Today’s trio of episodes share a theme that smacked me in the face and reeked of more pot smoke with gin and juice than some of the tents at the Coachella Festival. The sheer volume of drugs I watched consumed on screen today was astounding. In fact, the lead-in for the story In the Game was the death of a young actress who overdoses on cocaine. (This popular episode is also the one where Nate accidentally takes an ecstasy tablet that David had hidden away in an old aspirin bottle in the kitchen cabinet, and Nate’s high is absolutely euphoric.) In Knock, Knock the addict Gabriel again surrenders to smoking pot. In Out, Out Brief Candle another of Claire’s stoner classmates freaks out smoking a joint laced by Gabriel with mortuary-strength formaldehyde. Overall, the drug use on 6FU is the one key component of the series I don’t particularly identify with. Youthful experimentation is behind me. I choose not to do such drugs. There...I said it.
I do consume alcohol, but with this year I do not drink as much as I did a few times last year, while I was getting my feet wet in the local film community, drinking more than I care to admit. I drank because I was nervous. I felt like I was taking a huge leap into the very public arena of our local filmmakers. Example: In the first short film I produced, I appeared in a scene wearing nothing but a tank top and panties.
What tends to amaze me is that when I write scripts with overt actions, and I have myself in mind for certain characters as I’m writing, I’m quite aware that I may have to perform these actions on film or stage. Yet I’m so detached from my own acting while I’m writing the character. (I think of what I’m writing for my other actors and I take what those actors can and cannot do into consideration, but I guess when it comes to writing for myself, I try to challenge my personal boundaries as an actor.) Three days before the festival I began to have an incredible amount of anxiety. My fear of an audience not being able to get past my physical appearance felt like it would cripple me.
The night of the festival I drank a lot. And by a lot I mean I drank a fifth of Scotch whiskey and a fifth of Honey Jack Daniel’s Tennessee whiskey. I had no idea I was drinking so much as I was drinking it. When the intro graphic for our team’s film appeared on screen, I might have vomited into my purse...except it would have been impossible, because to vomit I would’ve had to breathe. I’m really not sure I was breathing, sitting between Phillip and Miss Gracey Casterline, clinging to their hands. At that point I couldn’t have looked away from the screen if I’d wanted to.
The viewing went much better than I had imagined. I'd had visions of people throwing vegetables at the movie screen and asking why a cow in a wig and red panties was allowed to act in a film.
Yes, I know I’m incredibly critical on myself. I am dealing with that. My ex-fiance Grant used to tell me that he often tried to be kinder to me than most others might be, because he knew no matter how tough the world is to me, I’m a hundred times tougher on myself. When he first told me that, I was absolutely stunned. I thought everybody else picked themselves apart to their very core just as I did.
The 2012 festival circuit went much like this for me until the Knoxville Horror Film Fest "Grindhouse Grind-Out" competition, which was a special level of frightening for me.
The one thing I can say about myself is that I take very calculated risks as an artist. So I had researched the audience of the Grindhouse event--I do that with every performance-based event I work on, because knowledge of audience is so important. I had neglected that once long ago, and I made the mistake of reading a poem about my own ass at a fundraiser for the Baptist Church. (In my defense, I had no idea it was a fundraiser for the Baptist Church or I would not have chosen to perform that specific poem.) It was the first and only public performance I participated in where I actually had someone unplug my microphone from the wall. More insulting still, this same idiot running the event went on to tell a gentlemen in the audience whom I'd met five minutes before the reading that I "needed to be controlled.” When the kinder man sought me out afterwards to recount this, I just laughed. People had tried to control me well before that judging ass-hat and they had also failed…yeah, good luck with that, buddy. And, if you’re curious, I kept on performing the poem to completion without the microphone plugged in. I’m a big believer in the band playing on.
