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| Kate and Richard |
Have I told this story before?
I was living in Manhattan with my hairdresser friend who worked on Broadway (on "Cats" - you know, really tiny perm rods) and we were at the Grand Union on East 86th Street picking up some staples when we glanced, as one does, at the tabloids blaring their blather at us in fully saturated color.
Richard Burton had recently passed away and tabloid headlines were all about his messy personal life, made messier by tabloids, no doubt. The latest headline had been about Liz Taylor planning to "crash" the funeral.
Something clicked in my pointy little head. "Fred," I said, "they're talking about Kate's dad."
It was a sort of epiphany.
Fred had worked on a couple of Broadway shows that Kate Burton had been in and if she wasn't personally known by me, he certainly knew her well and talked about working with her. It occurred to me for the first time that these people we see in movies and on stage are real folk. Sure, I knew that, but this time it really sank in. They enter our lives on screen and then even our homes by way of television. We think we know them. We greedily read stories about them. We are their public and we think we own them.
I would give my neighbor some privacy over the death of her father. I'd express my sympathy. Maybe I'd take a casserole. But I'd be irate if the local paper published trashy stories about the family.
Media stars and politicians are usually fair game ...
Until you are touched by them personally. Suddenly they're off limits.
The death of Robin Williams has apparently touched a major nerve, superseding other major news events. The death of Lauren Bacall barely got any attention by comparison. But we think we know these people, that they are our friends in a way that the other tragic figures are not. The pointless violent deaths of everyone else happening at this time sicken me, but I cannot relate to them the way I can relate to someone I saw on television every week who brought me joy. My sarcastic laugh is still "Arr-arr" à la Mork.
The Kate Burton Lesson has taught me, though, that this is someone's husband, someone's dad. My casserole does not fill the void made by his death. His family deserves our sympathy and respect. He may not have been my friend, but I still feel that the tabloids and pundits who receive money for belaboring his life and death are parasites - and the ghoulish people who read or listen to them are just as bad.
Pah, what can I say? We're only human.
