My Life in Fur (Part 3)
By: Clay Rivers
Tags: Work, Disney, Memoir, Nonfiction, This Happened To Me

Show Biz Is was a musical revue of the history of show business featuring the Kids of the Kingdom singers and dancers, with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Pluto, Goofy, Chip and Dale in cameo appearances, all accompanied by a live band. The show began with an overture and an opening number that reminded audiences what they liked so much about “show biz.” This was followed by a tribute to the circus; a rousing tap number that segued into an homage to silent movies; then a high-kicking, banjo-strumming number from the musical Show Boat. During all those numbers, I sat in the wings and waited for my first entrance in the show as a film director at the top of the “Hooray for Hollywood” section.

One day I was bored and the cast was worn from performing five shows a day in the sweltering Florida heat and humidity, so I decided to liven up things with a practical joke.

The plan was this: at the beginning of the silent movie tribute, while all the dancers were on stage, I (with the aid of the show’s prop master) would hop into the steamer trunk that was to be rolled onstage by a female dancer dressed as Charlie Chaplin. At the choreographed moment, she would open the trunk and when she went to pull out a pink corset — surprise! — she’d see me lying in the trunk, slam the lid closed, and slowly wheel the trunk to a downstage corner where she would join the other dancers for a heart-wrenching rendition of “Smile.” After the song, the trunk would be hurriedly shoved into the wings, leaving me one minute to get out of the trunk and into my Donald Duck costume, and traverse a four-foot-tall staircase for my big entrance. And the show would go on as written.

That was the plan. It was foolproof.

What could go wrong?

Any number of things.

The trunk could tipped over and a small black man in a T-shirt, shorts, and yellow tights the same color as Donald Duck’s legs and bill would fall out onto the stage in front of hundreds of guests. And what was the possibility of the guests putting two and two together? Very likely. Any eight-year old would have been able to figure out that the small Black man in yellow tights running into the wings was Donald Duck. Given how tight-lipped Disney was about the Characters, if that happened, I would surely be fired.

Nevertheless, I figured what the heck? I fancied myself to be a thrill-seeker.

Trying to keep a secret around the Tomorrowland Theater was a feat unto itself. So I told no one, except the prop master and our dresser. But when the show started and I hadn’t begun getting dressed, my fellow characters suspected something was up.

When the time came, everything went according to plan. Unnoticed by the dancers onstage, I slipped into the open trunk and the prop master closed the lid. I was cool as a cucumber as I got wheeled into place in the wings.

“Charlie Chaplin” came over and comically pushed the steamer trunk to center stage, with me inside. My heart was racing a mile a minute. I prayed to God in Heaven to keep the trunk upright.

Mr. Chaplin flipped the trunk open, swung around, and grinned at the audience. By then, word had spread backstage and everyone had crowded into the wings to watch the prank unfold. At the precise moment she turned her attention upstage to the trunk, I yelled “boo!” and tossed the corset in her general direction. The poor gender-bending female dancer let out a piercing scream and the cast and crew erupted in laughter. She slammed the trunk’s lid closed and wheeled the trunk downstage while she and all the dancers on-stage tried in vain to suppress their laughter during the song.

They failed miserably. They couldn’t sing a single word of the song. At the end of the number, the dancers hurriedly shoved the trunk (with me inside) into the wings. This marked the beginning of my work. I had to get into my costume and make my entrance on-stage. I catapulted myself out of the trunk to the cheers of my fellow characters and the backstage crew and wondered What the hell have I done? I tripped and fell as I ran back to my dressing station. If I missed my entrance I was doomed. The Donald Duck voice was a part of the pre-recorded soundtrack. If that voice boomed throughout the theater with no Donald on the stage —

“Clay, why did you miss your entrance?” the stage manager would ask.

“Uh, I was playing a practical joke?”

The potential was there for the stage manager to have my head on a platter seconds after the curtain came down on the performance if I didn’t make my entrance. My stage manager was not one to be toyed with. Ever. I was doomed whether I made it or not.

A two-man team of faithful dressers jammed the requisite costume parts onto my body; then velcroed, hooked, and snapped everything in place without a second to spare as I ran up the steps and made it onstage in time for my lines, “Lights! Camera! Action!”

After the show, my stage manager gave me a stern look tempered with a half-smile. He and I never spoke of the incident, thank God. That stunt pretty much sealed my reputation as the mischief-maker to count on when things were a little dull.

And I never pulled that prank again.

With that particular cast.

Excerpt from “Walking Tall: A Memoir About the Upside of Small and Other Stuff” by Clay Rivers.