You know you're adopted when: You can't even listen to Dame Judi Dench sing 'Send in the Clowns' without finding the parallels to your own adoption experience. Hearing the line "I thought that you'd want what I want, sorry, my dear," I immediately thought of my adoptive mother - the day I tried to explain to her that adoption is not all roses and lollipops (Gypsy!), counter to her beliefs. I begged her to understand that I was someone else before she .. got me. I begged her to realize/accept/acknowledge that before I was in her arms I was in another woman's body. And I was floored when upon saying, "You're my mother. You should want to understand this. You should wantto help me in this," she replied with, "I really don't see what you're so worked up about. It's not as if you were two or three and have memories of this.."
I'm one of those obnoxious kids who was 'raised on the stage' - not at all by my mother's design, mind you. You can hardly drag that woman out of her front door, let alone into a spotlight. I've been in theater since.. forever. I think I did my first play when I was 4. And looking back, every major play I did - i.e. every play I had a lead in - had a somewhat common thread.. or maybe it's just that I make it common.
For whatever reason, I've been pulling out all of my old broadway soundtracks lately - specifically the plays that I have been involved in. And perhaps it's only my current state of mind.. but each one touches that sensitive little 'adoption spot' in me. Even if it's theme is completely unrelated, I manage to pull pieces from each one and make it applicable. Maybe that's why I kept doing theater.. and maybe that's why I rocked at it (sorry, no modesty this morning).
Into The Woods: I remember seeing this play when I was little - maybe four or five. And I remember some woman ignoring my presence there at her knee and complaining to my mother that she couldn't understand why she had brought me. The tickets were expensive and there was no way someone my age could follow such a 'complex character study'. I then proceeded to relay the entire plot, scene for scene, and my interpretation of the moral of the story. Many many years later I was lucky enough to be a part of a production of this play. I was first cast as the Baker's Wife and later on as the Witch. As the Baker's Wife, the character wants nothing more than to have a child. She and her husband try everything possible and eventually end up striking a deal with the Witch, who gives them a magic potion and voila! Baby is born. ..And I remember thinking to myself that I would play the part with the desperation I saw in my adoptive mother...
Later, when I played the Witch - who is Rapunzel's captor/adoptive mother, I remember being elated because a) it was an amazing part to play with amazing songs and b) because I could put a little something extra into it. I knew how Rapunzel felt. I know what it's like to be locked away in a high tower without any chance of rescue - this was her lot in life and she had to accept it. And later on in the story, when Rapunzel dies at the hand of the Giant, while her mother, the Witch, looks on in despair and disgust and utter helplessness - I remember trying to imagine my first mother (though I knew nothing of her at the time). I remember trying to imagine how it must feel to loose your only child to some 'greater force' that you have little-to-no control over.
Les Miserables: I played Fantine once. A single mother who loses her child to a villainous couple because she cannot afford to keep her. She works at a factory to scrape together money to send to her, and when that isn't enough, she sells everything; her hair, her jewelry, her body. She gets sick and knows that she is going to die. And she sings this lovely ballad to her daughter from her deathbed. Again, as I was performing this, my mind was with my first mother: with no choice but to turn her daughter over to another so that they would have everything she could not give her.
Annie: Even though I did this play when I was younger, you can imagine what was going through my mind. 'Little Orphan Annie', trying desperately to find her birth parents - only to be taken advantage of by three unlikely criminals. For months after this production, I felt uneasy. It could be argued that 'Daddy Warbucks' represents every set of wealthy adoptive parents..appealing to every child. Who wouldn't want to go live in a mansion and have everything you could ever ask for (except for your first parents)? When fellow cast members, audience members, friends at school, etc. would realize that I was adopted, they came to the strangest conclusions. The adults in the play forced the idea that it was a cathargic experience for me. My peers in the play as well as classmates at school assumed that this was natural for me - that like Annie, I had a ton of friends at 'my orphanage' and how much fun that must have been! Kids have such a warped view of what adoption is..
The Baker's Wife: Yes, it was a play separate from Into the Woods, but the same character - different situation. I played the Baker's Wife. As a young woman she falls in love with a man who asks her to pick up and leave and begin a new life with him, but she declines, insisting that it is irrational and there is far too much grounding her in her town. She winds up in a loveless marriage - and at one point, sings this beautiful song called Meadowlark, which essentially is the story of her life. I got a lot of crap when performing this song - I was told my emotion was 'too forced'. What those critics failed to realize was that in a way, this was my own story. Certainly, I was never asked to run away with any man.. nor did my relation to the song have anything to do with any man.
I did, however, relate to the Meadowlark in that she was 'rescued' by the King.. he gave her everything she could ever want or need and she was his most prized possession (and I don't use that term lightly). The Meadowlark loved him for everything he had done for her. Along comes the Sun God...one whom the Meadowlark belongs with. Her place was with him. They could have soared high above the beaches together, living side by side in complete bliss. But the Meadowlark refuses to leave the King. She is endebted to him for all he has done for her. She doesn't want to hurt his pride.
So, thank you, theater, for allowing me to act and sing what I wasn't allowed to feel.. Into The Woods and The Baker's Wife are on DVD.. and I would strongly recommend that you watch them if you have any interest in musical theater at all. They're brilliant plays with brilliant music that will undoubtedly move you. Especially in light of what I have written here this morning.
