So bland.
Celia turned back to us and offered us some raisins. We both took her up on it. And then the three of us sat in the kitchen, eating our oatmeal quietly, all aware that Celia had staked her claim. I was hers. She would make my breakfast. Harry was a visitor.
Connor started crying, so Harry took her and changed her. Luisa went downstairs to grab the laundry. And when we were alone, Celia said, “Max Girard is doing a movie called Three A.M. for Paramount. It’s supposed to be a real art-house piece, and I think you should do it.”
I had kept in touch with Max, on and off, since he directed me in Boute-en-Train. I never forgot that it was with him that I was able to catapult my name to the top again. But I knew Celia couldn’t stand him. He was too overt in his interest in me, too salacious about it. Celia used to jokingly call him Pepé Le Pew. “You think I should do a movie with Max?”
Celia nodded. “They offered it to me, but it makes more sense for you. Regardless of the fact that I think he’s a Neanderthal, I can recognize that the man makes good movies. And this role is exactly your thing.”
“What do you mean?”
Celia got up and took my bowl with hers. She rinsed them both in the sink and then turned back to me, leaning against it. “It’s a sexy part. They need a real bombshell.”
I shook my head. “I’m someone’s mother now. The whole world knows it.”
Celia shook her head. “That’s exactly why you have to do it.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re a sexual woman, Evelyn. You’re sensual, and you’re beautiful, and you’re desirable. Don’t let them take that away from you. Don’t let them desexualize you. Don’t let your career be on their terms. What do you want to do? You want to play a mom in every role you take from now on? You want to play only nuns and teachers?”
“No,” I said. “Of course not. I want to play everything.”
“So play everything,” she said. “Be bold. Do what no one expects you to do.”
“People will say it’s unbecoming.”
“The Evelyn I love doesn’t care about that.”
I closed my eyes and listened to her, nodding. She wanted me to do it for me. I really believe that. She knew I wouldn’t be happy being limited, being relegated. She knew I wanted to continue to make people talk, to tantalize, to surprise. But the part she wasn’t mentioning, the part I’m not even sure she truly understood, was that she also wanted me to do it because she didn’t want me to change.
She wanted to be with a bombshell.
It’s always been fascinating to me how things can be simultaneously true and false, how people can be good and bad all in one, how someone can love you in a way that is beautifully selfless while serving themselves ruthlessly.
It is why I loved Celia. She was a very complicated woman who always kept me guessing. And here she had surprised me one more time.
She had said, Go, have a baby. But she had meant to add, Just don’t act like a mother.
Fortunately and unfortunately for her, I had absolutely no intention of being told what to do or of being manipulated into a single thing.
So I read the script, and I took a few days and thought about it. I asked Harry what he thought. And then I woke up one morning and thought, I want the part. I want it because I want to show I’m still my own woman.
I called Max Girard and told him I was interested if he was interested. And he was.
“But I’m surprised you want to do this,” Max said. “You are one hundred percent sure?”
“Is there nudity?” I asked. “I’m OK with the idea. Really. I look fantastic, Max. It’s not a problem.” I did not look fantastic, nor did I feel fantastic. It was a problem. But it was a solvable problem, and solvable problems aren’t really problems, are they?
“No,” Max said, laughing. “Evelyn, you could be ninety-seven years old, and the whole world would line up to see your chest.”
“Then what are you talking about?”
“Don,” he said.
“Don who?”
“Your part,” he said. “The whole movie. All of it.”