At the moment, I am on cloud nine after having "worked" a full day on the show "Community." I say worked in quotations because I basically spent 15 hours on the Paramount lot doing a metric boatload of absolutely nothing. I guess you could count it as 14 official work hours, minus the hour-long lunch break (which was actually an hour and a half), during which time I snuck in a coffee date on Melrose with my actor/singer/producer friend Andrew Appel, whom I've been meaning to catch up with for a while.
This whole day has left me feeling like a fan of many things. First of all, I am a HUGE fan of days like this -- easy, fun workdays that leave me more relaxed than even the laziest of days at home. I am a fan of the Paramount lot, which -- once I take a glimpse beyond the confines of our gross little smelly little prison of a holding cell -- is majestic and magical and the birthplace of all these epic things that made me want to make movies in the first place. I'm a fan of the camera guy I ran into at crafty who showed me, step-by-step, how to make the perfect peanut butter sandwich combo which was actually two sandwiches -- nutella on one side, raspberry jam on the other. I'm a total fan of Danny Pudi, whom I ran into on another trip to crafty. I struck up a conversation with him, which was easy to do since I had recently seen him perform at The Thrilling Adventure Hour. The fact that he is part of that crowd already earned him massive points in my book. His costume -- a green pair of pajamas with rocket ship print -- totally won my heart.
Needless to say, by the time I clocked out at 11:12 PM, my cake was thoroughly iced. But the night wasn't over yet for this Fan Girl -- I had one more pit stop to make. On my way home from Hollywood, I stopped by the house of my acting teacher, James Eckhouse, to drop off a DVD copy of my short film, "Lifeline." (He had told me in class on Monday that he could take a look at it and give me feedback this week.) This moment was actually a huge deal for me for several reasons. First of all, like many of my peers in their mid-to-late 20s, I grew up watching [the original] Beverly Hills 90210, so James was a fixture of my childhood. This was strongly reinforced by the fact that last year I had gone back and re-watched THE WHOLE SERIES on Netflix (at least through season five, after which point Jim Walsh was no longer a principal character).
Around the same time of my Beverly binge, I also saw James in an independent film called "Half-Life." I was still living in Berkeley, and I remember being in a mire of artistic angst over "Lifeline" at the time. Normally, when I go to those Film Festival screenings with the cast and crew Q&A at the end, I do my best to come up with some extremely witty, thought-provoking question that not only makes the filmmakers look into their "process" in a way they previously hadn't, but also (one can only hope) makes them go, "That girl who asked that question must be totally smart, and creative, and an actor/filmmaker too; just the kind of person I want on my team!" This time, the only burning question that came to mind was "How did you get James Eckhouse to act in your film?"
So there I was, at his doorstep, dropping a copy of MY SHORT FILM -- the very same short film I had been working on while watching him on multiple screens, big and small, dreaming about my life in LA! I took the time to really drink it in -- watching the wind blow through the trees, thinking about how far I'd come, and laughing at my inner 10-year-old for STILL not getting over the fact that his zip code wasn't actually 90210. It's totally silly, but it kills me; it really does.
So there is my flood of fandom for the night. Now, it's back to the books with Buffy. I have a half-formed Frankenstein monster of a song, which I need to flesh out and finally freaking finish. In order to do that, I must watch AT LEAST Warren's debut episode, I Was Made to Love You. Whoever happens to be reading this, I'm holding myself accountable to you. But enough manifesting for the night. It's time for some Dollhouse and dreams.
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