Carter's Big Break

by Brent Crawford

  This is outrageous! My mom is going to be mortified! I’m going to get fired! I’m going to be an absolute legend at school! And it’s a complete lie. I flip the page and it’s more of the same with smaller pictures and an image of the planet Earth with pinpoints sticking in it showing where the shots were supposedly taken. The caption asks, “Who is Hilary’s new jet-setter?” with a shot of us running through the lobby of the President Hotel. The picture is next to California, and the caption reads, “Chatêau Marmont, Los Angeles.” We’re holding hands and shielding our eyes, but we are nowhere near Los Angeles. And what the hell is a “chatêau”? Then they have a photo of us swimming at Grey Goose. It’s connected to Italy and says, “Lake Como.” What? Another one is in the Hy-Vee parking lot. We’re getting out of the Escalade on Merrian Lane, but the line points to Florida and reads, “Rendezvous in South Beach!” When did they plant palm trees in front of the Hy-Vee? The bottom of the page says, “Meet Boy Toy . . .”

  I flip the page so hard it rips out of the magazine. The next photo is just me, by myself, leaning on my bike, drinking a Mountain Dew, like a stone-cold pimp. It reads, “Pizza Magnate, Starvados Sbarro!!!” What the hell? It continues, “Grandson of Gennaro and Carmella Sbarro . . . heir to the Italian restaurant fortune,” followed by a shot of me riding EJ’s bike with Hilary on the pegs. The lies continue. “Sbarro placed third at the X Games, but he’s Hilary’s gold-medal man!”

  Hey, US Weekly dickheads: As long as you’re making stuff up, why did I have to get third place? And I remember leaning on my bike the other day, drinking a COKE, not Mountain Dew! You can see that it’s totally added in. My pinky finger is gone.

  Sport Coat Phil flings the door to the trailer open and steps into the room like the Terminator. He’s wearing his headset, sunglasses, and a scowl. He’s got the US Weekly in his hand and is looking right at me when he snaps, “You got somethin’ you want to tell me?!”

  “Dude! I was just coverin’ her—”

  He interrupts. “I want an explanation, bitch, and if I find out you’re lying, you’re fired!”

  “Dude! Okay, I was feeling them a little, but—”

  He holds up his finger for me to shut up, adjusts his headset, and yells, “Get your fat ass over to the makeup trailer!”

  I stand and say, “Uncalled for!” Then I stop and ask, “Aren’t we in the makeup trailer?”

  Hilary laughs and points to the blinking device in his ear before she says, “Carter, he’s on the phone. Matilda authorized those photos . . . supposedly to create buzz about you before the movie comes out.”

  Matilda enters the trailer, and I guess Hilary’s all made up and it’s my turn, because a makeup lady starts poking at my face. Matilda explains that she made a deal with People magazine and they weren’t supposed to run the photos for six months, but US Weekly intercepted them and ran the story they thought would sell the most magazines.

  “And Mountain Dew,” I add.

  C. B. storms into the trailer like a tornado and yells, “Carter!”

  I jump up and ask, “What the hell did I do?” mostly to get the makeup lady off me.

  He holds up a copy of US Weekly, and I say, “Oh, yeah, that.”

  C. B. notices Phil and Matilda cowering in the corner. He throws the magazine at them. No one is saying anything, and the makeup lady is coming at me with her mascara stick, so I swat it away and ask, “Yo, what’s a pizza magnet?”

  He probably doesn’t know either, because he yells, “I can’t believe you’re resorting to this kind of publicity already! We just started shooting!”

  Phil barks, “We didn’t mean for it to come out this early, but this is the game, C. B.! You’re the one who cast a nobody! We’ll need to make him a celebrity sooner or later.”

  C. B. throws up his hands and yells, “Starvados freakin’ Sbarro?! This is going to be a great movie; we don’t need this!”

  The lady tilts my head back and starts pushing the sponge into my swollen chin like I called her ugly. “Owwww!”

  Phil says to me, “Shut it, kid!” and then barks at C. B., “This is the difference between making twenty million and a hundred and twenty. It’s unfortunate that they got his name wrong, but we can always change Carter’s name.”

  “Huh?! Ouch!” I whine as I instinctively knock the sponge out of her hand and then apologize for doing it.

