However, one year, three months, three days and five hours since arriving, I’ve played a corpse on CSI: Miami, appeared in an unpaid web-only commercial for Blue Buffalo dog food and done a voice-over for a friend of a friend’s office phone system. ‘Press one for accounts,’ I said in my clippiest British tones. ‘Here’s $150 for your trouble,’ they replied. Move over Daniel Craig.
Seeing as how, contrary to popular belief, the streets here aren’t actually paved with gold, and landlords rather appreciate receiving their rent cheques each month, I needed to get a job. Hollywood’s ‘world-famous’ Star Man Celebrity Tours were hiring, and I was starving, so we came to an arrangement: I would work for them and they would pay me.
Which is why I’m on a topless bus in a stiff shirt with a cargo of visitors from Kansas showing them where Halle Berry lives, River Phoenix died and Marilyn Monroe is buried. The circle of life, if you will, for seventy bucks a pop. Plus tips.
At least I get to ‘hone my craft’ in the down time, he said like a genuine Angelino (or ‘twerp’). This city is bursting at the seams with non-paying acting opportunities, and I’ve signed up for Improv Workshops at The Groundlings. The Groundlings Theatre is a bit further down Melrose from Paramount, where if you close your ears to all the American accents you’d swear you were in Camden Market. In 1983. The only place in LA you’ll find more eurotrash clothing than on Melrose is in a Kardashian’s closet.
Inside, a motley crew of wannabes are being taught by a never-was the basic tenets of improv: i.e., make stuff up. We’re honing our short-form skills, learning how to explore an altered state of consciousness, becoming one with our co-conspirators, learning how to say ‘yes’ to the process. It’s utterly exhausting, and I’m ready to say yes to a beer and some nachos.
It’s a regular post-improv outing: a bunch of us hop along to Santa Monica Blvd in West Hollywood for a Mexican blowout at The Gardens of Taxco, where the brylcreemed waiter tells us in sing-songy broken English the chicken is so good ‘it tastes like it was booooooorn in the sauce.’ We used to head out to Marix up the street, the Mexican joint that got famous for being Jennifer Aniston’s favourite restaurant back when she used to eat carbs, but after a noisy class we prefer the crammed booths and relatively subdued atmosphere of Taxco.
Especially Sindy, always the ringleader, the motivator, the one that stops me from slinking back to my apartment to binge-watch Sherlock on Netflix. Sindy – an LA native with sun-bleached hair and yoga-toned body – can light up a room in two minutes and down a margarita in five; in class she once improv’d being a burger so well they had to stop me from leaning in, grabbing her with both hands and taking a bite.
There are many in the class who’ve thought of grabbing Sindy with both hands, but the distance between thought and action can be vaster than an LA skyline.
She likes to take regular hikes up Runyon Canyon, a massive, stunning 160-acre, rough and rustic park that straddles the Santa Monica Mountains, and I like to go with her. We take a clockwise sweep over the gently rising dirt path, pausing at the top to catch our breath. There, we take in the immensity of this incredible, buzzing city as we sit on the high bench, our feet dangling and kicking like children’s beneath us.
Runyon Canyon is an oasis of calm – and, admittedly, dog poop – in what can otherwise be a crazy wild place, a giant footprint of unspoiled nature in the middle of a concrete metropolis. It’s enough to make you forget where you are, apart from the fact that you’ll likely see a shirtless Jake Gyllenhaal or Matthew McConaughey, or Charlize Theron pushing her stroller, sunglasses on, baseball caps pulled down low, pounding their way up the hills and troughs, reminding you that you are merely mortal and living amongst the gods.
While it may be tempting to just roll over and give up when confronted with so much personified perfection, it spurs Sindy and I on. WE TOO CAN BE GODS! Hey, we’ve got the baseball caps and shades; all we need now is the TV show and the movie. It’s just one way in which we bond: shared ambition…and a love of cheese. After hiking we reward ourselves by driving a few miles east to Silverlake, where beautiful vintage homes dot around the glistening reservoir and hipsters spill into the streets outside the abundant coffee shops and diners. We like to hit up the Silverlake Cheese Store, where melted delights await as we melt away the hours.
