Sitting My Way Through Life

by Kimberly Thompson

  m e r ’ s Ponde

  rni

  g

  s

  Q: Stage, movie, or television? A: Honestly, it would have to be stage.

  Chapter 7 Television

  Rule number 1: Never piss off the producers. Rule numbers 2-5: See rule number 1. The first paying gig I remember getting was called Ancient Secrets of the Bible. I worked in the art department behind the scenes. Since they needed some actors in front of the cameras doing man on the street interviews, I went on as a sort of construction worker. This gig made me eligible for my Screen Actors Guild membership. (SAG). My next role was in Mysteries and Other Wonders where I played an archaeologist who died by the mummy’s curse. I’ll never forget, I was laying in the desert, supposedly dying from this curse. There was a 500 pound camera right above me. They instructed

  me to look at the camera and focus on a certain spot. Once I was focused they started rotating the camera. “Now die.” I’m thinking, “What the hell do you want? Make your instructions clearer.” Actually, I was thinking..”I HOPE that thing is counterbalanced! I don’t want to die even if I am getting paid for this.”

  When I worked with these people in the art department, they weren’t exactly detail oriented or very interested in accuracy. They wanted things like corn out in an ancient Hebrew market. Corn is a New World crop. Squash is a New World crop. You can not put those out. No. I don’t care how pretty it looks. It’s not accurate at all. “Are you sure?” YES!!! You can not do that! It is WRONG!!!! I would then do these things on clay tablets and say, “Now this is what they look like.” They would say, “But it doesn’t look good on camera.” I kept trying to explain to these people that it may look good on camera, but it’s not historically accurate and you are supposedly doing history. So what do you want? I got fired from the job because I guess I was too much of a stickler for detail. Well I wasn’t really fired. They just didn’t renew my contract. They were canceled like two shows after they got rid of me. It was for CBS, and the execs said “Erm... no... we kind of need this to look real instead of just pretty.” They were fired for historical inaccuracies.

  I also did some PSAs and I did a commercial for HUD which actually got my picture published in TV Guide. I have seven copies.

  I did a music video. A few, in fact. Country/western, pop, rap. I don’t do those anymore. No more music videos, period. You are treated so miserably on those things. Besides, they’ve got this thing about focusing on my butt. They’re always like “Ooh! Let’s get a shot of his ass!”

  There was one we filmed up at Vasquez Rocks. Remember Star Trek? There was a scene in one episode where Kirk fought a lizard guy. We filmed in that same exact location on the exact same rock. There are a lot of things filmed there. Several places we went to, they had used in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade. Whitney grew up in southern Utah, another favorite place for film makers. We’ll be watching something and he’ll say, “Oh I remember that place. We used to play there.” or “I used to jump off that rock there before the government made it a state park. Now they don’t allow that.” Anyway, I did a music video for Jimmy’s Chicken Shack. A one hit wonder if there ever was one. I was an electrician putting up the sign “Jimmy’s Chicken Shack” all in light bulbs. So they had the camera come up and what do you see hanging over the edge? My ass. Right there hanging with the butt cleavage going. There is just this absolute fascination with my hairy white ass. I did another one for REM called “Imitation of Life”. A really neat music video. The fun thing with that one was I was this guy doing a barbecue and one of the guys from REM was holding a very young orangutan. The orangutan tried to make friends with me because I had the burgers and the hot dogs. They told me not to give him any. I wasn’t going to but he was like “Hi, come here.,. let me give you a hug.” He would then try to reach over and grab a hot dog or burger. I’d push it out of the way. He changed his attitude from “Let me give you a hug.” to “You asshole.” In the video there was this guy who would supposedly come by and something would distract me. While I was distracted he would set himself on fire, go running down the hill and jump into the swimming pool while we were singing. This was supposed to happen three times. The guy had to jump into that pool seventeen times. Each time he got a $500.00 bump, though. But they had to slather this stuff on him quite thickly, and it is actually somewhat poisonous, so I hope it was worth it to him.

