My First...

My First Kiss...with a Girl

        I was twenty five years old when I made this new friend. I'm going to call her Sarah for the purpose of this story. We had seen each other at the gym a few times and ended up always talking, and before we knew it, we were spending almost every waking moment together. She had a boyfriend at the time, and preceded to introduce me to many of his super interesting and handsome friends, which I didn't mind at all.  

        Sarah was (and actually still is) smart as a whip, funny, charming, well educated and a good, honest, sweet friend. Almost every Sunday we would go to Kokomo, which was located in the Farmers Market at the time, close to my apartment on Hayworth. There we would talk about the previous evening's sometimes crazy adventures over Eggs Sardou and their delicious coffee cake, with a varied crowd of friends.

Twenty-five year old Marika at Kokomo (photo credit: Sarah)

        On this particular Sunday, it was Sarah and I, and a male friend of ours, who I'll call Mark. We had brunch as usual, and then drove Mark back to his apartment which was pretty close to the Farmers Market. Mark asked us if we wanted to come in and hang out for a bit, and since it was a lazy Sunday, we both said yes.

        What comes next is going to cause male readers of this blog to admire Mark greatly, as it took some skillful scheming to get two innocent twenty-five year old girls to make out. Ok, maybe not entirely innocent. Still, at the time, it didn't seem manipulative at all, and I think therein lies the talent that many men would dream to possess, or pay to acquire. It was one of those natural "one minute we're all hanging out and the next, we're all kissing" sort of situations.

Mark "suggested" we play a game... 

        Mark suggested we play a game. It was a kissing game that required  a blindfold, and as "luck" would have it, Mark had a scarf close by and off we went. Mark offered to go first and as he put the blindfold on, explained the rules of the game. He said the person who was blindfolded will get kissed by one of the "players", and has to guess who is kissing them. Simple enough. My mind didn't move ahead and think "well, there's just one boy, so how will it work when Sarah or I get blindfolded?"  

        Sarah and I took turns kissing Mark and he guessed right after "needing" a second round, after which, Sarah put the blindfold on, encouraged by Mark, of course. Mark proceeded to kiss her and I was still sort of in the dark about what was coming next, naively. She guessed that it was Mark which obviously was correct. Then Mark motioned for me to kiss Sarah. 

        I should stop here and say that if you were ever in a situation where you'd be presented with the opportunity or invitation to kiss a girl, as I was in this case, Sarah was the girl you'd want to try that sort of thing out with. She was, and still is, ridiculously beautiful. Tall, lean, and with coloring quite opposite from mine. A perfect body, beautiful hair, rosy cheeks, bright eyes, soft lips...you get the picture. And a free spirit without hang ups, like me. 

        I leaned in and kissed her. It's been a long time and I only vaguely remember the kiss itself, but I remember thinking I'd never felt anything so soft and magical, kissing wise. It was a gentle kiss, without the force and push that men tend to bring. More like soft, relaxed lips and tongues playing without an agenda. I was kind of tantalized by the whole thing. And was happy to be next up to be blindfolded.

        I remember that we played the game for a few rounds before it was time to leave Mark's and go about our respective Sundays. We walked outside and said good bye with no awkwardness at all, which was cool. I definitely walked away impacted by it, like somehow mesmerized by the feeling of having had my lips pressed against "girl lips," yet I didn't feel the need to overanalyze it, or worry about whether or not this was going to effect our friendship. And it didn't. So, in conclusion, and to quote Kate Perry, "I kissed a girl and I liked it." 

My First Groundlings Performance

     I've always been interested in comedy, and at some point I decided to audition for The Groundlings Improv School. For those of you who aren't familiar, The Groundlings is an improv and sketch comedy theatre and school, that was founded by Gary Austin in 1974, and has been known to "output" some incredibly hilarious comedy and improv actors, including my former boss, Lisa Kudrow, and my friend Jennifer Coolidge. Personally, I wasn't as interested in the performing part as I was in the writing part, but in order to get into the Writing Lab, you have to take the other classes first and be approved to move up. 

    I was the only non-actor in every class I took at The Groundlings, and for me, I think it was one of the things that made me somewhat successful, meaning, I didn't have to review a level but was moved up after one try. I had no big dreams making it into the main company or getting to audition for SNL, so I had a pretty good, unattached attitude about the whole thing. I didn't mind going first for anything, a warm-up game, improv, or a sketch, so I found myself always jumping up when I heard the teacher say, "Ok, two people up."

