Life Imitating “Tootsie”

Have you seen “Tootsie”? The 1982 film starring Dustin Hoffman, Jessica Lange and Geena Davis, to name a few? I have. I’ve seen it. I’ve watched it many, many times. I watched it especially frequently in early 2010, in the days before I moved to New York City to pursue my dreams of “making it” as an actor, whatever that means.

The movie spoke to me on many levels: for one, I identified very much with its main character, Michael Dorsey (played by Dustin Hoffman). Like him, I was a shorter Jewish actor trying to make it in the big city. Like him, I had always identified as an underdog. Like him, I got the reputation for being very “opinionated” which, for actors, can be a death sentence. And like him, I thought that I would do anything, go to any lengths, to prove myself worthy and land a job. Also, like him, I like to sometimes wear tighty whitey underpants.

With that Michael Dorsey spirit, I moved to New York City in the sweltering Summer of 2010. I had a small apartment in Bushwick, near the raised train tracks of the JMZ lines. I had an agent who I felt would fight for me. I had friends who would support me and whom I would support when the going got tough.

Then, the going got tough.

I wasn’t booking parts. I was getting frustrated. Self doubt was eating away at me and keeping me awake in the wee hours. After two years in New York City, the only thing I’d really worked on was “Dubstep Hamlet”. Granted, “Dubstep Hamlet” was cool. I’m not knocking “Dubstep Hamlet”. It was at Webster Hall (which is famous and old). It was Hamlet (which is one of the greats). And there was plenty of dubstep. Dry ice and dubstep. “To be or not to be,” and dubstep. “Get thee to a nunnery!” and dubstep. “The rest is silence,” followed by dubstep.

After two years of being in New York I hadn’t booked many parts. I had listened and gained an appreciation for dubstep music. I hadn’t really booked many parts. I had gotten close to booking some parts but hadn’t booked many parts and when I was sad or defeated about booking parts you could find me in my tiny apartment room in Bushwick listening to dubstep music. I had to listen on low volume. Thin walls.

Then, one day, I got a call from my agent.

“We have an audition for you for a play in Washington D.C.,” he said. “It’s Shakespeare. Two Gents. They want you to do a monologue.”

Now, to you out there, reading this, that may not sound like the biggest deal. But at the time, it seemed like a HUGE break. Why, you may ask? Because this monologue, the one they wanted me to do for the audition, this monologue was a monologue I had already worked on, had already spent hours working on, had already planted those Elizabethan words in the garden of my body and watched ’em grow, baby, grow.

And so, with that, I went to the audition. Light in my loafers, you could say. With the wind at my back, you could possibly remark. I sure was feeling “the old confidence”, as the expression goes. When my time came in the room of the casting office somewhere off 8th avenue in Midtown to speak my piece, I spoke it with aplomb. The words of that monologue flew from my lips. They shot out of my body. It felt electric to do. It was the kind of feeling that makes acting, for all of its frustrations and struggles, well worth the while.

After I was finished, the director of the play shot up from behind the desk, came over to me and gave me a huge hug, practically sweeping me and my light loafers off the carpeted floor. “That was brilliant!” he exclaimed. “Just brilliant! We’ll see you tomorrow at callbacks.”

I slept lightly but peacefully that night, my arteries and veins pulsing with joyous anticipation. I would have to perform that monologue again and then the part was mine, I thought to myself. Self doubt- vanished. Validation- secured.

The following day, in a different office in front of more people, I performed the monologue once again. Once again, it felt electric. Once again, the director sprang from his chair (this time with a little less spontaneous convulsion).

“Great, great, great” he said, very aware of who else was in the room, more measured in his being watched. “Now, here’s a scene to do from the beginning of the play. Go in the other room, look at it, and perform it for us in about ten minutes, ok?”

Here was my thought process in that moment:

“Sh*t. Sh*t. F*ck. Sh*t f*ck sh*t f*ck what the f*ck they want me to do a f*cking cold reading of SHAKESPEARE and have it for them in ten minutes? G-d damn it! G-d damn it! G-d damn it! I hadn’t practiced this. I hadn’t any preparation. Who did they think I was, some Anglo-phile Elizabethan wizard? That I could just cook up some magic for them, willy nilly?”

