Who Stole the Funny? : A Novel of Hollywood (15 page)

face,” Ash said.

Kirk looked at Ash sharply, the way people always did the first time they heard him mimicking the old stereotyped black film actors. “That’s pretty cool,” Kirk said. “Maybe in the next three weeks you could teach me a thing or two? Maybe I should take a class

from you.”

So Kirk had been crying, not doing lines of a decidedly non-

theatrically-related variety. He was the only actor who hadn’t gone home, the only one who wanted to work. The only person to talk

to Ash and realize he could learn something.
Yeah. A real trouble-maker,
J.T. thought.

“Kirk, how can I help you?” J.T. asked.

“Well—I thought that maybe we could work. I need to . . . um,

get better
. I need to prove that I really can handle my job,” Kirk said earnestly.

J.T.’s parental instincts kicked in full force. If he did nothing else on this show, he was now determined to make sure that this young actor was protected from the random, paranoid abuse of

the Pooleys. “I’ll tell you what I’d like you to do, Kirk,” J.T. said, “I’d like you to go home and go to bed. I don’t want you to think that you are making mistakes. You’re not. Trust me. I want you to fall asleep thinking that there is a reason you are on this stage and not some other actor. You were the best for the part. That’s why you’re here. Your talent shone above all the other young men in this
wonderful
town. I’d like you—no, I
want
you to feel good about yourself. Get as much rest as you possibly can. Tomorrow is going to be the beginning of hell for all of us. You okay with that?”

“You don’t want to work with me?” Kirk asked. He could not

have been more defenseless.

“There’s nothing to work on, Kirk. I
love
to work. I love to work as hard as I can. But right now, the writers have a lot more work to do than you. The only thing you need to work on is your 1 0 4

W H O S T O L E T H E F U N N Y ?

rest. And when you come in tomorrow, try and be as prepared as

you possibly can. You’ll get a new script delivered to your house in the middle of the night. When you wake up, study it the best you can. Okay?” J.T. smiled at the kid.

“Yes, sir,” Kirk said, as if all the demons that had been attacking his self-esteem had suddenly been recalled and assigned to another person.

“Oh—and even though I really appreciate your professional-

ism by referring to me as
sir,
how ’bout just calling me J.T.?”

“Yes, sir. J.T. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thanks.”

When Kirk left the cave, J.T. and Ash sat back down on the

stage floor. This time both of them lay on their backs.

“Well played, J.T.,” Ash said.

“You too. I thought you’d never say Toronto. That would’ve

been one for the record books.”

“Ah, I just wanted you to squirm a little,” Ash gently laughed.

“Good one,” J.T. said. “Well, should we lie here for a few more minutes before we Enter Laughing into the writers’ room?”

“Yeah . . . let me put my mental armor on. I shoulda worn a

cup. Remember, J.T., I’m getting older. Don’t throw anyone out the window. I stopped being a big, scary black man years ago.”

“Got it. No one goes out a window,” J.T. said distractedly. He

continued to stare up at history, seeing ghosts in the rafters of the catwalks. These were good ghosts, of course. Professional ghosts.

The Writers’ Room

Sitcom writers gather to write upcoming episodes, work in

teams on ideas for episodes, and on Mondays fix the script to be shot on the following Friday. Their lair is the writers’ room.

The writers’ room on this sitcom was down the upstairs hallway

from the Pooleys’ office. This was a
Pooley
. A
Pooley
was anything manipulated by the husband-and-wife team for the sole benefit of themselves. The writers’ room was down the hall from Marcus and Stephanie so they could keep

their eyes on the writers and

The Hollywood Dictionary

be sure that work was always

THE WRITERS’ ROOM:
A place

being done. This room also

traditionally nicknamed with war

had no windows. Another

imagery: the bunker, the foxhole,

Pooley. Windows would in-

the submarine. Unfortunately,

vite daydreaming.

we don’t live in a world where our

The writers’ room for
I

soldiers in bunkers, foxholes, or

Love My Urban Buddies
was

submarines make at least thirty

filled with an eclectic bunch.

grand a week and order steak for

Writers with talent; writ-

breakfast.

ers who were friends of the

Pooleys; writers whom the

network demanded be there; writers whom the studio countered

with, demanding that they be there as well; and a Thing Three

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W H O S T O L E T H E F U N N Y ?

with stars in his eyes. His name was Timothy James Jameson III.

