Welcome to Show Business, Baby

I have read too many women’s magazines. “Follow your muse,” they say. Do I even have a muse? I am 35. I am a divorce lawyer. I am stressed out. I live in a world where people fight over Beanie Baby collections and 10-year-old furniture. Yet, inexplicably, I’m convinced I have a muse, so I quit my job and move to California.

I will work in the Entertainment Industry, I say. I’m not sure what this means, but it sounds very much like I’m following my muse.

I attack my job search with zeal. I read the trade magazines, I call people I barely know to network, and I attend industry functions at which I know no one. I send resumes to blind ads in the back of Variety. Nobody returns my call. I feel like I have the plague.

A friend sets up a meeting with a big shot studio exec friend of hers so I can tell him about my sitcom idea. We meet for dinner at a chic Hollywood restaurant.

“I don’t want to talk about sitcoms,” the big shot says three minutes after we get there. Dinner costs $347. That’s $115 for each minute I got to talk about my sitcom.

I apply at the temp agency by the drugstore where I go to buy women’s magazines. It’s called Remedy. I hope they will Remedy my jobless situation. I wait. Remedy does not call. I register at more temp agencies even after swearing on my Remedy application that I will not do so. Nobody calls. Not even Remedy. I freak out.

Finally, a call comes. The assistant to a head of made-for-TV-movies has called in sick . . . and I’m headed to a major studio lot!

I decide I will wow her with my typing and phone skills, vowing to be the new darling of the studio assistant world. By 2 p.m., I begin to wonder if the entertainment world is, in fact, glamorous, as I make all the arrangements for her daughter’s 4th birthday party, which is only three days away. I coordinate this with the nanny. We pick out lovely party favors and chocolate cake. I begin to feel lucky. I am a lucky, lucky temp, and not the unlucky, ignored 4-year-old child of a studio exec.

Every night when I go home from my temp jobs I look in Variety and the Hollywood Reporter for job ads. I send resumes, I type cover letters, I fax until my fingers are blue. My cover letters are becoming more quirky, sarcastic and obsequious. “That’s not my job” is not in my vocabulary, I say. “Don’t hold it against me that I went to law school!” I am increasingly desperate, and it shows.

My very sweet and supportive husband lines up a temp job for me. I am to wear a Pokemon suit for an electronic entertainment expo at the convention center. “It’s only four days, and $750!” he offers. How bad could it be, I wonder? I accept. After all, I’m not doing anything, right?

*

I arrive at the expo. I have not played a video game since Pong. That doesn’t seem to matter, as I am eminently qualified for this job, because I fit the suit. I think about the Johnny Bravo “Brady Bunch” episode in which Greg is a rock star because he fits the suit. I do not feel like a rock star, however, as I lie on the ground and wiggle into the fiberglass tent that is the giant Pikachu costume.

What I do not realize is that Pikachu is the most beloved of all video characters in the entire universe. Or so it seems. Everyone wants to pose with me and pet my fur. “I love you, Pikachu!” I hear through the costume’s red screen cheeks. I can’t see much, but I wave my little arms from within the suit. I wag my gigantic tail. The experience is heady. I am on TV! I’m on the expo magazine! I am a star, and everyone loves me! I start dancing to the Pikachu theme song. I am Pikachu!

Sadly, however, some people forget that there is a person inside of the costume. They thump on my fiberglass shell and try to push me over.

“Watch the suit, pal!” I snap. Nobody hears me. The battery on my fan goes dead. Suddenly, the suit is 10,000 degrees. Pikachu sags. I am certain that I have lost my mind. It is the longest four days of my life.

I am rescued by the call I’ve been waiting for: a job! At an agency! I am going to be an agent’s assistant! My increasingly sarcastic cover letters have paid off.

“I loved your cover letter!” my new boss howls with laughter. I can’t believe my luck. I start out at a real, for-sure talent agency.

Our clients are fading TV stars. I will not name names because they were all so nice. Who cares if they last worked in 1978? At least they aren’t fighting over Beanie Babies and 10-year-old furniture. I talk to fading TV stars on the phone all day long.

*

I am making a quarter of the money and working twice the hours as at my old job as a divorce lawyer. It’s fun, though, and interesting. I learn all about being a talent agent. I overhear real agent talk. “Sign with me, baby, and I’ll take you straight to the top!” It’s everything I dreamed of and more.

Then things get busy. Agents get tense. Apparently, competition is stiff for the bit parts that our fading TV stars want in sitcoms that are so poorly written that even 10-year-olds flinch. This is not good. Everybody is in a bad mood. They yell at me. I can’t do anything right anymore.

Last week I was a genius. This week I am an idiot. This is definitely not good. “Do not think of it as being fired,” my boss tells me. I am too stunned to know what I think. I hope that Unemployment thinks of it as me being fired.

I find out that my unemployment benefits will be $29 less than I was making at the talent agency. I celebrate my new unemployed status. I make a new resolution: I will think about what I want to do for a career before jumping into something else.

I make a list:

* beg for my old job back,

* write a novel,

* consult for trashy legal TV shows,

* have a baby,

* draft wills for my mother-in-law’s seniors’ aqua aerobics group,

* sign up for career school advertised on daytime TV,

* retire,

* ask parents for money.

My law partner calls. “We have a huge new case. Everyone is mentally ill. The file fills two whole cabinets. We need you!” I take a deep breath.

“OK, just one last case,” I say. It won’t kill me to work in the real world for a week. I have listened to my muse. Now I ignore her. She protests, “What, and leave Show Business?”

Diana L. Mercer is an attorney and author, and still looking for work.