Some of you out there might be able to cold read Shakespeare very well. If you can do that, more power to you. For me, it is very hard. The language takes work and it certainly doesn’t come naturally. Like a tough and grisly bit of British beef, I have to chew it up for a little while before I’m able to swallow it.

I did the best I could that day, and the best I could was mediocre. I left the studio on 8th avenue feeling deflated. Like a ballplayer robbed of a home run. Like a bridesmaid and not a bride. Sort of like Dustin Hoffman. Sort like in that movie, “Tootsie”.

A couple weeks passed and I’d heard nothing from my agent. I had gone back to working my “day job” dressing up as a sailor passing out brochures in Times Square for the musical, “La Cage Aux Folles.”

Then, the phone rang.

“Hey there, David,” my agent said. “Good news. About D.C. Two Gents. They didn’t cast the role yet and they want to bring you back in tomorrow. I’ll send you the info.”

“New life!” I thought, as I pressed the red “call end” button on my Blackberry. “Redemption! Another chance! Hope not lost! Hope not lost! Tell the world that hope is not lost!” In my mind I was dancing through the streets. Maybe I was dancing through the streets. I changed out of my sailor suit and rushed home to look at the script.

A few hours later, the phone rang. Again.

“Hey there, David, um, so, some, um, not so good news. Sorry. Turns out they don’t want to see anyone they’ve seen before for the part. The, uh, the D.C. part, so, uh, sorry about that. It’s a no go for tomorrow.”

I pressed the red “call end” button on my Blackberry brick phone, my body seething with sorrow, rage and disappointment. Those feelings turned to indignation and then from standard indignation to the righteous flavor of indignation. That righteous indignation fueled grandiose visions in my head and soon enough, like Michael Dorsey in the movie “Tootsie”, I was convinced that this was the time to take a risk. I would not be denied.

I would go anyways, to that studio on 8th avenue, and I would demand to be seen.

I slept not much that night, in my little room in Bushwick- body pulsing, grandiose visions playing feverishly out in my mind.

As I sat in the waiting room the next day in the call back, I felt my body to be very awake. I was nervous, I guess, and and I remember my behind rocking back and forth on the blue plastic of the chair. After some people were called in by the monitor and I was left sitting there, I saw her check her list, then look at me, then check her list again.

“Um, excuse me?” she finally said. “Can I help you?”

“Yes,” I said. “My name is David Jacobs and I’d like to be seen for the role today.”

She looked at the list again.

“I don’t see a David Jacobs on this list. Are you sure you’re in the right spot?”

“Yes, I’m sure,” I said. “I was seen for the part a few weeks ago and I’d like to be seen again-”

“Well, we’re not seeing anyone we saw a few weeks ago-”

“I know you aren’t, I know. But I would like to be seen again. Could you please just ask the casting director? Could you tell the casting director that I’m outside and I’d like to be seen again-”

“I’ll see what I can do.”

She disappeared into the main room. I sat there, rocking back and forth on the blue plastic seat, headshot and resume clutched in sweaty palm.

She returned.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “We can’t see you. We can’t see anyone we’ve seen before.”

“Just two minutes-” I whimpered.

“We can’t see anyone we’ve seen before. Thank you.”

In my grandiose visions, the ones that rock and roll me in the night, I stay there and take a final stand. I make a speech that is so persuasive and moving that somehow the rules change for me. I summon up bravery and courage in myself and others and get what I came for. In reality, I got up from the blue plastic chair and walked out of the waiting area, out the door and back onto 8th avenue. If this were a movie, it might be the part in which a pigeon makes a dropping on my shoulder. In reality, I went to Penn Station and took the subway home.

The spirit of Michael Dorsey has not left me and I hope, if you are blessed and cursed to have that spirit in you, too, that it never leaves you, either. Years have passed since the events described above. I have not stopped acting and I have not stopped making art since that time. I will never stop. Never, ever. And instead of weeping over the rejections and setbacks I have tried to celebrate them while letting them humble and educate me. There is a certain victory in that, too. And I have made more art because of them and felt more joy and pain because of them and because I have felt joy and pain I have better stories to tell.

Like this one. Right now. For you.