Quiet time

Ad agencies are inherently loud places.

Even before open space floor plans – don’t get me started- hallways would be filled with people yelling from one office to the other.

You'd hear self-congratulatory chuckles of creative teams laughing at their own ideas.

Heels tapping along polished cement floors, while people walked fast and conversed like they were on The West Wing.

And of course, the ever present click clack of computer keys, followed by the jet engine roar of the printer firing up and spitting out copies of resumes…er…creative briefs.

There’s an unmistakable rhythm, hum and drone to the daily pace of an agency. Which is why it’s so eerie when an agency goes quiet.

Sometimes it’s a convergence of several things. People have left or been let go and have yet to be replaced. Others are out on production. Art directors are out on press checks. Copywriters are working (on our lattes) at Starbucks. People are behind closed doors in meetings.

The end result is an unsettling, yet welcome quiet. You can almost hear the tumbleweeds a blowin’ down the hallway and smell the honeysuckle.

Anyway, as sure as the the ebb and flo of the tide, the noise eventually returns to quiet agencies like swallows to Capistrano.

Loud, egotistical, long-lunching, knit-cap wearing, ironic-tshirt sporting, complaining swallows.

Daughter's choice

Tonight, I decided to let my beautiful, smart, funny and giving daughter choose the subject of this evenings' post.

Shockingly, she said it should be about her. Specifically, her unbelievable and unrelenting work ethic. A deal's a deal so here we go.

In the past few weeks, I've wondered just who's daughter she actually is. She's been sequestered in her room, night after night, studying history, english, biology, geometry, Spanish, bible (Christian school, hello?) with friends on FaceTime.

It's not that she was lagging behind. Some of the subjects she already had an A in, and some a B+. But settling just isn't part of her DNA from either side of the family.

So she's worked relentlessly this semester to bring all her grades up to an A or A+ (which by the way she's doing with well-deserved success).

It's the part about working relentlessly that makes me think we're not really related. As you know by now, my idea of working relentlessly is watching all three seasons of House Of Cards in one sitting. I know what you're saying, but if you think it's so easy let's see you do it smart guy. Here's a tip: take your bathroom breaks during the credits.

Anyway, all this is to say I'm beyond proud of my girl for developing a work ethic that'll serve her well in life, and propel her on to make her mark on the world in a spectacular way.

Which she'll need to do to take care of me. Cause watching all this TV isn''t getting me anywhere.

Guilty pleasures Part 10: San Andreas

There are three things I noticed immediately while watching the latest disaster film, Into The Storm. No, 2012. Nope, The Day After Tomorrow. Mmm, maybe Twister. Or Volcano. Was it The Core? Ah, I remember: San Andreas.

First, it's almost unearthly how similar Dwayne Johnson and I are built. It's like looking in a mirror. It's boggling how two completely different, unrelated people with, and I'm going to take a wild guess here, completely different workout regimens can look so much alike.

Second, when the big one does finally hit, as we all know it will, I'd like to be somewhere near Dwayne Johnson. That guy knows exactly what to do in that situation. It's uncanny. Who would've thought his years in the wrestling ring would prepare him for unlimited acts of heroism during times of shifting tectonic plates?

And third, I'm so unprepared for the giant quake that's coming it's not even funny. Well, except the part how I'll be driving along and suddenly the car will get swallowed up by a giant hole in the road that just appears out of nowhere. That'll be good for a laugh.

I went into San Andreas expecting nothing more than a fun time, a stupid script I've heard in every other disaster film of the past decade (apparently "Ruuunnnnn!" is a popular line of dialog), impossible scenarios and great special effects. And I wasn't disappointed.

In movies like this, it really doesn't matter who the actors are - the special effects are the star. And in San Andreas, they're spectacular. Buildings crumble. Bridges fall. Glass shatters from skyscrapers onto the street below, where pedestrians are running for their lives. Cue the tsunami.

The movie delivers on everything you'd expect it to.

Here's one special effect I wasn't expecting: I don't know how Paul Giamatti managed it, but he actually pulled off chewing the scenery while it was falling all around him.

I said it doesn't matter who the actors are. Let me backpedal a bit and say Alexandra Daddario is irreplaceable as Dwayne Johnson's daughter. In fact there ought to be a law that she plays the daughter in every film from now on. Or the sister. She just needs to be in every movie, okay?

Anyway I won't tell you how it ends, but when it happens for real, let's just say it'd be a good idea to have my construction company up and running.

Mindless fun, great eye candy and a loud, entertaining two hours if you let it be.

I give it an 8.5 on the Richter scale.

It's getting wheel

Every once in a while it occurs to me how out of shape I am. I try not to dwell on it too much, because then I feel bad about downing a pint of Americone Dream while bingeing Breaking Bad for the sixth time.

And who wants to feel bad.

Besides, digging that spoon into the frozen ice cream is a workout. Technically.

Anyway, what brought all this on was the fact my friend Kurt and his wife are going on a ride this weekend. A bike ride. Around Lake Tahoe. A hundred miles around Lake Tahoe.

When he first told me about it, I thought it'd be the perfect way to get back in shape. When I lived in Santa Monica, I used to ride my bike on the bike path every weekend on a thirty-mile round trip to Redondo Beach.

I like riding a bike. I'd be back into it in a heartbeat.

The plan was to train with them for eighteen weeks, make the ride, then feel this enormous sense of accomplishment and well-being.

But eighteen Saturdays of training were just something I couldn't commit to, what with kids' schedules, college tours, school concerts and unopened Cherry Garcia to take care of.

So here we are at the weekend of the ride. While in years past the weather's been beautiful for the ride, this weekend it's all thunderstorms and heavy rain at the lake.

