O}I IHE SET' ,WAITI}IG TO EXIIILE'

HmhfugLes$olls

WhimeY Houston is te-

sPlendent in a smooth-{it-

ting red suit, her hair a tumble of curls' Angela

0[Y UHII: torest Whitaker (far right) prepares

to frialewith Whitney Houston (center, left)

and [eta Rochon (center, right).

lnbringing WaitinStoExhale to the screon

with stirs like Whitnoy Houston and Angela

Bassett, the dream factory is finally ansaering

the dreams of an oft-ignored audience

sv Menrne SoutHGATE

thing, anything. The ac-

tresses are seated at a table

with a light underneath itthat reflects uP into their

faces, hollowing out their

cheekbones. Houston'smakeup attist (whom she

calls Quietfire) aPProaches

her and whispers into her

ear. She turns to the others,

who've been chatting back and forth, and

savs, "Try to lean away from the table as far as

possible,''cause the light's bouncing up--and. it.ak"t you look like Boris Karloff"' The

women nod and sit back a bit.

For the fout actresses who play the women

otExhale, there's a lot more dding on this pic-

tute than iust how they look. For Houston,

B00KKEEPING: Exhale author lerry McMillan

watches over director Whitaker's shoulder.

,t'tIiti1r

Boomerang's ultraglossY

cosmetics firm. This club

is real.Today, however, some

not-so-regular folks are

here, souped-up versions

of the black women Youmight see at such a club in

any major American citY.

HE sIGN oN the door of the ]ock-ey Club in Phoenix, Arizona, laYs

out an elaborate dress code: No

GYM SHOES, NO HATS, NO SHORTS,

No DAISY ourrs (JneN suonrs),

ALL SHIRTS MUST BE WORN INSIDE

PANrs. Within, all is PurPle, Pink,and shiny. The decor, the detailed

dress code, and the Pictures of

smiling, brown-skinned men and

women on the walls will be familiar to anyone

who has spent time at dance clubs {requented

by middliclass African-Americans. It's not a

,..n. yor'u. seen in the movies, though'

Onscreln, black folks are either trapped in the

'hood, smoking crack and shooting one

another, or playing superstar in some affluent

neverland, like Eddie Murphy does in

Baisett, her hair in a pixie cut, wearc a sleeve-

less gold 1am6 shirt and flowing black pants'

Lela-Rochon is in a bright red, '60s-looking

mini that shows off her legs, legs, legs, her hair

cascading down her back in a Barbie-like fall'

And Loretta Devine, a little heavier, a limle less

glam, wears purple and pink tlike the club), her

I*n shott taii crimped and sryled a bit'

They're here to film the $14 million Wciting to

Exhale andbring new life to characters whom a

lot of people already know intimately from the

muchjadored best-seller by Terry McMillan'

But right now, these four women are won-

dering wf,en the cameras are going to roll and

ho* ih.y'te going to look when they do' -A

.ouole of hundred extras mill around the

dance floor, waiting for the cue to do some-

making her first film since The Bodyguard, itcould prove that she can handle a nonsinging,

down-io-earth role; for both Houston and Bas-

sett, it could demonstrate that black women

who aren't Whoopi Goldberg can carry a pic-

74 PRE\{iER: : DECEMBTt 1995

0!t TllE sET . 'wItTt1{G r0 ExH[[E'

EYE V0ITAGE: Angela Bassett (left) and Loretta

Devine. "This is one of the few good parts thathas come along for me in a decade," says Devine.

ture. For Rochon and Devine, it could takethem from "Who's that?" to household names.

And for actor turned director Forest Whitaker,here in charge of his first theatrical feature, itcould signal to Hollywood that his acclaimedHBO film, Strapped, was not a fluke.

Scripts like this don't come along everyday. For black actresses, they may not come

along in a lifetime. And the four women andtheir director are determined to make it work.Like the characters they play, they've been

holding their breath for a long time.

s A NovEL, Waiting to Exhale was a pub-lishing phenomenon. Unlike the work ofsuch writers as Alice Walker and ToniMorrison, McMillan's Exhale was un-

abashedly popular literature, chronicling thelives and loves of four contemporary middle-class black women in a refreshingly loose-limbed, accessible style. It was read every-where-on subways, buses, beaches.

