Naomi Grossman: American Whore Story
Naomi Grossman is the kind of person who has always known her own worth, right back to her schooldays when she would fleece the other kids for their milk money to be part of her friendship club, demanding attention and seeking to profit from it or at least break even in the deal, the first in a long line of hustles of the inexhaustible overachiever who is also, predictably, something of an oversharer, a combination which has taken her from high school plays and bit parts on Sabrina the Teenage Witch to the unexpected breakout character on a hit television show and from there around the world.
Introduced as a supporting role in the second volume of American Horror Story, subtitled Asylum, Pepper not only changed Grossman’s life, an inmate instantly recognisable among the drably clad throng, tragic, sympathetic and endearing, she was also enduring, changing the shape of the show which was conceived as akin to repertory theatre, a roster of actors rotating through different parts in different plays with no connection between them until Pepper’s popularity brought her back in the fourth season for a part in the Freak Show.
Directed by Richard Israel, Grossman’s one-woman show American Whore Story an autobiographical self-appraisal of a talented and driven individual who has led an eventful life and now looks back on her half-century with the perspective that comes from time passed, her necessary detachment is leveraged by black humour and the quick wit of a survivor who has pushed through every considerable challenge, artistic compromise and romantic betrayal, throwing herself into every situation and character with sometimes intimidating bravado.
From the worst waitress in history to unintentionally finding herself living under an assumed identity, from doing drugs at Burning Man and briefly and enviably landing on top of Ryan Gosling, the success has been hard-earned and there are moments of horror, both physical and emotional, but while Grossman channels the trailblazers who trod a similar path before her, Lucy, Marilyn and Judy, she is now the one who writes her own story, protecting herself and loving her crazy life beyond the walls of the asylum.