  C. B. asks Phil if they can really do that, and Phil explains, “We make movies . . . we can do anything.” He didn’t bust out an evil cackling laugh afterward, but if this was my movie and I was the writer/director, he would have.

  The makeup lady dabs goop onto one of my cuts until I jump out of the chair and pant, “Okay, I think I’m done!”

  C. B. looks at Hilary and then at the makeup lady, who’s scowling at me. He says, “Okay, Starvados . . . let’s get started.”

  I’m in a karate stance, looking at the makeup lady, when I ask, “Are you really gonna change my name?”

  C. B. just laughs and steps out into the sunlight. The lady comes at me with a powder brush, so I draw my hands back and slowly back out of the trailer.

  As if I didn’t have enough crap to deal with . . . the first pair of eyes I connect with are attached to my angry ex-girlfriend. Abby’s all lit up and doing her job as a stand-in, but her arms are crossed, and she’s giving me a nasty look. A look that suggests she’s seen the magazine, and even though she doesn’t know the whole story, I have been tried and found guilty of something. Man, I can’t deal with this right now, but I know that when I do, “innocence” is going to be a tough sell. I’ve got to get into character.

  We shoot all the scenes inside the house, and they actually go great. Hilary and I are having fun, and it shows.

  C. B. even smiles a few times. The crew is joking around, calling me Starvados. I don’t mind until Sport Coat Phil uses the nickname. The day flies by, like a proper summer day should, and C. B. yells, “That’s a wrap, people!” before I know it.

  I hurriedly change clothes and try to catch Abby before she breaks out, but Phil lets himself into my trailer to go over the next week’s schedule. He explains that I’ve got two days off because Hilary is shooting the scenes I’m not in. I’m thinking about going to the pool and hanging out with my boys when Phil asks me if I’ll volunteer to come to hang out with Hilary on set so that she stays on point and in a good mood. He thinks I’m a good influence. (Just so you know, you don’t get paid for your “influence,” and you’re not allowed to tell the actor’s union.) He looks at his clipboard and explains that my next day of actual work is at the train station, on Saturday. I have to be there at six a.m. to shoot action scenes. I’ll be jumping onto a moving train and jumping off of it. They’re also going to film me in the boxcar eating trash and reading books and writing in my journal.

  I try to joke with Phil. “Wait a minute. Nobody told me I was going to have to read and write! I’m calling my agent!”

  He doesn’t laugh. I suspect he’s not programmed for laughter, and that his earpiece is actually a neurotransmitter blinking his coordinates to the Hollywood mother ship. He’s walking away, probably to go plug himself in for the night, when I ask, “Am I gonna have a stunt double or something when I jump from the train?”

  He shatters my theory by laughing his ass off. I guess “nobodies” do their own stunts, and it’s really funny when they think that they’re “somebodies.”

  Abby is long gone and Hilary stops me before I can chase her down. She demands to know where I’m going and won’t let me leave until I promise to come over to the President Hotel and do a yoga class and watch TV with her later tonight.

  I ride over to Abby’s house to explain the photos, but I couldn’t get past the front door. Her mom/bouncer has obviously seen the US Weekly, because she greets me with a snarky, “Hello, Starvados!” and tells me to get lost. She says, “If Abby wants to talk, she’ll call you,” and then slams the knocker in my face.

  When I walk into my own house, the phon
e starts ringing. Abby and I are so connected it’s ridiculous! I let it ring three times so I don’t seem too anxious, and then say, “Hey you . . .” all smooth.

  She’s just breathing heavily into the phone because she doesn’t know what to say. I lower my voice and tell her, “It’s okay, boo . . . I’m glad you called.”

  Then my ear fills with a dude’s voice, “HUH!?”

  Crap, it’s just EJ. I recognize his panting. “Huuuu, uhhhh . . . dude . . . huuuu, uhhhh, I’m at Hy-Vee, huuuu, uhhhh . . . I think I’m freakin’ out!”

  “Is there a special on tenderloins, you sick freak?”

  “Huhhhh, uhhh . . . No . . . I’m at the checkout . . . huuu, uhhhh, I’m lookin’ at . . . uh, US Weekly.”

  “Oh yeeaaah, you like that, don’t you?!”

