The Incredible True Story of Blondy Baruti

by Blondy Baruti

  The character, whose name is Mo Gosego, speaks virtually no English. So not only does he have no understanding of American culture and tradition, but the team has no way to communicate with him. This is problematic in ways large and small. Simply negotiating a typical day is challenging for Mo; but even more challenging to his employer is Mo’s apparent indifference to his job. He does not work as hard as some of his teammates, and he allows opponents to push him around on the floor. The Warriors’ coaching staff and management can’t figure out how to motivate Mo, nor can they adequately communicate their expectations. To remedy the situation, they hire a translator—a young man named Jason who has just returned from Africa after serving a stint in the Peace Corps. Jason speaks Lingala, which presumably will allow him to act as an efficient intermediary between Mo and his American teammates and coaches. But of course, things are much more complicated than that, as Jason’s unfamiliarity with basketball is nearly as big an obstacle as Mo’s unfamiliarity with English. Their working relationship becomes a deepening friendship, one that is complicated, funny, and human. What I saw of the pilot and the overview was funny and smart; I wanted so badly to be a part of it.

  And not just because Mo seemed to have been written with me in mind. I knew in my heart that this was an A-list project. Most of the cast, after all, had already been assembled: Skylar Astin (one of the stars of the hit film Pitch Perfect); Jami Gertz, whose career included starring roles in the films Sixteen Candles and Twister, along with recurring roles in the series ER, Ally McBeal, and Entourage, among others; and Golden Globe winner Ving Rhames. The executive producers were a group of industry heavyweights: Dan Fogelman, who had written the screenplays for Crazy, Stupid, Love and the Pixar animated hit Cars; Mandalay Sports Media’s Peter Guber and Mike Tollin; and Aaron Kaplan of Kapital Entertainment. The series was being produced in cooperation with both the NBA and the Golden State Warriors, which would allow for mutually beneficial cross-promotional and licensing opportunities.

  It was, in every way imaginable, a big-time project.

  As soon as I finished reading the pages, I called Becky.

  “Okay, I’m in. When do I have to be there?”

  “Two days,” she said. There was a pause. “And Blondy?”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s an audition. They won’t pay your expenses.”

  I swallowed hard. “That’s okay. No problem.”

  Actually, it was quite a large problem. I had a couple hundred dollars to my name, money that the Blitzes had sent me to get home and to rebuild my life in Oklahoma. This was less than half of what I needed to fly to Los Angeles; and I’d need a cheap hotel room, as well. Eventually I told Becky of my fiancial concerns. She offered a possible solution: instead of auditioning in person, we could just shoot some video and upload it on a laptop.

  “No,” I said. “I want them to meet me, and to see who I am.”

  I knew there was only one way to get the job: to sit in a room with the producers and read from a script and explain to them that there was no one else for this role; that indeed I was born to play the part.

  If you’ve spent much time traveling, you know that buying a plane ticket on short notice can be a brutally expensive proposition, and so it was in my case. As soon as I got off the phone with Becky I went online and began hitting all the airline websites, as well as the wholesale sites like Kayak, Travelocity, and Priceline, searching for a bargain. Alas, there was none to be found. The cheapest flight, on less than forty-eight hours’ notice, was roughly $700. Which was several hundred dollars more than I had. I did not want to impose upon my parents again, so instead I reached out to a friend named Drew Faulkner and his wife, Brittany, whose family worked in the oil industry. I hated doing this again—it seemed like I always had my hand out, asking for help—but these were desperate times and they called for desperate measures. I called Drew and explained the situation. I hid nothing, including the possibility that I would not be able to repay him.

  “It’s just an audition,” I said. “There is no guarantee that I will get the job. But if I don’t go to the audition, there is no chance at all. If I get the part, I promise I will pay you back—with interest.”

  Drew just laughed.

  “Don’t worry about it. I would be honored to help you. How much do you need?”

  “Well, I have about three hundred and the ticket is seven hundred, so I need four hundred.”

