Chapter 1

Rosalie

“Rosalie, would you please pass the gravy?” Daisy asks, barely taking a pause in her story about the gossip she heard this week at MGM. I’m surprised she can keep eating at the rate she’s carrying on. In spite of myself, I can’t stop listening though. She swears it’s all gospel truth.

“So then I heard that not only did they make Judy Garland wear these weird things called nose discs inside her nostrils to make her nose look prettier on film, and fake caps on her teeth, they wrapped her chest so tight, she could barely breathe because they didn’t want her bosoms bouncing around. I guess there were some rather nasty remarks made during the early filming before they settled on that solution.” She shovels some potatoes and gravy into her mouth and then continues after barely swallowing. “And I also heard she was given lots of pills. Some to keep her awake, and some to get her to go to sleep at night. Can you imagine? It’s like that poor girl has no say in her own life. And they made her take pills to keep her weight down too. She’s just a little bitty thing! But it was important to them that she look like a young girl about ten years old, even though she’s sixteen. I bet she’s glad she’s done with the shooting of that movie. It’s going to be released soon.”

My heart drops, and I put down my fork. I’m not fat at all, but I do have a healthy appetite. Maybe that’s why I haven’t been able to get any movie parts yet. I look at the mashed potatoes on my plate, and suddenly the mound looks like it’s laughing at me and challenging me. I’ve always been happy with the meals we have here at the boardinghouse, but now I wonder if I’m too happy about food.

I work different waitressing shifts at the Beverly Hills Hotel, and this week I’m on breakfast and lunch. I prefer the lunch and dinner shift because I get better tips, but I’ll switch to that next week. I can’t complain. Waitressing jobs are hard to come by in Los Angeles because there are so many ambitious young women flooding into town all the time. It always sounds to me like the 1849 Gold Rush when hopeful miners flooded into California with hopes of striking it rich. Now it’s hopes of another kind of golden success, but the level of determination and naïveté are certainly the same. Experienced waitresses are a dime a dozen, so you just know that a few minor slips in your performance means they’ll give your job to the next girl before you can blink. I’m the envy of most of my friends because I often get to serve folks who are either studio executives or actors and actresses. Some of them are pretty nice, but not all of them. I guess that’s people.

Daisy is the only girl in the boardinghouse who actually works in one of the studios. She works in costumes at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (she usually calls it MGM), so I’m sure there are lots and lots of stories floating around about the making of The Wizard of Oz there. I’m just surprised anyone talks about any of it. From the stories she’s sharing, I would think the studios would have everyone sworn to secrecy.

“Do you think they treat all their actors and actresses that way, Daisy?” I ask. “Or is this just because she’s so young?”

Daisy shakes her head sadly. “I don’t think she’s a special case, but the other stories I’ve heard are probably more about carelessness than actual abuse. You know, Buddy Ebsen was the original actor hired to be the tin woodsman, and he was hospitalized because of the makeup they put on him to make him look like he was covered with tin. He got so sick from it his lungs almost shut down, so they had to hire Jack Haley to take his place. Haley’s been sick too from the new makeup they came up with, but it was just an eye infection they could cure, so they’re making him continue with the role. Also, poor Margaret Hamilton—you know, the Wicked Witch of the West? She got second and third degree burns when she left Munchkinland because their safety precautions didn’t work. Also they used a stunt double for her when she was supposed to ride her broomstick that was shooting out fire, but the broomstick was made out of a pipe that exploded! The stuntwoman was hurt so badly, she had internal injuries and had to have a hysterectomy and her leg was all gouged up pretty badly too. Isn’t that just awful? I don’t think I’d ever want to be an actress after hearing this!

“They try to keep it all quiet on the set, but you know how people love to talk. The studio doesn’t care much about anything but the money they’re going to make from their movie, and they would come down like gangbusters on anyone who went to the press with these stories. I do love making costumes though.” She looks down at her plate, seeming to have run out of scary stories for now. But then she looks up and laughs. “I’m probably pretty safe from harm unless my sewing machine falls on me or I get stuck with a pin. But anyways, don’t tell anyone I told you all of this because I could end up in a real jam if my name got back to the studio bigwigs.”

“Who would I tell anyway?” I laugh. “I don’t know anyone.” Just as I thought, she’s not supposed to be blabbing about this stuff.

“You never know who you might meet at work, Rosalie. You rub shoulders with famous people all the time.”

“I see them and hand them their food, but I’m virtually invisible to them, and we certainly never get into any long conversations,” I protest. “You probably have more contact with actors and actresses than I do when you do fittings and such.”

“Yeah, maybe. They really don’t pay us much attention though, do they?”

I can’t help but hope that one of these days that might change. In the meantime, I go to work and go to acting classes. Once in a while I try to get a part as an extra, but so far that hasn’t panned out. I’m hopeless when it comes to singing, so voice lessons would be a waste of time, but I’m also considering some dance classes. We’ll see.

I sure don’t plan to sling hash forever, even in a posh place like the Beverly Hills Hotel. I have ambition!