ROBERT DOWNEY JR.

"Sherlock Holmes"-- it's a big movie and tomorrow, when it opens, is a big day for Downey.

I've been looking at clips, wondering what I can say that will add to what's been said and what you probably know.

Downey-the-actor's career has been on a steady rise upward. Downey-the-man has had much publicized ups and downs.

We were living in Malibu during his "down," when he was required to be at a hearing, held before a judge in the Malibu courthouse.

It's next to the entrance to the library, so picking up books, I saw the crowd waiting to get a glimpse of Downey -- found it interesting -- we'd seen some very famous actors in the parking lot at Hughes Market, at the post office, Malibu Hardware, various restaurants, even occasionally at Starbucks.

Malibu-ites don't stop and stare, or zoom in for autographs. It seems to be an un-spoken, un-written rule. (JC at that time was a recognizable "name"-- on TV every week in "Northern Exposure." The clerks in the grocery, post office, drugstore, without asking, addressed him as Mr. Cullum.)

The crowd waiting for Downey wasn't just tourists -- it was Malibu-ites, (people I knew), as well as fans from Santa Monica, Pasadena, and Hollywood. All the parking lots were jammed.

I bought into Robert Downey Jr., the very first time I saw him. The movie was "Less than Zero," and he made it touching, involving.

The "downs" in this actor's life don't interest me as much as the ups.

I loved him and Mel Gibson in "Air America," was amazed by him as "Charlie Chaplin." I watched the Ally McBeal television series when he joined the cast. I missed the movie, but read the raves for him, in the hit movie, "Iron Man," and thoroughly enjoyed Downey in Ben Stiller's "Tropic Thunder."

Robert Downey has been a working actor since 1970 (when he was 15). He's been in 60 films.

He's not pretty, and he's not handsome. He's short -- five-foot-seven or so, depending upon what lifts he's wearing in his shoes, and weighs -- up and down -- about 155. (I'm guessing, based on my experienced eye -- I can't find any specifics anywhere, about his actual weight.)

So, what is it that makes him such an employable actor?

Well ... he's a character actor, but also a "leading man" type. Five-foot-seven is short for a leading man -- but in quite a few movies, as the leading man -- he was charming, sexy, tender, strong, very masculine, lovable.

Downey has the ability to enter the character he plays, become that person without adding or inventing external characteristics. It's a special talent, different from those actors who change, when they don the character's clothes.

Is it method acting? Sure, but Downey's method isn't the set of emotional exercises that the method actor uses, practices, and does during rehearsal.

There is in Downey an openness, an ability to be someone else. In each film he's different, and yet, he's himself. But the timbre of his voice changes -- the look in and around his eyes, his mouth, the way he carries himself, and his moments of thoughtful repose -- change.

To my eye he's a natural. It's easy for him to become someone else. And he doesn't watch himself in a mirror, or listen to the sound of his voice (like some actors do) -- he's just IT, that other person.

In the trailers, and clips for "Sherlock Holmes," he's older, wiser, and seems like a detective.

In a recent interview, (the link follows this paragraph) he still seems to be studying the interviewer, searching for clues. Though he responds to the interviewer, he's Holmes/Downey.

Take a look. It's not a very good interview, but it's interesting to see Downey awkwardly trying to be himself.

Here's an interview from last year. Again, Downey's trying to be himself, sort of laughing at himself. (I think he understands the characters that he plays more than he understands himself -- only when he's performing, do I feel him relax, and be Robert D.) Have a look.

The "Sherlock Holmes" clips and the trailers I've seen don't draw me to the theater to buy a ticket. The preview scenes and the music fit with the "create suspense" elements of the box office hit films today -- the trailers suggest that the film is chock- full of spooky, scary, possibly shocking, terrifying happenings.

Hmm ... When I see it, I'm sure I'll enjoy Downey's work -- not sure that the story, the case that Sherlock Holmes is solving, will get me involved in the case, beyond just watching an very gifted actor.

Even if Robert Downey Jr. is not nominated for an Oscar for this film, sooner or later he'll be nominated again, (he's already been nominated twice), and very likely he'll win -- there's no one quite like him in Hollywood.

