The Sundance Kid

Turns out Colin was right, I could have packed the clothes I needed for the Sundance trip in a carry-on. Paul Reiser, Julia and I were the only people in our party who brought their biggest cases. But they were performing. I missed the email that said there would not be time to go snowboarding, so I needn’t have bought new (and expensive) ski pants and coat.

At least my case wasn’t overweight by two pounds like Paul’s and I was able to take the manuscript for his latest book, Familyhood, thus saving him $95 in excess baggage.

It pained me to have to pay $25 each way to check in a suitcase filled with outfit changes and six pairs of gloves in different shades that I didn’t use. Lesson learned.

I didn’t care that Paul could only get Julia into the first class airport lounge with him. Lori (Julia’s manager), Joan and I were happy in the Malibu bar drinking champagne and Bloody Marys with a surfboard as a table.

The gigs at the ASCAP Music Café on Main Street were a triumph. I loved being in the green room with the young rock bands who were also on the bill, so full of enthusiasm and excited about being on the road. Our favorites were The Manchester Orchestra, who became firm pals.

Paul was ready for a celebratory whisky after the last gig, but the young rockers had drunk the two liters ASCAP provided. Well, it was four o’clock in the afternoon. I went and found Paul some single malt and therefore proved myself invaluable on tour.

Julia and I were in an apartment with a fan that blew cold air - the Reisers, meanwhile, were slumming it in the Waldorf Astoria.

Thanks to Paul’s great celebrity, we were invited to many places and events where companies line up to give away their wares. I brought home hoodies with earphones sewn in, the headphones of Colin’s dreams, Ralph Lauren aftershave, a camera, drinking bottles, Moleskine notebooks, jewelry, a bracelet to be worn at all times to make me “balanced,” sweatshirts, ski hats and a pair of Shape-Ups. The vodka in my rucksack was confiscated at the airport, but my big case was able to hold the rest of my bounty.

We were determined to see at least one movie, and let Paul and Paula choose. It’s not as easy as you might think to see a movie at the Sundance Film Festival. The good ones are sold out well in advance and you need to get to the main office, a bus ride away, to collect your tickets. It’s incredibly well organized, though, with free and abundant buses and shuttles. Each shuttle stop has a volunteer on hand to point you in the right direction.

With great ceremony, Lori handed out our tickets, collected earlier by a nice lady from ASCAP. We had to be at the Egyptian Theatre at 9 p.m. sharp. We went for a farewell dinner before the movie, and it was there that Paul and Paula flaked, saying they were too tired. I had three words for them. Rock. And. Roll. But there was no budging them.

The rest of us raced to the cinema and were the last ones to take our seats in the packed theatre. I was sat behind the tallest couple in the world. The film was Cuban with sub-titles I had to crane my neck to see. It was a cheery tale set in 1993, where the impoverished, homeless, young protagonists deliberately get infected with AIDS so they can get a permanent bed in a hospital with regular food. There was some incest thrown in for good measure. The soundtrack was heavy metal. Death and misery and lots of suffering. Kind of the Buena Vista Anti-Social Club. It was called Ticket To Paradise and will probably win best foreign film.

The next morning at the airport, I gave Paul a hard time for a) choosing such a bleak film and b) not even sitting through it with us.

There’s talk of gigs in New York, San Francisco and possibly the UK in the late spring. I’ll be traveling light. And choosing the movie.

Driven to distraction

When we were kids and went out on a day trip, my brother, sister and I would pretend Dad was our carriage driver and command: “Home, James. And don’t spare the horses.”

So it was especially poignant that the limo taking Julia and myself to The Tonight Show was driven by a man called James. Despite my protestations, James insisted on calling each of us “Ma’am.” It’s just plain wrong that any human being should have to defer to another, but that didn’t stop me asking James to stop texting the studio every five minutes while driving in the fast lane.

He explained that everything is timed down to the last minute and he needed to keep base informed of our progress. We compromised and I did the texting for him.

It’s a big deal to be a guest on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno. Every artist with new product to push vies for the music slot. Just Julia and Paul Reiser’s luck to have a record out the same week as Annie Lennox, Bruce Springsteen and Rod Stewart — but they all made the cut that week.

The band had already played through “Unsung Hero” (from Julia and Paul’s album “Unusual Suspects”) twice, then had to wait around several hours for the camera rehearsal. Julia had received her five-minute warning to be in her place. I could tell from the TV screen in our dressing room that the band were already on their marks, including Paul.

Julia’s singing teacher advises performers to keep detached from emotional stories on a gig day, so they can keep in the zone and ease those nerves. Just as Julia was putting on her boots, her manager, Lori, told us about the last episode of The Big C (on Showtime) where the character played by Laura Linney has terminal cancer. Her son found a garage full of gifts and letters for the rest of his life that she wouldn’t be able to give him because she’ll be dead.

