…if you’re like me, then you’re a fan – scratch that – a
SUPERfan of “law & order” …and yes; I mean all of them. (I was even
getting into “law & order LA”, and now I’m haunted by by the notion that
dt. jaruszalski will forever be chasing dt. winters’ killers in limbo… somebody
needs to do an episode of SVU where they investigate the rash of murders of all
the ‘law&order’ shows, I mean, it’s like a friggin serial killer targeted
them all at the same time).
And that’s the reason why auditioning for, and shooting,
“mr. 3000” was so damn surreal for me.
Chuck (the director) scheduled the auditions to begin
first thing in the morning at some studio in midtown manhattan. I was one of the first people to audition (robert
pastorelli and casey affleck were the other actors there that morning… I’ve got
a story about that too, but that’s for later). After I finished, chuck told me to hang-out for a while and we’d
hang-out after he was done. So, I got
some breakfast, visited my agent, did some general lolly-gagging around the
city, then went back to the studio around 3pm. The place was jam-packed, crawling with actors, folks were even
standing in the hallways. Right after
I got there, my boy paul (the other ‘whassup’ guy) came bounding out of the
room, I had no idea he was going to be there.
We greeted each other with our customary enthusiasm & ball-busting,
then we posted up in the hallway, shootin’ the shit. Where we were standing, we were right across from the doorway to
the studio, so people had to walk right toward us as they left the room. as we’re standing there talking, who comes
walking out the room; muthafukin tamara tunie - the coroner from “SVU”…
(and she is even finer in person than on TV)
I guess I was in one of my more playful moods that day, so,
as she walks out of the room (looking down as she put some things into her
bag), I say to her; “um, excuse me…you’re just going to walk by and not
speak?” she stops in her tracks
and looks up at me, but says nothing.
So I continue; “you were in my living room, just last night, and now
you gonna act like you don’t even know me???” …now here’s the freaky part.
She gets this look on her face …kinda like this:
…then she walks, very slow and deliberate, right up to me,
less than a foot from my face, and she says; “really? Well…maybe you need to
refresh my memory.” So, still in
character, I say to her; “oh, ok, you gonna be like that… it was you,
benson, and stabler, and ya’ll were talking about the asian girl with her foot
cut off…” This big smile creeps
across her face, and she says; “I was kinda hoping that’s where you were
going with that!!! [laughs] …’cause, I was a little nervous for a minute,
thinking; what the heck did I do last night that I don’t remember being in this
man’s house!!!” We laughed and
engaged in casual banter for a minute, then as she left, she turned and said; “next
time, you need to do something to make yourself a little more memorable…” I look over at paul, and he’s just standing
there, motionless, looking at me with his mouth closed…as I assumed he’d been
doing the whole time, which made me chuckle.
Finally he speaks… “brooksie, do you know her?” “nope”, I say. He then exclaims; “DAMN NIGGA, YOU GOT
SOME BALLS!!!”, and starts laughing.
Paul has shit to do, so he eventually leaves. The room has thinned out a bit, so there
are some empty chairs. I walk in and
take seat…not realizing I had sat down right next to muthafukin chris noth - det.
mike logan from ‘law & order’…
I don’t remember how it happened, but, we ended up
talking. Not about the business or
anything, just regular conversation. I
remember talking about philly for a bit….he talked about a movie that he shot
here, and, how much he liked the city, and how he was contemplating buying a property
here, asking my opinion of certain areas and such. He was just a cool, unpretentious, laid-back, friendly
dude. He ended up getting the role in
the movie, so I got to hang-out with him some more down in new orleans. (see
previous blog for that story)
Jump ahead to new orleans.
It’s either the 1st or 2nd day shooting. I was’nt shooting so I was just hanging-out
on set as they shot a scene in the locker room. I was watching bernie (mac) do his thing and not paying
attention to the rest of the actors.
