by Rob Lowe
As the governor speaks for the last time, I see frost on the cornhusks, vapor rising off the crowd as people listen in the cold. I watch a man raise his small son up onto his shoulders and I remember scurrying under a barricade to meet George McGovern so many years ago. Now I’m grateful to have been able to experience firsthand the emotional, bunker-mentality altruism that marks all campaigns. On my left, I see one of Dukakis’s inner circle, a large, tough Boston Irish Catholic. He is wiping away tears.
We land in Boston before sunrise on election eve. I go to the hotel to make live, drive-time radio pitches to get out the vote. By midafternoon I’m with the rest of the campaign at headquarters for the potential victory rally.
If anyone has ever wondered what comedian Al Franken did to earn a seat in the Senate, they obviously were not among the thousand people watching the results come in at Dukakis campaign headquarters. Franken, saddled with the single worst job on the planet, works relentlessly, alone on the ballroom stage, to keep up the room’s fading spirits. But the crowd can read the writing on the wall, and in the hour and a half Al vamps, he gets maybe three laughs. The Democrats should have given him a Purple Heart; instead, years later, they brought him to D.C.
Michael Dukakis is a profoundly decent, earnest man. He is a personification of the possibilities open to the families of immigrants to our great country. I admire him very much. Now he is onstage, humbled and gracious in a crushing, decisive loss. I’m standing in the wings just offstage. After today, it will be time to go back to other pursuits, but nothing will offer the same satisfaction as trying to help change the country, even in a peripheral role.
Dukakis is wrapping up his concession. The crowd is on its feet; there hasn’t been this much emotion in this campaign in months. Michael waves a final farewell and the room explodes. He stands there, taking it in. He’s not an emotional man, but it almost looks like there are tears in his eyes. A final wave and he walks offstage. He stops when he sees me and offers his hand. “Thanks, Rob. I’m sorry I let you down.” And I can see that this time, indeed, the emotion is real.
* * *
Months have gone by with no decent movie offers. There are always bad ones, however, like the offer to shoot a sex-filled romantic comedy in Italy, for which I would be paid a fortune and given a Ferrari, or the half million dollars for ten days’ work, to do a remake of Heidi (Charlie Sheen would do it instead). The poor performance of my last two movies has put me in a predicament: too famous to be new and not enough box-office mojo to get the big movies, at least not at the moment. Anyone can run a career when the going is good. But it’s in the down times, the quiet times, that long-term careers are really made. You need to find ways to stay in the conversation, to be current and to reinvent yourself.
It sounded like a good idea at the time. Would I like to participate in the opening of the 1988 Academy Awards? Without hesitation, I said yes. Mistakenly, I take this as an honor, if not a duty. After all, I’m from Ohio; if someone asks you nicely, you do it. Particularly if it’s the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences!
I’m invited to the home of the man who will be producing the broadcast, veteran Hollywood showman/producer Allan Carr, who has made some very big movies, including one of my all-time favorites, Grease. He also, however, produced a movie version of Sgt. Pepper’s without the Beatles and wore a caftan. In retrospect, perhaps I should have known better.
The pitch is simple, an elaborate musical number in the style of the famed Copacabana will open the show. A who’s who of old-time Hollywood stars will participate, including the biggest box-office queen of her era, Snow White. The gag will be that her date stands her up and I will gallantly come to her rescue. We will then sing a silly, fun duet to the tune of Ike and Tina Turner’s “Proud Mary.” Did I mention that no one was on drugs when they came up with this idea?
The great Marvin Hamlisch will be in charge of the music, and other numbers will feature members of “young Hollywood,” like Patrick Dempsey and Christian Slater, tap-dancing and swinging around on ropes. Figuring that the plan is to add fun and levity to Oscar night, I sign on as well.
Every star can make a bad movie or TV show. If you are lucky, you may get to stay in the business long enough to make several. But very few get to participate in a train wreck in front of a billion people.
