Scrappy Little Nobody (24 page)

Another source of anxiety is the famous people! The fucking famous people everywhere! Handsome movie stars, beautiful movie stars, young movie star couples I suspect are only together for the PR. (For the record, if I was approached to be the girlfriend of a male celebrity for a few months for PR purposes, I would one hundred percent do it. That’s not a joke; I wouldn’t even hesitate.)

Even when you are nominated for an award, or chatting with your movie star cast, the other celebrities at award shows reduce you to the most pathetic version of yourself. You know that feeling when you see a pretty girl and you immediately hate her because you assume she’d never talk to you (this metaphor works if you’re a girl or a guy), but then she smiles and introduces herself and you’re like, how could I have misjudged you, you are clearly the best person alive! That feeling is intensified tenfold with movie stars.
Ugh, look at Kate Beckinsale across the room with her perfect hair and her perfect laugh and I’ll bet she’s an ice queen bitc— Oh god, she’s coming over here.
She gives you a compliment and tells you one dirty joke and you are ready to blindly pledge your life to her service. Long live the queen!

After a while you’ll have to pee, and that’s where the illusion really falls apart. Even the nicest gown can’t be glamorous when you’ve got it hiked around your waist. Why even steam the dress?! You’re holding up the full skirt with one hand (sometimes the dress is so big it fills the entire stall) while you use the other to get your underwear down. You are pigeon-toed in your six-inch
heels and it’s a miracle if you make it through the ordeal rip- and urine-free.

The show itself is usually funny, but no one laughs because we are all hungry and nervous. Sometimes you get to meet someone unexpected and delightful—for example, at my first Golden Globes I met the voice of Dug from the film
Up
, and he indulged me by saying, “I have just met you and I
looove
you.” I know! The after-party is often better, because win or lose, it’s over, and you can find something to eat! Actually, watching gorgeous women in skintight gowns attacking anyone holding a tray of food is half the fun.

The best part is going home. It’s a relief. I’m so happy it’s over, which I know sounds like a line. It’s not like I’m NOT checking Twitter to see if people liked my dress, but there’s an afterglow when my anxiety level returns to its normal, low-grade panic setting and simple acts are transformed into considerable luxuries.

I usually take off my shoes in the car and walk into my home barefoot, my dress dragging. The dress comes off and I get into sweatpants and a hoodie with no bra, but for the moment I keep on the jewelry and makeup. If the event is out of town and I’m staying in a hotel, I get into the bathrobe, which is nice, but it still has a Marilyn Monroe, glamorous vibe, and I’m going for more of a trashy jewel thief thing.

At home I get to sit on my couch, put on an old episode of
30 Rock
, and eat mac and cheese in sweatpants and thousands of dollars’ worth of diamonds. It is the most delicious dichotomy I’ve encountered in my life.

My first big award show was the Golden Globes the year I was nominated for
Up in the Air
. When you’re wearing a long dress, which I was for the first time, you want to go for height and comfort in your shoe choice. Style really doesn’t matter because no one is ever going to see them. But as this was my first Golden Globes, I wanted to wear this perfect pair of punishing, embellished skyscrapers. They were ridiculously painful, but they were a work of art. Because I knew I wouldn’t be able to endure an entire evening in them, my publicist put a pair of slightly less ridiculous shoes in her bag to hand off to me once I was done with the red carpet. After I walked the carpet and sat down in the ballroom, I ripped off the skyscrapers, but my feet were so swollen they wouldn’t even fit into the “easy” shoes. I sat through the entire program with my bare feet under the table, praying that by the time the show was over I’d be able to squeeze them into my footwear. If I’d won, I would have looked like a little girl in her mother’s dress, hobbling up onstage. But that was the year I met the voice of Dug, so the night was a win.

The first time I got to present was that same year at the SAG Awards. I was wearing a strapless purple gown and nervously fiddled with the bodice as I waited backstage. Eventually, Stanley Tucci, who was presenting with me, leaned in and said, “Stop adjusting your boobs, you look fine.”

