No Kidding...

I think that what I like most about my life right now, is that I never quite know what’s coming next. This past weekend was no exception, as I found myself, through a series of random events, acting in a television commercial. Someone desperately in need of white guys with no shame contacted me and asked if I would do it, and naturally, I said, "Of course!" In retrospect, my enthusiasm probably automatically lowered my pay, but it didn’t occur to me at the time. All I was thinking of was the chance to be on national television acting the fool; as if I don’t stand out enough as it is.

Thus began a series of barely comprehensible phone conversations and text messages, wherein it was established, surprising though it may be, that I did not know my tailored wardrobe measurements off by heart. So I had to make a trip to a tailor and get that done. While demands were coming at me left and right, I kept asking simply when and where this shoot was going to take place. I thought that maybe that information would be more accessible than my measurements, but apparently not. At 11:00 Thursday night I got the call that I was needed at 7AM the next morning. Not for the last time during this experience I said, "You’ve got to be kidding me." "No sir, no kidding sir."

So, a van arrived at 6:30 in the morning to pick me up. I was barely conscious as we wound our way deeper and deeper into the city. Civilisation crumbled around me as we passed through urban slums and arrived, finally, at a converted warehouse in an industrial area. I walked inside the main hangar, and suddenly I was in an advertising agency in New York. The set was shiny and new and everything was fake, in that special television way that somehow makes everything look more real. I was rushed upstairs, through dilapidated hallways that smelled of cat-piss, to the dressing room. Wardrobe decisions were made from the shirts and ties I had brought with me, and I was urged into the suit that was now tailored and waiting for me. Not bad, I thought, they made a suit in 12 hours, that sure beats Jack Frasier’s. I was told that I wouldn’t need any make up because my skin was perfect, which I took as a compliment, until I realised that by "perfect" they meant "white." By 7:30, I was dressed in my cheap, 12-hour old, fake Italian suit, with my hair slicked back into a tight pony-tail. Maybe my role would be as a bad-assed gangster. They told us we would be shooting in twenty minutes, so it was only a matter of waiting.

Seven hours later, my suit had lost some of its crispness. I was finding it difficult to say anything without interjecting several cuss-words into my speech. Every couple of hours someone would come up to tell us that we would be shooting in twenty minutes or so. I would ask them if they were kidding, and they would say, "No sir, no kidding sir." Turns out there was some kind of disagreement between the client and the agency… Excellent.
More time passed. The highlight of the afternoon was probably when the hairdresser asked me if I had ever "tried" boys. I told him no, but that he could go to Canada and marry one if he wanted. He seemed to like that idea quite a bit, so I took that opportunity to tell him that I might be more comfortable if he didn’t touch me like that. This shed a little more light on the earlier comment about my perfect skin.

Finally, we were brought down on the set where we sat in our places and they set the lights. Then we were sent back upstairs to wait for another hour. At long last, we started actually shooting. The director, who looked so much like my friend Mark that I started calling him Chewey, explained the concept of the commercial to us. You would think that someone might have let us in on that little secret in the previous 8 hours, but until that moment, we had no idea what it was about. For the first scene we were told to react to what was being said by the lead actor. After the first take, I observed that it might be easier for us to react if we had any idea what the actor was saying, since he was speaking Urdu. "Wow, that’s a really good point!" said Director Chewey. "No kidding," I said.

After a few different takes and angles we set up for our big shot. I found out that we were to be hit by a large shock-wave of energy emanating from the phone-set we were advertising. I took a little time-out to ensure that there would be no real shock wave hitting us. It turns out it was going to be a crazy Matrix-Style, slow-motion, computer generated deal. "You’ve got to be kidding," I said, as I realised that I was in Pakistan, and I was about to be filmed in "bullet time." The shot itself took hours, most of which I spent frozen, my hands in front of my face, wincing at the awesome, telephonic power of the supposed shock-wave. At one point we had to cut because a stray cat wandered through the shot. I thought that was funny. After that, they took about 150 photos of me from different angles so that they could map a computer version of yours truly.

Finally, I was done… that is, until I got a call on Saturday night that I was needed the next day at 2:00. "No sir, no kidding sir," The van came to get me again and I made the trip back to the "studio." I was once again rushed into my suit, but this time I knew better and took my time getting ready. I was told that we would be shooting in twenty minutes or so.

Seven hours later we were called down to the set. I sat in a chair and they took ten still photos of me from different angles. "Ok, you’re all done," they said. At this point, I have to explain that I am not the kind of guy that gets angry very easily. I snapped. Lost it. "Are you fucking kidding me?" I yelled at this poor assistant director. I didn’t even let him stammer out the accustomed response. "You’re telling me that I’ve been sitting here for 7 hours, waiting for you to take two minutes worth of pictures that you could have taken when I walked in here?" This appeared to be a question he could answer: "Oh, yes sir." Furious as I was, I still took satisfaction from my first ever chance to "storm off the set."

Someone tried to stop me to say that they needed to keep my clothes to help with the computer modeling. "Come again!?" I asked, so taken aback that I even forgot to curse. "Look man," I said, "This shirt and tie probably cost more than this whole suit, so forget it, if I give it to you jokers I’ll never see it again." He protested and said that they were very trustworthy people. I laughed and told him I was taking his suit too. "Are you kidding sir?" he asked. "Yes," I said, "I’m kidding. I’ll hang it up upstairs." What he didn’t realize, was that I was using my sarcastic voice. I turned around, walked straight to the van and went home.

I felt a little bad about stealing the suit, but really after spending 24 hours for what will probably be about 3 seconds of footage, I really couldn’t have cared less. Besides, if they can show me a Pakistani that can fit into my suit, I’ll give it back with pleasure. No kidding.