There are ominous signs from the beginning. During rehearsals it becomes clear that some of the older Hollywood legends cannot walk unassisted. So the grand procession is scrapped and they are placed at tables where all they have to do is wave. Snow White is played by a sweet but inexperienced actress with a very high falsetto. The plan is for her to walk the audience and sing to Meryl Streep, Jack Nicholson, and others. However, when the big night arrives and she is faced with the living, breathing, actual stars, her voice jumps up two more octaves to a tonal range that could bust a dog’s eardrum (to make matters worse, it will later be discovered that Allan Carr and the Academy have forgotten to get clearance from Disney to use Snow White in the first place). By the time I make my entrance, live, in front of a billion people, she has that thousand-yard stare common to all performers who are going into the tank. We’ve all been there, I know the look. I look deep into her eyes, trying to get her to focus on me and steady her nerves. We start our bit together and it seems to be going well.
Then, out of the corner of my eye, I see the great director Barry Levinson in the middle of the audience. He has made Diner. He has made The Natural and is about to win two hundred Oscars tonight for his new movie, Rain Man. There is nobody hotter or more important on the planet. I see him very clearly now. His mouth is agape. He almost looks ashen. He turns to his date, his face a mask of shock and disgust. Even in the middle of singing a duet I can very clearly read his lips as he says, “What the fuck is this?” Bravely, I soldier on. I tell myself, who cares what he thinks—he’s just an acclaimed artistic-genius writer and director about to be anointed King of Hollywood, you can’t please everybody.
I leave the stage, not having a real sense of how it went over, Levinson’s reaction notwithstanding. I make my way to the greenroom, deserted at this early part of the show except for an elderly lady with flame-red hair. She is sitting in a corner alone.
“Young man,” she says. “I had no idea you were such a good singer. Please come sit with me.”
I realize it is Lucille Ball. I go and sit with her and she takes my hand and holds it tightly. She says nothing now, but doesn’t let go, and together we watch the broadcast play out on a monitor. After a while she lets go of my hand and asks if I can find her some aspirin.
“My goddamned head is killing me, sweetheart.”
I get Lucy some Tylenol and she kisses me on the cheek. I watch as she goes on to receive her Lifetime Achievement Award to a standing ovation. Within weeks she will pass away.
Every year people debate what’s wrong with the Academy Awards; why are they always so long, so boring, or just plain terrible? Why are viewers so uninterested? I have my theories, but of these two things I am certain. First: Don’t ever try to take the piss out of the Oscars. The ceremony is not merely escapist fare for the average American; it is of cancer-curing importance, an evening of the highest seriousness, to be revered at all costs. I hadn’t realized that. As my teenage sons would say, “My bad.” And second: When Lucille Ball likes what you do, it’s hard to give a shit about anyone else.
* * *
I have just finished remodeling my new house in the Hollywood Hills. It’s a quintessential Rat Pack–era bachelor’s pad, chosen by me for its view, privacy, and proximity to the Hard Rock Cafe, the latter criterion most revealing of my current state of mind.
I’m becoming increasingly isolated. I rarely see my family, and I don’t know how to deal with my mother’s unraveling marriage or her deteriorating health. I can’t escape into work, as my Oscar disaster hasn’t done my career momentum any favors. So in this period of malaise, I look to boost my spirits where I can.
I
now am on a feel-good treadmill. Long weekends of adventure and imbibing, weekly Monday Night Football get-togethers with the boys, which inevitably lead to Tuesday morning sunrises. Romantically, I am all over the map; I date a group of girls who are beautiful and fun-loving and whom I promise nothing. If they would like more of a commitment from me, they aren’t letting me know.
That said, I’m also capable of pushing the boundaries of dating technology. I’ve taken to using MTV as a sort of home-shopping network, and it’s not beneath me to call up to get the contacts on the sexy dancer in the latest Sting video. I find C-SPAN to be useful in this regard as well. Seeing Oliver North’s secretary, Fawn Hall, being sworn in during Iran-Contra, I make a note to track her down. Later I will take her to Jack Lemmon’s Lifetime Achievement Award dinner at the American Film Institute. Future costar Sally Field will give me a Barry Levinsonesque “Whaaaat the fuuuuck” as I breeze by her table with the striking blue-eyed strawberry blonde from the Pentagon.
