Notes. From the Upper West Side. A Novel by Dan Wrench. Chapter 15.
Little Round Jewish Hat. Back to the Black Box Theater at Midtown and that first day of shooting, Little Round Jewish Hat. Bang. That's Bangalore Springfield, the Foeingdian stand-up comic who asked me about Libyan parp, decided he needed the eyebrow lining after all and went to find a makeup babe.
I went and got some more coffee from one of the coffee boxes on the donut table and stared at the pretty dark stand-in under the light that parp was focusing. You remember the stand-in. The one who said she thought Oprah was a friggy twat? Yeah.
She was a babe. She was sitting on an aluminum chair with her legs, straddling the back only. The back wasn't solid, it was like a frame with thin metal slats, so you could see through to the tight jeans over her spread legs. I was staring at the thin layer of denim over her content she caught on.
I got a smile from her, but I didn't do anything. Fuck me. I forgot all about that until just now, writing it out. I was at the beginning of a flirt with this babe and then stuff happened and I'm just remembering this loose screen now, five months later.
I bet I could have bald her. If I can find the contact sheet, I bet I still can. Right then all I could think about was how great it was to be in that theater instead of in Square World. I was in a place where I could glance at a cunt and get caught by the owner of said cunt and have her smile instead of screaming like I raped her.
I was safe. I was home. And I had to beat a bitch just so I could spend the day here instead of a chucky cheese, I thought. Somebody gave me a gun so I could blow out my fucking brains.
We were all sweating. It was marching getting toward April so it wasn't what you would call hot in New York, but the lights were pretty intense in that small space, so somebody clicked on the air conditioner and make up babe did another round of touch-ups on the actors. So okay, one thing I've always wanted to ask you libertarians is this. Lenny Payne called up to park.
I had navigated back to where I was standing with bang only now Lenny was standing next to me. What? How do you defend countries like Guatemala and El Salvador? Park didn't say anything for a long time, just kept playing with this big light aiming it down at the sweet snatch in the aluminum chair then finally he said, I don't get it.
Hey, Lenny. Said Bobby. We were about ready for you and Teresa so why don't you do something like getting into character? Dude, I am my character.
That's where I tuned out. Bobby was coming down the ladder to have a conversation with Lenny. Park was still screwing with the lights. I was trying to figure out the connection between libertarians and El Salvador.
I mean, libertarians are natures and nut jobs, but I don't think they're in charge of any countries that I know of. And if there are any libertarians reading this, sorry about calling you natures and nut jobs, especially you libertarians not getting blow jobs for my wife, except you know it's true. I mean, heroin should be for sale at Walmart? Really?
Why shouldn't heroin be for sale? Park asked me once. Because it eats the brain. You mean like gin?
That's pretty much the gist of any conversation with the libertarian. You just have to smile and write it out and have the real conversations with people who know that gin is not heroin. So do you believe in legalizing marijuana? Park asked once.
Yeah, I said medical marijuana. Why not? What's the difference between medical marijuana and regular marijuana? Doctor, I said, a doctor says you can have it.
Why should it be illegal to buy drugs unless you pay a state licensed doctor to write it down on a piece of paper from the magic pad? Ask parp. If you want to see a doctor first, okay, nobody's stopping you, but why should you have cops on your doorstep if you want to buy drugs without getting a permission slip first? Because it's fucking dangerous shit out there, I said.
Not everybody thinks first. They have to have a break on them before they do something dangerous. You know what's dangerous? Park asked.
Trusting doctors because they have the magic pad. Just ask Heath Ledger and Michael Jackson. Oh yeah, you can't ask them. You know why?
Their doctors killed them. Fuck it, libertarians. A doctor killed Michael Jackson, so now let's put the cocaine back in Coca-Cola. So even though Lenny was pretty wrong about Guatemala and El Salvador, at least he knew that park was kind of a laughingstock.
You have to admire that. After Bobby got down to talk to Lenny, he called over Teresa to have a chat. That's Teresa, the leading lady, who like, I don't know, had two words to say in a lot of dancing and silent acting while Lenny sings. And holy fuck, if you've seen the video you know already, what a subtastic rack.
That is not a trick effect. Those tits were not added in post. Definitely a gorgeous babe in spite of being a nasty bitch, which you'll find out about in a minute. I'd say she was late 20s blonde hair and a super dark complexion so you know the hair has died, but who the fuck cares, am I right?
And the most tremendous cock-gobbler lips in the cock-gobbling biz. I already mentioned that Junior has CG lips, but not like these. It's like God had a hard on when he made her mouth. A set of warm, wet suction pillows for your dick.