MEDITATION

What is the most powerful, moving, moment I EVER saw, and hold tight to my heart, and brain?

JC in "Shenandoah," singing "Meditation.

Where does it come from, the beam that comes from him? The gestures he did ...

Actually they were my staging based on knowing him, his hands, his grace, and our communication -- if I say "do this," he tries it and does it -- if he says "do this, Em" I think NO (I don't like to be told what to do), but I try, and usually end up doing it.)

Anyway, it wasn't his gestures, it was him, his stance, his singing and playing of the role. Critics praised him, and he won a Tony for playing Charlie Anderson in "Shenandoah."

So why am I, his wife, heaping these compliments, praises onto him? Because we were tidying our offices, arranging the CD's in alphabetical order on a new shelf. Because playing the "Meditation," the whole song, or just the ending of it brings me joy!

In "Shenandoah," playing the part of the southern farmer with a large family, a wife, and land that he loved, JC was magnificent. The man he actually is, became Charlie Anderson, and Charlie Anderson was John Cullum.

At this moment, he's across the hall ... that voice, that amazing man who doesn't think of himself as a singer ... I'm enthralled like a brand new fan when he sings ... There he is, puttering, dusting things in his office twenty feet away from me -- plumber, electrician, food shopper, handyman who just a while ago repaired the barre in my studio -- gee, how did I manage to land this guy?

Instead of playing "Shenandoah" again, here's a bit of him in his first starring role on Broadway, Lerner and Lowe's hit musical, singing the title song "On a Clear Day."

SITCOMS ARE BLOOMING

The previews for fall shows ... the new television series ... it's hard for me to look at them without putting on my casting agent's hat and --

Gritting my teeth ...
Disapproving ...
Making a "Ick" face, snarling "Ick" at the screen.

ICK for the wilder, more violent than ever murder-death-disasters on which the preview scene is usually based ... It's as if some half-grown, boy-kid producer put together the "SELL," splicing in every horrible scene he ever saw -- decapitations, beatings, bestial behavior, buzz saw mutilations, creating a wow- after-wow, sixty seconds that I vow NEVER TO SEE.

Of course the exciting preview includes "SELL" shots of the cast -- the usual interchangeable batch of great-looking unmemorable guys and girls who resemble last year's stars, and at least one black, who resembles Denzel W.or Halle B.

Hey, I don't mind if the leads are beautiful, or look like relatives of Whoopie/Lativah or Liz/Marilyn or Hannah Montana. It's the acting that gets me. (With two great-looking, super actors in my family, I've got well-honed critical abilities -- a highly-trained eye and a super- sensitive ear.)

The newbies all have the TV acting style: punctuated, telegraphic delivery of lines that sets the mood, cues us dummies in the audience on how to react. Most easily recognized is the pause before the laugh, pause that sets up and braces you for whatever happens next -- a double-take or a burp, a laugh or the wham-bam shock, and the gasp of fear. Like a ticker tape, you know what to feel -- what the actor feels is always announced a second before it happens.

Ick! Yuck! Blauuugh!

Casting agents send JC scripts for the new pilots -- mostly roles these days, for dying, fat grandfathers with Alzheimer's. JD, a leading man type, suffers at auditions for the leading man roles. Gets call-backs, but not the role -- JD doesn't do the TV acting style, except as a joke when his parents ask him how he's doing. He's "not quite the type," which means JD doesn't remind the producers of the type they kind-of -sort- of-maybe-had in mind, based on shows that got the highest Nielsen ratings last season.

Good wife says "yay" when JC says "no" to a bad role. Good Mom applauds JD in the Shakespeare leading roles he's been doing.

The new shows ... well, I tune 'em in hopefully, complain about the actors, mentally re-write plots, expurgating the crudities and violence. Moaning about the endless ads, I change the channel -- quite often find myself watching two shows at the same time.

Got to admit it-- good wife, good mom Em usually ends up watching an old movie.

NAME DROPPING "LENNIE"

Celebrities, famous people, are always surprising when you are face-to-face with them. It's the larger-than-life image on the screen, the visions of him or her on television, the articles about them in newspapers, and the books about them that make the name/the face historical -- unreal.

