"Sutton Foster: The Memoir"

A new book that seems to have slipped under the radar--Sutton Foster's memoir--deserves some attention this year.

Foster writes about her "crafting" hobby -- stitching, sculpting, sketching -- and this part doesn't interest me at all. If she needed this "hook" to get into her life stories, fine. But I don't think anyone needs to dwell on the paragraphs about collage, crochet tools, etc.

Here's the meat of the story. Foster had a difficult mom who suffered from some combination of agoraphobia and borderline personality disorder. As the years went by, the mental illness grew stronger. Despite being often impossible, Mama Foster had ambitions and sometimes-weirdly-clear thoughts about the future. She recognized that her small child had an extraordinary talent--and she found ways to cultivate the talent. Also, when Patti LuPone appeared on PBS to do her now-famous version of Stephen Sondheim's "Being Alive," Mama Foster looked at her adolescent daughter and shrugged. She said, "Sutton, YOU could do that."

(Patti LuPone is a strange secondary character in this memoir. She gets on a call with Sutton and says, "Darling, I love you. I AM you." Patti also confesses that she doesn't really have hobbies--beyond reading--so her life is often mainly waiting for a new professional phone call. And Patti--like so many of us--really eagerly anticipates the Broadway revival of "The Music Man." Who knew?)

Sutton Foster gets wonderfully candid about her mom's final years. Mama Foster retreated to a dark den and basically stopped communicating with her husband, who was locked in an awful codependent arrangement for most of his adult life. Mama Foster began to make each family event into an *operatically* intense and layered drama. "Sutton, you're getting married in Brooklyn? You're doing that because you know I won't get on a plane -- you know this is a way to ensure that I won't attend." Eventually, Mama gets a tumor on her body around the size of a grapefruit--and she doesn't tell anyone until it's far too late. The hospital visits are harrowing; of course there is a cold, awful doctor, because being Sutton Foster doesn't make you immune from the awfulness of certain doctors. And Sutton's brassiness comes through: When Mama snaps at Sutton, Sutton smiles and says, "I'm here, and I'm not leaving. You'll have to get used to me."

There are other treats here: Bobby Cannavale invades Sutton's love life, and he seems monstrous, and Sutton doesn't really hesitate to underline the monstrousness. (I did recently see Bobby on a talk show with his spouse, Rose Byrne, and I thought....Rose Byrne does not seem like a happy human being right now....) I was fascinated by the Reno Sweeney chapter: Sutton couldn't "find" her character, and Joel Grey became blunt. Grey said: "Why are you doing this show?" And Sutton realized she didn't have an answer. Her pseudo-answer: "I wanted to do it because Patti had done it."

One disappointing part has Sutton taking over the role of Millie from Erin Dilly; I felt dismayed because all Sutton said was that "Erin was a goddess! Really, it was like SHE was comforting ME--and not the other way around!" This reeks of bullshit -- and, at the least, I want more detail. I *did* like how Peter Hermann and Mariska Hargitay directed Sutton to begin considering adoption; and I liked that Hermann gave "Anna Karenina" to Sutton, and she neglected to read the book, and she now feels guilty.

Clearly, this is an essential memoir. I wouldn't object to a sequel.

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Liars and Saints

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