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Behind the Scenes
Tales of Working with Monkeys, Kangaroos, Sydney Pollack and My Own Personal
Wardrobe Malfunctions
think working on commercials is the most ludicrously fun job imaginable. I mean sure it isstressful – especially when you have dozens of people standing around waiting for you to be brilliant and spontaneous… and then there are days of fruitless auditioning… and driving… and auditioning… But the rest of the time – unbelievably cool. Here are a few of my favorite “Behind the Scenes” stories for your reading pleasure. I’m planning on writing expanded versions on my blog if you are interested check that page – scrappysblogspot.blogspot.com.Oh – and if you want to sue me for something I said about you or your company – then everything is made up. Pure fiction.BALL PARK FRANKS
This was my first big commercial in Los Angeles. I think it was only the 3rd or 4th audition I went out on for The Bobby Ball Agency who then proceeded to forget all about me – no matter how many times I showed up with “get to know you pastries” and a smile. Which is odd – you figure you have a client who books a national that quickly – you’d want to send them out. No matter – success is the best revenge and all that – right? So I book this spot where I am at a gym and this dufus is behind me trying to jump rope or something and all I have to do is give him an “are you kidding me?” type look. Is this the greatest job in the world or what?! The thing shot at a gym way out in the Valley and I arrived on set with my own wardrobe choices in tow. Something I have learned from these shoots is – only bring things you want to wear. If you bring an outfit that you don’t like – or feel stupid in – that is the one that wardrobe will like best. Never fails. In this case I had run out and gotten some wardrobe choices because at the fitting they had trotted me out in a couple of little Spandex numbers and a jog bra. Not flattering. So – I found a great little pair of Nike nylon running pants that I was comfortable in – and it worked – the ad guys liked them and I was off to makeup where we sat around and played with my hair for a few hours while they set up the shots. Then – as with traveling – ”hurry up and wait!” They needed me ”now!” I run to the bathroom which is attached to the back of the trailer and put on my little Nike pants – which were now no longer Nike pants because someone had used a black Sharpie to ink out the logo. Now here is the embarrassing part – and I tell you this story only because it is too funny not to – but can we please pretend that all this happened to “the Catheryn character” in the story? Thanks. So – the Catheryn character goes back to wardrobe for “last looks” and the wardrobe woman says, ”Oh – you have panty lines – did you bring a thong?” At the time I didn’t even own one – but you know – I’m from Maryland. Anyway – she says, “Just take your underwear off.” So, I do – but on the way from the bathroom to the wardrobe part of the trailer I look down and notice that, well, nylon pants + no underwear + me being a woman past puberty = something that I describe as “the brillo pad affect.” Yes – it looks like a muppet in my pants. Now everyone is yelling for “the actress” and I’m standing in front of the wardrobe mistress who says, “You look great – go!” And I am sort of gesturing, toward my crotch – I mean it’s not THAT noticeable – but it’s noticeable and she looks down toward my frantic gesturing and as her face drops her eyes fly wide open and she says, “Do you have a razor?” Is she kidding me? More yelling from the set. Clearly she is going to try to sell me on the full dry shave option to save her own skin – but this is when my devotion to watching Oprah pays off. “Do you have a pair of panty hose?” I ask “control top preferably?” She scrambles for a pair and I cut them off at the knees. (This is what Oprah says she does to avoid panty lines – those were the days before Spanx!).Voila! Problem solved and I’m off to the set.Hoover, Hoover, Hoover… This shoot was GREAT because the company guys, agency guys and the director were top notch and fun. (No, I’m serious – I’m not just kissing ass because I am so grateful that the thing ran forever and paid me a ton of money. Thank you thank you thank you!) In the spot a kangaroo hops through my kitchen leaving muddy footprints (actually left by a set decorator with a paw shaped sponge and what looked like chocolate pudding). Then – a man drives up in a Jeep, slings a vacuum from his back and says, “I’ll clean that floor, mate!” Which