Letter From Elba

It’s been my peculiar fate to live a movie star tabloid-worthy life.

You know, thrilling ups, dramatic downs.  Old husbands, young husbands.  In the chips. Tap City.  Tons of triumphs.  Too many tears.

And in a major twist, just as cruel Fate is ready to count our heroine down and out, a switcheroo Hollywood happy ending.

My true life story is so compelling that it just screams summer blockbuster.  But first I need a killer screenplay.

And I’m just the girl to write it.  Come on.  How hard could it be?

True, I have had no formal experience in the scenario trade, but I have studied the craft under Christopher Moltisanti on The Sopranos.  Unfulfilled as a mafioso, he had bought a “how to” book on the art of screenwriting.

Lucky for me.

I learned lots of useful things from him about plot development and importance of your main character having an “arc.”  (Christopher use to wail to Tony that his own life had no arc.  Me?  I don’t have that problem.  I’ve got enough arc for ten people.)

Good thing that Christopher also taught me how to take a Hollywood meeting.

You bring along a fellow mobster to cajole and threaten Ben Kingsley, (note: always remember to call him “Sir Kingsley) do cocaine with a hooker, and finally, mug Betty Bacall and take away her presenter’s freebie-crammed gift basket.

Got it.

And I’ve seen Get Shorty, and I know that all I have to do is write “fade in” and put in some periods and commas and stuff and then type” fade out” and voila!  I’m well on my way to a pitch meeting at Morton’s with producer Scott Rudin.

Check.

Okay, Scott’s in.  Now for a director on the project.

There can be only one.  David Fincher.

And though I loved The Social Network and Panic Room, it was his outstanding work on Se7en, Zodiac, and Fight Club that convinced me that he could deftly capture the je ne sais quoi of my ex husband’s breezy personality.

Hard work over.  Now comes the fun part.

Casting.

The legendary director John Huston used to say that the secret to his job was in the casting.  If he cast the part right, he wouldn’t have to work hard behind the camera.  And since this was the guy who did The Maltese Falcon, The Treasure of the Sierra Madre and The African Queen, who am I to argue?

(Note to friends/family: If you’re unhappy with my choices, don’t come emailing to me. It’s my movie and I’ll cast who I want to.)

Okay, first, who should play me?  If this were the golden era of Hollywood, I’d have to vote for Natalie Wood or Ali MacGraw.

But they’re both no longer available, so hmmm.

I need a brunette actress who can convincingly portray someone brainy yet adorable, intellectual yet winsome. Someone who can get inside my head even though her personal life bears little resemblence to mine… Natalie Portman…Kristen Stewart?

No, I’ve got it.  Demi Moore.

Now for my ex- the father of my children.  That’s a cinch.  In his younger days, when he was 6’3″ and dark and very handsome, I would have called upon Burt Reynolds. Remember when he was the dishy Cosmo hunk?

But now, Frank Langella- as Nixon.

The roles of my eternally-patient brother and long-suffering sister-in-law will be played by pre-off-the-deep-end Tom Cruise and Annette O’Toole.

Or Julianne Moore or Debra Messing or Marilu Henner.  (Screenwriter’s note:  Give sister-in-law final casting approval.  You’ll want to see your brother once in awhile and you’ll need her heavy Broadway producer cred when they decide to make Hollywood Confidential-The Musical.)

The part of my loyal best friend will be played by Uma Thurman.

The parts of all my divorce-intolerant girlfriends will be played by the cast of The Real Housewives of New York.

Now who should read for the brooding, sexy, much younger love interest that blew my already dead-in-the-water marriage to smithereens?

In the old days, it would have to have been Alain Delon or Richard Gere.  But I need to appeal to today’s audience.  Okay, Justin Timberlake or any of those Magic Mike guys.

The divorce lawyers?  No need to bother Georgianne Walken with that one.

Mine- Joe Pesci.  His- Steve Buscemi.

