by Dillon Khan
‘Thanks, I did –’
‘No, I mean it’s a good script if you were the presenter. Are you the presenter?’ he asked condescendingly.
‘No,’ I said, taken aback.
‘Well, why haven’t you listened to what I said to you yesterday? You’ve got to think like you’re PJ. And the links are too long. Kids today just don’t have the attention span,’ he said.
I felt patronized on behalf of the entire youth population. He continued before I could get a word in.
‘The intonation is non-existent and your research seems patchy at best.’
Good job it was so early in the morning and none of the others were here to see my first dressing-down from Max. The last time someone spoke to me like this was my mother when I was ten and I forgot to leave the toilet seat down.
Max carried on scanning through all the links, correcting and deleting big chunks. If this was an essay marked by a teacher, there would be question marks and ‘see me’ all over it in red biro. As much as it pained me, his detailed critique was right. I’d tried my best for hours with several rewrites. I’d come in early to get it spot on and I wasn’t even close. My first attempt at writing and I was a total loser. My ego was shrinking faster than a buffet at the hands of Homer Simpson. This wasn’t like writing my dissertation; it was a whole different ball game.
Max must have seen the discomfort written on my face.
‘Don’t worry, we’ve all been through it. My boss, Robert, did the same to me when I got here and I’d written for national newspapers and magazines. It’s a good start but there’s still a long way for you to go, so be sure you learn from this. Take my feedback and apply it to next week’s script.’
‘What about this week’s script? We’re in the studio in an hour,’ I said with a worried look on my face. I stared at my near-blank computer screen where my script had resided only a short moment ago.
He quickly opened another document from the shared server. ‘We can use the one I wrote.’
I sat there in silence as he continued.
‘I got a call yesterday from our Talent & Artists department that there’s an artist flying into the UK today. In fact,’ he said, looking at his watch, ‘he’s coming straight to The Beat from Heathrow right now to be a guest presenter on Defm8.’
‘Yesterday? When was the call?’ I asked.
‘About three-ish,’ he replied, unashamedly straight-faced.
What? So he’d known my script was for nothing? And all the work I’d put in had been a total waste. I felt increasingly frustrated the more it sank in. I stayed silent.
Max realized why instantly. ‘Don’t worry, your work wasn’t in vain. I had to see what level you’re at. Success comes before work only in the dictionary. You learnt from it, didn’t you?’ he asked as he cut what good was left of my script and pasted it to his.
This was a fucking test? It just happened to last the same time it had taken for me to sit all my A-level exams! But I had to be professional and not show my true feelings. Instead of what was going through my head, I said, ‘Yes.’
‘Aren’t you interested in who the guest is?’ Max asked.
Yeah right. No guest could make up for the last twenty-four hours of pain. ‘Who is it?’ I asked begrudgingly.
‘Jay-Z,’ he said, as cool as you like, while typing and staring at the screen.
I couldn’t hide my surprise. The angst of being ridiculed, shot down like I was the Luftwaffe in the summer of ’44, and being made to run a pointless errand was all forgotten in an instant. The biggest rapper in the game was in town and appearing on my first show.
I stopped sulking. Instead I gathered tapes, collected scripts and fan mail and followed Max down to the studios like Sonic the Hedgehog’s hyperactive sidekick. It was a dream come true. But I was nervous too. This was the first time I’d see a show recorded in the studio, the first time I’d meet a star and the first time I’d meet PJ.
After showing me around the gallery, introducing me to the staff and telling me what I’d be doing on the studio floor, Max took me to the dressing room. PJ was sitting in the corner with his shades on, clearly nursing a hangover as the make-up lady fussed over him, covering up the evidence of his excesses from the night before.
As soon as he saw Max he pleaded, ‘Please, nothing hard today, dude!’
Max laughed. ‘Is it ever?’
‘Course it is, otherwise they’d have you doing it,’ PJ quipped.
The mood for the studio banter was set.