is hilarious because the name of the vacuum is – FLOORMATE! Get it? I know! Now, you might not know this but kangaroos are grazers which means they hang out and eat – or don’t eat. Therefore you can’t really bribe them to act for tasty kangaroo treats. They simply don’t care because – eat – or eat next Thursday. So what the trainers do is take them through the motions of whatever actions they need to perform repeatedly until the kangaroo just does it on his own. Apparently the kangaroo I was working with had been taken through the routine in the kitchen countless times the day before. This didn’t stop him from trying to make a break for it out the back door several times during the shoot. Kangaroos are actually kind of scary with their moron mentality and dinosaur strong tails. I’m not a big marsupial hater, I’m just saying that if you ever have to work with a kangaroo don’t expect the cuddly character you see in cartoons. And they drool. They do however, have incredibly soft fur. And maybe it was just the one that I worked with who was so cranky that the director and I took to doing impressions of Faye Dunaway in Mommie Dearest burning cigarettes into the side of the kangaroo. (Said in aloud throaty voice) “What? I didn’t ask you if you wanted to hop – do it! Psssss!” (hissy fur burning sound) These guys were so great they actually showed up at a sketch show I did the night after the shoot. Ad guys came to my sketch show in the Valley! Unbelievable!Sadly, the man who played my kitchen cleaning hero in this spot – Trevor Goddard of JAG fame died of an apparent suicide several months later.WESTMINSTER KENNEL CLUB
I once did a spot for The Westminster Kennel Club where they cast the dogs first, then the actors: TO LOOK LIKE THE DOGS. Kind of leaves no question where I am on the advertising food chain. I was a Terrier. I had really short hair at the time. The usually hyper little critter liked me so much he kept relaxing and falling asleep. Kind of had to shake him a little. (Good thing I wasn’t working with a baby, huh?) Man, I wish I had a copy of that spot.“OVER THE COUNTER PAIN MEDICATION”
This commercial – though it never aired, holds a special place in my heart because such bizarre and great things happened during the shoot. Many of them involving monkeys. Since I don’t want to get sued for talking about it, I’ll call it over the counter pain medication – “OTCPM.” But it’s not Tylenol and it rhymes with Sexcedrin.So in the spot a realtor with a pounding headache has AN ACTUAL REAL LIVE CAPUCIN MONKEY ATTACKING THE TOP OF HER HEAD! I know! How fun is that? I wasn’t cast as the woman with the monkey on her head –- I was half of a disinterested couple looking at the house she was trying to sell. The whole thing was gorgeous – very American Beauty! I could smell the Cleo award!The whole thing was strange from the beginning. First off- there were 3 callbacks for this spot! In the land of SAG commercials (Screen Actor’s Guild – that’s our union) you have to be paid for any audition that lasts for over an hour and any callback after the second one. I think we get like $45 an hour or something, but I’m not sure – and it is a tricky business because in order to get this money you have to mark it on the casting director’s sign in sheet and who wants to piss off the casting director – they are the gate keepers – the ones who decide if you will be brought in for the audition or not. But get this – at this last callback it was between me and a gorgeous model. I guess they couldn’t figure out which would be funnier with the geeky husband…Day 1 of the shoot – learned the ins and out of monkey acting etiquette. Rule number one - I was never to look the monkey (who’s name was, curiously – Monkey…) in the eyes. Never look Monkey directly in the eyes because a monkey will interpret this as an act of aggression. This wasn’t as hard as it sounds because my husband and I were supposed to be pretending it wasn’t there anyway; he was a figment of the woman’s pained imagination. Monkeys, unlike the aforementioned Kangaroos are not grazers. Monkeys will act for treats – and one thing they really like are Skittles. Monkey loved green Skittles. So the handler would put him on the realtor’s head. He would take a green Skittle and offer it to Monkey – just as Monkey came within an inch of grasping the treat in his little monkey paw the trainer would snatch it away – and the monkey would freak out! Shrieking and ripping out the Realtor’s French twist.Day 2 of the shoot – 7am and everyone is ready to go -now! Which is annoying because I spent all day the