Millie's shoes clicked on the concrete as she walked to the trailers. Cold this hour of the morning. Her gum clicked too. Millie liked the sound of punctuation and of process. She liked things to move, for herself and other people. Why she was so good at her job. Lots of people around who could do makeup. But there was more to the job than that.
Millie managed the team when Jack Dawn wasn't around. She would check out her boys and girls, get them all lined up, schedules ready. They were good kids, hardworking. This danged picture is made of makeup, Millie thought, hours of it every morning. Latex and fur and all of that stuff.
But nothing ever again, Millie thought, could be as bad as those darned Munchkins. One hundred and twenty-four of them all lined up in Rehearsal Hall 8, moving from chair to chair like it was an assembly line. Hard work, but the Little People were fine to work with. Millie had no time for the stories. Millie told her crew to treat them as adults, call them Mr., Miss, or Mrs. and to watch out for knives. Only one or two of them had knives, the real deadbeats, the drunks. Most of them were sweet and looked kinda lost. Like they woke up in the wrong world. But all this sexual business that people were saying. That was just their own dirty minds. The Little People were sweet as could be and as innocent as lambs. Heck, a lot of them had to be. There was something wrong with their glands. A lot of them had foreign accents and got totally lost in the studio. Had to be led around like a class of schoolchildren.
Humiliating for them really. Dressed up in those horrible clothes that pansy had designed for them. Get you, sweetie. Put them in big collars, loose sleeves, to make them look even smaller. Costumes were so bad, they had to have people help them out of them when they had to pee. People were just so mean. One minder used to carry them to the John, one under each arm. "What am I, a nursemaid?" Insulting. They didn't like it either, Big Man. That poor little fellow who fell into the John and couldn't get out? We put big ugly red spots on their cheeks. Supposed to look like they were made of porcelain. Big deal. I just told the kids to treat them with respect.
Lights on inside and warmer.
"Hi, Millie."
"Hiya, Tony."
"Storm last night."
"Yeah, big wind. Any damage to your place?" Millie asked.
"No. But we got a lot of sweeping up to do. Lots of eucalyptus, and you know how they shed bark."
"Not a problem we ever had in Missouri. Got all your gear?" Tony had been new, brought in to help handle the Munchkins. Jack had him stay on to train. "Got your pencils, spirit gum?" Millie asked. Her fingers rattled through the box.
"Mmmm hmmm," said Tony, sharpening an eyebrow pencil.
"You mix this today?" The spirit gum.
"Uh, no, that's yesterday's."
"Well it looks like it. That stuff's murder at the best of times. You better mix it new."
"Okey-dokey."
Nice ordinary people.
Millie looked at the schedule. "How come you're doing Frank?"
"Jack had Harry and me switch."
"Oh, sorry, he did tell me. Slipped my mind this hour of the morning." Millie thought of Frank Morgan. "Don't light a match," she warned the kid.
Tony smiled. "I know."
Frank Morgan liked his tipple.
"See you later."
"See you."
Just a quick hiya to the old hands. They knew enough to mix their gum fresh. Hi Tommy, Hi Mort, Hi Bill. Bad storm last night. Drains on our street's all blocked. This city is not designed for rain.
Millie got to her own locker and hauled out her kit. Looked like a toolbox. My little pirate's chest of goodies, thought Millie. All kinds of colors, hard to get. If I lose this, I might as well close up shop for good. Now let's see. Bit of mascara, eyebrows. Today is black-and-white, isn't it, so the lips are going to have to be even lighter than usual or she'll end up looking like Theda Bara. There now. Take all this over, have it ready, and pull back the Technicolor stuff so I don't make a mistake.
Millie loaded it all into a bag and walked down the hall away from the dressing rooms. She walked down the corridor, stepped outside. Everything was a beautiful blue color now, cool, with quite a wind blowing. It whipped the back of her coat up. She walked onto Stage 27. Monkeys were all over the rafters, fixing lights. Paint was still drying on the Kansas backdrop outside the window. Twelve-foot-wide moat between the wall and the set, filled with a bank of lights. Thank God those lights were off for once. Millie was cold, but not that cold. She went to the stars' dressing room, a trailer they had wheeled on to the stage, and opened it up. Millie had a key. She opened it up and laid the makeup out on the table.
Millie never talked about the people she worked with. If people asked her, she'd just say, oh, so-and-so's really nice. Millie would have a thing or two to say about the Kid, if she had a mind to. Oh, she was charming and all that. Went out of her way to be charming. But the stories she told. Like the story she told everyone about the dressing room. Stood outside it crying, saying that they hadn't given her the key. Just had to be the center of attention. Make a little drama out of anything. And as for that graduation business. Told Margaret Hamilton that she would have to miss her high-school graduation because the studio was making her tour. Said it was Hollywood High. Well, she goes to University High, which is clean across town from Hollywood, and she doesn't graduate until next year. So I know better than to believe anything Miss Judy Garland says. There now.
Millie, chewing her gum, locked the door behind her. Better go see about the boys.
Millie went down along the stage, into the next room. Six o'clock, there was Ray Bolger, getting a shave.
"Howdy, Ray."
"Oh, hello, Millie," he smiled, his mouth ringed with shaving soap. She liked Ray Bolger. Quiet and nice.
"Everything okay?" she asked Bud, who did Ray.
"Yup," Bud answered, looking up, smiling. "For once Ray's out of that mask. Just a standard paint job now."
"I feel like a used car," said Bolger, hugging himself. "The only thing I'm going to remember about this picture, Millie, is sitting in this chair. Even a dentist's appointment doesn't take as long."
"Well, at least today you're out of that mask."
"And it's black-and-white." He pretended to sob with relief. Black-and-white meant cooler lights.
"Jack'll be able to sit down," said Bud.
Jack Haley's Tin Man suit dented. He couldn't sit, for eight, ten hours, so he had to lean on a board.