He was a recent Yale graduate and was delegated the job of typing everything the writers “wrote.”

The writers used no pencils, no pens, no legal pads. They vol-

leyed words back and forth verbally. Other people typed what they said, copied the pages, proofread them. Here, in the writers’ room, the writers spoke aloud and Timothy James Jameson III typed it

into a computer. The writers made jokes about everybody on the

production staff who wasn’t in the room. They made jokes about

the actors who were tanking their jokes. Sometimes they napped.

There were even times when twaddle turned into twat and they had sex; then they called their spouses to say they had to work late.

“It’s fuckin’ wicked,” Timothy had told one of his former college roommates. “I dunno why I spent all that time and effort at Yale.

Nobody writes here! They just . . . talk a lot. Shit, I can definitely do that! And the food! All the fucking food I want whenever I want it!

Junk food, filet mignon, man, everything. All compliments of the studio. Or the network. Who the hell cares? No one here pays for anything! I can get clothes for free from wardrobe, cool stuff for free from props, I mean, who wouldn’t want this fuckin’ job?”

J.T. knocked and went into the writers’ room without wait-

ing for permission to enter. He considered it to be a good practice for a director on a sitcom to come to the writers’ room after a rehearsal to report on what worked versus what could use a punch

or a new angle, or should just get thrown out. He forgot, as always, that what he considered healthy—communication from the stage

to the writers via the director—was hardly the norm, and in fact had become unwelcome.

J.T. noticed all of the baby faces. Some were playing darts

with Kirk’s picture hanging as the bull’s-eye. Others were playing trash-can basketball with pages from today’s script. Others were watching a monitor with—a live feed from the stage to the writers’ room.

R o b b y

B e n s o n

1 0 7

Fuck,
J.T. thought when he realized he was being spied on. And all those twenty-something writers! J.T. knew that the one thing the paranoid Pooleys were most paranoid about was being exposed,

and this just proved it. Having an older writer with more experience and an actual sense of

funny in the writers’ room

The Hollywood Dictionary

would be a definite threat to

LIVE FEED:
Big Brother is watch-

the Pooleys. There wasn’t a

ing and listening to EVERY-

single old-timer in there.

THING.

“What are you doing

in here?!” Stephanie Pooley

demanded. She was en-

raged that someone other than her foot soldiers was in her writers’ room.

“This is where I come to report the day’s work and find out

what else is needed of me, ma’am,” J.T. said.

“Well—report!” Stephanie said, hoping she sounded intimi-

dating.
My God,
she thought,
what a fucking loser! And just look at
him! His eyes, his nose, his neck—he probably can’t afford to get his
face fixed. He disgusts me!

“Well,” J.T. began to report, “the cast has left, there are no sets, and I would like to know what you want to see and hear that will give you the satisfaction that you’re getting the best ever Christmas and best ever explosion.”

“The best ever Christmas would be the day we don’t need a

director to pretend to direct our show. And the best ever explosion would be one that is strapped to your chest,” Stephanie said proudly, as if everything said in the writers’ room stayed in the writers’ room.

“I see. Ms. Pooley, have you ever been hit by a man?” J.T. asked in a flat, nonmenacing tone.

“You’re threatening me?!” Stephanie Pooley shouted. “Did ev-

eryone hear that?! He threatened me!”

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W H O S T O L E T H E F U N N Y ?

“Actually, Ms. Pooley, I was merely asking a question. I don’t

hit women. But something tells me, from the few moments I’ve

spent with you and your husband, that you just might be slightly punch-drunk. Just a harmless observation.”

Ash began to make his way into a position where he could grab

J.T. at a moment’s notice.

