Girl Walks Into a Bar (14 page)

Before I started
my mini-dating tear, it had been three years since I had been in a relationship. That relationship ended in Sacramento.

My fourth summer of
SNL
, I was offered a role in an indie movie, to play the “best friend” role. This was my only foray into the best-friend role because this was a low-budget indie movie, not a big studio venture. In this movie, the leading lady was going to be Estella Warren, the really hot chick from the
Planet of the Apes
remake from 2001.

I was to play her lesbian roommate.

“OK,” I said to my agent, “I think I should do this, but I do have one question.”

“What’s that?”

“In what universe would Estella Warren and I be best friends?”

By this I only meant that I am about fifteen years older
than her, and let’s face it, when you put us side by side, you don’t really think, “Ah, two peas in a pod! There’s ham ’n’ cheese! Peanut butter and jelly! And Dratch ’n’ Warren!” But this was my chance to play more than a secretary who pops in for a few laughs and is not seen for the rest of the movie…. This could bump me up to that coveted “wacky friend” status!

I arrived for the shoot, which for my part would take two weeks, in Sacramento.

I’m sure there are lovely parts of Sacramento. I was exposed only to the Hyatt Hotel and its two-block radius. From this viewpoint, Sacramento is the most white-bread town in the country.

Something went wrong on this movie shoot, in either my life or the shoot itself, or both at the same time, pretty much every day.

Let’s start with this: Probably the second day of shooting, I was in my trailer bathroom peeing. I heard a knock on the outside of the trailer door. I feebly tried to shout that I was in the bathroom, but there was no way someone would hear that through two doors. The knock happened again. I ignored it. Next thing I knew, as I was standing up from the toilet, the door swung open to reveal the college kid production assistant who was there to empty a trash can or something. I screamed. This kid had opened the door at the peak moment of full bush exposure. This is the kid who, the day before, had driven me back to the hotel, a drive wherein you make chitchat like “So, where ya from?” and now he had seen me rising from a toilet with my pants at my knees. “Sorry,” he blurted out, and bolted from the scene. (I realize this is the second frontal-exposure
tale I have shared thus far. In spite of the Rule of Threes, I promise it is the last.) I was surprisingly annoyed. So know that for the rest of the shoot, I was skulking around, trying to avoid this particular kid. Was I cool about it? No, I was not. When I saw him later, did I have a good chuckle about the fact that he had just seen m’bush? No siree. I chose avoidance. This entailed my peering around, like Harriet the Spy, over at the lunch tables when it was time to eat. I was a refugee on my own set in Sacramento.

The director of this movie was Charlie Matthau, son of the late Walter Matthau. Charlie was very friendly, earnest, a bit of a goofball, and he looked just like a young lanky version of his dad.

When I was shooting this film, I was in a relationship with Addict #3 and it was severely on the rocks. I was in complete denial about this relationship. It had probably been over about three months in, though by now we had been together for around a year. But all his “I need my alone time” and “I’m just a guy who likes space” and “Work is the most important thing to me” were not taken as clues by me that this relationship would in no way be a self-esteem builder. So one night during this shoot, I was on the phone with this gentleman and I was getting the picture that I was barely going to see him for the rest of the summer and this did not seem to affect him very much. He was throwing all sorts of trips, jobs, and travels my way, of which I was no part. As the conversation progressed, I was seeing that this thing weren’t goin’ nowhere. We basically broke up right there on the phone. I was devastated. Really? This was happening on the phone? In Sacramento?

