As the stock market ratcheted upward in the mid-eighties, Melvin watched his net worth near a million dollars. But other factors in his life were not so bullish. The AIDS epidemic hit the theatrical community in New York with a vengeance and both Melvin and Marc lost many of their lifelong friends. And Melvin’s career seemed to have peaked; he was no longer in demand as one of the premier directors.
One night on his way home from the theater, Marc was mugged by a group of teenagers. They beat him up, stole his watch and wallet, and left him bleeding in the street. As a saddened Melvin ministered to his friend’s wounds, he made a major decision. They would leave New York. He would sell his stocks and convert his fortune to fixed income investments. They would buy a home where it was warm and safe, where they could relax and read and swim together. Maybe they would do some community theater work if it was available, but that was not the most important thing. What was important was that they share Melvin’s remaining years.
Melvin ran into Amanda Winchester one day while he and Marc were on vacation in Key West. They had worked together briefly on a project that had never panned out twenty years before. Amanda told him that she had just formed a local amateur repettory group to do two Tennessee Williams plays a year. Would he be interested in directing them?
Melvin and Marc moved to Key West and started to build their house on Sugarloaf Key. Both of them thoroughly enjoyed their work with the Key West Players. The actors were everyday people, dedicated and earnest. Some had had a little acting experience. But for the most part, the secretaries, housewives, and retail clerks, plus officers and enlisted men from the U.S. Naval Air Station, were all novices with one thing in common. Each of them viewed his few days on the stage as his moment of glory, and he wanted to make the best of it.
Commander Winters came out of the dressing room first. He was wearing his uniform (he had come right over to rehearsal from the base) and looked a bit stiff and uncertain. He sat down in one of the theater chairs next to Amanda Winchester. “I was really glad to see you back again,” said Amanda, taking his hand. “I thought your Goober last fall was just right.”
Winters thanked her politely. Amanda changed the subject. “So how are things out at the base? I read an article the other day in the Miami Herald about all the modern weapons the Navy has these days, pilotless submarines and vertical takeoff fighters and search and destroy torpedoes. There seems to be no limit to our ability to build more powerful and dangerous toys for war. Are you involved with all that?”
“Only in a limited way,” Commander Winters answered pleasantly. Then, anticipating the discussion with the director, he leaned forward so that he could see Melvin and Marc as well as Amanda. “I apologize if I was a little flat tonight,” he began. “We have a couple of big problems out at the base and I may have been a bit distracted, but I’ll be ready tomorrow — ”
“Oh, no,” said Melvin, interrupting him, “that’s not what I wanted to talk to you about. It’s your first scene with Tiffani . . . Ah, here she comes. Let’s go up on the stage.”
Tiffani Thomas was almost seventeen years old and a junior at Key West High School. A Navy brat all her life, Tiffani had gone to seven different schools in her eleven years since kindergarten. Her father was a noncommissioned officer who had been assigned to Key West about three months before. She had been recommended to Melvin Burton by the high school drama teacher when it became apparent that Denise Wright simply could not play the role of Charlotte Goodall.
“She hasn’t done anything for me yet except rehearse,” the teacher had said of Tiffani, “but she learns her lines quickly and has a quality, an intensity I guess, that sets her apart from the others. And she’s clearly been in plays before. I don’t know if she can get ready in three weeks, but she’s my first choice by far.”
Tiffani probably would not have been called beautiful by her Florida classmates. Her features were too much out of the ordinary to be be properly appreciated by most high school boys. Her assets were olive eyes, quiet and brooding, light freckles on a pale complexion, long red eyelashes tinged with brown, and a magnificent head of thick auburn hair. Her carriage was proper and erect, not slumped like most teenagers, so she probably seemed aloof to her peers. “Striking,” Amanda called her, accurately, when she first saw Tiffani.
She was standing on the stage alone in her short-sleeved blouse and jeans as the two men approached. Her hair was pulled back in a ponytail the way her father liked it. Tiffani was very nervous. She was worried about what Mr. Burton was going to say to her. She had overheard the buyer who was playing Hannah Jelkes say that Melvin might do away with the part of Charlotte altogether if “the new girl can’t hack it. “I have worked so hard for this part, Tiffani thought. Oh please, please, don’t let it be bad news.
Tiffani was looking down at her feet when Melvin Burton and Commander Winters joined her on the stage. “Well, now,” Melvin began, “let’s get straight to the point. The first scene with you two in the hotel room is not working. In fact, it’s a disaster. We must make some changes.”
Melvin saw that Tiffani was not looking at him. Gently he put his hand under her chin and lifted it until her eyes met his. “You must look at me, child, for I’m trying to tell you some very important things.” He noticed that her eyes were brimming with water and his years of experience told him immediately what was wrong. He leaned forward and whispered so that nobody else could hear, “I said we would make some changes, not do away with the scene. Now get yourself together and listen up.”
Burton regained his director’s voice and turned toward Winters. “In this scene, Commander, your character Shannon and young Miss Goodall engage in foreplay that leads to intercourse later that night. In the following scene they are discovered, in flagrante delicto, by the confused Miss Fellowes. And that establishes the desperate situation causing Shannon to run to Maxine and Fred at the Costa Verde.
“But our scene does not work right now because nobody watching it will recognize what you two are doing as foreplay. Now I can change the movement to make it easier — putting Shannan already on the bed when he discovers Charlotte behind the door would be one way — and I can change Charlotte’s clothing so that she looks less like a little girl, but there’s one thing that I cannot do . . .” Melvin stopped and looked back and forth from Tiffani to Winters. They were both staring blankly at him.
“Come here, come here, both of you,” Melvin said, gesturing impatiently with his right hand. He dropped his voice again. He took Tiffani’s hand with his left and Commander Winters’ with his right. “You two are lovers for one night in this play. It is essential that the audience believe this or they will not understand completely why Shannon is at the end of his rope, like the iguana. Shannon is desperate because he was originally locked out of his church for giving in to the same lust . . .”
They were both listening but Melvin’s director’s intuition told him he was still not reaching them. He had another idea. He took Tiffani’s hand and put it into the commander’s, closing his own hand over theirs for emphasis. “Look at each other for a moment. That’s right.” He turned to Winters. “She’s a beautiful young woman, isn’t she, Commander?”
Their eyes were in contact. “And he’s a handsome man, isn’t he, Tiffani? I want you to imagine that you have an uncontrollable desire to touch him, to kiss him, to be naked with him.” Tiffani blushed. Winters fidgeted. Melvin was fairly certain that he saw a spark, albeit a fleeting one.
“Now tomorrow night,” he continued, looking at Tiffani and taking his hand off theirs, “I want you to capture that feeling when you’re hiding in his room. I want it to explode out of you when he notices that you are there. And you, Commander,” he looked back at the middle-aged naval officer, “you are torn between an overpowering passion to possess this young girl physically and the almost certain knowledge that it will be the final ruination of both your life and your soul. You are hopelessly trapped. Remember, you fear that God has already forsaken you for your past sins. But, despite that, you finally relinquish yourself to your lust and commit another unpardonable sin.”