All of which could be a scene from a TV show itself, The One Where Friends Catch Up, but we’ve been doing the improv/hike/cheese routine for a good nine months now. There’s just the tiniest of spaces between girl friend and girlfriend, but it’s often wider than a canyon. Which, appropriately enough, is where most of our relationship takes place.
Frankly, I wish I had more time for the hiking and the noshing, but my executive responsibilities as The Star Man – though, in reality, there are at least twelve of us with that exalted title – are somewhat time-consuming. Apparently the world is full of people that want to snoop on the rich and famous, and a guided tour is the best way to do it without ending up with a restraining order and community service.
While not exactly my dream job, it’s far from a nightmare. I get to poodle about in the gritty streets of Hollywood, past the manicured lawns and towering mansions of Beverly Hills and Bel Air and into the diverse and bustling streets of Los Angeles, with its farmers markets and museums, pointing out everything from the hotel where Keanu Reeves used to live (the delightful Chateau Marmont) to the spot where Hugh Grant got arrested (the grubby end of Hollywood Blvd).
Along the way, I also point out as many giant celebrity homes as possible, hoping that at least one famous person is on the lawn in pyjamas picking up their paper. Truth be told, if tour customers popped themselves down to one of the breakfast joints on 3rd Street or cafés in Los Feliz, they’d be way more likely to bump into Leo or Brad. Though passing on that info may not be quite so good for business.
Plus, they wouldn’t get the wealth of fun facts that someone who’s been living here for one year, three months, three days and five hours is able to impart. Did you know the ‘Y’ in the Hollywood Sign is owned by Hugh Hefner? Did you know The Andez Hotel on the Sunset Strip used to be a Hyatt and that Led Zeppelin’s drummer drove a motorbike along the hallway? Did you know that George Clooney has a basketball court in his garden? That Michael Jackson is buried in the same graveyard as Walt Disney? That Khloe Kardashian bought Justin Bieber’s house?
My brain is positively bursting with the type of information even your mother wouldn’t be interested in, yet hourly there’s a line around the block of people ready to spill their dollars to find out all this and more. It’s something of a mystery to us, the numerous Star Man employees, but we’re grateful for the cheques while we’re trying to get our real careers off the ground.
Not least of which is our receptionist, the unfortunately named Jennifer Lawrence. No, not THAT Jennifer Lawrence, hence the whole ‘unfortunately named’ thing. When our customers hear her name on the phone their heads almost explode. To add to the irony, this Jennifer Lawrence is quite possibly the only human being on the planet who didn’t move to Los Angeles to become an actor, and for that fact alone she is awesome.
This Jennifer Lawrence moved to LA from Ohio to a) get out of Ohio, b) study graphic design, and c) get out of Ohio. Then came Winter’s Bone and X-Men and Katniss and lots of falling over, and suddenly she’s the girl with the same name as the famous girl and everyone’s asking her if she wants to be an actress too.
And she doesn’t. Really. She wants to be a graphic designer, working on movie posters and ad campaigns and magazine covers and CD sleeves and websites. And she will, because like her namesake, Jennifer Lawrence is driven, focussed, talented…and entirely adorable. Or ‘the next Mrs Saunders,’ as our nosy manager, Bradley Cooper – just kidding!! – keeps teasing me.
All he knows is that Jen and I are as close as co-workers can be without giving the HR department a heart attack. As he frequently likes to point out, she’s clearly fond of me, finds me inexplicably amusing and we t
end to finish each other’s sentences. The fact that she’s gorgeous, too – all curves and dimples and shiny hair – is all he needs to know to jump to ill-gained conclusions, and he’s virtually getting his suit pressed for the upcoming nuptials.