But there was a part where bernie says something to one of the other
characters. I look over to see who he
was talking to… it was muthafukin paul sorvino - sgt. phil cerreta
from ‘law & order’…
...now, this dude was a real character.
First off, the girls in the make-up trailer all talked about
what a “dirty old man” he was… how he was always flirting and making dirty
comments, and trying to “rub his old man balls” up against them whenever they
had to lean in close to do his make-up. (not in a sexual-harrassment kind of
way, just a dirty-old-man kind of way)
He also had a bit of a diva side. We were shooting scenes in the dugout, and paul has a bad back
or knee or something, so, whenever there were parts when he did’nt have any
lines and could’nt be seen on camera, he had them set up a chair in a little
room right behind the dugout, and he’d go sit there… because, apparently,
sitting in that room on that chair was vastly superior to sitting in the dugout
on the bench. Oh, and there was the fan. He constantly complained about how hot he
was, so, he had his own fan set up to blow on him – yes, directly on him only
- inbetween takes. And if a PA forgot to turn his fan on as
soon as chuck yelled “cut!” paul would kindly remind them. (yes, that was
sarcasm) d’ondre whitfield was
playing the role of skillet…
…and at some point he made the grievous error of
absent-mindedly standing in front of mr. sorvino’s fan!!! Well, paul barked; “Hey! You! Fella!
Could you move!” Now, d’ondre is
an extremely congenial guy…very friendly, always smiling, laughing, joking…but,
not right now. He got a look on his
face that let you know he was kinda pissed, but, he was also keeping a lid on
his anger. He stopped for moment,
composed himself, then stepped to paul, held out his hand, and said; “hello,
my name is d’ondre, I’m an actor on this film, just like you.” Paul, visibly embarrassed, shakes his hand
then says; “sorry…d’ondre, would you mind stepping from in front of the fan,
please?” (not really humble, just spitting it out so d’ondre would move as
quickly as possible) d’ondre says; “see,
that’s all you had to do.” And as
he walks away, we can all hear him talking aloud to himself; “…I have a
name, and it’s not ‘hey fella’…you’re gonna speak to me with some respect…” I gotta hand it to d’ondre; I don’t have
much confidence that, if it were me, I would’ve been able to compose such a
dignified response.
Then, there was this other time, we were in the middle of
shooting a scene, cameras rolling, when all of sudden, a cell phone begins to
ring. Now, in case you don’t know; any
noise – especially a phone ringing - while cameras are rolling is probably the
biggest cardinal sin you can committ on any TV or movie set. It rings once… it rings twice… the actors
are trying to carry on with the scene (just in case the rings are’nt audible
on their mics and the take can still be used), but the crew is now looking
in the direction of the rings… it seems to be coming from paul. On the third ring, paul suddenly realizes
it’s his phone, he jumps at the realization, and starts wriggling his butt,
trying to wedge it up against the wall in some vain effort to muffle the sound (ever
see a dog scratching it’s butt up against a wall? Yeah, just like that). At that, everyone begins laughing, and
chuck has no choice but to yell cut.
Paul begins apologizing profusely for ruining the take, as he tries to
fish his phone out of his back pocket.
Still ringing, he looks at it and says; “oh, it’s mira…let me take
this, guys…” yes, that’s right, it
was his daughter, oscar winner mira sorvino… so, naturally, we had to suspend
shooting so he could have a quick chat.
Now, my personal interactions with paul were very
different.
There’s a bunch of scenes that take place in the
dugout. I’m in all of those scenes… I
did’nt have lines, I was just in the background, a “featured extra” (since I
played the trainer earlier in the movie, chuck threw me a bone and put me in
all of the dugout scenes, which was awesome, ‘cause it put several more weeks
of pay in my pocket). And in those
scenes, I was alwys right next to paul.
(the other guy is earl billings, star of those “aflac”
commercials, and golf buddy of samuel l. jackson…how do I know that? He told me
so.)