(And trust me, if you had seen our lawyers, you’d know that I am doing them a real mercy cast.  This is a major looks upgrade.)

Okay, we’re done with those tense courtroom drama scenes.  Now it’s time to look through the head shots for just the right actor to portray my next husband.

He’s Irish and charming and all man.  Paging Liam Neeson.

Almost done.  But I can’t forget about the kids.

For the role of “Nick,” I would tap either Gary Oldman or Thom Yorke of the band Radiohead.  True, Gary is older than I am, but he’s a masterful enough character actor to pull it off, and Nick really admires his oeuvre.

And Thom Yorke doesn’t have to actually appear in the film.  Maybe he can just score the soundtrack.

“Natasha” will be portrayed by Dame Edith Evans.

No, scratch that.

I have just received an injunction from my daughter’s lawyer.  She has formally denied any knowledge of ever having met me, so now her part will be played by Jack Black- recast as the wacky neighbor.

We’re set. I can’t wait to start shooting.  Locations in Winnetka, Aspen, Florence, and Newport have already been scouted.  Book the talk shows.  Find me a colorist.  This gray has got to go.  I need to ask Rachel Zoe to pick out a gown for the Oscar red carpet…

Hold up.  Just got a call from my agent, Ari Gold.  The script’s in turnaround.

Hollywood can be one tough town.  I know that from Sunset Boulevard.

Quick.  Someone text Joe Eszterhas and tell him we have a one o’clock lunch today at the Ivy.  I know he’s busy but he’ll be there, I promise.

I’ve already called Christopher.

Nothing humorous happening here.  If it’s laughs you want, see you in the funny papers.

I have come today to take on that egregious term “starter marriage.” I hate that phrase. It’s cute, no…cutesy.  Even worse.

And it’s used casually and callously to describe a holocaust of the heart – a young marriage- presumably without kids- that has collapsed within the first year or so of the wedding march.

There’s nothing cutesy about it.  I ought to know.  I had one.

There is an inherent danger in taking one’s own experience and extrapolating a larger truth from it.  Just because it happened to you doesn’t make it that same way for everybody else.

But I’m willing to take that chance so that I can be the spokesmodel for the pain and disappointment, the failure, the secret shame that lurks behind those two little words.

“S.M.”  The initials are kind of ironic, aren’t they?

Ignoramuses think “no kids, no harm, no foul” and snicker when they hear about a soon-failed marriage and the quick divorce that follows.  No one discusses it.  No one mourns it.  Or is allowed to.

People think no real damage was done.  They might be out a shower gift or a wedding present, but what’s the big deal?  And wasn’t it better for all parties concerned if the two flighty people involved broke up before any permanent mistake was made- like a baby, for example.

Nobody really got hurt now, did they?

I’m still uneasy with the memories.  And so is my family.  And so are all the other families out there that this awful thing has happened to.

Believe me.  Anyone who has ever had the misfortune of witnessing a young marriage fail can never been flippant about it.

It leaves you with a blot on your marital record and a stain on your moral one.  It forever alters the way you feel about love, marriage, vows, the world, and ultimately yourself.

And let’s not even talk about the money down the drain that your parents just shelled out to give you that dream wedding if you’re the girl half of the couple.

You’re now officially a failure at twenty-six.  Or in my case, twenty.

And it wasn’t any better for the other party most closely concerned either.

I was fourteen and he was fifteen when we met.

Before he had a driver’s license, he used to run from his house in Glencoe to my house in Wilmette.  My mother had to drive us on our official first date.

We went to high school together and then, college. We got pinned, engaged, and then almost a year later, married in a big, gorgeous, black tie ceremony.

I carried miniature calla lilies and walked down the aisle on my proud father’s arm to Purcell’s “Trumpet Voluntary.”  My new husband and I walked back to the triumphant strains of Mendelssohn’s “Wedding March.”

With all the hopes and dreams and plans and emotions that you- and your mother and father- had when you got married.  Tact precludes me from saying much more.

