The Judy Miller Show Revisited

Today would have been my mother’s 72nd birthday. 72 is a lucky number in Jewish numerology because “Chai,” the word for “Life,” is equivalent to 18, so 72 is four times “Chai,” or four times life! That seems like a good fit for my mom. Her earth life may have ended after 65 years but her spirit and the impact she made on her loved ones is definitely four times life.

I wrote about my mom at length a year ago today but I can’t let this day pass without sharing a few more random thoughts and uploading some items from the family archives. As I said a year ago, May tends to be a difficult month for our family thanks to the triple whammy of my mom’s birthday, Mother’s Day, and the anniversary of her death. On the other hand, it’s also the perfect time to celebrate her life.

Seven years after my mother died I still find myself reaching for the phone to call her. Especially when I’m doing something that I know she’d love to hear about such as our recent theatre trip to New York. My mother was passionate about theatre and the movies and was responsible for passing on that love to me. I can barely remember a day in our house when my mother wasn’t blaring a Broadway show on our old RCA record player. By the time I was five I had memorized the complete scores of “Camelot,” “My Fair Lady,” “The Sound of Music,” and “Flower Drum Song” through sheer osmosis.

Judy Miller was something of a Drama Queen herself growing up, at least according to my grandparents and my mother’s two siblings. As a young girl she was a bit of a tomboy and quite mischievous. Definitely more Dennis the Menace than Shirley Temple. When I find photos like the one at right, labeled “Judy and friend,” it kills me that I can’t call my mother for the story behind the picture and find out who that gun-toting kid is. Could it be the former classmate she told me about who grew up to be an infamous serial killer? I doubt it, my guess is that it was my mom who put the gun in this little boy’s hand.

I think that my mother could have been a great actress, and it was only in later years that I learned she once dreamed about a life on the stage. Here is the program from her performance as Meg in “Little Women” that took place on May 7, 1946. Sixty years ago this week my mother was walking the boards with the other Jewish March sisters at the Fine Arts Building on Chicago’s Michigan Avenue. How I wish I could have seen that. Just as I am known to blurt out random lines from plays and movies without any seeming connection to the topic at hand, my mother used to constantly repeat the first line from “Little Women”—“Christmas won’t be Christmas without any presents!” I thought of her more as Jo March, not prissy Meg, especially after she introduced me to the MGM version of the story starring red-haired June Allyson as Jo. My mother was a huge June Allyson fan, and looked a bit like her.

I have no idea if my mom continued acting as she got older. She was certainly obsessed with the movies and told me how she’d spend every weekend at the big movie palaces on State Street in downtown Chicago, right next to her father’s store, Karoll’s Red Hanger Shop. Maybe it’s just as well that she didn’t pursue an acting career, I don’t think she was tough enough to deal with the constant rejection. Despite my plentiful family archives, my mother spent much of her life avoiding the camera. For every well posed photo I have of her, there are about a dozen of her shielding her face with her hands and looking miserable as my grandfather chased her down with his Brownie camera. She had the maddening idea that she was unattractive no matter how many assurances she got to the contrary. The photo above shows my mother as one of the runners-up in the 1951 Miss University of Chicago beauty pageant. She is third from the left, and I ask you, is she not the prettiest among this group? If you’re sensing some Oedipal stuff going on, just email my therapist, it won’t be the first she’s hearing about it.

Here are two of my favorite photos of me and my mom. The first shows us building a snowman during the famous 1967 Chicago Blizzard. Oh what fun that was. While other parents were panicking about getting milk for their families, my mother, always a kid at heart, couldn’t wait to get out into that storm and start playing in the snow. The second photo is of my mother walking me down the aisle of a Parisian synagogue at my first wedding in 1993. It was great to share that moment with her but it makes me crazy that she was not alive to witness my marriage to Kendall in 2004. She adored Kendall and would have so enjoyed that day.

This photo of my mother and my daughter Leah reveals the most painful aspect of her absence. Judy Miller was the kind of doting grandmother every child dreams of having and the fact that Leah was only four when she died is agonizing. But at least Leah knew her and remembers her, as does my nephew Spencer. Last year on the anniversary of my mom’s death Leah wrote her a letter that I’m convinced she somehow received. Leah has performed in almost 20 musicals at this point and I haven’t attended a single performance without hearing my mother’s kvelling from the Great Beyond. Oh, how she would have loved being part of Leah’s life. The two are definitely cut from the same cloth, from their identical red hair to their creativity, love of reading, and obsession with musical theatre.

My mother went through some extremely painful times during her life as did my entire immediate family. But through the worst of the dysfunction, there was one thing that was never in doubt—the love that my mother felt for her family members and vice versa. It could have circled the planet many times over, and it is this love that I celebrate today.

Happy Birthday, Mom.

Comments

[OldOldLady Of The Hills]

Beautiful tribute Danny. (I am going to read your last years post, too)...Your Mom sounds like such a vibrant and fun person, (in spite of all the painful things)...And that she passed on her love of theatre, and Musical Theatre in particular to you and Leah is just one wonderful part of the legacy she leaves you. I LOVE all those photograps you included.