PJ, who was barely a few years older than me, was a chancer, a blagger, a Del-Boy, who came to The Beat by pure fluke. He hadn’t gone to university but his life experiences thus far included owning a fifth of a gardening business, selling time-shares in the Middle East and artist management of some unsuccessful groups, like the twins called ‘Double Trouble’.
He’d come to The Beat one day to drop off their music video when an overly eager intern took him in error straight to the studios to do a presenter audition. It was an easy mistake to make: when you see someone good-looking in Reception, with a designer mohawk, trendy clothes and wearing shades indoors, you assume they’re auditioning for something. Realizing a cock-up was in progress, PJ kept quiet and did the screen test as a laugh. Weeks later he was contacted about the video for Double Trouble and informed it was the worst thing that had ever been submitted to The Beat. However, his audition got the opposite reaction. He charmed his way through the next set of screen tests and landed a contract.
His laissez-faire approach made him a natural, flirting with the camera as others fluffed their lines under the pressure. But what sealed his position as a mainstay was his photographic memory and phenomenal knowledge of music trivia. He was a musical Norris McWhirter, who was famous for recalling facts from the Guinness Book of Records off the top of his head. PJ’s on-screen exposure was matched off it, as he was always pictured falling out of clubs with his celebrity friends on drunken nights out.
As Max introduced me, I stuck my hand out to shake PJ’s. He didn’t move. My hand stayed hanging for several seconds till I moved it back into my pocket and looked at Max, confused and embarrassed. He sat in one of the make-up chairs next to PJ without flinching.
‘So you want to be part of the gang, do you?’ PJ said in a Clint Eastwood style growl.
Not sure of what to say, I looked back at Max. He sat straight-faced, offering no help.
‘Er, yes?’ I said, unsure.
‘Well, do you have what it takes?’ he continued.
‘Er, yes?’ I repeated. Was this guy for real?
Then he took his shades off and began to fire music questions at me. At first I was daunted by the challenge, but soon began to hit everything he threw at me out of the park. The cockier I got, the more agitated he got. He kept going till I finally got one wrong.
‘I knew you’d slip up on The Doors. Rookie mistake. I’m not sure he’s a keeper,’ he said, shaking his head at Max.
I looked to Max for some back-up but he raised his hands, not wanting to get involved. ‘Hey, there are no friends in this game. Each man for himself.’
For the next hour PJ kept referring to me as ‘rookie’. Now it was my turn to get agitated as he got cocky. We recorded Total BEATS first, waiting for Jay-Z’s arrival to film Defm8. I stood nervously with my floor manager’s headphones on. It was my role to cue PJ before each link, and his frosty attitude became colder as I fluffed counting down from five to one.
‘Max, why have you got someone in the gang who can’t even count?’ he asked, staring into the camera. He then looked at me and signalled with his fingers. ‘Rookie, after the number threeeee comes the number twooooo. Not one!’
By now everyone on the studio floor and in the gallery was laughing at me. I tried to laugh it off with them, but I was in agony on the inside. Was humiliation the weapon of choice?
I concentrated hard on doing the
next count. The words were right but this time I got the countdown on my fingers wrong. Cue more ridicule. PJ’s cockiness was limitless and he didn’t bother listening to my instructions to practise reading through each link before we recorded it to tape. I prayed for him to mess up, but he was too good. We flew through the recording, getting to the penultimate link and that week’s best fan mail. I had several to choose from but couldn’t decide which one to go for. My hesitation brought another jibe.
‘Where’s the letter, rookie?’ PJ asked impatiently.
I shuffled through all the papers trying to choose one, dropping pages on the floor like a dithering idiot.
‘While we’re still young,’ he added.
Max was barking similar orders in my headphones as he’d heard Jay-Z was minutes away.
‘Couldn’t we have got a hot female intern?’ PJ said to Max.
Agreeable laughter came through my headphones. I finally chose the best mail and gave the accompanying picture to Max to roll in. I handed PJ the letter that was written on pink paper. Snapping it from my hands, he said, ‘C’mon, let’s roll to record,’ and began reading it to camera as soon as I cued him in.
