We the Applauding

Hollywood Milieu ©2009

Written by Denny Dormody

This is the lowest of the low. This is not a hardware-tools industrial. This is not a small feature. This is not a short subject. This is not even what a buddy called “the lowest form of show business, a funeral.” This is worse. Sitting in a game show and applauding.

Riding The HOLLYWOOD GLACIER

The Writer’s strike. No one is working. Things are desperate and getting more desperate. Working a game show is not my idea of acting nirvana. There is one redeeming factor. You are paid in cold hard cash.

If they were paying cash, I’d watch an autopsy. I’m sure watching an autopsy would be more fun then some of the no-brainer game show tripe that I have suffered through to pay the rent. Horror stories. No food. No bathroom breaks. No kidding. I know these working conditions are against the Geneva Convention guidelines for prisoners of war. You would probably have a better day as an inmate at GITMO. Still cash is cash.

Worse case scenario: Sony Pictures. Hulk Hogan is a referee as a bunch of Neanderthals are beating the life out of each other in some type of ‘sports’ competition. American Gladiator. It should have been called American Slaughter. If this is sports than I’m glad I’m not a sports fan. There’s one thing worse than competing in this glorified reality TV bloodsport and that is sitting in the audience watching the carnage.

An acting buddy and I are told that the gig will only be four hours. Four hours and someone in the shadows hands us $45 in cash. I’m broke; I’m game. My baloney radar is usually running at a high rate of steam when I am working these train wrecks. I hear a couple of crew guys saying that we are going to have to work another four hours. To soothe the pain, the producers are bringing in pizza to keep the knuckle-walking audience at bay. There must be a way out. I know violence in not the way, but tonight I’ll consider it. Besides I left my AK-47 assault rifle in my locker at that storage place next to the railroad tracks near home. If there is a way out, we’re taking it.

45 people are standing in line to be wrapped as per the original Craig’s List invitation to “Work on an exciting TV show with celebrities.” Hulk Hogan is not my idea of a celebrity. Jeffrey Dahmer may be, but not Hulk Hogan. We are 44 and 45^th in line. I hear a lady complaining that her babysitter has be go home after four hours. I’ll use the same ploy if push comes to shove it. The line shuffles along. Almost there. Cash is king.

We get to the guy with the clip-board. He hands us cash. We run like scalded dogs back to the parking structure. Our nightmare is over. For the other 150 audience members, the nightmare is just beginning.

The next morning. We get a call from another actor buddy, forced to stay for the full eight hours. Not everyone got paid. They ran out of money! Can you imagine the bedlam when they announced they were out of cash. Soccer riots in Uruguay comes to mind.

I’m surprised the angry mob didn’t burn down the studios on the way to the parking structure at 2:30am. They waited four weeks for their check in the mail. There are game show horror stories all over town. It gets worse.

The Price is Right with Drew Carey and the "Audience"

The ultimate horror story: An older lady is working as an audience member. They would not let anyone go to the toilets. No bathroom breaks. Finally a bathroom break. This older lady is waiting in line with the rest of the younger ladies. She tells them to “Move back!” and she relieves herself standing there in line. A puddle at her feet told the story.

These are hard working people. The working poor trying to make some money to pay some bills. I’m sure most of the actors in town worked a game show audience or two in their early days. How many would admit it, however, is anyone’s guess.

I once fell asleep while suffering through The Price is Right early one morning. Let’s say its not my favorite cerebral show. Not exactly intellectually riveting. It also didn’t help that the night before I had worked Eli Stone at Disney and we wrapped at 2:30am. I had only about 4 hours sleep. A surly production gestapo lady dressed in a security uniform watches me doze off on the TV monitor. She confronts me. She escorts me down the hallway. I’m banished off the lot like trash in a dumpster.

I went home without the $75 cash. In my case, The Price was Wrong.

Denny Dormody is a Los Angeles Times Magazine published comedy writer and author of Riding the Hollywood Glacier. dennydormody@gmail.com