  I auditioned for another video for A Perfect Circle. The casting associate asked me to do something to completely freak her out, so I did this sort of GLARE and licked the palm of my hand with the tip of my tongue. She jumped with a yell and said..”You did it! You did it!” I can play freaky really, really good.

  The first thing I booked in LA was Frasier. Up till then, I had been doing several plays but I hadn’t been able to get a representative. Whitney and I were just trying to get ourselves established there. We had moved here in ‘94, but I hadn’t really pursued trying to get representation. A few people tried to get me to sign on with their agents and I did get sent out on a couple of things but I never signed up officially. So I was doing the play 12 Angry Men out in Thousand Oaks, California where I met this woman, Jean Waller, who hooked me up with her managers, CA Talent, who still represent me. They were the ones who booked me for Frasier. At that time, I was working at a bank part time. I was sick to my stomach with nerves while waiting for a call back. Co-workers were saying “Would you just calm down? I wish they would just book you or do something because you are just “Aaaggh!” My nerves were still on edge when I went to the call back, but there were several people there saying “No, you’re going to get it.” Fortunately, they were right! You could really see the pecking order on Frasier. Kelsey Grammer would walk in just at any old time with his entourage. I’m not kidding. He had several people with him and they would go off to his suite. David Hyde Pierce had his suite. Jane Leeves, Peri Gilpin and John Mahoney each had rooms with metal plates screwed into the doors, so you knew those had to be really nice as well. Recurring characters such as Bebe, played by Harriet Sansom Harris, had a room where the nameplate on the door could be slid in and out of the holder. Robert Stanton, the guy who played the boy scout agent, he had to go outside, down these stairs and his would be the first trailer. Around the corner was one for the woman who played the news reporter. Then you would go down to the end of the building and there was this one little lonely trailer... and that’s my trailer. I had my own trailer! I stood in it for about five minutes staring. It was my trailer. It wasn’t very nice or anything, but it was mine so I sat in it. Mine. All mine.

  Even though I never really got the chance to socialize with Kelsey Grammer, I did get to socialize a bit with the rest of the cast. At one point, I was completely ready an hour early, so I stood around dressed all nice and everything when this guy comes in all grubby and dirty with this oil stained sweatshirt, torn jeans, three days growth of beard and his hair is sticking out. He came up to me and said “Hi. I’m David Hyde Pierce.” Mmm... Okay... I guess you aren’t like Niles Crane.

  I also got to meet Jane Leeves and Peri Gilpin, and believe me, those women are absolutely beautiful even without any makeup on. They came in looking absolutely flawless. Either that or they had that new makeup on. If so, they would have had to spend three hours to make it look that natural. They were just that beautiful. At the rehearsal, my line was “On behalf of Mercer Island Zoo, I would like to welcome our very special guest, Dr. Frasier Crane.” It was my big speech. They decided to rewrite it to “Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Mercer Island Zoo, I would like to welcome our very special guest, Dr. Frasier Crane.” so the poor little production assistant had to run upstairs, type it up, print it up, run everyone’s script, pass them out to everyone who then had to open up their scripts themselves, put in this new page with three new words on it just so everyone had the most current script. All for just three little words. The couldn’t just trust me to remember it. It had to be on record for everyone. I don’t know why. Maybe it’s
a way to keep the PA busy somehow.

  During my scene, I introduce Kelsey Grammer who comes up to the stage to give his speech and, of course, out comes this crane being chased by Martin. I do a double take and chase after them. Well the double take got big laughs. Huge laughs. So they cut my double take because I was only supposed to be there as set decoration. You don’t take the laughs away from the stars. You just don’t. That’s Kelsey Grammer’s job. He gets the laughs, I’m just there to feed him lines.

