Shooting Stars (36 page)

If I had rocked up on Kristen's doorstep my first year in the business, I wouldn't have gotten the shot. I would not have known, so instinctively, how to set up my camera on this cloudy grey morning from seventy-five feet away; I would not have picked the right ISO or f-stop; I would not have chosen nor owned the right lens. And if I had not picked, by gut and experience, the correct lens and settings on that first try—
before
I checked the frames—I would have missed
the shot.
Besides, if I were in my first year as a pap, Kristen would have busted me: my car would have driven by too slowly, too suspiciously,
twice
; the small hole in between the trees, accessible only by pulling into a neighbor's driveway, wouldn't have registered on my radar as an option; and, no doubt, I would have given Kristen a solid, several-second eye-fuck alerting her to a voyeur. These things can't be taught. They must be experienced.

Eventually, as a pap you start to just know things—like which path people will walk from the store to their car; which way they'll face when they get out of their car; where they'll exit a parking structure; or where they'll stand to pump gas. You begin to know that when they check into a hotel, they will peer out their balcony or they will go for a walk on the street. Or, if they're part of a new couple, you know they will eventually kiss. And at the same time you are becoming aware of human tendencies, you come to know your camera, seeing through its eye like you see through your own. Eventually, you become a fully trained operative.

* * *

When you get something incredible—and exclusive—and nobody else knows about it, then you generally work it to death.

It's Thanksgiving week, and since Kristen's pot pictures are exclusive and there's little chance they'll get scooped, we're holding their release. During the holidays, mags basically shut down, letting a host of good, publishable pictures pile up. When pictures pile up, prices go down, and some shots and celebs get overlooked because there are too many choices.

Also, without the pictures floating around, other paps aren't alerted to her presence, so Kristen and I have the week to ourselves.

After a few days of following the teenage hippie around unnoticed, I begin to like her. She drives the pickup. It looks like my old one, not like the 1960s one she drives in
Twilight
. Kristen reminds me a lot of her seductive trailer-trashy character in the movie
Into the Wild
—a bit rough around the edges but a gem nonetheless. She's disgustingly beautiful—impossible
not
to rubberneck—but she's refreshingly
not
Hollywood. She never went to high school, dropped out before the ninth grade, and was introduced to acting because her parents were both film crew.

“Why don't we offer the shots to the studio instead of the mags?” I suggest to Jimmy one afternoon. The studio can't want a pot-smoking heroine as its image when the
Twilight
series is geared toward teenagers. It makes sense to me that they would pay more to have them in their possession, thus never released to the public.

“Can't,” says Jimmy. “That would be considered extortion. Besides,” he reminds me, “the studios don't protect their actors like they used to.”
¹⁸

For now, the strategy which Jimmy and Will opt for is to try to sell direct to large international publications for exclusive market buy-outs,
keeping in mind what we know about the American market: they may not buy the photos at all.

* * *

So, the Monday after Thanksgiving, just after
Twilight
comes out, iPIX releases the pot-smoking pictures. They held the set for five days. Five days is about the max an agent wants to sit on pictures. They're scared to take the risk the set might lose value. A few weeks old means old news.

As expected, few in the United States are interested. The noted exceptions are
Star Magazine,
which put a shot on its cover in the upper corner—not a full cover, but a cover nonetheless—and TMZ, which picked up the set in an exclusive online deal. (Run by lawyer Harvey Levin, TMZ may print trash, but at least it's true trash. TMZ staffers don't make up stories about breakups or hookups, and they're as “investigative” as it gets in the world of tabloid journalism. I'm a fan.) I think the
National Enquirer
—which Jimmy reads devotedly to “get the facts”—prints it too. But no other glossy mag in the United States makes mention of it.

But the real sales for a picture like this will be in Europe and Australia. The
Twilight
books are just as big in those countries, and unlike the States, the Commonwealth has no problem exposing celebrities' drug habits.

