Posted on 03/16/2002 7:37:16 PM PST by denydenydeny
This story has nothing to do with Hollywood.
A few days ago, while I was in New Hampshire at the Hanover Inn, visiting our son at the Cardigan Mountain School, I watched some of a tribute to my former Honeymoon in Vegas costar Nicolas Cage.
The part I saw included the staggeringly lovely Elisabeth Shue talking about Cage. "He's so brave," she said. "His artistic choices are just so brave; I think he must be the bravest person I know."
I'm paraphrasing here, and I'm sure Ms. Shue was just excited because she was on camera. But when I think of the word brave and also the word star, which are suggested by Shue and Cage, I think of a little boy very far from Hollywood.
He is far and away the bravest human being I know right now.
I think I will tell you about him so you know what a real star is like--and don't get fooled by us cheesy Hollywood imitations.
In November of 2000, I was in Little Rock, Arkansas, visiting my in-laws. By total chance, I got an email from a woman in Little Rock who didn't know I was there.
She wrote that her nephew had serious tumors in his head. He was about seven and had been through chemo, radiation and recently a bone-marrow transplant.
She said the boy, whom I will call D., was an immense fan of mine and especially of Win Ben Stein's Money. "He doesn't know any of the answers, of course," said the letter, "but he just loves your voice."
I emailed back that I was in town, and soon I was in the Arkansas Children's Hospital. D. was in a spacious room in the children's cancer ward, a place of sufficient horror for many lifetimes but a place where the nurses and doctors were clearly working overtime to save lives and to keep up a cheery attitude.
There were stuffed animals and toys everywhere. I brought the tyke a little train set and some other toys I don't recall. He was in a sterile room with two sets of doors to keep out infection, because his chemo had virtually wiped out his white blood cells.
His mother was lying on the bed with him. He had about a dozen tubes going into his chest all at one central point. His hair was gone, his eyes were sunken, but still he giggled when I entered the room.
"It's Ben Stein," his mother kept saying. His father, who had brought me over, added, "He's not on TV; he's right here."
"You see all those tubes going into him?" his mother asked. "He calls those his Ben Stein lines, and when they hurt, he says it's Ben Stein who's taking the pain, not him."
I said I doubted I could take that much pain. The child just looked at me, and then he played with his train while looking at me.
After I left, I made an arrangement to help the family in a way that is easy for a TV star (even a lowly cable one) and hard for an army sergeant, which is what the boy's father is.
I came back twice more to see D., but he was not doing well, so he could only wave weakly to me from his glassed-in room.
Time passed. I stayed in close touch with D.'s parents. They made a Website for the boy and his many supporters. He had every kind of treatment. He had his ups and his downs. He was free of tumors for a time, and then they came back and he was in and out of the hospital.
Yesterday morning, I got an email from his mother. "D. has had a stroke. His tumors are back, and they are growing. The doctors say it is only a matter of days until he passes. I will keep you informed."
Let me tell you that D. never once complained. He never asked why he had to spend his childhood with tubes in him and in agony from chemo. He never asked why he had to be inside behind glass when other seven-year-olds were outside making snowmen.
His parents barely complained as well. They stuck with him every second and only wanted to serve him and their country.
D. may make a miraculous recovery or he may enter immortality soon and lay down his poor, cancer-riddled body. I imagine him playing in the next life and making up for the time he has missed, maybe for all eternity. But who knows?
What I do know is that life for most of us is pretty easy. We sometimes go to auditions and don't get parts. I was at one two days ago, where I tried out to be Ralph Fiennes' political adviser in a movie in which he's Prince Charming to J.Lo's Cinderella.
A room full of beautiful actresses were trying out for smaller roles, some of them complaining mightily about how going to auditions is the worst thing in the world.
And then there's Elisabeth Shue, telling us that making the right acting choices is the bravest thing in the world. And then there are people on TV saying that dieting is the hardest thing in the world.
This is America, and we all have our opinions. But for me, I saw real stardom and courage in the hollow eyes of a little boy in a room at the Arkansas Children's Hospital.
I saw real acting genius in his mom and dad and in the nurses keeping up their happy facades while small children lay mortally sick all around them.
There will be no star for D. on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. There will be no table where he is remembered at Morton's--except mine. But he is a true star, shining eternally in a dark night, and he has brought light to everyone he has touched.
Addendum: I wrote this column on Friday. D.--whose real name is Dillon Rolins--died peacefully on Tuesday night, in Arkansas in the bosom of his family. May God bless his soul. He was an angel, and now he is with the other angels, where he belongs. Nothing I will ever be able to tell you about Hollywood will ever touch the magnificence of this child's courage and innocence. No movie or TV show, however well written, acted or lit, will ever touch the greatness of his family's devotion. But as you already guessed, this story has nothing to do with Hollywood.
BUMP.
The more I see and hear Ben Stein; the more I like him. Great insight and wise words. God bless D and his family
Sui
It's kind of a cheap writing gimic. The well fed middle class versus some starving kid in Biafra. It's a game any ideology can play for maximum effect. But it is just a game, and Ben doesn't do himself any credit by going so cheap in his writing technique.
This is not about "The well fed middle class versus some starving kid in Biafra."
The column is about the definition of a word--courage--and how shallowly it can be defined. Anyone of any class can be shallow, or courageous, or--for that matter--stricken by cancer.
There are many words I could use to describe this article, but "cheap" is not one of them. Now, your facile "Biafra" metaphor--that's cheap.
God Bless little Dillon and his family. And God Bless Ben Stein for being a friend to Dillon and his family. Just think of the joy it must have brought that little boy to have one of his favorite TV stars show up to see HIM and bring him gifts. Such a little expense for Ben Stein, such an enormous gift to that boy!
It's kind of a cheap writing gimic. The well fed middle class versus some starving kid in Biafra. It's a game any ideology can play for maximum effect. But it is just a game, and Ben doesn't do himself any credit by going so cheap in his writing technique."
I truly pity you, for one of these days you will realize how deeply you are wallowing in your own bitterness. You hold yourself out to be a pure libertarian, yet you begrudge anyone who has succeeded on their own accounts. Greed may be the motivation of Capitalism, but envy is the driving impetus of socialism...
Your resentment of Stein and his success highlights on which side of the line you've chosen to fall.
Steins point is well taken. The total confusion as to what constitutes bravery and character in this country today sits squarely at Hollywoods clay feet. These people are so shallow and selfserving as to appear rediculous to any discerning person.There are people of character there, to be sure, but the majority seem to be of the type Stein quotes.
Posted in memory of the great Alan Hale, another actor who took the time to visit sick kids.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.