In the late 1990s, Mel Brooks was convinced to adapt his cult-classic film The Producers into a Broadway musical. The show opened in almost exactly 20 years ago and quickly became the hottest ticket in town. Audiences were howling with laugher at Brooks’ comedy. Critics raved about it too – the show picked up 12 Tony Awards, the most by any Broadway show to date. Two of those awards – Best Direction and Best Choreography – went to Susan Stroman. It might be surprising to learn that Stroman did this award-wining work on a raucous comedy while grieving.
Stroman’s husband, Mike Ockrent, was initially slated to direct the show. However, before production began on it, he died unexpectedly of leukemia. While Stroman’s Wikipedia page says she “immersed herself in her work” after her husband’s death, it is not quite so simple. Stroman was initially reluctant to resume work on The Producers. Her grief was deep and heavy. But Brooks convinced her to return to the show. He said “you’ll meet us in the morning, we’ll have coffee, we’ll work, you’ll do rehearsals and you’ll go back home and you’ll cry your f*cking eyes out. But you’ll come back the next morning and you’ll smile, you’ll laugh, and then you’ll go home and cry. But when you’re with me you’ll have fun.” And that is pretty much what happened. Stroman led the show to success, despite still dealing with the heaviness of her grief. (Quotes and anecdote are from “Singular Sensation: The Triumph of Broadway” by Michael Riedel)
This year, so far, has been one of grief for me. Though I am not dealing with the death of a loved one, my grieving experience has still been incredibly difficult. And I didn’t do myself any favours by keeping much of the experience completely hidden from pretty much everyone, including my closest friends. My purpose for sharing this story today is not to seek attention or be commended for anything. Rather, it is to let everyone know where I have been and what I have learned along the way. I am certain that others relate to the things I’ve been feeling, and I want them to know they are not alone in any way.
My conception of grief before this experience was that it was sort of a linear process. We’ve all heard of the 5 stages of grieving – Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, and Acceptance. I assumed that I would trot through each stage in a nice, neat line and be over everything in a few days. It turns out that a linear model is completely bogus. I’ve experienced every stage several times, all over the place. The constant zigzagging between emotions was emotionally exhausting. It was also frustrating. The first time I experienced feelings of acceptance, I thought I was better, and I could move on with my normal life. When everything crashed back down to depression and anger again, I felt like I had made no progress. It was confusing and annoying to build up and crash down over and over and over. I remember, exactly one month after my grieving period started, I thought to myself “I still feel exactly as horrible as I did a month ago. I’m putting in all this work, but I’m not recovering from this at all.”
Of course, that wasn’t true at all. Grief and grief recovery, it turns out, are very nuanced experiences. Many seemingly conflicting things are true at the same time, and they are all a part of my recovery journey. Therapist Hillary L McBride recently tweeted “For a person to say “I am not ok” when they are in fact not ok, is a marker of health. This disrupts our construction of health as absolute or binary, and reminds us that we can both be powerful and vulnerable, struggling on and brave, all at the same time.” Seeing this statement put some of my experiences into perspective. Things that on the surface look like stagnation are part of recovery for me. I still sometimes cry over the things I am grieving. But in doing that, I am confronting and expressing my emotions. And I have noticed that the frequency and intensity of tears is slowly but surely reducing. I can feel triumphant from getting through small, insignificant things, but that does not mean I am incapable of handling bigger, harder things. Still relying on supports is a sign that I know what helps me get through difficult times. And again, very slowly, I am needing less. Talking about my experiences is still sometimes hard, but not because I feel lost and destitute. It is difficult to find words to describe the nuance and complex nature of all these overlapping things in my recovery process. I sometimes feel quite frustrated by how slowly things improve. But I feel so very proud and grateful when I notice something tangible, even if it is small. Things are improving every single day, even if they are hard to see.
I would like to return for a moment to Susan Stroman’s story. In some ways, she has her grief to thank for her success. She was bolder and more assertive than ever when working on The Producers, since she didn’t feel obligated to finish the show. She pushed for her specific vision of the show, which resulted in many parts of the show which have become iconic. But despite her success, I imagine that Stroman wishes she hadn’t gone through her grieving experience. Another strange duality of the grieving process is that you can wish it had never happened, but still acknowledge the strength and bravery you developed from it.
I was strongly considering not continuing with law school for part of this semester. I didn’t think I could handle the stresses of school and the seemingly constant reminders of what I lost. But I made it through, thanks to the support and encouragement of so many people. I now have no intention of stopping. I made commitments for next year that I am excited about. I hope that, like Susan Stroman, I can be emboldened by the grief experience and use that strength productively. While I doubt I have a Tony Award in my future (or any award for that matter), I am ready to step forward with the strength grieving has forced me to cultivate.
My tough year inspired me to run for a role on the law school’s student council, which turned out to be successful. I am not sure I would have done that if not for grieving and experiencing the recovery process. I have more compassion and empathy for my fellow students, especially students who struggle. I also feel ready to bravely advocate for positive, impactful changes in our institution. Grieving, and feeling like a complete failure while doing so, required me to look for my inherent strength and worth, since no external source was telling me I had value. That was really hard. But in doing that, I am now less afraid of failure. I feel like I have far less to lose by proposing and advocating for ideas that challenge the status quo. My worth is not tied to anyone in the school liking me, so I am more prepared to doing the best job I possibly can. In this way, recovery has been a freeing process. I still wish that none of it happened, but in accepting that it did happen, I am learning to use that experience for good.
I am still recovering. It is an excruciatingly slow process. It has normalized a bit, and I am no longer dealing with intense, erratic emotions. I sometimes have hard days, but more often, I have hard mornings or afternoons, and by the end of the day, I am feeling good about at least a few things. I savour the little joys that are starting to come back – I cherish the feeling of the wind across my face every time I go out for a bike ride, sing out a little louder when I song I love comes on in my car, and do an extra twirl when I am wearing an outfit I love. A big part of the recovery process right now is figuring out what my future holds, given that everything I wanted for myself is no longer possible. That is scary and intimidating at times. But, to myself and everyone else dealing with hard times and an uncertain future, to paraphrase the words of Max Bialystok and Leo Bloom in The Producers, whatever the future holds, we can do it! With our brilliance, and resilience, up together we will zoom!
Thank you for reading!
Current Mood:
Current Soundtrack: I debated whether I should put the entire original cast recording of The Producers for this, since reading Riedel's book reminded me of just how great of a show it is. But that seemed a little too on the nose for this post. So instead I chose a song that is in not on the nose whatsoever.
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