In a couple of those scenes, chuck gave me “a bit of
business” to do (an industry term for making it look like you’re doing
something instead of just standing there) …one of them was; walk up and
hand paul a clipboard, pantomime a brief conversation like we’re going over
something, then walk away. For
whatever reason, they had to do about 10 takes of this scene (if I remember
correctly, bernie kept fuckin’ up his line). So, I had to do the clipboard bit 10 times. Now, inbetween takes, paul and I had
already established a jokey rapport… I mean, he loves filthy humor, so of
course we’d get along just fine. (and I knew he liked me when he remembered
my name) So, just to entertain
myself, I started writing & drawing silly shit on the paper before I handed
it to him. I wanted to see if, and
how, he would react. This motherfucker
is such a pro, he not only kept a straight face, but he started countering my
silly drawings with his own…now I was the one who had to keep a
straight face! But we’d both chuckle
like little kids as soon as chuck yelled cut.
So, as far as it pertained to me, paul sorvino was an alright dude.
The last couple of ‘law & order’ alumni I got to rub
elbows with
were michael rispoli...
and courtney b. vance...
Mike has played more characters on all 3 series than I can
remember. He was in my big scene with
bernie, so we got to hang out a lot.
One day while we were hanging around outside our trailers, bouncing a
ball back & forth, we got into a conversation about L&O, all the roles
he’s played, which was his favorite, what the crew is like, etc. He was a very cool dude… kinda quiet &
reserved, but very cool. I don’t
really have any stories about him, except…
one night we went out to eat, it was around 3am, and the only thing we
could find open was a chinese joint.
There were a bunch of kids in the booth right behind me, they kept
looking back at us and I could hear them whispering. So, I started getting myself ready for the onslaught of
“whassup!” yells that I knew were coming my way. Eventually, they turned around and one of them asked; “yo,
aint you that dude from the sopranos???”
Mike, modestly, said; “yeah.” Shocked, I looked at him and said; “you were on the sopranos???” “yeah, I was jackie, the boss, first
season…I got killed”, he said.
Holy shit… I had no clue! Plus,
I felt kinda stupid. But, because he’s
such a gracious gentleman, mike felt compelled to shine some his spotlight on
me… “yeah, but, don’t you know who this guy is?” Then the kids took a closer look at me… ”oh
shit! It’s the ‘whassup!’ dude!!!”
Thanks mike… thanks a lot… the ONE time I thought I got away scott
free. After that, they mobbed our
booth, taking pics with their phones, calling their friends, asking us to make
voicemail messages for them… until mike politely asked them to let us eat in
peace. The kids apologized and went
back to their booth, obeying the word of ‘mob boss jackie’.
As far as courtney, my only interaction with him was at the
4th of july cookout at bernie mac’s house, which I mentioned in a
previous blog… but it’s a short story, so I’ll repeat it… this takes place
right after chuck and I arrive at bernie’s house, and he greets us in the
vestibule…
“…bernie
tells us; “angela should be right behind ya’ll, so let’s wait for her then
we’ll all go in.” A minute later, angela basset shows up. We’re all saying
our hello’s when I notice some dude with her, carrying some bags. When I turn
to see who he is, I blurt out an involuntary; “OH SHIT!!!” Startled, he stops in his tracks and gets a
nervous “WTF?” look on his face. I had
no idea that angela basset was married to courtney b. vance!!! (whom
you all might know as the D.A. ron carver on “law & order: criminal
intent”) I calmly apologize for my
outburst and tell him what a huge fan i am.”
After that, he was cool… he ended up in the rec room playing
a game of pool with chuck.
I guess if you’re casting a movie in new york city it’s
gonna be impossible to avoid the horde of ‘law & order’ alumni… those shows have had
the NYC acting scene on lockdown for over 20 years. And even though I realize this now, at the time, it was freaking me out (in
an awesome way) being around so many of them at the same time…
