"Rex" by Susan Kim

From TRUTH BE TOLD's September 25th, 2025 show ("Scary Monsters") Susan Kim's "Rex" tells of a very famous monster, backstage and on set.

Susan writes plays, books, documentaries, and quite a bit of kids' TV. A flaneuse who fortunately lives in Manhattan, the best city for that kind of thing, she loves animals and funny people, and really wishes we could all just get along. 

TRUTH BE TOLD was created by Susan Kim and David Zellnik and each episode was produced and scored by Eric Svejcar. Logo designed by Joseph Zellnik.

Transcript

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Hello, and welcome to the podcast Truth Be Told, Season 1, Love and Monsters. Each of these 14 episodes will feature one story performed at Ensemble Studio Theater in New York City as part of the live event Truth Be Told. This story night was created by Susan Kim and David Zelmick and features members of EST and friends who tell heartbreaking, embarrassing, hilarious true stories, all based on a theme. This seven-week season draws from our first two sold-out evenings in 2025. First Love, First Lust, and Scary Monsters. And so, without further ado, a story of a very famous monster, backstage and on set, written and performed by Susan Kim.

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When I was little, I worried about monsters. In everything I read, kids were pitted against ridiculously powerful adversaries who were after them for no other reason than they were there. It was so unfair. And of course, you couldn't win by using brute strength or running away or even asking for help. No, you had to somehow tackle the monster by yourself, simply by being brave or clever or just plain good, which I really wasn't. I was so doomed. Anyway, skip forward a few years. In my 20s, I worked in television. It was the unglamorous, non-fun part of television, the budgeting, scheduling, taking notes part. And it was mostly for PBS, which trust me made it even worse. Most of my work meant trailing after powerful men, writing down what they said and reminding them where to go and buying in gifts for their wives, and one time literally carrying their sandwich. This was, of course, years before I realized I could make millions writing one-act plays. But hey, even the worst job lasted only a few months, and I did work on some pretty cool projects with famous people I admired, or at least used to admire until I met them. Because guess what? There were big egos involved, as well as low budgets and short schedules. And remember, I was really, really low on the totem pole. So yes, I met monsters. One production that was especially terrifying was the TV adaptation of a recent Broadway remount of an old play by George Bernard Shaw. The Starlet, a beloved Hollywood actress, I won't name in case someone here is related to her, was at the time married to the biggest film director of the day. She was 30 and four months pregnant, and since she was playing a teenager, insisted on wearing a corset to winch her in. Despite her famously adorable personality, she was ragingly horrible to me. She wasn't alone. The director, an imperious British stage guy, had a vicious temper which he aimed almost exclusively at me as well. He did admittedly get the coolest calls in the edit room. I would fight to answer the phone because it was always, hello, darling, it's Judy Dench or Ian McKellen or Helen Merrin. As I said, pretty cool. Being charitable, I will say that everyone was so awful because we didn't have the resources to give them what they were used to: nicer accommodations, more time, actual flunkies. As for me, I was hired as a script assistant, but was told on the first day I'd also be rehearsal stage manager and associate director for a multicam shoot, two jobs I had never done before. And did I mention the egos? What's more, we all had to report to the choleric head of great performances, the original King Bitch. But even he paled next to the scariest monster of all. Rex Harrison was in his mid-70s, a bit stooped and diminished, but still handsome and with great bearing. And he still sounded like Henry Higgins. Urbane, biting, sophisticated. At times it almost felt like being in the same room as George Bernard Shaw, until suddenly it didn't. Part of what made Rex so scary was never knowing what would trigger him. He'd be reasonably sunny and just explode like some forgotten landmine shearing off your leg. He picked different targets and at random, rarely as co-stars, although he was nicer to some than others, that was bad enough. But he saved his towering white hot explosions for the most obvious targets. The timorous, mostly female, junior crew. The slightest thing would set him off. A misplaced prop, the wrong lunch, the color orange. And his expletives? Even scarier because I wasn't exactly sure what they all meant. Victorian slang for female anatomy? I still don't know. Obviously, I did what any rodent does when there's an apex predator. I hid. I tracked where Rex was at all times and I avoided him as much as possible. But one day, for some reason, for a few seconds, I unplugged the radar. I was alone in the break room when I sensed someone enter. I whirled around, and to my horror, it