Today is a sad day. Helen Reddy has passed away. She was an amazing entertainer that I was lucky to have crossed paths with on many occasions . It all started back in the late seventies. I first got her greatest hits album for a birthday one year and was an instant fan! At about that time I had become best friends with a kid I met in high school, named David Fitzgerald.
David was a bigger fan of Helen’s than I was, and had additional albums that he introduced me to. I soon had all of her released albums in my collection!
At some point, we found out that Ms. Reddy was going to appear at the Cape Cod Melody Tent. David and I snatched up some tickets and had my poor Dad take us to my first concert! Thus began the life of two groupies who went to every show she performed in a 200 mile radius!
My dad was florist, like his father, and his father before him. This allowed me to bring a dozen roses to every concert and we would give her a box at every performance! At one of her shows we asked to go back stage and see if we could meet Ms. Reddy. Since they new we were kids, and brought the roses, we were escorted backstage. First I noticed that our roses had been distributed to a variety of people backstage. I remember feeling a little sad as I I thought that she should have just cherished them. Hey, I was a naive 14 year old! Miss Reddy was nice when we met her, but I remember also feeling that she was a little stuck up…just my first impression. I also remember seeing that she smoked Merit cigarettes and that kind of disappointed me as well, as I was rabidly against smoking and couldn’t believe a singer would do such a thing! Again, I was a young teenager. She autographed our programs, and then wanted to know if we would like her warm-up comedian’s autograph as well. We didn’t, but not wanting to be rude, had him sign as well. I believe his name was Argus Hamilton. I still have her autograph from that night, but somehow misplaced his.
David and I collected clippings, watched and audio recorded every tv show she appeared on, and eventually video taped her performances when we had VCRs.
At about this time, I also began autograph collecting and was able to obtain her home address. David and I sent clippings and pictures for her to autograph, and to our surprise she usually sent them back signed in her distinctive handwriting. It would take many months, but we were very lucky to receive a response. In 1980, my 26 year old brother committed suicide. I was devastated, and David wrote Ms. Reddy and told her of my tragedy. She sent him a signed picture where she wrote for me to “feel better” and he presented that to me. While we somehow fell out of friendship, I always thought that was very kind of him to do.
At one point, Helen Reddy was appearing, I believe at Mechanics Hall in Worcester, Massachusetts. David and I purchased tickets for both the 6PM and the 8PM performances. We also had a dozen roses to give her for each performance. Now at this time, I had seen many shows where someone would walk up on stage at the end of a show, and give the performer some flowers. Instead of giving them to the stage manager, or handing them to her from the footlights, for some reason I had decided that I would walk up on stage and hand them to her. I didn’t know that this was usually done by the theatre when I had seen it happen, and not some random person in the audience. The strains of the closing music were playing, where I walked on stage, handed her the roses, and… gave her a kiss on the cheek! The show ended and we went outside to wait for the next show at 8, where we would do the whole thing again. That is when the evening started to go down hill. David and I were standing outside a bar or restaurant, where someone knocked on the window from inside, and when I turned around to look they gave me the finger! Completely puzzling my teenage brain!
The time came for the 8PM show and David and I were seated in our seats. Then, the stage manager made an announcement over the PA system, “If you have any gifts for Ms. Reddy, please give them to the stage manager, because she was attacked at the last performance.” Attacked! I slumped in my seat, I was in shock. I noticed the stairs to the stage had been removed. Needless to say, I was kind of sick to my stomach for her entire set. We held onto the next box of roses till after the show.
For some reason, we decided that we would try to see her after the show, again, I think we just were in disbelief of all that had happened. We went to the front of the stage, and asked if we could see Ms. Reddy. The person kept trying to tell us that she was out front in the lobby and that we should go there. We said, we know she is backstage, and would like to meet her. We were totally clueless that they were trying to get these two attacking stalkers out of the theatre! They knew that we were the kids with the roses and wanted us out. I felt terrible. David and I would talk about our adventure for years to come, even wrote in our high school yearbooks, “Attack H.R.” We were still fans, but followed her career a little more from a distance.
Flash forward to the mid 1990’s when I was trying to make it as a stage actor in New York City. I was looking through the paper one day when I saw that Helen Reddy was appearing at a supper club in the city. For old time sake, I called and bought a ticket. I was sad when I sat down at my table. There were only about 12 people in the audience… including me! How could this be? The woman was a Grammy award winner, had 6 top ten hits, 18 studio albums (seven of which went Gold), performed at the London Palladium, and appeared in countless television and movie performances. People were eating their salad during “Angie Baby, ” cutting their steak during “You’re My World’, and settling their bill during “I Am Woman.” I of course, applauded recognition for every song intro, while the rest of the audience seemed to only occasionally acknowledge a somewhat familiar tune when they looked up from their soup! I learned a lot about fame that night.
After the show, I noticed that Ms. Reddy was sitting at the bar having a drink with her then husband/drummer, Milton Ruth. I decided to approach her. I had felt guilty for 17 years over the “attack incident.” I started by saying that I owed her an apology. I told her of the incident when I was a teenager and apologized for kissing her on the cheek. Ms. Reddy smiled, looked me in the eyes, and said,”I haven’t washed it since.”