Exclusive Excerpt: 'Life to the Right of Hollywood'

My name is Joseph Lindsey and it’s been 4195 days since I last pretended to be a liberal. When I sat down to write my story my first instinct was to write it as a vapid, narcissistic autobiography, one about an actor who hides in a conservative closet while playing the part of a Hollywood liberal in the hopes of getting ahead in show business. But I couldn’t do it. Instead, I followed the lead of today’s mainstream media and didn’t let the truth get in the way of a good story. So here for you is an excerpt from my novel Life to the Right of Hollywood, a fictitious story, some of which is true.

Take 31 – C.A.A. Come. And. Accept.

We walked the length of a carpeted football field, past some sort of Buddhist waterfall, through an automated Starbucks machine zone and then to an elevator that on all four sides was a fish tank. My escort waited for me to enter, followed behind me, then with his back to me pushed floor number seven. Hypnotized into a stint of free association by the fish that circled me like some sort of marine park amusement ride, I could feel the gooey ooze of my mind begin to take hold. As the elevator continued to rise, the tiny speakers above the aquarium pulled me from my hypnotic state by what sounded like a public service announcement. It went something like this, “Hello and welcome to CAA, Creative Artist Agency, the most powerful name in entertainment representation. You should know that some of our current clients have films opening this weekend, and you should go to the Cineplex and see them. Here is a short list for you to memorize and tell friends…

…Ralph Fiennes in The Cherry Tomato Picker, Julia Roberts in the remake of The Sound of Music, Brad Pitt as Al Gore in Hanging Chad, the Al Gore Story. And look for Nicholas Cage in Champagne Supernova, the story of a disenfranchised American struggling to become a French citizen in Champagne, France. For a complete list of client films, and to see if you are eligible for a free matinee pass to see any of the films mentioned in this announcement, ask you agent’s assistant for further details.” Then with an auctioneer’s sort of tone and pace, the announcement finished with: “CAA employees, family members, house-help and landscapers are not eligible for free movie passes. Thank you for choosing CAA as the representative to your working future in show business. This CAA announcement is brought to you by Carl’s Junior.” Just as this little bit of information finished, the elevator stopped on the seventh floor and the doors swished open.

“Are you Kavel’s assistant? Should I ask you about movie passes?”

“No, I am not Kavel’s assistant, thank God. But I’m sure Jeffrey, who is, can get you anything you like. This way please.”

We walked a hallway that bustled with activity, phones ringing, faxes faxing, people working behind computer screens, others thumbing through People magazine and all while sipping Starbucks in a mode of work.

I was escorted into a large white room with the vacant feel of an Ikea display. Nine Frisbee-sized Swiss Army clocks representing the time zones of Los Angeles, New York, London, Nashville, Beijing, St. Louis, Calgary and Stockholm circled the room. A large photo of Paul McCartney and Lenin, the communist leader not the co-singer, hung on opposing walls, the plant in the corner was very large and very plastic, and a red crescent moon-shaped microfiber couch with a matching footstool in the shape of a star was placed deliberately in the center. It was either an old Soviet Union installation work of art, or it was this Hollywood agencies way of honoring Muslim freedom fighters being tortured by the CIA in secret prisons all over the world by saying, “See, we respect your religion, and here’s a fifty-thousand-dollar microfiber crescent moon couch and star shaped footstool to prove it. Please don’t behead us.”

Instructed to have a seat on the footstool, I was told that the team would be with me in a moment. Deafening silence filled the room as I sat and waited for what felt like a lifetime but couldn’t have been more than five minutes. The door opened and a lanky young man, dressed in a red velvet blazer with a Ringo Star haircut, entered with a swish in his walk that could’ve stirred a frappuccino. He stepped up to me, handed me two free movie passes and said, “I’m Lord Kavel’s bitch; anything you need you call me. Never ask from Lord Kavel what I can get you first. I’m the gatekeeper. You may call me Jeff, Jeffrey, or little worker Bee. Ciao.” He did a sort of backwards swishing walk, opened the door, and spun out.

Slouching into the microfiber footstool I felt the beginnings of a nap coming on when the door again burst open and in walked nine perfect human specimens, all dressed in black designer outfits. These nine perfect human specimens breathed under haircuts that surrounded their cultural facial leanings that hinted at the fact that each may be a representative from the nine time-zone-clocks that held the room together. As if choreographed by Bob Fosse or Paula Abdul with a touch of chemically altered crazy, they all stopped in front of the microfiber couch, sat, and crossed their legs in unison. They sat looking me over like a piece of meat, or, like an old Soviet Union art installation.

Five men, four woman. No one said a word.

My agent Kavel entered, placed his hands on my shoulders, looked me straight in the eyes and said, “Don’t worry about them. I know they look like a bunch of high-end pricks that can eat trout from a county river and crap sushi onto a plate in Beverly Hills, but trust me, they’re all the right people for you. They’re either all gay or they’re Jews.”