You see these lips and you're ready to forgive any other imperfection that is not morbid obesity. I walked up to her as she was coming down to the stage. We hadn't met yet, so my smile was at its shininess. So I get cackled.
What's it like to be doing something Frank wanted to do? Huh? You know, the old chairman of the board wanted to do this song. No, he didn't.
Oh, well, I have it on pretty good authority. I wrote the lyrics and George Vadar wrote the music. I don't know what the fuck you think you're talking about. Huh?
I said, like she just pointed out that I wasn't good looking enough to speak to her. It stings, but you can't really argue. She pushed past me to get to the stage. When she was like five steps away from me, she turned around to give me one last, you are a bug look.
I resented that. And from that moment on, I changed her name in my head. From Teresa to main cunt. It helped.
It still does, but I think it back on it, the cunt. Now get this. Just as this stuck up bitch is about to hit the lip of the so-called stage in this so-called theater in from behind me strides this new chick I hadn't seen before. She sneaks up on main cunt and surprises her with a kiss on the cheek.
Main cunt stops, smiles, and starts chatting with her pal. Now you have to remember that whispers is waiting to talk to main cunt. The director is waiting. The husband of Mondie McDade is waiting.
She had her little conversation with me on the fly while she was moving, but her pal shows up and suddenly she forgets where she is and starts to chatter. So Bobby gives her this dull, holy shit, you can't be pulling this amateur crap look. She sees this look and turns away from her pal who gives her kind of a little wave while main cunt gets on the stage next to Lenny to rehearse the master shot. The pal has a goofy broad-brimmed hat on like she should be wearing a sah-rap-ay for Christ's sake, only she isn't because it's 75 in the shade in March and in midtown Manhattan there is no shade.
Only hot pavement and guys pushing closets on wheels. She looks up at me for a sec, the pal does. I don't know why she looks up at me, but there I am and we make eye contact and she makes a face and looks away. I'm thinking you're damn cunt like I need that now.
And then I'm thinking fuck it, parpe is right. I gotta get a gym in my house and fuck with what the wife says. And these fucking abs, I gotta do the diet and fuck with the wife cooks. I was frustrated.
Shitty body. Chicks used to dig me. And now my wife is fucking ruining any chance I might have for a fuck on the side by making sure I never work out. And then I'm always pounding down steaks and roasts and cakes and beers.
Cunt. Oh I was so pissed off at the world. Only Tony Parpe seemed to be my friend. Parpe, who knew that wives were the enemy parpe, who knew what I had to do to get my cock drained and who told me and how did I repay him?
By scoffing. Yeah, right at that second before I knew he had his eye on my wife's cock-obbler lips, I knew exactly why I was still hanging around parpe. It was so clear to me right then that I couldn't figure out why I ever had a hard time answering Jessica when she asked me. Parpe was the anti-chuck-e-cheese.
It helped that he hated that shit that everyone else thinks is clean and wholesome, that he hates talking about it. Makes it more of a dividing line. Around Parpe it was like I wasn't too old to live my dream without people giggling behind their hands or just tsking or rolling their eyes. It's the way I felt when depth-charge rep was still going.
It's the reason guys like me and Libby have Parpe in our lives even though we'd know he's an evil fuck. I have a wife who decided that letting me live my life instead of playing the role of the man in her domestic fantasy was a favor she was doing. I mean she got tired of doing me that favor. She sat me down and informed me that all I had to do to pay her back was give it all up and be a happy pension earning bartender.
Ask the twat if I could please put a gym in the corner of the living room or could we please put the family on a low carb diet so daddy could lose some fucking weight. I'd be lucky if she didn't break down and cry. I'd get another long distance call from her father telling me how disappointed he was. I grew up with dreams and now I have to beg some cunts forgiveness if she overhears me talking about them in my sleep.
If I'd listened to Parpe a year ago I'd have pecs and abs right now I thought instead of looking like such crap that hot chicks clucked their tongues at me. I wanted to split right then and run around the block. I wanted to go to a clean stretch of floor and do push-ups and sit-ups until I puked and whatever other exercise I had to do to look and feel pumped. But I just stood there and kind of looked at the space where main cunts pal had been standing when she made the face at me.
I still had that stupid cup of coffee in my hand and some stupid costume that maybe looked like some yuppy jerk with crappy abs. Hey, Pullman Hyma! It was bang coming up the aisle. Bob is looking for ya, so I found Parpe.
He was off the ladder now and standing on the stage just kind of looking at everybody. I looked crestfallen when he saw me. I know he noticed but he didn't ask why the callous prick. He just wanted Bobby to know where I was and told me not to wander too far away since they might need me in a minute.
