What Hollywood Is Like

We stopped in at the Barnes & Noble and I picked up a book entitled Easy Riders Raging Bulls : How the Sex-Drugs-And-Rock-'N'-Roll Generation Saved Hollywood. I flipped to the index and looked up Len--there was tons more about his brother Paul, of course, but I checked out the sections on Len.

Oh my God.

I put the book down.

Most of the stuff we had heard before or at least been able to figure out between the lines of what Len had said. To see some of the relationships in black-and-white like that...it's going to be a while before I can actually read that book.

After the bookstore, we decided to see a movie and settled on The Object of My Affection. One word: oy. I don't recommend it. Poor writing (even Darin was cringing at the dialogue--a playwright wrote this?), no story, and lousy production values. The reviews at Film.com sum it up pretty well.

Afterwards we drove by the comic book store, and while we were there I said, "Darin, I just remembered something. Honest. I just remembered."

"What is it?"

"Linda's having a party tonight to celebrate thesis being over and I have to go." I looked at him. "You don't have to. I'll go by myself."

He said he'd come with. He wasn't thrilled about going (parties are just not our thing), but nonetheless we drove over the hill to Hollywood. We were the first ones there, of course. Linda mentioned to me that she had woken up absolutely furious at what Carolann had said in class yesterday, but we didn't have a chance to talk about it.

Which is good, because the whole thing got worse in a hurry.

Carolann and her husband showed up and she proceeded to describe a dream she'd had:

It was this psychadelic dream, with flashing lights and weird colors. The entire class was on their knees and Len was putting tabs of acid on your tongues.

After which I said, "And where were you?"

"Oh, I was watching the whole thing, omnipotent."

Uh huh.

Later on I was in a discussion with Jackie and Carolann about USC and Carolann said she was just so relieved now to be graduating, because now the handcuffs are off and she can write the way she wants to write without having to please the professors--which she's learned how to do, of course, and they all love her stuff, but it's not what she really wants to write. What she wants to write is better than that and they're not going to let her. She's mastered the academic game and now it's time to move on and conquer the system, I guess.

This wasn't the end of it, of course. I have since learned today that:

• during the party Carolann rather loudly told her version of what happened in class Thursday--the rest of the class are mindless sheep, of course, and she's the only one willing to stand up to Len.

• she thinks that Len's criticisms of her are based on professional jealousy--there's a new crop of serious, talented writers coming up and he can't take the competition.

• she talked Len on Friday to tell him how pissed off she was at him for what he said to her Thursday night.

• she thinks that Len only has problems with the people in class who won awards last year--her, James, and Linda--probably once again out of professional jealousy.

School is over; I guess we don't have to be polite any more.

The thing that I can't get over is that I feel completely blindsided by this side of her. I guess I should have had a clue a few months ago, when Carolann raged at me and others for daring to criticize her in class. (Yeah, I called her Helen then; fuck it, I'm changing it to her real name.)

I've never seen anyone cover up not their belief in their own godhood so well before. And not only a sense of divine right, but a firm belief that everyone else is shit. See, I'm usually pretty good with people--true, I tend to expect that they're going to be reasonable, decent human beings until proven otherwise, but when they're not reasonable, decent human beings, I can usually sense that ahead of time.

The reason that I think the gloves are off now and she doesn't have to hide her light under a bushel anymore is that she got hired to write Bloodsport 5. Or, as we learned at the party last night, she and her husband got hired to write Bloodsport 5. Or, actually...it seems her husband is going to write Bloodsport 5 but Carolann's name is going on it--because she kept saying that "I'm the beard, I'm the beard." I would have interpreted that to mean that a)she was going to write it and Chris was going to get credit and b)she was using the word "beard" wrong, but evidently I would be mistaken.

Uh huh. Whatever.

I don't like the feelings this whole situation has brought up in me. Nasty and vicious and hurtful. Where I really want to say something awful, the kind of thing that can't be taken back (except if enough money is involved).

One of the things I've realized is that I'm going to run into people like this a lot in this industry. They're in every business, of course--Silicon Valley is chock-a-block with insecure backstabbers too. And the lesson I should take away from this is not that this is how you should be, but look what you engender in other people when you act this way.

Evidently several people were talking about Carolann's attitude last night, and not nicely, either. The entire class may not grow up to be successful, but several of us surely will. And we'll remember.

Still, there is something attractive in a diseased and pathological way about being able to act like that, isn't there? "Fuck you, I'm better than you are." The kind of thing that I might think--and I do, quite often--but would never, ever be able to say to someone. Hell, it's hard enough to say, "Hey, I'm pretty good," without wanting to blush and look around for the nearest lightning strike.

I came home and got a message from the Rewrite Professor telling me that his contact at Disney really really really wants to see the Rewrite Script and when can I get it to him?

Which made me feel a little better.

Lies, Damn Lies, and Statistics

The gym.