Here's what happens: Will, iPIX's seller, calls Europe and says, “We have Kristen Stewart smoking pot.” And, like me, they say, “Who's that?” Turns out,
Twilight
won't be released in Europe for two more weeks—two weeks after its U.S. release, and three weeks after the shots are taken. Will has to explain that
Twilight
is about to be “the next big movie,” and Kristen Stewart is about to be “the next big thing.” OUCH. If European and Australian mags run the pictures pre-
Twilight
release, their readers won't be interested—they won't know Kristen either. If the mags wait to run the pictures three weeks later, after the movie's release, they'll be scandalous. But since the pictures are already on the market in the United
States, they'll also be old news. As much as Europe and Australia love the pictures, there is no place for them. Kristen-Stewart-smoking-pot-on-her-doorstep becomes a big fat non-event.
¹⁹

* * *

The girls and I, and our extended friends and boyfriends gather for a gastronomic Thanksgiving. We celebrate a week late for scheduling reasons, but the turkey is just as good and a hell of a lot cheaper. Right after supper, Alexandra suggests, “Let's go find out the sex!”

The five of us—Alex, Jo, Georgia, Amy, and I—hop in the car and drive ten minutes to Treasured Moments Ultrasound, the 4D video sonographer in Glendale. I pay $49 and for ten minutes, we watch my tiny four-month-old baby
boy
wiggle around in my growing womb. Yes, I said
boy
. Finally I was going to have a permanent man in my life—albeit a teeny tiny one—who I would love unconditionally. His nose seems a bit squished (like mine), but besides that, he is perfect. Lullaby music plays in the background, and we goo and gaa over this miniature version of me.

Oh my goodness, he's a boy. I haven't thought of boy names. I was so sure he was gonna be a girl. What do I know about boys?

“Baby boys need daddies,” I cry to JoDeane.

“And someday he'll have one,” she reassures me.

* * *

My body is entering the a-little-overweight-and-frumpy stage. My stomach pooches out just enough that my pants won't fasten, and since maternity outfits would give my condition away to the paps, those are not an option. (After my rocky start in the business, I still don't trust most of the paparazzi so I attempt to keep my personal life as private as possible. Just like many of the celebs, I suppose.) I live in baggy clothes. The 24/7 nausea has finally lifted, and although the level of fatigue I experience is still astounding, it's manageable as long as I get ten hours of sleep each night. Work's not so bad these days, and I even join my friends for dinner occasionally.

Last week, I broke the news to my family and everyone else except for the paps (and Bo). While my family members uttered the obligatory congratulations, Mom was the only one who was truly excited. As I had feared, I could hear everyone's thoughts:
How the hell is she gonna pull this off? I hope she's not looking for money
. That hurt; I won't pretend it didn't.

It also made me feel guilty. Yes, it's true, I am alone in this world. Is it fair for me to bring in another, a child loved unconditionally but raised by only one person?

JoDeane's husband Andy reassured me, “That's more than a lot of kids have. He's gonna be just fine, Jen. You're gonna love him more than most moms and dads combined.”

Andy's right. For years now, I've craved a baby like an addict craves a hit. Now, I'm just worried I'll love him too much.

17
. Later, in an interview with
Vanity Fair
, Kristen Stewart reflected on that shot and how it and
Twilight
instantly changed her life. (“Kristen Stewart on the People Who Critique Her Red Carpet Poses: ‘I Don't Care About the Voracious, Starving Shit Eaters,'”
Vanity Fair
, June 5, 2012.)

18
. I've since wondered if Kristen wishes the paparazzi would have made her that offer a few years later when a paparazzo snapped her cheating on her later real-life boyfriend, Rob Pattinson, a.k.a. vampire Edward Cullen.

19
. Had we held the set longer, I might have made twenty or thirty grand. As it was, I made about five or six. But expecting iPIX to sit on pictures for three weeks without alerting anyone of their existence would be like getting a starving dog to ignore his Kibbles 'n Bits breakfast to wait for a T-bone steak dinner: it just wasn't gonna happen. On another note, the “KStew” set is a great example of one of those “ugly” stories that I told you the magazines fear. It's a story that people often hear and talk about, but one they don't ever actually see. Everyone believes it's true—enough people have seen it online or heard about it on the radio—but the hard proof is missing. American magazines are just not interested. Another example: Kate Middleton's topless photos. We all heard about them, but unless we concertedly Google searched, few of us ever saw them. (The photographer of these photos would have made boatloads more had Kate been in a bathing suit.) To be clear, “ugly” photogs (like drug, topless, and infidelity exposures) are available—the Internet has far fewer inhibitions—but in the current media environment, they don't print in many magazines nor on reputable blog sites (i.e., those which actually pay us), and in turn they are not all that valuable.

