Chapter 5: Chapter 5 – A Typical Day in Hollywood

Peter is lounging back in his custom-made, ergonomically designed, hi-tech office chair, tossing a football to himself, when a calendar reminder pops up on his desktop screen and makes an awful pinging noise. Informational meeting in 15 minutes. He yells out,“Fuck.” He pounds on his desk, then yells louder through the open door, “Kelly, do I have to go to this?” 

Kelly, his assistant, without turning around, yells back, “An intern requested an informational with you. You said this was a good time.” 

Peter throws the football at his couch, misses, and knocks over the metal trash can next to it. “If I get butt-fucked for my fantasy draft tonight, I’m blaming you.”

In the duration, Peter gloomily scrolls through his fantasy football picks. He emails a few tabs to himself, then sends a vulgar meme to his fantasy group chat about some sexual assault scandal currently unfolding in the NFL. 

Right on time, the intern walks into Peter’s office. “Hi.” He looks up from his computer monitor and is struck by the work of art that has apparated before him. For a moment, in his mind, he’s back in high school and he can’t think of what to say. All of the blood in his body has gone to his cock and he can’t breathe. 

“I’m here for the informational meeting.” Her voice belongs in an angel choir. She looks slightly annoyed, her face concerned between straight cut bangs and a black turtleneck. 

Peter blinks himself back to reality. “Yes, of course. Take a seat.” 

The intern sits in the chair across from him, holding eye contact as she smooths her skirt over her legs. “Thank you for taking the time to meet with me today.” 

“No problem, it gives me an excuse to talk about myself.” She laughs. To Peter, it might as well be an orgasm-moan. He stares at the dyed gold curls on the back of his assistant’s head. They look like receivers for a recording device that pipes conversation directly into his wife’s ear. 

“Hey, I haven’t had my afternoon caffeine fix yet, and I’m worried I won’t have time to pick anything up before my meeting later. Want to walk with me and we can continue this at Coffee Bean downstairs?” 

She looks at him quizzically. “Yeah, of course. Um, should I go get my wallet?” 

“No, no. This is on the company. We’re very generous,” He says with a conspiratorial smirk.

They sit out in the sun, at one of the patio tables outside of the Coffee Bean at the bottom level of the building. There is plenty of foot traffic here during the lunch hour, and anyone walking by would assume Peter and this young intern were having an innocent meeting. All above board. 

Peter talks about his start as a production assistant, and his move up to being an associate producer, then producer, where he worked on the red carpet during live shows. Then transferring to the development department to be a development assistant, until he was promoted to junior executive, where he cut his teeth watching his bosses create crap for a dying network. Finally he transitioned to the digital space, which a few years ago was considered the Wild West, but now, since all of the streaming services and smartphone apps had made it so easy for people to consume content on the Internet, it was easier to watch a digital show than to watch something on cable. 

He leaves out the part about how he used to want to be a film director and make great movies, and the part about how all of his earliest memories that weren’t of his parents beating the shit out of him and each other were watching cartoons like Rugrats and Angry Beavers and how he sobbed uncontrollable tears of joy after watching Shawshank Redemption and how when he watched Pulp Fiction for the first time he had to immediately watch it again because it gave him a certain good feeling and he even bought a Bad Mother Fucker wallet on eBay. He left out the part too about how every single thing he’s been involved in making since graduating Film School has made him consider suicide and that each one made him feel like he was pushing the cultural needle further and further in the wrong direction. He left out the part about how he’s largely given up making art because it’s hard. And how now he settles for cynically reading negative movie reviews of anything new that got made. 