I arranged a meeting with Leonard Bernstein. (Practiced pronouncing the last syllable of his last name STINE, not STEEN -- even now I hesitate -- which is it, which was it?)

The second time I was employed by Green Mansions, (resort in the Adirondacks where I had my first job -- see my post "Hoard the Vanished Brand" June 6), I'd created some of the staging for Bernstein's chamber operetta, "Trouble in Tahiti."

Mark Ryder and I were the dance team in residence. I'd worked with the leading lady on her big song --"There is a garden ..." It was a fascinating aria -- confusing libretto, but I loved the music.

The Frankel-Ryder Duo (or Ryder-Frankel Duo -- we were already arguing about top-billing), had just been discovered by the IN culture groups in New York. So it wasn't difficult to get one of our new friends to set up a meeting.

Leonard Bernstein was lying down on a couch, when we came into his study. "Hi" he said.

Shock! When he stood up he was gorgeous -- even handsomer than he looked in the pictures -- bare feet, green striped pajamas -- but gee -- very short.

I was 5.4 in those days. (See my post "Black Coat Lament," May 25, about the inch I lost.) Mark was 6 feet. A Google reference says Bernstein was 5.8 -- mm -- my eye is sharp -- I think he was shorter.

Years later, when Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor were the media King and Queen, Lennie often came backstage for "Hamlet." Richard and JC rehearsed their onstage duel before every performance. Duels, even with blunted swords, are dangerous. Hume Cronyn and I were in the corner watching, Liz was at the mirror, powdering, checking herself.

Into the dressing-room strides Lennie. Richard freezes. JC moving in for a thrust freezes. Richard calls, "Leeeniee!" Lennie cried "Diiickee!" (Dear friends rarely called Burton "Dickie.") They hugged.

I strangled the laugh that welled up in me with a quick coughing fit. Lennie, Dickie kissed -- it was an extravagant, marvelously strange, huggy-kissy kiss on the lips. (Hey, in show biz, kissing on the lips, even passionately, doesn't mean what it means in the ordinary normal real world. )

Lennie dropped in quite a few times. Sometimes before the show -- always with Leeeniee! Diiickee! I got used to it. ( JC and Richard didn't kiss but they often hugged and danced around.) After the show, we'd go someplace for drinks with the various celebrities. (Holy cow, says that part of me who acts like it's nothing -- night after night, everybody who was anybody showed up!)

Liz was in her yellow flowers in her hair phase. I don't remember her outfit, just the black curly hair, the flower, and that marvelous, uniquely beautiful, perfect face -- lavender eyes with that thick fringe of perfectly mascared lashes.

Okay, back to the Frankel-Ryder story -- Lennie gave us permission to work on a "Trouble in Tahiti" ballet. Alas, it didn't happen. Maybe as novice choreographers we just couldn't figure it out. The construction of the music was based on a libretto that didn't lend itself to a choreographic version of the plot as a duet.

My partner and I went on to other things. My "Haunted Moments" ballet to sound effects caught the attention of composer Walter Piston, at Julliard -- there was a flurry of almost-but-not- quite collaborations.

I never did manage to put my meeting with Lennie in a novel, though Cordelia cancels her interview with him in "Somebody" Book I, chapter 27, Installment 4. p. 475, "Mrs. Wife."

Anyhow, DVD's of Lennie's passionate conducting -- the cajoling, powerfully evocative way he demonstrated the emotion he wanted his orchestra to convey -- Bernstein's recordings of Mahler and Beethoven, are unforgettable.

Years later, after Bernstein's wife was gone, we heard the rumors about his sexuality. It was a time when everyone wondered about what everyone else did or didn't do. Most of the celebrities we palled around with, were talking about "playing it both ways."

A young conductor with whom we were creating a musical told us about his meeting with Lennie. "Sad lonely, guy no family around -- the poor guy made a pass..." The casual, cruel picture our young friend painted made me want to weep -- the handsome, gloriously passionate Bernstein exciting a 90 piece orchestra, begging a young man to stay the night ...

