CITY_OF_GIRLS_by_Elizabeth_Gilbert

again: “What you have to understand, kiddo, is that Edna is one of the greatest actresses of her age.”

Edna grinned. “Oh, Peg, stop talking about my age!”

“I believe what she meant, Edna,” corrected Arthur, “is that you are one of the greatest actresses of your generation. She’s not talking about your age.”

“Thank you for the clarification, darling,” replied Edna to her husband, with no trace of irony or annoyance. “And thank you for the kindness, Peg.”

Peg went on: “Edna is the best Shakespearean actress you’ll ever meet, Vivian. She’s always had a knack for it. Started as a baby in the cradle. Could recite the sonnets backwards, they say, before she learned them forwards.”

Arthur muttered, “You’d think it would’ve been easier to learn them forwards first.”

“Many thanks, Peg,” said Edna, ignoring Arthur, thank God. “You’ve always been so good to me.”

“We shall have to find something for you to do while you’re here,” announced Peg, slapping her leg for emphasis. “I’d be happy to put you in one of our terrible shows, but it’s all so beneath you.”

“Nothing is beneath me, dear Peg. I’ve played Ophelia in knee-deep mud.”

“Oh, but Edna, you haven’t seen our shows! It’ll make you miss the mud. And I don’t have much to pay you—certainly not what you’re worth.”

“Anything’s better than what we could earn in England—if we could even get to England.”

“I just wish you could get a role in one of the more reputable theaters around town,” said Peg. “There are many of them in New York, rumor has it. I’ve never stepped foot in one myself, of course, but I understand that they exist.”

“I know, but it’s too late in the season,” said Edna. “Middle of September—all the productions have been cast. And remember—I’m not as well known here, darling. As long as Lynn Fontanne and Ethel Barrymore are alive, I’ll never get the best roles in New York. But I’d

still love to work while I’m here—and I know Arthur would, too. I’m versatile, Peg—you know that. I can still play a youngish woman, if you put me at the back of the stage, in the correct lighting. I can play a Jewess, or a gypsy, or a Frenchwoman. At a pinch, I can play a little boy. Hell, Arthur and I will sell peanuts in the lobby, if need be. We’ll clean out ashtrays. We only wish to earn our keep.”

“Now see here, Edna,” declared Arthur Watson sternly. “I don’t think I’d much like to clean out ashtrays.”

—

That evening, Edna watched both the early and the late performances of Dance Away, Jackie! She could not have been

more delighted with our awful little show if she’d been a twelve-year- old peasant child seeing theater for the first time.

“Oh, but it’s fun!” she exclaimed to me, when the performers had left the stage after their final bows. “You know, Vivian, this sort of theater is where I got my start. My parents were players and I grew up around productions just like this. Born in the wings, five minutes before my first performance.”

Edna insisted on going backstage and meeting all the actors and dancers, to congratulate them. Some had heard of her, but most hadn’t. To most of them, she was just a nice woman giving them praise —and that was good enough for them. The players bubbled up around her, soaking in her generous ministrations.

I cornered Celia and said, “That’s Edna Parker Watson.”

“Yeah?” said Celia, unimpressed.

“She’s a famous British actress. She’s married to Arthur Watson.”

“Arthur Watson, from Gates of Noon?”

“Yes! They’re staying here now. Their house in London got bombed.”

“But Arthur Watson is young,” Celia said, staring at Edna. “How can he be married to her?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “She’s quite something, though.”

“Yeah.” Celia didn’t seem so sure. “Where we going out tonight?”

For the first time since meeting Celia, I wasn’t so sure I wanted to go out. I thought I might prefer to spend more time around Edna. Just for one night.

“I want you to meet her,” I said. “She’s famous and I’m mad about the way she dresses.”

So I brought Celia over and proudly introduced her to Edna.

