I'll Scream Later (No Series) (18 page)

B
Y THE TIME
I got back to New York, it was fall. In the first months after Bill and I broke up, we spoke on occasion and a couple of times we saw each other. One of the last times was not long before I was to leave the city for good.

I was taking an afternoon nap in my apartment: in the months after I got sober, I napped a lot during bouts with depression—sleeping to mask all the bad feelings that were still hanging around the edges of my life. I guess I had left the door unlocked for Jack, who was working with me pretty much full-time at that point.

I’m not sure what woke me; maybe I just sensed something. When I opened my eyes, I was startled to find Bill standing next to my bed, watching me.

I didn’t ask how he’d gotten in or why he was there. We both made a few seconds of really trivial small talk, nothing more, then we made love.

Afterward, we went to grab a bite to eat and talked a little more. On our way back, he stopped on the street and said. “It’s over. It’s really over. I just wanted to verify it.”

I was stunned, floored, confused. Then I was crying. I didn’t think he could hurt me again. I thought I had grown enough by then to say, “I’m my own person now. This doesn’t matter.”

Later I decided he said it outside because he knew I would get upset; by the finality of it, the abruptness of it. When I got upset, that never led to anything good between us.

But, as I had learned to do long before Bill entered my life, I licked my wounds and dived back into life and work. I did a couple of magazine shoots—I was in
Esquire,
as part of its “Women We
Love” series, and in
Glamour,
answering the question if there was life after Oscar—there was.

I love photo shoots—each is going after its own mood, trying to visually tell a story, and it’s fun slipping into characters and the clothes, too. Back then, though, the days were often extremely long with hours and hours of downtime.

All I can say is thank God for today’s digital cameras. They have cut the time it takes to do a cover shoot or magazine spread by hours, even days. No more waiting for the Polaroids to dry before the real shooting begins.

Work was picking up, too. Studios and directors were interested in meeting with me—a good thing—but I was spending half my time on airplanes between New York and L.A. to make those connections. I realized that L.A. was where the work was going to come from.

I sat on my slanted floor, looking at the leaves in Washington Square turning brilliant yellows and reds, and decided I had to move to the land of palm trees and sand. I talked to Jack and convinced him to work for me there.

So I embarked on a grand adventure. Headed to a city where I could count the number of people I knew well on one hand, though it helped that I had extended family in the area. I landed on the West Coast with no place to live and not much money in my pocket. But I had dreams….

W
HAT IS IT
with me and earthquakes!

The flight to L.A. was on October 1, 1987. While we were in the air, the pilot came on and told us that the city had been hit by a major quake. I had no idea what to expect when we landed, was just grateful that we were apparently going to be able to land. Besides, I did not have a plan B if L.A. didn’t work out.

The Whittier Narrows earthquake rocked the San Gabriel Valley with a 5.9 quake that day. Eight people died and thousands were without homes, hundreds of buildings were destroyed, including most of what was downtown Whittier.

After the plane landed, Jack and I headed for the safest place I knew—the Winklers’ house. Henry took one look at us—I’m guess
ing we looked pretty pathetic—and said, “You’re staying here for the weekend.” Whew!

So he and Stacey put us up in their pool house—a beautiful space in the back of the house. I took the bedroom; Jack took the couch in the main room.

Over the next few days, I started settling in, trying to get used to the aftershocks, which were mild, but rolling through steadily.

Then on October 4, at 3:59 a.m., came a huge aftershock—5.6 magnitude—everything was shaking. I jumped out of bed and bolted for the house. I had that sense of chaos you feel when you have no idea what’s going to happen next, and with earthquakes you never do.

Inside the house, Henry had grabbed his son Max. He recalls, “It was the middle of the night and I’ve got on brown socks and I’m in my Jockeys, and I’m running down the back stairway with Max in my arms when Marlee comes running in the kitchen door.

