White House Kids on the ‘Love Boat’?

So you’re here to visit hollywood? allow me to be your guide. The tour bus won’t go to Universal Studios or cruise past movie stars’ homes. In fact, it’s not a bus at all. Today’s transportation will be an aging Toyota, which I’m definitely going to replace when I sell my first screenplay. I can’t offer a ride in air-conditioned luxury, but I can promise an authentic look at some real Hollywood landmarks, places that hold special (not to be confused with fond) meaning to some of us who work--or are trying to work--in The Business.

Here we are in West Los Angeles. I know, it’s not technically Hollywood, but Hollywood is not just a geographic location, it’s a state of mind. And it travels. Take this restaurant. It’s hidden in a not-very-pretty commercial area where people usually go to buy tires or gardening equipment, inspired, perhaps, by the roar of the nearby freeway. Nonetheless, many a deal has been struck here over corkscrew pasta. It was at this very restaurant that I once had lunch with a producer who said he was interested in my screenplays. I didn’t want to deluge the guy, so I brought only three. I’m sure the last words he said to me were, “I’ll call you next week,” but I never heard from him again. Let’s christen this spot the Room of Famous Last Words.

Within the actual city limits of Hollywood, I’d like to point out an office building that houses several independent producers. I had a few meetings there about a script idea . . . I like to refer to it as the House of Broken Dreams. And look, there’s Paramount Studios . . . the regal gate, the manicured flower beds. I had a very encouraging meeting here, but that didn’t lead anywhere either. For me, it was the Heartbreak Hotel.

Perhaps you’ve noticed a trend here: lots of effort, lots of rejection. (And, no, I’m not naming names today, because I’m a writer and don’t want to bite the hand that I hope will someday feed me.) But Hollywood wouldn’t be Hollywood without a few brushes with greatness. So indulge me as the tour goes back in time to my first incarnation in Hollywood, as an actress, 20-some years ago.

Behind every finished product, every TV show or film, there is an audition process. People who drive cars better than yours grant you a few minutes to show them how brilliant you can be. And then they judge you.

So let’s drive by ABC, where I was once ushered into a “theater room” to try out for my very own chance at the brass ring. Tiered seats loomed above a small stage, and lights blinded the performer from seeing anyone who might be in those seats. (Looking back, it reminds me of today’s government hearings. Turn on C-SPAN and watch the unfortunates who are brave enough to testify before Congress. They’re sitting below elected officials, looking--and feeling--small by comparison.) When I walked onto the stage, I immediately began to quiver, and my voice rose an octave or two. I can’t recall what I read for, but I do remember that I sounded like Minnie Mouse. I like to refer to this tour stop as the Theater of the Absurd.

Next up is the Cold Shoulder Production Company, where I had another audition for a guest role on a weekly TV drama. I’d been sent the script but hadn’t been told what scene I would be asked to read. “A cold reading,” my agent had said. Very cold, as it turned out. As I entered, several men were sitting around a huge table in a huge conference room, and I was instructed to read a scene in which the female character was being chased down the street by a vicious Doberman.

“But there’s no dialogue,” I said meekly.

“That’s OK,” one of the anonymous men answered. “Just do the scene.”

If I were Robin Williams, I could have really nailed that scene. I could have done a whole gestalt therapy bit: First I’m the dog, then I’m the victim. The dog has some authority issues, the woman’s acting out a childhood trauma.

But I’m way below Robin Williams in the comic food chain. I ran around the conference room, looking back fearfully at an imaginary animal and screaming, which I assumed was what the anonymous men expected my character to do. Personally, I would have just climbed up a phone pole, but there wasn’t one in the conference room.

I didn’t get the part.

Then there was the audition for a supermarket commercial. It’s a tour highlight because the producers were casting a woman in a bathing suit--that’s right, a bathing suit!--serving canapes to guests lounging poolside. And, yes, we all had to audition in bathing suits! I waited in an outer office in my hippie-style crocheted bikini with actresses who were polished, implanted, perfectly made up, and who could apparently afford better swimwear than mine. To make matters worse, I’d scraped my thigh while body surfing just days before, and I looked as if I’d been attacked by a rabid sea otter. When it was my turn to perform, I found myself in an inner office crowded with men who were eating lunch. With my make-believe tray, I walked around and made believe I was serving them canapes from this great supermarket, all the while trying to angle my body so that they wouldn’t notice my thigh and trying to ignore the fact that they were stuffing their faces with submarine sandwiches.

Needless to say, I never did get to serve those canapes on TV.

Before we drive by Aaron Spelling Productions, you need to know that Aaron Spelling made it possible for me to get my Screen Actors Guild card. It’s one of the Catch-22s of acting: You can’t be in the guild unless someone hires you, but producers are reluctant to hire you if you’re not in the guild. I deeply appreciate Spelling’s generosity; his shows paid my rent for many months. I even forgive him for the episode of “Vega$” in which I had to wear a rhinestone headdress that weighed as much as a small child and walk down a spiral staircase that went nowhere. Besides, the headdress was more than offset by touching experiences, such as the “Love Boat” episode in which my co-star was an orangutan. He and I didn’t have any actual scenes together, but we spent all our off-camera time getting to know one another. He was professional and courteous; he enjoyed holding my hand and cleaning my hairbrush. (I took his number and said I’d visit him on his ranch, but these on-set flirtations always end the same way--no one ever follows up.)

My final, and I do mean final, “Love Boat” audition took place after my father (another former actor) had been in the White House for a few years. I was given a script that had to do with several couples embarking on a cruise. I was sitting in the outer office and Eleanor Mondale walked in. Eleanor Mondale? “She must he here to read for another show,” I thought to myself. “Our fathers are duking it out in the political arena . . . the producers can’t possibly be planning on casting us both.” Then I heard one of the assistants on the phone trying to track down Steve Ford. And another said something about Amy Carter.

White House kids on a “Love Boat” cruise? Who came up with this? No one had told me about it. Did Eleanor know? She certainly looked more relaxed than I did.

When I was called in to read for the part that I’d just decided I wasn’t going to take, I asked in a tentative voice, “Uh, is there a sort of casting theme here?”

“Yes,” producer Doug Cramer answered. “We thought it would be fun to have First Kids, potential First Kids, all on the same episode.”

Fun wasn’t the word that had sprung to my mind.

I read the scene in a monotone, ensuring that I wouldn’t get hired, and then drove to my agent’s office, where I grilled him: “Did you know about this ahead of time?”

“No,” he said. “But what about the Nixon girls and the Johnson girls? I mean, it’s a big boat.”

*

Now you can go home with more insight into the true workings of Hollywood. On your next visit, perhaps I’ll be able to take you around in my Lexus SUV and tell you more stories. Like the meeting I had with a TV producer on the Disney lot who was hiring writers for a new show. I got sort of distracted by the directions on the lot: cross Snow White, turn on Daffy, go under the Seven Dwarves. I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was doing very inappropriate things to Disney characters and, consequently, didn’t present myself well to the producer. Which is why I’m still driving this Toyota.