“We’re at 501
West Olympic,” explained my caller. “Come up to the seventeenth floor.”
That’s downtown, my least favorite neighborhood for
street parking. I might find a spot within three or four blocks, but it was summer,
and I wear a suit. No problem, said the caller, and directed me to crew parking
a mile away.
I pulled into a lot jammed with mobile dressing rooms,
equipment, cars, and a line of vans. An attractive young woman directed me to
the leading van which chauffeured me through downtown traffic and pulled into
another line of vans to let me off. After phoning a contact number, I waited
for another young attractive woman (all assistants at film shoots are
attractive young women) to conduct me to an elevator which let me out into a
crowded corridor.
It takes a small army to shoot a film. Dozens of people
under thirty rushed about. They were probably crew. Lounging about and getting
in the way, another dozen, mostly over thirty, were probably actors. A person
in charge noticed that I looked like a doctor and summoned the patient.
It was fortunate he wasn’t suffering hemorrhoids or jock
itch because there was no privacy. We huddled in a corner and discussed his eye
irritation. Afterward, the person in charge asked if I’d see someone who’d
injured his neck in a fight scene. Leaving the building, I boarded the first of
the line of vans and returned to the parking lot.