Stuff that I have Noticed #77: Instant Friendship

• Posted on 10th April 2024
• in entertainment books
• by Ben

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Have you ever met someone for the first time and instantly become life-long friends? It has happened to me three times.

The first was seventy-two (or three) years ago at Hollywood High School on the football practice field. There was this tall (6’4”) skinny kid who had a mischievous twinkle in his eye. I was a fullback and Robert Collins was an end. (This was when there were full-backs half-backs, wing-backs and ends, long before the game evolved into tight ends, wide receivers running backs and flankers). Football, while still a complex game, was much simpler then in the nomenclature department.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bob — aka Cobb — was a Texan who had been living in Lubbock with his Grandmother and had moved to Hollywood to live with his Mom. I can recall zero details about our meeting and glomming onto one another but I do recall that it was virtually instantaneous. Then when my parents met him it was a sealed deal, I had an (informally) adopted brother.

From our first meeting until he moved, briefly, back to Texas after our freshman year in college, we were practically inseparable. Cobb spent many nights at our house and my folks treated him like a son. As we aged I moved to NYC to act on Broadway while Cobb stayed in Hollywood, founded a film company and won two Emmies as a cinematographer. We didn’t see one another for several years but stayed in touch most of the time.

When in 2004 we began prep on Elizabeth Hepburn’s Better & Better Series I finally got the opportunity to work as a Director with Cobb as my Director of Photography. This was something we has fantasized about when we were teenagers; Cobb shooting and me directing a big project. Four years before his departure from this life, we finally did it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Here are samples. (BTW, you’ll see and hear Cobb on the clip from another project we did together, this time as on camera “talent”. Stay tuned.)

I’ll violate chronology here and go to number three: Eric Brown

In October of 2002 I was introduced to him when an old friend, Bob Marks, recommended me to shoot a play Eric had produced. On the phone Eric hired me (He was the only person who ever booked me for a shoot who didn’t balk at my fee.)

After the first shoot Eric came to my office to see the tape and I mentioned that if I were to shoot a second one I‘d be able edit the two shows for the best performances. Which we did and Eric came to watch me edit. That’s when we clicked.

So it was technically not the first time we met but almost. From the beginning there was an ease between us that was natural and comfortable. As I worked the edit, we talked and learned one another’s back story. Eric had been a successful attorney, a partner in a Park Avenue law firm. He had walked away from that with a stash of cash and began taking acting and singing lessons. He referred to this as his life’s “second act”. He didn’t think he’d ever become a professional actor but was deeply interested in theatre and this was a way to get a taste. He was very pleased with my final edit, ordered a whole bunch of copies and happily wrote me a substantial check.

Our bios couldn’t be more different; me a recovered southern baptist, gentrified, educated redneck and Eric a sophisticated Long Island Jew. Yet we worked together seamlessly, and a deep friendship evolved.

Over the next four years, with Eric as executive producer, we created not only Elizabeth Hepburn’s Better & Better Series but a full-length documentary, Birth of the Music Video as well. We remain close friends and get together as often as we can simply to be in one another’s company.

Now, back to number two instant connection; Elizabeth Hepburn, my twice* wife.

On July 26, 1967 I arrived at the Mount Gretna (PA) Playhouse to begin rehearsals for Carousel in which I was to play the lead role, Billy Bigelow.

Excerpt from my first book Three Stages: I strolled over to the theatre where the rehearsal was in progress. As I entered the building through the backstage door and moved through the dressing room area I could hear the cast singing one of the group numbers. I walked onto the stage and there they were, sitting in the front two rows of the house near the piano.

[The Director] Charlie saw me, came over and shook hands then turned and introduced me to the assembled company. There were probably twenty folks there, principals and chorus but I saw only one of them.

Sitting in the front row was a lovely young woman with a Shetland Sheep Dog at her feet. I didn’t know who she was but it was as though there was a pin spotlight on her and all the others in the room faded from view. Her presence hit me like a velvet sledge hammer. It was confusing.

I’m talking actual love at first sight. Her name was Betsy (now Elizabeth) Hepburn and my sole reservation was that I hadn’t heard her sing. (I could not allow myself to become involved with a singer that wasn’t great.) That concern was quickly resolved in the musical rehearsal, her singing was as angelic as her self. I wrote most of a chapter in the aforementioned memoir about our brief courtship so suffice to say, we were married four months later. We celebrated our fifty-sixth anniversary on the 25th of last (2023) November.

Both Eric and (obviously) Elizabeth are very present in my life and I love them both — in somewhat different ways.

* Divorced in 1998 and remarried in 2010, a whole ‘nother book.