Theater and the Sally Slap

This is a continuation of last week's story.

If you haven't read "The Opening Night Brawl" yet, you'll want to click here and do that before you read this next part:

https://thiscantbebroccoli.blogspot.com/2020/07/theater-and-opening-night-brawl.html

The person I got in touch with after speaking with the person I'll call Woodstock was the character I named "Sally."

Here's the interview:

ME:  Did you get a chance to read the interview I sent you?

SALLY:  Yes.

ME:  What did you think?

SALLY:  I think it was a load of horses____.  That's what I think.

ME:  You don't think _____ was being truthful?

SALLY:  I think she was a f____-ing liar.  I think she's always been a f_____-ing liar, and I don't trust her to tell me the time of the damn day.

ME:  Did you slap her that night?

SALLY:  Yes, I did.

ME:  She said she doesn't know why.

SALLY:  And she's a f____-ing liar.

ME:  So why did you slap her?

SALLY:  She's standing there watching Charlie and Pigpen fight and I see her laughing and joking like it's funny.  This is my opening night.  I was having a good night and now I need to deal with this bull___?

ME:  But that wasn't her fault.  That was between Charlie and Pigpen.

SALLY:  Who do you think instigated it?

ME:  She instigated it?

SALLY:  She was the one calling Pigpen--She was his little stool-pigeon, giving him information about what was going on at the theater after Charlie kicked his ass out.

ME:  So she was responsible for him being there on opening night?

SALLY:  She told him--She told Pigpen all these things Charlie was allegedly saying about him at rehearsals and Pigpen had enough and he showed up fit to be tied, and then that's how they got into it.

ME:  But that's still not Woodstock's fault.

SALLY:  So you're her defender now, huh?

ME:  I'm not defending her.  I'm just saying--

SALLY:  She knew he was going to be there, and I had my husband get him to go home--

ME:  Your husband saw him?

SALLY:  He was in the lobby before the show--My husband was there to see the show--and he saw Pigpen.  He's talking to Woodstock, and my husband knows the whole story of Pigpen and Charlie, and he goes over to him and tells him, you know, Pigpen you gotta get out of here.  Charlie doesn't want you here and we're trying to have a nice time tonight.  Woodstock turns to him and tells him 'Mind your business, _____.'  My husband isn't like me. I have a temper. I would have clocked her ass right there, but he's better than me, he just tells Pigpen, 'Please leave. We're not trying to have trouble tonight.'  Pigpen leaves.

ME:  He did leave?

SALLY:  He did leave.

ME:  That's why nobody saw him inside the theater or at intermission?

SALLY:  Correct.

ME:  So why did he come back?

SALLY:  Because I think that little _____ called him up and told him to come back.

ME:  Woodstock?

SALLY:  Yeah.

ME:  Why would she do that?

SALLY:  This is awhile ago when you had pay phones.  We had a pay phone in the lobby.  Patty saw Woodstock on the pay phone at intermission.  Who was she calling?

ME:  But you don't know she was talking to Pigpen?

SALLY:  Why'd he come back then?

ME:  He could have just done that on his own.

SALLY:  Pigpen had to be--He was a hothead, but you had to prod him to do everything.  He wouldn't come back after being sent away like that.

ME:  So he comes back, he and Charlie get into a fight, and you see Woodstock laughing.

SALLY:  Laughing because she ruined my night.

ME:  Well, it wasn't just your night.

SALLY:  Excuse you, yes it was.  I had worked very hard.

ME:  I'm not saying you shouldn't be upset, but it was also Charlie's night and--

SALLY:  I didn't say it wasn't, but you're asking me, right then, why I slapped her. I slapped her because I had worked hard to get to that night--We all had, yes--and she's laughing because the whole damn thing is ruined and she thinks it's a joke.

ME:  She said she didn't like you.

SALLY:  I knew that.

ME:  She wasn't sure if you knew--

SALLY:  Yes, I did know that.

ME:  How did you know?

SALLY:  I could just tell.  I'm not stupid.  I'm not--

ME:  Okay.

SALLY:  I'm not blind.

ME:  Why didn't she like you?

SALLY:  You're asking me that?

ME:  Yes.

SALLY:  I think it's because I was better than her.

ME:  At what?

SALLY:  Everything.  Acting.  Singing.  I could dance.  She couldn't dance.

ME:  Okay.

SALLY:  That's why she wanted to ruin my night?

ME:  You think she wanted to--

SALLY:  She was mad she didn't get the part I got, and she wanted to ruin my night so she started that fight between Pigpen and Charlie.

ME:  But she didn't.  They had a falling out at the cast party before that, didn't they?

SALLY:  But there weren't any problems after that until Pigpen showed up.

ME:  But it was still his choice to show up.

SALLY:  He was under her spell.

ME:  She's not a hypnotist, she's--

SALLY:  She was sleeping with him.

ME:  With Pigpen?

SALLY:  Yes.  That's why she didn't get the part in the show.

ME:  In the show you were doing that night?

SALLY:  Yes, because she and Pigpen were trying to get Charlie out of the company and it didn't work.  Charlie found out and he didn't want to work with her anymore.

ME:  Because--

SALLY:  Because he couldn't trust ______.

ME:  So you see her laughing at the fight that's happening and you know she doesn't like you and you think she did this all on purpose--set this all up to ruin your night--

SALLY:  Yes.

ME:  And you walk over and slap her.

SALLY:  Yes.

ME:  Do you understand how some people would say that striking someone like that, even if everything else you said is accurate, is not right?  I mean, it's an assault.