‘“Dear PJ, I love watching the show”,’ he began.
‘Of course you do,’ he said, looking back up at the camera and winking.
‘“I can’t go a week without watching you do your thing on TV. I love all the interviews and videos.”’
Looking back up at the camera, he said, ‘Why thank you, my dear,’ brushing imaginary dirt from his shoulder.
‘“You’re so sexy! I’m your number-one fan and I have a poster of you above my bed that I look at every night before I go to sleep. I can’t wait to come to The Beat to meet you in person.”
‘Well, you can if you’re over eighteen!’ he joked, winking again. The letter went on sycophantically, and getting to the end of it, he read, ‘“P.S. I’ve enclosed my picture.”
‘Max, put the picture up onscreen,’ PJ demanded eagerly. He turned the letter over and finished reading it.
‘“You make me TOTALLY hard, from … Steve”?’ The name came out of his mouth as a near whisper.
Max had done as he was told and split the TV screen, with PJ on the left looking shocked and on the right the picture of a teenage boy grabbing his crotch with a poster of PJ above his bed.
PJ squirmed, uncomfortably lost for words as the screen dipped to black.
Seconds later he could hear the laughter coming from the gallery through my headphones as everyone pissed themselves laughing.
‘And end of link,’ I said.
‘Fuck off! No way! We’re not using that. Max?’ he shouted.
‘Sorry, PJ, we have to, we don’t have time to re-record it,’ said Max over the tannoy system to the studio. ‘Besides, gay fan mail means you’ve arrived.’
I felt a sense of satisfaction as I walked over to PJ to collect the letter from him but I didn’t let it show on my face. I stuck out my hand to take it from him, but he didn’t move.
Shit, I’ve just majorly pissed him off, I thought. I was hoping he’d see the funny side to it, not react like this. I groaned inwardly. There would definitely be fall-out from my stitch-up and I was regretting it already.
Just as I was about to put my hand back down, PJ grabbed it firmly, shook it and smiled charismatically. ‘You’re definitely one of us, kid. Welcome to the gang.’
Initiation was over.
7
China White
Pritz and I sat in Pizza Hut eating from the buffet, seeing who could knock back the most slices. It’s weird how blokes can make a competition out of anything, from the credible ‘Who can run the fastest 100m?’ to the not-so-credible ‘How many peanut M&Ms can you throw in the air and catch in your mouth in one go, while leaning back on your chair?’ We’d been playing this current pizza-eating game since we were kids and it was a sheer miracle that neither of us was the shape of the legendary wrestler Big Daddy and his arch nemesis Giant Haystacks. Pritz held the lead of 2,356 victories to my 2,331 – approximately.
The thing with Pizza Hut buffets, and any other all-you-can-eat buffets for that matter, is that the idea sounds good value for money. Your greed gets one step ahead of your stomach, and when you do start to eat you can barely polish off a few slices. However, we were veterans and knew how to get past the psychology of it all. Patience really was a virtue, along with some visits to the toilet. The average customer sat for forty minutes in the restaurant while we sat for double that. We were possibly the only loss-making customers for the corporation as we didn’t even order any drinks. Instead we settled for tap water with ice and lemon to keep the extra space in our stomachs for food and not over-priced fizzy cola. Another trick was to not eat anything too spicy that required extra gulps of water, and we varied the pizzas so we didn’t get bored of the taste.
Pritz was on his fourteenth slice and I was on my eleventh when I got a text from Max:
Outside Chinas. Air Street. 11:30pm. Don’t be late!!!
It was 11.15 p.m. now, so we paid up and scrambled out. Soon we were heading down Regent Street in the rain, virtually hugging the shops, hoping the buildings would offer us some cover. Groups of girls clustered under umbrellas were tottering their way to the clubs and bars located within a stone’s throw of Piccadilly Circus. Any girl who walked past would get an instant look back over the shoulder from Pritz. He was getting his female radar in check before the night began.
