Kellerman - Read my lips: stories of a Hollywood life

Read My Lips

Read My Lips

Stories of a Hollywood Life

SALLY KELLERMAN

Copyright 2013 by Sally Kellerman

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of the Publisher. For information address Weinstein Books, 250 West 57th Street, 15th Floor, New York, NY 10107.

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Book Design by Lisa Diercks.

Cataloging-in-Publication data for this book is available from the Library of Congress.

ISBN: 978-1-6028-6201-2

Published by Weinstein Books

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First edition

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To my fascinating, uber-mensch of a husband and my precious children, who lovingly dragged me kicking and screaming into adulthood. I love you all madly.

TO MY READERS...

This is my memoir. In my case, that means anything I can remember.

It is a collection of experiences that made me laugh or crystories of people Ive loved, of lessons Ive learned and have yet to learn. There is some X-rated language and the odd X-rated visual description.

My moma darling, five-foot-two Arkansan, New Orleans, piano-playing, warm, a-tad-judgmental, spiritual, generous, thoughtful, kind momwanted a lady. My dada funny, handsome, sentimental, good man who said what was on his mind, was a tad controlling, and worried about how Id turn outwanted a lady too.

Instead they got an actress, a singer, an entertainer.

Please dont be like Carole Lombard, my mom said to me when I was little. She once overheard Lombard say shit in Bullocks Department Store. And please dont be like Aunt Moatsie. She wore slippers to the market...

I wasnt enough like Carole Lombard when I tested for her life story, but I did wear slippers to the market.

IT WAS HALLOWEEN. I CAME ONSTAGE WITH MY BACK TO THE audience, dressed in black from head to toe. I had some of my favorite guys backing me that night: Lyman Medeiros on bass, my wonderful musical director Ed Martel on keyboards, and Dick Weller on drums. The band was playing spooky music from Phantom of the Opera, and the lighting was eerie green. The room, Im so happy to say, was packed.

These days Vitellos is my club of choice when Im in town, somewhere to develop my show, try out new material, and keep on singing. Over the years Ive worked many different clubs in LA, my hometown, where Ive had all my successes and made all my mistakes.

Vitellos is a little Italian spot on Tujunga Avenue in Studio City, an upscale Mediterranean restaurant serving the kind of food that I could eat every nightand do. Spaghetti marinara, thin-crust pizza, delicious saladsyou get the ideaserved on white tablecloths, with lit candles, by waiters so good you dont know theyre there. The club has about a hundred seats, and guests can eat a little dinner, sip a little wine, and enjoy music from all kinds of top-notch performers, like the great arranger-songwriter Johnny Mandel who wrote The Shadow of Your Smile.

Since it was Halloween, I opened with an eerie version of I Put a Spell on You, then moved on to songs like Spooky and Love Potion Number Nine. At one point in the show, I went into the audience, as I always do (I love to see all the faces and sing to them up close), greeting every table. That night I passed out candy wrapped as eyeballs. Ive got a crush on you... Id croon. Would you care for an eyeball? I talked a little, joked with the band, and sang a lot. It was an especially silly night, but for me, singing is freedom. I was in heaven. Before I knew it, it was time to take a bow, hug some friends, and pack up to go home.

Don Heckman, a well-known music journalist who now heads up the International Review of Music, came to see me perform. He loved the show and reviewed it the next day. Even when shes not doing a mini-Halloween celebration, he wrote, Sallys performances are all utterly mesmerizing, overflowing with humor, atmosphere, and musicality.... At her best, and in a crowded female vocal field, she is one of the rare true originals.

It feels good to get such encouragement from a critic I respect, especially for doing something I love as much as performing live.

Yes, I was one of those kids who wanted to perform from the very first moment I could stand on two legs, find my lungs, and hold a makeshift prop. Sure, Im better known to audiences as an actress than as a singer. However, for me, theres never been a separation between singing and acting. Singing is acting; its telling a story through music. Acting may have been my chief role for a long while, but singing has always been its understudy; now its taking the lead. Over my more than fifty years as a performer, Ive done a lot, seen a lot, screwed up a lot up and gotten some things right. And Ive done it all here, where I call home: Los Angeles.

I love Los Angeles. It may be a huge metropolis but it is still my little town, the one Ive known all my life, for better or worse, through richer and poorer, through blue skies and smog. I have always lived within a twenty-file-mile radius of where I was born and raised, so I feel like a real small town girl in many ways. Today, LA is sprawling and still growing. Theres so much traffic that I can take a nap between signals.

Down the hill to the south from my home in the Hollywood Hills is the entertainment capital of the world. Ive watched West Hollywood grow from a little burg to an incorporated city. Ive seen wide open spaces get gobbled up, from the Hollywood Hills and the Valley to Studio City and Santa Monica, with builders scrambling to make their creations safer from inevitable earthquakes.

But to me Hollywood is still the place where Santa Monica Boulevard had one shoe repair joint, Coombs Hardware store, and a five and dime. Its where I stood in front of Schwabs Pharmacy on Sunset Boulevardthe main drag of much of my lifetalking to my friends about acting or boys. Its where I got malts on Hollywood Boulevard; and at night, left the door to my apartment unlocked. Open. Free.

We have grown and changed a lot over the years, my town and me. If Hollywood is about anything, its about reinvention and survival. Hollywood has taught me plenty about both, whether I wanted to learn those lessons or not.

I have always known I would never live anywhere else, no matter what my life held in store. After all: Every great Hollywood story needs a strong third act. Im working on mine.