The award went to Drew Barrymore for
Grey Gardens
, and she gave a flustered but obviously heartfelt speech. We escorted her offstage, and once we were in the wings, we turned to congratulate
her. She walked steadily past us, leaned against a pillar, and closed her eyes. She was holding her award low by her waist and breathing slowly in and out. I thought,
Something real is happening in front of me. This is a human, taking a moment for herself because everything else has been pageantry.

Stanley and I backed up a bit more. A woman wearing a headset crept near her with a desperate look on her face, but Drew Barrymore, movie star and recent SAG Award recipient, was not ready to turn herself back on. The woman in the headset finally squeaked, “Miss Barrymore, we’re just gonna take you back here to have some pictures—”

“Just give me a second.” She was perfectly calm and perfectly polite, but she was serious.

“Can I get you some water?” (It never fails.)

“Sure.”

The woman disappeared to get a glass of water. I suspect that this was more about buying time than being thirsty. Stanley and I stayed quiet and tiptoed past her. Just before she was out of view, I turned back to see her still standing there, eyes closed. I looked away quickly, because even observing her felt like an invasion. But it was sort of beautiful. She’d just been honored for a project she clearly cared about deeply and was resolved to experience that moment on her own terms.

I had a very different experience presenting an award at the Oscars that year. At most award shows, you have the option to
rehearse. At the Oscars, rehearsal is mandatory. It doesn’t matter if you’re Brad Pitt or screen legend Sidney Poitier, you come in the day before to walk the little path to your mark and say your intro into the microphone. It is “strongly recommended” that women rehearse in their heels.

I was paired with Zac Efron, and in my jeans and ridiculous shoes I asked him, “May I take your arm?” The rehearsal is filmed and treated as a full production so that the director, cameramen, and editors can root out any potential mishaps. There are hired stand-ins scattered in the audience, sitting in the seats of all the nominees.

We walked our path and said our lines and waited for the winner to be announced. For rehearsal, the winner is chosen completely at random, so the camera crew will be prepared for anything. I was presenting the award for Best Sound Editing and (as I’m sure you remember) Paul N. J. Ottosson won for
The Hurt Locker
. But in the rehearsal,
Inglourious Basterds
won. A gentleman from the audience stood up and made his way to the stage. I gave him a perfunctory embrace (’cause that’s what you do) and backed up about four feet to the “listening” mark, where the presenter waits until the speech is over. Now, if I were this dude, I would just go, “Thank you, thank you, speech speech speech, I’m making my speech, it’s going on for about sixty seconds, thank you so much, good night.”

Instead, I was treated to a thoughtful monologue about the joys of working with Quentin Tarantino, the trials and triumphs of the sound-editing process, and the importance of family above all. I’d fallen into a parallel universe. This had taken research. He wasn’t
reading off of anything, which meant he had memorized all this information and all these names. I realized that something strange was happening in the audience. Even though these people were not involved in the nominated films, even though the winners were chosen completely at random, they must have been sitting there thinking,
Call my guy’s name, come on, call my guy’s name.
I do not know how the rehearsal nominees are hired, but the screening process seems to find people fitting the description “kooky but harmless . . . we hope.”

The real deal was equally surprising. The presentation went smoothly, Mr. Ottosson accepted his award, and I escorted him offstage. The weird thing was what happened after. What’s the first thing you would want to do after winning an Oscar? Jump into the arms of your loved ones and collaborators? Of course that’s what you’d want! But that’s not what happens. What happens is that the two goons you’ve never met before who just butchered the pronunciation of your name are whisked around with you to take a series of commemorative and candid photos in different setups around the theater.