    In each class there was a mix of writing & performing sketches, and learning improv. While I found myself at home with the writing, I learned quickly that there is nothing easy about improv. It takes a lot of brain power, and then the ability to disconnect that brain power. You can't plan ahead, try to be funny, or have an agenda. You have to go up and be like a blank canvas, completely open to create something with someone else without thinking.

    And in that moment, when you're up there and you say something in response to what your partner just said or asked, you hope that there is a different voice or accent coming out of your mouth, and a tic or a weird gesture spontaneously shooting out of your body, creating a character different from you. When it works, there is nothing more rewarding and fun. When it doesn't work, it's like dying the slowest death I have ever experienced. 

    I had some amazing teachers at The Groundlings, my favorite being the tall and super talented Roy Jenkins. Creative, extremely brilliant in long-form improv, firm but genuinely supportive as a teacher. If you have never been to The Groundlings, or even if you have, head over to the "Crazy Uncle Joe Show" on Thursdays at 8pm. Roy will blow your mind. 

Not for the faint hearted

    After I finished my first year at the AFI, I got a call from the Groundlings that there was an open spot in the summer session Writing Lab, which always has a long wait list. It had been a couple of years since I had taken classes there, but I decided to jump in and was extremely happy I did. Not only did I make some incredible and funny friends, like Karen Forman, Keri Safran and Brandon Econ, but I found myself under the tutelage of Kevin Kirkpatrick, who is like an improv comedy Nazi. If you want to get your ass kicked and learn something valuable at the same time, Kevin's your guy.

    I don't know if it was a reflection of Kevin's edge, my being in the midst of a divorce, or the company I kept in class, but everything I pitched seemed to have a creepy old lady or a whore angle. Or both, as in the sketch Karen and I wrote, with the two retired prostitutes who went to Wells Fargo to apply for a small business loan, so they could open a retirement home for ladies like themselves.

Charlotte & Francine, two semi-retired prostitutes

    The Writing Lab was an incredible experience and I learned a lot. You write one or two sketches each week, with a new partner each time, perform it in class and then either get told to drop it or keep working on it. It was like a sketch comedy writing factory, and at the end you emerge with one sketch and one monologue, which you perform on the main stage, in costume and with props, for a live audience. 

    All the monologues were written in first person, so you'd get up on stage and do your monologue as if you were talking to someone, but you were really just talking to the audience. My character was a pathetic love sick secretary at a law firm, who shows up at one of the partners' house, a partner she is madly in love with. There is a party in full swing, one that she hasn't been invited to, and she keeps on leaning in, commenting on the passed hors d'ovres and the guests, whom she knows from the office, without actually ever being invited in. Quite sad.

     The most interesting thing about performing my monologue (and subsequent sketch) was that I had never imagined being interrupted by laughter, so I wasn't ready for it. If I had thought about it for even a minute, I probably would have realized that people might laugh at this, because it's funny. So the laughter threw me off, and there was also some anxiety, but I got to the end without fainting or peeing my pants. Victory for me.

Keri looks so ghastly in the scene below that I felt like I should show her true beauty...

    The sketch I performed was with Keri Safran and we did many, many re-writes until we were happy with it. On the day of the performance, I remember pulling Keri aside beforehand and telling her "remember I'm not an actor, so I may forget or flub lines or not say anything at all. If that happens, please fix it somehow." I remember her pulling me aside a minute later, telling me to stop drinking the prop wine, because if I continued drinking it, I would definitely be flubbing my lines. 

    The sketch went over really well, and I found it was much more fun to do a scene with someone, as opposed to the solo monologue. While my experience at The Groundlings taught me how to write funny fast, it also reaffirmed that I'm not a born performer by any means. I love participating in the occasional sketch or bit, but I could never dedicate my life to it. Kudos and props to those of you who do. 

    After the Writing Lab was over and I went back to the AFI for my second year, I was invited to join the Improv Class at the AFI, which was for Directors only, (and I guess me) and was taught by none other than Groundling goddess Karen Muruyama. With Karen I returned to what fascinated me so about improv when I first started with Roy all those years ago. The brain let-go and the exhilaration of not knowing what comes next. Which for those of you who know me, is something I struggle with, but also always enjoy the opportunity to confront.

    And now, without further ado, please enjoy Keri Safran and myself, as Marge and Cheryl in "Happy Hour," named after the special time these two ladies, one librarian and one teacher, spend together after work, drowning their sorrows in the library stacks. My First Groundlings Performance.