The next morning, I reported to the set in a sea of self-pity and depression. I must say, though, you would not know it to look at me. I didn’t know anyone on this set, and I wasn’t about to pour out the situation to a stranger. So there we were, on the set of this café (I was a coffeeshop owner instead of a secretary!), about to shoot the scene. Suddenly, a wail rose up from I don’t know where. A mournful, keening, horrid cry. I looked around. It was Estella Warren. Out of nowhere, she had broken down into a heap of tears. Granted, this is how I was feeling on the inside, and here it was, all my emotions pouring out of the very full-lipped,
Maxim
mouth of Estella Warren. You see, when I was in the makeup chair that morning, she had casually mentioned that she had failed to connect on the phone with her boyfriend, who lived in LA, at the appointed time the night before. She was talking about it pretty lightheartedly in the makeup chair, like it wasn’t a huge deal. I don’t know what happened between then and now, an hour later. Maybe the ramifications of the lovers’ spat were hitting her hard. Who knows—maybe there was more going on than just the phone call. I’m really not trying to bust on her, the peanut butter to my jelly, but I was thinking about
my
situation and that I REALLY had something to cry about. I had just been straight-up dumped
on the phone
the night before.

Charlie was all too happy to come to this beautiful girl’s rescue. He sat next to her on the bench while she sobbed and wailed, a young Walter Matthau next to the
Planet of the Apes
girl, arm around her and speaking to her in hushed, comforting tones. The crew scattered. “Everyone off the set!” What the hell? I was the one who should have been laid out on the floor!
I had real problems! OK. I went off to my trailer. There I sat, listening to “Nothing Compares 2 U” on steady rotation. I’m not proud to share this fact. If I could have talked to my dumped self with my current wisdom, I would have said, “Turn off that damn song! U R 2 good for this, and he is not the guy 4 U!” but back then I just pressed
PLAY
for the thirtieth time. I assumed shooting had resumed and I’d be called back in when they needed me. Four hours later, a knock came on the trailer door. “They’re ready for you.” I went back to the set to learn that nothing had been shot since the morning meltdown. This was a low-budget movie, where every second counts and there’s no time or money to spare. But that’s the difference between being the beautiful starlet and the best-friend lesbian coffeeshop owner. The starlet shuts down production for four hours, and the best friend listens to Sinéad O’Connor ad nauseum. Maybe we should have joined forces. For all I know, she may have spent her four hours listening to Sinéad O’Connor too. Dratch ’n’ Warren!

This shoot continued with me living in a backdrop of misery. My heart? Broken. My genitals? Viewed. Yes, I was still trying to skillfully avoid College Boy. Well, there was still the work to get me through this, right? The COMEDY?

I failed to mention yet that the plot of the movie involved hottie Estella Warren being a virgin and choosing to which man she would give up her virginity…. Yup.

We were filming my last scene. I’ve been a very stereotypical man-hating lesbian throughout this whole film. My character had been married to a man in her past. In the last scene, I have a talk with my best friend and roommate Estella Warren.
I had talked to my ex-husband, whom I haven’t spoken to for two years.

“Joe called,” I say.

“What’d he say?”

“He apologized for driving his truck into the lake. He said he’s lonely. “

“Aw, he misses you.”

“No, he misses his truck.”