Only there are no upcoming nuptials for Jennifer Lawrence and I, for as with Sindy, we too are firmly entrenched in the friend zone. Where Sindy is my outside partner in crime, Jen is my inside one; with her it’s take-aways and movie nights. We’ve yet to find a sofa we’re afraid to spend at least four hours on, and for that I love her dearly. She’s made a potentially cold and lonely city a place of warmth and companionship, and my only fear is she’ll never know exactly what that’s meant to me.
I love Los Angeles, but it can also be a sprawling, impersonal and occasionally isolating place to call home. Sure, there are trains and buses, but the vast majority of people here live miles apart and lock themselves in their air-conditioned cars and buzz around to meet each other in air-conditioned units in stucco blocks and go to air-conditioned theme bars to shout above music so loud that they can’t hear what anyone really has to say. Sore voices fall on deaf ears and life goes on unexpressed, problems remain unresolved, while relationships teeter on the edge of evaporation.
Unless…unless you have a Sindy. Or you have a Jennifer Lawrence. Or, way more importantly, unless you have a Laura McCarthy. Sweet, gorgeous, perfect Laura, the girl who gave me the confidence to say yes to America, to say yes to opportunity, to say yes to unconditional, generous, unwavering love.
Laura and I met at uni when we were both still young enough to have to show ID in a bar. It was love at first white wine spritzer; the first time we locked eyes I felt a kind of explosion behind my retina, like her beauty had pierced my nervous system, punctured my very core. Then she spoke and we clicked faster than a jazz singer’s fingers, and we’ve been pretty inseparable ever since. Until, you know, that whole moving to America thing.
I’d been talking about it for a while, that if I was going to give this acting lark a proper go, I might have to give myself at the very least one year, three months, three days and five hours to see if I could make it. Or at least to see if I could get my foot up on the first rung of an extremely tall ladder that’s always on the brink of total collapse.
As the old phrase goes, if you love somebody, set them free. So she set me free. In the most selfless, loving, understanding, giving, supportive, utterly benevolent way, she watched me log on to Kayak, find the best deal to LAX, and buy a one-way ticket to an entirely uncertain future. All with a smile on her face and the faintest of tears in her beautiful eyes.
We shall be reunited, of this I am certain. Thanks to the magic of Skype and Facetime and iPhones and Androids, we’re in constant touch and Laura’s been able to meet Sindy and she’s talked to Jennifer Lawrence and she’s happy that they’re here to help her boy find his passion. Thanks to unwavering trust and the deepest of love, she’s thankful that the girls are helping to mind the store while we’re apart, keeping me on my path, showing me how to navigate this extraordinary town.
Without Sindy and Jennifer, despite all the wondrous things LA has to offer, this could be some kind of crazy life. And without Laura, it’s no kind of life at all…
About the Author
Tony Horkins is a London-born, Los Angeles-based journalist whose work has appeared in GQ, Elle, Marie Claire, InStyle, The Sunday Times, Observer, The Guardian and Empire.
When he’s not staring into a computer screen, he’s riding his Triumph motorcycle through the Malibu canyons and playing drums for the country band Grant Langston & The Supermodels.
Website: www.tonyhorkins.com
Twitter: www.twitter.com/@tonyhorkins
Visit www.sunloungerstories.com to discover more about the authors and their story destinations.
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The Best Gift of All
***
Margaret James
DESTINATION: Florence
Giselle, Georgina, Grace – the Gorgeous Girls Gang – I’d had texts from all of them today.
Where r u hon?
When will u b here?
Why r u so l8?
I wasn’t late. I was taking my time.
Just the wedding, I had told them weeks before.
No pre-wedding shopping, partying, facials. No getting hair extensions, special nail art. No massages or peels. As for designer spray tans – I would get a real tan on the way and it would come free. But I’d be there on the day, of course, when it really mattered.
We were meeting up in Florence. They’d flown out last week, first class, like the Gorgeous Girls Gang always does. They’d tried to talk me into joining them, but I had other plans. I’d got the ferry and had been hitch-hiking all through Europe over the past week, taking in the sights along the way.
‘You don’t look like a Florence,’ said the driver who stopped for me and my now very tatty Florence-Firenze magic-markered card near Genoa. ‘I’d have guessed Melissa, Katy, Lucy?’
