And how could I be mad? I knew she had heard me and was sorry.
It became more and more clear that Whitney carried heavy burdens. Later that week, we were shooting at a pier on the Hudson River. I could see that something wasn’t right with Whitney that day. I didn’t know what. She looked beautiful in her wardrobe, but she seemed troubled and disconnected. I said to her, “You know Whitney, I went to therapy to take care of my challenges, and baby. . .” Before I could say another word she whipped her head around and said, “Oh no Mama! My Lord and Savior Jesus Christ take care of me.” She said it with such fervor and determination that I never brought it up again.
The next summer, Whitney invited me to Jersey and gave me the grand tour of her house. Her sweet little daughter, Bobbi Kristina, was swimming, so I jumped in. We had fun, but after an hour, I was ready to get out. She of course was not but nevertheless allowed me to wrap her in a big, fluffy towel and take her back inside to her talented mama.
Whitney and I stayed in touch off and on but we didn’t see each other much. Years later, I was in Atlanta filming Meet the Browns and Whitney asked me to her home for dinner. When I arrived, she was “indisposed” and could not come down for the meal. I spent the evening with Cissy and Pat, Whitney’s mother and sister-in-law. Then, a couple of months before Whitney passed away she called me. She was very excited about Waiting to Exhale 2 and said she was on her way to rehab so she would be in top shape to shoot the movie. “I’m going to do it this time, Mama! Don’t worry, this time I’m going to do it for real.”
I never heard Whitney’s voice again, but I often recall the day we filmed in the church where she sings. I was giving an interview in the back of the church and without moving my eyes off Whitney, I said to the journalist, “Her voice is the eighth wonder of the world, and that’s all I have to say.”
I went to a big birthday party given by Carrie Fisher and Penny Marshall, who directed The Preacher’s Wife. It was a celebrity-filled affair. In addition to my castmates Denzel, Whitney, and Loretta, the crowd included Jack Nicholson, Jane Fonda, and Jay Leno. I was excited to meet Carrie, “Princess Leia” from Star Wars. She, too, lived with bipolar disorder and, similar to me, had turned her story and struggles into art.
Oprah Winfrey called, and I flew to New York again, this time to participate in a reading of Toni Morrison’s Beloved. I was so excited. Oprah put us up at the Four Seasons, and that morning I ordered a $40 frittata. Disgusted at that, I was still happy it gave me energy to face a day with the likes of Samuel L. Jackson, Mary Alice, Thandie Newton, and Oprah. There were about twelve of us sitting around a long table, poised to impress the great one herself. Well, I for one had studied my ass off. Now, before my big speech, Oprah and I had been trading side glances, teasing like regular girlfriends about Thandie Newton’s character was trying to take Sam Jackson’s character from Oprah Winfrey’s character.
In other words, “Don’t let her get your man, girl.”
We were bonding, and I was very happy that Oprah was so down to earth and playful in real life. But then came time for my big monologue. I took a deep breath, slowed myself and delivered one of the finest performances of my life.
My speech had been so impressive that even the seasoned theater veterans started to applaud the delivery. Oprah clocked this exaggerated praise. Let’s just say the “girlfriend bonding” shit stopped on a dime. I immediately knew I would not, under any circumstances, be cast in Beloved. It was Oprah’s first starring role, and experience told me she was not about to let my happy ass upstage her even happier ass.
Thomas was back on the scene and he and I drove from Los Angeles down to Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman’s beach house in Laguna. We had fun, but we mostly fought. It was all because of that “I’m the man” bullshit. I’m sorry, baby. Everybody in the world knows I’m the man. How I am not a lesbian, ladies and gentlemen, is beyond me. But when you’re a Dick Diva, you’re a Dick Diva. He left for Detroit, and I flew to Hawaii to hang out with Bette Midler and her family, Marc Shaiman, Scott Wittman, and hallelujah, Mr. Bruce Vilanch himself. We had an insanely full-out and fabulous time.
When I returned from the trip, there was sad news from home. One of my favorites among my mother’s eight sisters and seven brothers passed. Aunt Louise was the first of Grandma Small’s children to die. My first cousin Carol and her family were living in Compton, so I drove down to be with them. We had always been so very close.
That month I had a small meltdown because I hadn’t had a job for a while. When you’re in therapy it’s often one step forward and ten steps back. But I didn’t give up. There is no elevator to success in health or work. I was climbing the stairs against the winds of life. I responded by getting drunk, going shopping, and buying an electric-blue fox coat. Sorry, PETA.
Things picked up when, God help me, my new manager, Barry Krost, made a deal with Disney to do The Jenifer Lewis Show. A talk show. To make a long story short, I was basically incapable of asking other people about their lives without going on and on and on about my own. The show was a fucking train wreck and was never aired. I told y’all—yeah, I can sing, and act, and entertain, but apparently I just can’t stop talking about myself!
Thank goodness the writer Lee Rose called, and I was off to Vancouver to film An Unexpected Life. In the cast were the great Elaine Stritch, Stockard Channing, S. Epatha Merkerson, Christine Ebersole, and RuPaul. I am under court order to never reveal stories about the carryings-on during that shoot. Ask Ru.
I won an audition for a role in an animation created by Eddie Murphy called The PJs. It was a cast of wacky and talented people. Phil Morris’s fine ass was doing Eddie Murphy’s voice, and even if you listen carefully, you can’t tell the difference. I was fired from that job for reasons unknown. I think somebody was having sex with somebody and before I knew it, somebody else had my job. But I didn’t give a fuck, because I had fifteen other jobs. To this day, I don’t remember doing The Proud Family. There was just a whole lot of shit going on, y’all, and I was in high demand. Thank you, Jesus.