Random Sequence

Scenario 22 (excerpt 4)

Conrad thought it was a stupid idea: Smash Studios' parody of a 1960s beach movie that also had something to do with Mexican mobsters and zombies. (He hadn't even been able to slog through the entire script.) Still, he hadn't worked in months, and an out-of-work actor "is like an unstrung puppet" he always said -- to himself, anyway.

He hated having to portray a California surfer dude, though. So did the other rent boys, who had started referring to themselves as the "wig amigos" for the blonde hairpieces they all had to wear. "This halitosis won't even be released in theaters," he speculated with his fellow thespians when they gathered at the food tent between shots at what they called Career Kamikaze Beach. (Even the food was terrible. They had started referring to the food tent as the "Enema Pavilion".) "It'll be on at 3 A.M. on the Dickwads Network, if that. Or it will be a digital frisbie."

The director, a prissy doofus with a Romanian accent, kept shouting at them -- things like "take waves! take waves!" whenever he wanted them to run into the ocean and jump on their Styrofoam surfboards. He had shot several close-ups of Conrad (because he was the best-looking of the bunch, Conrad thought; he had, after all, won a national porn award). But in the rushes, he thought he looked like a Aryan maniac, slavering lasciviously over silicone-injected bikini tarts.

Sand in his board shorts. A sunburn on his shoulder blades. Was it all worth it? For scale? "Whisper words of wisdom, IMDB," he sang softly, under his breath, as he slathered on Fake Bake in the dressing trailer.