Yes, as we ourselves were growing up and growing older, we've heard and seen other sad stories -- inside, behind the scenes, some very private stories that maybe I'll share in some other posts.

The other night we watched the movie "West Side Story." Knowing all the creators, the original cast, seeing the stunning film Robert Wise made ... (He came here, took measurements of my studio, photos of the bars. the floor, the mirrors, close-ups of yellow-pad of dance notes that hangs on the cork board -- used my studio in his "Two for the See Saw" film ...) Enough with the name dropping -- what stays with us, even with all the personal, irreverent, hodgepodge of memories, is the music for "West Side Story" -- the towering talent of Leonard Bernstein the composer.

INDEPENDENCE DAY YAY

Watching a television program on Jimmy Hendrix, waiting for him to smash his guitar, we switched to New York City's fireworks.

We're in walking distance from the Hudson River. The explosions made it seem as if our home was surrounded by the enemy attacking in the area. Bombs rattling the windows in New York ... that is a terror to which you cannot reconcile yourself.

We switched to a view of the explosions, immediately aware of more colors, more glittering, cascading flowers, in the sky. The orchestra was playing loud lyrical music when we tuned in, tunes that didn't seem to fit the fireworks, though we knew that the explosions were computerized.

Back to Hendrix, playing left-handed with his instrument behind him, over his head, under a leg, guitar upside down, or flipped over on the floor -- one hand plucking, teeth plucking. His pounding, louder and louder climatic, full-out sounds got us contagiously nodding, toe tapping and thinking "this is sort of tiresome." As were the fireworks --impressing us, not thrilling us.

I found myself thinking Macy's spent too much money on this. And Hendrix madly inventing new, crazy, wild positions for plucking away, singing while chewing gum, seemed to be wowing us, not with his music, but with his tour de force technique ...

The orchestra went into its final medley of "America the Beautiful," "Stars and Stripes," "Glory Hallelujah," with views of amazed youngsters, views of blandly pleased adults. With me thinking, "Enough already," glad it was going to be over in a minute, clicking back to Hendrix out of control, burning, bashing, and destroying his guitar.

We watched the Chuck Berry segment that came next, restlessly waiting, and peeved -- we wanted to hear him play his guitar and perform, and all we heard was experts and Chuck himself explaining his importance to Rock & Roll. Finally, a minute before the show ended, we saw a film clip -- Chuck playing four bars of his "Maybelline" hit song, and three seconds of his duck walk.

It brought us back to news, about the moon-walking Jackson's funeral. Over and over the tale is being told, making much of the sadness talk dreary and unreal.

Spur of the moment we tuned in "1776"' to see JC playing the South Carolina senator, and our personal friends -- Bill Daniels (Adams), Virginia Vestoff ( his wife), Howard DaSilva, Ken Howard , Billy Duell -- the list goes on -- we haven't seen the film and these friends in a very long time. JC was in the Broadway show "1776" when my back was broken in a car crash. Members of the cast chipped in, and bought us four flights of a gliding stairway, so that I could get physical therapy at the hospital.

The movie -- that's a trip -- to see the young spectacularly masculine, sexy, commanding Senator, hear John Cullum singing "Molasses to Rum."

That was a thrill -- the lump in one's throat one gets as we are pulling for the senators to sign the Declaration of Independence -- the final freeze bring tears to our eyes as the Liberty Bell clangs.

Fireworks, Hendrix, Berry didn't say much to me -- but "1776" -- our friends, the music, the songs, the vision was deeply moving.

LADDERS

Making it ... in show biz, in dance, in theater, is ... it's pulling yourself up on a rope.

NO. It's tougher. It's making the rope -- tying Mom's sheets together, throwing the sheet rope out the window, hoping the cloth will hold ...

NO. It's harder, trickier, more dangerous. Making it is climbing a ladder. The ladder is there. Other guys climbed it and made it. Wonderful men in history, as well as men with their faces on coins, and those ancient men with their outlines chiseled into cave walls ...

You can find the ladders. You can get there. But you have to make your own rungs -- climb, put your weight on the bottom rung, hold onto the side posts, and pull yourself up to the next rung.