I hope Paul, the band and The Tonight Show staff don’t think Julia was being a diva and kept them waiting on purpose, she was just trying to compose herself after sobbing like a baby at the sadness of the story.

It’s been a fantastic, roller-coaster week: The Tonight Show, then two triumphant gigs at The Catalina Jazz Club in Hollywood. When I wasn’t pulling Julia’s boots off after the shows, making her buckets of chamomile tea, flat ironing her hair and feeding her dog (and her neighbor’s dog), I was collecting Marley from school en route to the gig and dropping her off at Grandma’s.

Marley likes to play I Spy. This was the first time she ever beat me. I still can’t believe I didn’t get “sea” as I was driving her along Pacific Coast Highway. Once she had tired of that game we moved on to more philosophical questions. “Do you believe in God?” my favorite five-year-old asked. I side-stepped the issue and marveled at the weather.

My sisterly duties also included dropping off Marley’s friend, Charlotte, aged four. They were discussing, between fits of giggles, how boys like to kiss girls.

Marley: “…and some girls kiss other girls.”

Charlotte (howling with derisive laughter): “No they don’t! Girls can’t kiss other girls!”

Marley: “Yes they can. Girls can marry another girl if they want to.”

Charlotte: “No they can’t! Girls can only marry boys.”

Marley: “They can. Ask Claire. Claire? A girl can marry another girl if she wants to, can’t she?”

Claire: “I spy with my little eye something beginning with S.”

Marley: “Sky.”

Claire: “Correct.”

S#*! my mum says

If Oscar Wilde was right and all women become like their mothers, you can forgive me for feeling a little anxious after Mum and Dad’s trip to LA.

Not that they are losing their marbles, far from it, but they have been known to tell the same story several times a day. And the fact they must have the TV on maximum volume (and it’s still not loud enough for them) has done permanent damage to my own ears.

Fearing this might be their last trip, we wanted it to be a memorable one. Julia used her air miles to fly them over Upper Class. Trouble is, having sat in the lap of luxury, they have vowed never to fly any other way.

There are advantages to living in a one bedroom apartment. Mum didn’t want to be at Julia’s in Topanga (she now calls it Satan’s Hills, because the first day we all went there on this trip, it was baking hot and the winding roads made her car-sick), so they stayed in an apartment in Santa Monica. A few years back, before she vowed never to stay in Satan’s Hills again, Mum and Dad stayed with Julia, and have only just got over the shock of coming face to face with a rat, one of the perils of country living.

I had hoped I had met all Mum’s cleanliness needs by having a pair of rubber gloves and a proper dishcloth available, having made the mistake in the past of just supplying a selection of scrubbing sponges for her to choose from. Mum measures success by how clean and tidy someone's home is.

I got it wrong this time as well. Mum needs three dishcloths: one for the kitchen and one for each toilet which she wipes down every day with disinfectant… “That’s why your father and I don’t get diseases.”

Colin and I only moved into our brand spanking new apartment two days before my parents arrived. Every box was unpacked and everything put in its proper place. I knew this would make Mum happy and proud.

During the time we were technically homeless, we loaned our furniture to some friends. Some fleas from their cat had migrated onto the bed and sofa and proceeded to bite me to buggery. Various homemade and natural remedies are being tried to eradicate the problem before we nuke the bastards with the hard stuff.

After days of scratching until I bled and fearing I might lose my mind, I finally found relief with a daily dose of antihistamine. The fact that my mother is aware of the flea situation is an even greater source of irritation. At least I’m no longer homeless.

Mum and Dad’s trip has actually been triumphant on many levels. The main highlight was Julia and Paul Reiser performing the first single, “Unsung Hero,” from their new album, to rapturous applause at a $1000-a-plate charity event in Laguna for wounded warriors. And they got to stay at the swanky Ritz Carlton in Laguna Beach (see picture above).

Watching Mum dance with her youngest grandchild brought a tear to my eye and taking Marley to kindergarten was truly memorable. I have never heard Mum laugh so hard as when Marley and I went through the steps she (Marley) had learned at Princess Ballet. Mum said it was even funnier than the Dawn French ballet sketch with Darcy Bussell. I was not trying to be funny.

My pork chop and apple sauce dinner was another highlight in three weeks of unusually disastrous meals from me. The spicy sausages were a genuine mistake, hot on the heels (if you’ll pardon the pun) of the cottage pie made with tinned tomatoes that I didn’t realize were laced with chilies (honest). “Your father and I don’t like spicy food.”

Ironically, Mum found the “guatemala” Julia made too bland. She meant guacamole. But my all-time favorite miscommunication has been Mum thinking that I said I “make a cake” every day when I actually said I “meditate” every day.

It would not be fair to give the impression that my mother is less than stellar in many ways. This is a woman in her 70s who doesn’t dye her hair, has had no Botox or facelift (she’s never even had a facial), who, if there were only four pieces of cake for her family of five, would say she’s watching her weight and will pass on the cake, even if it’s her favorite.