“Speaking of bad memories, where is your husband? I have to

talk to him about your young badass actor, Kirk. Kirk Kelly,” J.T.

said.

“Anything you say to me will be repeated to my husband,”

Stephanie barked at J.T.’s elbow.

“I’m sure. Well, Kirk is very game. He wants to work hard. We

had a good talk and he will not be a problem at all. As a matter of fact, I believe Kirk will give you
the best ever performance,
” J.T.

said.

“You’re doing it again. You’re patronizing me!”

“No, Mrs. Pooley, not yet. I’m still making an effort to be civil.

Kirk will come around.”

“And what makes you think that?” Stephanie was revising her

estimation of J.T.
He’s not a loser. He’s retarded,
she thought.

“Well . . . I’m his director, and I’m trained to observe these . . .

things.”
She must have some kind of mental disability,
J.T. thought
.

What’s so hard to understand?

“We’ll see, then, won’t we?” Stephanie said smugly. “And Mar-

cus is in Casting at the moment and cannot be disturbed, so I

would appreciate you going back to the set and preparing the show like a good little director.” A few chortles percolated from her baby writing staff.

“So . . . Marcus Pooley is in
Casting
? Without his director?” J.T.

asked pleasantly.

“The director does not go to our casting sessions,” Stephanie

Pooley said with great delight.

“Maybe I’ll tell that to the Directors Guild of America. You

R o b b y

B e n s o n

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know, basically the strongest, most influential union in show business?
That
Directors Guild of America. Asher, may I have my cell phone, please?” J.T. asked.

“Um, sure. Here.” Ash handed J.T. the phone, which he kept

while J.T. was working so he wouldn’t get interrupted.

Stephanie now looked panicked. “What the fuck are you doing?”

“I’m calling in one of a number of Guild violations that you and your husband have committed on our very first day together.”

Jeremy.

“You have a ‘cell phone’?” she snorted, presenting her futuristic gadget. “Everyone has a Sidekick; shit, I’ve got a Danger Sidekick II. A ‘cell phone,’” she howled. “He’s got a ‘cell phone.’”

“Yes. A ‘cell phone.’ Then

I’ll use my ‘cell phone’ to call

the Screen Actors Guild and

The Hollywood Dictionary

ask them what Kirk Kelly

CELL PHONE
: BlackBerries were

should do. He was falsely ac-

now the bottom of the elitist

cused of being on drugs by

food chain.

his showrunners in front of

the studio, the network, and

a director, remember?” J.T. said, dialing random numbers.

“Wait—” Stephanie Pooley tried to grab the cell phone. “Cast-

ing is just down the hall. And if you ever even think about whispering a word about what you see here on this show, I will personally make sure you never work in this business again!”
I will,
she thought
. I’ve done it before to animators and voice talent and I’ll do
it again.

“So I take that as a threat, and everyone in this room heard

you.”
Crap,
J.T. thought.
It’s only Monday and I’m already being
banned from the business again. What is it about me that brings this
out in people?

Asher gently pulled J.T. from the writers’ room.
Only Monday.

Shit. What’s gonna go down on Tuesday?
he thought.

1 1 0

W H O S T O L E T H E F U N N Y ?

Look at those two,
Steph thought
. I wonder which one is the husband and which one’s the wife.

Asher closed the door behind them. They began to walk down

the hall.

J.T. felt Natasha’s spirit sitting on his shoulder and began to sing softly, “Now if you feel that you can’t go on . . .”

“Can’t go on!” Ash echoed.

“Because all of your hope is gone!” J.T. sang.

“And your life is filled with much confusion,” Ash sang, much

better than J.T.

“Until happiness is just an illusion . . .”

“And your world around you is crumbling down . . .”

“Darlin’,
reach out
!” J.T. said.

“Reach out for me!” Ash sang. And then together, as they

walked down the hall, they spun into their choreography.

“I’ll be there, with a love that will shelter you! I’ll be there with a love that will see you through . . .”