xtcian

Real Time with chopin blake

3/12/04

The casting process for my show began today, so we made it onto the 20th Century Fox lot and saw a laundry list of actors, each of whom brought something different and fascinating to the table. I know this sounds confusing if you don't know why we're here in Hollywood (I'll explain it all next week), but being on the other side of auditioning – i.e., the side with all the power – is such a superior experience. They say baseball is a game where missing the ball 70% of the time makes you a superstar. Acting is a game where missing the role 98% of the time makes rent. I don't know how these people do it.

A few weeks ago in Brooklyn I swore that I'd attend a taping of "Real Time With Bill Maher," and as luck would have it, our manager is good friends with the executive producer. Thus, we went over to CBS and sat in the green room, furnished with chicken teriyaki sticks, shrimp tempura, and oatmeal cookies. The green room is where it is fucking AT.

This was easily Maher's best show of the year so far, featuring a line about Teresa Heinz that has to be heard to be believed. George Carlin was fabulous, naturally, and the ex-Prime Minister of Canada was stunningly brilliant, simple, sweet and could almost make you cry. Even if Bush wins again and we move to some mountaintop in the ass-crook of France, at least I know there was a show that spoke some truth for a time.

I would write more, but the Enemy of Fun™, Chopin the dog, overdosed again on Rimadyl, the Doggy Advil. He only took about ten pills this time (as opposed to the 80 or so he snarfed down in 2002) but it still left us in the animal hospital until the wee hours. I do hope he understands that just because we're in Hollywood, doesn't mean he has to go out like Marilyn Monroe.