But for the record, two young lives were changed by the implosion of our short-lived marriage.  The events that led up to it were ugly and sad.  And not only my hopes and dreams were shattered.

But you have to move on.

I’m sure most people recover, remarry, and live happily ever after.  They never refer to their early “mistake.”  They have children with others.  It’s better left forgotten.  It happened a long time ago.  Why rake up the past?

I never wanted to discuss the breakup of my first marriage.  To me, the subject was off limits. Taboo.

But when my kids were old enough to (kind of) understand, I manned up and sat them down and explained- with names and all- the basic facts.  I didn’t want them “clued in” about my marital past by some stranger, well-meaning or meddling.

And yes, it was hard to talk about.  And yes, it was a good thing that I did.

Years later, my daughter crossed paths with my first husband’s son in an American Express office in Paris.

Without exchanging names, they had struck up a conversation while waiting to change travel arrangements and airline tickets.

As they started to go their separate ways, he introduced himself and asked her out.

When she recovered her equanimity, my daughter introduced herself and then said “Your father was married to my mother.”  He, too, was shocked by their chance meeting, but he also knew the truth about the past.

Needless to say, the date never happened.  But what are the odds of that encounter?

(And if we hadn’t told our kids?  Read John Galsworthy’s great trifecta, A Modern Comedy, to see what happens when Soames and Irene Forsyte are too ashamed of their own unsucessful first marriage to tell their respective offspring.)

So do me a favor.  Don’t use that ugly little term.  Try hard to find another expression for it.  If you can’t think of one, you can always turn to the master of all things literary to help you sort things out.

After all, Shakespeare had the proper take on another young marriage that went tragically wrong: “For never was a story of more woe than this of Juliet and her Romeo.”

“Starter marriage” just doesn’t scan.

While reading the Sunday New York Times travel magazine supplement recently, I came across an article about Tokyo called “Fixated.”  If you missed it, let me bring you up to speed.

Because Tokyo is so enormous and overwhelming, as a coping mechanism and counterpoint, there is a trendy, hip phenomenon the reporter wrote about called “hyper-specialization.”

In other words, there are bars, restaurants, stores, and museums devoted with single-minded obsession to one person, place, or thing- “the insane enthusiams of Tokyo’s small business owners.”  And they’re big hits!

Hmmm. I’m insane. I have enthusiasms.  Why can’t I move to Japan and open up Ellen-centric bars, restaurants, stores, and museums?

Take a look at my business plan:

The first shop I would open in Tokyo is called “Farewell, My Lovely.”

It would sell menus and matchbooks from long-closed Chicago restaurants.  Featured in the inventory would be cartes du jour and souvenir ash trays from Fritzel’s, Febo, Miller’s, La Cheminee, The Gold Lion, Indian Trail, The Blackhawk, Cricket’s, Four Torches, Maxim’s, Mel Markon’s, Sage’s East, My Favorite Inn, Tango, The Golden Ox, Abacus, Mike Fish, L’Epuisette, Kungsholm, La Milanese, Al Farber’s, Eli’s The Place for Steak, The Cart, Glass Dome Hickory Pit, Chez Paul, Agostino’s, and Como Inn.

Wouldn’t you shop there?

I would open a mystery book store called “The Spy Who Came in From The Cold.”  It would only sell copies of The Night Manager by John le Carre.  I am obsessed with this novel- as I know millions of you are.  Why waste precious retail space stocking any other title?

How about a quick peek inside my music store “Tune Up?”  There you’d be able to download memorable hit songs like “Peanuts” by Little Joe and The Thrillers, “Mother-In-Law” by Ernie K. Doe, “Yakety Yak” by The Coasters, and “Do Wah Diddy”- the Steve Gersten cover version only.

