Shooting Stars (30 page)

I stepped back to the podium and continued, “I slowed down to look at the film set, but my car was still moving forward when Officer Cregg banged his hands on it and leaned his entire head inside my window to look around. He went like this.” Here, I illustrated to the judge the officer's head movement, which to me had looked like a turtle coming out of its shell. I continued, “I feel sure he saw my camera equipment lying on the front seat and took me to be a paparazzi. He demanded that I stop—as my car was still moving at this point—and he said, ‘Pull ahead, ma'am. Right there. Pull up to the curb and stop.' I stopped only because he told me to and I was obeying him. I did not want to stop. I was only rubbernecking and slowing down, and that's not illegal.”

Monitoring the set of
Entourage
on the sidewalk in Beverly Hills was, I would venture to guess, the most power Officer Cregg had enjoyed in quite some time. He took his job seriously, and he was gonna show me who was boss.

Of course, there's irony here: the crew of
Entourage
loves paps.

I carried on, “The officer then told me that he was writing me a ticket
because I was ‘impeding traffic,' but I looked in my rearview mirror and asked, ‘What are you talking about? There is no one behind me.' I pointed behind me and asked him to look. The officer refused to look, and after another sixty seconds with him writing the entire time, I appealed again, because
still
no one was behind me. ‘If I leave now, I will never have impeded anyone,' I told him. But he continued writing, then handed me a ticket, and in a very sarcastic voice said, ‘You can go now.' And he smiled.”

“Thank you, ma'am. Is there anything further?” the judge asked.

“He's telling a bold-faced—”

“Thank you, ma'am.” And in the same breath, and in the kindest tone, the judge said, “In the case of [
blah, blah, blah
], I rule in favor of Officer Cregg.” Then, he hit his gavel and said, “You're dismissed.”

As I walked to the courtroom exit past Officer Cregg—who hadn't looked at me the entire time—I couldn't help myself. “Fucking liar,” I mumbled.

Then, I quickly corralled my closest pap friends and arranged a gang-bang outside the courthouse taking Cregg's picture and posting it on the Internet with the true story. The following week, I spotted him working as a greeter at Walmart.

Kidding! (No one shops at Walmart in L.A.!) But I wished that as I paid my ticket.

* * *

It's June 16th, the day after my thirty-seventh birthday. Summer is boiling full-steam, and I head to Malibu. What's ahead of me in the next few months will change me forever. Of course, I don't know that yet.

I'm going to Malibu to join Simon on “McC.” McC is what Simon calls Matthew McConaughey because he can't pronounce “McConaughey,” much less spell it. Simon's always impressed with my “big words” and math, i.e., paycheck, calculations. But where he's lacking in some areas, he's a genius in others, and you'll find no one better at making fun of celebrities.
I Nextel Simon every morning to pump me up, and unless he's in a funk, he'll get rolling on a comedy routine that would top
Chelsea Lately.

This morning I take the scenic route through town to the Westside, then onto the PCH. The Pacific Coast Highway follows the ocean shore from southern to northern California. Surfers, seagulls, and sailboats dot the bright blue waters, and it's hard to pay attention to the road.

Simon beeps me on my way in. “Did you remember your oxygen? You're headed for the Bubble today. The air is thick out 'ere.”

“The Bubble” is what Simon calls Malibu—shiny and sparkly on the outside, suffocating on the inside. “The Bu” is what the tabloids call it.

McC just moved from his Airstream trailer where he lived for months parked in a Malibu campground off the PCH into a rented home in an elite neighborhood on the north end of Malibu beach. In McC's new subdivision, the ocean—meters away—is blocked from the public's view by elephant-size homes like the one he's building. (He rents adjacent property while overseeing the construction.) Julia Roberts, her husband Danny Moder, and their three kids are also new to the neighborhood, having moved into a custom-built, eco-friendly home situated on a cliff overlooking Little Point Dume beach. I don't think there's anyone (besides maybe Bitchworth) who reviles the paparazzi like Julia Roberts. Simon “gets a giggle” when he thinks of how her “britches must'a knotted up” when she discovered Matthew would share her same chunk of sand. You see, the problem is, Matthew
adores
the paparazzi. And since he always produces an attractive salable picture with strong resale value (especially wearing a bathing suit, his most frequent attire), we love him too. Or at least we love photographing him. So now every time Julia heads down to her beach, she must “SMILE!”

