The Flying Mafioso Brothers

Today was a damn good day. A day of firsts. My first time travelling on business. My first time working for Talbots. My first hotel room by myself, my first time staying in a four star resort hotel. Good times.
My flight was to leave at 1020 Sunday am from Newark. I dont know Newark well so I left at seven to be there by 830 knowing how uotite they are about international flights. My bizarre, bush hating fundamentalist christian, proported ex-med student at the Guadalajara Medical school for do-gooding wannabe doctors, spoke like a 40s radio announcer and drove like a grandma at dusk. Even so, i was very early. I bought water and the latest issue of Paper magazine and bided my time until Peter showed up.

When he arrived, we compared seats and realized that we were really far apart so i switched out of an aisle in the rear of the plane and into row 11 seat D...the party seat!!

Peter was in the same row, in the window seat on the other side of the plane. Thank god he wore headphones the whole time. Across the aisle from me sat a morbidly obese older man with a porcine face. He quietly asked the passing stewardess for a seatbelt extender and they removed the arms on the chair. He got up out of seat five times, each time placing a vast expanse of back, butt crack and side roll inches from my face, and reached into his bag in the the overhead compartment to get Hershey's bars with almonds. Thats five bars, and five butt in faces, before takeoff. It was very depressing.

Next to me sat two clean cut, jersey looking guys. I borrowed a pen from the closest one to me to fill out my customs form. We started exchanging pleasantries when a stewardess came over the intercom and announced that the plane had a flat tire (did you just notice once we were all aboard??) and that we would be leaving in another 40 mins. They had coffee I had water. We took off. I napped. I woke up. They ordered screwdrivers, I declined. They ordered another drink...and split a large Vicodin. I knew at that point it was either join in the party or suffer the rest of the flight. I had a margarita. Theyre on a golf trip and the rest of their party is sitting in first class. Sal, the slightly stooped stocky man sitting in the window seat, which means he has an almost unbearably bright halo around his shining bald head when he leans across to talk to me, is the resident pro at the Country club in Jersey that they all belong to. Which basically makes him god. He has a close grey goatee, wears his sunglasses on his neck and a pink polo shirt emblazoned with the logo of some exotic golf tourney somewhere. They take these hedonistic golf trips all over the world. Ireland, Bahamas, etc. No wives allowed. They both agreed they left their wives with a couple grand for the week and and told em they were away on business. The first thing I noticed about Sal was his voice. I told him he should try a career in voice over and i wasnt kidding. He sounds like marlon brando at 65 after a bourbon and a couple cigars. So deep and scratchy. It coulda made hm millions. In point of fact if he had tried out for a role on the Sopranos he certainly would have gotten it. As they drank more and more screwdrivers each one with four mini bottles of Skyy at a time, his scratchy rasp got louder and louder. Larry, in the middle seat, is the newest protogee on his first trip with Sal. He is tall and well built with beautiful hands and a weird naivete to him that you wouldnt expect from someone so wealthy. He had recently had his nose done. I found this out when sal was like "you like that nosea his? Elegant an' slenda, no?" According to both, it had been big to begin with but was very crooked after he was accidentally hit in the face with a skeet at the club. He has thinning dyed hair (dyed, he revealed) in a classic italian modified pompadour. Both men wore shorts.

They drank fast and heavily. I had a screwdriver, with one vodka. No ability or interest in keeping up with them. Especially since Larry is constantly reminding me that Sals the professional, Sal knows what hes doing, He, Larry, is the straight man, just keeping up, trying to learn the ways. Sal starts telling stories. Hes been up and down and up and down in life. Playing high risk stocks and heavy into what he called (to my great joy) the cash business he had won and lost a serious fortune twice. Hes lived out of suitcases and laundered huge sums through remodeling and flipping mansions in nassau county. He built a hundred thousand dollar bathroom with heated walls and floors. A legacy golfer he has been in the country club business in Brooklyn and Long Island where he grew up, nad now New Jersey. He pulled out of the clubs in LI when his cash contributions to the politicians to remain the Club Pro grew to outsize his salary. He says the BK and LI mobs are essentially dead and that its all politics now. You just pay directly instead of giving the protection money which eventually went to the politicians. Its worse, he says, now because unlike the Cosa Nostra, there is no honor to the Mayors and reps, you dont even get what you pay them for. He prefers NJ where things remain in the hands of organized crime. He recalled his first Guinea basement party in Bay Ridge. He went with his girl, now his wife who sounds like a real spitfire. There were little kids singing in Italian, brains stretched out over a dryer being made into tripe, and an old man in the corner playing accordion.

