Three or four years ago, no one said a word about the Holocaust, but ever since that NBC miniseries that everyone was supposed to watch, it seemed impossible for Declan to escape it. Every time he picked up a magazine, some Nazi war criminal was on the cover; every time he watched the news, there was a story about John Demjanjuk, the alleged “Ivan the Terrible”; the last school assembly he’d attended was about Holocaust awareness; the only field trip he’d taken this year was to the Skokie Library to meet elderly men and women with numbers tattooed on their arms. “Never forget,” they all told him. “Never forget.” Declan knew this was an awful thing to think and he would never in a million years have said it to Carrie or her family, but he sort of thought the whole point of the Annex was that it should be a place where you could forget about things like the Holocaust.
The door to the audition room opened. The Annex’s technical director, Sammy Doulos, now in his fifth year at the high school, walked out in an EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER concert jersey, faded green DARTMOUTH sweatpants, and black shower clogs. He reeked of pot smoke. Sammy flung his hair out of his eyes, then looked down at his clipboard. “Declan Spengler,” he said.
Declan nodded gravely. “Thanks, Sam.” He could hear the sounds of the hallway fade into silence; his name carried that sort of weight here.
He adjusted the strap of his shoulder bag and strode forward, confident yet gracious and humble — the same way he would handle fame when it came to him. Just a couple of years earlier, he had waited all night down in Chicago at Lake View High School to get cast as an extra in My Bodyguard. The most instructive part of the experience hadn’t taken place when the camera was rolling; it happened in the downtime when he got to watch how professional actors behaved. Adam Baldwin had been standoffish and rude, but Matt Dillon was totally cool; he even gave Declan useful fashion tips — told him to pop the collars of his polo shirts and grow his hair longer and part it in the middle instead of on the side so he could “get more chicks.” Declan liked the idea of dispensing advice like that.
He entered the audition room, and the door shut behind him. So many memories in this room. So much sadness; so much raging glory. The first time Declan had come here, he was still reeling from the worst night of his life. The Sunday before Declan’s Our Town audition, his father had asked him to carry two suitcases down the driveway to the Mustang — only after Mr. Spengler handed over his house keys had Declan realized his dad was leaving his mom for good. But on that Monday, after Declan read for the part of George, and Ty Densmore squeezed his shoulder and told him he brought “that special vulnerable quality” Ty had been looking for, Declan understood that if he hadn’t spent the previous night crying, he wouldn’t have nailed his audition. Now he could barely remember the gangly, awkward kid he’d been before Densmore turned him into a star.
As Declan walked to the center of the room, he could imagine his entire high school career converging in this moment: the smell of foundation makeup; the harsh sensation of eyeliner pressed right under your lid; the mounted TV on which Densmore showed videos of Nicol Williamson performing Shakespeare; the window where they watched every other student and teacher leave while they stayed past midnight to get a scene right; the way Densmore would break you down, then build you back up again and tell you exactly what he was doing: “I am breaking you down, Dec, but I will build you back up.”
Densmore was sitting behind his desk in his usual black turtleneck and a gray scarf, tall black boots hiked up on the desk. His bald pate gleamed in the glow of the overhead fluorescents. He had a notepad in his lap and he was sucking on the end of a ballpoint pen.
Declan put his bag down on a chair and took his place in front of the desk.
“A bittersweet moment,” Densmore said. “Your last audition for me. And the last role you’ll play here. Now, tell me which you’d choose.”
“I’ll be playing Peter,” said Declan.
“Who?”
“Peter Van Daan.”
Mr. Densmore’s face seemed to droop. He stroked his goatee with his pen. “Peter? Really?” he asked. “Think for a moment; think very carefully. Peter isn’t that much of a role, Dec. He won’t showcase your ability to command a stage. He’s just such a bland boy: he stutters when Anne flirts with him; he blushes around her. Let’s be honest, when it comes down to it, Peter is just an irritating, stuttering, nattering little pussy.”
