Blow Jobs: A Guide to Making it in Show Business, or Not!: A 'How Not To' by The Counter Culture Diva

by Dolores DeLuce

  It’s a good thing I’m not a stalker, because I knew how to get onto every studio lot in Hollywood, where I became known as the Knitter to the Stars. For over two decades I made and sold sweaters to most of the sitcoms and soap operas that filmed in Los Angeles. In the process I met many of Hollywood’s A-list stars, including Julia Roberts, Lily Tomlin, Roseanne, Fran Drescher, Linda Hamilton, Jenna Elfman, Leah Thompson, Alicia Silverstone, and Tory Spelling, to drop just a few names.

  My two favorite clients were Lily Tomlin and Ellen Burstyn. On top of being a major fan of their impeccable artistry, neither Lily nor Ellen ever made me wait endlessly, like so many other important stars did. Both were classy dames who were nothing but kind and always treated me with respect. Lily Tomlin not only bought sweaters for herself and her partner Jane Wagner, she also recommended my work to the costume department of the Murphy Brown show. After one of my sales trips to that set, Lily took valuable time from her half-hour lunch break to help me pack up my bags and carry them out to my car. I was humbled by her act of kindness, and also embarrassed for her to see my dirty old clunker parked outside her trailer. Nonetheless, a few days later she sent me a lovely thank you note, singing my praises.

  On my very first meeting with Ellen Burstyn in 1986, I had a similar experience. I met Ellen’s assistant after my jazz dance class while I was showing sweaters to the owner of the Santa Monica Dance Academy, hoping to barter some for dance classes. When Ellen’s assistant saw my work, she introduced herself and told me that if I could get to New York, she would set up a sales meeting to show my work to Ellen. I just so happened to be planning a visit with my daughter to see my family in New Jersey that month, so I packed a giant duffle bag, larger than my own height and weight, and we schlepped my entire inventory along on our vacation.

  On the day of my appointment with Ellen on the set of the Ellen Burstyn Show at ABC studios in Manhattan, Viva helped me maneuver the impossible bag on a bus from my sister’s house in Glen Rock, New Jersey, to the Port Authority in New York City. When we arrived, Ellen was in the middle of a table read with her cast members, Megan Mullally and Elaine Stritch, who played her daughter and mother in the new sitcom. The minute Ellen lifted her head off the page and saw me waiting for her on the sound stage; she excused herself from the cast and announced to everyone that she didn’t want to keep me waiting. She came over and greeted me and Viva warmly and offered to help us with the bag to her dressing room.

  It was encounters like these that brought me to that 0 degrees of separation from greatness, and made me grateful for the solution to my childhood anxiety.

  I wish I could say that all my star clients were as generous and gracious as Lily and Ellen, but that was not the case when I encountered one Miss Julia Roberts. I met her through the wardrobe department while she was filming I Love Trouble with Nick Nolte in 1994. Julia had just returned from her honeymoon with her first husband, Lyle Lovett. As I unpacked over thirty sweaters for the pretty woman to sift through, she ignored me as she bantered with the film’s costume designer and wardrobe supervisor, bragging about the prowess of her new husband, Lyle. She kept repeating the phrase, “Good gracious, I’m so sore down there,” indicating the size of Lyle’s love offering. I chalked it up to her youth and insecurity. I thought that it was her way of saying to the world, “My hubby may be short on looks but damn, he’s long on penis.”

  Julia finally chose a sweater from the pile and asked me the price. I quoted her about $200 for a multi-colored, short, double-breasted crop cotton sweater. She tried it on and then asked me if I could add a few inches to the neckline. It just so happened that I had a bit of the same yarn in my bag with me. I told her I could do the alteration right there in the wardrobe department but it might take an hour or so. While I knitted away, Julia was called back to set. When the alteration was finished, an hour and 45 minutes had passed. I gave the sweater to her assistant and told her the price would now be $225, adding $25 for the time to make the alteration. Although Julia was earning over a million dollars for her work on that lousy film, she sent her assistant back with a check for only $200. The assistant informed me that Julia refused to pay any more than the amount I had previously quoted her.

