Casual Friday. It’s already hot and sticky in L.A., and I’m writing this naked. Those are the facts, people. Just accept them.
On Casual Fridays I like to bunk off work and hand the Swami over to someone who writes better than I do, or at the very least has something better to say. Today that honor falls to a guy whose name I will have to cut and paste, because I can neither pronounce it nor spell it: James Poniewozik.
He’s written a fantastically informative article for Time magazine about the future of television. And right now, he posits, the future seems to rest on what happens next week when Jay Leno launches his new show five nights a week on NBC, replacing their old, costly, lumbering, expensive dramas that nobody was watching.
Most people are expecting this experiment to be a flop. The bulk of variety shows do, after all, go into a rapid tailspin and disappear. In the 1950s, we used to enjoy watching a mixed bag of crap. Nowadays, less so. Unless there’s a talent show element to it at least, such as American Idol, in which case we’ll watch crap forever.
Witness the Osbournes variety special – The Osbournes Reloaded – which Fox was extremely cockahoop about at the time, and which was meant to be the first of a series of six. Unfortunately, the premier was so mind-numbingly dreadful that the rest of them were never shown. Here’s a taste.
So now we’re getting Jay Leno, trying to salvage his post-Tonight Show glory.
I once received a phone-call from The Tonight Show, inviting me to be on as a guest. Somebody had dropped out, it was late in the day, and I lived close to their Burbank Studios. This was when I used to do handwriting analysis. One of Leno’s producers had seen me on The View, apparently, and thought I’d be fun. But first they needed me to do a quick audition please. “Sure,” I said. “Easy.”
I didn’t drive in those days, so I traveled to Burbank by bus. And I bet not many of Jay Leno’s guests ever did that!
When I arrived, I was taken into a small room by the producer who had me analyze her handwriting. The girl in question was a mess. She had huge emotional problems, I recall, and somehow it didn’t seem right or responsible, even for an audition, to make light of them. So I gave her a straight reading, which was pretty damn accurate, just not especially entertaining.
Midway through, the room darkens. This taller, older woman walks to the door, stands there with her arms folded, listens for five seconds, then blurts out “No” in a stern voices and strides away.
That was it. I was promptly shunted out, given a handshake – “Sorry.” – and told to leave. Clearly, I wasn’t Tonight Show material.
To make matters far worse, when I got home I took off my trousers and found a massive brown skid-mark down the back. Seems I’d sat in something on the bus! One of the many hazards of using the L.A. public transit system. Most times you spot it before you sit down; but sometimes you’re preoccupied with an audition and possibly appearing on The Tonight Show and you forget to look. Oh god. Nothing could have been more embarrassing. I’d walked around their offices, meeting people, saying hi, doing quick handwriting analyses for anyone who asked…and all the while I looked like I’d shat my pants. I still cringe even now.
Anyway, who knows if I’ll be invited onto Leno’s new show. Maybe that old bag who said no to my gifts before has retired now.
Of course, I don’t do handwriting stuff any more, but that’s okay. I have other talents. Yesterday, for instance, a producer emailed me, asking if I’d like to do the voice of the lead character in a cartoon for the web. A fun character. He’s a talkshow host. “The guy has a gun for a nose,” the producer explained, “and explosives for a chin….it’s called Gun Nose.”
Of course it is. What else?
I said maybe. But I’m not hopeful for it. Gun Nose? Really? Why on earth would a producer dream up a character called Gun Nose, then automatically think, “You know who’d be good for this? That guy who does reports on NPR. I forget his name…the idiotic one.” Weird. And a hoax, I’m sure.
In the meantime, take a look at the Time article. All very interesting. And don’t forget to watch when Jay invites me on his new show later this year as a guest. “Next we have a very funny and original man. Author, handwriting analyst, NPR contributor, and the voice of Gun Nose….Cash Peters.”
I thank you.
If Larry King’s quitting, then so am I. No, please don’t get up, I’ll find my own way out.
I’ve decided.
This is my last day of full, balls-to-the-wall committed living. For now anyway. As from tomorrow, July 1st 2010, I’m quitting regular life for a whole two months. Nine weeks. Sixty-two days. During which time, I’ll be letting go of the tiller, lifting my nose from the grindstone, shutting down the computer, ignoring my cellphone, and generally freeing my mind and hands to do more interesting things.
And by “more interesting things”, I mean “nothing at all.”
My brain is mush, kids. It’s just a fact. This realization came to me a few
days ago after I completed another book – about travel and health – which I wrote after completing a novel, which I wrote after completing the previous travel book, Naked in Dangerous Places. This on top of doing the weekly BBC thing and occasional pieces for NPR. At some point recently there came a moment when it dawned on me – I wasn’t living, I was just working. Working, eating, sleeping, and working again. That’s not a life, it’s a prison. Admittedly, a prison in which you get to eat a lot of cake and drink coffee and chat with friends and watch movies when you’re really supposed to be writing, but a prison nonetheless.
The need for this was driven home even more forcefully when I saw a
very tired and deflated-looking Larry King announce last night that he’s leaving CNN after 25 years and 50,000 interviews “to attend more of his son’s baseball games.” But that’s not the real reason. The poor guy’s been a host on CNN since 1873. Recently, his ratings have slipped horribly, there are pretenders waiting in the wings to grab his chair – he has to go. It’s just time.
And that’s how I feel. It’s time. Time to stop, rest, reevaluate.
So I’m giving it up for a while. Not to attend more of my son’s baseball games – I’ve not attended a single one yet, why should I start now? – but simply to relax. To loosen the reins and stand back from Twitter, Facebook, my website, and my cellphone. I’ll check my email now and then, I suppose, when curiosity overcomes me, but certainly not daily. And I don’t even plan to watch a lot of TV, although, since I’m a TV reviewer on the BBC, quitting it completely would be setting a dangerous precedent. Eventually listeners might notice. It’s not guaranteed, but they might. I can’t take that chance.
What will I do instead?
I told you – nothing. I’m starting a tiny little film project tomorrow that should be heaps of fun. I’d also like to try being a movie extra – they’re always advertising on craigslist for “background artists” – and I’d be so very good at just standing there in the background doing nothing – it’s actually a gift I have. That would be great.
Oh, and you know what else? I’d like to return to handwriting analysis.
Don't click to look inside. I'm just sayin'.
Haven’t done that in ages. I authored three books on the subject years ago, and for a time was on TV a whole lot with it – Entertainment Tonight, The View, Montel Williams. I was really good too. But I got sidetracked, dammit, and let it go. Now it’s time to revisit it. I’ll post something on FB or here in the next few days explaining how you can get your handwriting analyzed, if you want it done – because, quite honestly, who’s more fascinating than you?
[UPDATE: I have now made this so. Go to my website and take a look. Prepare to be amazed)
The rest of the time I shall meditate, do yoga, and attend raw food classes. There are beaches to visit, cafes to lunch in, movies to see, and I may even go on the new 3D King Kong ride that Universal Studios has added as part of its tram tour. Ooooh.
Summed up, then, I’m taking off.
I have big plans for the fall, including starting a small company making health and nutrition videos. Also, my one and only novel, Force of Habit, will be published, and the raw food documentary I started making last year will be available finally. So that’s all to come.
In the meantime, have a wonderful summer, everyone. See you back here in September. Be good.
TV Swami – he gone.
www.cashpeters.com
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Tagged as background artists, beach, Entertainment Tonight, extras, Handwriting analysis, Larry King, meditation, Montel Williams, raw food, The View, travel books, yoga