Jerks.

It feels like a lifetime ago...the day I drove in a daze to Ventura to shoot a short film for Forza Motorsports. I remember the Nova was running rich, fuming badly, but I didn't even stop to adjust the carb...I just floored it to make it to the set. The director knew I would be late, and he held up shooting for me so we could proceed as planned.

I had been cast in the film because I had three things going for me: I'm a girl, and I could talk cars, and I had my Nova. The director needed those three elements, and thus....I had a role playing a "Jerk American" that drove Muscle Cars. We weren't supposed to play nice in the film, I remember the direction was to be a little bitchy. So I was. It was easy to let the negativity pop through, because I had been up all night the previous evening, and was not feeling particularly sociable.


In fact, I had called the director at 5 am, telling him there was no way on Earth I could make it and he should replace me.  You don't do that shit in Hollywood---people start to think you're unreliable, flakey, all the bad things that add up to you never working again.

But there were other things going on. A best friend of mine had been in a horrendous accident the night before, and I had spent the wee hours of the morning at the Cedar Sinai hospital with her. I felt lucky to be included, to help her, to be there for the aftermath during which we picked up the pieces. For her to trust me, and think of me first, when shit hit the fan.

So without hesitation, I called the director and said "sorry..."

To my infinite surprise, he said they'd hold up shooting for a few hours while I made my way there, and so I got to do both things...help my friend, and shoot a short film. When I watch this film, I think back to the reactions of my friends and family who criticized my "attitude" in the film. I don't know...to me, it was just acting...it was playing a role of a cocky, jerky girl driving an old car. I got criticized for playing a major jerk in a film that I almost missed out on, because I was being a good friend. Interesting the many roles we play in our lives, eh?

That's why recently I started thinking back on this film...


Because its  interesting the many ways we're judged.  As I find myself being judged in new ways, sometimes I wonder if all we're seeing of each other are these superficial roles, the ones we're directed into as we're cast into the characters we have to play each day, and not, as Mr. MLK Jr. would say, for the content of our character. 



Skeptically Yours.