There are many things that a Hollywood Starlet must do in order to be promoted to Hollywood Star, even if they don’t particularly relish those things. In this fine example, the powers that be are forcing Carole to appear enraptured by her potential Christmas gifts whilst wearing skimpy shorts and five-inch stilettos. Because nothing says “Happy Birthday, Jesus!” like the image of a badly-permed hooker…
Photographer, sighing: “I’m really not getting what I need from you.”
Carole: “The feeling is mutual. Unlike the feeling in my feet, which I can no longer feel because of the bondage footwear. I just don’t understand what we’re doing. What’s my motivation in this scene?”
Photographer: “A paycheck. It really doesn’t get any deeper than that.”
Carole: “But who are these gifts from? Why should I be happy about getting them? What’s up with this stupid low-ass bench that nobody wearing stilettos would sit on in the first place?”
Photographer: “Look, those are questions you need to ask the people who hired us. Me? I don’t have any questions. I just want to get the shot and then get the money that will allow me to buy the hooch that I desperately need after dealing with people like you.”
Carole: “Now, see, that’s what I’m talking about. You have a purpose in this scene. I don’t. I need a purpose in order to perform my best work.”
Voice from offstage: “Can you folks wrap it up? I’ve got an underwear ad to shoot for Jockey.”
Carole: “Who the hell is that?”
Photographer: “That’s Clark Gable. You didn’t smell the ego?”
Carole: “No, but I smell a certain degree of dissatisfaction with his current marriage.”
Photographer: “Really? How did you get there?”
Carole: “It doesn’t matter. Call him over and we’ll see how excited I can get about surprise presents that suddenly show up. Then get your camera ready.”
Gloria Steinem, feminist extraordinaire, suddenly enters, stage left: “Sister! Don’t objectify yourself in the eyes of men!”
Carole: “Honey, you’re from the 1970s. This is 1932. The only way for us to have real power is to let the men think they have it, then we change the script while they aren’t looking.”
Hillary Clinton, politician extraordinaire, suddenly enters, stage left: “Actually, we still have to do that in 2018. But the times, they are a changin’.”
Bob Dylan, songsmith extraordinaire, suddenly enters from… well, you know: “Is this where they’re doing the underwear shoot? Sorry I’m late. Joan Baez was being especially clingy today and she wouldn’t let me leave until I opened her present. I’m not sure what I’m supposed to do with five-inch stilettos, but I can probably write a song about it later.”
Photographer: “I have no idea what’s happening right now.”
Carole: “See? Until the old white men finally lose their misogynistic power, you do what you have to do to gain just a little bit of progress.”
Donald Trump: “There was no collusion!”
Previously published in “Crusty Pie” on 05/19/15 and “Bonnywood Manor” on 12/24/15. Considerably revised and extended for this post (the original was just the first paragraph). Yes, this one is loaded with trivia and obscure references, but would it really be Bonnywood if it wasn’t?
Categories: Past Imperfect
Bonnywood Manor 
Lighting guy: Am I walking to work or carrying my lunch?
Guy wrapping empty box presents: Be cautious or Adolf Twitler will steal your lunch and make you walk every day. And it might not be to work.
Carole: That makes complete sense.
Lighting guy: It does? Does anything? Why am I here? Why are you here? I mean … light. That’s heavy, man.
😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Bob Dylan: “Thank you for writing the lyrics to the song that I thought I had to write about the gift from Joan, but now I don’t have to after the clarity of your heavy light. Still curious about the stilettos, though. Do you think the wearing of such will help me enunciate more clearly in my songs instead of my trademark mumble?”
LikeLike
Sadly, times are changing very slowly.
LikeLiked by 1 person
It’s annoying as hell and I’m not going to be quiet about it…
LikeLiked by 1 person
I can tell stories from the 1970s. Not much has changed, if anything.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Uh…. Um. Hmmm. Nope. Got NOTHING. Nothing. Things are just dandy as they are in YOUR words. Because you’re one white male who proves all that business about us (females) wanting to be ‘in charge’ however nominally; false. You can have the power..heck you DO. And off the subject – in fact so far off that it’s not vaguely related…you got tagged in my “Familial” post. Because you ARE my brother from another mother… 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
I really don’t know how to respond to this, because I’m not sure if it’s an indictment or a warm embrace. (Said with tongue firmly in cheek.) Perhaps I should just trot off to your “Familial” post and see where things lead… 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Warm embrace of course. https://brianlageose.blog/2018/12/01/past-imperfect-212-2/?c=29624#respond
LikeLiked by 1 person
Okay I don’t know what that link is even for. I appear to have purchased the mouse from hell (or it’s possessed)…. 😐
LikeLiked by 1 person
Lombard, Dylan Hills, and Donald- talk about all yer Christmas’s coming at once.
LikeLiked by 1 person
And then the alarm clock went off, and I couldn’t quite decipher what was real and what was just a fever dream…
LikeLike
I’ve always been confused about something that maybe you could clarify. Is ‘stage left’ the left from the audience’s perspective or is it the left of the stage from the actor’s perspective, technically then the audience’s right? It’s just I’d really like to visualise this piece accurately to give it my full unadulterated appreciation.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Ah, this one I can answer, having trod the boards in the younger incarnations of my life. (Does it surprise you that I dabbled with acting when I was still dewy and fresh? It shouldn’t.) “Stage Left” and “Stage Right” are from the actor’s perspective. “House Left” and “House Right” refer to the audience perspective. Now that we’ve shared this, care to join me in a revival of “Hamlet”? We could do a wondrous interpretation, set in a campground where the tents refuse to cooperate during setup and we all have soliloquies about what went right and what went left… 😉
LikeLiked by 1 person
Thankyou for the clarification. Hamlet was the reason I dropped a 2 year English ‘A’ Level course just 2 months before the exam. I hated it, so would happily rip it to shreds. ‘To be or not to be, that is the tent, whether tis nobler upright, or allowed to suffer in a soggy heap of outrageous misfortune’. That sort of thing? No? (Exits stage left…….).
LikeLiked by 1 person