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| Don't adjust your monitor, she's REALLY that foxy. |
Tonight--with a beautiful, hearty portion of the NYU Grad Acting family--I had the distinct honor and pleasure of celebrating the "retirement" of the incomparable Deborah Hecht.
Most of you reading this probably know her--you've worked with her, you were (are!) one of her students, you're friends with her. She's probably touched you in some way. I feel fortunate, because I can say that, in my relationship with Deb, all of these things are true. Yes, I'm bragging about that. And yeah, I carry a little torch for her--and yeah, she's waaaaay out of my league.
Deb--I tend to call her Debbie, I think that suits her better--is certainly worthy of more than a mere Facebook post, but there's so much I want to express right now, and I hope to convey to everyone just how amazing this woman is, and how much I love her.
So I give you: Lessons I Learned from Deborah Hecht.
In the first half of my first year at NYU Grad Acting, Debbie teamed up with David Costabile and sat me down in Zelda Fichandler's office, and she asked me how I was getting on with my classmates. Of course, she already knew the answer: shitty. She told me many things, but what I remember most is her saying "You're a leader". And when I protested, she said "sometimes you just have to take the good things that people say about you on faith." Lesson #1.
At the end of my first year, in evaluating my work on a Shakespeare project, she bluntly said my performance reminded her of a "head and feet, with a giant, gaping hole in the middle". I could only laugh, knowing what she meant: I hadn't personalized the work I was doing, and she straight up called me out on it. Lesson #2: Debbie knows her shit, and she don't fuck around.
In the second half of my second year at NYU, when I was a pretty much a gelatinous husk of a human being, so mired was I in my emotional turmoil, I had a Trio Evaluation, attended by Debbie alongside two other titans of The Program, Richard Feldman (I call him Dickie Feldman...I think he secretly hates it), and James Calder (whom everyone just calls Calder, and they're fucking GLAD they don't have to take his class anymore). At one point Deb, likely unfazed by my hyper-emotional state, asked a simple question that cut right through me:
She said "Do you have trouble owning the things that are good about you?" Of course I could only affirm that that was indeed the case. She then said "You need to learn how to be your own best friend." When I protested, she said "No, I don't mean being self-sufficient; you've got to learn how to be your own best friend." Lesson #3. And you KNOW she's right.When I was just out of school, back when the recession was nice and fresh, and I couldn't buy a job, and I wasn't auditioning and I didn't have any money and I'd just been dumped and I didn't have a phone and even McDonald's wouldn't hire me and I had nothing and I felt as though I was nothing--I did this little shitty cabaret set that turned out to be a bit of a scam, and among the peers that showed up, Debbie was there. And she stuck around even after those terrible, terrible "singers" stunk up the joint before I did my set.
That's not really a lesson, more of a warm memory.
In fact, there are a lot of those--Debbie crying after our Games Project in First Year; Debbie crying after seeing my solo show; Debbie advising me to drop my middle name in billing, because Clifton Duncan sounds more like a star's name; Debbie coming to "Good Person of Szechwan" and offering me encouragement during what was a difficult time for me.
Debbie was our vocal coach for "Kung Fu" at Signature this past winter, and she helped me develop, and have faith in, a good 4 or 5 vastly different characters, ranging from a fey, nasally Chinese guy to the laconic and bass-heavy James Coburn. We probably did about 30 minutes of work in the 2 hours or so we had together--the rest of the time we laughed and talked about history and politics.
I used to call Debbie my second mother. I'm a bit less needy now--thank god, that's a lot of pressure to put on somebody--so now I feel honored that I can call her my friend. Sure, it means that I'll probably only see her maybe once a year--twice if I'm working--but I can't be disappointed, because I know, and I'm especially aware after tonight--that she's living a life that is so rich and so full, and she's creating a professional legacy that is so incredible, that you kind of have to be content with just sitting back and waiting for her to pencil you in.
And when you meet up with her, and just kick back over drinks, marveling at how youthful she is, tickled by her girlish giggle, and how she never has the same hairdo twice, and then two or three hours vanish--it's always worth the wait.
Debbie--you've always believed in me, and you've always been there, even when you weren't. I'm so privileged to know you, and so impressed and so proud that there are so many people that love you so much and so unabashedly.
Now let's get together for lunch. How does November sound?
Much love,
~Clifton Duncan (no Alphonzo).