  There was a pause on the other end of the line. Drew wanted to know where I would be staying, and how I would pay for it. I said something about crashing on a friend’s couch.

  “Look, I’ll get your ticket, okay?” he finally said. “You keep your money. Get a hotel room. You need to do this right.”

  “Drew,” I said. “I can’t thank you enough.”

  TWO DAYS LATER I walked into the Disney offices in Burbank for the most important meeting of my professional life. I signed in at the office of Susan Vash, a casting director, and took a seat in the waiting room, along with a half dozen very tall young men who looked like basketball players, all holding sheets of paper in their hands, and mumbling lines to themselves. This was my competition. Interestingly, two of the candidates were white, a result of the producers leaving open the possibility of changing the lead character’s background from African to Eastern European. The most important thing was finding the right actor, someone with a unique combination of stage presence and athletic ability. Once they found that person, they would shape the story accordingly. But I knew they preferred someone of African descent, which gave me a measure of confidence. Honestly? I figured the two white guys were long shots.

  The more formidable presence was offered by Ger Duany, a Sudanese actor who had a significant role in The Good Lie, a 2014 film starring Reese Witherspoon about a group of African refugees and their struggle to adapt to their new life in the American Midwest. This was a serious and well-received film, and Duany was a talented actor who, like me, had also played college basketball and survived a tumultuous childhood in Africa (in his case, Sudan). His bio also included roles in I Heart Huckabees and The Fighter, so it would be an understatement to say that his résumé was deeper than mine. After all, I had no résumé.

  We briefly made eye contact, but said nothing. This was my first audition, but already I got the sense that they are intensely weird and competitive. Everyone in the room is fighting for the same job. There is nothing collegial about it. I kept my head down and focused on my lines. I tried not to think about the fact that I was the least experienced actor in the room.

  One by one we were summoned from the waiting room. I was one of the last, which was unnerving. Some of the candidates ahead of me were in the room for only a few minutes, while others were inside for considerably longer. The shorter the audition, I noticed, the more despondent the actor appeared when he emerged. This also was unnerving, for I knew that when my time came, the relative success or failure of my audition could be clearly measured by its duration. If they showed me the door quickly, I was done. If they permitted me to stay and chat for a while, I had a chance. To improve the odds, I presented the most upbeat and affable version of myself that I could possibly muster. I did not want them to know that I was terrified and broke and fighting the urge to flee. I wanted them to think that I was confident and friendly and eager to be part of their team.

  I wanted them to believe that indeed I was Mo Gosego.

  As I had so many times in my life, when faced with a challenge, I reflected on my experience in the Congo. I will admit that upon first seeing Ger Duany in the waiting room, my reaction was one of despair.

  Oh, shit. He’s a real actor. He will probably get the job.

  But then I realized, what was the worst that could happen? I would survive this experience. Win or lose, I would learn from it. I would grow and become a better person.

  “Blondy?”

  Finally, it was my turn. I stood to greet the woman who was standing in the doorway, smiling broadly, hand extend
ed.

  “Pleased to meet you,” she said. “I’m Susan.”

  I nodded. “Blondy Baruti. I am the kid from Africa.”

  She laughed. “Yes, I know. Come in, we’ll get started in a moment.”

  There was only one other person in the room: Susan’s assistant, Melissa, who was recording the audition on a video camera. I literally jogged into the room, bouncing on the balls of my feet, shaking my arms out like a boxer getting ready to fight. But smiling . . . always smiling.

  “Tell us a little bit about yourself,” Susan said.

  “I’m Blondy Baruti, I’m from the Congo, I played college basketball, I’m still learning the language here in America, and I feel like this story is mine. This is my life!”

  Melissa peered out from behind the camera, smiling. She and Susan looked at each other and laughed.

  “Okay, well . . . that’s great,” Susan said. “Show us what you’ve got.”