“Just then I slipped, so here I am in my Jockeys and my brown socks, trying to hold on to Max, sliding down the carpeted stairway. And Marlee thought that might have been the funniest thing she had ever seen. I was trying to make sure that Max, who was maybe two or three at the time, wasn’t hurt. Marlee was bent over laughing.

“Max is now twenty-five and I think my backside has just recovered.”

Nothing like seeing the Fonz in his underwear bouncing down a set of stairs balancing a baby to take your mind off an earthquake!

The aftershocks moved on, and Jack did, too. He found an apartment at the Oakwood in the Valley; it’s one of the apartment complexes of choice for people trying to break into Hollywood. But I stayed with the Winklers. For all practical purposes they adopted me.

I ate with the family, went to Stacey and Henry for advice, played with the kids. I did a lot of growing up there. It was such a happy time for me, and my memories are filled with the sound of laughter.

W
ALKER
PREMIERED IN
New York in December, and Jennifer Beals donned one of her fabulous leather jackets and went with me.
We were captured arm in arm on the red carpet, looking as if we could be sisters.

The reviews for the movie were scathing. After I’d been overwhelmed by terrific reviews for
Children of a Lesser God,
these came like a shock to the system. I stopped reading them. Here’s a taste of why.

Roger Ebert wrote, “Some bad movies are in no hurry to announce themselves, but
Walker
declares its badness right from the opening titles.”

Ouch!

One reviewer suggested I get a new agent—that would happen soon enough, though not because of
Walker
.

For me it was another session of Hollywood 101, one of those sometimes-you-learn-the-hard-way moments. My
Walker
lesson: at times a project can seem to have all the right ingredients—director, actors, passion—but even with the best of intentions and hard work by everyone, nothing guarantees success.

Christmas of 1987 was the year Ruthie and I escaped from everything here—bad reviews, bad boyfriends, bad memories—and invaded St. Bart’s for the first time. The Maa-Ruus were definitely on the island.

Ruthie and I hit St. Barts

For the first time in a long time, I felt completely free. We talked and laughed and spent endless hours in the surf. I truly started healing.

As Ruthie says, “I could tell she was finally done with Bill.”

But I wasn’t quite.

I
T WAS
D
ECEMBER
1989. I made dinner (with Ruthie’s help) for Bill before we headed to an AA meeting in West Hollywood. I think Bill and I both envisioned it as a kind of cleansing. I spoke first, with Jack interpreting and Ruthie there for support. As they encourage you to do in AA, I shared my experiences, all the things that had brought me here, with as much honesty as I could muster.

Jack recalls, “I felt it was the best job I’d ever done interpreting for Marlee. It was so organic, so real, Marlee was very specific about accepting responsibility for her part in the breakdown of the relationship with Bill. She was also candid about all the things that had happened between them—the pain, the violence, her drugs, his drinking—it was an incredible moment of heartbreaking honesty.”

After I spoke, Bill pulled me aside. He was furious. I remember him saying, “You never learn, do you. These people can’t be trusted not to talk.” I was, once again, hurt, but I told him. “You stop pulling my strings, you can’t do that to me anymore.” I dug deep for the courage to just walk away.

After that, though he would occasionally cross my mind, we lost touch completely.

In September of 1994, just a little more than a year after I’d married, I was given the Innovator Award as part of the annual Diversity Awards, a fund-raiser sponsored each year by the Multicultural Motion Picture Association.

The awards show was held in the International Ballroom of the Beverly Hilton Hotel. Those involved are a mix of studio executives, politicians, and artists drawn from the worlds of music, film, television, and sports.

The recognition was for my work on closed-captioning and my involvement with several children’s charities. I was truly moved to be included.

It was a lovely night. Jack was there and flipped through the program, which as part of the fund-raising efforts is filled with paid ads. He noticed a full-page ad next to my name, reading, “Mazel Tov, Marlee Matlin, Recipient of the Innovator Award, from William Hurt.”

I’ve always wondered about that ad. What was Bill thinking when he placed it? Was it an attempt to reconnect? Or to make amends? Was it sincere or sarcastic?