First stop is the wings just offstage—
snap, snap, smile, how do you feel, congratulations.
Next is a long walk down a dim hallway to a professional-looking photo setup: all-white background, good lighting, pose with the presenters, pose by yourself (while the presenters get a drink)—
smile, do a serious one, hold out the Oscar, snap, snap, congratulations
. Last up, a door is opened to a small ballroom, and bleachers full of photographers start snapping and screaming. You know that scene in
Notting Hill
when Hugh Grant tries to tell Julia Roberts not to open the door (but
somehow can’t get out the words “Don’t open the door.” Come on, Richard Curtis, you’re better than that!) and she opens the door and is confronted by a sea of flashing lights and demanding voices? It’s like that. You walk onto a platform—
snap, snap, smile, over here, hold out the Oscar, snap, snap, congratulations, but I need you to look over here.
This room goes on the longest and is the most aggressive. Though, to be honest, I prefer the unbridled onslaught to the cordial desperation of the other stops. Then there are solo photos in the ballroom (again, the presenters go get a drink) and eventually you go back to your seat.

I’ve presented to groups before—sometimes the winner of a technical award will be a small team—and those seem less jarring. They can enjoy the win together and throw each other what-the-hell-is-happening looks, which must make it more manageable. But accepting an award by yourself has the hardest comedown I’ve ever witnessed.

One year after I presented an award, I was waiting in the hallway outside the auditorium to go back to my seat. You have to wait for a commercial break, so I was back there for a few minutes. Lupita Nyong’o walked up and stood across from me in the hall. She had, perhaps fifteen minutes prior, won an Oscar for
12 Years a Slave
.

“Congratulations,” I said.

She smiled, gave me a nod, then looked back down at the award in her hands.
Jesus
, I thought
, Lupita Nyong’o just won an Academy Award for starring in her first film; her family, the cast and crew are mere feet beyond these doors, and she’s gotta stare at my stupid mug for another three minutes before she can hug them? This
is a travesty. Someone hand her a glass of champagne! Or a puppy! Or a male model to make out with!

A similar thing happened at the Grammys. I was waiting to introduce a musical act and Sam Smith walked toward me after winning Best New Artist. He got to the bottom of the stairs under the stage and stopped. He looked around, Grammy in hand, and asked me in his sweet accent, “Do you know where I’m supposed to go?”
Travesty! Champagne! Puppy! Male model!

I didn’t know where he was supposed to go. I just stood there, a living reminder that even after you win a Grammy you’ve got to put up with idiots who don’t know anything. I think Drew Barrymore had the right idea.

The year I was nominated for
Up in the Air
was fun because I knew I wasn’t going to win. I know that sounds like bullshit, and of course the best iteration of an award season would be to win everything and make yourself an impractical but fabulous headdress with your many statuettes. However, that year, Mo’Nique won almost every award for the absolutely harrowing performance she gave in the film
Precious
. I won the National Board of Review, but in that instance the winner is announced before the ceremony.

There was never a “and the winner is” type show where I was going over a potential acceptance speech. I can’t imagine the stress of a close call, hearing your name at some events and someone else’s name at others. Doubly fun was that all of us in the
Up in the Air
gang were destined to be losers. George was up for Best Actor, which was always later in the program. After my category was presented, he would turn to me and whisper, “I’m still a nominee and you’re just some loser.” Knowing you weren’t going to win wasn’t what you wanted, but at least you could drink.

The only time I’ve been genuinely happy to lose an award was when I was nominated for an Independent Spirit Award for
Rocket Science
. I didn’t stand a chance anyway (I was up against Cate Blanchett), but I wouldn’t have been able to make a speech if I had won because—drumroll—I was high off my face.

The afternoon before the show, I’d felt a tingling sensation in my nose. Actually, it wasn’t quite in my nose, it was behind my nose. By that night it had become painful, and in the mirror my face looked swollen and slightly warped. I thought maybe I was having an allergic reaction to something, but I didn’t think allergies were so painful. Whatever was swelling in my nose was hard and it was putting pressure on the area above my lip, making it uncomfortable to smile. The ceremony was the next afternoon and I hoped that it would be gone when I woke up.

In the morning, it had gotten significantly worse and I walked across the apartment to wake my roommate Alex. I knocked on his door.

“You need to take me to the hospital.”

He opened the door, half asleep. “You look weird.”