| her. She was just a messy, messy girl. What I love about Kerry is that she’s unflappable. She’s not super emotional. That isn’t to say she’s not caring and wonderful, but she’s not fragile. Kerry is solid, and you know that no matter what happens, she’s going to catch you. If you miss a line or whatever, she’s there with you. Sometimes you can look at your costar and they’re like deer in headlights. Not Kerry. Sometimes my skate wouldn’t come off or whatever, and we would have to improvise. I always felt safe with her. She was easy, and she’s fun. It’s fun to be with somebody on stage who doesn’t have a lot of weird, emotional baggage. Not that I’m not—I’m very empathetic. I’m actually too empathetic. If I’m in a group of people and there’s ten people, and one person’s having a rotten day, I immediately can tell who it is. I home in on it, and I fixate. That’s actually lovely. It can be a nice thing. I’ve learned to love that about myself, but when you have a job to do, and you have a leading lady who’s emotionally fragile, you’re like, “Which version am I going to get today?” Luckily, I’ve had super solid Kerry Butler, Kate Baldwin, who’s like—talk about unflappable. She’s a broad in the body of a Rita Hayworth. She’s got it. It’s so fun to be onstage with her and that’s why I’ll continue to do this. Have |
got a good suit for the Tonys this time. A green velvet suit, green little bowtie, brown platform shoes. They called my name, and I just flipped out. I flipped out. I was so happy because this time I knew what it was all about. I jumped up and down. I kissed Stephen Schwartz, I kissed Stu Ostrow on his bald head. I ran up on the stage, so excited. I’ll never forget going into the park that night and standing in the middle of Central Park, looking at the city, I say, “You’re mine.” I don’t even know what that meant but, “You’re mine.” After that… I had been wearing Benny Hill clothes. I thought I was cool. Polyester pants, loud shirts with colored flowers on them. My manager at the time, Patti Falconer, wanted me to go to a party. I get there a little late. I am standing outside and this guy walks up, and he goes [in an exaggerated Italian accent], “You’re a star.” And of course, I had a brown, flowery, polyester shirt and brown pants, and brown and white platform shoes. He looks at me and goes, “[But] you don’t know how to dress. Look at you. Brown on brown in brown.” I was about to hit this guy, but at that time Patti walks up. She says. “Hey, Jack.” He says, “No, no, no. I’m Jacques Bellini.” She said, “No, you’re Jack Bell.” He said, “No, I’m Jacques Bellini, dresser to the stars |