Middle-class black women (and a fair numberof men) finally saw the realiry o{ their own livesin print-and it thrilled them. McMillan'sreadings were more like rock concerts or re-vival meetings, with 300 or'100 people waitingout in the rain just to meet her and touch thehem of her garment. Because of the devotionthat the book inspired, the movie is under close

scrutinv from the African-American communi-tr, and even'one on the set knows it. Observes

Houston, "I like that somebody's taking a

chance on making a movie about four sisters

who love each other. We do have lives, we are

achievers-all the things that we know we are

but the world doesn't see or acknowledge."McMillan also thinks the filmmakers are

taking a chance, but in a different way. "To

tell the truth, I didn't think it would make a

very good movie," she says. "There's no real

plot. I mean, I wrote it, and I thought it was adecent story. But if it hadn't been a best-sellerand Whitney and all these foiks weren't in it, Idon't know if I'd run to go see it."

When the movie rights to the book weresold, McMillan, straining under the weight ofher newfound populariry, wanted nothing todo with the screenplay. But the first draft byanother writer iust didn't work, so the produc-ers, Deborah Schindler and Ezta Swerdlow(who were based at Twentieth Century Fox),then went back to McMillan and asked for

help. "By this time, she had some distance{rom it," recalls Schindler. "She said, 'I'd liketo take a crack at this, but I don't want to do italone.'" Her friend Amy Tan had had a goodexperience cowriting the script lor The loyLuck Club with Ronald Bass, so McMillanasked for a "Ron Bass rype." As it turned out,the real thing was not only available but inter-ested, and so McMillan and Bass, now also

executive producers ofExhale, devised a script

that is remarkably true to the spirit of the book.McMillan has exercised her power off and

on throughout the proiect, most notably in her

approval of a black male director, which an-

noyed a number of people in the African-

76 ii.:\..:i: l.ci\{srn 1995

American communiry. "My fear with choos-ing one of our really talented black women di-rectors is that they were too close to this sto-ry," McMillan says. "It might almost be onthe brink of being sentimental. I'm, like, Let'sbe happy that70 percent of the crew are peo-ple of color. Now we have a black director,but that's not good enough, we need a woman.It would always be something. My attitude is,

It's my book, it's my movie. My mother taughtme that you can't please everybody."

Whitaker had this potential controversy inmind when he went in to make his pitch. "Myinitial reaction when I read the book was thata woman should direct this film," he says."But ultimately I think it's about people andtheir friendships and theit loves and dreams. Iunderstood a lot of that from my own life. Andfour women are playing the parts, not me."

oD FoRBTD soMEoNE should call Waitingto Exhale a black movie. Says EzraSwerdlow: "Obviously, for African-American women, there is something

there that spoke to them about their experi-ences, but white women too felt the deep con-nection to the characters and experiences andthe struggle for relationships that wotk andmean something. To me, as I read it, I just

learned about people." Says Tom |acobson,head of production at Fox when the film was

made: "I think that it's a universal woman'sstory, and those types of movies cross over toet:erybody if they are well-done and promise a

unique moviegoing experience."That the producers want the film to appeal

to as wide an audience as possible is not sur-prising. But the fact remains that nothing likeit has ever been made before. (When was thelast time you saw a movie starring four blackwomen, let alone ones who aren't playinghookers or gangsta girlfriends, and take a stab

at having independent lives?)As soon as Exhale got the go-ahead, most

of the black actresses in Hollywood started an-gling for parts. Whitney Houston and AngelaBassett were approached and agreed to star as

Savannah and Bernadine, respectively. "Once

we had our marquee names, then it was a mat-tet of just getting the best people possible,"says Swerdlow. Whitaker saw dozens of ac-

tresses, but some of the most obvious choices

refused to audition and ultimately lost out.Those who did audition know that they are

fortunate-and worked hard to get where theyare. Devine, who plays Gloria and jokinglyrefers to herself as "the last fat girl in L.4.,"was a member of the original Broadway cast ofDreamgirls; she claims that divine interventionwas at least panially responsible for her gettingthe role in Exhale. "My mother held a prayer

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vigil at her church," she says with a laugh.Lela Rochon didn't call on God bit she

worked every other angle she could to ger rherole of Robin, whom she feels she *., b'orn toplay. Best known for cameo parts in two Ed-die Murphy movies (Harlim Mghrs andBoomerang), Rochon wasn't initially-asked toaudition, but had met McMillan ihrough afriend. "l said to Terry, 'Give me ten min"uteswith Forest. Girl, t will go in there and rock it.You'll be so proud of me.'" Rock it she did.