So Teresa said you wrote the lyrics and the fighter wrote the music for this. I said, oh yeah you didn't know that? You said Sinatra wanted to sing it. I looked like a, well like a damn idiot.
Parpe laughed and said, I can't believe you believed that. So I'm the only one who thought it was a Sinatra tune? You're jerking me around, right? Wait, you really thought I was serious about Sinatra?
Now if you've seen the video, you know they went way out of their way to make it seem Sinatra esque. The jazzy tune, the finger snappy and Lenny was pretty much doing a Sinatra impression. I'm just saying, I don't think I was the only person who might have been fooled. I really don't.
Well, now Teresa thinks I'm a retard, I said. You told her Sinatra wanted to sing this song? He shook his head and laughed and stared at the floor like, I was the guy. You could always count on to break a wacky.
Hey, dude, you told me Sinatra wanted to sing it, I believed you. I'm not some dumb but lovable sitcom character. Just then the assistant director diked waved her clipboard over her head and screamed, reh, I saw them. Like somebody just stabbed her in the ass.
People ran around for a few seconds, stopped, then a shaved head guy with headphones turned on an audio player and the melody of Little Round, Jewish hat started playing over the theater loudspeakers. It was on a piano, just the melody so Lenny's lips could be synced to it later in the studio. Then Lenny started the same. It was a sunny old day, just a funny old day.
I was making my way down to Broom Street, went a breezefane bi-eye. Kind of roughing my tie. Blue some schmutz in my eye, a very own pit street. I lost my Little Round Jewish hat.
It blew away just like that. I forgot to wear the Little Clip. Now it's swinging down the Soho Strip. I was running like heck.
Could I broken my neck? How'd I step in this drag? Somebody tell me when next thing I knew, she was chasing it too straight out of the blue. She tried to help me.
I lost my Little Round Jewish hat. It blew away just like that. I forgot to wear the Little Clip. Now it's swinging down the Soho Strip.
It blew down a lane. Then it blew down a drain. Then it blew into a drain. Now man, it was moving.
Where ever it sailed. She stayed on its tail. Up healing down a deal. Yeah, she was grooving.
Now hadness or not, it was almost shebast. Didn't want to get caught. Out at sundown. Or when, or who should appear?
Grinning ear to ear. With my little head gear. That she'd run down. She found my Little Round Jewish hat.
And she brought it back. How about that? And I know she thinks I'm pretty hip. Cause we're swinging down the Soho Strip.
She found my Little Round Jewish hat. And she brought it back. How about that? I think I'm pretty hip.
Cause we're swinging down the Soho Strip. Lenny and main cunt rehearsed it a couple more times. Smile at each other. Bobby said.
Smile. Bang laughed. Like breeders and blowers. Nobody else laughed.
It was that lame. Whisper gave him a look that said, dude we're trying to make a film here. Bang, stop laughing and scratch his head. The assistant director looked at him like she just caught him crapping on the sidewalk.
She's a clown. She said, we rehearsed it some more. All of us. Lenny and main cunt smiled at each other right then they're swinging down the Soho Strip.
By the way kids, there is no Soho Strip. If you think there is because you heard about it in the video, consider yourself a victim of one of Park's many lies. That's right. He made it up so he'd have something to rhyme with clip the lazy shit.
So down on the Soho Strip, Lenny and main cunt walked past other people like me and as it turns out main cunt's pals, the string shoulder tank top and gouch up hat. Really you could look at it in the video. There we are. See us?
Only she took the gouch up hat off before they started shooting. I'm the guy next to her doing my famous non-plus look. It's kind of a one take double take. Bobby thought it would be cool if me and the pal were pretending to be out on a date which was okay with me.
He gave me a chance to act suave. So there we are in front of the green screen, swinging down the Soho Strip. When we see the zany guy lurched for a small piece of felt pulled off his head by some fishing line. I did cappled on one take.
That could have been a mistake. But main cunt's pal just smiled like we were on a date and she loved my strange little laugh. I was really starting to admire her ass. In the low rise jeans with the black tank top that didn't quite reach all the way.
She had a bare midriff and I could almost almost see ass cleavage. CUT! Bobby said CUT! The assistant director diked screened.
Paul Bobby said don't be checking camera's ass when lenny's hat flies off his head. It's a character thing. Yeah. He said.
Notes from the Upper West Side Copyright 2013 to 2014 by Dan Ratch. Notes from the Upper West Side is a work of fiction. The people depicted in this work do not exist.