Think of it as a kind of modern version of “The Shop Around the Corner,” the 1939 film in which Jimmy Stewart and Margaret Sullivan played shopkeepers who hate each other by day but are secret amorous pen pals by night.
Not that Alexandra Billings and Chrisanne Blankenship-Billings ever hated each other. But there sure have been some tough moments in their 20-year relationship.
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Consider, for example, the scene in “Before I Disappear,” Alexandra’s one-person show (now extended to Aug. 25 at the Bailiwick Repertory Theater), in which, describing a time in her life when she was a female impersonator, Alex tells a friend about a testy conversation with Chrisanne.
“Chrisanne said women don’t sit that way,” she says mockingly, “Women don’t do this or that — and I said, honey, I’m not a woman, I’m a queen!”
It is a typically biting scene from “Before I Disappear,” Alexandra’s bittersweet autobiography on stage. In it, Chrisanne and Alexandra dance around each other’s lives, serving as best friends and combatants, all the while avoiding the obvious: That they were meant to be together, not just as friends but as lovers.
The friend part was easy: They met at a drama club meeting in high school, when Alexandra was a 14-year-old freshman boy named Scott and Chrisanne was a 17-year-old senior on the way to college.
But the lovers part seemed, at best, improbable. Scott Billings was an effeminate boy who was mercilessly teased by his peers, a painful period that Alexandra re-creates in “Before I Disappear.”
Years later, Scott Billings became Shante, a glamorous drag queen who headlined the Baton Lounge. It was a time of shiny veneers but also of great danger and damage: Alexandra, as the cool and bitchy Shante, was doing drugs, working as a high-priced prostitute, suffering through abusive relationships.
In “Before I Disappear,” Alexandra is unsparing about this period. One instant, Shante is a highly articulate call-girl talking economic policy with a sophisticated trick who pays by credit card, the next she’s a cheap, blathering streetwalker who easily drops her price from $100 to $50. Finally, she’s a rude, cold bitch who draws up arbitrary rules for her services.
“I told them, `I don’t hold hands, I don’t kiss on the mouth,’ ” explains Alexandra. “There was no price on that.”
It was the only time in Alexandra’s life that Chrisanne disappeared. “I just couldn’t handle Shante, I couldn’t handle the transformation,” Chrisanne says.
Chrisanne picked up her life, began a career in theater, twice got engaged to other men. In the meantime, Alexandra had bottomed out as Shante, gone into recovery and undergone surgery to become a woman. They picked up their friendship, even double-dated.
“I remember once, we were out with Alex, who was just crazy about this guy she was dating and fawning all over him,” says Chrisanne with a chuckle. “And I looked over at my fiance and I realized he was looking at me like he was asking, `What am I doing here?’ And I realized we couldn’t be together. It hit me that if you wanted to have me in your life, you had to have Alex in your life.”
They began living together, just as friends. They hung out, went to movies and theater together, talked all night. When Alexandra was diagnosed HIV positive, it was Chrisanne who comforted and supported her. Then one day, as they were getting together to go out, Alexandra realized she was primping, combing her hair and dressing up as if she were going out on a date.
“I went out to her and said, `Are we dating? Is that what we’re doing?’ and Chrisanne looked up at me and said, `Yes, I think so,’ ” says Alexandra. “But we went really slow. It was like one of those old-time movies. For the longest time, we just held hands. It took us three, four months to kiss.”
Almost four years later, they are constantly touching, like new lovers still. They’ve had a commitment ceremony and taken each other’s surnames (although Alexandra doesn’t hyphenate hers professionally).
“I’m the happiest I’ve ever been, and it’s funny, because Chrisanne was there all along,” says Alexandra, sounding remarkably like Jimmy Stewart and Margaret Sullivan.
And though “Before I Disappear” is distinctly her story, not theirs, it couldn’t have happened without Chrisanne.
“Being in this relationship, feeling safe, knowing that I was being loved truly for myself, that’s what made it possible to do this show, to tell my story,” says Alexandra. “This was the right time.”
The After Hours date book
Fridays and Sundays though Aug. 25, “Before I Disappear,” by Alexandra Billings, Bailiwick Repertory Theater, 1229 W. Belmont Ave. Call 312-883-1090. Bailiwick is wheelchair accessible.