20: From A Distance

Different Voices

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Ira Glass

Erika Yeomans knows when her search began. It began when she saw a photo in a magazine.

Erika Yeomans

The picture is this one. It's this photo with his hand on his forehead and his eyes all squinted up with tears rolling down his cheeks.

Ira Glass

At the bottom of the black and white photo is written in cursive lettering "I'm too sad to tell you." It was ironic. It was charming. And the man seemed unusually expressive and vulnerable.

Erika Yeomans

I just think I'm intrigued because it shows a man crying. And you don't see that image very often. And you don't see a man letting himself have these true emotions. And yet he kind of pushes it away a little bit by sort of writing on there "I'm too sad to tell you." And actually, there he is again. There he is again with his hair longer. You see now, you see the first version with short hair and then the second one with his longer hair. And I prefer it short, out of the two photos. I definitely feel much more attracted to the one where his hair is a little bit shorter. It looks very now, both-- the hair styles are very retro '70s now with guys.

Ira Glass

In fact, the photo was from the 1970s, an art photo by a virtually unknown Dutch artist named Bas Jan Ader. Erika read the article about him. And the facts of his life only enhanced the air of mystery and romance in the picture. He did a kind of conceptual art, Bas Jan Ader, this conceptual art that involved a lot of physical challenges that he would set for himself. In one piece, he was photographed falling off the roof of a house. In another, he falls out of a tree. They're goofy, almost comical photos. But other works of his, like the crying pictures, have a kind of wistful, longing quality.

Erika Yeomans

There was just something very appealing about it and sad. And I felt like I identified with that longing. And longing for what? I don't know. A searching for something? What is it? I didn't know. And I wanted to know what he was thinking.

And his last piece he did was this triptych called In Search of the Miraculous, in which he disappeared. He was trying to sail the Atlantic in a 13-foot sailboat by himself. And he disappeared, and his body was never found. And a year later, his boat was found capsized off the coast of Ireland, and it was this big mystery.

Ira Glass

Well, from the WBEZ Chicago, it's This American Life. I'm Ira Glass, back for another week documenting life in these United States. And today on our program, admiring someone from afar, trying to get closer to them. Act One, In Search of the Miraculous. Act Two, 1,000 Miles to Miles Davis. Act Three, Stalking Snuggles. And Act Four, 1,000 Women Become Selena. Stay with us, won't you?

Ira Glass

When Erika saw the picture of Bas Jan, it had been a while since she'd had an adventure. For years, she had been slogging away as director of a theatre company, an experimental theatre company that was perpetually strapped for cash, perpetually struggling to get reviewed and get attention. It was frustrating. She needed a change. And seeing the picture of Bas Jan reminded her that life could be an adventure.

I feel hesitant actually saying it just flat out in those words because so few of us carry the idea that life should be an adventure into our adult years. And a lot of people think the whole idea is really silly. But this is what Erika Yeomans believed.

And Bas Jan, she thought, lived his life as an adventure. He was handsome, sensitive looking, and he died for his art. And she decided she was going to find out everything about him, make a film or a document of some kind, even though she had never done anything like this before. She was about to turn 30. It was time for a rite of passage.

Erika Yeomans

Birthdays, certain birthdays are supposed to be these big moments. They're supposed to be these big, pivotal moments in your life. And when I was 13, I had a birthday party called Farewell to Childhood, which I had all my girlfriends come over, and we had to dress like five year olds. And when I think about it, it's really kind of a sick thing. And it's embarrassing that I'm even talking about it, but who cares?

So at 13, I had this conceptual birthday party, basically, a performance conceptual birthday party. And then I had to have the whole thing costumed and done, because I had to get over my childhood. And so I think 30 was a big year for me, because I kept thinking prior to 30 that something was supposed to happen when you're 30. I don't know what, but something.

Ira Glass

Erika tracked down Bas Jan's widow in Los Angeles and decided to make a pilgrimage. And rather than fly from Chicago, which she couldn't afford anyway, she decided she was going to drive. It would be more like Bas Jan, she thought, more a test of will and physical endurance. And events conspired to make it more of a test. Her employer wouldn't give her much time off, so she would actually have to do the drive in two days, not three or four, which it usually takes.

Erika Yeomans

Part of my drive out there to LA in some stupid small way was my attempt to be by myself on a journey that, not that it has risk tied to it at all, and it's not really an athletic feat. To drive a couple of days in a beat-up car by myself with a tape recorder and try to figure out if I'm going to be able to discover anything about myself, which I don't know if I did or not. But I was sort of talking to the tape player as if it was, at first, my driving partner, and then second, it became like my therapist. And so then it became a journal by the 48th hour. It became like my journal.