‘So the Quant made you write that script for nothing?’ Pritz recapped. ‘He deserves a first-class ticket to Quantville. Population: Max. But I have to admit the studio stuff sounds fun. That’s not a job, that’s Mickey Mouse stuff,’ he said.
I laughed. ‘Quant’ was Pritz’s version of the C-word. It had been made up by one of Pritz’s workmates to highlight the geeks in their research department and we’d adopted it as our own. ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah. And I suppose getting your boss’s coffee is hard work,’ I replied.
‘Hey, it’s the price I have to pay to make sure he stays sweet and gives me a hefty bonus at the end of the year. So what was Jay-Zed like? Did you get your picture with him?’ asked Pritz.
‘No. It felt a bit cheesy,’ I said, scrunching my face up.
‘Who cares? Imagine if the boys back at school saw it? How else you going to prove it?’ said Pritz.
‘I don’t need to prove it. Besides, do you want me to carry a Polaroid in my back pocket?’ I said in defiance.
‘Oooh, look at yooouuu, maaaam. C’mon, it would be good to see that twat Michael Four Eyes’ face when he finds out you met his idol.’
I imagined the look on the face of the neighbourhood bully from our childhood and it made me contemplate it for a second. Then I realized he’d most likely thump me, mug me and rip up any picture.
We got to Air Street on time to find it in chaos as traffic had come to a halt. Just by the entrance to the road, people were shouting at big burly men dressed in suits, as long queues snaked out behind them along Regent Street. The only female standing with them was holding a clipboard in one hand, smoking a cigarette with the other and ignoring the people talking to her. They were outside a single plain and unsigned doorway that lead to London’s hottest club, Chinawhite. Cameramen with powerful lenses were standing on the opposite side of the road, talking among themselves, fingers twitching and ready to snap at the first sign of anyone remotely famous.
We stood on the corner waiting for Max, spending our time looking at the two queues, which were moving painfully slowly. The drama that was ensuing with revellers and the traffic was a great advert for the place, giving the impression that this was a hotspot and very exclusive. The longer people waited, the more exclusive it was – treat them mean, keep them keen. The same people would turn up week after week to be treated the same way. Everyone in the queue probably wondered if it was really worth it, but looked around to see others clamouring to
get in and figured surely all these people can’t be wrong, there must be something wonderful inside.
The smaller of the two queues was for the guest list. It was mainly made up of businessmen and models. The club’s PR company would email invites to all the top modelling agencies, and they’d send their girls (and boys) down for free. The girls inevitably got treated to free drinks and were discreetly provided with drugs all night, courtesy of the businessmen. In return the suits got to feel big among the other alpha males, getting the girls drunk enough to flirt with. And the club made sure there were beautiful girls and boys inside to be gawped at by the average folks. In this ménage à trois everyone was happy. If you had a club like this with dog-ugly people inside, it would be empty the following week and you’d be closed for good the week after.
In the other, less-exclusive, queue, similar agreements were being made. There was a mixture of average folk ranging from wannabe singers and dancers to tourists and students, all desperate to be at the hottest VIP spot in town. Groups of girls in the queue were fine, but groups of guys were not. So the boys would end up having to try to persuade girls to go in with them. The uglier they were, the more the girls negotiated on the amount of drinks they’d have to buy them later.
Annoyingly for everyone waiting outside, there was a third invisible queue. It consisted of people who had the velvet rope lifted for them and walked straight through, without paying, and to whom the restriction of ‘no hats, no trainers’ did not apply. Famous people, friends of staff and rich regulars would hug the bouncer or kiss the doorgirl before disappearing inside.
It was approaching midnight and after my long day I was tired and fading fast. I wanted to call to see where Max was but didn’t want to seem like I couldn’t wait without panicking. But the never-ending rain and Pritz’s complaints made me realize it wasn’t so unreasonable. I dialled Max’s number.
He picked up and it sounded like he was still in his car, but then the line went dead.