  I had been given one scene to prepare, an emotional interaction between player and translator. In the scene, Mo, having drawn the ire of everyone in the Warriors’ organization for his passive approach to the game of basketball, finally breaks down and explains to Jason why he seems to lack fire. Susan read the part of Jason; before we started, she asked if I need the pages, since I was empty-handed.

  “No, thank you. I have it memorized.”

  Susan smiled. “All right, then. Whenever you’re ready.”

  We ran through the scene together; Susan was a total pro. And near the end, I went for broke, throwing every ounce of energy into an emotional payoff.

  “I know you’re from the Congo and this is hard to understand, but in America, when you play basketball, you have to fight for every rebound and every loose ball,” Susan (as Jason) read. “Nothing is easy. You have to work and fight every minute.”

  I looked off into the distance, and then into Susan’s eyes. In that moment—in that little room with just the three of us—she became my translator.

  “Why is everyone here always telling me to fight?” I cried. “I have been fighting all my life in Africa. I am tired of fighting. This is just a game!”

  Afterward, they congratulated me on doing a good job and thanked me for my time. I could not tell how long I had been in the room. Just as I was getting ready to leave, Susan stopped me.

  “Blondy, can you wait outside for a little while?”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “Thanks, we’re going to finish up with the others, and then we’d like you to do another scene.”

  Oh, my goodness.

  I was no expert, but I figured this had to be a good thing. There was just one problem: I hadn’t rehearsed or memorized any other scenes. This was the only one I had been given. Susan handed me several pages.

  “Pick a scene,” she said. “Don’t worry about memorizing. We’ll just read it.”

  I went back outside and waited for the last two candidates to finish their auditions. They were in and out quickly, and soon enough I was back in the room, stumbling through a scene that had neither context nor meaning. All the confidence I had brought to the first scene had evaporated as I stuttered and stammered. Susan, meanwhile, patiently delivered her lines as professionally as she had the first time around. Soon enough, the scene was over. I rolled up the pages and tried not to cry. My shirt was soaked with sweat.

  “I’m sorry,” I said, certain that I had played my way out of the starting lineup (to borrow a basketball metaphor).

  “That’s okay,” Susan said, waving a hand dismissively. Then she talked with her assistant for a moment before turning to face me once again.

  “When are you going back to Oklahoma?” she asked.

  “Tomorrow,” I said.

  She seemed disappointed. “Is there any chance you can stay a little longer?”

  I was confused. I had just botched the second audition, and she wanted me to stay in town?

  “How long?” I asked.

  She shrugged, then smiled reassuringly. “A few days. Maybe a week. We’d like to set up another meeting, so we can introduce you to the producers and the writing staff.”

  For an instant, I felt the urge to leap forward and wrap Susan in a hug. But I managed to squelch that urge and respond in a more professional manner.

  “Sure, I can stay as long as you’d like,” I said, trying to sound casual. “No problem at all.”

  Inside, however, my stomach did a tap dance, veering from unbridled joy one moment to utter panic the next, as I tried to figure out how I was going to finance another week in Los Angeles. I had only been there one day, and already I was broke. But I was not broken, and that was all that mattered.

  CHAPTER 24

  * * *

  With a week to kill in L.A., I decided to take care of some unfinished business and repair my friendship with Jordan Clarkson. I still had not spoken with him since the day we looked at houses together many months earlier. He was doing well with the Lakers and I was happy for his success, but there was a hole in my heart at having lost one of my best friends for reasons I could not fathom.

  When Jordan again did not respond to my texts or phone calls—“Hey, brother, I’m in town again and wanted to get together; miss you”—the situation seemed hopeless. I called my parents several times that week to give them updates, and during one of the calls they told me that they had heard from Jordan’s family. Jordan, apparently, had told his parents that I was trying to reach him, and they all were concerned that I was looking for a place to stay. Now, finally, came the explanation for Jordan’s disappearance. His parents had felt that as a rookie in the NBA, with serious professional and financial obligations, Jordan had to focus entirely on his career and his job. They were worried that I was unemployed and in need of help, and they felt this was too great a burden for Jordan to take on under the circumstances.

