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BREAKFAST
WITH HENRY
July
17, 1998
The
story you are about to hear is
true. Only the names have been
changed, to protect the author,
who has a pathological fear of
lawsuits. This
morning, I had breakfast with
Henry Rollins. Not
every day you hear that, eh?
That's what I love about this
business. You never know what's
going to happen next. That
statement isn't always a happy
one, as anyone else on this crew
can attest. "Poor planning" is a
phrase I hear quite often around
the set, although that's really
hard for me to gauge, as this is
my first real
production. Of
course, by the time the LAX
debacle rolled around, my voice
was added to those of the rest of
the crew, and when a movie virgin
such as myself is saying that,
you know there's trouble. That's
trouble with a capital "t" and
that rhymes with "p" and that
stands for... oh, you get the
point. When
I took my trip to Arizona, I
resisted the suggestion of
flying, simply because I didn't
want to deal with LAX, the
airport that brings a whole new
meaning to the phrase, "Get
lost." Which, when I finally had
no choice but to go to LAX, I
did. Many, many, many, many,
many times. But
my problems aside, the rest of
the crew was pretty well lost as
well. There aren't enough walkie
talkies for everyone, so it's
rather like trying to coordinate
a field trip to Carlsbad Caverns
for fifty deaf children. At one
point, some genius decided to
schedule the scene where seven
vehicles pull up to the terminal,
in perfect succession, for the
busiest traffic period of the
day. It didn't help that the
police would only let us stop one
lane of traffic, and some drivers
would just hop past our piddly
little obstruction and drive
right to their intended
destination, which had the
unfortunate coincidence of being
right in the middle of our
shot. This
meant that the drivers had to
make another pass around the
airport, which takes twenty
minutes, and try to do the shot
again. It
also didn't help that the actress
(if I can call her that) driving
the lead car is an
internationally known supermodel,
whom I refuse to identify,
because of the nasty things I am
going to say about her. First of
all, she, being an
internationally known supermodel,
is the main reason this film was
able to secure financing. So the
filmmakers are slightly touchy
about stepping on her toes,
although she is quite happy to
put those toes wherever she feels
fit. She
rewrote her character, who was
originally an (gasp!)
internationally known supermodel,
making her into a grungy rock 'n'
roller (her term). So she sees
fit to play every line of
dialogue as if she is reading an
epitaph. Her makeup is pale grey,
and her hair is made into
multicolored dreadlocks.
She
even wrote the lyrics to the song
she wrote, which contains these
insightful words: "Rock
out! Yeah! Love and hate! Yeah!"
repeat ad nauseum, improvising
other cliches as you
go. Watching
her scenes is like pulling teeth.
I have three words: cutting room
floor. But
enough crap, back to the story.
The LAX day went on forever.
Shooting started at 4 a.m. (take
that, you bastards who said I
would never get out of bed before
noon) and lasted until 8 that
evening. Longest day of my life.
If it wasn't one thing, it was
another. Usually, it was
another. But
this job hasn't been all bad. In
fact, it has been mostly great. I
did, as I previously mentioned,
get to have breakfast with Henry
Rollins, who, in spite of what
you might think, is really quite
charming. No biting the heads off
of anything, and I didn't see one
vein pop out of his
neck. Thankfully,
I'm not easily starstruck. I try
to keep in mind that these are
regular people who just have a
more interesting than usual job.
They eat, sleep and crap just
like the rest of us. (Presumably.
I haven't taken the time to
really check that out in
detail.) This
lack of starstruckedness (there's
a word for your Funkin
Wagnalls...) has helped me to
stick out from the rest of the
production assistants (PAs,
which, trust me, is only a few
letters away from peon) through
an important nugget of advice
that I received at a family
wedding. At any stressful
production, people are always
hearing "I need" as opposed to
"What do you need?" Trust me,
they notice when you ask, and
even if they don't need anything,
they appreciate the
gesture. When
asked what I do at these things,
I inevitably draw a blank,
because a large portion of my
time is spent sitting on my ass,
doing nothing. So when I find
myself in that position
(sitting), I make a point of
walking around to the higher-ups
and asking them if they need
anything. Usually, they send me
for a drink or something, which
is easy enough. Most of the other
peons are either too starstruck
or too lazy to undertake the
enterprise of making sure
everyone's
comfortable. But
this habit also can bite you in
the ass. For example: One of the
lead actresses is named Paget.
She's a real sweetheart, and a
real pretty one to boot. So one
day, we were shooting at the
executive producer's mansion (did
I mention that he's married to
Tia Carerre?), and I asked Paget
if she needed anything. "Coffee,"
she said. Lots of cream and
sugar. So I went back to the crew
services table (that's fancy
movie talk for "free food") only
to find that there was no coffee.
Some would be brewing soon, but
not for a while. So I apologized
to Paget and brought her a
Coke. Eventually,
the coffee was ready, and I was
in the middle of a long, arduous
stretch of sitting around, so I
decided to bring her some, as per
our earlier agreement. In between
a scene where she and Christine
Taylor are sitting in a car, I
handed her the coffee. As soon as
I had given her the cup, she took
my hand and said "You know, I'm
madly in love with you, but I
don't even know your
name." I'm
assuming that was hyperbole,
meaning she was grateful for the
coffee, but here were two
gorgeous women, one of whom was
telling me she loved me. I can't
pinpoint the exact moment my
tongue turned into melted butter,
but it happened faster than I
could say, well... anything. I
managed to mutter something not
entirely resembling my name,
which Paget apparently understood
as "Patton." I
regained my composure to correct
her, and she introduced me to
Christine, but it was really just
a blur after that. I'm amazed I
didn't knock over some lighting
equipment or get brained by a
stray grip with a 2x4. Alas,
the love disappeared when the
coffee did, but it was still
pretty damned cool. Just
call me "General." That
piece was (c) 1998 Patrick
Keller, Gern Blansten
Productions. Feel free to
distribute it as long as the
article is complete and contains
this notice. Questions, comments,
news tips, weird stories and
other minutia, no matter how
strange should be sent to
me.
Employees and their families are
not eligible and will be
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