The intern talks about her dreams of being a screenwriter. Her name is Daisy. Although she enjoys her classes in comedy and drama, she’s gravitating toward horror. She wants to learn everything she can about the entertainment industry and is willing to work long hours for free to get her foot in the door. She talks about her favorite horror movies and also how sometimes she has a nagging feeling that being a screenwriter isn’t really contributing anything to society and that maybe she should pursue a more meaningful occupation in a field like science or medicine. She catches herself and smiles shyly into her lap. She looks up at Peter without tilting her head up. A breeze blows through her hair and Peter gets a whiff of her vanilla scented shampoo. He hopes she doesn’t notice his nostrils flare as he breathes it in. A few seconds pass while Peter just looks at her. “Hey, don’t be embarrassed. I feel privileged to hear your thoughts. It’s always refreshing when young people are thoughtful. It’s an important time in your life, so I think it’s a good thing you’re thinking hard about these things. If you ever finish a script, I’d love to read it.” 

Her face lights up. “Really? That would be amazing.” 

“Yeah, of course.” Peter frowns as a reminder for his lunch meeting pings his phone. “Oh yeah, and just let me know before you send it. We have to get you to sign some release form or something, so if we ever accidentally steal one of your ideas you can’t sue us.” He winks. “And now, I need to get to my lunch meeting. It was great talking to you.” They stand up. He’s up a split second before her and takes a peak at the tops of her thighs as she gets out of her seat. They shake hands. Her hand is soft and warm and fits into his palm. He savors the feeling of her flesh pressed against his and hopes she can feel the heat of his desire.

#

Karen stares out the window, at the cars on the 101 freeway flowing beneath her. Counting them feels more productive than sorting through the ideas sent through from the development team. 25 ideas per person. 10 people on the team. 250 topline ideas. All stinking of garbage. Peter wanted her to narrow it down to her top 5 but it felt embarrassing to bring any of them to his attention. She’d have to come up with something herself if this week was going to be productive. The process of development is a strange one. You start with an idea. Something general enough that anyone who hears it could understand and picture it as a show or movie. It has to be familiar, so people who watch it will feel comfortable and safe watching it. It also has to be new, so people won’t feel like they’ve seen it before when they tune in. “Be” is the wrong word. It just has to feel new. If it is new, no one will watch it. If it feels new, like a fresh coat of paint, or a new character on Law and Order, that will be good enough for people. If it’s too familiar though, people will feel cheated, and will just go back to rewatching something that they already consider a comfort show. 

The process of development in its digital form is even stranger. With all the avenues of new media exploding onto the scene, a child in their bedroom opening toys can compete with multi-million dollar marketing budgets. The audience will reject anything that feels too expensive. Thereby the word “pro-sumer” comes into play. It should feel produced by a consumer, not a company. So, head-scratchingly, the corporation Karen and Pete work for pours millions of dollars into the digital development wing to create shows that look like they didn’t cost too much money to create. 

Model Camp for example. In which aspiring teen runway models go to a sleepaway camp in the Hamptons for a month to learn the power of friendship and the eating disorders that work for their particular metabolisms. Shoe Story, where a guy goes around Fairfax Avenue (a fashion forward district of Los Angeles frequented by Streetwear enthusiasts who line up to by clothing either for themselves or to sell on the resale market) and asks people about their shoes, where they bought them, how long they’ve worn them, and the sentimental value they hold, compared against their original cost and current resale value.

Ad Infinitum shows such as these were “developed in the digital wing.” Now, development is a strange word, because it includes many things. For example, thinking of an idea for a show is considered development, and if you spent an hour in a room, thinking of a show and came out with one idea or even a half idea, or an exponentially smaller portion of an idea that was greater than zero, that only existed in your mind, you could consider that a billable hour. You wouldn’t even need to write it down. 

The next step in development is writing that idea down, and “fleshing it out.” This might mean a working title and a one-to-two sentence description of the idea you had while sitting in a room. That way, you can email it to other people, or hand them a piece of paper with the idea on it while you’re in a development meeting so they can read it. 