I started to suffer from a real sadness. When I was recording myself, my thoughts, late at night, it started to get very depressing.

And I kept thinking that this was all wrong. And I kept comparing it to Bas Jan. Like how is this adventurous? How is this romantic? What am I trying to teach myself? How am I supposed to grow from this? I'm tired. I've had too much coffee. I've had too many cigarettes. I haven't eaten anything that's healthy. Everything has been in cellophane. It's like this whole thing of doubt, doubt, doubt, doubt, doubt and not knowing why I'm there. And I'm stuck. I can't fly from wherever I am in the middle of Missouri or New Mexico. I have to finish it.

Ira Glass

If you ask Erika how she pictured Bas Jan's trip, his transatlantic trip, in his 13-foot boat, she answers without pausing.

Erika Yeomans

I envisioned him catching his fish off the side of the boat and having a little mock up barbecue pit and grilling his fish and having his fresh water supply, eating very little, fasting for a lot of it, and writing a lot in his journals. And perhaps he was going through questioning things, but I don't think he was doing it in such an alarmist way and a melodramatic way that I certainly sounded on the tapes.

Ira Glass

Erika drove 15 hours a day for two days. And the third day, things melted down. She barely ate, smoked nonstop. And though she had told her friend Margy that she'd arrive at Margy's house around 9:00, she didn't hit the nether-region outskirts of Los Angeles until 9:00, which may not seem like a big deal.

Erika Yeomans

It's millions of lanes of roads whipping around. It's a Friday night, which of course, you know-- I pretend like there's not going to be any traffic. And of course, there was bumper to bumper traffic, cars going really fast. And I'm just driving along. And I start to feel really woozy. And I get woozier as I go on.

And as I'm getting into the actual city, and I'm looking for the exit for Margy's place, I start to have a panic attack, where I know I'm passing out. I've never passed out in my entire life. I've never ever even experienced that feeling. And here I was, and I know I was passing out. And I couldn't stop my heart from pounding. I couldn't stop myself from-- just either I was going to vomit or I was going to pass out. And I started to panic.

And so I was shaking, trying to get off this freeway with cars whipping around me. At this point, I was going about 30 miles per hour. And I wasn't about to go any faster, because I was really frightened. I was completely paralyzed. I couldn't get over to the exit. I finally weaved my way around with people honking at me, and they know I'm a tourist. They see my plates from Illinois. And I know they're saying all these things. I'm waiting for the gun to come out.

I get off the exit. And I'm in some neighborhood that looks really desolate. It looks really scary. It's really dark. There are no streetlights. And I start weeping. And I'm on the side of the street, just thinking I'm going to sleep here tonight. I'm never going to find Margy's house. I was completely, completely, utterly frightened, didn't know what I was going to do. I pumped up myself. I started to breathe, breathe, breathe. I ate some peanuts. That was all I had in the car.

And so I got back on the freeway. And meanwhile, during this time, I'm in my car and I keep hallucinating that I'm melting in my car and that my back of my car is melting into the freeway. And so I keep--

Ira Glass

Hours late, she finally pulled over and called Margy, who came and retrieved her in her pajamas. The next morning, Erika didn't want to look at her car, though she had to.

Erika Yeomans

And I went outside and I noticed that my back rear tire had blown. And that was why I was hallucinating. I wasn't hallucinating. Because my tire had blown and that's what was making me feel like I was melting into the freeway.

Ira Glass

On their face, the facts of Erika's adventure do not seem like the stuff of myth. A car drive three days long on the interstate highway system. But what's remarkable about her story is that through sheer force of will, she turned it into the right of passage and test of endurance that she had wished for when she set out. And once she recovered the next day, she called Bas Jan's widow, Mary Sue, and headed out to meet her.

Erika Yeomans

I was wearing these very, very, very fluorescent yellow cigarette pants, my army combat boots, and my gas station jacket from the '50s, a very in jacket. I thought I'd fit in with the scene and this art community. At Bergamot Station, there are supposed to be all of these galleries. So I figured there would be a lot of groovy people. And I wanted to look as groovy as I could.

Ira Glass

Mary Sue liked Erika and answered anything she wanted to know. And some of what she said was very different from Erika's pretty picture of Bas Jan as an ideal man, a romantic art hero.

Erika Yeomans

I went through the rudimentary questions, at this point, of trying to figure out what did he sound like? How did he talk? Was he political? Was he not? And there were these very short answers to these things. But after about an hour or so of talking, she started to explain to me that he wasn't this perfect, beautiful creature. Because I kept saying, he's gorgeous.