You can never anticipate how a woman is going to react to meeting a showgirl. A showgirl in full costume is intentionally designed to make all other females look and feel insignificant by comparison. You need to have a considerable amount of self-confidence, as a woman, to stand in the lavish radiance of a showgirl without flinching, resenting, or melting away.

But Edna—tiny as she was—had just that kind of self-confidence.

“You’re magnificent!” she cried to Celia, when I introduced them. “Look at the height on you! And that face. You, my dear, could headline at the Folies Bergère.”

“That’s in Paris,” I said to Celia, who thankfully did not take note of my patronizing tone, distracted as she was by the compliments.

“And where are you from, Celia?” Edna asked—tilting her head with curiosity and shining the spotlight of her fullest attention upon my friend.

“I’m from right here. From New York City,” said Celia.

(As though that accent could’ve been born anywhere else.)

“I noticed tonight that you dance exceptionally well for a girl of your height. Did you study ballet? Your carriage would suggest you’d been properly trained.”

“No,” replied Celia, whose face was now aglow with pleasure.

“And do you act? The camera must adore you. You look just like a film star.”

“I act a bit.” Then she added (quite archly for someone who had only ever played a corpse in a B movie): “I am not yet widely known.”

“Well, you shall be known soon enough, if there’s any justice. Stay at it, my dear. You’re in the right field. You have a face that was made

for your times.”

It’s not difficult to compliment people in order to try to win their affections. What is difficult is to do it in the right way. Everyone told Celia she was beautiful, but nobody had ever told her she had the carriage of a trained ballerina. Nobody had ever told her she had a face made for her times.

“You know, I’ve just realized something,” said Edna. “In all the excitement, I have not yet unpacked. I wonder if you girls might be free to help me?”

“Sure!” said Celia eagerly, looking like she was about thirteen years old.

And to my wonderment, in that instant the goddess became a handmaiden.

—

When we arrived upstairs in the fourth-floor apartment that Edna would be sharing with her husband, we found a pile of trunks

and parcels and hatboxes on the sitting-room floor—an avalanche of luggage.

“Oh, dear,” said Edna. “It gives quite the impression of density, doesn’t it? I do hate to trouble you girls, but shall we begin?”

As for me, I couldn’t wait. I was dying to get my hands on her clothes. I had a feeling they’d be splendid—and indeed they were. Unpacking Edna’s trunks was a lesson in sartorial genius. I soon noticed that there was nothing haphazard about her clothing; it was all in keeping with a particular style that I might call “Little Lord Fauntleroy meets French salon hostess.”

She certainly had a lot of jackets—that seemed to be the elementary unit of her aesthetic. The jackets were all variations on a theme—fitted, jaunty, slightly martial in tone. Some were trimmed in Persian lamb, others had satin details. Some looked like formal riding jackets, but some were more playful. All of them had gold buttons of different design, and all were lined with jewel-toned silks.

“I have them specially made,” she told me, when she caught me searching the labels for information. “There’s an Indian tailor in London who has come to know my taste over the years. He never gets bored of creating them for me, and I never get bored of buying them.”

And then there were the trousers—so many pairs of trousers. Some were long and loose, but others were narrow and looked like they would hit above the ankle. (“I got used to wearing these when I studied dance,” she said of the cropped variety. “All the dancers in Paris wore trousers like that, and heavens, did they make it look chic. I used to call those girls ‘the slim ankle brigade.’”)

The trousers were a real revelation for me. I’d never been a firm believer in trousers on women until I saw how good they looked on Edna. Not even Garbo and Hepburn had yet convinced me that a woman could be both feminine and glamorous in pants, but looking at Edna’s clothes suddenly made me think that it was the only way a woman could be both feminine and glamorous.

“I prefer trousers for daily wear,” she explained. “I’m small, but I have a long stride. I need to be able to move about freely. Years ago, a newspaperman wrote that I had a ‘titillating boyishness’ to me, and that’s my favorite thing a man’s ever said about me. What could be better than having a bit of the titillating boy about you?”

Celia gave a puzzled look, but I understood Edna’s point exactly and loved this idea.