SALLY:  I don't really give a _____ what anybody thinks about it.  I did it.  It's done.  Would I do it again?  I don't know.  I got mad.  I don't get mad--None of us were the types where you'd get mad, and you'd snicker behind somebody's back forever.  Eventually, you're going to get smacked.  That's what I did.  I smacked her.  No harder than when you mouth off at your mother or your father.

ME:  Not every parent slaps their kid when they mouth off.

SALLY:  Might be better off if more people did.

ME:  Do you know--Okay, do you know what was going on with Linus and Schroeder?  Why they went through the glass in the lobby?

SALLY:  I don't know about that.  Schroeder was a ____ _____.  He was always going nuts and breaking ____.

ME:  Woodstock thinks Schroeder might have said something bad about Charlie.

SALLY:  That wouldn't have started a fight with Schroeder.

ME:  Why not?

SALLY:  Because Linus didn't give a ____ about Charlie?

ME:  Really?

SALLY:  He said he did, but not really.  Not enough to put Schroeder though a window.

ME:  And do you know what was going on in the ladies room?

SALLY:  The fight with Patty and Marcie?

ME:  Patty and Marcie were fighting in there?

SALLY:  Yeah.

ME:  But they were in the theater with Woodstock.

SALLY:  Who said that?

ME:  Woodstock?

SALLY:  Bull____.  Nobody was in the theater.  Everybody was in the lobby.

ME:  She said that she was in the theater with Patty and Marcie, then the police came, and then they went out through the dressing rooms, and they saw Franklin in the parking lot, and they took off--or Woodstock took off, I don't know if--

SALLY:  The fight in the ladies room happened after the police left.

ME:  You were still there after the police left?

SALLY:  I was helping Lucy clean up and that's when the fight was.

ME:  In the ladies room?

SALLY:  Yes.

ME:  What was it about?

SALLY:  Those two fought all the time.

ME:  It sounds like you all fought a lot.

SALLY:  We had some big personalities back then.

ME:  Who broke up the fight in the ladies room?

SALLY:  Nobody.  They knocked themselves around--

ME:  But Woodstock said somebody came out of the ladies room covered in blood.

SALLY:  I didn't see that.

ME:  Do you know who got arrested that night?

SALLY:  Linus, Schroeder, Pigpen, and another guy.

ME:  The guy that went through the concessions table with Charlie?

SALLY:  That was--I don't remember who that was.  It might have been.

ME:  Where was your husband during all this?

SALLY:  I sent him home right after the show to let the babysitter go home.

ME:  So he didn't see any of it?

SALLY:  No.

ME:  Do you know where Charlie disappeared to when all this was over?

SALLY:  I don't.

ME:  Do you know anybody who might?

SALLY:  Lucy.

ME:  But he took off on Lucy.

SALLY:  Then I don't know.

ME:  Did you keep doing theaters after that?

SALLY:  I did some shows in ______ with ______, and then I had another kid--I had my son--and I had to take a break, and then, I never came back from the break.

ME:  Do you miss it?

SALLY:  I do.  You know, I had fun.

ME:  Even with all that you had fun?

SALLY:  That shit was the fun part.  I didn't like--I liked being in front of people, acting and singing, but I didn't like having to learn all those parts and go there every night, but it was fun when ____ would get wild and we'd have--that's what the fun was.

ME:  The brawls?

SALLY:  That was the only big brawl.  But you're here twenty years--twenty-five years later asking me about it.  You're not asking me about the shows we did, so--

ME:  So what do you think that means?

SALLY:  I think a lot of people do theater, and a lot of them are boring and they do boring theater, and we weren't boring and neither was the theater we did.

ME:  You think if you all weren't so, um, fiery, uh--

SALLY:  (Laughing.)  Fiery's nice.

ME:  --That you could have did the work you did.

SALLY:  I think we were a fun group.  It sounds bad to say we were going at each other and getting into fights, but it keeps life interesting to be like that.  I never liked the nights where we would open and everybody would stand around talking about how much they liked the show eating crackers and drinking bad wine.  I hated all that.  I liked this better.

ME:  You liked getting your hair ripped out in a clump?

SALLY:  Is that what Woodstock told you?

ME:  She said she got a clump of your hair.

SALLY:  I don't remember that, but I remember giving that _____ a black eye.

ME:  You sound proud.

SALLY:  I'm very proud.  I wasn't a punk.  You telling me that's not something to be proud of?

ME:  It just seems like something a lot of people would be ashamed about?

SALLY:  Would you be ashamed about it?

ME:  If I gave someone a back eye?

SALLY:  Yes.

ME:  Um...not if they deserved it.

SALLY:  Look at you being honest.  There you go.  That's why I'm proud.  You don't like me and you're going to ruin my night--I'm going to get some of mine back.  That's what I did.

ME:  What would you do if you saw her again?

SALLY:  I've seen her again.

ME:  You have?

SALLY:  Yeah, I see her all the time.  She married my little brother.

ME:  Are you ____-ing kidding me?

SALLY:  You don't know much about small towns, do you?

ME:  But she said she's never talked about this with you?

SALLY:  I don't talk with her.  I just said I see her, but we don't talk.

ME:  So what do you do?

SALLY:  We have family parties and she stands over there and I stand where I stand and we don't have any trouble.

ME:  But you fought and you never even talked about it.

SALLY:  You don't need to talk about everything.

ME:  Well, that's kind of the opposite of how I am.

SALLY:  You better be careful, you know.

ME:  Why's that?

SALLY:  Talking too much will get you into trouble.

Sally was an actress for over ten years.