politricks and other distractions

Oscar Buzzzz

I seem to either be stunning my audience here or boring them to death, judging by the lack of comments, so I'll touch on something lighter: the orgiastic celebration of my first professional homeland, Hollywood.

Somehow my Oscar invitation got lost in the mail, so I had to watch it from up here, 800 miles north with local friends, including two ex-patriates from Paramount.

As a quote-unquote Real Person now, I was slightly appalled that the gift bags given to presenters were worth over $100,000 each. Might this not have been the year to have that sort of money donated to charity? Maybe buy some armor for the troops or something?

I got past that factoid, just like I get past every factoid about wealth rising to the top in America. At least in Hollywood, they look pretty for it - though I predict next year's new award category will be in makeup, for artistic superiority in covering facelifts so they look good on HDTV. I was actually happy when the bald fat guys got up. Their eyebrows moved. It was... refreshing.

Other scary part: how thin the women are getting. I thought Dolly Parton was going to faint dead away. Obviously, I couldn't have lasted this long in Hollywood. I don't have the patience to diet that much.

As I drove away from Eric's house after the show ended, I was thinking happy thoughts about Hollywood and how much fun I had working there. Then I drove a little further and remembered all the days I had spent in Eric's office, bitching about my job (and he in mine doing the same). Many, many scenes poured through my head and all of a sudden I didn't miss it quite as much. I especially remember refusing my boss's request for sex when his wife was really pregnant. I'd tell him no, then shut his office door behind me as I left and say, "You can do whatever you want once the door is closed." Now, that was f-u-n.

My first year in TV, I used to ask non-producer friends the same question: Did you have to be an asshole to become a producer or did the process of becoming a producer make you an asshole? It was a question that stumped most people. You could see them running a cast of characters through their heads, tallying up who'd grown up in Beverly Hills vs. who fought their way up. I never did get a consensus. Now some of my friends are producers, and I just pray they haven't become producer pod-people. Maybe things are getting better.

My friend Laura - who was speaking of theater producers when she said it - once pronounced that producers had all been children that nobody else would play with, so they became producers so everybody had to play with them. For a 20 year old (at the time), she was very smart.

As I watch shows like the Oscars, for all their self-congratulatory air, I do applaud the pure stick-to-it-iveness of everybody who was on that stage - even the model/companion girls. All those people stuck to it and achieved. And this year, I even think the quality of the films they got produced was good. Shocking.

I'll try to be positive and remember the good times of being on sets and working with good people - from the lowliest grip to the most famous international star. For the most part, everyone is thrilled to show up at work every day on a Hollywood lot and that does make it a different environment from most offices. People are all a little larger than life, that's why they're drawn to that world. And a bonus for putting up with the torture of writing comedy is that everybody's always trying to make you laugh. What's wrong with that? (Well, I can think of a few guys I'd have liked to close down, but...)

So, I salute the few friends I still have who remain in Hollywood and who still work in the business. It ain't easy, but the scenery sure is nice -- as long as you stay off the 405.

posted by dcnative @ 9:17 PM