A Star is Born (15 page)

The applause Bill got when he completed his remarks was thunderously loud and intense. Most people simply stand up and thank their manager, their housekeeper, their cat’s second Tuesday playmate, and a host of other people unknown to everyone watching. Bill hadn’t done that. He had spoken from the heart and had used the opportunity to do something good, to reach out beyond himself, beyond the moment, beyond the four walls of this room.

He had used the moment to reach out to others who had been knocked down or kicked aside, to give them a lifeline. I know that it had been done before, but it was so rare an occurrence that I couldn’t recall the last time I had heard someone give a speech like his. I was so proud of him. Moira and I were jumping up and down and were cheering so loud for Bill. We both had tears in our eyes as we hugged each other. We were so proud of him. In that moment, we both were reminded of why we loved him so much. Despite his flaws and occasional failings, which simply meant that he was human, he really was an awesome guy.

When Bill finished his remarks, he bowed to the audience, but the thunderous applause continued. He stood for a minute and let the audience applaud. He knew that applause brought more attention to what he had just said, and he wanted as much attention as possible cast on the problems caused by bullies.

As Bill disappeared backstage, the emcee of the event gave a couple of spontaneous remarks about how, “That makes me proud to be a part of this group, because there are people like that young man in our midst.”

The ceremony went on… and on… and on. After Bill received his award, he was somewhere backstage for quite some time, long enough for me to miss him, which admittedly didn’t take long. After Bill’s award, huge parts of the ceremony were dreadful, not because anything bad happened or anyone fell or anything like that. No, it was dreadful simply because it was interminable and filled with awards I knew nothing about and cared even less about. I spent my time trying to stay awake or people watching. There certainly were a large number of people to watch that night.

Bill made it back to his seat in plenty of time for Derrick’s category. With the usual suspense, the Best Actor nominees were presented, along with clips from each person’s movie.

“And the Oscar goes to… Derrick St. James.” And we all burst into applause. And yes, I behaved myself. I didn’t trip him as he walked down the aisle, nor did I shout out “Way to go, Elmer!” I was a good boy who behaved himself, at least on the outside. On the inside, I was kicking him every which way.

Derrick’s speech was actually prepared in advance, but he seemed to ad lib, since he started by copying Bill and thanking my mom for saving his life when he was just about out of options and had given up on everything. “A lot of people have talked about Bill and me, about how close we are. What you don’t know is the most important part: we were both saved by the same woman. His guardian angel was also mine. Through her work we became brothers, and we both became survivors.” I could hear people all around us starting to whisper, asking one another if they knew who this person was. Derrick had carefully safeguarded his background, so this was a big step for him. I was stunned that he had revealed so much about himself, at least to me, by describing himself and Bill as “brothers” and survivors.

The second person he thanked was his wife, followed by Bill, Moira, and, surprisingly, me! I didn’t expect that. I didn’t have any confidence that he actually meant what he said, but it felt good at the moment. He thanked a lot more people, people I didn’t know and had never heard of, and walked off stage to make way for the next presentation. He was back in his seat quickly, because Best Picture was coming up, and he needed to be there for that. I was suddenly starting to think that their picture might stand a chance of winning. Coming into the night, we hadn’t expected any of them to win, but it certainly had turned out to be an exciting evening so far.

The competition in the Best Picture category was fierce, and in the end another movie got the little golden Oscar. But Bill and Derrick had nothing to regret; they had both come out winners that night in the best possible way. They had both been recognized by their peers for their work, and they had used the spotlight to reflect some of the light onto people who were most in need of a little inspiration. I was proud of Bill, and in spite of myself I found that I was also a little proud of Derrick.

The Day After

A
FTER
the event concluded, all of the winners were photographed and interviewed. As you might have anticipated, both Bill and Derrick were questioned at length about their remarks, Bill especially since he had gone first and had spoken most from the heart. Every interviewer wanted to know all about what he was talking about and what he had meant. He spoke equally well one-on-one as he had in front of the thousands of people in the ceremony.

Moira stood beside me and Derrick’s wife while the two of them posed together with their awards for the photographers. An interviewer asked the guys where they grew up, but both men refused to answer that question. Finally finished, we all adjourned to the post-ceremony dinner, where both guys received an endless parade of people congratulating them and trying to pitch their script as the greatest thing ever written that was especially good for them and their talent.

Leaning over to Moira, I asked, “Is this as nauseating to you as it is to me? Do any of these yahoos actually think we believe a single word falling out of their slimy mouths?”

“That’s just how you play the game. Smile and pretend you don’t realize that they’re full of it.”

“So, are they going to be in as much demand as I think they are after this tonight?”

“More. Way, way, way more. You remember the pile of scripts they had last time?”

“Yes.”

“That was small potatoes compared to what they’ve got coming at them starting tomorrow. The really hungry, super-aggressive ones will already have couriered scripts to my office or my house.”