Then we came to the trunk filled with Edna’s blouses. So many of them had quaint jabots, or ornamental ruffles. This attention to detail, I grasped, is how a woman could wear a suit and still look like a woman. There was one high-necked crepe de chine chemise in the softest pink you could imagine, and it made my heart ache with longing when I touched it. Then I pulled out an elegant little ivory number of finest silk, with tiny pearl buttons at the neck, and the most infinitesimal sleeves.

“What an impeccable blouse!” I said.

“Thank you for noticing, Vivian. You’ve got a good eye. That little blouse came from Coco Chanel herself. She gave it to me—if you can imagine Coco ever giving somebody something for free! It must have been a weak moment for her. Perhaps she had food poisoning that day.”

Celia and I both gasped, and I cried out, “You know Coco Chanel?”

“Nobody knows Coco, my dear. She would never allow for that. But I can say that we are acquainted. I met her years ago when I was acting in Paris and living on the Quai Voltaire. That was back when I was learning French—which is a good language to learn as an actress, because it teaches you how to use your mouth.”

Well, that was the most sophisticated combination of words I’d ever heard.

“But what’s she like?”

“What’s Coco like?” Edna paused, closed her eyes, and seemed to be searching for the right words. She opened her eyes and smiled. “Coco Chanel is a gifted, ambitious, cunning, unloved, and hardworking eel of a woman. I’m more afraid of her taking dominion over the world than I am of Mussolini or Hitler. No, I’m teasing—she’s a fine enough specimen of a person. One is only ever in danger from Coco when she starts calling you her friend. But she’s far more interesting than I’m making her sound. Girls, what do you think of this hat?”

She had pulled from a box a homburg—like something a man would wear, but not at all. Soft and plum colored, and dressed with a single red feather. She modeled it for us with a bright smile.

“It’s wonderful on you,” I said. “But it doesn’t look like anything I’m seeing people wearing right now.”

“Thank you,” said Edna. “I can’t bear the hats that are in style just now. I can’t endure a hat that substitutes a pile of miscellany on the top of your head for the pleasing simplicity of a line. A homburg will always give you a perfect line, if it’s specially made for you. The wrong hat makes me feel cross and oppressed. And there are so many wrong hats. But alas—milliners need to eat, too, I suppose.”

“I love this,” said Celia, pulling out a long, yellow silk scarf, and wrapping it around her head.

“Well done, Celia!” said Edna. “You are the infrequent sort of girl who looks good with a scarf wrapped around her head. How fortunate for you! If I wore that scarf in that manner, I would look like a dead saint. Do you like it? You may keep it.”

“Gee, thanks!” said Celia, parading around Edna’s room, searching for a mirror.

At some point, Edna’s husband walked in, but he was inconsequential (handsome as he was) compared to this exotic

wardrobe. She kissed his cheek and sent him on his way, saying, “There’s no room in here yet for a man, Arthur. Go have a drink somewhere and entertain yourself until these dear girls are done, and then I promise I’ll find space for you and your one sorry little duffel bag.”

He sulked a bit, but did her bidding.

After he left, Celia said, “Say, but he’s a looker, ain’t he!”

I thought Edna might be offended, but she only laughed. “He is indeed, as you say, a looker. I’ve never before seen his like, to be candid with you. We’ve been married nearly a decade, and I haven’t grown tired of looking at him yet.”

“But he’s young.”

I could’ve kicked Celia for her rudeness, but Edna, again, didn’t seem to mind. “Yes, dear Celia. He is young—far younger than me, in fact. One of my greatest achievements, I daresay.”

“You don’t get worried?” Celia pressed on. “There’s gotta be a lot of young dishes out there who want to put the moves on him.”

“I don’t worry about dishes, my dear. Dishes break.”

“Ooh!” said Celia, and her face lit up with something like awe.