 

My First Time Caught In a Lie

    It was December 31st, 1984 in Stockholm. My parents were going to a New Year's Eve party at some friends' house. I was staying home with my brother Ulrik, who left five minutes after they did, not interested in spending New Year's with his younger sister and her friend Marie. Understandably so. 

Where it all happened...our old house in a suburb of Stockholm 

    I'm confused as to what happened next, since there were no cell phones back then. Friends just magically appeared and around 9p.m., the party was in full swing. Writing about this now makes me laugh. It's bizarre that I could have ever thought I would be able to have a party while my parents were gone a few hours, without them noticing. Could 14-year-old Marika really have been that naive?

   

                                             The cool, older boys...

    Reading about the evening in my diary, it seems like your average mid-eighties teenage party by Swedish standards. Someone brought alcohol, there was loud music coming out of my step dad's Pioneer sound system, and the really cool, deliriously good-looking, older boys from high school arrived, which had all the girls excited. A few of us ended up hanging out in my room upstairs when Per asked everyone to leave because he wanted to talk to me about something. I wrote "there wasn't a whole lot of talking" with two exclamation marks after, in my diary.

    As every great party does, this one hit its peak with dancing, drinking and smooching all around. And then got a bit messy. Anders threw up on the bathroom floor, Markus mopped it up, and Anders subsequently fell asleep on the wet floor, on some chards from a glass he had shattered. Because Markus had been so helpful, I kissed him for a bit. He and Per were good friends but that didn't seem to matter. Most definitely because this took place in Sweden, known for its lack of boundaries in the area of love and sex. 

    After a few of us smoked cigar in the sauna (!), and someone punched a hole in the upstairs bathroom door, the party started to wind down. Eventually there was just a small group left, so everyone helped clean the house, then Marie and I put on PJ's and went to bed.  

    The next morning, after Marie had left, there were some obvious questions asked. "Did you have a party last night?" they asked. I said "no" with a straight face. "What about this hole in the bathroom door?" I mumbled that I hadn't noticed it before, and had no idea how it got there.  

    I braced myself, knowing exactly what was coming next. Since our sauna had no windows, there had been no way to air it out the night before, so I really had no defense for the cigar smell that was still so pungent in the sauna. Still, when the question came ("Did someone SMOKE CIGAR in the sauna?") I said "no" quite firmly.

    And there it is. Caught in a lie. Or three to be exact. But the funny thing is, I don't remember there being an argument, or any punishment whatsoever. I just kept on denying I had a party in spite of the clear evidence, and the big blowup with serious consequences never came. They didn't call my bluff. What I derived from this experience wasn't that my parents believed I was telling the truth, but that they were using some sort of "Jewish-guilt-Jedi-mind-trick" to punish me. And it worked. I was always on edge, wondering when the punishment was coming. And behaved well for a few weeks as a result. 

Trusting parents...or super clever and manipulative?

    I called my parents to ask them about it. Nicke, my step dad, doesn't remember anything about this crucial event, but he did say that they probably just trusted me and accepted my "no" as the truth. I reminded him of the smell of cigar in the sauna and the dented door, and that it was so obvious I'd had a party, but he had no response. I was really disappointed, having hoped for him to reveal the big scheme they had cooked up to teach me this important life lesson. 

    I talked to my mother next. My mother Elise remembers everything, and yes, I usually find that as annoying as people find me, when I inform them of that thing they said verbatim twenty years ago. For MY FIRST though, she's proving to be incredibly helpful, filling in important gaps, and it's fun to talk to her because we both remember so much. Not surprising, she was quick to tell me whose party they were at that New Year's Eve in 1984, but when it came to my party, she didn't remember either.

    She said that if I had a party that New Year's Eve, they definitely knew about it, but explained that they probably had expected me to, so it might not have been such a big deal. I brought up the dented door, the presence of alcohol although I had just turned 14, and of course, the cigar in the sauna, but she still maintained it wasn't so bad, and just behavior that was expected from teens. 

    My final attempt at resolving this issue was with my brother Ulrik, who must have used my party as leverage/extortion to get me to shovel snow or take on his other chores, as he typically did when he came across what he deemed "valuable information" about my life. Not surprising, he emailed me back saying he has repressed all childhood memories. Not a bad email to get, since I can now take generous liberties in future posts. 

    In conclusion, I was caught in a lie, but I guess I'm the only person that thinks that was, or is, a big deal. It's funny, my parents didn't seem cool or easy going while I was growing up. At all. But I suppose they kind of were.