About three years ago, our paths crossed briefly at an event tied to the Oscars. It had been so long since we’d had any contact, but I realized my feelings about him remained so unresolved, I freaked out when I saw him across the room. Thank God my husband, Kevin, was there. He suggested I go over and talk to Bill, make the first move. Just as we turned to head over, Bill was there with his son, Alex.

With Kevin right by my side and his good energy helping to calm me, Bill and I chatted for a while as if we were only casual acquaintances. Then it was over and we quickly moved past each other into our separate nights.

I
THINK
I
MIGHT
be a sports fanatic. Wait, no, actually I
am
definitely, officially a sports fanatic. I love sports—watching, playing, analyzing. I follow my teams religiously. Hand me a bat and you can count on a couple of RBIs; toss me a basketball and I’m good for a two-pointer.

Some of the best times I’ve had in Hollywood have been at the celebrity sports events that are generally put together to raise funds for various charities. It’s easy for me to say yes to these. I’ll take getting dirty running bases instead of a black-tie gala any day.

So when I was invited to a celebrity ski event in Calgary before the 1988 Winter Olympics, I was there!

It was beautiful—clear days, pristine snow, good friends, absolutely carefree. I met Brooke Shields there—
Pretty Baby,
whoa! I taught her to sign the alphabet—such a sweet and genuine person.

There were all sorts of races and competitions; ice sculptures of all sorts of animals seemed to be everywhere you turned. It was crazy. During a slalom race, I watched MacGyver battle it out with Superman.

I don’t remember who won the race, but as Richard Dean Anderson and Christopher Reeve finished, I knew I wanted to meet Ricky. I’d loved him as MacGyver, but that was just leftover affection from an early crush I had on him as a teenager when he was starting out his career as Dr. Jeff Webber on
General Hospital
.

He always seemed to play the tough good guy with a heart of gold. That is exactly who he was. Oh, and more than a little hot!

I have to admit, I’m a hopeless flirt—always have been, always
will be—thank goodness for an understanding husband who knows he’s my one true love now!

With Ricky, though, I was just simply hopeless. In what has to rank as one of the lamest flirts I’ve pulled over the years, I waited for him at the ski lift after the race and told him I was scared to ride alone. Would he ride with me?

Since he didn’t know me yet, he had no idea how absurd that was. We spent the fifteen-minute ride up the slope laughing and talking. It wasn’t
love
at first sight, but it was definitely
interest
at first sight.

That night at a banquet we kept exchanging glances. Brooke and I were sitting next to each other, and I was probably driving her crazy talking about him—how cute, how nice. She kept encouraging me: “Go for it, go talk to him.” Finally I did.

The banquet tables were big, the speeches were, well, a little dry. So I walked around and said, “Hi, Rick,” and he smiled and said. “Let’s get under the table.” What?

So we ducked under the table like kids in a fort on a rainy day and stayed there for the rest of the night talking.

Later that night he walked me back to my room at the hotel and asked me if I wanted to exchange phone numbers. “Definitely!” Then he gave me the sweetest kiss on the cheek and said good-night.

He was a big star, one of
People
’s most beautiful people, one of Hollywood’s most eligible bachelors. I couldn’t believe he’d given me so much of his time. I went to sleep wondering if that would be it.

When I woke up the next morning, a note had been slipped under my door:
Marlee, it was great meeting you and I have a question—do you want to go to Hawaii with me?

And…I declined. Darn it! I was scared and a little intimidated by this handsome, magnetic man.

We would reconnect a few weeks later when he got back and invited me to come visit him in Vancouver, where he was shooting
MacGyver
. I remember spending an evening walking together. It was dark, in a sort of warehouse district, and my heart was pound
ing, hoping I’d made the right decision to come. We walked and talked and walked some more, for hours. And I started falling in love with him.

He was the sweetest, gentlest, kindest man. Funny, with a dry sense of humor. There was a lot to fall in love with. Not many guys when you’ve just started dating would take a trip with you to visit your grandmother. But that’s exactly what he did—it was one of the most romantic things ever.