Next step is the one pager. When the sentence long description becomes an entire page, with episode ideas, expanded description, even things like tone (comedic, informational, dramatic, for example), feel (documentary style, animated, guerilla style,etc.) and budget (presumptuous dollar amount that is way higher than necessitated by the idea). With this one-pager, you can really spread your idea around, get it on peoples desks, put it up on a Google doc projected on the big screen during a meeting while people also look at a hard copy of it on the conference table in front of them. This makes it a real idea, the title of which can even be written on the communal whiteboard that hangs in the middle of the hallway in the digital development wing, which is titled in Blue Handwritten dry erase marker “in development.” Ninety Nine times out of one hundred, that idea will be immortalized in the blue dry erase marker, and will stay there for eternity, or until it is wiped off. But sometimes, for some reason, something in the wind, or zeitgeist, or in popular brand marketing lexicon will suggest to the decision makers that the idea could have good market appeal, and it will go into the next step of development: piloting. 

A budget will be nailed down. Then “talent” will be auditioned. A set gets built if needed. And once scheduling has been done, a pilot is shot. Then edited. Sometimes a sizzle reel instead of a pilot (basically a series of “highlights” from a project, set to uplifting music and voiceover.) This pilot is sent around to potential brand partnerships and other decision makers. 99 times out of one hundred, this is the end of the road for the idea, and it will be shelved, immortalized as an .mp4 file on a company server, or a sample of work on “creative”’s portfolio website, which will live on until it is deleted to make more space on a harddrive. But sometimes, someone in power will like the pilot enough to give it a shot, and they and their team will give notes on the pilot, little pieces of information on things that could be improved here, or a suggestion for a different ethnicity for the host, or a different “look” for the on screen graphics, and so forth. 

Another pilot will be shot and edited based on these notes, and be set in front of the decision makers. And then another round of notes will be sent back based on the revised pilot. And so on and so forth. Until one day, the idea in pilot form is tweaked and adjusted to the point of being satisfactory to all decision makers and purse holders attached, and that pilot will get a series order. In terms of television, this was often a season, or ten episodes. In the digital landscape, it might get a five or ten episode order. And then if the market responds, and viewers tune in, and the platform it lives on is satisfied with its success, it will get another larger episode order, and become an actual show. During Peter’s time as head of the digital development wing, the one idea that had made it to this point, Doggy Runway, was unprofitable after episode 10, and was scrapped.

After looking hard at the blank word document on the computer for a few seconds, Karen checks her phone to make sure she didn’t get any texts. Nope. Phantom text. Could’ve been a small earthquake. She Googles to see if there are any recent earthquakes in Studio City. Of course, the search engine is of no use, since no major outlets would’ve reported an earthquake that quickly, so Karen checks Twitter. Nope. No recent earthquakes. But the redheaded girl Karen follows on Twitter (Strap Queen) has posted a new artful pegging video. Karen gets up from her desk and heads to the bathroom for some privacy. 

By the time she’s finished watching the pale, gyrating hips of Strap Queen plunging her strap-on dildo into the prone body of her petite sex slave, it’s necessary to rub out a quick one. 15 minutes later and it’s time for lunch. Karen splashes cold water on her face to bring the flush down. She washes the smell of cunt off her hands. Procrastinating never felt so bad when you were being paid for it. She gets back to her desk, pastes four of the least reprehensible ideas into a word doc, and shoots it to Pete’s email, with the Subject Line: We’re fucked. 

#

Peter is late again. He has a 1 o'clock lunch with an auteur television showrunner. A 22 year old wunderkind who already has 3 shows under his belt, along with a blockbuster indie and an impressive social media presence. It doesn’t hurt that his dad is the former head of ABC (different last name.)

The restaurant is Konbi. An overpriced dump next to a gas station. It specializes in those mini egg salad sandwiches they sell for a few yen in Japanese 7-11’s. Very instagrammable. Peter has driven around the block six times without any parking luck. Lowriders cough past him, other Teslas tailgate him and their drivers give him half asleep glares. Peter finally gives up and parks in one of the spots reserved for people using the tire air pump at the gas station. He jogs into the restaurant. He reminds himself to not have a heart attack. 