And that's when she sort of said, "I can't paint him that pretty, though." Dot, dot, dot. There were problems. And that's when she started to talk about open relationships. And we sort of had a girl talk about open relationships and how they don't work and about the pain that was involved in her marriage.

Ira Glass

What happens when you admire someone from afar, partly because they seemed so sensitive and tragic, and then you find out they were sometimes kind of a jerk? In this case, Erika tenaciously held on to her picture of Bas Jan as a romantic, feeling man. And if you ask Mary Sue, she says there's something lovely about that.

Ira Glass

Now, one of the oddest things about this whole story is that Erika sees Bas Jan as a purer artist than she is, a truer artist. When in reality, she labors, mostly in obscurity, following a vision that's completely idiosyncratic, completely her own. A typical show of hers is filled with odd, striking images, lots of strenuous movement, elliptical dialogue, no story. Some shows seem to have an unusual number of people throwing themselves on the floor. The shows can be hard to sit through. But from start to finish, they are clearly a labor of love and a labor of obsession. But to hear her talk about it, she has sold out compared with Bas Jan.

Erika Yeomans

He was more concerned about-- I don't want to say art for art's sake. But he was more interested in what he was doing to himself physically and mentally by putting himself in these images and doing these different tasks. And I don't think he was that worried about if he was going to be a big famous artist, or if he was going to be a successful artist, because he didn't even take care of the work that he had. After he died, they can't even find a lot of his work, because it got damaged in a garage, because they didn't really take care of it.

Ira Glass

Kristine McKenna writes about art for the Los Angeles Times. And she spoke with Erika about Bas Jan several times during Erika's visit.

Ira Glass

Erika Yeomans collected footage from old Hollywood films and from Mary Sue to make a movie about Bas Jan. Her goal was to finish the movie by the time she was 33, the same age Bas Jan was when he set out on the ocean and disappeared. The film she made, In Search of Bas Jan's Miraculous, has played in galleries in New York and Amsterdam.

Ira Glass

Act Two, Meet Your Hero. So what if you idolize someone and then finally do get close to them, actually become their friend? What happens to the romantic dream that you had of them? Well, Quincy Troupe first heard of Miles Davis back when Troupe was just a teenager.

Ira Glass

Troupe was in East St. Louis, and Miles was far, far away. Part of what was appealing about Miles was the fact that he had begun in St. Louis himself and had gotten out. And of course, Miles was a blueprint for hipness.

Ira Glass

More with Miles Davis and Quincy Troupe. Also Snuggles the fabric softener bear and 1,000 Selenas. That's in a minute, from Public Radio International when our program continues.

It's This American Life. I'm Ira Glass. Quincy Troupe spent three years collaborating with Miles Davis on Davis' autobiography, talking to Davis and interviewing him, actually, until Davis got sick of being interviewed, to create a book written in Miles' voice and syntax. It sold over 1 million copies. And if you ask Quincy, when did he stop seeing Miles Davis as the mythic, legendary figure and start seeing him as just another friend, he really can't tell you. It was gradual. One day he was on the outside of Miles' life looking in. And then at some point later, he realized that he was on the inside.

Ira Glass

Many public figures up close lose the larger-than-life quality that they seem to have from afar. But there's something about Miles Davis that even today, even though Quincy Troupe was as close to Miles Davis as he's ever been to anybody in his life, that even today it's easy for Quincy to see Miles as this mythic figure. He says Miles just had this effect on people.

Ira Glass

Quincy Troupe co-authored Miles Davis' autobiography, Miles. He is a poet and journalist and essayist and author of several books. He latest is called Avalanche from Coffee House Press.

Ira Glass

Well, now we have this artifact. This is Act Three of our program, Snuggles. From 1980 through 1995, a guy in New York ran what he called an apology line. And the idea is that people would call up. They would call this anonymous line, and they would apologize for anything they believed that they had done that was worthy of apology. Eventually, this guy started to call himself-- or maybe he called himself this from the start-- Mr. Apology. His real name was Allan Bridge.

And over time, people would apologize. And some apologies would be real. And some would be fake. And some would be some combination of the two, you couldn't really tell. And then people could call in and respond to the apologies they were hearing as well. Anyway, this particular apology was transcribed in the magazine of the apology line, Apology Magazine, volume one, number four. This is called "Snuggly Bear," from August, 1993. This is a transcription of something somebody said on the phone line.

