It took forty-five minutes to drive to Macy’s school in the middle of the day, and once I got here, it was like when I was a kid and my mom would drive me to an audition after school and then we’d get there and find out it was a cattle call. I thought I was going to be the star of the Show and Tell Show, but I’m one of four feature players today. I had to stand at the side of the classroom for thirty minutes while a store owner, a cellist, and a scout for the Lakers talked about their jobs. It was interesting, don’t get me wrong. I will never get cast as a store owner or in a sports movie, but I will definitely use what I’ve learned today if I ever get to play a brooding cellist who takes himself way too seriously.
But now I get to take center stage and Macy is holding my hand while introducing me to her class.
“This is my uncle Dylan. He’s a big famous actor, and also he models for commercials and magazine ads and stuff, like my dad used to and my other uncle—Uncle Owen—still does sometimes too. Uncle Dylan met Ariana Grande at a party once. And he gets to take me to Disneyland for free forever and we get to be VIPs there, and also he was on a show called That’s So Wizard! which is why he knows Summer and Lucky from the fourth grade’s dad—because he was his little brother on that. But that was when they were kids. Now he does plays with no singing and good movies and special stuff on TV—nothing crappy. My dad says if he really wants to be taken seriously, then he should probably stop spending so much time being pretty. Anyway, I’m going to be an entertainer too, except I’m going to sing in musicals.”
There is a lot of snickering from Macy’s classmates because they’ve probably heard her sing.
“Hey!” She plants a fist on her hip and frowns at the room. “That’s not nice!”
“All right, Macy. Thank you for the introduction.” Mrs. Bean starts clapping, and the students in her third grade class do too—a lot more enthusiastically than they did for the other three special guests—not that it means anything. “Why don’t you start by telling us how you got into acting and why you enjoy doing it, Mr. Brodie.”
“Well, I—”
“My grandpops was an actor, and all of my uncles used to—”
Mrs. Bean interrupts her. “Macy, you can sit down now.”
“Why?” Macy pouts.
“Because your uncle is the guest, and he is the one who is supposed to talk to the class. Please sit down.”
“Fine!” She lets go of my hand and stomps back to her table. If she were a cartoon, there would be fumes coming off her.
“Well, my dad was an actor, like Macy said. He was the weatherman for a Houston news show when I was born, so he’s been on TV for my whole life almost. He got cast on a soap opera when I was really little, so we moved out here, and my mama would always take me and my brothers on set to visit him. And I was like, this is cool. There was a big table with free snacks on it and people running around with headsets and my dad had his own trailer. So I told my parents I wanted to do that, and when I was around your age—eight years old—I started doing commercials. My older brothers were already doing commercials, but they didn’t have speaking roles. I did. So that kind of became my thing. I was the only one of my brothers who was acting, like my dad was. I liked doing what Pops did. I thought he’d like that I was doing what he did. He gave me advice at first and he’d help me work on stuff. And my mama would always drive me around to auditions and to jobs, and she had to be on set with me, so…I got to spend more time with her…”
Holy shit. I think I just had an epiphany. I never made that connection about my parents before for some reason. I need to remember to talk to Scarlett about this.
And now I’m thinking about Scarlett in front of a room full of eight-year-olds and Mrs. Bean.
“So that’s why I got into acting, but I stayed with it because I love exploring life and human emotions and myself—through portraying characters. And it’s a great way to meet people.”
Like emotionally unavailable actresses, Miles would say, if he were here right now.
“That is very interesting,” Mrs. Bean says in a tone that tells me she finds actors completely self-involved and she’s probably heard them say this five million times. “Why don’t you take some questions from the students now. Hands up and wait until you’re called on, class!”
About twenty hands shoot up in the air—way more questions than the other guests had—not that it matters.
A little redhead at the table closest to me looks like she really wants to ask an important question, so I point to her. “Hi. What’s your question?”
She stands up. “Hi, I’m Angela.”
“Hello, Angela.”
“Hey. Um, I would like to know if you are friends with the actor who played your brother on That’s So Wizard! because he’s really cute and I see him pick up his kids here a lot, and one time he smiled at me and I totally died.”
And the trend continues.
A bunch of other girls giggle and whisper about Shane Miller too, until Mrs. Bean shushes them.
“I am still in touch with Shane Miller, who played my older brother, as well as Nico Todd who played Shane’s best friend on the show. My real life older brother Owen is actually working with Shane right now, and he’s always been better friends with those guys because they’re around the same age. I, on the other hand, am still in my twenties. I look young, but I’m very mature. So. Best of both worlds.” Why am I explaining this to eight-year-olds?
A boy at the same table as hers looks like he’ll have a good question for me, so I point to him. “Yeah, hi. In the blue shirt.”
He looks down at his shirt and then stands up. “Hey. I’m Ethan. Are you ever going to be in a Marvel movie? And if you could be any Marvel character, which would you want to be?”
God forbid he should ask me which Shakespeare character I’d want to be.
“I have no plans to be in a Marvel project, but if I got to choose, I would want to be Loki. Next question. You with the curly hair.” I point to the girl with the super curly hair at the back.
“Hi! I’m Britta.” She stands up. “I was going to ask the Marvel question too.” She sits back down.
“Okay, then. Who else?”
Half the class puts their hands down because I guess they were all going to ask the Marvel question.
“Oh oh oh wait! I know!” Britta stands up again.
“Yes. You thought of another one?”
“Yes! What was Ariana Grande like?”
“She was sweet and glittery and very pretty. You, sir.” I point to a freckle-faced boy who looks very serious.
“Um. I’m Freddie, and I would like to know… Wait. I forgot what I was going to say… Oh yeah! If you had to choose between being allowed to act for the rest of your life or being with the people you love for the rest of your life, which would you choose?”
The fuck?
“I would obviously want to be with the people I love for the rest of my life. Except for my brother Miles. Are we talking about living in the same house with these people? Because I wouldn’t be able to handle Miles for more than a few hours.”
“Hey! I’m telling my daddy you said that!” Macy calls out from her seat.