previous day sitting around all prettied up doing mostly nothing. But now, hey – everybody’s yelling and since it is the morning after my 30th birthday I’m maybe dragging a teensy bit… After I finish in makeup (really – that’s all you can do with those bags under my eyes? Red wine and birthday cake should make you pretty!) I can’t find anyone in wardrobe. So I find my slightly too tight lavender shirt, put it on and head on out. Just as I hit the top step of the trailer – ping! The top button pops off and flies into the grass. I quickly retrieve it and run to set. The shot is ready, everybody is ready and I have a little trouble getting their attention. “Excuse me, excuse me! Um, I lost a button.”“Marcel! Marcel! Where’s Marcel!?” the first A.D. yells. (For those of you not in the biz – the first A.D. is the assistant director – I’ve found many of them play the “bad cop” in a whole good cop bad cop thing with the director. I don’t know if this crappy demeanor is a result of function or personality.) Now Marcel – the wardrobe guy is a colorful character. And by “colorful” I mean “tall, French and can’t sew.” He is literally 6’4 with long blonde dreads which he repeatedly twists into Princess Leah like buns with his huge lanky hands while he cocks his head and speaks at you. I’m not surprised Marcel is nowhere to be found because he is AN ARTISTE (pronounced aarrrr- TEEESTE)! Now everyone is on their walkies. (Again – if you are not in the biz – walkies are the on-set walkie talkies everyone has strapped to their hips with their names - or nicknames - written on them on white gaffers tape in black Sharpie. This is great if you forget someone’s name…) So everyone is yelling into theIrs – no Marcel! There are dozens of people around me standing with really expensive pieces of rented equipment. A few minutes later, Marcel arrives – and stands in front of me holding a threaded needle up in the air between his thumb and pointer finger – elegantly – as if he is holding a long plastic cigarette holder. After a pause he says, “I do not know how to sew a bah-tin” and his hand sort of falls back in the air – uselessly…“Goddamnit, this is a three-thousand-dollar fucking button!” The first A.D is now screaming.“Here, I can do it, I can do it.” I take the button and the needle from him and make quick work of it – finishing up by looping the thread around the base of the button like my Mother taught me. I then hold the needle out so he can snip the thread off. Having no scissors – Marcel leans in and BITES the thread out FROM BETWEEN MY BREASTS.My TV husband pipes up, “I’ve got a problem with my zipper…”And we’re off to work!There are a lot more stories from this shoot that I want to write about; what happens when one of the monkeys escapes and refuses to come out of the neighbor’s palm tree, how not to pick up a P.A. even if you know him, why the spots never aired…so, yeah – check my blog if you are interested.Coming Soon – or check my blog. Exciting adventures of shooting at the Disney Ranch at dawn and traumatizing oxen named Amos and Andy. Hey – how was I supposed to know I wasn’t REALLY supposed to yell at them…..??Sydney Pollack, yes indeed – the great man himself directed this one. At the time I auditioned for this spot I was living in Redondo Beach, house sitting in Glendale and working in West Hollywood. I remember this being a huge pain in the ass because I had a particular fuchsia shirt that I decided my character would wear and I had to drive from West Hollywood to Redondo to get the shirt for the audition, then back to Glendale to get the shirt for the callback and for the second callback – I don’t remember but I’m sure it was at the furthest point on the triangle from what I superstitiously believed was THE DELL SHIRT. I had been compelled to buy the ugly thing at Loehmann’s earlier that month for $40... I had no real idea at the time…The casting was at a now defunct studio on Ventura Boulevard in Studio City called Chelsea Studios. Later the guys who run the place told me that the casting of the three Dells spots was the most expensive project they ever did – neat huh? I don’t miss going to the place because it was next to that carwash with a huge hand holding a red sports car in the air. Every time I passed the place all the guys would take a moment to rest their wet rags on their hips and make comments. Don’t know how any cars ever got dried with all those actresses passing by all day.At the first callback I sat in the lobby talking to a guy that they had no shit - FLOWN IN FROM NEW YORK FOR THE CALLBACK. Boy was I impressed – and sure I would never get it if they were putting that much effort into the thing. The spot is basically my character “Sydney” yelling at office guy “Dave” for not being cost efficient. Yes, my character’s name is Sydney – so during the callback, whenever somebody said “Sydney” I would say “Yes?” Because I thought it was funny and I didn’t know that the energetic guy running around in cute little jeans was “THE Sydney.” Sydney Pollack. I’m not retarded or unaware – it’s just that in order to work in this business without ingesting major amounts of pharmaceuticals I’ve had to develop a certain amount of Teflon coating. Sometimes this Teflon coating bears a close resemblance to stupidity. Can’t be nervous if I don’t know what’s going on now can I? Who’s stupid now, HUH? “Sydney?” ad guy pipes up.“Yeah?” answers Sydney Pollack.“Yeah?” echoes Catheryn Brockett. Somehow they hired me anyway. I am also quite proud of the fact that during one take – right after my line, ”Smart move, Dave – we could use you in accounting,” I gave the Dave character a good smack on the tushy. Hilarious and inappropriate – especially since I hadn’t asked my fellow SAG actor if I could touch him. Then there was the third callback. I had just gotten back to the PR office when my agent called, “They are afraid you are too funny.” Too funny? Fantastic! Me and my ego got back into the car for a third trip over the canyon. In one of the strangest auditions ever – I had to stand in the room with just the camera guy and look into the camera saying one of the lines 10 times “progressively less funny.” And boy, I got off on that – probably because I knew I could do it. What? I mean I pitted out the fuschia shirt – but we all have our skills and this is one of mine. Maybe my life would be easier if I had more useful ones – like medicine or web design. More about the shoot later.Coming Soon – or check my blog. Working with the fantasticly dry Jeff Gorman and his even more fantastic brigade of women.OFFICEMAX
RUBY TUESDAY’S
TAVIS D
What? You’ve never seen my Tavis D spot? That is because it never actually aired and I knew it never would and I’ll tell you why – “more snot.” The spot was the first big thing I did in New York and I had no idea what was going on. I arrived for the job – booked as a “spec spot” (which means it was not ever guaranteed to run – it is done “on speculation”) early early, I mean pre-dawn early one ugly winter New York morning. The set was built in a big cold warehouse in Chelsea. Now, the audition had been a monologue about being miserable and awake all night as my husband sleeps peacefully at my side, and in retrospect I am sure I probably should have MEMORIZED IT, after all we were SHOOTING IT, but for some reason that thought did not cross my mind until I was in the makeup chair. Dozens of people were setting up for the shot – which started out as a huge camera hanging over the bed about ½ inch from my face – like that metal monstrosity they hang in your face dentist’s office when you get x-rays. The camera would then spin and back up and away while I was saying this monologue (THE ONE I DIDN’T KNOW) revealing my sleeping husband. (Oh – would I have had his lines…) So I’m in the makeup chair – trying to casually get a copy of the script while the make up woman is making me look like I have a miserable cold. Cherry nose, veins and shadows under my eyes – Vaseline under my nose to look like fake snot. When she is finished I am trotted out in front of a panel of ad guys who stand and look at me as if they are considering if the couch goes with the drapes until one squints a little, cocks his head and asks, “Could you make her a little pretty?” The rest sort of nod. Hmm, “Could you make her a little pretty?” Secretly, I am a teensy bit proud of myself for my ability not to take this personally. Anyway – the rest of the day pretty much went off without a hitch – except for the part where they yelled at me for not knowing my lines, and the part where they kept stopping the shot for ”a little more Vaseline.” Yes – more snot. Now, I know the guy who invented Vaseline ate a heaping tablespoon of it every day – and lived into his nineties or something, and that is weird, but who wants a close up on someone’s snot covered face? No one. And well, it never aired. The other “spec spot” they shot that day – the one with the pretty brown haired woman bounding out of her house feeling all better – that one aired for years.(with John Cleese!)
CINGULAR
© 2005-08 Catheryn J. Brockett. All rights reserved.
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