Black Ink

Celebs and Media, Toronto, Work

Today was boring. I was street filler in front of the gym where our intrepid QaF friends work out. I was kind of pissed when I found out that for all the scrambling I did to borrow my Dad’s car for the scene (they pay extra for extras who use their own cars in shots), the casting company had overbooked the background with cars. They didnt need me. Harumph! Before I could raise a stink the Eastern European guy behind me (who was also S.O.L.) exploded “If I have to pay for parking because you arent going to use my car I am gone!”

“Bye,” says the holding director. And as he walks out, she scribbles something beside his name in black ink. She looks up at me.

“I will …um… just go get my car out of security holding,” I mutter.

Dumb Ones

Distractions, Toronto

Here’s another overheard Halloween conversation for you:

Girlfriend: “Im going to be a geisha!”

Boyfriend: “A gei…what is that?”

Girlfriend: “Its a Chinese whore.”

Why cant I shoot the dumb ones?

Cleavage

Celebs and Media, Personal Bits, Work

Call time for Prom Queen was at 7:30am. I dont think Ive been up before 8am since spring 2002. It was weird to see people actually on the street. They got us into Hamilton and into background holding at 8:30 and left us there until 5:30. Seriously. I had forgotten my book and my gameboy and, for kicks, I was considering killing the owners of the greasy fry-up that was renting out their 15×15 “party” room to the production company. It would have been something. The collection of extras was your similar-to-QaF trendy hip fags in one corner, the straight boys in another and a few older types, playing friends of lawyers (one played by Scott Thompson), all sitting around absorbing the smell of stale cigarettes and bacon. They pulled half the extras into set for tight shots and left the rest of us there to listen to the owners of the restaraunt (?) tell us about how people kept on filming pornos in the back “party” room. He was going onto his third sexcapade story when I blurted out “OOOH! King of the Hill!” which thankfully came on the tv over the make-up benches. Volume up. Ten minutes into the show they called us to the set…fuck. No…not during The Bold and the Beautiful…

Wardrobe was interesting. Intructions were to bring hip youthfull biz type clothes, which I have none. I brought my brushed black cotton sport coat, grey dress shirt and acid lime green tie borrowed from my roomie. The assistant wardrobe took one look and made a face that resembled your finger after being a week in water. “Oh go ahead and put that on,” she said of the tie. When the main wardrobe mistress came in I was the first person she saw coming into the room “Thats a great tie!” she exclaims. Oh movie people.

By the time they placed us on set and gave us our crossing cues I was in a much better mood. Punchy. Scott Thompson flubbed his line 5 out of 7 takes but they didnt seem to mind the order of “this brave gay teen”. I had my first instant background mime lesson in seconds. “Cantelope, watermellon” my lips feighned while my eyes were so expressive. The girl I was paired up with had a cracking great chest with a pair of lips for a zipper pull lain poetically over her cleavage. I couldnt stop looking at it. I wound up mime-talking to it at one point. She and I nearly started to laugh out loud at one point.

In all a good day if not long. I wound up getting extra cash upon extra cash for the time-overages. I wonder what I will be put on next?

Queer as Folk, Indeed

Celebs and Media, Queer stuff, Work

So Im in a holding pen somewhere out in a derelict Mississagua factory thats been converted into the set of Babylon, the nightclub where our lovely citizens of Queer as Folk bitch at each other on the dancefloor. And Im with 200 other club kids/musclemarys/heroin addicts/blithering idiots that make up the “background” as we are called (no longer “extras” weve been reduced even further). And Im listening to this loud mouthed, long haired homophobe spew third rate gay jokes. Im in shock. I am sure he was doing it to make sure nobody would hit on him. Fat chance. this guy wasnt as ugly as…oh…the Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons but he was just as annoying and far from amusing. As I went from holding pen to wardrobe (they didnt like my sparkly Hustler shirt–sorry Paul) to make up (the hairdresser tsk tsk at the back of my neck and said he didnt have the time to do a whole head shave) I was amazed at the amount of homophobic comments were made. Crew would joke about not bending over. Make up girls joked about who looked gayer. And of course you had the nervous straight guys asserting their machismo with comments like “They should make a show called Queer Factor where you have to fish used condoms out of a tank with your teeth.” Perspective time: Im on a shitty third rate soap opera tv set and I expect sensitivity?

Well…yes. I do.

I hear all the time that gay people “respect” Showcase and QaF for putting out some gay culture, but it looks like its rotten from the inside, kids.

