by Rob Lowe
On my way out, I see Matt Dillon coming in. As ever, Matt doesn’t seem to have a care in the world, as if he were just out running errands. I wish him luck as he heads to Paul’s office. “Yeah, thanks, man,” he says, closing the door.
In the lobby I’m hung up by the receptionist, who can’t find any validation stickers for the parking garage. As I wait, Dillon comes out of his audition. I’m surprised at how fast it was.
“Geez, man! How’d it go in there?” I ask.
Matt looks at me a beat and lights a Marlboro Red. “I dunno, man. He told me I needed to read poetry!” he says, then throws his head back and lets out a vintage Dillon “Heh, heh, heh!” laugh. Looks like neither of the Outsiders will play one of Newman’s own.
* * *
One of the great things about show business is that Monday can be disappointing and Tuesday can be exhilarating. Momentum and fortunes change on a dime. (It’s why addicts are often drawn to the business. They actually enjoy the rush of the roller coaster.) After whiffing on Harry & Son, I’m an inch from getting Class, in spite of changing my mind about which part to play. Although the lead part of Jonathan the Virgin is more coveted, I found it sort of dull. I asked the directors and producers to let me read for the other role of Skip, the wiseass preppy rich kid who befriends Jonathan, because I thought the part was more entertaining. This is an instinct I would always follow; the best part is not the biggest, it’s the one that is the most memorable. Some of my favorite roles would end up not being leads but ones that I took because I felt like I could do something unique with the part, like in Square Dance, Tommy Boy, Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me, and Thank You for Smoking. Other times I would be offered the lead and choose a supporting part that I felt was more challenging or out of the box, like Nick the deaf-mute in Stephen King’s The Stand. Years later, I would switch roles at the last second again on Curtis Hanson’s Bad Influence.
But now I’m on location in Chicago where Class will be shot, for the last screen test for my part. My competition is an actor who is one of those guys who gets white-hot overnight and is in the mix on a number of big films. He has everyone in Hollywood talking, and I just hope he doesn’t get this one. His name is Raphael Sbarge. We will go head to head in the ballroom of the Chicago Sheraton tomorrow at 9:30 sharp.
But there is a catch.
My agents want me to fly home to work out some details in my deal before I screen-test, so I go to the production office and ask the secretary to book my flight back to L.A.
“Hey! Hey!” a giant bald man is yelling at me through an open door of an office. “Get the fuck in here, kid,” he says, waving.
I realize this is Martin Ransohoff, the producer of the movie and a big-time player with hits like Silver Streak and critical successes like Catch-22 and The Americanization of Emily. He also reportedly once beat the shit out of Sam Peckinpah. He is the embodiment of old-school Hollywood, from the days before bloodless MBAs and comic-book nerds took the place of the men with big vision and bigger appetites, men who understood and appreciated the lost art of the Grand Gesture. Yeah, sure, Marty might let his nut sack dangle out of his robe as he takes a meeting outside by his pool, but at least he takes his meetings outside by his pool!
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, kid?”
“Um, my agents say I should come home while…” I manage to get out before being cut off.
“Fuck your agents!”
“Well, sir…”
“Your agents are going to agent you right out of this fucking movie. Close the door and sit down.”
I do as I’m told.
Ransohoff has what looks to be about fifteen strands of hair on his otherwise totally bald head. These strands are swirled together on his crown, but now he is so agitated that he is pulling at the tuft, jerking it straight out in a jabbing motion, revealing it to be at least two and a half feet long.
“Your agents are idiots. Let me tell you how this goes. Tomorrow morning at nine thirty, unless a fucking 747 hits you on the head, you are going to get this part.”
This is news to me; I thought I was in a real horse race and that the screen test was a huge deal. “But what about the screen test? What about Raphael Sbarge?”
“Fuck Raphael Sbarge. There is only one way in this entire fucking universe that fucking Raphael Sbarge will ever play this part. And that is if you are so fucking stupid that you blow it all at the very last second by flying back to L.A. ’cause your ignorant asshole agents can’t close your deal over a lousy couple of grand a week! You gonna give this part to Raphael Sbarge over a couple of grand a week?”