Sals a complex man. Constantly reminding us that hes not an educated man, he is sharp as hell with amazing street smarts. He seems acutely aware that thought he leads the group, hes their employee, and never forgets it. Larry worships him. Larry's a smart soft stockbroker. He grew up in Buffalo and his career and marriage has followed an easy arc to tremendous financial success, a lovely wife and six year old child. Basically he feels like a pansy, like being the family man has lost him touch with his inner child, who wants to drink, play golf and cards, travel and pal around with other wealthy grown men acting like bad kids. he reads historical fiction and lets his wife put his passport in a plastic bag and mark his luggage with a ribbon. I heard them talking to each other "Larry I gotta be completeleh honest witcha, yer a pussy larry." " I know Sal. I know Im a pussy, but Im working on it."
So larrys drinkin hard trying to convince sal that he doesnt want to be the wall street fruit that he really is. Sal's shoutin, starting to repeat stories, every other anecdote he stops to invite me to come and celebrate Sammy Hagar's birthday with them at Cabo Wabo. "Lissen, we ah just hahmless guys. Were heyh to golf, drink al'col, smoke a little, and laffs. We jus' laaff and laaaaff and have fun. Its all about laffs. You'll be the queen, we gonna take carayah." With Larry repeatedly interjecting "yeah! we're the nicest guys ever" and laughing nervously. The people around us were glaring at us with increasing hostility, and the vodka keeps flowing. Is there no cut off in the air? Im wondering as i check again to make sure peter isnt one of the people looking annoyed. One of their friends comes back, ostensibly to visit but i could tell he came to tell them that they could be heard in first class and to apologise to me for having to put up with them. Meanwhile theyre telling they guy how fantastic I am, how im the best and this is the best fligtht ever and that im going to go to Cabo Wabo with them and bring all the models from my photo shoot. Death first?

Their friend offers to let me watch a movie on his IPod. Sensing my only out before Sal starts getting truly innappropriate i take him up on it. I choose the untouchables and spend the next hour half listening to Kevin Costner try to bust the mafia smuggling liqour in prohibition times and the other half hearing Sal ask larry if theyre gonna get laid tonight. Completely harmless. Larry "Yes, absolutely, Ill make sure of it. If I have to pay Ill make sure." Sal "I dont mind payin, im the typa guy, ill be completeleh honsest I got no problem breakin out my wallet myself and paying." They try to order yet another round and are told they have drunk the plane dry.
Then segwaying into a story about their mutual friend Paulie, "Laary. Laary you got to cahl Paulie. i loves freakin paulie. i loves dat paulie and hes in trouble. he still owes me for the pills I got waitin for him at da house, and he comes to me he cant pay? you gotta call paulie larry. Hes in trouble. I love Paulie Laary."

I think the obese man across the aisle, who im sure cant fit into the tiny bathrooms, has crapped his pants. Not a good smell with recirculated air.

We are informed that we are descending into the Cabo airport and all electronic devices must be shut off. Slurring now and half lidded, Sal takes this opportunity to tell me how beautiful I am and what a nice girl but hes not sure of the haircut. he doesnt like the bangs, i have too nice of a face for bangs. I need a new hairstylist according to Sal. meanwhile larry the pussy is sort of chuckling at what sal is saying and sort of apologising for him and telling me incredulously that hes never seen him so wasted and simultaneously tryin g to get me to to call them later.