“When you have found your own success as a woman,” explained Edna, “you may do such a fun thing as marry a handsome man who is very much your junior. Consider it a reward for all your hard work. When first I met Arthur, he was just a boy—a set carpenter for an Ibsen play I was doing. An Enemy of the People. I was Mrs. Stockmann, and oh, it’s a dull role. But meeting Arthur livened things up for me during the run of that play—and he has kept things lively for me since. I’m awfully fond of him, girls. He’s my third husband, of course. Nobody’s first husband looks like Arthur. My first husband was a civil servant, and I don’t mind saying that he made love like a civil servant, too. My second husband was a theater director. I won’t make that mistake again. And now there is dear Arthur, so handsome and yet so cozy. My gift, till the end of my days. I’m so fond of him that I even took his name—though my theater friends warned me not to, since my own name was already well known. I’d never taken the names of any of my

other husbands before, you see. But Edna Parker Watson has a nice ring to it, don’t you agree? And what about you, Celia? Have you ever had any husbands?”

I wanted to say: She’s had many husbands, Edna—but only one of them was her own.

“Yeah,” said Celia. “I had a husband once. He played the saxophone.”

“Oh, dear. So we may assume that didn’t last?”

“Yeah, you guessed it, lady.” Celia drew a line across her own throat, to indicate, I guess, the death of love.

“And what about you, Vivian? Married? Engaged?”

“No,” I said.

“Anybody special?”

“Nobody special,” I said, and something about the way I uttered the word “special” made Edna burst out laughing.

“Ah, but you have a somebody, I can see.”

“She has a few somebodies,” Celia said, and I couldn’t help but smile.

“Good work, Vivian!” Edna gave me an appraising second look. “You’re growing more interesting to me by the moment!”

—

Later on in the evening—it must have been well after midnight by then—Peg came in to check on us. She settled into a deep chair with

a nightcap in her hand and watched with pleasure as Celia and I finished unpacking Edna’s trunks.

“Gadzooks, Edna,” Peg said. “You have a lot of clothes.”

“This is a mere fraction of the collection, Peg. You should see my wardrobe back home.” She paused. “Oh, dear. I’ve just now remembered again that I’ve lost everything back home. My contribution to the war effort, I suppose. Evidently Mr. Goering needed to destroy my more-than-three-decades-in-the-making

costume collection as part of his plan for making the world safe for the Aryan race. I don’t quite see how it served him, but the sad deed is done.”

I marveled at how lightly she seemed to take the destruction of her home. So, apparently, did Peg, who said, “I must admit, Edna, I was expecting to find you a bit more shaken up by all this.”

“Oh, Peg, you know me better than that! Or have you forgotten how good I am at adjusting to circumstances? You can’t lead the sort of patched-together life that I’ve lived and get too sentimental about things.”

Peg grinned. “Show people,” she said to me, shaking her head with an insider’s appreciation.

Celia had just now pulled out an elegant floor-length, high-necked, black crepe gown with long sleeves, and a small pearl brooch set deliberately off center.

“Now that’s something,” said Celia.

“You would think so, wouldn’t you?” said Edna, holding the dress up to herself. “But I’ve had a difficult relationship with this dress. Black can be the smartest of colors, or it can be the dowdiest, depending on the line. I wore this gown only once, and I felt like a Greek widow in it. But I’ve kept it because I like the pearl detail.”

I approached the dress, respectfully. “May I?” I asked.

Edna handed me the dress and I laid it out on the sofa, touching it here and there, and getting a better sense of it.

“The problem isn’t the color,” I diagnosed. “The problem is the sleeves. The material of the sleeves is heavier than the material of the bodice—can you see that? This dress should have chiffon sleeves—or none at all, which would be better for you, petite as you are.”

Edna studied the gown and then looked at me with surprise.

“I believe you’re on to something there, Vivian.”

“I could fix it for you, if you’ll trust me with it.”

“Our Vivvie can sew like the devil!” Celia said, proudly.

“It’s true,” put in Peg. “Vivian is our resident dress professor.”