This Will Only Hurt a Little(39)

James did not say his line in response. Instead, he grabbed both my arms and screamed in my face, “DON’T EVER TOUCH ME AGAIN!”

And he threw me to the ground. Flat on my back. Wind knocked out of me. Immediately, I could feel the wet hot stinging of tears, but I tried like hell to suck them back in. He stormed off to the bathroom to change as the ADs and cameramen and my makeup artist rushed over to help me up and see if I was okay.

“I’m fine. I’m fine.”

I smiled to prove it.

The cameraman looked at me carefully. “Are you sure? That was so crazy.”

My makeup artist started wiping under my eyes to get rid of my tears as the director came over.

“Hey,” he said, looking concerned. “Are you okay?”

I nodded.

“Listen, I hate to do this, I wish we could just call it, but we really need one more. Can you do that? Can you change and do one more?”

I went to the bathroom and changed into dry clothes and went back and did one more take, barely looking at James, who said nothing to me. They yelled “Cut!” and I ran to Linda’s trailer, where I burst in and dramatically sobbed as I told her everything. She was appalled and told me to call my manager and tell her what had happened. Judd and Paul weren’t on set. Gabe Sachs showed up and asked if I was okay and told me Paul was on his way. The director had called everyone. I was finished for the day and just wanted to go home. James was full of bad behavior, so why would this be treated any differently? Judd called me that night. Everyone had watched the tape. They had talked to James’s manager. They were going to talk to James. He would need to apologize to me. It was barely a slap on the wrist. But that’s how a boys’ club works. I already knew there was no sense in trying to express to Judd and Paul how humiliating it had been on set. How James continually made me uncomfortable and got away with it because of his “talent.” I knew there was only one thing for me to say.

“Okay.”

? ? ?

We were shooting in the school gym the following day, and James found me and said he was sorry. He said he didn’t like that Daniel was always getting hit by his girlfriend or something and he reacted badly. He told me Judd had him watch the tape and “it was pretty mean.”

And then he smiled at me and hugged me, and I don’t need to tell you this, but James is a fucking movie star. He was horrible to me, yes, but he’s also gorgeous and charming as hell. That’s where the manipulation lives. These dudes so often get away with their shitty behavior because they smile at you and stare into your eyes and for a second you’re totally transfixed and you just say, “Yeah. It’s okay. I get it. You were in the moment. I’m sorry I don’t understand. I’m sorry I’m not a better actor. I’m sorry I’m not a prettier girl. I’m sorry.” And you accept their apology and somehow end up apologizing to them.

But the Franco weirdness aside, working on the show was beyond fun. We all felt like we were a part of something really cool. We knew that what we were doing was totally different from the unrealistic teen shows every other network was putting out. I read a review of Freaks and Geeks that said something to the effect of, “You won’t find any polished pretty people here. These are real kids.” I was vaguely insulted. Like, I know I didn’t look like Katie Heigl on the cover of Maxim, but I felt like I was fairly attractive. Honestly, it didn’t occur to me that I might want to lose weight now that I was on a network TV show, but Linda was on Jenny Craig and I figured maybe I needed to do it too. I liked it for about three days and then I was annoyed and wanted to just eat whatever I wanted to eat. Paul Feig found out that Linda and I were on a diet and came to talk to us about it one morning. In a very awkward conversation, he tried to tell us that we’d been hired because of what we looked like, that we were perfect the way we were, and that he wanted to make sure we didn’t feel any pressure to be thin from anyone, because that wasn’t what they wanted. We assured him that we wouldn’t get too thin. I think I quit the diet shortly after that conversation. My first diet failure.

I used to go into Linda’s trailer and hang out in the mornings. She always had the heat turned up really high, and after hair and makeup, we would lie on the floor cuddled up next to the heater and talk and wait for camera to be ready. It was on one of those mornings that Linda said something to me about Hollywood that I probably should have gotten tattooed on my arm. We were talking about how the show wasn’t a huge success even though it was critically acclaimed and how hard it is to get jobs and how much rejection there is and Linda said, “Yeah. But we all hang on because it only takes one job to change your life. It only takes one.”

I hadn’t thought of it in that way before, but hearing her say it made so much sense. It only takes one. So you keep going. Because if it’s not this one, maybe it’s the next one. Or the next one. Or the next one. And she’s right to a certain extent. But I certainly haven’t been in the ONE THAT CHANGES EVERYTHING. I haven’t even really been up for the one that changes everything. I’ve built a career slowly over time, and I’ve been lucky enough to keep working and working and working. So it’s not always the one, but fuck if we don’t all wish it would be.

We knew the show wasn’t doing well in the ratings. While we were shooting, no one in the industry seemingly cared about any of us, or even knew WHAT Freaks and Geeks was. (By the way, I am publicly calling bullshit on all the people who claim they loved it when it first aired on TV, because guess what? If everyone who claims they watched it in 1999 actually did, we’d be on season 17 by now!)