[Mindy]

My mom died in 1991 at the age of 58 from renal failure, and not a day goes by that I don't think of her. I, too, find myself wanting to call her or ask her questions that I didn't get around to asking when I had the chance. Reading the description of your mother reminds me so much of my own. She loved musical theater and passed that love of theater on to her children. She continues to live through us.

[Tamar]

Beautiful photographs, Danny, and a wonderful tribute to your mother. Thanks so much for sharing your love of her with us.

[Elaine Soloway]

Happy Birthday Judy.

Give my mom a hug.

Love,

Elaine

[kay]

I don't know you (I found your blog while googling a friend's name :D) but I check in nearly every day to read your magnificent writing. The tribute to your mother is absolutely beautiful. Thank you for sharing that--with a complete stranger.

[Vicki Forman]

That is so very lovely. Thank you, Danny. I especially like the last photo, of your family and that beautiful loaf of challah.

[Randi(cruisin-mom)]

Danny, oh to have your talent and gift for expression...what a lovely tribute to your mom. You really brought her to life with your words. I'm sorry she died so young...what a great loss for you and your family.

[Heather]

She really is the prettiest in that photo -- how could she not have won?

May 10th is my brother's birthday too. I have known more people born on that day than any other!

[shari]

Beautifully written and great photos, although I imagine Sue is not thrilled with that last one.
It's 10 years since my mother's death. This year I am having a gathering of women who have lost their moms over for brunch on Sunday and we will share food and stories.
Happy birthday and Mother's day, Judy.

[Bruce]

Hi.
I found your blog by doing a search on "Gottliebs Chicago." See, my mother died last week. I was going through here personal effects and found out that her grandparents were both Jewish from Chicago. her grandmonther was Ida Gottlieb and her father was Emil Polak. I was interested in tracing the family line - our Jewish side of which we are very proud of.

Any info would greatly be appreciated.
Shalom,
Bruce

[David]

Bruce: Danny is, sadly, but an "honorary Gottlieb".

My grandfather Gottlieb had several sisters; I'll find out if Ida was one of them.

Danny: a fine post indeed. And she's gorgeous in every single one of those pictures -- even the bottom one, where the rest of you look to be in some sort of altered state!

[Pearl]

What a beautiful tribute, Danny, for such a fine lady with a spunky personality. I'm sorry she died at a young age and didn't live to see some of your family's fun and fabulous times...on earth. But no doubt, somewhere in the Garden of Eden, from where she has her heavenly view, she sits with a smile on her face, repeating, "THAT'S my Danny-boy!"

[Adriana Bliss]

Danny, your post brought tears to my eyes especially on your mentioning the agony of losing the "grandmother." That is the most painful aspect of losing my own mother.

Thank you for posting this beautiful and touching tribute.

[Judy V]

Having loved Kendall's book, every year or so I've done a search to see if she's written more. That's how I found your blog which I now read regularly. How could two so gifted writers be in the same family?
Beautiful tribute to your mother-and all mothers. They are with us forever.

[Neil]

Beautiful. She obviously raised a son with the ability to write about emotional things.

Oh, and cool hair at your bar mitzvah! Can you still fit into the jacket?

[marsha val]

How often I think of my beautiful, vibrant friend, Judith Aida, and I am lucky because Leon knew her and loved her too...and we can remember the times we were all together and the FUN..Of course, he was mostly just infatuated with her ( and I just loved being with her and sharing our lives together) I have said it over and over, she truly was one in a million and lives in our hearts forever..Love to you, Danny, and your wonderful family...

[Judy]

A truly beautiful tribute to a beautiful mother. Last week would have been my father's 83rd birthday had he lived past 61...same day as your Uncle Paul's birthday.
As with my husband's mother who has been gone since '58, the loss of grandparents is great, and I had cried many tears mourning that my children never had the love of grandparents as I had growing up. My husband's stepmother was very much a wicked witch. They spent summers for several years at a bungalow colony near our summer house, and my kids, their grandchildren now recall their visits as sheer hell. Not one visit went by when she would find a way insult my husband, her stepson, in his children's presence... without a peep from his father. Mothers are irreplacable. Every week I visit my Mom at an assisted living facility and am more aware than ever what a tough cookie she is. Sometimes, I think she's too much for me...I love her but at times, can't say I like her. I know I can be bitchy at times, but oy vey. I hope I won't be like her in my 80s.

[cherie]

Your tribute is so lovely. Thanks for sharing yourself and your family with us. Your words are inspiring. cheers

[steven davies]

That is the most wonderful tribute I have ever read:)))I like your mother love musical theater!

[Rebekah]

Wow. Again, you're making me want to cry. It is very clear that your mother is a wonderful person and a fitting addition at God's side in Heaven. She is watching over you, Danny. She is seeing Leah grow up and she IS at those performances kvelling, as you say. And she is very proud!