Like for Warren Beatty in Shampoo, whose active love life made him feel “like [he] was going to live forever,” spinning the many plates of my relationships makes me feel engaged and alive. New infatuations give me a rush that my career can no longer provide. I even live up on Mulholland, where Beatty’s character lives at the end of the movie, when he finds himself with nothing to show for his years of skirt chasing.
And, indeed, as my twenty-fifth birthday approaches, I am feeling pretty empty. Sitting with family and friends at the back room at Mateo’s, I feel like I’m turning thirty, or even forty. Not one part of me feels like someone in his midtwenties; I’ve been grinding so long and have traveled so far and seen so much that I’ve doubled the standard emotional mileage. I’m way past warranty.
But if one or two drinks make me feel better, then clearly three or four will really do the trick, so I take my medicine well. And why not? Last time I checked it’s still the ’80’s, right?
* * *
Finally, a great script comes my way. Bad Influence was submitted to producer Steve Tisch by a new young writer as a writing sample. Tisch, showing the kind of wherewithal that would one day make him the only man with both an Oscar and a Super Bowl trophy, says let’s make this script. We bring on newcomer Curtis Hanson to direct, and, like Ed Zwick before him, he is launched to the A list and films like L.A. Confidential and 8 Mile.
Bad Influence is a Faustian story of a meek, regular Joe seduced by a charismatic and possibly dangerous stranger into a life of excitement and sex. Way ahead of its time, David Koepp’s screenplay is a marvel of tension, erotic atmosphere, dark humor, and vengeance fulfillment. I originally want to play the more traditional role of the average Joe, but Koepp takes me to lunch and begs me to play the dark and charming sociopath Alex. (Koepp is smart and the movie’s artistic success will also supercharge his career. He will write Carlito’s Way for Al Pacino and a little movie called Jurassic Park as his next projects.) By the time coffee arrives, I’ve switched parts and James Spader will eventually play the other.
Curtis Hanson is also a fantastic writer and one of his best additions to the script is the use of a videotape to “bring down” my character. Personal video recorders are the new big thing and entire movies are being made about the phenomenon. In fact, we cast Spader after seeing a rough cut of Sex, Lies, and Videotape. During the hilarious and harrowing set piece in the middle of Bad Influence, Spader tells my character that his greatest wish is to get out of his impending engagement. So my character, Alex, secretly videotapes him having sex with a girl he provides and shows it as a “special presentation” at his fiancée’s holiday party. Wish granted.
Personal videotaping had rarely been employed as a “gotcha” device in movies, and Bad Influence used it perfectly. I related to it as well, since I had been videotaping almost anything that seemed even remotely interesting to me.
Rehearsals are held in a big church just off Highland Avenue in the heart of Hollywood. Just before lunch one day, I’m asked to meet and approve my makeup artist for the film. A production assistant brings her in.
I can’t believe what I’m seeing. Striding toward me on outrageously long legs is a sexy and big-spirited blonde girl, with whom I’d had a blind date years before. It had ended in a sort of confused muddle; both of us were dealing with breakups, and although we hit it off like gangbusters, neither was in any position to make more of a go of it. I vaguely remember her telling me that she was a makeup artist and not taking her seriously. She was far too cute, young, and fun; she hardly fit the middle-aged, union crew members mold I had grown used to.
“Hi, Sheryl,” I say, surprised.
“Hey, Rob, good to see you again,” she says, and I’m struck once again by her big, blue eyes. We make small talk. We’ve both seen each other around the circuit we travel in, and we have many people in common. Eventually, we sit at a long foldout table in the middle of the old church meeting hall to talk about the job at hand.
“What do you want to do with this character?” she asks. “How do you want him to look? ’Cause I have a couple of thoughts.”
At this point in my life I’ve done countless movies and many hours of television, and have worked with many makeup artists, some the best in the business. But not once has one asked me how my character should look. I sit in their chair and they do whatever they do and that is that. I have a thought: This girl sees me differently.