About once a quarter, Simon and I split our favorite greasy
brekky
—a sausage, egg, and cheese biscuit from McDonald's. Simon is borderline manorexic, thus we always
split
any meal we eat together. Today, I'm in charge of coffee since my hour-plus commute has made me the later arrival. I buy us two cups from Micky-D's and a biscuit to share. At around nine, we eat on the dirt shoulder of McC's dead-end street and outline the day's plan.

Within a mile from Julia and Matthew's is an elite school where young kids with famous parents go, and a Vons grocery store where they—and others—shop. It's a sticky square mile, and like wildebeest crossing the African plain, a few celebs who make the journey will inevitably fall prey to the paparazzi.

Today we decide that Simon will sit on Matthew since he already has a cordial relationship with the handful of loyal McC photogs, and I will troll around looking for anyone else who can be picked off.

After parting, my first stop is around the corner at another dead-end, Julia's. Next to Julia's driveway is a small path, a three-minute hike leading down to the ocean at Point Dume, one of the best surfing spots in SoCal. Even though Little Point Dume beach, a.k.a. Hut Beach, is public, all direct paths to it are gated and bolted with prison-style locks, and the neighborhood pays a security guard to monitor
her
(Julia's) path, specifically. After a few drive-bys, I strike up conversation with a guy trimming the bushes around Julia's mailbox. “I hear Julia Roberts lives here,” I say in my best tourist voice.

“Yep.” He nods. “She's around.”

I didn't ask if “she were around,” but he seems proud to be in the loop as he shares this piece of first-rate information. No one knows she's back. The last photographs of Julia were from Rome where she filmed the starring role in the movie
Eat, Pray, Love.

I dig more. The yardman, Gino, a jovial Mexican with an Italian nickname and at least 350 pounds on him, tells me that Julia's husband Danny surfs almost daily. Danny's not especially famous, but surfing shots are rare, and they would be hard for the mags to pass up.

Gino's full of life and light, evidently not having worked long enough in the Bubble to be asphyxiated yet by its poisonous interior. I'm drawn to him and decide to be up front: “Gino, I'll give you a hundred bucks if you call me the next time you see Danny walking down that path.” This is slightly risky—I don't know if Gino is loyal to Julia, and I could get myself and my car blacklisted—but I go with my gut.

Gino's eyes light up and his smile extends. “I had a feeling you were
one of them.” Gino's from South Central L.A.—no dummy. “OK, sure, I'll call you.”

Verbally, it seems I've found a tipster, but that means nothing. Everybody takes your number (it's easier than saying no) but only a small percentage of them ever actually tip. They either forget—find the process non-stimulating—or upon reflection find they ethically disagree with the cause. Out of at least a hundred I've propositioned, I can count on only about five calling. Tip money alone isn't enough to make someone tip; they have to want to do it for other reasons.

Lucky for me, Gino has an impetus: clipping bushes, all alone, all day long, mind and body sizzling in the sun, Gino's clearly bored. And, for a people-person like him, that's an unbearable physical state. (Believe me, I know.)

An hour after we meet, Gino calls: “I'm friends with the gate guard. I'll make this happen.”

Sweet. Gino's in.

Nothing happens that first day, but with a Julia tipster in the bag, Simon and I commit the week. Each day I make the trek down to Malibu, and Gino stays in constant contact regarding the comings and goings of the Roberts-Moders. He tells me their cars, their future in-and-out of town schedule (which he finds out from the housekeeper), their beach walks, and so on. He
gets
it. He knows what information I need to know. Suddenly Gino's mind-destroying job of clipping bushes eight hours a day in Julia's front yard becomes bearable. Suddenly he's Sam Spade.

Over the week, Simon and I skirt between following and photographing Julia, unbeknownst to her hawk eyes and thanks to Gino whom we throw four hundred bucks at; Matthew and his pregnant girlfriend Camila Alves; and Tommy Lee and Pamela Anderson, who appear to be back in love once again. Pink drives by us for a nice photo-op on her motorcycle, and at the grocery store we stumble across the Red Hot Chili Peppers's Anthony Kiedis in his golf cart. (Per Gino, Anthony apparently lost his key privileges when he let a friend borrow the unlocking jewel. No doubt, Malibu is serious about protecting her Point Dume.)