While we were there in Reseda, California, at the Jewish Home for the Aging visiting my grandmother Rose, Ricky told me he was falling in love with me and wanted to be in a relationship. That moment touched my heart.

Ricky also had the Winkler seal of approval, always important in my life—Henry was a producer on
MacGyver
. He told me, “Rick’s one of my guys, he’s a good guy, you’ll be safe with him.”

We had great times together. He had a hockey fan in me and we would hit the Kings games when he wasn’t shooting in Vancouver. I’d always try to make his pickup hockey games on Monday nights. His dreams of becoming a pro player had been dashed when he was a teenager and broke both of his arms in two accidents within a few weeks of each other. But he was still fantastic on the ice.

One of the things I loved about Ricky was his love of life—something was always on the agenda, and it usually involved some sort of challenge. So I wasn’t surprised that he signed on to race in the Long Beach Grand Prix. I went with him, and my only regret is that I didn’t find a way to drive in the race myself.

Put me behind a wheel and I move at warp speed; my friends still have driving-with-Marlee nightmares. I may be fast, but I’m also, if I do say so myself, pretty skillful. No accidents on my record. I think I could have been a contender!

Then again it is never too late to try something you think you’ll love, is it? So don’t be surprised if one day you see me down in Long Beach suited up like Danica Patrick, tucking my hair into my helmet, ready to race with the big boys!

Ricky would go with me to the Oscars that year. We’d become one of those “hot couples” all the celebrity mags would watch for a
Hollywood minute. In May, we were on the cover of
Us
magazine, looking deliciously in love. By June it had ended for us.

It was a great six months, but he was fiercely independent, and I know I got too clingy for him. I wanted more, wanted to commit, and he just wasn’t emotionally there. Broke my heart because he was such a great guy.

We’ve stayed in touch over the years; we both left the relationship with no bitterness. It just wasn’t right.

Ricky, who has dated so many beautiful, smart, and talented women over the years, has never married, but he does have a beautiful daughter who was born a couple of years after my oldest, who is the center of his life. When we talk, he sounds happy. And that makes me happy—if MacGyver deserves anything, it is a happy ending!

I
N LATE
F
EBRUARY
, not long after I had started dating Richard Dean Anderson, I would go with an arts delegation to Russia, then to Leningrad, for the Second American Film and Theater Diplomacy Film Festival.

The first was held in 1959. Seven films were featured, and Gary Cooper came as Hollywood’s representative. This time there were twenty-five films, a lot of actors, but also other cultural representatives from dance and music. The idea was that the arts could bridge gaps that politics never could.

The pretty big group included Daryl Hannah, Richard Gere, Michael Douglas, Matt Dillon, Cicely Tyson, and the Muppets’ Jim Henson, among others.

Moscow was so cold. (I know, no surprise.) But somehow when you’re in a city that isn’t merely cold, but that feels so bleak—the faces of the people looked dead, completely without emotion—it can chill you to the bone.

I’ll never forget the subway there—people moving along like automatons, no smiles, no eye contact, shoulders drooped as if every single one of them was carrying the weight of the world on his or her shoulders.

But inside the theaters was a different story. People would wait for hours in line, in the cold, to get a seat. I introduced
Children of
a Lesser God
to an audience made up mostly of Russians who were Deaf. The process was multilayered—I signed using ASL (American Sign Language), then someone translated my signs into Russian signs. And Jack was interpreting what I signed into English, and someone else was translating what he said into Russian. But in the end, it all worked out just fine.

Leningrad was better, lighter somehow, but I was anxious to get home. It’s one of the most consistent feelings I have. No matter where I go—whether my career or my love of travel has taken me there—I’m always ready to leave as long as home is on the other side of that plane ride.

In one of those this-is-a-small-world-after-all moments, I learned years later that Kevin had been in Leningrad at the same time I was there. Imagine, your future spouse—of all times and places!