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The Understudy, from Maide

1978. I am swimming laps in the YMCA pool in Stratford, Ontario. I'm a member of the Stratford Shakespearean Festival. I got in by the back door. I'm in the musical comedy company, not the acting company, but thrilled to be there at all. It's five months steady work, and I think if I hang around serious actors I will become one.

I've been swimming hard and I'm tired, and wander into the next lane and give the woman swimming there a healthy kick in the leg. When we reach the end of the pool we both pull ourselves onto the side. I turn to apologize. She pulls off her swim cap, red hair cascades out and I realize I have kicked Maggie Smith, star of the Stratford Shakespearean Festival. She's gracious. She asks me my name and I tell her. She asks me if I'm part of the Festival, and I say yes. What I fail to tell her, as I am in a state of wonderment that one of the greatest actors in the English language is sitting on the side of the pool shooting the breeze with me, what I fail to tell her is that I am also her understudy for Amanda in "Private Lives."

Why or how I was given that understudy is a mystery that until this day that I have not been able to unravel. My acting career up until this point had been pretty sketchy. In fact I followed the Peter Principle of acting. I kept promoting myself beyond the level of my capabilities. Every time I got comfortable doing anything, I tried something else. I went from opera singer, to musical comedy performer, to commercial spokesperson, to television actor to film actor to theatre actor, each discipline with its own technique, always learning on the job, always terrified that they'd find out I didn't know what the hell I was doing. I learned technique all right, I learned in moments of extreme terror to smile.

Whatever the reason they gave me the understudy, I knew, and they knew, and they knew that I knew, and I knew that they knew that I knew that that never, never would they send me in for Maggie Smith. Maggie in her most popular role - opposite Brian Bedford, her best friend from Britain? Brian Bedford who was known to eat beginning actors for lunch

I knew something about understudying in my previous incarnations. I learned when I was a member of a chorus in an opera company, and arrived one night for my half-hour call and was thrust into a costume four times too big for me and pushed onstage to sing the nurse in Rigoletto. I learned that night that when you're an understudy, it's best to learn the lines.

So I knew the lines when the phone rang at home to tell me that Maggie's dog had bitten her in the mouth, and she'd required stitches, and was so swollen she would probably not make her next performance four days away, and would I report in the morning for a costume fitting. I even knew some of the blocking , but the thing I knew most clearly, most stunningly, most accurately was that I was in way, way over my head. My British accent was about as reliable as British beef, and I knew absolutely nothing about the world of Noel Coward, the world of tuxedoed gentlemen and languid ladies. My parents were farmers.

I hung up the phone, and did what I always do in moments of stress. I picked a fight with my husband. I kept it going for a couple of hours and would have kept it going all week, only I realized that I was using time that could be spent running lines.

Next day I'm in wardrobe being pinned into a long, beaded gown, and fitted with a period wig. I look like I'm in drag. The wardrobe master tries hard not to laugh. I take a deep breath to fill out the front of the dress and that was the last breath I took for three days, because suddenly, in a blinding flash, I realize that this is for real. They will actually put me on stage in three days time because "Private Lives" is always a sell-out and they are not going to cancel. People come from all over the world to see Maggie and Brian do their thing.

I didn't eat, sleep or breathe for the next three days. I was so out of my body, I'm surprised I didn't meet myself coming down the street. I had no rehearsals, of course. Mr. Bedford didn't rehearse. And I noticed a strange thing beginning to happen. My colleagues began to avoid me. I think it was the smell of fear on me, or failure. We all agreed on one thing. I was going to bomb. Big time.

I tried to prepare. I really did. I practiced fluttering my hands like Maggie. I draped myself across chairs, trying to imitate her 5 foot 7 gracefulness, with my 5 foot 2 farmer's body. I practiced speaking with her nasal twang. "Norfolk, awfully flat Norfolk." She always got a laugh on that line. I would settle for stunned silence. I was sure there were going to be things thrown, and a line around the block demanding money back.

Friday night was the performance. Friday morning I woke up and realized I had lost my youth. I imagined an atomic bomb being dropped on Stratford, a special bomb that would decimate just the buildings and leave the people alone. It was the only way out that I could see. Then something strange began to happen. A stillness, a calm fell over me. And I realized I was like the men in the war who described the same sensation when they were sent into impossible battles. I realized we shared something. I realized I had a name for what was happening to me. I was on a suicide mission.

The phone rang. Madame Smith was feeling better and thought she would be able to make the evening's performance after all. "Oh, thanks for letting me know," I said politely. I put the phone back in its cradle. I sat down, and I realized I was pissed. I was disappointed. I was angry as hell, for when the curtain went up that night on, "Private Lives," I wanted it to be me on that stage. I've never felt the same about Maggie Smith since. In fact, I've thought that if ever we are swimming in the same pool, be it at Stratford, Ontario, or in some private club in London, England, I will wander over into her lane and kick the bloody bejesus out of her.

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