Agencies, Food, and Radio City Music Hall
After convincing one of the other PAs that returning the four hundred seventy-two cases of camera gear, of which six were actually used, I got through the rest of the summer of 1985 without running afoul of the Teamsters or their escaped mascot, Lurch.
Autumn came to New York and though I’d like to comment on the beautiful foliage, milder temperatures, and East Side brats back in their school uniforms, I spent most of Fall captive inside a cargo or passenger van shuttling pretentious ad agency fops from their office digs at 47th and Madison to soundstages all the way over at 47th and Tenth Avenue. More than one of them would complain about how sitting all day made them flabby, but that conversation would occur between squeezing themselves into a fifteen-person rental vehicle with a box of Dunkin’ Donuts and a large coffee, light and sweet.
I wasn’t a great audience, and after I suggested that taking a seven-block walk might help their physiques, they never offered me any donuts again.
After boring me to the point of turning up Howard Stern to drown out these self-indulgent losers, the next thing Body by TastyKake talked about was craft services and lunch.
Flabby: “Were those day old bagels yesterday?”
Me: “I don’t see how they’d last that long.”
Fortunately this jab didn’t register for several days thereafter. By that time I was safely on another job, and another group of future Weight Watchers clients. I envisioned the previous herd descending on the pig trough once known as the craft services table.
By the way, the most out-of-shape ad agency I ever worked for was the one that handled the Jenny Craig account. I won’t mention their name, but if it had occurred during the cell phone-camera era, I’d have evidence.
After the Biblical Plague of Agency Bulimics (minus the second part) polished off the morning spread, they’d turn their attention not to the job at hand, but to the lunch menu. At times we’d hire a caterer, but of course that bill of fare had to be approved by the twenty-four-year-old anorexic graduate of Smith College, or “The Agency Producer” as we came to know them.
Prior to that, the following conversation took place between the Whiny God King director, line producer Richie Zeifman, and whichever part of the “creative” team could tear themselves away from the pastries.
Richie: “Brad. Take a look at the rehearsal.”
Brad: “Mmphhgrlmg.”
Richie: “Alright, let’s roll camera.”
Brad: “Mmphhgrlmg!”
Whiny God King du Jour: “Cut!”
Brad: “Mmphhgrlmg!!”
Richie: “Circle that take. Let’s move to 211 and add the parmesan cheese to the broccoli spear.”
A few hours later, after swallowing his fifth plate of breakfast, and just before assaulting lunch, Brad, already through a second pack of cigarettes, would ask Whiny God King if he’d gotten the broccoli spear from overhead.
Whiny God King du Jour: “I didn’t see that on the board.”
He removed the cigarette and placed a pat of butter in his mouth to show it would not melt.
Brad: “What’d you think I was saying when Ricky asked me to check the shot?”
Whiny God King du Jour: “It sounded like “Mmphhgrlmg! And he prefers Richie.”
The butter vaporized with the next round of expletives.
Brad: “Does he? Perhaps he should communicate with his director better.”
Whiny God King du Jour: “Perhaps you shouldn’t talk with your mouth full.”
Richie : “Reset after lunch!”
Richie’s tact delayed the schoolyard brawl between the fat kid and the insecure kid. The fat kid went back to his Happy Meal with the Diet Coke. The insecure kid left the table for a smoke.
The reason I’ve taken a moment to describe these culinary fetishes is this ad agency and director worked on my first “Stands In For or Doubles As” commercial job.
“Stands In For or Doubles As” is a term in film production that took off in the eighties.
An example.
You want to shoot a scene at Sutton Place in New York City, you have two options. You can pay the confiscatory permit fees necessitated by an endless parade of corrupt politicians in the Big Apple government, or you can find a location that looks like Sutton Place. Given that ninety-nine percent of the viewing public wouldn’t know Sutton Place from Peyton Place, most enlist the second option and go to Brooklyn Heights or Riverdale.
TOMORROW: STAND-INS AND THE LITTLE PEOPLE
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