“Faye Dunaway playing a legendary film star – what could go wrong.”    
– Billy Masters on The Take way back in April.

If there’s one thing I enjoy more than starting a column by saying I was right, it’s starting a column by sharing a Fayewatch item.  Miss Dunaway will NOT be appearing as Katharine Hepburn on Broadway…or anywhere else, for that matter.  While I predicted this outcome months ago, I wasn’t completely right.  Sure, I knew she wouldn’t make it to Broadway, but I didn’t predict that Faye would be FIRED.  And this makes me sad.  Not because she was good in the role – it was an ill-advised pairing from the get-go.  But from the stories that are now circulating from the limited run in Boston, the hijinx that would have engulfed an actual Broadway production would have given me fodder for endless columns.  At least we can now tell you about her unhinged behavior in Boston.

It seems things were never good on the Tea at Five set.  At a photo session announcing the play, Dunaway reportedly threw her luncheon salad on the ground, proclaiming that since she was watching her weight, “the salad would be better on the floor than in her hand”.  Sources confirm that she never learned her lines (as I reported, an earpiece had to be used onstage), she frequently cancelled or was late to rehearsals, and would not allow people – including the playwright and director – to look at her.  When she did show up, she insisted that nobody around her wear white “because it distracts me”.  You know what might have helped with that?  Learning the lines!  And, while it seems implausible, sources claim that shortly before opening night, Faye had staffers get down on their hands and knees and scrub the floor of her dressing room.  I’m sure the words, “Now clean up this mess!” were uttered.  More believable, however, is that people working on the show would get “troubling, rambling, angry” voicemails in the middle of the night.  Hmmm – this sounds familiar.  And you can hear it on BillyMasters.com.