A big city like Tokyo can’t have too many walk-in nail salons.  Mine would be called “That’s a Wrap.”  What gal wouldn’t want a mani/pedi administered by Bulgarian-speaking fem-bots and featuring the latest, sickest OPI Goth colors like “Manic-Depressive,” “Bankrupt,” “Restraining Order,” and “My Trial Was Fixed”?

You can then have a drink in my latest Ellen-centric Bar, “Straw.”  It would only serve Nedlog orange and Green River.  I get thirsty just thinking about it.

And now, I’m getting hungry, too.

Let me proudly lead the way to “Mary’s Cupboard on the Ginza.” It’s a tribute restaurant. Yes, that’s right, a full-scale, authentic reproduction of our beloved Winnetka favorite.  I went to an auction and purchased the three-section tan plastic plates, the rotisserie spits to hold the bbq chickens in the window, and the fliptop containers for pickle relish.

Naturally, I spent tons of yen and finally got the guy to open the vault and give me the cole slaw recipe that he’s had locked up in there since 1970.  And we’d hand out Blackjack gum when you paid the check.

We’re taking reservations by email now.  Just visit our website at www.bbqsaucegivesmeaheadache.com.

On the cultural side of Tokyo, I would underwrite “The Ramis Museum”- a tribute to the acting genius of Harold Ramis.  Yes, yes, I know.  He’s better-known for his work as a brilliant screenwriter and director of such hits Analyze This and Caddyshack.

But in Ellen-world, he’s revered as a god for his acting.

I would have a loop of clips of his Egon in Ghostbusters (“I collect mold, spores and fungus.”), Knocked Up (“No pills, no powders…”), As Good as It Gets ( He was “the gift.”) and Groundhog Day.  The man deserves a regular Oscar, an honorary Oscar, and the Jean Hersholt Award, and I’m going to see that he gets the respect his acting chops are due.

And because I am such a devotee of their handbags, I would debut a store that featured nothing but the finest scarves, clothes, jewelry, and leatherwork by the artist, Hermes. Oh wait, that’s “Hermes.”  Forget that concept.

My Tokyo movie five-screen theaterplex, “Arigatwoontheaisle”, would devote each theater to constantly showing The Hangover, Tropic Thunder, Office Space, Role Models, and Sabrina.  Perfect.

And if BBQ isn’t your thing, step right up to my other restaurant, “Rossburger.” I came up with the menu myself.  These babies are thin sirloin patties, griddle-cooked, and served with catsup, mustard, relish, and grilled and raw onion, only.  No substitutions of any kind will be made. EVER.

Apres dinner, why not stop by for a nightcap at my retro chic bar “Men Who Live On Boats”?  This bar’s theme is dedicated to the tv shows of the sixties in which men lived on boats.  Always playing on giant flat screens will be reruns of Surfside Six, Adventures in Paradise, and It’s a Man’s World.

Or you could stroll over to my trendy bistro, “Patternless,” where to the soothing soundtrack of the disembodied voices of Alan Rickman and Jeremy Irons reciting Tom Stoppard plays, you can play with “rental” Scotties and do the Friday and Saturday New York Times crossword puzzles.

What a perfect way to end an evening.  I think you’d all agree.  And I know it would all make sense- and big bucks- there.

I mean it’s Tokyo, Jake, Tokyo.

Thirty-four years ago today, my daughter Natasha was born.

Nick was born nineteen months later, and my priorities became them for, well, forever, I guess.  Motherhood is a never-ending adventure and a challenge.

And those who do it well deserve to be recognized.

And so my thoughts naturally turn to the mothers down through the ages whom I admire. Marmee from Little Women.  Self-sacrificing Stella Dallas.  Marie Curie.  Abigail Adams. All sterling examples of the virtues of motherhood.

But today I doff my hat to Kris Jenner.  I respect her.  I really do.  She has taken every piece of conventional child-rearing wisdom and turned it on its head. Her low/no expectations have really paid off.

Under her tutelage, and spiritual guidance, her unlettered, no-talent kids (unless you count Kim’s starring turn in a sex tape) have become the idols of millions.  And they rake in the millions of dollars to match.

