Notes. From the Upper West Side. A novel by Dan Wrench. Chapter 17.
Lounge Act. There are lots of takes and retakes in movies. You probably know that already. Actors get into character, do some lines, stop, do them again until somebody says, okay fine.
If the director is really nervous, it could be forever before the okay fine comes. Meanwhile, Sid Director is starting to get defensive because he can see production assistants rolling their eyes. The best way to keep that guy from turning a fun day into a nightmare of one more time is to have somebody standing close to him, the cinematographer or audio person or assistant director say something like, wow, after the fifth or sixth take. You know, a wow that says, I've seen this so many times I could puke, but the last time through made me a believer again.
That's pretty much what the director is looking for anyway. Audience reaction. Approval. Stroking.
Assurance. So all I'm saying is crude. Do you want to go home? The word is wow.
See, there's no such thing as labor laws in movies. Actually, there are, but nobody pays attention to them unless you're a kid, including the union. So 12 hours into your eight hour day, you will start to have psychotic impulses. For example, moving in on Lenny's face means moving all the lights close, the camera close.
Then somebody says, doesn't look like the same light. And out come the bounce boards. Or the cloth suspended in frames like sails. And these contraptions all sit in a four foot square area.
Then these boards go out by his face and they shoot again and again until somebody says, wow, and the director says, okay, fine. Think about it the next time you see a movie. See that shot on the desert island? Any shot.
Guarantee with the camera move one foot to the right of the cast the way you'd see some sweaty guy in a William Nelson get up holding a big piece of cardboard. And if you could read his mind, there'd be a better than even chance you'd get a visual of the director with a plastic fork in his eye. But the film hard suggested do what they're told and keep their mouth shut like the guys who dragged slabs for the pharaohs. It's what they do.
Meanwhile, for the rest of us, it's just a buttload of waiting and drinking coffee and not being a chucky cheese. I thought I noticed some gratuitous squeezes on my arm when we were walking down the so called Soho Strip. And I looked at Kami and she gave me kind of a good smile. And I gigcackled kind of quietly.
Oh yeah, main cunts pal. Her name is Cameron. I call her Kami now. Of course, I was unsure right then that she was coming on to me, but I was hoping in spite of the completely uncalled four face she made at me when we first made eye contact.
I thought, is she happening? Or is she just acting? But the more I thought about it, the more it seemed like shit must be happening. Why else would she be squeezing my forearm and pressing her ass cheek up against mine to stay in character?
It just didn't seem feasible. So I gigcackled softly some more and I thought about it. Then Bobby got the great idea to do a close up of my famous non-plus look, the one take double take when Lenny Ziamica first goes flying off his head. No, it's not in the video.
I'm parked cut it out because he's having addictive prick. Timing, he said, the footage was running longer than the song so something had to go. What a wipe. So suddenly I got to be the center of attention.
For a long time, too. Remember what I just got done saying about close ups and people surrounding the actor and staring at him and making sure his light is just right for take after take after take. Well, that was me in the center of it all. I was all alone up there on the stage in front of the green screen with makeup, horror, padding my face and cameras and crew closing in.
And best of all, I got to show Cammy that I had wit. That I was urbane if not dashing. That I was a somebody and not just a somebody with a day job rubbing glass mugs. At first when Bobby said he wanted to get the close up and everyone should get off the stage but me, I gigcackled self-deprecatingly and said, You sure you don't want camera up here?
Nope, just you, said Bobby. Cause she's a lot prettier than I am. I looked at her as she was stepping off the stage when I said that. She turned around and gave me the smile that said I'm such a sweetheart.
I gigcackled again when I saw that. Parpen whispers caught the exchange and gave me the look that says, somebody's trying to put his penis in the blonde girl, but they didn't say anything. I had a great time. Holy guacamole.
I was like no old coward playing a Las Vegas lounge with a cigarette in one hand and a cocktail in the other. In between takes while the crew was making adjustments. People kept lobbing softballs at me and I kept parking them and all the babes were laughing. Even the main cunt laughed.
But if she wanted a piece of this now after her last little tirade, she was going to have to work for it. You know? For example, Bobby said, Lookin' good, did you know you were getting a close up? And I said, Ah, so this is a close up.
Do you think anyone will notice my eyes are in fact tattoos? And somebody said, But you know what, I moved closer to the light? And I said, I'll move closer. But if I see dead relatives in Jesus, I'm backing away again.
And bangs said, Hey Paul, you gay? And I said, Not even a little. But if I were persuadable on that head, I'd fuck your brains out sexy pants. And Parp said, Is this your Noel Coward playing Las Vegas routine?
And I said, Fuck you. Really, I was on a roll. And like I said, chicks were laughing. It was like a time in dialects class, but from my midterm I got up and read the first chapter of Giles Dope Boy with his Scott's accent.
It killed! I can credit that performance with the blowjob I got a week later from Cilla Chrisney. It killed. And up in the risers facing the stage, there was Cami, with her beautiful blonde hair and funny nose and round ass.
A babe who pumps iron to stay perfect, who refuses to allow her body to follow the implications of her unfixed nose. I could see her over the heads of the crew. At one point, during my rapid fire exchange with the film Tards, she was standing and facing away from me. Then turned around, Cami looking at her, sat down, opened her legs and grabbed her thigh so that her hands framed her cunt while she gave me the smile that said, Want this cunt?
Someone giggled and said, Cameron? But she was far enough back in the risers that most people didn't see. I looked away. Bobby said, What's going on?
And he and Parp turned around for a minute to scan whatever it was I might have been looking at. But by then Cami was yawning up. Great, big exaggerated yawn. They didn't catch on.
You okay, Paul? Parp asked. Yup, just. I trailed off there.
Distracted. I said, Finally. I could only see Cami with my peripheral vision, but I'm pretty sure she was smiling. Oh, Cam.
It's harsh remembering this. Notes from the Upper West Side. Copyright 2013-2015. By Dan Wrench.
Notes from the Upper West Side is a work of fiction. The people depicted in this work do not exist.