Girls will be boys and boys will be girls

Everyone on the cast and crew was excited about the third weekend, because this would be when we would finally meet Willam. Although Willam did not have the most voluminous resume of our cast (that distinction went to James Terry, whose appearances goes back to the sit-coms I watched in the 70's), Willam had the most juicy credits, most notably for a recent extended stint on 'Nip Tuck'. Plus, there was the whole mystique surrounding a professional transvestite ... Did he dress in drag all the time, or only in front of the camera? Should we refer to him as 'he' or 'she'? Would he be friendly or would he bite?

Willam arrived in full make-up. I think it takes him hours to apply, literally. My secret desire is to have Willam do my make-up someday. He was gorgeous. Willam also had all his own costumes. Do not ask me how or why he had a fifties waitress costume. I was just happy he had one. Shanna noticed at his audition that he was wearing high heels that retailed for hundreds of dollars. I don't remember how many hundreds, because I have never owned shoes that cost more than a hundred dollars.

Willam's first scene just happened to be my first (and only) scene - the rental car scene. I have not acted since high school, when I played the nagging Jewish wife in the second act of Neil Simon's 'Plaza Suite'. But, I figured the part of the bitchy rental car agent was not too much of a stretch for a sarcastic high school teacher. Also, I'm the one who wrote the damn script. How hard could it be to act out my own lines?

The hard part was remembering my own lines. It was fun though! I got to act in a scene with all my main characters. I got to wear my over-the-top fuzzy green cat sweater, which generated some attention of its own. During a break in shooting, Mac asked me, with polite hesitation, "So .... do you wear this sweater ... in real life?" (only once, on Halloween).

When Michael yelled the last "cut!", Willam looked at me and said "Bitch!". I knew then that I had nailed my part.