“No.”
“I didn’t think so! You are a smart kid. I’ll see you tomorrow. Now get out of my fucking office.”
It was sound advice. I got the part, as he promised, and I don’t even remember the screen test.
I had hoped my pal Emilio would play opposite me in Class, but it was not to be. Instead, a kid from New York named Andrew McCarthy accompanied a friend to his audition for a small role in the film. While the friend read, a casting director asked Andrew if he could take a Polaroid of him while he waited. “Would you want to possibly be in movies? Maybe you could get a walk-on?”
“I don’t see why not,” Andrew told him as he took the Polaroid.
A month later, Andrew is starring in the movie. He never told me what happened to his friend.
Andrew and I are well cast, in that we are very different. He is aloof and observing—Holden Caulfield come to life. Within ten minutes of meeting Andrew, I know he won’t be putting on the headgear to spar with me in the hotel hallway.
He does, however, convince me to accompany him on a pilgrimage all over Chicago to find sensory-deprivation tanks.
It’s late in the evening the night before the first day of photography.
“Hey, Bob”—to this day he is the only human to ever call me that—“I think I found two tanks in the classifieds. Let’s go.” I was a huge fan of the recent movie Altered States, where William Hurt reverts to being some sort of ape-creature after spending time in a deprivation tank. I’m curious to see what might happen to me.
I don’t know much about Chicago and its various neighborhoods but I am well versed in its music, so when we pull up to a tenement on the South Side of town, I know we are in way over our heads. Looking around at the devastated buildings and deserted streets, I don’t really need Jim Croce’s song “Leroy Brown” to know this is the baddest part of town.
We knock on a buckled door. A gentleman in a kufi leads us down into his darkened basement without saying one word to us. I am petrified. I’m reminded of John Wayne Gacy and his Chicago-area basement. If this guy pulls out a clown suit, I’m outta here. Andrew and I are shown two black, coffinlike, fiberglass enclosed tubes. The guy in the kufi opens them up. The smell of salt is enough to make my eyes burn instantly.
“Twenty-five dollars for half an hour. Fifty dollars for an hour.”
“We’ll take an hour,” says Andrew, stripping down.
I climb into the tank naked. The water is at body temperature, with tremendous salinity to make you float effortlessly. Eventually, encased in the darkness, you forget you are in water at all. You feel nothing, no water, no light; you are suspended as if in the void.
I hear a terrible hammering. I realize it’s my heartbeat. How long have I been in this thing? I wonder. I lay there stiff as a board, waiting for the kufi man to suddenly whip the lid off and stab me with a carving knife. I begin to have random thoughts as I panic in the claustrophobic darkness. What is in this water anyway? Does anyone know where we are? Do we know where we are? Would Raphael Sbarge be as scared as I am? Did Andrew quietly leave me here and go back to the hotel, where he’s listening to Bob Dylan and playing his bongos? What if I’m locked in this tank or this basement? Why did Bill Hurt turn into an ape in this thing, anyway? Will my ape be as badass as his ape if the same thing happens to me? Why did I agree to do this in the first place?
“C’mon, Bob. Time to go home.”
In the end, the only earth-shattering experience I got from my time in the deprivation tank was a vicious ear infection. No wonder they never really caught on.
* * *
The making of Class is a markedly different experience from that of The Outsiders. There is no gang of like-minded guys to keep one another company and keep one another’s spirits up. At least Reid Rondell, my stuntman from The Outsiders, is brought in to double me and to stage the big fight that ends the movie. I do manage to spend time with Cruise, who is shooting Risky Business in town (the night I visit, they are filming the iconic Porsche-going-into-Lake-Michigan scene), but since both of us are so busy, it isn’t the same. Also, Tom has a new perspective on his acting style, telling me, “I want to spend time hanging with you but Joel [his character] doesn’t.”