We have a little laugh. It was sort of the only grounded moment my character had, with a little joke thrown in for good measure. I was glad to be justifying all my crazy man-hating lines. Right before we were about to shoot, Charlie Matthau came up to me with an excited grin on his face. “Hey! The name Joe isn’t funny. So how ’bout if you change it to Abdul!?” He was tickled pink by this idea. “What?” I said. This guy can’t be serious. This is the first time you are hearing the name of my ex-husband. It’s one of my last scenes. It’s a semi-serious moment. Oh, and it’s a year after 9/11, when, I hate to say, the only times you were hearing names like Abdul were in connection with terrorism stories on the news. “Why?” “’Cause it’s funny!” Now, at that point I should have just said, “No. I’m not doing that.” That would have been a page out of the Amy Poehler handbook. She is excellent at shutting people down when she knows better. Not so with myself, back then. “I really don’t want to say Abdul.” Back and forth we went. “How ’bout Mohammed!?” I can’t stress enough how positively deeelighted he was about throwing an unusual, or “funny,” name into this scene. Back and forth we went again. I was NOT getting this joke. “How about Ali?” I said, offering up a name to appease
this sudden Arab jones he had. For some reason, the name Ali didn’t sound as punchline-y-we-are-trying-to-insert-a-wacky-name-here to me. We did one take in which I said Ali. Charlie appeared with a new grin and a brand-new idea. “I got it!” he said. “Say Shaquille.” I was dumbfounded. I was frantically searching the set for the writer. “So the audience thinks I was married to Shaquille O’Neal?” “Say it!! Ha-HAAA! Say Shaquille.” “I’m not saying Shaquille.” I looked to cameramen, to Estella. No one was batting an eye. Where was that damn writer? Then came the most ridiculous suggestion of all. Mind you, I was still fine with JOE. “I got it! I got it! … Say … O.J.!” So my scene would go “Well. I talked to O.J…. He said he misses me.” “So…,” I said to Charlie while wanting to be ejector-seated off this set and out of Sacramento. “So … the audience thinks I was married to O. J. Simpson.” “There could be other O.J.’s!” he said through a new round of boyish giggles. “No one is going to think of the ‘other’ O.J.’s!” Again, why didn’t I just take control Poehler-style and say, “We’re saying Joe. That’s it. Roll cameras.” I have no idea! I was trying to bring some integrity to this character, I suppose, and do a good job at playing the best-friend role, but I was at my wit’s end. I said, sarcastically and somewhat under my breath, “Why don’t we just say Adolf?” “What?” he says. “I said, why don’t we just say Adolf?” trying to make him see how crazy his suggestions were. Slight pause. “THAT’S PERFECT! YES! SAY ADOLF!” At this point, I think I simply left my body. At this point, my attempt at biting wit was going to be worked right into the script. At this point, also, I had lost the fight in me. I had gone through Abdul, Mohammed, Shaquille, and O.J., and I happened to check out
of the entire process on the name Adolf. So as far as I know (for I have never seen the finished product), in the final cut of the movie, I say, “Well, Adolf called!”

The days were winding down. I’m making this seem like it was a two-month shoot in the desert or something. No, remember, I was there for only two weeks. What more could go wrong?

The final night of shooting! Hooray! Tomorrow I get to go home! I’m sitting in my trailer—we are shooting at night. I hear about five
pops!
like firecrackers. Hmm. About fifteen minutes later, a knock on the trailer door. “Hey, we’re escorting everyone to set. There was just a homicide around the corner.” Ta-daa!

But there is one more addendum. Another cherry on the grim sundae that was this shoot. We finished at five
A.M.
They were going to give me a ride back to my hotel. Who should appear to drive me back to the hotel but Bush Viewer!? NOOOO! I had skillfully avoided him for the
entire
shoot—
two whole weeks
and I hadn’t seen him again. Now I got to bookend the whole experience with an awkward and silent car ride in the wee hours of the morning for my final moment.

When I left New York for Sacramento, I had high hopes of finally graduating to the best-friend role. Instead I was faced with a straight-to-video experience that included accidental exposure, an on-set meltdown, a clash on the finer points of what’s in a name, and a homicide. And when I left New York for Sacramento, I had a boyfriend, albeit an all-wrong-for-me, introduced-me-as-Rachel-not-my-girlfriend-Rachel kind of boyfriend. I returned home from Sacramento to New York as a
single woman. I’d have to regroup and eventually turn off the Sinéad O’Connor. Maybe down the road was that perfect movie role for me that could break me through to a whole new level. And maybe down the road I’d find a nice guy who I thought was fantastic and who, just as importantly, felt the same about me. I believe this was the point at which I swore off dating the actors and comedians and the charismatic performers. I didn’t need that anymore. All I needed was a regular Joe … or Abdul (hee-heeee!) … or Mohammed (haaa-haaa!) … or Shaquille (bwahh haaa-haaaaaa!)….

Hey, Baby!

Back to my dating crusade
, and trying to keep hope alive: The third date that came my way was with a man I met doing a night of new screenplay readings. He was the producer of the evening. I had been invited to a friend’s party afterward that was going to be my usual crowd—the marrieds and gays. But this was the new, proactive Rachel who opts to go out with the group of people from the reading! We all went out to a bar, and the producer and I chatted the night away. This guy was cute, age appropriate, smart, creative, seemed fun, no ring. … I referred to him as the Hot Nerd.