Some random thoughts:

• I was “dancing” beside a group of kids, two of which had braces. You gat paid extra money if you are kissing on screen so they should have paired those two up and had them lock metal.
• To get the “background” going, they would blare out the music and start us dancing with lots of energy, only to shut it off mid-beat so the actors could say their lines. If you know what a “audio black hole” is then you know how hard it was not to stop dancing a beat after the music ended. It was like going over a cliff every time.
• Saw my brother’s ex-girlfriend’s brother on set doing makeup for the main actors. Nice guy. We did the gunslinging Isaac-from-Love Boat kapow at each other across the room. Funny.
• The guy that wound up being with me (my date, I shall call him) for the whole shoot was straight. The floor director paired us up and put us on the stairs and the first thing out of his mouth was “My girlfriend’s roommate got me into this.” Gotcha buddy…I wont come onto you. Kudos to you when we were asked to move through the crowd past the camera for grabbing my shoulder and konga lining. I hope they keep that.
• Food sucked. Hot dogs and PandJ sammiches. I bet first season background got better.

Best Writer/Speller

Distractions

You’re, Your, Then and Than. Its easy to learn. Why do people misuse these words the most? You might have noticed I dont use apostrophies because I think theyre useless visually (there are instances where they must be used such as “we’re” and “were”). I do that because Im sick of people who get online thinking that you dont have to use capitalization for the beginning of their sentences. The Internet is formed and that gives humanity to butcher the English language? Now…I dont profess to be the best writer/speller. I was in a special class for spelling with Nuns and rulers when I was growing up and I will never forget trying to make my printing as perfect as possible so at least they couldnt hit me for that reason, but I do find it rather damning when people cant use those four words properly. Its rather telling.

My First Day Without a Job.

Personal Bits, Work

My first day without a job. I went in and cleaned out my desk and handed over the keys. It felt good. Last night was a good fun bar shift. Near the end there were 9 guys around my bar and some of them I have had sex with (and would again) and the others I would have liked to. At one point I had a guy with a huge foreskin kneeling on top of my bar, serving shooters out of it. Here’s a tip for you bar-going types: If the bartender buys you a drink, don’t tell him you find the busboy attractive. A guy did just that to me after I bought him the drink. I then put on my best liar-face and proceeded to explain that the busboy was a female to male transgender and if you didnt believe me, look at the eyes and hands. Oh, and ask him outright, he’s very very proud of being transgendered. I then stirred the pot more by going over to the busboy and saying “That guy at the end of the bar likes you…he wants to know your background.” So the busboy went over and struck up a conversation. You should have seen the guy’s eyes as he went from the busboy’s face, hands, hairy forearms, back to his face…looking for any signs of femininity. I will miss that job.

I went and saw Texas Chainsaw Massacre this evening. It was like watching a American Eagle Outfitters fashion commercial for the first 20 minutes and then BAM in walks R. Lee Ermey as the sherrif. Someone must have given him acting lessons after Full Metal Jacket because he pretty much stole the show, other than Jennifer Beal’s boobies.

My First Extra Gig

Celebs and Media, Personal Bits, Toronto, Work

I went and saw Kill Bill this afternoon. It was impressive, action-packed, stylish and clever. Your basic Tarantino film. I recommend it to all who like anime, Japanese fighting movies, 70s pulp fiction, and Uma Thermin. Lucy Liu was ok, but she only had one good scene where she looses her cool. She could have had great acting but it was replaced by an anime hommage for her character set up and development. Gotta love the camera shot through the hole in the assasinated politician at the two escorts looking back and screaming. Brilliant. The only troubling thing I think about post-really-cool-movie elation is that most of the fight scenes weren’t really original. There was the decaps, the dismembs, and even the sword-over-the-head-kill-the-guy-behind-you-before-swinging-it-down-onto-your-opponent move. I wonder how many movies will be made with these Hong Kong wirefight moves? Like the slo mo/fast action pan in The Matrix, we will probably get tired of them and move on.

I just got a call. My first extra gig is on Prom Queen. The made-for-tv story of that guy who took his male date to the prom. Exploitation upon exploitation! Just give me the cash! This should be interesting.