As Thanksgiving rolls around, I spend my first major holiday away from home. This doesn’t help my loneliness but it does introduce me to another facet of the path I have chosen: You are going to miss a lot in life that most people take for granted. If you are not vigilant, that list can include holidays, birthdays, births, deaths, funerals, graduations, parent-teacher conferences, first steps, first words, school plays, trick-or-treating, Little League games, and just about every other moment that makes life worth living. Sure, there is an obvious trade-off with some of the great perks of success, but you can’t build a life on a backstage pass. Or free swag at Sundance.
I join my director, Lewis John Carlino, for Thanksgiving dinner at the home of a powerful and well-to-do Chicago family. They are gracious hosts, welcoming us into their massive home overlooking Lake Michigan. Immediately my attention is drawn to a stunning blonde standing among the other guests. Her looks are arresting for sure, but what really makes her stand out is the fairy-princess costume she is wearing—complete with wings and a wand. I ask Lewis who she is. It turns out she is the nineteen-year-old daughter of our hosts, and I will be seated next to her.
At dinner I make small talk with the fairy princess, who, it turns out, has done some acting and is thinking of moving from Chicago to L.A. Again, I think of my girlfriend at home, but I haven’t seen her in weeks. She is staying with her family in L.A. and is still not allowed to travel to be with me on location. Under the circumstances of my life, I have no business having a girlfriend at all, but I don’t have the maturity to know it or the guts to call it off.
By 4:30 in the morning the fairy princess and I find ourselves in deep conversation at an all-night diner. I am deeply infatuated with her, but she informs me that she is a virgin and is saving herself for Jackson Browne, whom she has never met. A Jackson Browne fan myself, I swallow my disappointment, tell her she’s chosen well, and wish her Godspeed. Soon it is so late that we are both falling asleep in our food. I walk her to a taxi and say good-bye. “Daryl Hannah,” I tell her, “you are amazing.”
* * *
After having worked almost exclusively with actors of my age and experience level, on Class I worked for the first time with stars. Jacqueline Bisset was at the time a worldwide sex icon and respected actress to boot (a rare combo), and Cliff Robertson was an Academy Award–winning star, as well as a producer for his film Charlie, which I had loved as a little boy back in Ohio. Jackie and Cliff played my mom and dad, and many years later this combo remains the best set of on-screen parents I ever had.
Here’s what they taught me about working with stars: They know what the fuck they are doing. They have been there, done that, heard every line of bullshit imaginable, been hustled in every fashion, worked with lesser lights who had the ability to bring them down, had all the marbles hoisted onto their backs, then hauled the movies up the cliffs of adversity themselves to where public opinion and the gatekeepers of the industry stood waiting in judgment, ready to blame them exclusively in failure. Most stars are great-looking on the outside but tough as shit on the inside. They have to be. When you hear a star is “difficult” or a “diva” or “demanding,” there are a few possible scenarios. The least likely is that you are dealing with someone who is still fairly new to the game and scared to death to have become so famous so fast, so they act out. They may also have a drug or alcohol issue and are making people’s lives miserable as a result. The most likely, however, is that he or she has been surrounded by people who don’t give a shit about the project at hand, and whose sole creative agenda is to cover their asses and save a nickel whenever possible. The star is the only one with the power to stand in the way of mediocrity and expedience, and often when they do, they are scapegoated.
Also know this: After years of working with, or getting to know, actors like Jodie Foster, Tom Hanks, Tom Cruise, Brad Pitt, Mike Myers, Jennifer Garner, Sally Field, George Clooney, and many others, I can tell you that stars are almost always the most gracious people on set. It’s part of the job and they know it. You don’t survive to become a star if you have a bad attitude.
Another thing I first observed on Class was the phenomenon of raw talent and star potential. In the movie, there was this gang of guys who were peripheral characters. To save money, local Chicago kids were cast and they all did fine. Except for one. He came from a large family with a history of acting locally—his dad played a priest in our movie. He was a nice-looking kid with big, soulful eyes, and was precocious and savvy in a way the others weren’t. And every time he had a line, no matter how inconsequential, he drilled it. He had a unique sense of humor and an uncanny knack for ad-libbing terrific dialogue. Wisely, our director began to incorporate his contributions, and John Cusack’s part expanded dramatically from its original, almost walk-on status to that of a memorable one. It was obvious that he was going to have a real future in Hollywood, if he wanted one.
