Reality Jane (35 page)

“Yup, got me a gold in the steer wrestling event. . . Yup, first time in a ro-day-oh. . . Yup, showed them cow-pokes who’s boss. . . Dem’s were the days.”

This cabbie was so annoying I pictured myself making a run for it at the next red light. Then I realized, he was probably the only cab driver in this two-horse town. So I settled back into my corner, fastened the seatbelt, and found myself mildly intrigued by my driver’s vignettes.

We had a few extra minutes, so he drove me by the Steinbeck Museum—who, my cabbie trivia-master said, used to live there—and talked about his favorite novels. By the end of our ride, I was entranced. I would have much rather spent the day driving around, hearing dusty stories about the good ole days, than do what I had to do. I made him promise to pick me up at 5:30 p.m.—the end of his shift and the end of mine—for another tall-tale pow-wow before my evening plane back to LA.

“I’d be glad to, Missy. I’ll be here. Now buh-bye.”

I arrived at the location exactly on time. However, it took twenty-five minutes to find the right gate and call button so Denise, Madeline’s mom, could let me in. The condo complex was surrounded by a black wrought-iron fence that came to sharp points at the top of its 15-foot exterior. It looked glum,
and foreboding like a prison.

Prancing delicately on platform heels, Denise rounded the corner towards me. She appeared curvy, bubbly, and pretty. I was expecting someone a little more damaged, and not quite so intelligent looking.

What does she want with us?
I wondered. I even considered warning her:
Turn back! Don’t do it!

Instead, I introduced myself. “Hi, I’m Jane. I’m the producer. Is the cameraman here?. . . Great, we’ll be starting with interviews. Is your daughter home too?. . . Great, can’t wait to meet her. So, Denise, ever been on TV?”

The camera crew had already rearranged the furniture in the living room and set up the lights for our first interview. The apartment was so small they’d had to fold up the kitchen table and put it on the porch to make room for the camera and the tripod. I made a few minor changes to the background, hid a couple of tacky knick-knacks from the camera frame, then made my way to the back room to introduce myself to Madeline, Denise’s daughter. She was watching TV.

I’d seen a photograph of her, which suggested she wasn’t too fat for a seven-year-old—plump, maybe, but not fat. However, when I saw her in person, I could see what her mother was worried about. She was twice the size she should have been, and already scowling. Carefree young kids shouldn’t scowl—only overworked, underfed field producers should.

I double-checked my notes. Corinne and her AP, Heidi, were calling this their “Obsessive Mothers” story. The mothers weren’t “horrible” this time, but “obsessive.” They said Denise was “a real witch”—a recurring theme, I’d noticed:

The Story
: Denise says her daughter’s obese. She tells us she can’t love her daughter like she wants to because she’s fat. If Madeline were skinny, she says she could love her more. This woman is sick.

• I’m embarrassed when I’m with Madeline in the supermarket.
  
• If she were skinny, I could love her more. She’s always eating.
  
• Her friends call her “Fatso.” I don’t blame them. I don’t let her know I feel sorry for her because then she’ll think it’s okay to be fat.
  
• She used to be so cute. Not anymore. I love her, but she needs help.
  
• Please help my daughter lose weight so she won’t be teased at school. I just want her to be happy.
  

Note
: Get shots of Madeline in the mirror putting on tight clothing and bathing suits.

My phone rang from my pocket. It was the office. I almost didn’t answer.

“Jane? It’s Corinne,” she said, not waiting for a reply. “Listen, it’s all there in my notes. Do you have it? Good. Make sure Denise and Madeline say everything on the script. Don’t leave out a thing, especially the stuff about Denise not being able to love Maddy because she’s fat. Okay? Call me directly if she doesn’t. Meg needs to know.” Corinne was now talking like a computer, slowly enunciating each syllable as if I was brainless. “We don’t have a show if they don’t. Am I clear?!”

“Yeah, yeah,” I said, annoyed. I’d heard it a million times.

“Oh, and by the way,” she said with a hint of niceness to her voice, “Meg said she plans to talk to you tomorrow when you’re back in the office. I smell promotion! Good luck!”

Click
. I switched my phone to vibrate.

“Listen,” I told Denise, “whatever you said to us on the phone, you need to tell me during the interview. That’s what Mr. Dean goes by. So don’t hold back. Otherwise, we can’t help you.”

I nearly gagged on that last sentence.

During our interview, which went like clockwork, Denise repeated all the lines appearing on my one-sheet production notes. She told me her daughter was the most important thing in her life, and that she wanted desperately to help her. She
admitted to being embarrassed about her daughter’s size when all the other seven-year-old girls were bone-thin. But she came across more honest than nasty. She said “our world” looks down on fat people, and with Madeline so young and already ballooning, she saw trouble ahead for her, and with it the risk of being ostracized. Her daughter was already being teased. She’d have trouble getting a job, making friends, finding a boyfriend, falling in love. “Life is tough enough,” she told me. “I don’t want my only child to be unhealthy and hating herself because she’s fat.” As she said all this, she cried.

Great,
I thought,
another underdog about to be turned into a monster. Sure, Denise thinks her daughter’s fat, but it’s not a vanity thing. She loves her. She cares! That’s why she’s doing this. Yet, by the time we’re done with her, you’d think she was a gas tank away from driving Madeline into a river.

“Denise, that was excellent. Thank you for being so candid. I really hope we can help you. I mean, I know we will. Can you get Madeline now?”

Madeline, reluctant to enter the room, hugged the doorframe just off the hallway. In the living room, we’d stacked pillows and teddy bears and created a comfortable place for her to sit for the interview. I plunged into a cross-legged sitting position on the rug and started playing with her stuffed dinosaur, trying to make it look like fun.