was him. Well, what to do? I couldn't cut past him, I couldn't hide. He was coming right at me, possibly because I was standing in front of the pastry tray. And I had no place to turn. So I blurted out the first thing that came to mind, and that was, hey Mr. Harrison, how's Noel? Footnote. Noel Harrison, the son of Rex and the first of his six Countum wives, was an Olympic skier and he had a hit song, The Windmills of Your Mind. He also appeared on the NBC series The Girl from Uncle playing secret agent Mark Slate. Rex actually stopped in his tracks. Noel? Do you know Noel? No, I said. But when I was little, he was in my favorite TV show. I realized I was kind of babbling at this point, but I just went with it. And I had the biggest crush on him, so I was just wondering, what's he been up to? Rex actually smiled, or I guess you'd more accurately say he showed his teeth. Well, he said, I'm afraid he's doing dinner theater down in Texas. My fair lady, you know. He shuddered comically, I guess, like like I was supposed to laugh, like it was hilarious his son was such a loser. I ignored that. Well, the next time you talk, will you please tell him you're working with someone who had the hugest crush on him? This is all true, by the way, I really did. I thought your son was cuter than a beetle. Yes. For a long moment, Rexy mired in his bog of paternal contempt. Then he shook it off. And what's your name? Susan, I said. Susie, he repeated inaccurately. I'll tell him that, Susie. Okay, that afternoon we had to read through the play. This was basically a warm-up. The production had only recently finished its run, so you'd assume everyone still knew their lines. Rex, not so much. He was okay, kind of in the scenes where he just wandered in and said something irascible and wandered out. But this was Shaw, right? Everyone had monologues, some quite dense. Rex had one in the third act that was an extended metaphor about the ocean, at least as written. He remembered every third word, then every 15th word, and then he just took off. I tried following along, but it was impossible. And I kept glancing at the others to see if I should cue him. Everyone, even the mean director, even the bitchy lead, the entire cast was bugging their eyes out at me and shaking their heads and mouthing, by now Rex was mumbling two words over and over. The sea. The sea. The sea. The seconds ticked by. It was unbearable, so I did it. Ignoring the others, I leaned forward with my script and whispered, the smash of the drunken skipper ship. Raising his hand, Rex cut me off. No, no, darling, I'm acting. And after that, I was golden. To everyone else, Rex remained his usual horrible bullying self, screaming at the PAs, making the prop mistress cry, terrifying the entire cast and crew. After one outburst, he abruptly stood. I'm going to get some tea, he bellowed. He spun on his seal, then he spun back. Susie, he shouted across the gigantic room, would you kill for some tea? No thanks, Mr. Henderson. I called back, and the entire room stared at me as he nodded and lumbered out. In the break room, Rex told me amazing anecdotes. He told me about Claudette Colbert and Noel Coward and Audrey Hepburn. He told me about chateaux in Monaco and meeting the Queen and opening nights on the West End. He moaned about what a piece of garbage Dr. Doolittle was and how that fucking pirate kept shitting down my back. He was charmingly obscene and absolutely hilarious. Really, what I'd hope he'd be all along. I don't kid myself that he saw anything special in me. And God knows he he never hit on me or acted inappropriately. We certainly didn't stay in touch. I've also learned that bullies often need a pet as well as a whipping boy. So maybe he was just using me to make his cruelty even more painful to the others. But all I know is that somehow, for whatever reason, I escaped his wrath. And why? Because I didn't cower? Because I didn't suck up or fawn. Sometimes I think it's because I didn't join him in mocking his son for doing fifth-rate theater in a third-rate city. And by doing that, maybe just for a few moments, I let him see his son in a different way. Not as a loser, but as a star. As someone even worthy of a crush. So it turns out I was right as a child to be worried about monsters. Because when push came to shove, I wasn't brave or clever or good. All I could really be was nerdy and artless and sincere. In other words, myself. Yet weirdly, that was what turned out to save me. And maybe that's what those fairy tales were trying to tell me all along.

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Susan Kim writes plays, books, and documentaries, and quite a bit of kids' TV. A flanes, who fortunately lives in Manhattan, the best city for that kind of thing. She loves animals and funny people and really wishes we could all just get along. Truth Be Told was created by Susan Kim and David Zeldnik, and each episode was produced and scored by Eric Svagar. If you enjoyed this, please tell your friends and keep listening. More stories of love and lust will be released every Monday, and Scary Monsters every Thursday. And do hit like and subscribe, it really helps. Till next time, remember, truth wants to be known. Yours too.