"I have an apology to make. And I suppose this is as good a place to do it as any. I was watching TV and a commercial came on. It was a commercial for fabric softener, I believe. It was a small, furry bear, Snuggly Bear. And Snuggly Bear was extolling the virtues of this product, this fabric softener, I believe. And I don't know what it was about this bear, but I was fascinated. Small bear, high-pitched voice, indeterminate sex, not sure if it's male or female. I was fascinated.

"A few days later, another commercial came on again. Once again, I stopped what I was doing and I watched. This time I kept watching and hoped. I kept the station on. I hoped that the commercial would come back. And sure enough, later on in the evening, another commercial came on, a different commercial with the same Snuggly Bear. Same product.

"I went to the supermarket, and I saw the product. And I saw the picture of Snuggly Bear. I purchased the product. I didn't use it to soften any fabrics. I just wanted to have a picture of Snuggly Bear. I wrote Snuggly Bear a letter. And I was hoping for an answer, but I didn't receive one. Then I wrote another one. I was hoping to get some sort of response, a photograph, an autograph, something. Still no response.

"I wrote a third letter, and I'm afraid I was rather upset when I wrote the letter. I've since learned that the letter was turned over to the FBI. I was warned not to try to contact Snuggly Bear again. Snuggly Bear travels around. I believe the bear has one residence in Martha's Vineyard and another residence on the West Coast. I'm not sure where the West Coast residence is, but I've been to the Martha's Vineyard residence. I let myself in.

There was, of course, a certain amount of security around the house, but I let myself in. I climbed the gate and I found a window open around the back of the house, a rather large house. And I wandered around. He wasn't home, of course. He or she wasn't home. I'm sure he was out on the road doing his pitch for the fabric softener.

"Well, if I can only reach Snuggly Bear. If I can only make Snuggly Bear understand that I understand. I'm sure if I get through to Snuggly Bear that I'm sure we could establish a relationship, or just an understanding. But the way it's going now, everything is in limbo. Every time I try to contact this bear, I'm thwarted. I'm calling to apologize, because I guess I've been a bad boy. I'm not stalking Snuggly Bear. They've accused me of stalking Snuggly Bear, but I'm not a stalker. I simply want Snuggly Bear to understand that I understand. That's all. I'm sorry."

Well, somebody heard that apology on the apology line. And then they called in with this message. "This is out to the man who has the fixation on Snuggles Bear. I do understand, and I would really like to give you my emotional support. I do care. I sort of had a similar experience with McGruff the crime dog. And actually, we managed to get together. I can barely even say his name now.

"We did manage to get it together. And I got into his life. He accepted me. He cared about me. But you can imagine. You see him all the time on TV. And life with a cop is difficult. I just didn't know when he'd be coming home at night, and I couldn't take it anymore. Plus, he was sort of spraying all over the furniture. Basically, what I want to say to you is maybe loving from afar is the best thing to do. And maybe it's best that you never actually get to meet Snuggles. Because then you'll have this pure, this untainted image of Snuggles. You take care. Bye-bye."

Ira Glass

Act Four, 1,000 Women Become Selena. It's one thing to admire someone from afar and try to get close to them. It is another thing to actually try to dress as someone you admire, try to look like them, try to become them, even for a day. Well, that's what happened recently here in Chicago at Clemente High School. Let me get some sound going here.

That was a very NPR moment, huh? Picture, please, a gray, cold Chicago day, two lines of women and girls stretched around the block in both directions around this high school. One line is 18 year olds in scanty clothing. Scanty, I guess, would be the appropriate word. The other line is full of eight year olds, many in scanty clothing, though not all. Music blares, people are singing and dancing. And nearly every woman and girl trying out to be the star of the upcoming Selena movie has brought her extended family with her. The director of the film says that he wants to find two Selenas, one to play Selena as a child, one to play Selena as an adult.

Selena, or Se-leh-na, was, of course, the Mexican-American pop star recently killed, widely revered. And perhaps you saw footage of these auditions on the news. We decided to send 18-year-old Claudia Perez to cover the event. Claudia loves Selena, and she wanted to audition herself.

Claudia Perez

12-year-old Jessica [? Letta ?] almost didn't make it. On Friday, she and her family drove seven hours from St. Paul, Minnesota. They arrived late at night and showed up at Clemente High School at 5:30 Saturday morning. Before coming down to Chicago, Jessica's mom told me something terrible had happened.

Claudia Perez

To hear the family tell it, it's like a miracle that Jessica got well. It was like she was chosen. In fact, Jessica was chosen once before. When Selena was still alive, Jessica and her family were at a concert in [UNINTELLIGIBLE]. She and her mom were standing outside the backstage entrance. And Selena's sister, Suzette, picked Jessica out of a huge crowd of little girls to have her picture taken with Selena.

