglas. When I was a starving actress I would wander into Zabar's for a bagel and a coffee, and let me tell you, I did not get the same treatment. I remember overhearing my grandfather on the phone after one of my shopping trips, ordering from Zabar's.