First bad sign: all white clientele in a Japanese restaurant. It’s packed. Various shades of whites snuggle up to the bar on tiny stools, their knees held close together to avoid rubbing up against their neighbors. 

Peter searches the place for the auteur. He knows he has an unkempt beard and wears Yeezys and vintage metal band shirts. He finally sees him at the end of the bar, which takes up half of the hallway sized restaurant. Peter removes his sunglasses and heads over. The smell of garlic and egg salad pervades the air of the restaurant.

The auteur rubs his hands together and asks Peter what he wants. Peter quickly scans the menu for any form of salad or protein. He hates the mayonnaise-y, mustardy taste of egg salad, but that’s what this place specializes in. He chooses the pork katsu sandwich. A pretty blonde waitress with a fat ass takes his order. Her blue eyes gleam with waitressly lust.

As the waitress turns, part of her skirt gets caught between her butt cheeks, pulling the material tight to each cheek. Peter can barely tear his eyes away.

Him and the auteur talk freeways and traffic for a while, then get down to business. 

“So what type of projects are y’all looking for?”, the auteur asks.

“Anything, really. We just want you, man. Literally anything you want to make, we will be there to support you in your vision.”

“Anything?”

“To an extent. I mean obviously you can’t pull a Faculty Member X with all the incest and Oedipal murder, and whatnot, but seriously, you can get pretty edgy.”

The auteur laughs ferociously at the reference of his own work. “Yeah (he draws out the ‘ah’ sound in his ‘yeah’ so it takes up almost five seconds of time)…” He’s struck by laughter again. “I am a pretty sick fuck. But I’m sure I could deliver something that would make all parties satisfied.”

The auteur picks up his chopsticks clumsily at their pointy ends, and uses them to try to pick up a few vinegary pickles, which slip out multiple times before he gives up and uses his fingers. Peter watches him shove them into his mouth and chew loudly while laughing to himself. “Yeah I got some pretty big ideas.” 

Peter says, “I would love to hear a couple of them.”

“Ehh… don’t want to give up too much before we sign anything. Plus this restaurant is packed, you never know who’s listening.”

“Fair enough. But are you interested in signing anything?”

“Let me eat first, bro- then I’ll let you know. I like to break bread with potential partners in business and art, so I can get a vibe on them.”

“Sure.”

The waitress brings the food. Her arm brushes against Peter's shoulder as she puts his pork katsu sandwich down in front of him. It takes up half of the coaster sized plate.

“This was $17.50?”

“Dude. It’s all about packing a large amount of unique flavor into a smaller package so it’s not overly intense. Getting that one perfect bite. America doesn’t have an obesity problem, it has a portion size problem.”

“I see.”

Peter bites into the sandwich, hot grease spurts out of the pork katsu and onto the inside of his hand, where his thumb joint meets his palm, burning it. The hot grease also spurts inside of his mouth, burning it simultaneously.

Peter forces a smile and puts his sandwich down. “Damn that is good. I just realized I forgot to wash my hands.” Peter stands up and backs into the blonde waitress. She trips and drops a pitcher of water onto the ground. 

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“I am so sorry about that.” He bends down to clean it up with some paper napkins.

“No need. Just leave it alone,” she tells him firmly.

“Sorry.” Peter rushes to the bathroom.

It’s the size of a poor person’s closet. He turns on the water and puts his hand under to prevent a burn from forming. The water is unfortunately boiling hot. He yanks his hand away and waits for it to cool. It never does. He gives up and walks back out to his lunch meeting. The Auteur is walking out of the restaurant door, pulling his NY LA baseball hat on tight and giving a half smile to Peter as he exits.