Today, over and over we're hearing what Michael J. did. And Farrah F. This post was written a week ago, about us, not super-stars.

JC has done it. His name is in books. When he's gone a younger generation will remember him. And when they're gone, his name will be in their books that will be looked at by the even younger, un-born coming generation.

But he isn't a film star.

The film stars we grew up with don't die. Movies -- wow --once you are chosen, hired to make one, you're on a rung that is definitely off the ground, that enables you to reach for the next one, pull yourself up and step up on it, and reach for the next.

(The next and the next ... that's like the guy who wrote the book about me ("Encore"), writing "and then she did this.. and then she did that." . The thing that's never explained on the book, the thing to write about is the hell of transitioning. Methinks all this ladder stuff is because I'm worried about JC and JD, my two guys, in transition ...

JC's at the top of the ladder. But now that the show he's in, "August: Osage County" is closing next week, what's the next step, where's the next rung?

Job ending makes most actors wonder, "Am I ever going to work again?" (And feel like a guy on the ground taking his first step.)

JC has to figure out what to do with his time, his schedule, his daily routine and then... there'll be an offer, a rung. And JD, on a middle rung that was crazy, blood, sweat and tears difficult to get to, is on the same path as his Dad.

Me, wife and Mom, safe in front of the computer where I'm the boss, with my fingers and brain having plenty to do, can only say don't worry guys. It's the biz. You've been here before. You're working actors and the next step, and the next is moving each of us, each in his own way.

GLOVING

I never studied acting. Of course I have a uniquely experienced teacher right in the house.

When Todd Bolender (one of Balanchine's leading male dancers who also choreographed) was creating "At the Still Point" for Mark Ryder and me, JC directed me. There was a section at the start of the 2nd movement of the Debussy music, where I stood downstage center. Doing nothing, just seeing, envisioning the couples dancing behind me upstage.

JC's directing which added a slow motion gesture, a twist of my head, did not fit with what Todd wanted. He wanted zero, utter stillness.

When JC and I worked on his role on Broadway, in "On a Clear Day," after he told me what the director had been pushing him to do , I mirrored back to JC, what I saw and felt from what he was doing as an actor.

And that has become our pattern. JC directs me like a director. I direct him, by being a mirror.

It changed when JC directed my play, "People in Show Biz Make Long Goodbyes." He cast me as Theresa, a reclusive pianist who earns a meager living making orchestrations, hasn't been outside since she fell in the subway and developed white blotches on her face -- it's a pigmentary problem she blames on the government, the city, the state, the MTA.

Director JC's more of a stickler, a drill master than most of the choreographers I've worked with. He drove me crazy with his intellectual ideas, his detailed precise blocking. I wanted to improvise and find the blocking myself, not be told what to do, but I did manage, finally, to give a performance that pleased him and the critics.

What I learned, however, was how to get to a feeling within myself, by going right to it. I have to describe it as "gloving." Putting on a personality of someone else, becoming that person, as if you slid on a glove.

That's not a Stanislavsky technique though it relates to "method" acting, to knowing who am I, where am I going, what am I doing, what do I want. If you ask those questions, you can arrive at the emotion your character is feeling, produce the tears, the anger, or the blah state ... whatever.

I "glove" the character. I do that instinctively when I meet people. I see them, get a sense of them, by "gloving" them. It's easy to do with females; but I do it with males as well -- workman, mailmen, repairmen, tech guys – connect with the person by "gloving."

Sounds sort of sensual, sexy It's not that. It's focusing. Listening, hearing, seeing the other person. Try it – now that I've told you my secret, try it sometime.

JOB HUNT

What do I know about job hunting?

What I know I will never forget. It's hellish. Heavy-duty depressing. It's hauling yourself around, dressed ultra carefully, braced for answering questions, and presenting yourself in shaft of sunlight. It may be a dark day, but you bring the sunshine with you.

Hold on ... when did Em the dancer ever apply for a job?

I did, three times. First, an open chorus call. Awful, awful -- changing clothes in small backstage area crowded with a few hundred girls, wedging myself into one of the lines, getting onto the stage where an assistant is demonstrating what appears to be an impossibly tricky sequence of steps. Being eliminated, by someone saying "you, you, you ... thankyouuu.

