Read Online Devilcountry by Craig Spivek - Free Book Online Page A

to say that James Spader, millionaire actor, was absolutely
miserable.  I felt bad for the guy.  I felt like I was part of the
problem.   We had intruded upon him.  Interrupting him.
Demanding shit from him.  Shit he didn’t even order or want.  I wanted
to say to everyone there, “Hey, everybody ,  let’s leave James Spader alone.   Find someone else to pay for the food and
just let him go back to figuring out the chords to Thunder Road.
    I delivered to Al Gore.  Actually it was to
his secret service.  I always wondered if the security and entourage are
reimbursed.  Stars can be pretty insensitive to that kind of stuff.
 A lot of the time it’s the assistant paying for the
food out of their own pocket.  The celebrity will either refuse to
pay or politely forget about payment or the tip.  I’ve seen it happen more
than once.  
    Patricia Arquette wanted a pizza during her
press junket for a film she was promoting.  I handed it to a handler.
  Lousy  tip , my guess is that it was coming
out of his pocket.  Nick Cage was walking out of the building right as I
was walking in.  He looked miserable.   Probably
because he was divorcing Arquette at the time.  Glad I didn’t
deliver to him.  
    On the way down from Arquette’s suite a woman
walked into the elevator and someone started talking to her from the hallway.
 She looked at me to hold the elevator so she could banter.  Without
thought, I complied.  She was older.  Dressed impeccably.  She’d
been face lifted multiple times.  A quick hello to her suitor turned into
some type of impromptu schmooze session.  Seconds turned into minutes.
 I had shit to do and here I was playing Rochester to her Jack Benny.
 Only she was an incredibly unfunny Jack Benny.  It was rude.
 Yet I did it.  Finally the meeting broke up.  Laughter between
her and whoever and she gave me the look of “Okay, we can leave now.”  We
rode down together, silence.  I asked her very briefly about what was
going on upstairs.  “Press junket,” she said it in a straight monotone
with her face forward.  All of the joy and life she had just shared with
the person she had been talking to was gone.  She gave me a whopping two words.  She wanted nothing to do with
me, and was completely ungrateful for me holding the elevator for her for over
five minutes.  The doors opened and she was gone. Once she got off the
elevator I realized who it was.   I had seen
her face on TV and in the gossip column of   The New York Post which Pudgie read religiously every day.  He’d lay them
out on each table.   Sometimes  Donnie would
be in the restaurant with his father.  Both Donnie and his father were
producers and ran a mid-size production company.  Pudgie would always
force a copy of it on them.  Or open up directly to her column and start
reading.  Donnie and his daddy were always polite but you could tell they
didn’t want to hear any of it.  The Big Pizza was their personal kingdom.
 A slice of paradise for them to both refuel,
refresh and most importantly escape from the rigors of the biz that was thrust
down their throats every waking minute.  On occasion I would intervene
asking Pudgie some random question in order to distract him away from them.
Donnie would always smile at me and give me a thumbs up as a sign of gratitude.  You could tell he loved his dad and cherished
the private time they had together.  I admired it.  It reminded me of
the times my father would take me into Hollywood or Westwood for the latest
Spielberg movie and a burger.  We don’t realize it but it is these moments
we take with us to the next world.  The movie was good but the meal was
better.  
    I remembered her now.   Her
horrible articles.  She was gross.  A parasite.  I
despised her.  I remember her column.  It was crap.  And she was
the queen of it.  She wasn’t famous.  She was famous adjacent. She’d
grown up in New York City.  Her parents divorced early, her