Free I'm Not Dead... Yet! by Robby Benson Page A

accepting the lead in Pirates instead of committing to a summer tour with Meat Loaf (which she knew would not happen). Karla’s debut album, Is This A Cool World Or What?! , had a November release date, and Epic/CBS International Records wanted her music videos to be shot in London.
    Andrew Lloyd Webber’s first wife Sarah had ‘discovered’ Karla, bringing her stellar performance in Pirates to the attention of Lloyd Webber who was looking for the perfect woman to star in a film version of his musical Evita . Karla was called to meet both the Lloyd Webbers at MCA studios in New York and sang in a small practice room with Andrew accompanying her. He immediately called director Ken Russell to set up a screen test for her in London. Singing “Don’t Cry for Me Argentina,” Karla moved everyone to tears at her two screen tests at Pinewood Studios (except the lyricist, who had hopes for his lover to star). Karla was Russell’s first choice for the role until the film fell apart, and he wrote about her performance in his autobiography, Altered States .
    I met Ken Russell in 2007 when he was being honored with a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Asheville Film Festival where I was a judge. When he saw Karla, he held out his arms exclaiming, “My Evita!”
    After Karla left Pirates I was devastated. Although we were crazy about each other, Karla was hesitant to take the next step.
    One of the millions of reasons I loved her was because she was very sensible and never dated musicians or actors. Cool. My kind of woman. My kind of person! She was so smart and sexy without ever trying to be sexy—that was a new one in my business. And she was funny! Funny! Looking back, she held the fact that I was starring in films against me. I had faced that many times. People think you make movies so you must be a superficial jerk. I couldn’t hold that against Karla. As a matter of fact, I admired her for it. It meant that she was waiting to see how Hollywood I was—how narcissistic, how self-absorbed. Who can blame her? Not me. These qualities made me respect her even more.
    Pirates moved from the Uris (now the Gershwin) to the Minskoff Theatre on August 9th. Between shows on the first matinee day, I found Karla on a pay phone near the stage-left landing, and before she could move away, I had to tell her something that if it stayed inside of my heart and soul one more second, then I would be a hypocrite.
    I went up to her when she finished the phone call and no matter what else was happening in the world, she had to know the most important thing that ever had happened to me: “I love you.”
    Karla was completely flustered and muttered something like, “Oh, oh...that’s... great, gotta go.” Not the response I had hoped for but it didn’t matter—if this world were to end on that very day, Karla would know I loved her…
    She quickly walked down the cement stairs; I wanted to stop her—I had been running the few stairs in this new building, but didn’t think it was my right to tell her anything—I didn’t ‘own her’—I loved her. So I waited at the the door to the staircase. Like me, the ‘stair-runner,’ Karla went down the stairs only to realize we were in a new theatre and this was not an exit. (The cement staircase was a mistake. It went to nowhere. It had no exit.) Karla had to turn around and come right back up past me. I was hoping that in the small time she spent on the stairs, she would say, “I love you, too.” Instead it was, “No exit. Gotta go.”
    When it came to love, my heart and true feelings were an unstoppable freight train and Karla was my destination. Up to a point; I despised men who forced themselves on others just to get their way. I knew when to step back—but Karla was the most extraordinary person I had ever met. And to prove it, here is what happened: She said she felt love for me, but also wondered if she had lost her mind.
    Karla was in a four year long monogamous relationship with her