Claudia Perez

Jessica is a beautiful little girl. She has long black hair and a cinnamon complexion. She's wearing a Selena outfit, knee-length boots, spandex hot pants, and a black, padded bustier with gold trimming over the breast. It's Jessica's dream to be like Selena. She wants to be a singer and sing in English and Spanish. She came to the auditions, but not just so she could be a movie star. It's like she wants to feel closer to Selena.

Claudia Perez

A lot of people still cry over Selena. She was so lovable, just her smile. She was like a little girl. When she went to the Grammy Awards, she went there with her camera, wanted to take pictures with everybody. Selena put a positive role. She made it seem like it's not bad to be Mexican-American. I asked Jessica in Spanish how she felt about Selena's death. She started crying.

Claudia Perez

Then I started crying too.

Claudia Perez

After Selena's death, Jessica and her family went to visit her grave in Corpus Christi, Texas.

Claudia Perez

The words mean, "Like the flower with much love, you gave to me. I'll march on. I know how to lose a love. But oh my, how it hurts me."

Claudia Perez

I met all sorts of people at auditions. Everybody was really dressed up and looked fabulous. There was Selena music everywhere, TV cameras, girls were fixing their hair and putting their makeup on. People were dancing. At one point, we were talking to these two girls. They sang us a Selena song. And pretty soon, people we didn't even know were joining in. Everybody was singing. It was just that kind of thing. One of the girls we met came all the way from New York with her mother and her little sister. It was kind of a secret mission.

The mother told her husband that she was at a Mary Kay conference in Philadelphia and that the daughters would be spending the weekend at their older sister's house. Then she flew them all to Chicago for the auditions.

Claudia Perez

When you finally get inside to the audition, it's kind of disappointing. It's like it's over before it starts. There were 20 girls on the stage at a time. They sit you down at these tables, give you this fake smile, hand you a card to fill out, ask you one question, then tell you to stand up and dance. You dance for 30 seconds. Sometimes they don't even play music. When I went up there, the woman running my table didn't even know who Selena was. She didn't bother to look at me. When we were dancing, they only gave you 60 seconds total to make an impression. So what are they looking for?

Claudia Perez

This is the director Greg Nava. He told me there were three auditions, in LA, Chicago, and in Texas. I thought, if he wants magic, I'll give him magic. I told him about Jessica. Of everyone I interviewed, she had the pizazz. She looked like Selena, she had big dreams like Selena, and she has Selena in her heart.

Claudia Perez

I thought that maybe the auditions were just a publicity stunt, not serious auditions, something Selena definitely would not approve of. But the director said they will most likely pick the little girl from the open auditions. And there was a 50/50 chance they'd pick the big Selena.

After a long day, the crowds are cleared. Two cousins who flew in from Texas were sitting outside in the cold, eating pizza, and waiting for a Chicago family friend to pick them up. They had arrived early in the morning and didn't get much sleep. They weren't sure when their ride was coming or where they were going to spend the night. I asked them what they thought of the auditions.

Claudia Perez

They had spent $135 each, saved from babysitting, to get to Chicago. But they didn't feel bad.

Claudia Perez

They just sat there on the bench waiting. They weren't really dressed for Chicago weather. They wore fishnet pantyhose, real short shorts, bustiers, and thin leather jackets. You could tell they were really cold. They were anxious for their ride to show up.

A couple weeks later, it was announced that none of the girls from the open auditions were chosen for the Selena part. Not them, not me, not Jessica. Nobody.

Ira Glass

Claudia Perez is an 18-year-old former high school dropout who recently got her high school equivalency, hopes to go to the Art Institute of Chicago in the fall, is looking for a full-time job right now. This is her second report for our program. She says she wants to be famous, but up until now we are the best that she can do.

Ira Glass

Well, today's program was produced by Dolores Wilber and myself with Nancy Updike, Alix Spiegel, and Peter Clowney. Today's show was first broadcast back in 1996. Contributing editors for this show, Paul Tough, Jack Hitt, and Margy Rochlin. Margy helped do the reporting and the interviews for our story on Erika Yeomans.

[ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS]

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[FUNDING CREDITS]

WBEZ management oversight by Torey Malatia, who welcomes his beloved radio staff every single morning to the radio station with this greeting--

Quincy Troupe

Eff you. Get out of my face.

Ira Glass

I'm Ira Glass, back next week with more stories of This American Life.

Quincy Troupe

Later.

Announcer

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