[5] TV LAND PART II Local and Network News in New York is a money hustle. After Amherst I tune up as an evening news writer doing per-diem at Channel 2 while looking for permanent work. News 12 is just starting on Long Island and I land the job as head staff writer on the morning show. In at 4 AM out by 10 AM. They want me to stay until noon but I’m like, “Screw that for what your paying me I’m going to go catch some rays.” You’re lucky if you clear $23,000 a year in a non union shop and Chuck Dolan is no union ally. That first summer working at News 12 I went to the beach 57 times out of 90 days available. I looked like Harry Belafonte on gold bud. I make extra money trolling around with Buddah doing collections and hanging out at the Mapes Bar on White Plains Road. The Mapes is a long time neighborhood hangout where I play a couple of gigs besides chasing degenerate gamblers and off the hook public employees who party too much. God sometimes makes things crystal clear to you. Longevity is a precarious thing working the ranks in news because someone is always after your job and unions have been decimated. Same thing in the collection racket. The writers at CBS are freaked by troubled union negotiations that threaten their security as the local news job market changes amid Network takeovers. J.J. Gonzalez at Channel 2 – one of the first full blooded Puerto Ricans on the air in New York – is crazed convinced that CBS head Harold Stringer is out to get him. I identify with his manic ways and realize I can be him in ten to twenty years if I stick to this gig. Channel 2 is a repository of old news hands and everything is tense there. One of the station’s anchors is a coke mess after the death of his son and sometimes is really weird. I overhear him speaking in all seriousness once, “So, if you had your choice Bob who would you rather have sex with …. Jane Jetson or Betty Rubble. Now mind you Jane is pretty but that Betty’s got something absolutely savage about her.” “They’re cartoons guy.” “What’s your point? Aren’t we all cartoons here?” This man anchors the news. An Amherst grad is President of the Network but he’s on his way out caught in the crossfire of the Network takeover battle in the late eighties. News 12 Long Island is a refuge but there are drawbacks. It’s a rip, write and read shop. There’s no budget to develop in house stories. One of the morning anchors is a complete moron. Chris C. A reader who never checks his copy before he goes on but complains edlessly when he gets off. A real self absorbed dweeb who changes his name in every market he’s worked because of all the scams he pulls. Thank God he gets fired and ends up as a waiter in Sag Harbor. But in the meantime we’re blessed with his presence. One morning I’ m writing some copy about Jack Wagner. The hot TV soap star is taking a turn at theater. He’s playing Romeo in a Westbury Music Fair production. C. goes on a tear earlier about some of the writing and I had enough, “Hey, you should proofread your stuff before you go on.” “It’s not in my job description.” I decide to fix his wagon and rigged The Star’s copy for his first block at 6:00 AM. He read it with all the sincerity a wax dummy can muster up, V/O BLAH, BLAH, BLAH BLAHBLAH :15 SEC BLAH, BLAH, BLAH BLAHBLAH LIVE: CHRIS SHOWTIME IS 8 PM AT THE MUSIC FAIR. :15 SEC I OF COURSE -- YOUR ACE ANCHOR -- WAS ASKED TO PLAY ROMEO IN THAT PRODUCTION BUT DECIDED TO STAY HERE AS YOUR HUMBLE SERVANT ON NEWS 12 FROM SYOSSET TO MON TALK I SERVE YOU LOVINGLY. The dummy reads it, gets startled, realizes what he just says on air and mutters, “Oh, those funny little writers.” Next thing I hear out of the Executive Producers office is, “Luis! Get in here!” The E.P. suspends me for a week after we stop laughing. Good thing too because I have to go under the knife again. This time to get circumsized at 31. That’s a cutting edge experience I don’t wish on my worst enemy. To make a long story short, I’m going out with this Hell’s Kitchen girl who recommends a moyle after we literally tear each other up physically. She’s a swimmer at NYU who likes walking the neighborhood in just her overcoat and high heels. A freaky tall glass of water and the first woman I meet whose into porno, vibrators, KY Jelly and sexual drama. She shares a bass player named Lewis with Madonna and they all end up getting crabs from the Material Girl. I rip myself in one of our adventures involving an eggplant and a pair of mules. Don’t ask. The real dilemma is popping a boner after the operation. It’s worse than trying not to laugh in church. When she almost runs over me with a car during an argument (I earn it) I think it’s time to get out. But things aren’t as tweeked at News 12 and Hell’s Kitchen as they are when I take a job as the Director of Development at a struggling Spanish TV Station out West. The owner’s crazy. Plain and simple. He calls me one day from the local jail after getting arrested resisisting a 50 dollar traffic ticket. “You know that the cell block guards tune in our station for inmates?” “Oh great. That’ll be a swell addition to the advertising kit. Plug into our captive audience at Channel Chingada the number one pick of felons and drunks!” “I like the captive bit. Get on it. I want to do an editorial too … Uh, something to the effect of the incompetent town police blah blah blah corrupt without equal -- throw an alleged in there blah blah blah and close out that all witnesses of local police brutality contact the governor to launch an inquiry.” All this over a 50 dollar ticket. Later, he obliterates the station’s front door window with a shot when a commercial doesn’t run on time and chases his son with a bullwhip for not programming the spot right. The scared kid leaves town. The final straw for me lands when he locks himself in the transmitter and threatens to blow up the local cable company because they won’t carry his low power operation. But, he’s the least of my worries. I’m having affairs with two married women. Both Guadalupe Angelita (Tita – the owners stepdaughter) and Delilah Blue are separated from their husbands but still hitched until their divorces come through. Tita’s 6 foot Mexican Jalapeno shows up unannounced one afternoon, “Who are you?” “I live here.” “You live in my house?” “Who the hell are you?” “Tita’s husband and you’re outta here.” I hit him with a lamp and take off for Delilah Blues house. It’s déjà vu all over again. Blues estranged husband shows up and tries to set fire to the front door with me inside. I end up in legal hot water for six months beating both these guys off. When the judge finds out I’m from out of town he hits me with 20 days in jail and warns me I can be deported. “Where, back to the Bronx? I’m a citizen.” “That’s five more days for your smart aleck city ways.” Brown gets you a ticket out of town and I leave with Delilah Blue. You know what? They do tune in that station at the cellblock regularly. “Thank you God. Can I come home now?” Call me I got call waiting Let it ring If there’s no answer Wait and pray again See Call waiting Here’s the secret You have to know life To recreate life and One more thing I love you Now go write Some of those stories You still have to go back Through the looking glass And we got That millenium thing Coming on Trust me I walk with you |
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