There were two kinds of celebrities who made the red carpet fun. The first group was what we called the brand-new “baby celebs.” They were the new kids in Hollywood who were genuinely excited to be there. One of my favorite moments was at The Golden Globes the year of Good Will Hunting. Matt Damon and Ben Affleck were the two happiest, most excited, couldn’t-believe-their-good-fortune kids in a candy store guys I’d ever seen. You couldn’t not love them, and my mother and I did.
Another year, the aforementioned Ben Affleck (post-Gwyneth, pre J-Lo, which in his personal timeline is known as the “fun years”) took my microphone and ran up and down the red carpet, trying to interview people. After a few minutes of frustration, he came back and said, “Holy shit, that’s hard!”
One year, it was freezing and I was in a very short, weather-inappropriate dress (one that I’m sure my mother had made me wear, the better to snag a wayward heterosexual actor with marital woes and a nice IRA). At a certain point, George Clooney and Noah Wyle, who were starring in ER at the time, came down the carpet together. (Insider tip: you can always see how a cast of a show really feel about one another by how they arrive. First year, big group, all-for-one, one-for-all. Year two, it starts to become a little cliquish. By year three, the only words they speak to one another are the ones that are scripted for them. Don’t believe me? Watch an awards preshow.) Anyway, I was freezing, and they both offered me their coats. I didn’t take either one. In hindsight? Stupid, stupid, stupid. (My mother said, “Do you know the resale value of that?”)
The second group of great red carpet celebrities is the A-Listers, because they play ball. Even if they don’t enjoy it, they pretend to. Most of them liked chatting with us, and they knew it would be a fun interview.
Sir Ian McKellen always has fun on the red carpet. He has absolutely no respect for rules or authority. (Any wonder why we liked him?) At one award show, he came walking down the red carpet smoking a cigarette. He got to my position during a commercial break. I guess I must have been staring at his cigarette covetously, because he offered me a drag. I said, “I wish, but smoking isn’t allowed in public spaces in Los Angeles.” He said nothing, but smiled and gave me that “What the fuck are they going to do to me? I’m a sir” look. I took a drag.
Julia Roberts and Sarah Jessica Parker were two of my mom’s favorites. They always knew they were on the carpet to have fun. They’d come right up to her and say, “Okay, let’s get this over with. Just say it to my face; tell me right now what you think of what I’m wearing.”
One year after Sarah Jessica asked my mother that question, my mom actually said to her, “Honestly? Love the dress, hate the shoes.” It was a classic Joan Rivers moment.
The only time I ever remember my mother speechless was when Denzel Washington came up to her at the Oscars and told her that he had been watching the show while he was getting ready and he quoted his favorite joke of hers back to her. I think in that moment it finally dawned on her that people were actually watching the show, not just six gay guys and a couple of menopausal women who hadn’t heard from their kids in a month.
The most difficult celebs fall into one of two categories. I refer to the first one as “third down in an ensemble show or movie.” The second group is made up of stars who hate doing the red carpet yet are contractually obligated to do it.
The first category is usually driven by the insecurity and bitterness and anger that only third-billed actors have because they are not the “star.” They are defensive and snotty and feel they are above talking to the press on such a banal thing as the red carpet. They consider themselves so far above it that they are usually temperamental and annoying—and terrible interview subjects. They are the ones who refer to themselves as ar-tistes. I like to refer to them as assholes. (We all know who they are, but in an ironic twist of fate—at least that’s what my lawyers told me to say—I can’t come up with any of their names. Hmmmm. ’Nuff said.)
The second category of difficult celebrity has a poster child. And that child is Tommy Lee Jones. The second he steps out of his limo and sets foot on the red carpet, you can feel the wave of dread passing through the press line, because you know it’s not going to be fun, it’s not going to be pleasant, and you’ll be lucky if you come away with only a mild case of PTSD. Seriously, you can hear the Valium bottles pop open as soon as he’s within a hundred yards of the cameras and mikes. So, I want to take this opportunity to send a message to Mr. Jones. Please think of this, if you will, as an open letter (add throat-clearing sound effect, here):
Dear Mr. Jones,
Let me start by telling you what an enormous fan I am of your work. In my opinion, you are truly one of the most brilliant actors of your generation. I also respect the fact that you, like me, are an Ivy League graduate. Granted, my roommate, Holly Litvak from Cherry Hill, New Jersey, was definitely not as cool as your roommate, Al Gore. (Quick question: Did you help him invent the Internet? Just curious.)