‘You’d have been wrong, wrong, wrong.’ I grinned. ‘It’s Ellie, actually. Where are you going?’
‘Orvieto.’
‘So it’s on your way?’
‘It could be.’
‘Great.’
I threw my rucksack up into the cab of the enormous HGV then clambered in myself.
My stomach rumbled loudly.
‘You hungry?’ asked the driver.
I shrugged.
‘There are Snickers, sandwiches and Tangos in the cooler. Just help yourself, no charge. Why are you hitch-hiking on your own? It isn’t safe, you know.’
‘I’m very careful.’
‘Yeah, you are – I don’t think. I could be a homicidal maniac who chops up girls like you.’
‘Then sells the pieces to the local demon barber who makes them into pies?’
‘You got it. So?’
‘I have a black belt in karate and I saw your curtains.’ I pointed to the shocking pink affairs which were swagged and draped around the cab. ‘There can’t be too many female homicidal maniacs who drive around with bright pink Hello Kitty pompoms hanging from their mirrors and wearing purple Hello Kitty shades.’
‘Why are you going to Florence?’
‘There’s a wedding. I have a few days to spare before I need to be there. What’s near Florence that’s worth seeing?’
‘Prato?’
‘What’s in Prato?’
‘Oh, you know – the usual Italian stuff. A zillion cafés, churches, fountains, city walls and towers, if you like that sort of thing?’
‘I do.’
‘I’ll drop you off where you can catch a bus. Get me out a Diet Tango, could you, and pop the tab for me?’
I passed her the drink.
Then, lulled by the motion of the HGV, I dozed.
‘I mean it – you be careful,’ said the driver two or three hours later, as she stopped to let me off.
‘I’ve already said – I’m very careful.’ I hopped down from the cab.
‘You girls, you think you’re going to live forever,’ sighed the driver. ‘But no one lives forever. So think about your mum and dad, how broken-hearted they would be if you got hurt.’
I nodded just to show I understood what she was saying and waved a last goodbye.
My mum and dad – yeah, right.
It was dark when I arrived in Prato. I booked myself into a hostel, had a shower and slept in a truly comfortable bed for the first time in a week.
The following morning I went out to see what Prato had to offer.
It had lots to show me. Renascimento squares with marble fountains, elegant town houses with secret, shaded courtyards full of cool greenery glimpsed through regal archways, and the most beautiful cathedral, the Duomo, its exterior Liquorice Allsort-banded in shimmering marble stripes of black and white.
I went inside and found the most
fantastic artwork, carvings, statuary. There were some amazing frescoes of Salome dancing - the model was apparently the mistress of the painter - at King Herod’s feast. It’s here in the Duomo that they keep the Virgin Mary’s girdle which was brought to Prato by a merchant’s Palestinian wife.
I stood beneath a glorious stained glass window, let it rainbow-paint me as the sun came streaming through, feeling I was in some kind of earthly paradise.
I went to the castello. I strolled along the battlements and gazed across the city and the countryside beyond.
I wandered up and down the narrow mediaeval streets.
I spent some of my precious Euros in a café where I drank the most delicious frothy cappuccino and ate a few cantucci.
Giselle, Georgina, Grace.
As I drank my coffee, my mobile went on pinging, pinging, pinging.
I knew I’d have to send a message soon. Otherwise they’d worry, they might even call the police, report me missing, and that wouldn’t be fun for any of us.
It wasn’t that I wanted to avoid them. After all, these people were my friends. I really loved them. They were warm-hearted, generous and very kind to me. But I was enjoying the freedom to do so much and spend so little and not think at all about what anything might cost.
I’d met the girls in my first term at uni and we had clicked at once, even though the three of them had been to Cheltenham Ladies’ College and they were made of money, while I’d been to the local comprehensive and was not.
‘What do your people do?’ Giselle had asked me on our second day.
‘My mother was a kindergarten teacher and my father is a painter.’
SUNLOUNGER 2: Beach Read Bliss (Sunlounger Stories) Page 35