Then Sal comes out with the kicker, right as we land "You know, you shoulda been a guinea insteaduva jew. You know dat? Dont you think so? In fact my fadda said its best to be a jew from the neck up and a guinea from the neck down." I couldnt make this stuff up people.

Finally we landed and Sal says he hopes he hasnt been too obnoxious. I assured him i had had a good time. Which I had. And we figure out that well be on the same plane back. Amazing.

I didn't call them, but I kept Larry's number cause I would love to go meet them at the club for lunch one day. I loved going to the Country Club with my grandparents in LA as a kid, all that old fashioned gallantry and formal rules of dress and conduct. It would be fun. Its all about the laughs!

Cabo Job-o!

Sammy Hagar has got to be some kind of fucking moron. Not that we need further proof after his hair/antics as the sloppy seconds post Diamond Dave front man for Van Halen. But to start a bar in a town called Cabo, meant to be a haven for the worlds worst-of-the-worst drunks who come complete with lots of vacation money for tequila and novelty t-shirts, that you name the towns name plus a meaningless rhyming syllable afterwards is so stupid its painful. Cabo Wabo. Chicago Whicago. Provo Wovo. Boise Woise. Dear lord. Apparently its just stupid enough to work. Fat, ugly Americans with no style, a party hearty attitude and a taste for public foreign drunkenness flock there. And revere Hagar's stupid ass for spawning a tequila, taco, schwag weed and barf party that lasts all year. In fact when i was in Cabo last week, it was ol sammys birthday party. I doubt that he went, but a lot of other morons did. I tried really hard not to cross the line into the Cabo Wabo courtyard during my stay, but the producers of the Talbot's catalog shoot that i was on wanted to buy a stupid tshirt for one of their husbands (who apparantly wanted people to know what a Cabo Wabo kind of guy he was so much that he's down to rep the spot with a t shirt without even going there.) I voiced my concerns about endorsing the place with my presence and about the amount of tolerance that it would use up which I could otherwise use waiting for them to try on their one thousandth poncho or buying a lil sombrero for their chihuahua. I couldnt see it clear to stand outside like a little kid while they went in, argh, so I went in too for a few moments and took in the puyallup fair crowd in cornrows and sombreros drinking tequila shots and corona backs. Really reminds you why the white house is in its current shape, it does represent the majority of our people. Sad sad sad but true. At least the ones who vote and make political contributions. And know how to read and write, at least marginally.

Baby Wrangler

Because I know none of you have the inclination to become a tool of the capitalist advertising regime, and I have the discipline to be your mole in the consumer cornfield, let me drop a little knowledge on you about the hierarchy and the different roles and responsibilities of everyone on set at your average commercial photo shoot.

1. Client: the person who actually works for the company that makes the product youre all there to advertise. Knows the company vision and is the one everyone wants to make happy. In a macy's type situation, there is no client, just the...

2. Creative Director: remember the Nanny in the madras shorts and the heavy woman with the heavy glasses? They're the reps of the big Macy*s cheese and what they say about the creative content of the advertisement goes. If they say the hair is flat or the pants look baggy or the lighting is too cool, then it is and whomever's department the offending detail falls under scrabbles to right the insufferable wrong as quickly as possible. They're the ones that say things like "I think the ponytail is fresh and exciting!" and "Those boots are all wrong for that coat."

3. The Producer; Easily the most stressed out person on set, the producer is responsible for all the logistics, the catering, the space rental, the models and the hair and makeup, they do all the booking, though they choose according to who the photographer likes to work with. they send their production assistants to get coffee for everyone in the afternoon and its just generally their job to keep everyone happy and make sure everyone has what they need. Again at a predominantly in house production like Macy*s, there is no producer on set, just someone in an office somewhere who works with the creative directors to makes sure everyone is booked and the food will arrive at the right time.

3. Art Director: micro manages every detail making sure that everything is produced in order to offend the flawless sensibilities of the creative director as little as possible.