  Another big name that kept me on my toes was Roseanne Barr. Encounters with her were always unpredictable. I recall the first time we met on the set at the CBS Radford lot in Studio City where they filmed her hit series. While Roseanne tried on a sexy red cotton sweater with lots of diamond-shaped cutouts along the sleeves and down the back, she bragged about her latest cosmetics lifts. I loved her lack of modesty as she stood braless and showed off her reduced upper arms and new perky boobs. As I helped her into the complicated sweater in the mirror, Roseanne noticed the difference in our heights and gleefully blurted out, “Geesh, you’re a friggin’ midget. I’m only 5’ 2” and I tower over you.” Then she let out that recognizable cackle of hers. Roseanne could be quite charming if you got her on one of her good mental health days, but there were other fittings that were not so funny; like when I sat waiting, grateful that her rage was not directed toward me, while she screamed unapologetically at her poor assistant for twenty minutes for some infraction.

  My title Knitter to the Stars also led me to occasional work, styling for the stars. As an assistant to designer/stylist Rob Saduski, I had the privilege of sitting with David Bowie in his dressing room during a daylong shoot for his album cover, Tin Man. In between different looks David would relax in his underwear and share funny stories with me as if we were just two friends, both artists who shared a common bond. It was a time when David was newly sober and had recently married Iman. He was so happy, open and warm, I just melted. At the end of the day, Viva showed up on the set to meet David. It was instantly obvious that he had a fondness for chocolate beauty when he met my bi-racial daughter. David Bowie kissed us both on our cheeks when saying goodbyes and I went to bed that night vowing to never wash my face again.

  I’d travel from high points like dressing David Bowie and then slid down the scale to low life celebrities, like Courtney Love who when I met her was not a celebrity yet but a chubby wanna-be and extra in a Ramones video, I was hired to style.

  After seeing the costumes I made for my one-woman show, The Last Dance of the Couch Potatoes, in 1988, Bill Fishman, a film and video director cast me in a part and asked me if I could also style the Ramones video I Wanna Be Sedated.

  He gave me a budget of $300 to dress over 20 extras in different character looks. More than 80% of the wardrobe came out of my own personal closet. When I fit the then plump Courtney Love, into a precious 1940’s vintage satin wedding dressed I owned, I asked her in the nicest way possible to be extra careful with it since it came from my private collection. The shoot quickly turned into the job from hell and made me want to be sedated.

  Before lunch break Courtney was high and drunk on her ass and rolling in the gutter in my priceless dress. She managed to totally destroy it while making it obvious that she was proving a point; nobody was going to tell her what to do. Do I need to tell you how much I still resent the fuck out of her to this day and believe that if anyone did not deserve success in Hollywood, it is her.

  Of all the celebrity sweater clients I have ever had, there was one who really took the cake. Renee Taylor, a writer and actress for many decades, is most recognized for her role as the mother to The Nanny in the long-running hit sitcom of the 90s. Renee became my regular client back in the late 80s when I met her through my designer friend Shawn Barry. On our first encounter, we were in her living room in Beverly Hills as she sifted through my bags while a Hispanic workman was on a ladder doing some repairs. Renee was excited about my work and completely oblivious to the workman in the room as she stripped off her top, without a modicum of decency. The poor guy almost fell off the ladder.

  This encounter with Renee was just a glimpse into the many selling adventures I would have with her over time. Despite her meshugganah ways, my designer-client relationship with Renee
went on for decades and I continued to jump through hoops to make her happy because I admired her work as a writer and actor. Years before we ever met I had done scenes and monologues from the many successful plays and movies she and her husband, Joe Bologna, had written and laughed out loud watching them act in their movies. I guess you might say I was a little star struck.

  Many years later, on the night before Christmas Eve, Renee led me to an ice rink in Culver City. I was almost out the door, on my way to a Christmas party in Silverlake with Viva and my friend Jennifer, when the phone rang. As I slipped into my silvery opened-toed pumps, I heard the brash tones of a Queens, N.Y. voice on my answering machine. “Hi, it’s me, Renee, returning your phone call,” she squawked. “Is this ‘the Sweata Lady’?”

  This was still a few years before her long-running hit, The Nanny. I had been trying to pin Renee down to a time and place for a private shopping appointment since October, but it was the night before Christmas Eve when she finally had found an opening on her calendar. She wanted me to come immediately to meet her at a big industry holiday skating party. To entice me, she said, “There’ll be lots of other stars there who might want sweatas.”