In the paparazzi world, as with Thanksgiving, little happens over Christmas. Mags take a break and lay out stock stories in advance. Most celebs are out of town. It's a good time to not work. I spend the holidays at home in Atlanta showing the family my baby bump and trying to figure out whether spending time at home, post-baby, is an option. (To my delight, it turns out, it is. Everyone's softening.) I drag a suitcase full of hand-me-down baby clothes back to L.A. with me.

By early January, I'm almost six months pregnant. If I don't share the news with the paparazzi myself, someone will do it for me. Anyway, now is the perfect time:
I am gorgeous.
My new wardrobe full of tight-fitting tank tops accentuates a stunning yet still petite baby bump protruding from an otherwise lean body. (And at five-foot-nine, I've never had anything petite in my life!) I find often that both men and women stare at me and smile to themselves. Femininity, something I haven't felt since becoming a pap, blankets me like a dusting of baby powder. And, let's not forget,
I glow
!

Simon, Aaron, and Claudia, my closest pap friends, already know. (No, Bo still doesn't; I haven't decided whether I'm telling him yet.) It's only appropriate my agency find out next. After making sure Jimmy is in the office one late afternoon, I pop by to show him the bump. “Spread the word,” I tell him. “I don't wanna have to do it.”

By the next morning all of iPIX knows, and by the afternoon, all of CXN. Of course, Bartlet calls, sore that he wasn't in the loop earlier. He loves gossip, and his questions and comments keep coming: “So,
who's the baby's daddy?…You're gonna use that guy—suck support out of him, right?…With baby baggage, you can forget about ever finding a husband….” Suddenly, I am a Tall Poppy in all its glory! It frustrates Bartlet that I'm so happy about becoming a single mom, and he's very annoyed that he can't get the dad's name out of me: “I know it's not Simon,” he says. “Simon's too smart for that.” (He doesn't even posture that it could be Aaron. Our “liaisons” will be news to him, and he'll hate that he never knew.)

When I tell Jimmy about my conversation, he rolls his eyes. He doesn't know why I still talk to Bartlet, but I tell him it's Bartlet's way of showing he's still looking out for me. If he didn't care, he wouldn't call.

Over the next several weeks, I run into many who have yet to hear. When they see my bump, a few question my ability to work, to which I just respond, “I'm going to work till I can't work anymore.” Frankly, with the hormones subsiding, the job's getting easier. Maybe I'll keep at it longer than I expected.

And when any of them ask who the dad is, I just say, “Not a pap,” and leave it at that.

* * *

Again and again, it's said that Jennifer Love Hewitt is the nicest celebrity in Hollywood. And I'd agree—Jennifer's right up there in the elite company of Gwen Stefani, Jerry O'Connell, Selma Blair, and Miley Cyrus. All of whom, at this moment at least, are wonderful.

And I would know. Daily, I watch the stars interact with life. I see how they treat their friends, lovers, strangers, coworkers, and
us
. Don't get me wrong, being “nice” or being respectful to paps doesn't mean always being willing to give it up. Jennifer Love Hewitt doesn't always want to be photographed—she'll cover sometimes—but regardless of her mood, respect and humility bubble up from her person like carbonation in a fresh bottle of Coca-Cola.

I was sad to read about Jennifer and her fiancé Ross McCall breaking
up. Claudia and I had taken the first engagement photos of the couple; I'd spotted them one day while sitting a few houses down on Duff.

Working breakups is not quite as awful as working about-to-die stories, though thankfully I've never actually had to work the latter. (Nor would I ever. I couldn't do that to myself or anybody else.) Still, breakups are no fun. Nobody wants you there, and you don't want to be there. As a freelancer, I can say “no” to these kinds of stories and usually do. But today, quite by accident, I end up in Jennifer's neighborhood after losing Ryan Gosling, who
by the way
drives like a maniac in his Prius even when he doesn't know anyone's on him.