4. Photographer and PAs (photo assistants) The PAs run around like crazy checking the lighting. setting up the sets hanging the backdrops, setting up all the electricty. and doing digital tech stuff in the monitor as the pictures get uploaded from the camera. They're generally very artsy, mainly aspiring photographers themselves and are almost all scruffily handsome with some sort of facial hair formation and a devil may care attitude. They are rarely women and often sexy. The photographers really vary. They can really set the tone of the shoot. If they're calm, confident and know their shit the shoot usually goes fast and has high morale. but if they're incompetent and cant get the right looks outta the models it can take way too long to get each picture and everyone gets frustrated (the macy*s in house guy is like that, has a crap eye and the creative director doesn't trust her instincts so its hella wishy washy and takes FOREVER.)

5. Stylists and stylist assistants are usually the hippest people on set with the most unique accessories and the ones with the skinniest jeans, most extreme mullets and most delicate hipply themed necklaces (swallows, anchors, antlers, luck amulets of any kind.) They are responsible for all things clothing and accessory. Their tools of the trade are big orange electrical clamps, clamshell clamps of the office supply variety, and safety pins (all for securing the loose extra material of clothes made to fit the tubby average joe behind the back of the day's sentient hanger) duct tape (to smooth pants closures and make calves of boots fitted),and lint rollers. They spend their lives shopping and returning and questing for the perfect shoe collection. They can justify buying anything, in any size.
They often include a tailor for last min alterations and detailing. The seamstress is often the most interesting girl on set.

6. Hair and make up: the earliest ones on set Hair and makeup arrives with much gear and has to get cracking as soon as there is a model on set. The assistants usually blow out hair and set in velcro rollers for volume, prep skin, moisturize, apply foundation and browset and then run on set with an "on set bag" full of combs, boar bristle brushes, hairspray, anti frizz stuff, blot powder and lip gloss. We dart in and out of the picture adjusting and arranging the hair and then dart back to our post at the fan, making the illusion of action and excitement by giving the hair movment with the "wind machine." You spend most of your time dreading the call "Hair!!! Can we have HAIR on set please?"

7. Prop stylists and prop assistants. Need an indoor lawn? a curtain of Christmas ornaments? A pink tennis racket and balls? Water wings, flippers, goggles and innertubes? Should it be snowing on set? Perhaps an in studio snowball fight! Want the model in antlers? Or maybe the sweater line would look best in front of a wall of evergreens. This is all the work of the prop stylist. Anything that isnt clothes or a model is up to them. They have the most behind the scenes work (covering lawn furniture in astroturf etc) and seem to be the least obtrusive characters on set.

Im sure this isnt a comprehensive list, but it sums up the general categories, and gives you some kind of idea of what gets done.

One more role Ive yet to detail and that I actually just learned about it on this shoot.
Baby Wrangler. You heard me, Baby Wrangler. There arent many, and apparantly they get paid a pretty penny (not enough, whatever it is.) Theses are the insane yong men and woman whose job it is to get good pics out of these kid and make scads of parents buy buy buy so that the thousands of dollars spent wrangling these beautiful children will pale in comparison to the number of tiny pink flared courderoys and children's place brand Crocs flying off the shelves.
On this shoot, the baby wrangler was also the stylist. She was a blonde, highly fashionable lesbian who once worked for non profits in SF but found herself enjoying making real money in NY with styling and ten years later shes screaming "Nobody better call me a....PICKLEFACE!!! (All scream "PICKLEFACE!!")Nobody better say Im a....NOODLEHEAD!!! (NOODLEHEAD! etc) Dont you turn to each other and LAUGH!!! ("Angie his left sleeve is covering his thumb, left LEFT!!") Whatever you do Wyatt dont tell Lee a secret about me!!!"
Depending on the kids age, shes doing anything from "PEEKABOO!!!" and "AAAAAACHHHOOO" (for the infants) to "Who do you think is my boyfriend? Did you know my boyfriend wears a bra and is named JOANNA?? Fatima do you think summer has a boyfriend named CUCUMBER HEAD??" for the 7 to 10 year olds. It was INSANE. The kids love her. Kids are so stupid.