  He gasps, “Dude, are you an international playboy? And you didn’t tell me? Huuu, uhhhh . . . Who are you, man?!” he demands.

  “Come on—”

  “Is your name Will Carter?! Answer me!”

  “Dude, we’ve hung out every day since kindergarten. . . . How could I be a pizza magnate?”

  “What the hell is a pizza magnet?” he asks.

  “I think my mom has one on the fridge.”

  He tries to ask about the movie, but I tell him I have to go.

  He barks, “Wait a friggin’ minute! I haven’t heard from you in weeks, and if you’re doinkin’ Hilary Idaho, I need to know about it!”

  My immediate reaction is to tell him that I absolutely . . . am! That we “doinked” in all those spots they have pictures of, and twenty others that they didn’t catch, but I know it’s wrong to lie and rub that fib in my best friend’s face—a guy who’d never lie to me . . . but who would tell me every detail, sound, smell, and position from every damn sexual experience he’s ever had, with three different girls, when he knows I’ve never had it! So I coldly reply, “Dude, I’m not tryin’ to kiss and tell.”

  EJ squeals with excitement from this inferred confirmation. “You hit that all over town! You smacked that ass, didn’t you?” I hear the sound of magazine pages flipping underneath his giggling. I know he’s miming the smacking of an ass as he shouts, “Whoooah! Yeah, she’s ridin’ the baloney pony express—”

  A cracking sound causes me to remove the phone from my ear, and I can vaguely hear his mom yelling, “Emilio . . . potty mouth . . . bad boy!” The line goes dead, and I laugh for ten minutes at the thought of EJ standing in the Hy-Vee checkout line, holding up an US Weekly and humping the air while yelling, “Smack that ass!” and “Baloney pony express!” I guarantee you, that cracking sound was the cell phone hitting the floor after his mom tackled him into the candy rack before dragging him out to the car like a mischievous toddler (not a guy who was six foot three, last time we measured).

  18. GET TO THE PAIN

  The next week flies by, and everything is going pretty well, except for the massive bruise on my hip and the constant throbbing in my left shoulder. (Just so you know, when you jump from a train that’s going twenty miles an hour, remember that the earth is not moving with you, and when someone tells you to, “Hit the ground running!” they’re not trying to inspire you with general, clever, old-timey advice. Rather, they are giving you specific directions as to what to do with your feet when you jump from a moving locomotive.) And while there are a lot of disadvantages to hiring a “nobody” to star in your movie, you will save a lot of money on stuntmen, and the union only seems to care if the “somebodies” are in danger. According to Phil, I rock!

  Sometimes we get the scenes right away and only shoot a couple of takes, and other times C. B. will make us do them over and over until Phil reminds him of that “one minute on a film set costs a thousand dollars” rule, and we move on to the next one. I like the acting a lot, but I officially love this movie-set thing called the “craft service table.” It’s a free snack bar that stocks everything from M&M’s to vitamin-infused popcorn. It’s all you can eat, all day, and they never run out of stuff, and they don’t yell at you for eating too much. I guarantee this is the reason Marlon Brando got so fat.

  Hilary’s breath hasn’t smelled like booze since the first day, but her behavior can be a little bit hit-or-miss. Sometimes she’s super sweet and polite to everyone, and other times she’s a freak-a-zoid bitch. I know from experience that chicks can flip out for no reason, but Hilary can get so pissed so quickly it makes everyone a little bit nervous. Once, a lady brought her a cold water, and she threw it at her because she likes “ROOM TEMPERATURE, BITCH!!!” and everyone should know these details after weeks of shooting. I think what she wants is for people to be honest with her and not treat her special, but she doesn’t know how to say it. I’ve definitely figured out how to make her laugh: you just make fun of her. She loves it! I make fun of her orange skin and how little she eats. Even though her boobs are real, I still put a couple grapefruits from the craft service table under my T-shirt and ask, “Do these look natural?” I goof on The Get Up Gang and do impressions of their rap songs, and I do a two-minute version of Cheer! The Musical that I still think is too long. I sing, “Go! Fight! Weeeeiiiiiieeeyaaaaahhheeeiiiiyaaaahhhhna!” all the time, and she dies laughing.

