[Congressional Record Volume 161, Number 34 (Friday, February 27, 2015)]
[Senate]
[Page S1196]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                    TRIBUTE TO ARLENE AND ALAN ALDA

  Mr. LEAHY. Madam President, Marcelle and I met Arlene and Alan Alda 
on a trip with Senator Lloyd Bentsen. We had dinner together but I had 
a chance to talk to Alan Alda about our mutual Italian heritage. Later 
I told my Italian-American mother how nice a couple they were. She 
said, basically, what would I expect? With an Italian background, they 
would have to be nice.
  The New York Times recently ran an article about this remarkable 
couple, focusing on her prolific writing, and his acting and writing, 
but especially their ability to maintain a wonderful marriage and a 
sense of life. I wanted to make sure my fellow Senators and anybody 
else who reads the Congressional Record would read this profile. I ask 
unanimous consent to have printed in the Record the article from the 
New York Times entitled ``There's Always Room for Rum Cake.''
  There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in 
the Record, as follows:

                [From the New York Times, Feb. 13, 2015]

                    There's Always Room for Rum Cake

                         (By Lois Smith Brady)

       Arlene Alda, 81, and her husband, the actor Alan Alda, 79, 
     say that one secret to a long-lasting marriage (theirs has 
     been going for almost 58 years) is forgetfulness, which comes 
     naturally to them at this point.
       The Aldas, who discussed their decades together by 
     telephone, with Ms. Alda also weighing in later by email, 
     haven't had a serious argument for the last 20 years, she 
     said, primarily because they can no longer remember for very 
     long whether they are angry with each other or why.
       ``I have a short memory, and so does he,'' Ms. Alda said. 
     ``Was that always true? I don't recall.''
       Both emanate warmth and thoughtfulness in the way of 
     beloved English professors or concerned therapists. Mr. Alda, 
     whose career in television and theater has been as remarkably 
     durable as his marriage, and Ms. Alda, a writer and 
     photographer, possess laughs that are like old jeans: 
     comfortable and well used.
       Ms. Alda said that laughter is ``the real glue that keeps 
     us happily and willingly stuck together.'' They are 
     definitely not the kind of couple who sit silently across the 
     table from each other. ``We're both loud laughers,'' she 
     said. ``Guffawing ones.''
       He said: ``I have a very highfalutin notion about laughter. 
     I think when you laugh you make yourself momentarily 
     vulnerable. Your defenses are not up, and if you can stay in 
     a playful mood, where you are susceptible to laughter, your 
     chances of being antagonistic with each other are lower.''
       In general, they do not seem to act their ages. She 
     described a recent afternoon: ``I have a blurb to write for 
     someone's book. I have soup I want to cook. I have a good 
     chicken I want to roast. I have a book I'm reading that I 
     want to finish. I have email correspondence. I have Facebook 
     posts.''
       Her 19th book, ``Just Kids From the Bronx,'' a collection 
     of vignettes about 65 noteworthy people who grew up in rough 
     Bronx neighborhoods and escaped in their own idiosyncratic 
     ways, is to be published next month.
       Ms. Alda, who grew up in the Bronx herself and is a Hunter 
     College graduate, met Mr. Alda in 1956 while he was attending 
     Fordham University. They connected at a dinner party on the 
     Upper West Side when a rum cake accidentally fell onto the 
     kitchen floor and they were the only two guests who did not 
     hesitate to eat it.
       ``He was a kindred spirit who was also funny, so there was 
     this great chemistry,'' she said. ``It sure was fun and 
     delightful to be with him that night. Boys from Manhattan 
     didn't date girls from the Bronx. That was a given. It was 
     too long of a trip. He took me home to the Bronx. Unheard 
     of.''
       Eleven months later, they were married in a modest ceremony 
     (18 guests watched) that reflected their humble goals at the 
     time. They mainly wanted to be able to pay the rent and not 
     suffer as their parents had.
       ``There was a lot of unhappiness in my parents'' marriage 
     partly because my mother was psychotic,'' Mr. Alda said. ``We 
