Colleen Taylor

"Bette Midler told Patrick Healy, of the Times, that she had wanted to be a serious dramatic actress but had faltered for lack of courage. 'I have that terror,' she said. 'Will people like you? Will they ask you back? Did I make the cut? That's always on my mind.'

To hear the brash, funny, commanding (as far as we knew) Midler tell of worrying whether people would like her is painful. But, in every group of artists, the insiders can tell you who, among them, should have had a bigger career but, for some reason, was held back. 

...[Dancer Mikhail] Baryshnikov believes that it is the feeling of obligation to the audience that triggers stagefright: 'Suddenly the morality kicks in. These people bought a ticket to your show.'"

 --from the very interesting article on stagefright by Joan Acocella in the August 3 issue of the New Yorker.

We all know an individual who is brilliant, but also inordinately shy or reclusive. I liked Baryshnikov's comparison of such anxiety to a sudden, chastening sense of "morality" and responsibility to others.

Reading this made me sad to think of how many of the most gifted and sensitive people among us are too reticent, leaving a significant portion of success' upper echelon wide open for those who are mediocre but oddly devoid of the moral -- and perfectly natural -- inclination to occassionally check themselves and dial it back.

"...She said that she has one key commandment of writing: 'Ass in the chair.'"

I often think of this quip from the fascinating and fun to read June 2009 New Yorker profile of the prolific romance novelist Nora Roberts (who also writes mysteries under the nom de plume of J.D. Robb.) 

"But walking around Chinatown is the only time I can feel authentic old Manhattan -- our neighborhoods have been neutered. I miss the old New Yorkers," she adds.

"What's confusing is that all these jocks dress alternative now due to hipsterdom or whatever. They're all out in disguise. It's very disturbing."

-- Chloe Sevigny in the November issue of Harper's Bazaar 

I liked this when I read it, as it articulates something that's bugged me lately in my more cynical moments, in NYC and elsewhere. 

But there's likely nothing new happening under the sun. I'm probably just getting old and wanting all these kids to get off my lawn.

"She's on the 11th date of her North American tour, with 90 or so shows to go, a number she doesn't like hearing out loud. She's both star and caller of nearly every shot, from wardrobe to the tiniest shift in backup harmonies. And being the boss, it emerges, is hard.

'I have a lot on my plate,' she says...'Things can get monotonous. Sometimes it gets overwhelming. A lot of people want things from you. But it's fine! It's called trade-offs.

You have this dream, and then the dream becomes reality, and what comes along with it is you run a company. It's the fine print of the dream that you didn't know was there.'"

-- a quip that's applicable to a lot of grownup life in general, from the more-interesting-than-you'd-think profile of Katy Perry in the latest issue of Rolling Stone Magazine