My First Hundred Years in Show Business by Mary Louise Wilson

Author:Mary Louise Wilson [WILSON, MARY LOUISE]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: BIO026000; BIO005000; BIO013000
ISBN: 9781468312249
Publisher: The Overlook Press
Published: 2015-06-23T00:00:00+00:00

THE ONE THING WE COULDN ’T FIND WAS ANY FILM OF DIANA walking. She walked like a ballet dancer, on the balls of her feet, hips thrust forward. Decades of models walked down the runway like her. Diana glided. They glided. By pure chance I mentioned to Carmine Porcelli, a fashion designer I knew, that I was working on a play about her. He not only knew her but had dined several times in her famous living room and this guy wasn’t an actor, but he perfectly imitated her mannerisms, particularly her walk. He glided beautifully.

Even so, I wanted to find film showing her walking so I could study it. Mark heard about a video the late Andy Warhol had made of her. Various people were in charge of his estate, there was some sort of museum in the works, and we got a number to call. Those times when we had to try to breach the walls of one or another snooty defender of the Vreeland cult in order to get something, information or papers we needed, I felt like an Oakie. Not dressed well enough. I didn’t have the right shoes.

The Warholians were vague and withholding on the telephone; the harder it got the more it became something I simply had to have, the most valuable bit of information we could possibly acquire. After several calls, we were finally informed we might pick up a copy of the video at the desk. The receptionist stared at us, we sidled in bowing and scraping and grabbed it.

Having scored a coup, we took ourselves to the Edison Hotel coffee shop for a celebratory breakfast. The Edison is a traditional hangout for old character actors. It was around the corner from Prelude to a Kiss, which I was in at the time and I had a matinee that day. I ordered eggs Benedict and scarfed them down. Minutes later my stomach seized up. I doubled over in an agonizing cramp. I thought I was going to pass out, so I lay down on the booth seat. I couldn’t see or hear what Mark was doing, he seemed to be sitting there like a wooden statue. I felt I was going to erupt. I asked the waitress passing by where the bathroom was, she said I had to go across the hotel lobby. I staggered from the booth to the door leading into the lobby. It was crammed with German tourists in lederhosen. I didn’t think I could make it and crawled back. Couldn’t I use the john in the restaurant? Our waitress must have seen this sort of thing often, she was completely blasé. She said this john is for the help only. By this time I was groaning like a wounded buffalo. Management called an ambulance. I was lifted onto a stretcher, and as I was carried out past the customers, I heard a guy sitting in the aisle remark to his buddy, “That’s the gal who was on One Day at a Time.

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