     were already ahead of the game in that neither of us were 
     seriously mentally ill.''
       Her parents had struggled financially and had no time for 
     luxuries like dinner parties or showing affection for each 
     other. ``I wanted something different,'' she said. ``I wanted 
     something without stress.''
       So they filled their marriage with affection, music, dinner 
     parties with artists and actors and celebrations of every 
     paycheck.
       ``The first job I got was with a traveling children's 
     company where we had to lug our own scenery,'' Mr. Alda said. 
     ``I got $10 a performance, and we were so glad, we went out 
     to get pizza to celebrate.'' To this day, whenever he gets a 
     new acting job, they celebrate by sharing a pizza.
       Early on, they lived in Cleveland, where Eve, their first 
     child, was born. He often read poetry and short stories aloud 
     in the evenings. ``I'd be stirring a pot of soup, and the 
     baby would be sleeping, and he'd be reading to me,'' Ms. Alda 
     said. ``It was a warmth that's hard to describe.''
       They eventually had two more daughters, moved to Leonia, 
     N.J., and discovered they had very different parenting 
     styles. ``I was the drill sergeant, and he liked to play with 
     the kids,'' she said. ``These were disagreements we had to 
     work out. How important is it for the kids to go to bed on 
     time?''
       She added, ``We would talk a lot and talk angrily. When you 
     look back, you think, 'Why did I have to be angry?' ''
       From 1972 to 1983, Mr. Alda commuted from New Jersey to Los 
     Angeles to play the part of Dr. Hawkeye Pierce in the iconic 
     television series ``M*A*S*H.'' Ms. Alda suddenly found 
     herself juggling raising their girls with trying to spend 
     time with a husband who was increasingly busy, famous and out 
     of town.
       ``I was not a good juggler,'' she said. ``It all took 
     energy, and I found that I had spurts of energy. Not 
     sustained at all.''
       Not wanting to become ``just an audience'' for her husband, 
     Ms. Alda worked harder on her own photography and writing 
     projects. ``I had my own drive,'' she said. ``One challenge 
     of marriage is how to keep your sense of self yet be able to 
     meld and blend with the other person.'' She said that being 
     married to a celebrity ``diminishes you, unless you feel 
     really secure in yourself.''
       ``I like basking in someone else's glow,'' she said, ``but 
     not as a daily diet.''
       Today, they live in an Upper West Side apartment and are 
     practically inseparable. On Facebook, she mentions Mr. Alda 
     in almost every post, and they seem to be always headed out 
     to a concert, play, lecture or reading. They even work on 
     their separate writing projects together.
       Mr. Alda, who has written two memoirs, writes in the living 
     room, while Ms. Alda works in the study. They keep all the 
     doors open so they can talk back and forth, bounce ideas off 
     each other or call out when it's time to break for a meal.
       ``Most likely one of us will die first,'' she said. ``I 
     can't even contemplate what that might be for either of us. 
     Meanwhile, we're doing what we should be doing. Living.''
       Like many of the people profiled in ``Just Kids From the 
     Bronx,'' Ms. Alda believes that success in life--and in 
     marriage--is mostly a matter of luck. ``Luck is in neon 
     lights,'' she said, adding that there is no way a couple can 
     predict their future on their wedding day.
       Both Aldas said it was especially lucky that they have 
     never grown bored of each other and that they didn't remain 
     penniless forever. ``I really do believe that scraping by can 
     damage a person and can damage a relationship,'' he said. 
     ``We have a lot of advantages. We know how lucky we are. I 
     don't think anybody can tell you how happy we'd be if we were 
     still scraping by.''
       They have a house in the Hamptons and drink really good 
     wine, but otherwise they don't live particularly large. Both 
     dress in the comfortable baggy clothes of struggling writers 
     and have remained frugal and reluctant to waste anything.
       ``That's never changed,'' she said. ``We are definitely 
     still those two people who would eat the cake off the 
     floor.''

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