Their so-so faces grace tabloids and magazine covers galore. (Although to be fair, Kim does look exactly like Princess Jasmine in the Disney cartoon Aladdin.)

They get thousands for appearances at pool parties.  They garner even more with their inane tweets.  These do-nothing professional party-goers have a Sears apparel line and cosmetic ventures devoted to them.

They have babies out of wedlock and legendary fragrances, like Batard and Je Regette, inspired by them.  And let’s not forget their flagship store venture DASH, opening soon in a strip mall near you.

And they have managed to earn sixty-five million dollars last year.  Enough moolah to buy Bentleys and mansions for all.  Even poor, pushed-to-the-sidelines Bruce can upgrade his model helicopters to his heart’s content.

I, on the other hand, have failed as a “momager.” I don’t have a Bentley, or a face lift, or a best-selling tell-all book.  (Yet.)

By Kardashian standards, the ne plus ultra by which all new parenthood must be measured, my kids are duds.  And I did my best to ruin them, I swear.

Take the way I raised Natasha, for example.  From the earliest age, I spoiled her with violin lessons and French tutors.  She had all the educational and recreational advantages that money could buy.

She had a pony- who she took with her to summer camp in Maine, by the way.  She went on fabulous vacations, had a second home in Snowmass,  prepped at an elite boarding school in Newport, where she sailed the Caribbean for a semester, and mixed with the nobs.

She attended a fantastically expensive college, spent semesters in Paris improving her accent, interned at the National Cathedral School in Washington D.C. and then went on to graduate school in Boston.  It all cost a ton, and I expected a solid return on my investment.

And, now,  what do I have to show for all this exorbitant expense and indulgent pampering?  A serious, responsible, conscientious, married first grade teacher, beloved by her students and respected by her peers, that’s all.

What a gyp.

Couldn’t she have made at least one sex tape?  Where’s her illegitimate baby?  Why is she wasting precious time grading homework and tutoring reading when she could be out partying at Tao or tweeting about hair extensions?

I also failed miserably with my son.  And he began so promisingly, too.

Right from the start, he was a slacker.  It would take six tries to get Nick up in the morning to catch the school bus.  If it wasn’t for my neighbor’s extra-long driveway that bought Nick those few precious extra moments, he would have been a perpetual truant.

He developed an unhealthy interest in skateboarding, blew through every allowance like Diamond Jim Brady, and hid Playboys in his room

So far so good.

He showed even more promise during his high school years.  Tattoos, and hair dye made their first disconcerting appearances, and for a minute there, it looked like I was well on the way to creating my very own “Rob.”

He slept until four in the afternoon, and any time not spent on a snowboard was considered time wasted.  It was Colorado, after all.

He was sloppy and unmotivated.  He traveled with a posse.  His house guests had house guests.

In fact, when Nick and I moved out of our Snowmass condo into a new house, a final check on his room showed that someone had left behind a bong, a bottle of Jagermeister, and a porn tape.

Now, I can’t swear that these items were his.  Any of his cronies, all green-haired weirdos with piercings of an unusual nature, could have laid claim to them.  But still….

He was definitely headed in that lucrative Kardashian direction.

But a funny thing happened on the way to the unemployment line.  He graduated CU with honors, earned a masters at Northwestern, got a great job, married a beautiful girl.

Now, he’s never late, always working, super-organized, completely responsible.  I never have to remind him to call his grandparents or that we have a date for dinner next week.

He’s always ten steps ahead of me and never forgets the slightest obligation.  He has matured into an one hundred per cent industrious, reliable adult who meets every responsibility with good humor and dedication.

In other words, he’s not worth a damn at judging a Miss Teen Age Wet T Shirt contest, dancing with the stars, or creating his own sock line.

The truth hurts.  At this rate, my kids will never be able to buy me that boob job.

Where did I go right?