The film short (a trailer for an otherwise nonexistent exploitation genre film, per the competition rules) my Team She Wonder made for the Grind-Out featured me as the personification of menstruation, "Aunt Flo." I had a wig under my panties and I was dripping from waist to ankles with fake blood. Okay, I thought it was hysterical when I wrote it. I think it is funny now to watch it. I even thought it was amusing while we filmed it. However, two nights after we shot the short I found myself pacing the floor of my best friend’s apartment so freaked out that I thought my head might actually explode. Mike assured me it couldn’t be that bad. “My thighs,” I say nearly in tears. “An audience of hundreds of people are going to be staring up the gateway to my va jay-jay displayed on a huge screen...in high definition.” I watched Mike’s face as I showed him some raw footage we shot. His only response was a slight twitch of his left eyebrow and a barely-there smirk. “Okay,” he said. “You need to chill out. This is fine. People will love it, Kali. You have a real sense of your audience and they are not going to see you as grotesque, but rather Aunt Flo as grotesque.”
The night of the Grind-Out viewing, I forgot to eat and started drinking early. I was more nervous than I had ever been about any of my other creative work. I began with Jello shots…how can anyone go wrong with Jello shots, right? I will admit that after about half of all the trailers had viewed, I was feeling much better about my Aunt Flo. By the time all the films had viewed I had forgotten there would be awards. I was starving and talking to Phillip about finding some food somewhere when I suddenly heard William Mahaffey, the man who founded the Knoxville Horror Film Fest, say the name "Aunt Flo" into the microphone. Phillip and I looked at each other for what felt like a minute. My team leader, Jennifer Skeen, grabbed me by the shoulders and with a giant grin told me I had just won the award for Best Performance (female or male). Honestly, I was in absolute shock. Finally, local judges 'got me' as a performer. A panel of judges had looked at my giant thighs and said, “That brave bitch has talent!” And, if I hadn’t eliminated any question of it by nearly exposing my girlie bits, they could have also said I had some pretty big balls.
It wasn’t until I stood up to accept the award that I realized how very drunk I was. I dropped my camera, which was saved by fellow filmmaker Leigh Ann Jernigan’s lovely husband Matt. The award itself, a spray-painted VHS tape with the Knoxville Horror Film Fest logo on it, was still wet with paint and it stuck to my hand when William handed it to me. That moment was an absolute high…and made me wish I’d eaten beforehand and not drank so damn much. I was fine for about another hour, until I stood up from the middle of a conversation and announced louder than I meant to that I was going to vomit. I went to the bathroom where Jennifer and her sister offered to hold my hair--which I felt was an incredible honor and made me fall head over heels in love with both and cherish them so much as amazing and loving young women…their mama did so good with them. I didn’t puke in the bathroom. No, I vomited on the back passenger tire of my other creative partner Keri McClain’s SUV...and on my boots. I was so disappointed in myself for letting myself get so out of control just because I was afraid I’d be misunderstood as an artist. I also felt guilty I puked on my friend’s car. I immediately texted my friend Mike: “I just puked on my boots. I’m going home.” Within seconds his reply arrived: “Excellent.”
The next day I drank a gallon of water and ate pain relievers like M&Ms. I stared at the VHS tape I'd won, now displayed on the television in my bedroom. Phillip sat next to me. I told him how stupid I felt for getting so drunk. Without missing a beat he told me that now that I had won that award for performance, I didn’t need to worry anymore how people saw me. Apparently they got me and were okay with me as a physical being. I did feel a certain relief, and that relief spilled over into the Fifty-four Film Festival this year, where I had just one beer. And when I co-hosted the Knoxville Film & Music Festival's KnOscars Party, I had only half a martini. I guess I’m not afraid anymore.
This being said, I also guess I can now understand the appeal of recreational drugs, even though I choose not to participate in that form of recreation. My late father smoked so much pot that he was difficult to get to know. I understand him a little better now. My father’s addictive use of pot was my initiation into drugs and how they can affect behavior. I also fell head over heels (twice) in love with a man who is a recovering addict. It’s not easy loving an addict. The sort of love I felt both for my father and for this love nearly destroyed me emotionally. I think that is a part of the collateral damage of alcoholism and all addiction. I don’t think I’m an alcoholic, but I was not happy with how much I drank at these festivals just to feel more secure. That is insanity and could have led me down a road to addiction. At my core, I just want to be lovable and not suffer anymore. I want peace. I want balance. I want flow. That’s truly the best high of all.
I wrote and produced this short film Fag Hag. I play Hag, also. The short film also features Kevin Buchanan as Fag, Graclyn Casterline as The Waitress, and Kwame Rock as The Doctor.
Thank you.
ReplyDeleteYou are very welcome, NGgreen.
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