Since arriving in Los Angeles – mythical, dry Los Angeles - five days ago the most amazing thing has happened. I have managed to get crap on my shirt with every and I'm talking three-times-a-day Every every morsel I eat and every drop I drink. Some kind of Hollywood X Files gravitational anomaly occurring at the ends of my hands. An anti-vortex of energy and flingability distributing root beer or ketchup or hamburger juice or slivers of deep-fried Archie comics somewhere between my sternum and my pubes. What. The F**k. Is Going. On? Today's first splash of anger happened when milky coffee schlepped itself all the way from my cup to my shirt. I was standing still.
And this evening. Steamed broccoli, frying oil and finally tahini. I was changing shirts more often than Bruce Jenner was changing his mind ok he finally settled on a decision but today I've left the same shirt on. It's all Jackson Pollack from the neck down.
The pattern had begun before my first meeting with a casting director. Or Hollywood casting director if I want to talk him up and by default make both of us seem intriguing and tenuously linked to Bette Davis. That said, the meeting was in Rita Hayworth's old dressing room on what used to be the Columbia Pictures lot. This is fair dinkum. I remember not one of her films. This is disconcerting. She was big. The point, however, is that I'd already sensed the dark magic fizzing away at my fingertips and therefore ate and drank nothing for the entire morning. I was in fine form in the meeting. Hunger and thirst make me come alive.
Speaking of everlasting fame, Carrie Fisher says a funny thing in the DVD of her live show Wishful Drinking which my friend David has on his shelf and which I watched when he went to Orlando to ride rollercoasters I mean to do some work for the Disney Corporation. I promised I wouldn't mention the rollercoasters but it's too late now. I'm out of Liquid Paper and my Remington typewriter sends this straight to the internet. There's nothing to be done. The funny thing Carrie Fisher said in her DVD of Wishful Drinking – the cover is a photo of a young Princess Leia coiled-plaits-face-down and clutching a Martini glass – is about fame. Celebrity, to be specific. She says “celebrity is merely obscurity biding its time”. Harsh but bullseye! There are hundreds if not thousands no probably hundreds of people who would be able to list a few of Rita's films but can you see how I've linked this back to an earlier bit? Good.
And scary. I mean, if I can't tell you one of Rita's films or who won the Oscar for best actor two years ago the what the hell am I doing here?
Oh that's right. Money.
That's correct, readers. I ain't here for fame. I just want the cash. Is that wrong? No. It just is. I want a flat in Soho, London, and a wee fishing shack on the Australian coast with a surround veranda and six bedrooms. And a nice car. Sue me, I'm first world.
What else? I've seen the Hollywood sign from Mullholland Drive. (Two birds, one stone, several films.) Been to Hollywood Boulevard and seen the stars on the walk of fame. Which leads me straight back to the other, earlier bit. Who the f**k is Gordon Hollingshead? Just one of the dozens of names that leapt out at me with their zinging unfamiliarity.
For those of you who've not been told or shown photos, Hollywood Boulevard is – spoiler alert! - Parramatta Road. I know. Sigh. I was hoping for sharp lines and symmetry. Each pavement's bronze inlay would be polished and sparkling. The smell of pancake make-up and cigarettes. Barbra Streisand singing unaccompanied and off-the-cuff outside Grauman's Chinese Theatre while Channing Tatum, laughing and wearing a tux, presses his hands into wet concrete. Cameras flash. The ghost of Glenn Miller and his entire phantom orchestra are playing outside Mel's very real Diner. And who can I see there through the window eating Mel's fries? Why, it's Gordon Hollingshead!
But no. The walk of fame is more like the walk of old chewing gum and scuff marks. Which I kinda sorta like but not completely. I mean, who is the walk of fame for? The stars? Do they really come down here with the rellos from out-of-town and show them their own star?
“Go show them your star.”
“Ma......”
“Show them! They didn't come all this way from Tupelo not to see your damn star.”
“It's embarrassing.”
“Show them the god-damn star!”
Later...
“Yeh I got that back in the 90s. Nice, huh? Let's get a picture. Betty-Jean, stand next to your Uncle Gus. Oh my god that homeless guy just vomited on Rita Hayworth.”
Is it for the tourists? This is more likely. Lots of people – me included – do stop and point at names they recognise. Take photos. Before wondering where to go eat. People need to eat.
Or is it for the young dreamers? To make them strive? To be better? More ambitious? Prettier? Walked on? Is it for them? I used to think so. Now that I've seen it, not so sure.
I like the idea of fame. Not the modern, Andy Warhol kind. The old-fashioned kind. The kind of fame we tell ourselves the recipient deserves. The kind where they picked up some Magic Dust in Narnia before walking through the back of a closet (hi Rock!) and straight into a screen-test and then spent the rest of their lives in a Normal Mailer novel and seemed better than us. I was quite happy for them to be better than us. For me, it was inspiring. I wanted to see behind the closed doors and closed sets and closed lives and find out how everything worked.
But that illusion goes the way of teenage acne and finally disappears and yet most people visiting Hollywood – including me, who's been behind a few things - still want to see the walk of fame.
Or do we just want to metaphorically stomp all over these people who seemed to get lucky? Blow out the candle of admiration and you'll always get a whiff of smoky envy....
There's a gelato shop near the entrance to the Dolby Theatre (née the Kodak Theatre aka the theatre where they hold The Oscars) and I'm determined to know how they keep it out of shot on the night. The theatre itself is inside the Hollywood and Highland Shopping Mall. Oh yes. It really is. It's like we just found out the Logies were held in a Westfield. Having been to the Logies (while my obscurity was being patient...patient and knowing) I must say the Melbourne event is a far glitzier venue than dear old, new, Hollywood. Well...on the outside. “Get The Oscars back in The Pantages!” And despite that sentence sounding like a zinger from an Adam Sandler film, it is not.
Rita probably attended The Oscars at The Pantages. Rita. Rita Hayworth? I wrote about her not eight paragraphs ago. Ahh...time. How we wither and fall from her ever-Present fingers. Apparently. Gordon knows what I'm talking about.
Speaking of spoiler alerts (three paragraphs back) I have attached a scan to this blog. It has nothing to do with Hollywood or L.A. But is certainly to do with film. And the critiquing of such. I was only in Liverpool three weeks but I made it into the print media. Okay it's a letter to the editor of the local Big Issue, but I was very chuffed. Enjoy.
So. Back to Los Angeles. The question being, of course, will I go back to Los Angeles? Do I throw my hat in the enormous ring and then sit on the edge of that ring, teeth clenched, arse clenched, and hope that somebody likes me? “You like me! Really like me!” Is my ego strong? My skin thick? My wallet stocked? My visa attained? My teenage-acne dreams within their use-by date? Come on....let's not kid ourselves. Of course those childish dreams of working on a Hollywood lot are still there. Even though I know and I mean know how tedious and dull making super-exciting images can be. To be honest I don't think it's the glamour of the idea that remains. I think I'm just a determined bastard that drew up a list a very long time ago and I keep seeing this tiny square of a unchecked box sitting there near the bottom. The one under that, the one at the very bottom reads “Die Rich”.
Maybe I'll give it a shot.
I should probably get this shirt cleaned...
PS: That all happened about 6 weeks ago. I'm now in Belgium and have a man-crush on a Belgian. Mmmmm....waffles....