Peter gets back to his car after paying the check for the ungrateful brat. It’s too fucking hot in Echo Park and it feels like the sun is shining directly into his eyes no matter where he looks. He feels his skin straining against his shirt as it gets that irritable itchy feeling right before a sweat comes on. He finally arrives at his Tesla. He sits in it and blasts the mercifully cold A.C. A window wiper tries to wash his window and he waves them away, “Fuck off. Thank you very much.” He starts the car and pulls away before any other miscreants can approach. 

“Tesla, call Karen.” He turns onto Sunset and makes an illegal U-TURN toward Dodger Stadium and the 110 freeway. After a couple of rings she picks up. Her voice fills the car at a pleasant volume. With the Tesla’s climate control and his designer sunglasses on, Peter has almost completely forgotten how hot it was outside. 

“Hey, Pete—” 

“Karen. I just met with the second biggest douche in Hollywood. Meeting was a total failure.” 

“Who’s the biggest?” 

“It’s in your bathroom cabinet, right?” 

“Wow, you are good. Did you overhear that from your child molesting mentor post coitus when he was on an important phone call?” 

“Karey… you are becoming so clever… you almost had the delivery on that one. Anyway, speaking of molesting, I gotta head to this next meeting over at the Four Seasons, can you take the TikTok or Twitch or whatever the fuck guy it is solo?” 

“Yeah, it’s not ’till 4, you want me to come to the Four Seasons?” 

“Naw, I should probably handle it myself. It’s with the female Harvey Weinstein of digital content development. Probably not gonna be done ’til after 7—” 

“You sure you don’t want backup?” 

“Yeah, I think I can handle it myself. And don’t let those Zoomers push you around. Get in, listen to their pitch, and get out.” 

“You got it. Should be fun.” 

“You’re too fucking positive sometimes. Not a good look.” 

“I guess I haven’t met enough Weinstein types yet.” 

“In good time, In good time. Catch you later.” Peter hangs up, pulls onto the freeway, and cuts across four lanes of traffic without using his turn signal. 

At the Four Seasons, Pete sees the sturdy 65 year old Gloria Hodgkins, seated with her knees spread apart, in a cream pantsuit. Her cravat neatly tied like Kamala Harris’s at her victory speech in Delaware. She gets up to greet Peter, smiling warmly, arms reaching for a hug. He gives her a warm embrace and lets her kiss him wetly on the cheek. She squeezes his arms after pulling away and studies his face for a few beats too long. “Peter, sweetie, you look great. Come, we have a table waiting for us.” She takes him by the crook of his elbow and leads him through the ostentatious pink marble lobby. They walk through the hall, under gilded crown molding and glass chandeliers, then out onto the lunch terrace to a white metal table in the dining area. 

A waiter brings them their menus. Peter refuses the man with a slight gesture of his hand. “I actually ate already. I’ll just have a seltzer water please.” 

“Get him a bloody Mary. Make it two.” Gloria barks the order gruffly, without breaking eye contact with Peter. 

As the waiter scurries off, Peter politely reminds him, “and also a seltzer too, please.” He’s not sure if the waiter heard him, but he tries to look relaxed. 

He turns to face Gloria. “Look, I know you’re a busy woman so I’ll get right to it: any project you want, any person you want, and basically any budget you want. We need new blood pumped into our digital wing, and we need it STAT. I’m going to be frank with you. Our higher ups are going to shitcan me if we don’t get something soon— blow up the whole digital streaming development branch entirely, and— this is off the record— they could be cutting off the entire subsidiary altogether— it’s become a bit of an albatross for Disney, so my bosses are pretty fucking desperate for a hit— they are really willing to basically pay any price, within reason… So, Gloria, what do you got for me?” 

Gloria eyes him coolly. “Okay… I've got a couple of promising projects in line… very promising. Been in a bit of a bidding war with one of them, between YouTube and Facebook Watch… could be taking it to Netflix or HBO Max, even. Pretty much a guaranteed hit, but it won’t be cheap.” 