Second audition, we girls changed into our nifty tight outfits, and were told to walk in a circle -- a huge circle on stage, so one waited with one's smile till your part of the circle was downstage, and then smiled a scintillating smile.

That was enough for me. I told myself NEVER again. I earned a small but almost breakeven living, from teaching (GI's, kiddies and fat ladies) what I myself was learning each day in the two classes a day that I took.

Three years later, when I was one-half of a dance team who'd been written up in the Herald Tribune and NY Times, I went to an audition wearing a double set of falsies and performed a ten second solo I'd worked on -- sang the lyrics -- "A GOOD GIRL, A NEVER WOULD GIRL, THATS WHAT FELLAS THINK OF ME..." doing my split kicks, jumps, and turns with sexy wiggles.

And left. Did not wait for thankyouuu. All I remember is those horrible falsies, yanking them out in the dark hall before I opened the backstage door and exited.

A few years later, I was able to collect unemployment insurance, because I was on my own payroll, correctly honestly receiving a salary from my corporation, having paid into the unemployment fund. Standing in that line isn't fun. But my knowledge of how it makes an artist feel, is from my guys, the two actors in my family, JC and JD.

JC, when a show closes, always gets a glum feeling that he will never work again. I know the look -- I call it Actoritis. I know the symptoms -- sleepiness, doing errands, grounding an electrical connection, caulking a loose tile, looking for household things to repair, even though in a minute the phone will ring, and JC will be working on another show.

His father's Actoritis infected JD. He's been an actor or more than 15 years, in New York, and L.A., in theater, films, TV, and voice-overs, doing countless auditions, taking classes in auditioning. His Actoritis never really goes away. JD's a realist. Even at the party on opening night, he's quietly aware that the blossoming love he's feeling for other members of the cast will bring him pain, have him mourning in a few months .

You have to have been in a show to understand. You fully totally, belong to the family that the cast becomes. You're married to them and the lines in the play, the blocking, the routines that the show requires.

Then ... like a guillotine ... the show closes. You're unemployed. Alone. Fixing leaky faucets.

You, out in the world of regular ordinary salaried jobs -- you know how hard it is to hunt for a job, get a right job, a job with a future, a way to grow, rise, earn more and expand.

Actors are always temps. Even in a hit show, you're a temp. The star is a temp. Even if you get TV series -- the series comes to an end. And you have to start again, with the hunt, the outfits, resumes, the smile, the selling of yourself in the sunshine that you manufacture

All this is to say, the actor temp would still be my choice if I had to choose again. It's my life, I own me.

It's the actor's life, an actor OWNS himself.

No permanent job is freedom. Working in the arts is freedom. Job hunting goes with being an artist. That's why so many try it for awhile. Why we, JC, JD and I, will never give it up.

THE GO SPIRIT

Waking this morning, to a faint noise, a vibration from our tenants on the floor below who are packing and moving, I thought about JC.

I crept downstairs last night, to sleep on the futon in my studio theater. It used to be "DanceHouse," my school where I taught; before that, it was rented by a guy who played the drums whom I desperately wanted to evict -- the noise was intolerable. We own the building -- a five-story brownstone in the heart of Manhattan; we occupy the two top floors.

Anyhow, upstairs, JC who is recovering from a coughing cold, was snoring.

JC's In-The-World clothes are on the rack in the hallway downstairs, upstairs on the brass coat rack, on coat hooks in the laundry room, in his three closets. (Yes, three, I just have one big one.)

Grrr.. No...it's wonderful--JC the actor marches out everyday, to shop, to audition, to do a benefit, to talk with Phil our building's super about the latest landlord problem. Then JC is off to the theater 6 days a week to perform. He doesn't say no. Never says no. He reschedules, jumps through hoops to be available for out-of-town relatives, old friends, as well as meetings with agents, producers, directors ... that spirit, what a spirit, the go in him.

I love his looks (a handsome husband is nice to have) but JC's go spirit inspires me, a go person in a different way... to go go go ... go further, faster, more delightedly... just GO.