  Edward Hibbert, the guy who played Gil Chesterton, had been on Broadway during this time where he was playing Oscar Wilde. For the play he had to dye his blond hair to brown to match Oscar Wilde’s. He had also done this without the permission of the producers. When he came back to do this episode they had an absolute shit fit. They made him bleach his hair for a two day shoot, then he had to dye it back again for Broadway. When it was realized that the script ran too long they had to cut some lines. Gil had some wonderful lines about his salary and his wife. They had a choice to either cut Mr. Twembly’s stuff or Chester’s stuff. Hibbert pissed them off so his stuff got cut. So that’s how I maintained my part on Frasier. I really enjoyed working with the cast and crew. Everyone was very sweet.

  I had the chance to work with Rosie O’Donnell on Nip/ Tuck. A lot of people put her down, but she was so nice to me. She was such a doll. I was brought in to have my makeup and hair done. They never really do anything to my hair really, well except for on commercials. Commercial people have this damn habit of doing a comb over because they think it’s funny. Damn it, I’m bald. Just let it be! But for Nip/ Tuck they just combed it back and left it in place.

  Anyway, this woman in the next seat turns to me and says “Hi. I’m Rosie O’Donnell.” It’s like, “I know who you are... hehehehe.” I was almost giggly with excitement. Such a sweet woman. She and I talked, but she kind of lost interest in me when she found out that Whitney and I weren’t interested in adopting. There are people who shouldn’t adopt, and we’re two of them. I would feel bad for any child who would be adopted by us. We’re both evil and maniacal in our own ways and it just wouldn’t be good for the child. So we adopt furry children. She did start talking to me again when I told her I had written a PSA for breast cancer and I wanted her to hear it. Since she was interested I sent it to one of her PAs, but I never heard from them. Dylan Walsh was also very nice. I also got to freak him out. When I did the character, I did my very best princely British dialect. I’m pretty good at it. Most Brits think I am a Brit. When I’m doing a Brit or Swedish character, I go in front of the camera in character so I don’t make errors. So the whole time I’m on set, I stay in character. When we were finished, Dylan stopped to say bye to me. When I said bye back to him in my normal American accent, he jumped back and said “What the hell happened to your accent!?”

  I almost stepped in it with Sharon Gless. I had pronounced her name “Gleese”. “No, it’s Gless. Gless.” I apologized and we went on to talk about the shows Burn Notice and Queer as Folk. I told her I had watched both. She was going on about the good looking guys on both shows. “Oh God, I love you. You’re a hoot.”

  Grant Shaud... I still can’t figure out how to pronounce his name. He told me like six times when I was doing Oliver Beene. He would tell me, and it would go in one ear and out the other. I think it’s because I was having trouble with a tooth and it kept distracting me. This was another time they focused on my flabby white ass. The idea was that the son, Oliver Beene, decides he wants to be dad’s boy now. He doesn’t want to be a mama’s boy any more. So his dad takes him to his health club. Poor Oliver gets whipped with branches and all this other stuff. He then goes into a steam room and this big guy (me) comes in, dressed only in a towel. I come in, stand there, and drop the towel. “Hey kid, you wanna know why they call me Big Ed?” “Because you’re fat?”

  Now here is where I’m supposed to lay flat on my back and do this bicycle thing with my legs. Try doing that with a camera between your legs and the poor kid looking down going “AAAAAHHHHHH!!!!” The problem was, I couldn’t raise myself up high enough to do it. They’re trying to get me to raise my ass eight inches and hold it up! Do you know how many people AREN’T fat and can’t do that? So what happens? They had to get some guy under me and hold my ass up. It was a two day shoot. That was really fun. Especially the part with the kid going “Aaaaahhhh!”

