Tuesday, December 6, 2011

LA Stories- C S I Almost Killed Us All

Working in The Machine that is CSI: Miami is no easy task, but since I was determined to become part of the Writer's Dept., I had to start somewhere. I began by volunteering as a Production Assistant for one of David Caruso's pet projects- a short film named "Rehab," shot at LA's famed Linda Vista Hospital. I worked hard and was noticed by the crew, and invited to apply for the upcoming Season 9's Production Office. It was a roundabout way to get to the Writers, but it was a definite foot in the door so I jumped at the chance...

After a brief but nervewracking interview, I was offered the job, and officially became a Production Office P.A. This meant I had to get up at 5:40 each morning and commute from Hollywood to Manhattan Beach in the worst traffic our Nation has to offer. This is the stuff nightmares are made of.

Once at work, I would open the office. This was a 45-step process, involving unlocking certain doors, locking others, starting some machines, shutting others down, turning on massive A/C units, warming up copiers, brewing coffee, printing, copying, "distro," (distributing,) etc. etc. etc. A huge process. And if the copier jammed or the wrong paper goes in the wrong slot, there is a hot and unholy hell to pay. One such morning, I was frantically trying to unjam this beast. I had a customer service rep on speakerphone while I viewed schematics online. An exec came and explained that it really needed to be fixed about 15 minutes ago.
This was all at 6:50am.

It's the size of a jet engine and I frequently found myself elbow-deep in it. My roommates would ask me how I got ink on my ears. Sigh.

For the most part, my fellow co-workers were very nice. Most of my job later in the day consisted of rushing up and down stairs, delivering various envelopes to various people around Raleigh Studios. I'd also get sent out on a lot of errands, sometimes to get a particular DVD from a particular store for the Guest Director's reference material, other times to load $40,000 worth of film into my trunk and tote it back to the set.

Apparently, EVERYTHING I did needed to be done 15 minutes before I was asked to do it, and I often found myself exhausted at the end of the day. The stress was equivalent to having a gun held to my face for 13 hours every day. They fed me really well- but I was losing weight and my hair started to fall out from stress. I recall waking up to my alarm, bitchslapping the snooze button and crying into my pillow so I wouldn't disturb my ex.

(After all, he had a long day ahead of him, waiting for his calling service to not call and playing video games.)

I'd turn my alarm off and walk towards my closet like I was approaching the gallows. I'd start to shake, and I'd have to sit down to put my shoes on. In the chill of the morning, beneath a bare lightbulb, I began every day of work shuddering on my closet floor like a frightened chihuahua. Eventually, I'd work up the nerve to walk (past the scary homeless guy in our parking garage) to my car and battle traffic. I'd often call home on the way for a pep talk. "I'm OK," I kept lying. "I'm OK..."

"You have to get up - there's crimes to solve and all five of us need fat free soy lattes."
(REMOVES SUNGLASSES)
"With no whip."
YEAAAAAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWW

One particularly stressful day was unique- the copier jammed and my boss was extremely frustrated that I wasn't a Minolta Repairperson. I eventually solved the problem and emerged from the copier looking like I'd lost a battle with a Giant Squid. I was then handed an envelope and told to run it down to (Soundstage) 22 and hand it to Manny.
"Who's Manny," I asked, on my way down the stairs.
"FIGURE IT OUT!"
Obviously something was stressing her - I hadn't yet learned to not take everything so deeply personally, so I felt an incredible sense of urgency to deliver this envelope. I wanted it to be the best envelope delivery ever.
And then they'd love me again.

I hadn't made it down to 22 very often, but I knew to watch for a red light above the door to make sure opening it wouldn't disturb any filming. No red light meant go go go, so I wrenched open the heavy sound-proof doors and forged ahead. It was dark in there. Dark, and very, very quiet.

I could hear vague murmurings from what sounded like a film crew, but my eyes hadn't adjusted to the darkness yet. I just knew I had to get the envelope to Manny- fast- so I set off down what seemed to be a familiar path. It was, in fact, the right direction to go... except for the fact that shit gets moved around a lot on soundstages. A large portion of a room had been relocated, and the floor it sits on, (a slightly raised platform) had a corner just jutting out where my feet expected sea-level floor.

I tripped over this corner spectacularly, and in an effor to catch myself, stuck my arm out... into a glass shelf. These thin horizontal glass shelves make up the walls of the CSI: Miami Crime Lab set, and there are thousands of them- one carefully stacked on top of the other.


Much like dominoes.

It's a detective show - can you figure out what happened next?

The shelf I'd reached through slid a few inches forward, then out of its bracket and fell onto the one beneath it. Which cracked and began to shatter, crashing into the one beneath it. And so on and so forth.

My eyes chose that particular instant to adjust, so I was able to witness the utter decimation of the wall in 3-D Technicolor surround-sound glory. The domino effect was breathtaking, and the sound was phenomenal. It was the very sound of "expensive," as the glass continued to self-destruct pane by horrible pane. As if to mock me, the catastrophe SLOWED ITSELF DOWN, and continued the agonizing shattering for what seemed like a good two minutes.

Frozen in horror, I stood swimming in a sea of broken glass. Finally, the cacophany of destruction ceased, and I heard a voice ask "Are you cut?"

I looked to find THE ENTIRE CREW STARING AT ME.
"I'm...so...sorry..." I stammered out.

"ARE. YOU. CUT." Someone asks again, less patiently.

"I don't think so, no..." I'm not. It's practically a miracle. I'd had a bad accident as a child involving broken glass, and here it was, my worst phobia come to life, and I was unscathed!

"THEN GET THE FUCK OUT OF THE WAY."

A Pair Of Arms lifts me out of the glass and sets me down amidst a crowd of pissed-off-looking crew guys.
"Um- are you Manny?" I ask the Arms. They point me to a guy with headphones. I hand Manny the envelope.
Manny can tell I'm on the verge of tears.
"Don't feel bad," Manny says. "It happens all the time."
"R-really?"
"...No. Not really."

I get the hell out of there, avoiding the hairy eyeballs of the guys wielding push-brooms sweeping my carnage aside. I head to the stairwell, past my boss' desk and into the ladies room where I proceed to have a minor heart attack. I took a minute (which is a supreme luxury in the P.A. world) and then went back to my desk, certain that any moment the phone call would arrive recounting "the incident" and I'd be fired on the spot.

Miraculously, that call never came! Not a single person on that 40-man crew ratted me out- although they did re-name me "Trouble" and teased the crap out of me when I had to (cautiously) run errands on that set. Manny, Arms and the gang are OK in my book- they protected me to Live Another Day, and eventually survive the season, which lead to my internship with the Writer's Department. I owe a huge Karmic Debt to that crew- I'll never forget what it feels like to single-handedly destroy the Miami-Dade Police Department and be forgiven.

As an added bonus, I was cured of my phobia, and I now fear no glass, broken or otherwise. Once you take a bath in your nightmares, they're a little less intimidating.

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