  “Jordan is very young and he is going to have enough trouble taking care of himself,” they explained to the Blitzes. “He can’t take care of someone else.”

  Now it all made sense: the disappearing act, the lack of communication, the coldness of it all. Jordan did what his family told him to do, and no doubt felt bad about it, so bad that he couldn’t even tell me to my face. That was unfortunate, because I would have understood. I mean, it was messed up and wrong, in my opinion, and did not take into consideration the depth of our friendship and what we had been through together. Part of this, naturally, is cultural. I had grown up in a world that was at once cruel and communal. Family and friends in Africa are raised under a guiding principle of generosity. This is not true of everyone, of course—in times of great strife, people can and do behave selfishly—but I saw many times over the goodness inherent in my fellow man. I believed then and I believe now that there are few things stronger than the bond of friendship. If you are my friend, you are like family. And if you are family, what is mine is also yours. If we are both hungry, and all I have left is one tiny piece of bread, and you have nothing? Then I will give you half of my bread. There is no question about that. It is a simple moral obligation.

  Still, I understand that we all come from different places. I do not fault Jordan’s family for worrying about him and making recommendations based on what they felt was in his best interest. I do wish my friend had taken the time to be honest with me, rather than withdraw suddenly and completely from my life, at a time when I really needed his help.

  But I didn’t want to stay with Jordan now, and I sure wasn’t trying to interfere with his life in any way; I just wanted to get together for a cup of coffee and tell him how much I loved him, and that he would always be my brother. I wanted to share the news of my audition. I wanted to tell him: life is good, my friend. And soon we will be reunited here in this magnificent city.

  In order to get this message across, I first had to get clearance from Jordan’s parents, so that they would know that I had no intention of squatting in their son’s home or otherwise interfering with his progress. The next day, Jordan and I
did meet, and after a few awkward moments, everything was fine.

  “This thing happened to us,” I said. “But now it’s over. I just want you to know that you are still my brother, and nothing will ever change that. I love you.”

  “I love you, too,” Jordan said.

  A FEW DAYS LATER I returned to Susan Vash’s office. Oddly enough, though the stakes were even higher, I felt strangely calm as I walked into the building. Three of us had returned for a second audition (although not Ger Duany, which surprised me a bit), but this time I made eye contact with the others, even smiled and said hello. It’s hard to explain, but already I felt as though I had accomplished more than I ever imagined, and I realized suddenly that it was important to get that point across to the people who were waiting in the office.

  When it was my turn to audition, I walked in wearing a broad smile and with my hand extended.

  “Hello, I am Blondy Baruti,” I said to each person. It was a much busier room than it had been one week earlier. In addition to Susan and her assistant, the group also included writers Casey Johnson and David Windsor and producer Aaron Kaplan. They were all about to settle into their chairs when I asked them for a favor.

  “Before we start the audition, I’d like to tell you my story,” I said. This, I was later informed, is not typically a part of the audition process. Producers and writers and casting directors are busy people; protocol dictates that an actor stay on task: read your lines, say thank you, and get out of the room. But that seemed insufficient under the circumstances. As Susan smiled at me—she wanted enthusiasm, and I was going to give it to them—I began to talk.

  “I don’t know if I will get this job or not,” I said. “But I want you all to know that I am thankful for the callback. Looking back on my life, it seems hard to believe I am even here—standing in front of a group of writers and producers from Hollywood, auditioning for a role in an ABC pilot. This is a dream to me. I grew up very poor in the Congo. I escaped the violence of my home by running away with my mother and sister, for days and nights and weeks and months on end. Somehow, I survived. I moved to the western part of the Congo and started playing basketball, even though people told me I wasn’t good enough. I came to America, to this great country, and I went to college. I’ve had to go through a lot of struggle, but I am still here. And for me to be able to audition in front of you guys . . . it means everything to me. Whether I get the job or not, I feel like I have done something with my life, and I’m grateful to you for giving me the chance.”