And she is different, too. Different from all the other girls in my orbit. As we work together I realize that she is an artist of the face. Later, when she becomes the first choice of every big leading man, including Al Pacino, Alec Baldwin, and Harrison Ford, I will know why. Not only is she great to be around (and let’s face it, beautiful) but she knows her shit cold. Go look at Al Pacino in Glengarry Glen Ross and you’ll see what she’s capable of.
My character in the film is extremely debauched. He has no boundaries and knows no responsibilities or consequences. I’m digging deep into this world, living this character almost constantly in my own, much less malignant version. And I’m rewarded at every turn, because the performance and the movie are turning out so well.
But when Tom Brokaw leads the evening news with my personal videotape exploit from back in Atlanta, I know I’ve got a problem. When he’s done with me and the second story is Tiananmen Square, the first democratic uprising and potential revolution in the six-thousand-year history of China, I know it’s a doozy.
Sometimes being a trailblazer is overrated. If the Kim Kardashians and Colin Farrells and all the like had let their video oeuvre out into the zeitgeist before me, mine may have been met with a mere titillated shrug. But in 1989 it wasn’t yet common, or even possible, for young couples to “sext” and Skype each other with nude tapes and photos. Today, there are people who think nothing of taking a naked pic and sending it to their sweetheart. And for some, having a sex tape is something to aspire to; they are even created for the express purpose of publicity, money, or career advancement. Not so, back in the day.
As I (and a lot of people) struggled to figure out how I stupidly put myself into this videotape mess, I was approached by no less of an authority on sexual mores than Mr. Hugh Hefner. “You had to do it,” he said. “The technology existed!”
The unrelenting media scrutiny and fallout from the videotape debacle will overshadow Bad Influence completely. Although very well reviewed, the press coverage is mostly about what an idiot I am, and the movie suffers at the box office as a result. The director gets hot from it, James Spader gets hot from it. For me, it’s another movie that doesn’t perform. That it was released by a tiny independent studio didn’t help matters, but in the end, even a major studio probably couldn’t have overcome the unfortunate nexus of “life imitates art” that I’d created. Depressed and under siege, I stay at home and self-medicate. I make sure that the fun is always on call to keep me from thinking too hard about my bad decisions and the circumstances of my life. I welcome the support of my family and friends, and after
years of work and hundreds of miles traveled for so many liberal Democratic candidates and causes, I wait to hear from my many friends in that world. The calls never come.
* * *
On a more positive note, to help promote the movie, I am asked to host Saturday Night Live for the first time.
Walking into studio 8H, I feel like I’ve conquered show business. Forget my current, stalled movie momentum and role as a public piñata. I’m hosting Saturday Fucking Night Live, a show I’ve worshipped since its first year on the air back in 1975! Even in my increasingly jaded disillusionment, this opportunity makes me giddy as a kid as I walk the halls of my heroes.
My agents and other advisors beg me not to do the show. Historically, it has been the unmasking of many a star as an unfunny stiff, so they don’t want to take any chances. But I’m a gamer, always the guy to take my shots. Sometimes it blows up in my face (Snow White) but sometimes it can lead to a whole new world.
“Do you want me to write you a ‘Wayne’s World’ sketch or a ‘Sprockets’?” asks Mike Myers, one of the few cast members who writes.
It’s about midnight on Wednesday and I’m in his tiny cubbyhole office. I choose “Sprockets.” I love his character of Dieter, the unisexual, avant-garde German talk-show host with the masturbating monkey. I have no desire to do a “Wayne’s World,” a concept I don’t get at all, although I’ve not seen many sketches.
Mike goes to work, typing underneath a giant poster for the movie Halloween that reads, “The Curse of Michael Myers!” This would be the beginning of my part in a number of classic projects made with the magic of Mike Myers and the SNL pedigree.
The show will be a huge hit. At one point I play the then massively popular talk-show host Arsenio Hall (complete with giant, fake fingers) and the next day USA Today writes about it. No one has seen me like this and suddenly I’m on the radar of Lorne Michaels, who has created more legends in comedy than anyone ever has or will. He is the most important and influential tastemaker and gatekeeper in the comedy universe.