Peter leans forward and says, “pitch it to me.” The waiter brings the Bloody Mary’s and a seltzer water. 

Gloria rips the celery stalk out of her drink and takes a sultry chomp out of it. As she chews, she says “You fuck me for it, and it’s yours.” 

Pete examines her face and puts on a half smile like he thinks she might be kidding. “Gloria…. you’re trouble, aren’t you?” 

“I’m 100% serious. You fuck me, and I make them pick you. You don’t even have to pay basically anything for my finder’s fee. Just give us a good rate on it, because it will be a hit. But I can’t bring it to you in good faith without you fucking me first.” 

Pete grabs his seltzer water to take a sip. Some of it spills onto the table when he picks it up. “I don’t even know what it’s about.” 

Gloria keeps staring at him. “I’ll tell you after you fuck me. What, am I that unpalatable?”

#

Karen is at the “Hype House”, surrounded by TikTokers. Some glance at her from a pool table. Others play with their various toys and gadgets. They’re all very young. The youngest is twelve, and the oldest might be 21. Nonetheless, they all drink from red cups that reek of alcohol and all partake in the smoking of a joint, which they pass in a clockwise rotation. Karen even sees white powder stuck to the 12 year old’s bleeding nose as he stumbles out of the bathroom after “taking a piss.” 

The TikTokers’ manager is there. He could be 25, but it’s hard to tell with all of his face tattoos and strange manner of speaking. He checks out the girls in the group between periods of staring at his phone. He never looks directly at Karen. She sits on a large white poof in the living room, between a massive Restoration Hardware Cloud Couch and an even more massive wall mounted flat screen television, upon which, half the screen displays porn, while the other half displays a video game that two of the kids on the couch, half stoned little boys, are playing. 

“So, it’s like a show about the lives of an internet celebrity and the crazy shit they get into,” the manager mumbles as he checks something lazily on his phone. 

Karen nods her head enthusiastically, “Awesome, what kind of crazy shit?” 

“You know, like going out, partying— all types of shit. You should see what they get into.” One of the young girls bursts into tears and jogs to the bathroom while hiding her face with her hands. 

Karen watches her with concern. “Is she okay?” 

“Yeah, she’s aight. She had an abortion today.” 

“Oh, okay, that’s gotta be hard— so do you have like a sizzle reel or something I could watch to just get a feel for it? I think you may have mentioned it over email. Something I could send to my colleagues when I pitch this to them.” 

“Yeah, naw…. I got something.” The manager turns to the kids on the couch. “Yo— throw me the remote.” The manager yells to the room, but no one pays attention to him. “Kids, right?” He shrugs, then digs through couch cushions for a few minutes before he finds it. He changes the HDMI setting to his laptop, which is attached by a cord from its place on the coffee table to the flat screen, then pulls up a sizzle reel. It’s a poorly cut together compilation of Tik Tok videos the teens had made. Half way through, there’s a shot of the manager having sex with the young girl who had ran to the bathroom, filmed on a mirror from the manager’s perspective on a bed. 

Karen gets up. “I’m gonna leave, actually… I think that’s considered child porn…” She rushes out.

#

Peter sits at the edge of the bed with his head buried in his hands. Gloria relaxes against the headboard, her tits staring out over the rumpled bed sheet. She smokes a fat cigar. “Well, if you don’t like any of my projects, that’s fine. I’m sure they’ll do just great on another platform.” 

“I can’t believe I let you fuck me…” 

“Peter, please. You were the one doing the fucking.” 

“I could take this shit to the LA Times and you’d be dead in this town.” 

“Don’t you have a wife? You think you can convince her that I raped you?” 

“Fuck you, Gloria!” 

“Again, so soon? You’re such a stud.”

Peter pulls up his pants and yanks his shirt on and rushes out of the hotel room. Gloria puffs her cigar luxuriously.

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