This Will Only Hurt a Little(74)
I didn’t have a stylist, so my new friend Irene Neuwirth introduced me to a designer she knew who made me a dress to wear to the event, which I had to buy. It was a daytime award ceremony, held in the basement ballroom at the Beverly Hills Hotel. It wouldn’t be televised. I wrote a thank-you letter to each of the critics for my nomination, not because I was trying to win particularly (I mean, I didn’t think it could hurt) but more because I felt like I had been acting for fifteen years and this acknowledgment really did mean something to me. Awards may be bullshit, but it’s nice to feel seen.
A few weeks before the event, my doctor put me on a new drug, a mood stabilizer that he thought would help even me out a little more, since I still was struggling with my moods and spinning thoughts. I started getting really bad canker sores in my mouth and down my throat. I went to Dr. Sugerman, who gave me a rinse to gargle with but had no idea what was causing it. A few nights later, as I was taking the new drug, Marc stopped me.
“Wait. Did you look up side effects from that?”
After a very brief Google search, we found out that one possible side effect of taking this drug was something terrible called Stevens-Johnson syndrome, which basically is a horrible allergic reaction that can end in death. I called all my doctors, and my general practitioner told me to go to the emergency room, which I did. They looked at my throat and mouth and skin and gave me some medicine and told me not to take the other drug anymore and sent me home. I guess because I was so freaked out about that, I decided to stop taking all of my antidepressants. I didn’t think the Lexapro was really worth it anyway. I stepped down off the drug but was still having weird brain zaps and feeling really strange and woozy. So that was my state of mind as we walked into the Beverly Hills Hotel.
There was a short press line, and I was sweating profusely, maybe because of the weather (it was June, almost my birthday), maybe because of the drugs, or maybe because I was nervous. Who knows? I wiped off almost all of my makeup with a towel and had a hard time even giving interviews because I was so sweaty. My publicist came up to me, and said, “I weirdly have a good feeling about this!”
We went into the ballroom, where I talked to some of my actor friends and started to calm down. Marc and I found our seats at a table with Courteney and Guillermo from Jimmy Kimmel. Jimmy was nominated but didn’t come and sent Guillermo in his place in case he won. All the shows that were nominated had big tables; there was one each for Big Bang and Modern Family and Community and all the shows’ creators and showrunners were there, but we were at a weird aggregate table, not dissimilar to Abby’s wedding. My award was up pretty early. I think Johnny Galecki presented it, maybe? He read out the nominees, “Julie Bowen, Modern Family; Jane Krakowski, 30 Rock; Jane Lynch, Glee; Eden Sher, The Middle; Busy Philipps, Cougar Town; Sofía Vergara, Modern Family.”
All of those actresses were going to be nominated for an Emmy, for sure. Most of them had already been in years past. Three of them had already won Emmys. And here I was, with my brain zaps from my antidepressants, my mouth and throat still sore from an allergic reaction that could have killed me, makeup totally sweated off, and pit stains growing on the dress I’d bought for the event.
When he announced my name, I couldn’t quite understand what I was supposed to do. I didn’t see where the steps were, so I kind of just climbed up on the stage awkwardly. As soon as I got up there I looked out at the crowd, and I had the thought that these people didn’t want to hear from me! I should get off this stage as quickly as I could! I’d never had that thought before, but here I was, dying to get offstage. I remembered to thank Courteney, since she was in the room. I thanked the critics. And then I bolted.
After I had returned to our table, a few friends came over to congratulate me. Courteney was so excited for me. Then the creator and showrunner for Modern Family, Steve Levitan, came by our table on his way back from the bathroom. He barely looked at me. “Hey, Courtney! How are you?”
“Good,” she said. “I’m good!”
“Yeah, this event is so lame. We’re all over there at our table like, ‘What even are these awards? I mean, are they even real?’?”
I glanced at the award I had just won sitting in front of me and then looked up at him. “Well, I mean, it feels real to me since I’m holding one?”
He laughed. “Ha. I guess. All right . . . Well, ’bye Courteney. Tell Bill I said hi.”
As soon as he walked away, Marc turned to me. “What a fucking dick thing to say. Fuck that guy. He’s just mad because you won and the two actresses from his show didn’t.”
“That was weird, right? Like a fucking lame thing to do to me, right? I’m not being oversensitive, because I just came off these drugs and I feel crazy, am I?”
“No babe,” he said. “That was fucked.”
Even Courteney, who tends to be very levelheaded and tries her best to see things from everyone’s point of view, thought it was weird. I tried to shake it and not let it bring me down, but it actually really hurt my feelings. It felt like he did it on purpose. Just to be a bully. Here was this guy, this fucking multimillionaire who was set for life because of his TV show, and for no reason, without even thinking, just shit on a thing that I was really proud of. Their show won, by the way (because OF COURSE IT DID) and you know, he acted like it was “real” when he was onstage, accepting his award.