by Robert Lopez
Remember it is not important how you look so long as the cast and crew fear you.
That they must also love you goes without saying.
Say it anyway.
This actor that won’t smoke, find his mother wherever she works, probably some diner somewhere as a waitress, and go there. Sit in her station and tell her to join you for coffee when she has a break. Ask specific questions and get specific answers. Do not let her avoid any question. She will try to explain why he is the way he is, how she raised him to be the kind of actor he is. All of this is irrelevant and a waste of time, but do it anyway.
Tell the actor you spoke to his mother. Tell him you sat in her station and had coffee with the woman. Tell him you saw his mother smoking a cigarette on her break out back with one of the busboys. Tell him she is good-looking.
Find out who this actor admires and use it against him.
Go to the park and find an unoccupied bench. Watch a black crow chasing after the smaller birds, making that horrendous noise. Then tell the property master, We’re going to need a black crow.
Tell the second-unit director to take all kinds of park footage.
Feel like going for a walk but don’t feel up to it. Feel more like listening to your guts swallow themselves.
Never say Cut when you want them to stop. Say Enough already.
After you say Enough already, you can say Print.
You cannot always confound expectations.
Talk about the nature of art, the nature of everything else.
Schedule a full week for the location shoot. Arrive at the park before six every morning. Sit by yourself.
Consider what else you can be doing.
Being outdoors this time of year can be glorious.
Let the fresh air cleanse and feed you.
Contact the actor’s mother again and ask her to accompany you to Cabo, to Cannes, to Cancún. Ask her if she knows anything about swaddling, if she has acid reflux. Tell her you want to be swaddled in cashmere after fucking her twice over in a location that begins with the letter C. If that’s too much to ask, propose marriage. Promise anything.
Fire the actor for having this mother.
Fall to your knees as the fired actor walks away and say that you’re feeling it for real here, people.
Feel it for real here, people.
Beg the fired actor to stay, promise anything.
Stand at the edge of the man-made lake, surrounded by confused minions. Say, Who the fuck is Shiva, people? Say, Who the fuck is Krishna?
Feel it all. Feel fucking all of it.
Consider the rehired actor’s ascension to stardom. Climbing over your bones.
Secretly open your heart to him and to the craft-services people trying to kill you. Feel the largeness of this moment even as you anticipate destroying them all—your minions, your children, your enemies, your gods and enzymes.
Kneel at the shore of the man-made lake and dip your hands into the water. Say, This is what I’m talking about, people. Hold man-made lake water in the cup of your hands, an offering to them all. Pray that somebody, for the love of Christ, is getting this on film. Baptize yourself. Weep. Pray that somebody somewhere is recording some fucking piece of this. Reject the suspicion that you have nothing to do with your genius, at your very core, you are your genius. You know it and they know it. Look at them. They’re transfixed, captivated. They’re all of them waiting to be directed.
Bless them with man-made lake water. Bless them with Eskimo tears. Accept their gratitude, their supplication.
Order the second-unit director to hire a twelve-year-old Hindu boy to paint pictures on an easel just outside the frame of every shot. Train the black crow to sit on your shoulder.
Go so far over budget that no one will dare shut you down.
Tell anyone who will listen that both the actor and Star are contenders for year-end awards. For lifetime awards. For awards that will have to be invented.
Tell them to start preparing speeches.
Weave the gratitude of your own speeches into everyday conversation, overthanking everyone you interact with, even those who should be thanking you.
But temper expectations publicly.
Say to the press, We’re just trying to tell an honest story here. It’s all any of us can ever hope to do. Thank you so very much.
While on the set, always stand with hands in pockets, squinting, the black crow on your shoulder a symbol of something the actor, Star, and idiot could never hope to understand.
Embrace the Hindu boy frequently.
Eat cherries, spitting acidic juice into a handkerchief as if it were blood.
Make cinematic history.
Acknowledgments
THE AUTHOR WISHES TO THANK Antoinette Lopez, Sam Ligon, Deanna Monet, and Erika Goldman. Thanks, also, to the editors of the journals in which these stories first appeared:
“Welcome to Someplace Like Piscataway”
in The American Reader
“Now I Am Doubled Over,” “Why We’re Trapped In A Failed System,” and “Someone Great Like Socrates”
in New World Writing
“I Want To Kiss Myself, Good God”
in The Literarian
“Anytime, Sweet”
in Gigantic
“Family of Man on Isle of Wight”
in The Collagist
“The Problem with Green Bananas” and “A Regular Day for Real People”
in The Brooklyn Rail
“Guiding Eyes for the Blind Dog Training School”
in Indiana Review
“Goodnight Maybe Forever”
in Willow Springs
“Good People”
in Dossier Journal
“Essentials”
in Failbetter
“The Sky Was Everywhere Like Water”
in New York Tyrant
“A Cloud That Looks Like Jesus”
in Fanzine
“Big People Everywhere”
in The Literary Review
“How to Direct A Major Motion Picture”
in Puerto Del Sol
“Christine and Grace, Naturally”
in Hobart
“The Human Cost”
in Memorious
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