  I also did the show As If. I was in the third episode with Robin Dunne. The show was about these six kids and their perspective of a certain night. Unfortunately, it was canceled after the second episode. Anyway, Robin was playing the gay kid of the crowd. He sees this muscle guy and he follows him to a gym and the guy goes into the shower. Robin waits for a bit and then chases him into the shower. He goes into the stall next to the guy, and starts soaping himself up then turns his back to him. Muscle guy steps out and I step in. Robert says, with his back turned, “I was watching you exercise. You look pretty good.” In my sexy voice I say “Thanks.” He turns around, sees me, and lets out a yell. This time they had me dressed in bikini briefs, shooting me from just above and just below. There is just some kind of fascination with getting me naked.

  There was this director’s reel I did where I was running down one of the streets in Woodland Hills wearing break away clothing. The tie drops off, then the shirt, and then the pants and then it Iooks like I jump over this hedge into this pool. The next thing you see is me in the water and you realize it’s just a kiddie pool surrounded by all these little girls who scream and run off. I was only supposed to have done it three times. It was more than three. I had to jump on this trampoline, go over the hedge and land on this cushion. The director of photography kept saying “Can’t you go higher?” I’m like, “Look at me! Look at this body! You’re expecting me to sail over this thing by five feet! You want somebody to do that? You do it! For God’s sake. You don’t hire someone who’s heavy because you like that look as part of the joke and then expect them to be Carl Johnson in the Olympics! I cannot physically sail. You want me to do that, you’ll need a cannon to fire me out of!” At one point, I went head first and somehow turned myself over and landed flat on my back. Photography directors are the worst. “Can’t you jump higher? Can’t you go slower?” NO! That’s why you have stunt people!. Put ‘em in a fat suit and have them do it. This is why I’m fat. I don’t want to do that sort of thing you want me to do.

  One of the first things I ever did in Salt Lake was a TV movie called Battling for Baby with Suzanne Pleshette and Debbie Reynolds. Debbie Reynolds is even smaller than Dolly Parton. I think she came up to my adam’s apple. Tiny thing. Back then I was a bit scruffy looking. I was growing a beard. I don’t know what for. Anyway, when she first saw me she said “Oh! You’re cute! I like you.” She then went on to talk about Eddie Canter, her ex-husband. In the movie I was a delivery boy, delivering It’s A Boy balloons to someone and there’s Suzanne Pleshette holding this baby and the baby just won’t stop crying. He kept crying and crying, so I made this kind of sniffing noise and the baby stopped crying and looked at me so I did it again and he started to laugh. Suzanne just glared at me for some reason or another. Later on I was sitting with some of the extras. Now, I grew up with very strict parents. One rule was that children did not interrupt adults and the other was when someone is talking, you listen. Pretty much just being polite. Anyway, I was listening to this couple who were just yapping away at me. Next thing you know, their three-year-old son was kicking me in the shins. Then this other woman suddenly turns on me saying “You should always pay attention to a child! You should never ignore a child!” It was like, “Oh my God, lady, you’re bitching someone out for being rude and yet what was I supposed to do? Tell his parents to shut the fuck up because I have to pay attention to their brat who’s kicking me? Who’s in the wrong here? I thought I was being the good guy!” I do love kids. On toast. With mustard.

  I once did a thing for The Man Show with Jimmy Kimmel. It took place on Ventura Blvd where they had t
he Juggy Girls dressed in bikinis holding up signs that said “Topless Carwash” and getting these guys to bring their cars around. Then out would come these guys, and I was the small petite one in this group, dressed in little red speedos. We would come out and do their cars using our butts to wash the cars and then soap each other up and stuff like that. Of course, they got the drivers to sign releases and everything and paid them, but there were a couple of guys who got really, really angry.They started making physical threats as well as threats to sue. They demanded the tapes. Well of course they weren’t going to get the tapes. There was a whole day’s work on those, so they were given blank tapes and told to go away. It’s like, “For God’s sake, get a sense of humor.” There was one man who thought it was so funny, he went back and got his wife and kids. That was one time I can say we were actually surprising people off the street.

  On Jay Leno, I also did a Man on the Street type segment with Brian Unger. This time I was a bald guy with a toupee who, since it was green week, they wanted me to take