“Not the way I’ll play him,” Declan said. “And when I’m at Northwestern, I won’t get to play lead roles right away; I’ll have to get used to being part of an ensemble. Peter will be good practice.”
What Declan didn’t mention was that he felt certain Densmore would cast Carrie as Anne Frank, and he couldn’t stand the idea of any other actor playing her boyfriend. The idea haunted him so much — Trey Newson dancing with Carrie; Rob Rubicoff stealing a kiss from her; Calvin Dawes smothering her — that he had to take the role himself.
“Well, let’s see this ‘Peter’ of yours,” Densmore said.
Declan turned his back, closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then spun around and gave Sammy a tight little nod. He was ready.
Densmore read a short introduction to the scene: “The stage is dark. A cyclorama of Amsterdam at night fades into view. Peter is with Anne in his room. And lights up!”
Sammy began the dialogue, reading Anne’s lines flatly: “I wanna be a journalist or somethin’. I love to write. What do you wanna do?”
Declan peered meekly through imaginary glasses and spoke in a halting middle European accent — not a thick one, just a lilt as he felt himself becoming Peter. “I thought I might go off somepless,” he said, “verk on a farm or somesing … some job zhat doesn’t tekk much brenns.”
Densmore kept his face blank, giving away nothing. He never did. And as Declan kept reading, he secretly thanked Densmore for that lack of consideration, for it made him try harder. He could feel Peter’s loneliness, his fear of getting too close to Anne, of dying in the war, of becoming a man. His tears flowed as Sammy read Anne’s line: “Everyone has friends.”
“Not me. I don’t vant enny.” Declan wiped his eyes. “I get along all right vissout zhem.”
Boom — right on the money. Now Declan’s only fear was that he would have no idea how, over the course of the rehearsal process, to delve further into this character. But somehow he would find new depths. It was like when he used to spend his weekend afternoons avoiding his parents’ fights by playing Asteroids at the Novelty Golf Arcade: just when he thought he couldn’t go any further, he’d unlock another realm, just as now, when he read the final line in his scene, he discovered a meaning he hadn’t registered before.
“Nine o’clock,” Sammy read. “I hafta go. G’night.”
“You won’t let zhem stop you from comink?” Declan asked.
Over the dozens of times he had read this line, to himself or when he had Carrie practice it with him, “You won’t let them stop you from coming?” had seemed like a simple question: Would Anne come to see him even if her parents told her she couldn’t? But there was so much more to it. The question was not just about whether Mr. and Mrs. Frank would allow their daughter to spend time with him; it was about the Nazis outside. Could they be stopped? It was about the world forces that would intervene in their just-blossoming love affair: Could they be stopped? It was about the indefatigability of love and the human spirit.
Declan could feel Carrie near him — could feel himself asking her to assure him that, no, she wouldn’t let anyone stop her from coming. Not the Nazis and not Carrie’s parents, who always eyed Declan with weary, condescending skepticism, as if their daughter’s love for him was something she’d outgrow.
Declan said the final line one more time to give it its full meaning and emphasis. His breaths halted; his voice quavered. “You won’t let them stop you from coming?”
He dropped his hands to his sides. He took a breath, closed his eyes, then opened them again. Densmore was staring right at him; a smile formed on one side of the man’s mouth.
“Well,” Densmore said, “I won’t let them stop you from cumming; the question is whether Carrie will.”
Sammy erupted in rude laughter — “Eeh eeh, eeh” — then mimed masturbating and made sound effects: “Pfft, pfft, pfft.”
Densmore winked, then reached across his desk and swatted Declan’s ass with his clipboard. “Nice job as per usual, Dec,” he said. Declan picked up his bag, lifted the strap over his shoulder, and headed out of the room as Sammy shuffled out to call in the next actor: “Franklin Light.” The skinny kid with the bicycle grease on his shirt and jeans walked past Declan and into the audition room.
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