It wasn’t actually. I’d been there some years before, foolishly dispatched by a fledgling fashion-cum-lifestyle magazine based in Calgary to cover an art exhibition and book launch – orchestrated by an ex-Albertan – in Laguna Beach. (I reported that trip for the magazine in my best Hunter S. Thompson style, which I’d rather not re-live, thank you.)
A number of years later, after I’d migrated back to the coast, I was called on again to visit LA in order to produce some edgy computer animated graphics for the TV station where I worked as Creative Director. (This was not the station’s idea; they are notoriously stingy, especially where self-promotion is concerned. It was the brainchild of an ad agency hired to buff up the station’s tired on-air image. Ad agencies in such circumstances are genetically programmed to recommend cutting edge production techniques that require out-of-town working trips to cool cities, in this case Los Angeles.)
My presence at the animation session was not strictly necessary, but when the station manager proposed I attend, I jumped at the chance. After all: Hollywood, computer animation, Cali-frigging-fornia… what was not to like? And so a couple of weeks later I was lounging at the Century Plaza Hotel in Century City, sipping something cool and having a bona fide poolside production meeting (I mean, seriously?) with the agency producer.
The following day we headed into the animation studio for our session and duly produced our ID package. What I remember most about the session was that the animation effects storyboarded by the agency and approved by station brass were not actually possible using this animation company’s technology. Instead they produced a facsimile of the effect which fell somewhat short of the original concept; I felt we had been taken for a bit of a ride by the agency, who mostly wanted an excuse to go to LA and do some cool computer graphics work.
We would be flying home the following day, but I had the evening free as my agency escort was going to visit some friends in the area. I had taken advantage of the opportunity to get back in touch with Katherine, my old friend and editor from the magazine days, who now lived in West Hollywood with her husband Paul, who was making it big in real estate down there. We arranged to meet up for dinner. “I’ll swing by the hotel and pick you around 6,” she offered.
The Century Plaza faced Avenue of the Stars with a grand, curved façade and a driveway to match, allowing traffic to flow off the street and pull up to the hotel forecourt with ease. It was a nothing, mid-week evening in early fall, but nevertheless the hotel entrance was a busy place. Knots of beautifully dressed people milled about in the mild evening air, coming and going in a succession of limousines: Cadillacs, Continentals, Mercs and even the occasional Rolls. It was all very Hollywood, and as I watched from a discreet distance off to the side of the main doors, I felt more and more out of place. Everyone here was too beautiful, too well dressed, too expensively transported – I was out of my league.
I was standing pressed against the hotel wall doing my best to be inconspicuous when a ripple of interest stirred the crowd. I turned to see a gleaming scarlet Ferrari swing into the hotel drive and begin to purr its way along the arc of the driveway. Even in a town where exotic cars were a dime a dozen, this was one sweet set of wheels, and everyone knew it. There was an appreciative hush as the car slowly rolled past the other waiting cars and the main entry doors before pulling to the curb right in front of where I was loitering. The passenger window slid down, and Katherine’s face appeared, leaning over from the driver’s seat. “Joe! Here!”
Every pair of eyes in the forecourt was travelling from the Ferrari, to me, and back to the Ferrari again, trying to connect the dots. It took me a moment to process the scene, and another to realize: this was it. My…Hollywood…moment.
Doing my absolute damndest to look like someone for whom getting picked up by beautiful women in Italian sports cars from Hollywood hotels was an everyday occurrence, I peeled myself off the hotel wall, casually sauntered across the pavement and slid into the soft leather embrace of the passenger seat, fully aware of the dozens of pairs of eyes following my every step. “I’m so sorry,” Katherine said as I chunked the door closed, “My Honda’s in the shop so I had to bring Paul’s car.”
I clicked my seatbelt into place and smiled at her. “Just drive, Kath.”