I also appreciate the fact that you are an athlete, specifically, an accomplished polo player. I, too, am an athlete, an accomplished equestrian in the discipline of show jumping. Did you know we had so much in common? Crazy, huh?
That being said, I understand and appreciate that you do not like doing interviews of any kind, especially those on a red carpet. However, doing these interviews is part of your job, just like interviewing you is part of mine. So here is my question: Why the fuck are you making it so difficult for us to do our jobs? You hate it and seem determined to make us hate it, too. What’s that all about? Why spread misery? Look, we’re all just trying to earn a paycheck, and mine, I’d like to point out, is about one-one-hundredth of yours. Also, smiling every now and again wouldn’t fucking hurt! When you show up at an awards show, it’s usually because you were nominated. Seriously, it can’t suck that bad. You’re nominated for an Oscar. You’re walking down the red carpet into a ceremony at which you’ll wait for your name to be called, not walking down the hall to the death chamber waiting for the governor to call. (By the way, have you ever done that in any of your movies? I’m sure you’d be good in the role of a convict or governor. You should give it some thought.)
In conclusion, I hope you do not take offense at my expressing my opinion. I’m very much looking forward to seeing you at the next Penn-Harvard alumni mixer.
Sincerely, your friend,
Melissa
* * *
One of the great lessons my mother taught me about show business was, “In this business you have to know your place. Your level of difficulty to work with cannot exceed the level of money you can make for others.”
Know When to Fold ’Em
I think country singer/chicken monger Kenny Rogers said it best:
You’ve got to know when to hold ’em
Know when to fold ’em
Kenny is a very wise man. Not wise enough to find a plastic surgeon who used a scalpel instead of a blowtorch, but wise enough when it came to gambling. And when it came to gambling, my mother took Kenny’s advice.
Before you all go down that “Oh, maybe the reason Joan worked so hard is because she pissed away a fortune playing the ponies and was up to her eyes in debt” road, please note, that’s not the case; my mother pissed away a fortune on expensive jewelry and designer clothes.
My mother took Kenny Rogers’s advice about knowing when to fold ’em. She believed you had to know which battles you should fight and which ones you shouldn’t, which wars could be won and which couldn’t. She also knew (and taught me) when and how to fight for jobs, money, and creative control. She used to say, “You can only be as demanding as your star power allows.”
For example, Barbra Streisand has the reputation for being a diva. Barbra Streisand also has Oscars, Grammys, Emmys, and Tonys, and delivers number one albums and sells out arenas. If she wants to be a diva, she can get away with it. Katherine Heigl, on the other hand—I know what you’re thinking: “Who the fuck is Katherine Heigl?” My mother’s point exactly.1
For those of you who don’t consider TMZ the most important news outlet in the world (and you should be ashamed of yourselves if you don’t), here’s the backstory of the most recent tale of Divas Gone Wild. Katherine Heigl was one of the original members of the ensemble cast of Grey’s Anatomy, which debuted in 2005 and is still going strong in its eleventh season. Katherine was one of the breakout stars of the show and even won an Emmy for Best Supporting Actress. Then she apparently became demanding and difficult to work with, even turning down another Emmy nomination because, as she publicly stated, she didn’t think the show’s writing was good enough for her to be nominated. At that exact same time, she capitalized on her television success and started making feature films, the most successful of which was Judd Apatow’s big hit Knocked Up. After a few more movies, which were not nearly as successful as Knocked Up, Katherine began taking swipes at the movie that had made her a star.