Simon and I work a tag team formation as tight as the Blue Angels—it's undercover papping at its finest. One of us Nextels the other immediately upon a celeb-sighting, and the other leaves his or her station to get in second position within minutes. If I spot someone at the Mayfair Market, for instance, as often I do when grabbing lunch, I know to take the risk of trying to get valuable
in
-store shots because Simon is hidden outside backing me up. “Minnie [Driver] is on her way out. Left-hand door,” I radio. I
trust
Simon. I know he's blacked-out behind his car tint and windshield visor, and he'll hose it. Simon and I make a seamless pair.

Compared to Hollywood, relatively few paps work in Malibu, and if you know what you're doing, there's the potential to make lots of money. Upon first glance, it's an ideal locale: Malibu rarely gets too hot—the breeze from the beach and the heat from the sun combine ideally; vegetation is green and luscious (thanks to sprinkler systems) and smattered with yellow and orange fruit; the ocean air, moist and salty to the skin, smells of fried fish and shrimp available from seafood shacks along the PCH; girls cross the road wearing short-shorts showing off toned beach legs, ponytails high on their heads, and fashionable flip-flops; and guys walk around shirtless with chests as hard as the surfboards they carry on their heads.

But this splendor comes with a weighty price tag. It's a far drive and a long day, especially when you spend it trolling down the beach lugging fifteen pounds of gear through thick sand. Malibu will exhaust your body. But, it's not the outside that will kill you in this beautiful little beach town,
a lovely place
with
a lovely face.
Rather, there's a beast inside, one that will slowly, but inevitably, break down your soul.

The Bubble: A rich, white (I'm not saying Malibu is prejudiced; I'm just saying that Matthew's Brazilian girlfriend Camila Alves is the darkest person on the beach), militarized zone (so it appears, with so many cops and all), which must at all costs be preserved. “A bubble so pure that the slightest drop of dust causes pandemonium,” says Simon. Sound pleasant? Trust me, it's not.

The Malibu city cops give you your first indication that you are in
danger if you spend too much time here. These protecting officers, given power by the residents, blanket the area in a far more oppressive fashion than even the LAPD do in Beverly Hills. For kicks, most days Simon and I play our unscientific “Count-the-Cops” game, and with one every few miles, we generally score over a dozen each day. “Code Blue in Malibu.”

At the two grocery stores in town, three or four security guards are perma-stationed, and the City of Malibu is trying to contract the venerable Kenneth Starr (remember him from the Monica Lewinski days?) to work on the ironically titled “Britney Law” and come up with
more
laws for the city, specifically aimed at keeping paparazzi out (and fighting the First Amendment, which besides the freedom of speech also ensures the freedom of the press, which, yes, includes photographing public figures in public places). Starr has expressed interest in working on it “at no charge to the city.” Thanks, man.

That, friends, is the Bu. Now meet the Malibu mafia.

* * *

It takes me an hour to get down to Little Point Dume/Hut Beach, where Matthew is. The route: park on the street, walk a half mile to the cliff top, amble the thorny path to the stairs, climb down hundreds of steps, traipse through soggy muck to sand, walk a half mile to where the ocean swells produce one of the best surf spots in southern California, wade through the rough waters of the treacherous “point of dume”…finally, arrive at the idyllic Hut Beach.

It is Saturday and Simon and I have been in the Bubble for a week now. Two hours ago, he and the other paps saw McC head down to the beach with his surfboard. Matthew took the gated path, which would have taken him about three minutes. Simon and the rest of the guys went in from the east, a slightly quicker route (forty-five minutes) than the one I took, but a $20 parking charge.

I sit on my beach blanket taking pictures of Matthew while he surfs. I also occasionally shoot Melissa Joan Hart, who happens to be nearby and
is also watching Matthew so she doesn't notice me. (Melissa's pictures end up on the cover of
People
magazine.)

At first I am noticed by no one. I am unassuming, sitting with my camera tucked between my legs, which I pull up every once in a while to take a photograph. But eventually people react. Beachgoers, always female, walk by and comment: “You are the most disgusting form of a human I've ever seen”; “We hate you—leave our private beach”; “Get away from my umbrella—don't sit near me.” I can see the confusion in their faces, though. I am tan and fit. I look good in my bikini—just like them, or their daughters. So why am I taking pictures like a paparazzi?