Re: Lowest Point

Personal Bits

I have to qualify my last entry. I got some emails asking if I was ok. Yes, thank you I am fine. I guess when I said “lowest point of my day” I meant “a negative moment” or “my least optimistic moment”. I do have to admit that I will miss working at the bar: I caught myself yesterday caring about things happening there in November. Its going to be tough, I think. I invested a lot of time and energy into that bar and I would hate to see it backpeddle or slip in sales/popularity. Then again, Im glad to be done of the personality shit. I mean really…rent a slide projector for only three slides repeated over and over again for one 4 hour period? Come on…Bye Bye Drama!

Does anyone think that Cosmo and Wanda from Fairly Odd Parents are gay? Wanda sounds pretty bulldyke.

You may commence calling me a hypocrite at any time. Today I signed up to be an extra for Queer as Folk. Oh hush you people, I dont want to hear your bitching or comments. I walked into the extra’s office today and met with Sherri, who was one of those people on automatic. Her schpiel was honed to a fine ramble, but was easy enough to interrupt for questions. Ive worked around movie industry types so she came as no suprise…always on, looked good, and nothing could knock her off the track she was barrelling down on, verbally. Halfway through her diatribe, a scraggly post-heroin kid comes in with a thick thick European accent complaining of not having any money for a phone card for his cell, hence missing his last gig. She shoos him out of the office deftly and in the same breath says: “He’s great”. In fact I think she said “He’s great” about all her flock of extras, so Im glad she’s saying nice things about me behind my back. When I told her that 1) I did special effects make up for a while and that I knew set policies and 2) I was a web/graphic designer, she scribbled furiously on my application. “Good! I can so use you! Do you want to work on anyting other than QAF?” I said please while my head said PLEASE!!!! So keep looking in for on set gossip.

I, Robot Update: I heard the other day that I, Robot only uses one or two storylines from the original book and that its mostly a “pre-U.S. Robotics, pre-Susan Calvin” story in hopes to garner a series of movies, a la Lord Of the Rings. Im still not happy. Ive also found out these people have also bought up Asimov’s Foundation series. Which makes me believe that the Estate of Isaac Asimov must have had a shitty garage sale one day.

10:02 PM Update: Dear producers of The Joe Schmoe Show: You bastards!!

Lowest Point

Personal Bits

Im at the lowest point of my day today. You know the moment: where you indulge in taking stock in the crappy things in your life, like making Kraft Dinner when you’re alone. Oh dont sit there and say you dont do it. So Im listing things: Crappy fungal toenail. Im alone in this city. Not even a fuck-buddy. Inversley, dating makes me ill. I have no solid career after Oct 19th. I cant get past one part of the gameboy game Im on… etc etc. And Im on my bike (ten minutes before I had sat down wrong on my seat. Note to self: underwear when bike riding), and Im at a light. As I said, its the lowest part of my day and I look down. On the ground is an old newspaper page all crumpled and nearly all one grey colour, but one word looked back up at me: Passion. It was weird. It was almost neatly folded so that was the only word you could see on the page. I stared at it for a moment and thought “Was that meant for me? Is Kismet kicking my ass?” Or was it the French word for “fish”? I ride on.

A couple random thoughts while riding: Why do people think “farmer’s blows” are ok? Short of unabashedly pooping on the street, I can think of nothing less I would like to see someone do. Especially when coming out of a dirty bar. Why do rich people talk on their cell phones while driving their expensive cars? If they had the money, why dont they enjoy the ride?

Jon Erik Hexum

Celebs and Media

Jon Erik Hexum. The first tv “hunk” I ever had a crush on. He and Lee Majors (I know, I know: how Marge Simpson of me) both had the hairiest chests on tv back then, at the start of the 80s. And Gil Gerrard too. Know him? No google searches…I will tell you in a moment.

There was a big boom of hairy chested beefcake on tv at the turn of the Me Generation: Regan was just a small virus spreading in California, Battlestar Galactica was so close to finding Earth, V was tv’s most lackluster metaphor for the Nazi rise to power (I thought Steven Speilbergs career at the time, was a better allegory), Magnum PI was using Higgins’ Ferrari, Dallas was on everyone’s yammering lips, and Buck Rogers (There…Gil’s tv show. Did you guess right?) was shooting up the Draconian space navy with Dale Arden. Bidda bidda bidda, Buck! Im rambling. Every male lead had a hairy chest for some reason. When did everyone become hairless? Was it with the death of disco? No more open shirts? Do we blame the Italians? Iranians? Turks? I can fathom the exact point in pop culture where we went from beautiful naturally hairy chests to these shaved house apes. I blame Calvin Klien.