Everyone on the Exhale cast and crewseems to know one another, either throughMcMillan or from some

has ar

other proiect. Thewhole production has an unusually clubby,collegial feel. With one big exception.

SISTER ACT: Houston and Rochon share a laugh."Where is the nappy hair?" asks McMillan.

ETwEEN TAKES, Whitnev Houstonstands alone, not speaking to anyone andmaking a show of being bored and fa-tigued. Rochon. her parrner in this

scene, is off in another corner, talking toWhitaker.

. Suddenly Houston stands up

straight and, with an expression of mild irrita_tion, says to a PA, "Can you get euietfire forme?" Several PAs call on their walkie-talkiesfor the makeup aftist, but he doesn'r appearfor a few minutes. The tension level on the setrises as Houston rolls her eyes in disgust andquietly fumes. The first AD steps in ind callsfor Quietfire with an expression of concern asPAs start to rrot around and talk anxiouslv. Afew more.minutes pass, then euietfire ap-p.1r.:j_lr the sight of him, Houston says firm-ly, "Where did you go?"

. "Someplace simple," he says, slightly

abashed.'Yeah. That's why I can't find you.,, She

gives him a look of dirgrrt and walks off toget her face touched up.

While her costars have only blandly pleas-ant things to say about her, Houston hrs be.nthe subiect of a great deal of specularion andtabloid gossip throughour the shoot, which isusual for her, and, as usual, a large portion of itis untrue or at least unconfirmable. And

OiI T}IE SET

though ir hasn t been enough to throw thinssoff track. she has missed some shootine daisdue to an unspecified illness iwhich ,oi.,. Jnthe set, observing that her absences have usu_ally resulted in a longer weekend, view wjththinly veiled skepticism ). Says one crew mem_ber, "She was the least giving of all the actress_es. I felt like lthe filmmakeril were seftins uDa relationship with a child. you keep giiingand giving and when you say 'Stop,i iL tollate. They already know they'ie in ctntrol.',

Houston cenainly looks like she's in con_trol as she strides onto the set, rhe last actressto arrive, with two personal assistants, euiet_fire, her hair_person, and her bodyguid, alarge man with long hair who b..r, nl'.r.r_blance to Kevin Costner. tThe grouping issometimes enlarged with various ag"nt,

-.nd

others who come and go.) She's bioomsrickthin and stanlingly beautiful, her face placid.imp_assive, and perfectly made-up.

Later, in a brief interview, Houston con_fesses ro nor having finished McMillan's nov_el: "I got about halfway through and stopped.never knowing rhar it would"b. rnrd. i*o ,movie." She seems to come closest to tellingthe truth about her life when she looks out hei

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trailer window. her eyes distracred vet steelv.and says, ''My world just keeps going. Thismovie is iust one small section of it." m"Whitney Houston business, it seems, isenough to make a diva out of anvone.

nrN McMrr-LAN rs asr<ro what herbiggest objection to the movie is. shesays. "Where's rhe nappy hair in thismovie? Somebody needs to have some

braids, some African twists, or som"thing.Because in the book I did not write for ailthese women to have French twists and lots ofcurly little spirals in their hair.,, That this iseven a topic for discussion shows how farblack culture has come in Hollywood. But thefact that all four stars wear hair that is eitherchemically straightened, weaved, or under astraighr wig shows how far there is still to go.

Waiting to Exhale ends with the four leldsdancing and embracing under a full moon bva desert lake, a scene that doesn't occur in thlnovel..."Them stopping by the lake is a bitmuch," says McMillan, "but at leasr it makessense because they see how beautiful it is andthey're rejecting all this other stuff. At first, Ithought they should end up at InternationalHouse of Pancakes. I was hoping that, as thecredits roll, you'd see them ai IfrOp, eatingsome pancakes. I thought that would b!grear. Thar's what they would do.,, rContributingtsriter Martha Southgate is work-ing on a nouel to be published by belacorte.

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