  C. B. added a few new scenes, but we’ve finally finished all of the interior shots at Saur mansion. We’re getting ready to shoot the kissing/crying scene at the end of the movie, and we’re both diarrhea-nervous about it. We’ve rehearsed it so many times, but C. B. still wants us to “keep it natural.” We’ve improv’d the scene fifty different ways. . . . The only way we could make it different is if we tried to do it in Spanish. I’m not scared to kiss Hilary anymore, but I feel like a robot when I try to cry. I’ve been daydreaming about funerals and watching depressing movies. I’m trying to think of every sad thing that’s ever happened to me, but nothing is working! I am incredibly depressed but not producing any tears.

  The camera and lights are all set up for the scene. We usually walk through the blocking and say the lines a few times before we shoot. I know this crap like I know my own name, but Hilary keeps taking these big dramatic pauses before saying her lines. She’s scrunching up her face and breathing really heavily. I’m not really concentrating on my work because I’m trying to figure out what the hell she’s doing. We get to the part where she’s supposed to get emotional, and she busts out wailing, “HUUUUAAAAHHHHH!!!” Her character is supposed to be upset that this relationship is breaking up, but she’s acting like her village was just bombed. Tears are shooting out of her eyes. I’m supposed to be torn up as well, but I’m just watching the Hilary Idaho show. The cameras aren’t even rolling, but C. B. yells, “CUT!!!” as if they are. He springs up from his chair and runs over to us. He grabs her elbow and barks, “What are you doing?!”

  Hilary looks really shocked that he stopped her brilliant performance, and explains, “I’m just trying something.”

  C. B. is usually pretty careful around Hilary. He knows that she’s fragile, so he keeps his comments pretty positive for the most part, but this hysterical crying has set him off. “How about you try the stuff we’ve been working on during rehearsal, and feel the emotion of the scene? How about you try to be honest, and not manufacture this BS crying? And while you’re at it, try not to ruin my film!”

  Tears well up in Hilary’s eyes (real ones), and I think I know what C. B. is trying to do. He’s trying to break her down, to get her to feel more vulnerable. He’s hoping it will spill over into the lines like it did for me and Abby at the audition, but he may have gone too far because Hilary is not looking sad so much as really pissed off.

  C. B. stomps back to the camera and yells to the crew that we’re going to try to shoot one. My heart jumps into my throat, but I’m still worried about Hilary, so I ask, “Are you okay?”

  If her frustration was looking for an outlet . . . it finds me. She yells, “Don’t talk to me! You think I don’t know what he’s doing? I’m a professional; I can get myself where I need to be.”

  She
yells to Phil that she’s taking a break and storms off toward her trailer. Phil shoots C. B. a mean look and follows her into the RV.

  I guess I’m relieved that the crying scene had to be postponed, but I’m pretty concerned about Hilary. Phil eventually exits her trailer, and she locks the door behind him. She refuses to come out, so we break for lunch early. I’m still focused on the upcoming scene until Matilda pulls the Escalade up to Hilary’s door and they drive away really fast. Phil’s assistant tells me that she was just going back to the hotel for a nap and she would be right back, but C. B. looks really worried. After two hours she still hasn’t returned, so we stop for the day. What a relief! I guess we’ll get back to the crying scene after we’ve filmed the stuff at my school. At first I was stoked to be getting off early, but the more I think about her “nap,” the more anxious I become.

  Since I’m done for the day, I ride to the pool and say hi to my boys. I lock up at the bike racks and give a nod to the front-desk girl before ducking into the locker room. Her jaw dropped when she looked up from her copy of US Weekly. Could it be? Oh yeah, Starvados freakin’ Sbarro is standing before you! She didn’t have a chance to ask for my autograph or check to see my season pass as I blew past. You can smell the sunscreen and hear the shouting and laughter before you even get to the pool area. A smile rips across my face when I see my boys jumping off the diving boards. Man, I’ve really missed this place. Daniel Day-Lewis may stay in character for the whole shooting process, but I think I need to take some breaks.

  Nutt is just doing a gainer off the high dive when I walk up. EJ, Bag, and Doc are wearing their official red lifeguard trunks. I know that I’m a movie star now, but I’m still totally jealous that they are getting paid to hang out at the pool. J-Low, Hormone, and Nutt are just hanging out . . . not getting paid.

  Bag spots me first and yells, “Look who finally showed up,” and punches me in the shoulder (ouch).