Or as I like to call it, perfect weather to stay home and binge on a show about drug kingpins and the destruction of their family.

I hope Kurt and his wife are careful out there, and have a great ride.

Even though I'm not with them in person, I'm there in spirit. And if it's any consolation, they've inspired me to map out a course for getting on my own road back into shape.

Right after I finish Season 4. Again.

The last picture show

Next to where the original Farmer’s Market was, where The Grove stands now, used to be an icon of a cinematic, automatic, hydro-matic time gone by. The Gilmore Drive-In.

When I was in high school, some friends and I would ride our bikes over to the back of the drive-in, and watch the movies from behind the chain-link fence (which could be easily hopped) for free on the ginormous screen. I’m not saying they were R-rated, but I’m not saying they weren’t. Besides, what was the point of rating anything if the entire city could see it on a 7-story screen.

I always got the feeling that on the list of things the Gilmore Drive-In was about, movies were somewhere beneath community. Socializing was the point, and there were just as many people in their cars as out walking around talking to friends.

I suppose it was foolish to think property that valuable wouldn’t get developed. And the slow death rattle of drive-in’s having the life choked out of them by actual theaters made it all but inevitable the Gilmore would one day be a faded Technicolor memory.

Still, I remember being with friends, watching Clint Eastwood’s violent directorial debut Play Misty For Me.

Even on bikes, even without sound, even though it was cold. It was still magic.

String theory

Why are you looking at a picture of Stu Rosen (aka Dusty), Maxine the Crow, Stanley Spider and Scooter the Squirrel? It’s because I don’t want you looking at a picture of me in a black shirt, tights and a bright yellow scarf tied around my neck.

Even though I know how badly you want to see that.

One of the many odd jobs I’ve had was working for master puppeteer Tony Urbano. In the marionette world – and yes, there is a marionette world - there are a few giants. Bob Baker was one. Tony was another.

Even if you don't know his name, you've seen Tony's work in Men In Black (1 & 2), The Abyss and Team America: World Police.

Tony’s studio was a warehouse in a small industrial park in Van Nuys. I’d seen an ad for a job while I was at UCLA (all hour and a half), so I went and applied. I interviewed with Richard who ran the studio, and who’d later become a good friend of mine.

Cue the Twilight Zone theme.

In the part of the studio that opened to the parking lot via a garage door hung dozens of marionettes. Skeletons. Pianists. Crazy looking ones, whose eyes followed you as you walked around the room after closing.

Did that one just turn his head? I’ll swear he did.

Anyway, Tony did shows for corporate and children’s events. He had a road company of puppeteers, of which I was one, and an ingenious puppet stage he’d designed that, when folded, was about four feet by twenty feet and fit on the roof rack of the company station wagon.

I, along with one of the other puppeteers, danced dolls at events in Redlands, Topanga Mall, South Coast Plaza and Universal Studios. We did celebrity birthday parties, although I can’t remember which ones.

It was open puppetry, that is to say we danced them right out in the open and not from behind a curtain to hide us.

Tony was also the puppeteer on Dusty’s Treehouse (remember that picture?) a kids show that ran for ten years on KNXT-TV. It even won a Peabody Award. I got to work on the show many times, and was able to get my AFTRA card because of it.

Here’s one of my fond memories of Tony.

One day we were at the studio and some young kids were playing ball in the parking lot. The garage door was open, and the kids were looking at all the marionettes inside. Richard, Tony and I were in there. Tony was manipulating Maxine as he was going over a new script for Dusty’s Treehouse. One of the kids recognized the puppet, and yelled, “Where’s Dusty?” And without breaking stride, Tony shot the kid a look and in his bitchiest voice said, “Dusty’s dead.”

I felt sad for the kid, but Richard and I couldn’t stop laughing.

The other thing we used to do when Tony wasn’t around was have a little fun with the Piano Player puppet. His hands were sculpted as if he were playing the keyboard. So Richard would grab the strings, fly him around the room, then land him on the side of a plastic trash can. He’d have his hands on the side, and make his head look down in the trash can and make throwing up sounds. It was awesome.

Guess you had to be there.

Anyway, there comes a time in every boys life where he has to stop playing with dolls, so eventually I moved on. Fortunately I found my calling, such as it is, in advertising.

There's about the same amount of manipulation and string pulling.

But at least I don't have to wear the tights.

Picture this

Last night was the high school graduation party for young Mr. Spielberg before he goes off to one of the top ten film schools in the country, and his good friend Trevor, who is graduating with him. It was a fun-filled evening, with many of his friends he’s literally grown up with and known all his life.

I’ve also known most of the kids there since they were in kindergarten. Which was great, because I never get enough reminders of how fast time is going by. Wasn’t it just yesterday they were asking me for 5’s instead of 20’s?

Anyway, besides the portable pizza oven catering the party, candy table, impromptu stage where my son (did I mention he plays five instruments?) sang with Trevor, was a wall with items representing who both boys were, their interests, where they’ve been and where they’re going. My boy was on the left. Trevor was on the right.

Each of our families had room for nineteen pictures. So late Saturday, we went online and had a ton of pictures printed out at Fromex. And they came out spectacularly.

The other thing they did was remind me how much I hate digital pictures. Not digital photography, just digital pictures.

Once you have the pictures in your hand, spending as much time as you want with them, they become time machines. They have the ability to take you right back to the moment they’re showing you.

I think too often we get caught up in the technology of seeing pictures on screen, and lose the meaning of the pictures themselves. I was reminded last night of something I've known but had forgotten - I'd much rather pass hard copies of pictures around than watch a digital slideshow any day of the week.

My beautiful son moves to Texas in August. But thanks to these pictures, and the many more I’ll be printing out, I’ll still be able to hold on to him.