“Come play with me, Madeline,” I said, trying to sound excited.

She waddled into the room, pouting but curious.

Madeline’s mom had pulled her hair tight into a perfectly round donut at the peak of her head. Curls framed her face like tiny mattress springs. She wore snug blue-jean overalls and a frilly orange shirt. Her eyes were bright and innocent, but they made her look sad. This was going to be hard.

“Now Madeline,” I said, “this won’t be hard.”

My soul sank into flames as I struggled to convince this girl to say just one more thing. To her, I was officially one of the evil clown soldiers of the Ricky Dean Gestapo.

“Listen, sweetie, and you are a sweetie, I just need you to say, ‘My mommy would love me more if I were skinny like my cousin.’ Okay? Repeat after me. It’s easy.”

Silence, blubbering, and tears followed, as tissues stuck to her eyebrows.
Why am I doing this? Help! What’s wrong with me?

“Makeup!”
Oh, that’s my job.
I leaned forward again on my knees to wipe her, bouncing from cold-producer-lady to compassionate human. “It’s okay. You’re doing great. Just please say that sentence for me. Please, please, say it. Just say it—the thing about your cousin, the sentence. Come on—”

“What sentence?” She looked at me, sobbing through yet another tissue.

All she knew was that being fat, and having to admit it publicly, really hurt, and that she really, really hated me. So did I.

“Oh, hell, forget it,” I said out loud, rather than thinking it, as I usually did. “Everyone forget it. Stop tape!” I turned my head toward the bedroom, where Denise was waiting behind a closed door. “Denise, this interview is over!”

I grabbed my phone to make the call as Denise scrambled out of the room to hug her daughter. Denise looked confused but put on a brave face for Madeline, firmly convinced that from this torture only good would come.

“Corinne?. . . Yeah, hi, it’s Jane. Listen, the kid’s seven. Hear me?” I stepped outside onto the porch, out of earshot. “She’s seven years old! I can’t do this.
She
can’t do this. She’s a baby, for Chrissakes. She’s bawling. She can’t articulate a big sentence like that, and this stupid script’s insane!” I was completely frazzled, all airs of professionalism gone.

“Jane, calm down.”

“I am calm,” I said. “Now listen, it’s not a total loss, okay? No need to worry. You got your story. Great stuff from Denise. Just like it says on the script. But the girl—she’s too young. We can’t do this to her.” We had to be breaking some kind of law! “She’s just a kid.”

“What did Madeline say?” Corinne asked, unaffected by my consternation.

“It was good. I promise! Like ‘kids at school call me fat’ and ‘I sneak food.’ But she was a little hard to understand because she was crying. She won’t stop crying. And I know how much you all like crying. So maybe it’s a good thing. Anyway, she did well, considering she’s
seven years old
! It took an hour, but we’ve got enough. Trust me, I have enough. Just don’t make me torture the poor kid anymore, okay?”

Corinne hesitated for a second. She was thinking. She was coming around. I had her on my side. But then
they
entered the room.

“Meg’s here. She’s going to toss the story if we don’t get the script verbatim,” Corinne said coldly. “And if that happens, I’m out my A segment for Thursday’s show. Frankly, I don’t need the black mark on my record. Sorry. You’re not the only one on a career path here.”

“But you still have your story,” I said, “and just what you wanted—
monster
mom!”

“Yeah, but we need the kid, too. She talked before on the phone. She’ll talk again. Now, here’s what we’ll do: My AP Heidi is the one who did the initial interview. She has a way with Madeline. I’m sure she’ll get it out of her.”

“What—Heidi? Heidi’s doing the interview? You mean Heidi, the associate producer who’s never done a field shoot in her entire life? You’re kidding, right?”

They were actually forcing me to persist. As I hit the speaker function on my phone, I felt a stabbing sensation in my heart. A little girl was about to suffer so I could rocket to the top. Had I really chosen a promotion over Madeline’s fate?

Heidi’s voice filled the room with a cold electronic vibration, Denise having gone behind closed doors again. I sat in front of Madeline on the carpet, holding the phone in my palm in front of me.

“Remember,” Heidi began in her baby voice, “what we talked about, Madeline? I’m your buddy, right? Now remember what we said on the phone and what you told me? Okay, say that. You told me your mommy thinks you’re fat and fat
people are disgusting. Can you say that?”

Madeline was again bawling. This was agony.

Between sniffles and gulps, she whispered, “My mom calls me ffff—”
Sniff, sniff
. “She says I’m. . . ” It was totally unusable stuff.

“That’s it. I can’t take this!” I said, abruptly hanging up and powering off the phone.

The crew looked at me as if I was crazy. I jumped up off the floor and began a soliloquy to no one in particular: “Did I mention I’m quitting? Yup, jumping ship! Nuts, huh? Just decided. I’m done. That’s it! No more. Can’t do it. I’ve already lost my soul. Now I’m just trying to salvage my earthly life. Yup. The few short years I’ve got left here on Earth.”

Many tears and a single hug later, I walked out the door with my three tapes in hand: one of Denise’s interview, one of Madeline’s interview, and one of some rather b-grade B-roll. In all, we had enough of a story for the editors to cut around. It wasn’t exactly what they’d asked for, but at this point, I didn’t care.

“Ya look a lot worse for wear,” the cab driver said on picking me up. He’d been waiting for 15 minutes.

“Yup,” I said, in no mood for conversation.

As I contemplated my future, we rattled down the road en route to the airport.