  I explained I had previous plans with my friend and daughter and then Renee said, “It’s a party, bring them along.”

  When I hesitated, Renee pushed further with, “This is the only time I can meet with you. I’m leaving for Egypt early tomorrow morning for the holidays.”

  “Okay,” I acquiesced. “I guess the Culver Rink is not that far out of my way in the route to Silver Lake.” The truth was that I didn’t even have enough money to buy my daughter a special Christmas present that year. So I asked Jennifer and Viva if they minded stopping off at a Hollywood party on our way to the other party, where our host was serving a traditional Mexican Christmas Tamale dinner. In our party clothes, Jen and Viva helped me lug three heavy bags full of knits down the steps and into my car, and we made our way to Culver City.

  We showed up at the skating rink around 8 p.m. and found it cavernous and cold, with benches lining the walls for folks to put their skates on. Over the loudspeakers Christmas music was blaring and lots of young pretty people were skating in circles on the manmade ice. I felt out of place as I sat like a bump on a log in my holiday attire, keeping a lookout for Renee and other celebrities while Viva and Jennifer went off to see if they could find some free food since we were all starving. After some time they came back with shaved ice cones. I hadn’t spotted as much as a D-list celebrity in the crowd. It appeared that this was the kind of event where the stars pass their invites on to their personal assistants; swag, assistants earned for a year of service while the stars themselves went off to Aspen or Switzerland to do what stars do on the holidays: ski, not ice skate on an empty stomach in Culver City.

  By nine o’clock, my blood sugar was dropping and I was turning blue and Renee had yet to show. Viva and Jennifer found some young folks to chat with and since they weren’t complaining I decided to just wait it out. These were the days before cell phones and text messages. By ten o’clock my toes felt frostbitten and I had given up on the idea of hot tamales in Silverlake. To ward off a diabetic coma, I devoured a sugary snow cone. I had invested all that time and effort in the pursuit of a sale, and even though my teeth were chattering I decided not to quit before the Christmas miracle. Finally Miss Taylor arrived, dressed inappropriately to the nines. She was wearing a skintight black leather mini skirt with a see-through, black lace stretchy top.

  She made no excuses for her tardiness and brashly asked, “Where’s the sweatas?” I suggested we go off to the ladies’ room for privacy to try things on but she declined. “Let’s just do it here.” Her husband, Joe knew how to tune out Renee’s antics, and went off to get a drink as I pulled several pieces out from my three bags full. As soon as Renee saw one to her liking, she quickly whipped off her lace blouse, revealing a push-up bra sized too small to contain her ample décolletage. There were dozens of people standing around, but Renee was oblivious to her surroundings. She had chosen two of my sexiest peek-a-boo angora and lace designs and began to stretch one over her ample bosom. With the plunging neckline and see-through lace, Renee in my best selling 80s design was a post-menopausal Madonna. She loved both pieces and had to have the black one and the red one. There was only one problem: both sweaters needed alterations to make them fit properly. She asked, “Can you add a few inches here and there and get them to me by tomorrow before 7 a.m. when we leave for the airport?”

  “Sure, no problem,” I replied.

  By 11 p.m. I finished packing the sweaters back into the bags. I left feeling guilty for ruining my own party plans. After dropping Jen off, Viva and I got home by midnight. I heated up some leftover cold pasta for us and spent the better part of the night working on Renee’s new “sweatas” so that I could collect the payment before she left for Egypt in the morning. In the wee hours I sat knitting away while watching the classic film A Christmas Carol, fully identifying with poor Bob Cratchit, who had to work on Christmas.

  After tying off the last stitches, I dozed off about 4 a.m., inhaling angora fuzz and awoke to the phone ringing in my ear at 6 a.m. The shock and awe of Renee’s alarming tones screeched, “Are my sweatas ready? What time will you be here?”

  I pulled the stuck macaroni off my cheek and suggested that we meet at the airport, since it was closer than Beverly Hills for me. What I could not understand was why Renee needed to have two long hair angora sweaters in Egypt. Wasn’t it hot there at this time of year, I wondered, but didn’t mention it to Renee because I needed the money.

