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BY DEBRA PICKETT SUN-TIMES COLUMNIST
"We have a standing reservation for you," he says, almost breathlessly. "Anyime you'd like to come over after a show, just call us or have your assistant call, and we'll take care of you."
"My assistant!" Cates says with a laugh. "I wish!"
But the manager is unfazed. The restaurant is not always open late, he explains, but if Cates should happen to have family or friends whom she'd like to entertain, well, this can easily be arranged.
Hours of operation are for the little people. And Kristy Cates, though she still thinks of herself as "just a girl from the ensemble," is no longer one of the little people. She's a star. The star of a hit musical.
This idea amuses her enormously.
As she sits, surrounded by caricatures of famous and vaguely familiar -- is that the water commissioner? -- faces, Cates says she's still getting used to the idea that the role of Elphaba, the awkward girl who grows up to be Oz's wicked witch, is hers.
Cates sang and danced in the relative obscurity of the ensemble in the Broadway production of "Wicked " before being tapped to fill in for Stephanie J. Block, the lead in the show's Toronto production, when Block was injured during a rehearsal.
She has since been an understudy for four different actresses playing Elphaba. But two weeks ago, she finally took the stage as an actual headliner.
'I'm like Jessica Rabbit'
"It's obviously terrible that Stephanie got hurt," she says, shrugging her shoulders slightly because she knows anything else she says out loud -- like, "but it was a great break for me!" -- will sound absolutely awful.
She's saved from this slightly awkward moment when a restaurant staffer arrives to present her with another perk of her fame: her own caricature.
"Oh my God," she declares, as she takes it in, blushing and shaking her hands (with their green-manicured nails) like she's just made the finals at Miss America. "I can't believe this."
She'd been told the restaurant had a "Wicked" wall (it's right beside the main entrance) that featured other cast members, but she figured if she was ever included on it, she'd be memorialized as the green-skinned witch she plays, not the glamor girl in the picture she's just been handed.
"As a cartoon, I am hot!" she declares. "I'm like Jessica Rabbit."
Glamorous image notwithstanding, Cates, who grew up in northern California as the adored baby sister in a blended family of six and attended the prestigious Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music, doesn't seem to have a high-maintenance bone in her body. Coughing and clearing her throat frequently as she eats her chicken Caesar salad, she explains that she seems to be allergic to something at the Oriental Theatre and has been relying on a cortisol inhaler and a personal steamer to keep her throat clear enough for singing.
Tales as an understudy
Cates, 28, spent her post-college years in New York, doing most of the standard struggling-actress stuff. She lived in a 425-square-foot apartment, worked a day job at a publishing company and took whatever roles she could find, including the lead in an off-Broadway revue called "Boobs! The Musical."
"There's something about not having 'made it' right away that I really appreciate now," she says, half-consciously casting a glance in the direction of the caricature she has stashed on the ledge behind the booth so she can think about how to sign it. If this is the life of a lead actress, she says, noting that her Diet Coke has been quietly replaced twice so that melting ice doesn't dilute its flavor, "I guess all the stuff that comes with it is pretty cool."
Still, Cates' favorite stories are the ones that come from her understudy days. For each performance, she'd have to show up at the theater, check in and wait around until the first song. Then, assuming nothing went wrong, she was free to go -- as long as she stayed within a five-block radius, ready to run back to the theater in case she had to take over in mid-performance.
'They gave me a backup cell phone'
Fortunately, her Loop apartment is within that radius. So, most nights, she hung out, caught some reality TV, had a light dinner -- maybe some Pizano's thin crust, or something from Ben Pao -- and watched the clock.
"It seems like nothing, but there are a lot of things you can't do during that time," she says, "and, of course, that's when you think of all of them."
She never drank or ate heavy food or even strayed a few steps outside her boundaries -- "I know those five square blocks really well!" -- except, of course, for that one time.
That was last summer, when her family was in town, and she decided to take them over to the Taste of Chicago. She had a cell phone with her but somehow didn't get the frantic call from the theater. Fortunately, she'd given the crew her boyfriend's phone number as well, and they managed to get word to him that Kristy needed to report backstage -- immediately. Her family got to see her perform that night, since the lead actress was having trouble with her voice.
"After that," she says, "they gave me a backup cell phone, so I was always carrying two of them around."
Those days are over, though Cates still can't quite believe it.
"I'm just a girl from the ensemble," she declares, as she inscribes the caricature with a note and drawing of a smiley face topped with a witch's hat.
The drawing, she confesses immediately, was not actually her idea, but something she picked up from one of the lead actresses for whom she was an understudy.
She hasn't learned yet that the big stars never bother with attribution.
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- LATEST NEWS -
 ONCE IN A LIFETIME “WICKED” PACKAGE
For the devoted WICKED fan comes this special WICKED 5th Anniversary Package benefiting Broadway Cares / Equity Fights AIDS (BC/EFA). How fitting that Halloween Eve sets the mood for two of Broadway's favorite witches to take center stage, literally. For one lucky winner BC/EFA has created an extraordinary night on Broadway enriched by take-home treasures to keep memories of your night at WICKED fresh for years to come. |
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 Defying Gravity - New Stephen Schwartz Book!
Written by Carol de Giere, Defying Gravity takes readers into the creative world of Broadway and film composer Stephen Schwartz, from his experiences writing Godspell's score at age 23 through the collaborative journey for the making of the mega-hit musical Wicked. |
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 Wicked In Chicago
With the production run coming to a close in Chicago, Wicked tickets are at a premium as the folks around the windy city realize that this rare musical phenomenon is going to be departing soon. |
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 Shoshana Bean Performing at Joe's Pub
Stage stars will sing alongside singer-composer-lyricist Jeremy Schonfeld, a pop and musical theatre songwriter who studied in the BMI Workshop, at Joe's Pub in Manhattan 7 PM June 24. |
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 Wicked Wins Awards
WICKED, at London’s Apollo Victoria Theatre, has dominated the Whatsonstage.com Theatregoers’ Choice Awards 2007, winning 4 awards! |
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