Her most-uttered phrase is: “Everything in moderation.” I recall her once thoroughly enjoying a raw carrot. When I offered to get her another one she said: “No thank you. I don’t want to get addicted.”

Deeply suspicious of all medication, Mum rarely takes even an aspirin. Because the midwife had the day off when Mum went into labor with Julia, Dad delivered her at home. On his own. My brother and I slept soundly in our rooms throughout as Mum didn’t make a sound.

This stoicism has come in handy for me in particular. Mum had such terrible morning sickness when she was expecting me that her doctor prescribed a new wonder drug, Thalidomide. She wouldn’t take it. She did take a course of antibiotics once when she had severe bronchitis and is currently receiving Vitamin B12 shots for pernicious anemia.

I walked back into our apartment last night, having dropped my folks at the airport and told Colin how annoying it is that Mum and Dad have started to repeat themselves. “If they’ve told me once how disappointed they are about the marine layer at the beach, they’ve told me a hundred times,” I said. Colin replied without looking up from his computer: “Yeah, you told me… about a hundred times.”

This is the Oscar Wilde quote (from The Importance of Being Ernest) in full: All women become like their mothers. That is their tragedy. No man does. That’s his.

The spirit is willing, the Fleshie's weak

Julia, along with 3,339 other foreigners, became a U.S. citizen during a swearing-in ceremony at the Los Angeles Convention Center as I and thousands of other family and friends waved our flags and cheered. Not only did she pledge allegiance to the American flag, but she promised to take up arms if required. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.

Is it against the law to impersonate an American citizen? My intentions were entirely honorable, your honor. I pretended to be Julia to save her the trouble of being on hold to Virgin Atlantic for seven hours, trying to get our parents upgraded using her air miles.

To confirm that I was indeed one Julia Fordham, the charming and most helpful Virgin representative asked for my date of birth, to which I answered in all honesty: March 10. Which was a shame, because that’s not Julia’s birthday. The Virgin rep said: “That’s not what it says here.” I managed to convince him that I had temporarily forgotten my own birthday and that it is, in fact, August 10.

Then as I confirmed my parents’ names and mine/hers, he wondered – beside himself with glee – if I might be the actual Julia Fordham of singer-songwriter fame and of whom he is the biggest fan with all of her/my records, which he proceeded to list, and wondered if I might sing a few lines from “Girlfriend”?

I thanked him for his kindness, even though there still weren’t any Upper Class upgrade seats available for Mum and Dad’s flight to L.A. and couldn’t get off the phone quick enough. I had broken into a cold sweat and was babbling so much incoherent crap and felt so sick with nerves having almost blown my cover that I wanted to puke blood.

Julia can call Virgin herself next time. But not today, as it’s her birthday. August 10. We’re celebrating quietly this year with afternoon tea – just we sisters, Marley and Marley’s friend, Lily. This birthday morning, Julia is going to hear the first playback of her newly mastered CD, co-written with Paul Reiser. This will be her 11th. She started recording her first album on her 25th birthday and here she is, quite a few years on, still in the music business, and still writing and singing great songs that people want to hear. I am so pleased and so very proud. Happy Birthday, Fleshie! (Our latest and possibly most favorite pet name for each other, as in “flesh and blood”).

They wrote the songs...

I hate to name-drop, but pull up a chair: Neil Sedaka, Stephen Bishop, Paul Reiser, Tony Orlando, Julia Fordham. And here are some names you’ve probably never heard of: Charles Fox, Dean Pitchford, Mac Davis and L. Russell Brown, yet they’ve written some of the biggest hit songs and theme tunes ever, like Killing Me Softly, Fame, Footloose, Tie A Yellow Ribbon, In The Ghetto.

They were all on the same bill at LA’s Wadsworth Theater last night for The Songs Of Our Lives, songs performed by the people who wrote them, in aid of www.fulfillment.org, a most worthy charity that helps young people realize their dream of a college education.

I am still on a high from the sheer brilliance of the evening. Tony Orlando, the only non-composer on the bill, paid homage to all songwriters who have touched our hearts and kept him in business for 50 years, especially L. Russell Brown who co-wrote most of his hits.

You might be wondering why actor/comedian Paul Reiser is mentioned in this esteemed songwriting company. Not a lot of people know this, but Paul actually majored in music and has co-written an album of great songs with my brilliant sister, Julia Fordham. The album is currently being mixed, as we say in the biz, and will be available in stores and for download on a website near you in the fall. Paul also hosted the evening and, as if it were possible, is even higher in my estimation for having made a, shall we say, mostly “mature” audience laugh heartily at his hilarious monologue that included the word “cocksucker.”

Here’s a trailer for NBC’s The Paul Reiser Show that will be broadcast early next year. Top telly.