  I got to LAX before 8 a.m. and through the rush of holiday travelers I met Renee and Joe in a long check-in line at their terminal. Joe excused himself to grab a coffee as I took out the two sweaters. Then Renee left me watching their bags as she rushed off to the ladies room to try them on. I remained alone in the queue, pushing their luggage, enough baggage to leave the country for a lifetime, along to the check-in point. Thank God, Renee returned with the good news that the sweatas fit, because if I didn’t make that sale after all I’d been through I might have gone postal. Joe got back with his coffee just in the nick of time to help lift their bags up on the scale for the check-in agent. As the airline agent looked over their passports and tickets, Joe wrote me a check for the sweaters. They went off to Egypt and I went home and took a nap before I did my last-minute Christmas shopping.

  The year The Nanny started to shoot I was still taking private chef and catering assignments too. I got a call from Renee’s best friend Beverly, who was hosting Renee’s 60th birthday party. Her friend didn’t know I knew Renee and while we were planning the menu, I told Beverly that I was the designer who made Renee’s sweaters. Right then the phone rang and it was Renee calling. Beverly told Renee that she just hired me to cater her party and Renee asked Beverly to put me on the phone. “Bring the sweatas,” Renee ordered.

  On the day of the buffet luncheon for twenty of Renee and Joe’s closest friends, I loaded all the food into the party and I went back to the car and schlepped the additional three duffle bags filled with sweaters. I put the food in the kitchen and the sweaters in the den for later, then put on my apron and got to work. Knowing Joe was Italian, I had made a vat of Ziti with meat sauce and several antipasto appetizers and cannoli for dessert. I hired another actress to help me serve and clean up. That afternoon, I met Fran Drescher for the first time with her husband Peter, the executive producer of The Nanny. They had just hired Renee to play Fran’s mother on the show, and the two couples were becoming good friends.

  The luncheon was a huge success. Everyone raved about the food, and once the men went off to the patio to have their cigars, the ladies gathered in the den for an impromptu sweata party. I took off my chef’s hat, put on my designer demeanor, and out came the sweaters. This was the one time when Renee finally delivered some Hollywood clientele for me. Her friends loved my knits even better than my meatballs, and that day I made more than
half a dozen sweater sales on top of my catering money. Fran herself bought three pieces for her personal wardrobe and then invited me to the taping of the pilot episode of The Nanny and introduced me to her designer Brenda Cooper, who bought my knits every season the show ran. Fran also recommended my work for her film, Beautician and the Beast, and I got to make three sweaters that she wore in that film.

  The year before The Nanny’s final season, the show hired extras through Central Casting to be professional laughers. Fran was in the middle of a divorce from her executive producer husband Peter and due to her vulnerability wanted to avoid taping in front of a live audience. I knew the casting director, April Webster, who recommended me for the professional laugher job and I ended up working on the show every week, making more money laughing my ass off while knitting and eating for eight hours a day, and earning union wages. The double-dipping really paid off because I would also sell sweaters to other actresses and some crew members on the show. I guess I owe Renee big time for that gift that kept on giving. That was a very good year to be the Knitter to the Stars.

  Chapter 4

  Maid For This

  Bleary-eyed and woozy from Windex fumes and silver polish, I laid my head on two inches of plush shag carpeting. I glanced up at the shelves and fixated on a photo framed in spotless silver of my boss, with cocktail glass in hand and his arms around Frank and Sammy. On the other side of the wall, with only one slim degree of separation between us, my illustrious employer was in his bed, taking his daylong nap with the aid of Valium and Xanax, while I reflected on the events that brought me to this moment.

  With my own dreams of stardom placed on pause, I stared at the glamour glossies under squeaky clean glass: the sparkling Liza, with a Z; Shirley in a dance pose; and a sweet teenage Brook (his Gemini sister), as her inscription read. On the lower shelf, anonymous starlets, ex-wives, and assorted gold-diggers and ding-a-lings mocked me with flirtatious poses. To my right, on the altar of power and prestige, the world leaders were regaled: Prince Charles, the Queen Mother, Ron and Nancy, and even Pope John Paul II posed with my gracious host. But my favorite photo sat all by itself in a corner nook. Right there under the glass I had just Windexed was the DNA of the young and radiant Marilyn Monroe. The inscription read, “To my lover boy, Norma Jean,” and, just below her signature was a bright red lip print of her kiss. I wondered how much I could get for that picture on the paparazzi black market.