“You have got to be kidding me.”

“Mark, you’ve known me long enough to know that I don’t kid around about anything.”

“Fair point. How do we handle this coming avalanche?”

“First of all, I recommend that you and Bill go out of town to someplace out of the way, someplace remote or in another country, for a couple of months. You’re on break between quarters at school. You two just get away and spend some time together and let me work my magic. I’ll have a whole crew of people start to review the mountain that’s coming our way, to weed out the wheat from the chaff. When you get back to town, things will have quieted down a little, and I’ll have a much-reduced group of ideas for you two to consider.”

“Moira, is this the way it’s gonna be from now on?”

“If you mean, now that everyone knows that they are incredible together, then yes, this is the way it’s going to be from now on.”

“Crap.”

She looked at me with a mix of maternal understanding and knowing commiseration, but balanced with a bit of “that’s business” tossed in for good measure.

“We should also start to talk with financial planners to make sure that you two are saving enough for the future.”

“Excuse me, but have you met Bill? The man doesn’t spend money unless absolutely forced to do so, and then only kicking and screaming. How many fancy sports cars have you seen him buy since he became rich and famous? How many exotic vacations have you seen us take? How many—”

“Okay. I get the picture. So he hasn’t spent much money. Really?”

“Really.”

“Well, a financial planner will help you guys to invest your money to provide stability while also investing for growth. You two are so young. You have a lifetime ahead of you, and you really need the money he earns now and in the near future to last for a long, long time. I cannot tell you how many times I have seen young men or women come to town, be discovered, make it big with one hit movie or show, and then vanish into the background, unable to get work again in the industry. Not because they’re not good, but simply because, for everyone who makes it, there are a thousand more waiting to shove them aside and take their place at one tenth the cost. It’s a dog-eat-dog industry.

“All of those who make it big and then vanish—most of them spend like their new income is going to continue. They buy big cars, big houses, expensive meals. And then their income dries up and they have to sell the cars, the houses, and the various toys they bought, often at nowhere near as much as they paid for them originally. And they go broke and… well, you can imagine what comes next. I don’t want to see that happen to you two.”

“I appreciate that. I don’t know what we’d do without you.”

“Watch and learn, my boy, watch and learn, and someday you can be doing the same thing for people. And, trust me, there is a never-ending supply of new talent just waiting to be discovered, all looking for their one big break.”

“You seriously think I could do anything close to what you do?”

“Sure, why not? All it takes is brains and ballsiness. For someone who walked into an abusive situation and put himself between the abuser and the abused, you’ve got no shortage of balls. And I know you’ve got the brains. So, yes, absolutely.”

I hugged her and said, “In case I haven’t told you lately, I love you.”

In addition to having brains and balls, I apparently also had the ability to make the toughest woman in town shed a tear.

The Road Show

M
OIRA
might have thought that we should go away and lie low for the next month, but Bill had different ideas. And guess which of the two prevailed? Bill. Bill’s idea was simple: capitalize on the moment and spread the message that he had started to share while on stage and in front of the world audience.

Specifically, Bill wanted to go on the road and start talking to anyone, any group, any audience, any school that would have him. He envisioned a talk that was a combination of what he had said to our high school, years back when I was bullied, a bit of what he said at the Oscars, and some new material that he had yet to create. His first preference was to speak to school audiences—to students.

Moira had her reservations, but set up a test run at a local school for the next week. I knew that Bill would do a kick-ass job, because he was now well-known, recognized wherever he went, he was a big name, he wasn’t that much older than the high school students he would be addressing, and the man was just plain good! When he was in front of an audience, Bill shone. Some people froze when the spotlight was on them, but Bill positively sparkled. Give him an audience and a subject about which he was passionate, and hang onto your hat—it was going to be good.

And that is exactly what Moira and I both saw a week later, when we and half of the Hollywood press corps accompanied Bill to a senior high school to the north of downtown LA. Given his name recognition, the auditorium that hosted the presentation that morning was absolutely packed to overflowing. The room was so full, in fact, that his talk was videoed and fed to large monitors in the gymnasium, elsewhere in the building. I didn’t see it, but apparently the crowd there was also substantial.

I had heard him speak before on the subject of bullying and hope. I knew what he was capable of doing. If anything, he had refined his technique, honed his skill in the intervening years since I had last heard him give some variation of his talk that day. Moira had never heard him speak publicly on this topic, unless you count his remarks at the Oscars, so she wasn’t fully prepared for the intensity of an hour with a high-energy Bill addressing the student body of the school that morning.

With his wireless microphone, Bill wasn’t remote up on a stage, but was constantly moving throughout the auditorium. He wasn’t talking at people, but was initiating a conversation
with
people. If anything, they were participants in the conversation, rather than passive observers who sat back and watched a show. Moira and I sat together, so I could see her admiration of Bill growing exponentially as the hour passed.