That’s Not In The Script

I love my friend’s little boy.  The Kid is three years old and knows he has me wrapped around his finger.  The thing is, entertaining a three-year-old is exhausting!  So, what do you do with a three-year-old full of energy on a fine Saturday afternoon? No, not the baby Benadryl.  Moms seem to frown upon that.  You enter him in a baby race, of course. 

So there I was in Central Park on Saturday morning lining The Kid up with all the other three-year-olds at the starting line.  I kept telling him that this race was for fun and he should enjoy it, there are no losers and all that other blah, blah, bullshit.  Look, it’s fine if you want your child to be an impotent, underachieving, unpopular loser.  My little friend, however, is in it to win it and so, although I was giving him useless platitudes just in case he turned out to be an utterly embarrassing failure, I also had him practice his Game Face along with important dignity-preserving statements like, “I let the Special Olympics kid win” and “It’s easy to run fast when you’re not burdened by all this handsomeness.” We may or may not have made other children cry.  Pussies.

Standing at the starting line, I surreptitiously checked out the competition.  I scoffed at the mom who had her kid in Baby Crocs.  O rly?  Even if you win this race (which you won’t) your kid loses.  Baby Crocs!  Humpft!!!  And then I looked down at her feet.  My. god.  She had long, leathery, bony feet that stretched over the edges of her flip-flops like an old gator sunning on a rock.  Really, her feet were overstuffed, cracked, vintage handbags.  Her toes were aged ginger.  If Dingo Girl had been there, I would not have been able to stop her from gnawing on those nasty feet.  I quickly turned my head in the other direction but then I locked eyes with HIM.  Oh, lord. 

Back in my younger days I was doing quite a bit of work as an extra on films and television shows shot in my town.  You may have heard of Chuck Norris and a little show called Walker, Texas Ranger.  I was on the set as an extra almost every week.  I excelled in the art of the fake, silent phone call made in the background of some lavish set.  I am the veritable Robert DeNiro of this little known niche.  For every take I’d create a different scenario.  First, I’d be the Tearful Girlfriend.  Face contorted in grief and despair, I’d conduct an entire conversation that started with an angry “You’ll never find another doormat as stupid as me!” and ended with me softly whispering, “So long, my love.  Go now with God,” before wistfully hanging up the phone.  And if you think it’s easy to convincingly portray intense emotion without uttering a single sound, you are sadly mistaken.  My favorite was Glamour Girl, where I’d mouth words like “Lunch?  Yes, I’d love to!  Oh, but let me check my calendar,” while tossing my long flowing hair and flashing a toothy smile. But my fine acting skills went unnoticed.  Until one day…

One day I got the call from my piece of shit agent that the casting directors wanted me to audition for a bit part in the show.  They were looking for someone sexy and bold but sophisticated.  They must have seen me in the background of last week’s episode when I was perfecting Phone Sex Operator!  Once the excitement died down, panic set in.  I was a naïve and not-so-worldly twenty-something.  What did I know about sexy but sophisticated?  Not a whole hell of a lot.  Just out of college, I was a starving artist living in khakis and denim skirts (hey, it was the early nineties in Texas where denim never goes out of style!).  I tell you what, the outfit I came up with makes me blush even to this day. 

As I teetered into the casting studio on pleather Payless five-inch stilettos, I noticed the other women waiting to audition had taken a different fashion approach.  One that did not involve looking like Jessica Rabbit trying to pay the rent in the red-light district.  “I got this,” I thought.  “These women aren’t even showing skin!” You know, if I’d spent more time paying attention to the show and less attention to the candy and sodas at the craft services tables, I’d have realized that Walker, Texas Ranger was a family-friendly show delivering heartwarming lessons week after week with a flying roundhouse followed by a tip of the hat.  It was not Streetwalker, Sex Arranger.

So there I was in the room with HIM, the casting director.  I started reading my lines at one end the room as I tried to walk seductively toward his desk at the other end.  Seduction is difficult to pull off in towering pleather stilettos when you’re used to wearing Keds, but I soldiered on, skillfully masking my unsteady teetering with regular tottering, swinging and swaying like the Betty Boop float at the Macy’s Spanksgiving Day Parade.  My voice low and husky, I whispered line after line because that’s what sexy women do, right?  They whisper? 

As I got closer to his chair my vision started to blur.  What the —?  My fake eyelashes had decided to become unglued and crawl down my face like hairy Wacky Wall Walkers.  But I pressed on, my padded boobs like beacons leading the way to his desk.  As I placed one hip against his desk and leaned precariously toward him, a wayward layer of eyelashes, having made its way to my chin, tumbled off my face and landed with a delicate splash in his coffee cup like a furry black fairy.  Neither of us said a word.  I racked my brain trying to cover my embarrassment without losing character.  Although it felt like a lifetime, I’m sure it was only a few seconds before I heard myself whisper seductively, “I’m sorry.  I shouldn’t lash out at you like that.”

I wrapped up the scene moments later, proud of my ad-libbing and wondering if I would be able to contribute other lines of dialogue once I was cast for the part.  I went home and waited for the phone to ring.  And waited.  And waited.  And waited.  All of this went through my mind in the mere seconds it took for him to smile and say, “Gorgeous day for a race, isn’t it?” Oh my god, he didn’t recognize me?  I can’t explain why, but I found myself lowering my voice and whispering, “Yes, yes it is.” His eyes popped open wide but I was saved from further humiliation by the starting bell and everyone yelling, “Run! Run! Run!” And so, I did. 

Leave a comment....