they laughed and I knew they
had heard me. They had adjust-
ed their hearing.
“They say when you lose one
arm the other gets twice as
strong. I think that’s what hap-
pened. My concentration got
stronger. My voice didn’t get
stronger, but my concentration
did. That was the best night of
my life. They gave a seven or
eight minute standing ovation.
We cried and they cried. In the
audience were two women I
had worked with - Silvia Sidney
and Helen Hayes. Sidney turned
to Helen and said, ‘have you
ever been to the theatre where
you’ve seen so much love come
from the audience to the stage
and back?’ And Helen Hayes
said, ‘I’ve never seen so much
love in the theatre.’ Later that
night we went to a party where
Tony introduced me as the gutsi-
est son of a bitch. I said no, I’m
the luckiest son of a bitch. To
have friends like Tony and an au-
dience who understood where
I was and that it was the begin-
David Saint with Paul Dooley and Jack Klugman. Photo by Gary Wien
NJ STAGE 2017 - Vol. 4 No. 5
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