Then, magically, she stopped working for the next five years, and I’m pretty sure it wasn’t her choice. As my mother advised me when all this was going down, “Melissa, never burn a bridge while you’re still on it.”2 That’s a very good piece of advice. I think I’ll share it with Lindsay Lohan … and Gwyneth Paltrow … and Shannon Doherty … and Lea Michele … and …
My mother also had little patience for pretentious phony-baloneys, which in Hollywood means everyone.3 Actors and movie stars are known for being notoriously grand (or, as my mother would say, “graaaaand”) and filled with their own self-importance. I can attest to this because my mother was an actress.
In her book I Hate Everyone … Starting with Me, she talks about how the SAG Awards telecast always opened with a hand-held camera going through the audience and stopping at various stars, who would look into the camera and say, “I’m So-and-So and I’m an AC-TOR,” with such gravitas that one would think acting was the most important occupation in the world. She knew this was ridiculous behavior but not completely the actors’ faults. After all, they spend most of their waking (and sleeping) hours surrounded by teams of gofers, fetchers, schleppers, lackeys, and sycophants, who tend to their every need and constantly remind them of how fabulous they are. It’s easy to see how that kind of attention could make someone think they’re all that and more.
Another (good) reason my mother couldn’t abide people who were graaaand is that they tended to be humorless and took themselves way too seriously. And if you weren’t funny or weren’t able to get the joke, you weren’t going to be in her good graces. (She had exceptions. For example, she didn’t think doctors should be looking for a laugh. She used to have a joke in her act: “Dr. Schwartz, at your cervix!”) The reason she loved the likes of George Clooney and Meryl Streep and Robert DeNiro is that they are in on the joke. They know they’re talented, they know their work matters, but they know that they’re making entertainment, not replicating liver cells to save lives.
This is as opposed to one B-level actress (who shall remain nameless because she’s psychotic, she knows where I live, and I’m actually afraid of her) who forgot she was raised in a double-wide and decided she was an artiste of the highest order. Not only did she break into French in mid-conversation, but she also enjoyed reading poetry aloud, often pausing for dramatic effect in the hope that us simple, unenlightened folk could take in all that she was saying and hopefully grasp the meaning and the beauty of her words. She pulled this shit in front of my mother once. My mother, not one to be outsmarted, waited for her to finish and then said, “That was wonderful. You should try reading it in its original Gaelic. So much of the beauty is lost in the translation.” Then she turned to me and whispered, “Melissa, I’m all for people bettering themselves, but please, at one point she needed to be reminded she came from a trailer park.”
The winner of the front-row seat on the Joan Rivers Bullshit Bus belonged to Madonna.4 (Gwyneth Paltrow finished second and Kanye West, naturally, brought up the rear.) In between Sean Penn and girlie-looking, Hispanic dancer boys, Madonna was married to the British film director Guy Ritchie. One night my mother and I were watching Madge being interviewed on TV about some forgettable movie that she and Guy had made (and I say forgettable because even I’ve forgotten it). To our surprise, Madonna was speaking with an English accent. And I don’t mean a slight accent. I mean, “ ’Ello, Guv’nah! Might you be needin’ a wee bit o’ bangers-and-mash?” I looked at my mother and said, “Isn’t Madonna from Detroit? I know she’s living in the UK, but what’s up with the accent?” My mother said, “Just be thankful she didn’t marry a pygmy. She’d be speaking a click-click language and shooting poachers with a blow gun.”
You know which singer keeps it real? Dionne Warwick. If you saw her on the street, you’d never know that it was Dionne Warwick. She wouldn’t be dressed how you would imagine “Dionne Warwick” would dress. She dresses like a widow who took a bus from Long Island to Atlantic City to see “Dionne Warwick.” (You know the look: pink sequined sweatshirt and matching baseball cap.) I’m not sure if she dresses like that by choice or by necessity; her financial troubles have been well documented. My mother once said to me, “You’d think one of her psychic friends would have seen it coming and told her to hang on to her money.” But Dionne was being Dionne, and as my mom would say, “You gotta like that.”
My mother always encouraged me to be myself. “Unless you’re going to be boring on that day, in which case, do us all a favor and be someone else.”
1 When Comedy Central roasted my mother, Tom Arnold had a great joke. He said, “Joan Rivers is a diva. A diva is what you call a cunt when she’s still in the room.” Five years later, still funny.