Class wrapped in the late fall of 1982 and I flew home to Malibu. In the space of nine adrenaline-filled months, I had gone from having no career at all to starring in three movies (one for television) back to back. Every now and then I found a moment to think about what it all meant. Was this all a fluke or the beginning of something real? What would happen when all these movies, all in postproduction, were finally released? What would my life become? These are obviously “first world” problems but still, the level of psychic and emotional stress, particularly for an eighteen-year-old, is not to be underestimated.
Having been away from home for such a long time also put a new twist on all my friendships. I still had my group of friends from school, but more and more, the time away and the one-of-a-kind experiences were conspiring to set us apart. Once again, I was feeling different and having to work hard to fit in.
* * *
The Outsiders is scheduled for a big Christmas release. All the actors have been spending hours in the “looping” stage (rerecording or adding dialogue as needed), trying to make the release date. None of us has seen any of the movie, so we love having a sneak peek at these tiny moments from a few scenes. Francis has the best sound department in the world, many of whom worked on the legendary sound design on Apocalypse Now. They are patient and great teachers and I learn everything I can from them. Looping, or ADR as they call it today, is an art. Most actors hate it, few are good at it, but early on I was taught its value and worked hard to be good at it. Today, whenever I get a compliment in postproduction about my looping ability, I thank Francis’s team of experts.
The movie looks amazing. It’s shot in CinemaScope and looks as big and full of dramatic grandeur as Gone with the Wind, which Francis modeled it after. I want to see more, we all do, but until Christmas we must make do with these little teases. Somehow Emilio has gotten word that the very first coming attractions, or trailer, for The Outsiders is playing in front of a movie called Spacehunter: Adventures in the Forbidden Zone, with Peter Strauss and an unknown fifteen-year-old girl named Molly Ringwald. We are all dying to see it, and so Emil, Cruise, and I pile into a car
and drive to the only theater we can find that’s playing it. We end up thirty miles away, in Marina Del Rey. There are only about fifteen people in the theater. The Outsiders trailer comes on, and it’s like watching our future flash before our eyes. When it’s over, you can hear the fifteen people murmuring. On the drive back to the Sheens’ house we are ecstatic.
But within days comes ominous news. The Outsiders release will be delayed from Christmas 1982 to the following spring. I am devastated. I want so badly to see the result of all the hard work. I also know that until everyone else sees it, my career (and life) will be in a holding pattern. I am too green in the ways of the business to understand that when a big movie moves off a Christmas release date, it’s a sign of trouble. In retrospect, I should have picked up that something wasn’t right. Tommy Howell is working so much on the postproduction that he is completely AWOL from any kind of socializing with us. Emilio also spends weeks doing and redoing lines for different versions of the same scenes. For some reason I’m not needed in this latest frenetic wave of work.
As the weeks drag on, and I wait for the release of The Outsiders, I spend hours in the looping stage on Class. There’s a lot of confusion over what the movie should be: a raunchy sex comedy like the recent hit Porky’s; a smart, subversive teen version of The Graduate (my vote, not that anyone cares); or a thoughtful, angst-filled meditation on coming-of-age à la Catcher in the Rye. The studio and Ransohoff want Porky’s, McCarthy and the director want Salinger. As always in Hollywood when there are competing visions and no one powerful and creative enough to unite them all, you get them all. The result is usually an uneven, toneless mess. The comedy isn’t always funny, the drama isn’t always dramatic, and sometimes it’s funny when you want it to be dramatic and vice versa. But, if you are lucky and you have some good people involved, enough of the movie works anyway. When they threaten to change the title to Beginner’s Luck, I know the Porky’s camp is winning. All I can do is work hard and hope for the best.