Movin' on up!

Its eleven nineteen on Monday night. I just got home from eating dinner at my new friend Charlotte's house. She is the lovely young woman I have been assisting at Macy*s. She is tiny and adorable, a few years older than me with big curly hair, brown skin and sparkly brown eyes. She was raised by a teen mom and a heroin addicted dad, both mexican, in the midwest. She lived in Seattle for a short time and loved it, thats what got me the in with her at the outset. She does beautiful work and is a rare find in this industry, down to earth, competent and real. Her ipod selection was so enviable that I was forced to buy a new ipod and steal all her music, she had me ship it to her and she put the entire eleven thousand song content of her pod on it and programmed all my settings for me. She rocks. So I went to pick it up and she invited me to stay for dinner with her and her boyfriend, a half jewish photographer of french parentage who grew up in Australia. It was a lovely dinner attended by one of his friends, a corporate team builder in from sydney, a hairdresser friend of Charlotte's who was gearing up to do Donna Karan's hair the next day and a swedish photographers assistant in NYC for the week on a job.
Today I worked the first of a two day shoot for children's place, a massive childrens clothing chain. It wasnt that much fun, the photographer and the producer are both German, so it had an overwhelmingly chilly krauty energy and the client rep was a weathered, bitchy jap whose, hard won still slender frame did little to make up for her haggard countenance and age innapropriate dress. Shes the sort of woman who assumes everyone below her in the heirarchy of the shoot is of below average IQ and should be spoken past, and hopefully avoided altogether. If you make a friendly comment or joke her way, shell scrunch up her face in some parody of a smile and seamlessly start talking to someone else about something else. Introduce yourself and she'll shake your hand limply and say nice to meet you and not tell you her name. that kind of energy from the person running the show has a kind of trickle down affect on the whole crew. It really took the cake when the photographer brought her six month old infant over to us for a "maddox" which they had apparantly given him in Ibiza when she was there over the summer and she kvelled about how it looked GREAT on him. Well maybe so but he wasnt loving the hair dryer (CAUSE HES A BABY!!!) and his limp blond hair which hadnt been cut in months wasnt loving the stand up action necessitated by the jolie-pitt's little PR dream fauxhawk. Ugh, so annoying.
I was assisting Peter Valley, the selfsame phenomenal makeup artist and hairstylist who I will be accompanying to CABO SAN LUCAS for a week next sunday!! Ill be there for six days at www.marquisloscabos.com. Eat yer heart out!! I couldnt need to get out of here more. I worked a day with Peter for a Macy*s fur spread and the next day his agency called and asked if i could make it to Cabo in a couple of weeks. I had to jump ship on a wedding I had committed to, which i felt crappo about and ditch out on a fall trip through Vermont with Ben, but I had to take it. That kind of opportunity comes around rarely and can lead to big things. Im nervous, because I dont stay up all night snorting coke, listening to electronica and neo folk and taking tequila shots and I think most of the fashion photo set does, but I tested the party waters with Peter, a white guy who hails (fourth generation) from Kingston Jamaica, and he says he throws in the towel early and leaves the kids to party. I was seriously releived to hear that esp since we shoot starting at like five AM to beat the heat that sets in by one or two. The shoot is for Talbots, who takes four trips to Cabo per season, and Im the only assistant so I dont think itll be too terribly demanding. but you never know.
The salon has been busy as heck lately. Sunday I did a wedding at seven thirty AM for a sweet but dry white couple both with nervous laughs who plan to honey moon in South Africa. I then ran to the salon for ten o clock and was booked solid on the hour until six pm. All requests. My feet felt horrendous by the time i got out of there. But I did good hair, which I needed since I got my first bad review on line this week. Ill try to find it and post it for you later but for now...Its now eleven thirty seven and i have to be up doing pro kid models (very creepy) hair in a matter of hours. Hair never rests! Ta ta!