2 The good news is that Katherine Heigl’s banishment from the business seems to have ended. She’s starring in a new series on NBC called State of Affairs, in which she plays a CIA agent named Charlie. I hope the series is a hit, but if not, maybe she can spin off her Charlie character into a lesbian housewife and get a series on Bravo.
3 Everyone except those people with whom I’d like to do business someday. You are not pretentious Hollywood phony-baloneys. You are smart, talented visionaries, and I look forward to collaborating with you on projects that will not only give voice to our creative muses and, hopefully, make the world a better place, but also make all the $tudio head$ and network executive$ happy.
4 All joking aside, my mother really respected Madonna. She thought she was smart and hardworking, and that she never backed down. She also appreciated that Madonna was constantly reinventing herself—that’s quite a compliment coming from a woman who had 365 plastic surgeries.
Swag the Dog
Of all the award shows my mother and I worked on, none is bigger than the Academy Awards. Oscar night is filled with tension, drama, and questions, questions, questions. Questions like “Who are you wearing?” “Who do you think will win?” and “Who do you think will react horribly to losing?” But there’s one question that’s more important than all those questions put together: “What’s in the swag bag?”
According to The Oxford English Dictionary, swag is a draped or sheathed piece of fabric. According to the Urban Dictionary, swag is an air of confidence, or swagger. And according to the showbiz dictionary, swag is all the expensive free shit that celebrities are given at award shows for no apparent reason other than their showing up.
Hollywood swag was originally created to lure celebrities to attend low-profile events. Let me clarify. I mean to lure A-List celebrities like Robert DeNiro and Julia Roberts, not “luminaries” like Teresa Giudice and the Situation, who would show up at any event that offered baby lamb chops or free valet parking. Later, the swag bag began making appearances as thank-you gifts given to stars by TV talk show producers for appearing on their shows, even though the hosts had no idea who those celebrities were and didn’t care about whatever it was they were promoting.
At some point the swag bag became a story unto itself, because the fancier and more expensive the gift items were, the more famous the stars wh
o showed up. (Celebrities are like sharks; they’re fascinated by shiny objects.) Soon, expensive, fancy gift items like Rolex watches, major household appliances, and all-expenses-paid vacations to private villas in Tahiti and Cabo and St. Bart’s were filling the swag bags. My mother and I couldn’t have been happier with this development. On one hand, we found it creepily bizarre that rich movie stars were being given expensive gifts they could easily have afforded to pay for themselves. On the other hand, we didn’t care, because we would much rather have interviewed George Clooney than George Wendt, the chubby guy who played Norm on Cheers. (No offense to George Wendt; he’s a fine actor. But the paparazzi don’t give a shit what kind of dress his wife is wearing.)
This arrangement was a win-win for everyone—until the government decided that the rich and famous had to pay taxes on the millions of dollars in free shit they were getting for no apparent reason. Then, suddenly, magically, POOF! Just like eight-track tapes, workout videos, and Kenny Rogers’s career, the swag bag was gone. (If you get very quiet and calm, you can still hear the sounds of personal assistants crying in anguish, knowing that the swag bag was no more.1 The gravy train had pulled out of the station, and they no longer would be getting the free shit their celebrity employers didn’t want.2)
The Grammys were known for having the craziest swag bags. One year, they included household appliances. I’m not joking: full-size refrigerators and washer-dryers. Interesting note: Almost every musician I asked about this was very excited to give the appliances to one of their favorite relatives, for two reasons: (1) Most Grammy nominees don’t do their own laundry, and (2) even if they were so inclined, they’d be way too stoned to do it.
The Oscars always tried to have elegant swag bags, filled with high-end gifts and lots of face products: moisturizers, scrubs, toners, and scalpels. Included in the bag one year was a gift certificate for teeth whitening from a famous Beverly Hills dentist. The next year was a certificate for Lasik surgery. If you were around for five straight award seasons you could have had your entire face and body redone for nothing (which means some of the women would actually appear thirty-nine, and there might still be an occasional good part for them).
The Book of Joan: Tales of Mirth, Mischief, and Manipulation Page 10
