OK, 'Night in Covina':
We were on the road again that evening after dinner – headed out to Covina! Back to see Jason! When we pulled off the Citrus Ave. exit and into the town, I got butterflies in my stomach, my legs got weak, my feet got icy cold – I just knew this was it, and I was going to meet Jason Behr. But it was the first and last time I was nervous or scared. It was just like a touch of stage fright before you go on.
When we got there, it was night, and the shooting was set up across from the UFO Museum. I was standing behind the yellow police tapes, in front of a bank building. The UFO museum was diagonally across the street. I looked through the darkness ahead – and there was Jason! He was maybe 20 feet away, sitting in his director's chair, head bent over his script – and the beautiful curve of his head, the back of his neck, his back... took my breath away. It was like poetry. I wished I could take a picture, but of course, we couldn't take pictures when they were filming. I totally didn't even notice Brendan Fehr sitting next to him, until he got up (he had bare arms and a sleeveless shirt). Our Fehrian friend started having palpitations about then! LOL! There were a LOT of people there. Bunch of very young girls in front of me. And Brendan, being Brendan, started joking around (loudly) about the cocaine he'd just scored and what a great price or whatever – and the little girls' eyes got round as saucers! He is just such a punk! Jason was very quiet, very serious, very intent on his work. He had on a dark jacket. Katie Heigl was there, with her hair up, looking absolutely gorgeous as usual. The three of them stood around and talked a bit. (I found out later Majandra was also there briefly but I missed seeing her.)
The street was blocked off and there were (stunt) cars ready to drive up and down the street for the scene where they walk across the street. There were all kinds of cameras and people standing around involved in the show, and a lot of policemen making sure the crowd behaved. People with clipboards and megaphones and headsets. They had this water tank truck that drove up and down the street and wet the street down for the scene. Very interesting – the water reflected the light better and made the filming better somehow (and I just thought it rained a lot in Roswell, NM! LOL!) Jason, Brendan, and Katie had the exciting task of walking across the street toward the UFO Museum. They walked across the street.. and came back. Walked across the street... and came back. At one point, Brendan gave Katie a piggyback ride back across the street on his back, just fooling around. I thought maybe he didn't want her to get her feet wet.
I had to answer a call on the cellphone and went around the corner - by the time I got back, they were finishing with that scene (I'd missed Brendan climbing the walls – literally!) and moving over to the Crashdown, so we high-tailed it over there to stake out a good spot across from the Crashdown, over on the main street. Ryan, Jason's stand-in, a guy with brown hair and a white shirt, walked through the scenes before Jason did them, so they could get the lighting and camera movements etc. figured out (and let Jason rest, I guess, or study his script or whatever).
So we watched Ryan jog up and down the sidewalk awhile. There was a woman in front of me, I remember, and I said, "He runs all right, but wait till you see Jason run! He trained to play a track star on "Push" and he can really run. Wait and see."
Oh – "Tess, Lies, and Covina": There was a rumor going around that night about Emilie – that she'd been in an car accident, hurt her face, and had to drop out of the show and that they were there reshooting scenes in Covina that night to shoot around her. People were first happy about no Tess, and then really upset at the thought Emilie was hurt. We didn't know it until the next night at the FF Party (when Emilie showed up, totally fine) that it was just a story somebody was amusing themselves by spreading through the crowd!
And it was a huge crowd. There were probably 200 people there – people with little kids, babies sleeping on their shoulders. Girls in gaudy getups of skin-tight pants, feather boas and body glitter. The women who had silver handprint tattoos put on their bodies {the MOBS} were there and a big topic of conversation.
At that point, one of the people from the show came out and told us that all the actors had gone home and they were just going to be filming some stunt sequences, and that we should all go home too. I knew that Brendan and Katie were done and had gone home. Some people left. I stood there hugging my bag of presents for Jason and got all teary-eyed. But I wasn't leaving.
And then it was quiet on the set, and the cameras were rolling. It was very quiet, and suddenly you heard the slap-slap-slap of little black Max sneakers running up the alley (unseen) to the left side of the Crashdown... and Jason burst around the corner, running faster than a human being should be able to run... and not wearing any shirt! ARGH! I dropped everything I was holding – including my precious bag of presents and his 3 framed "diplomas" (luckily not framed in glass). If I had false teeth, they would've been on the sidewalk too!
And the crowd was TOTALLY SILENT – until the director yelled "Cut" – and the crowd burst into spontaneous cheering and woo hooing! Jason started walking back toward the Crashdown and he took this huge bow, swinging his hands out to the sides and behind him, a huge grin on his face. And then he went back – to do it again! Oh, life does not get much better than this! I couldn't see it that well, but people said he had a bloody handprint on his chest, over his heart! I wondered what that was all about! Poor Max.
Quiet on the set again and action and the slap-slap-slap of little black Max sneakers pounding down the alley, and Jason burst around the corner again and ran SO fast and so beautifully and we were all sooo quiet. They yelled cut and he stopped (with difficulty – the man was flying) and turned and walked back. He made it about half way up the street – and everybody burst out cheering again – we just couldn't help it. And he got a huge grin on his face! I don't know how many times he ran down the street. I remember having the wonderful thought that this was being filmed, and in October it was going to be broadcast {"Ask Not"}, and I could tape it (at 2 hr speed) and I would have Jason, with no shirt, running down the street, on videotape, for all time – to be studied, frame by frame. He has the most incredibly perfect body. Very very lean but his muscles are just honed to perfection. And his beautiful long neck.. and his gorgeous back... oh my! And there he was, in his glory! Running – right in front of us! Life just does NOT get any better than this.
They had warned us about no flash photography (the flash would reflect off things and ruin the shots) and no videotaping, because everything was copyrighted – but a lot of people had fancy cameras with no flash and other people (maybe they missed the speech to the crowd?) were just videotaping away anyway!
Then Ryan was back and he was down at the corner and running up the street toward the Crashdown in the opposite direction. He did that a few times, and we cheered for him too – and he took off his shirt and waved it around and we woo-hooed for him too! He was enjoying himself! And then Jason was back (still without his shirt). He stood at the corner and waited and sortof shook his hands a little and got ready – and he got into character and he became Max Evans! It was astonishing. And when they called action, he ran. Ran for his life. Ran faster than any human being runs unless they are trying to win an Olympic gold medal. Ran so hard he had trouble stopping when he hit the bunch of people and equipment in front of the Crashdown. And then he went back down the street – and did it again.
There were also some other people involved in some scenes – a guy and girl walking down the street that Max passes – and I think touches them (with his bloody hand?). A stunt girl riding a bicycle that Jason had to time his running to match. Very technical and there was a lot for him to think about. There was a woman driving a car also, that drove around the corner (and backed up, and drove around the corner, and backed up, over and over).
I was worried about Jason, because they had wet down the street and the sidewalk in front of the Crashdown as they'd done by the UFO Museum for filming, and I was really worried about him running on that wet pavement that fast, in those flat soled, Chuck Taylor type sneakers – and there were also flowering trees in bloom along the street, and the sidewalk was littered with little white flower petals – I was afraid he'd slip and fall and get hurt, he was running so flat out and so very hard. Like a gazelle. Like a cheetah. Like one of G-d's most beautiful running creatures.
Then they changed the setup and herded us all across the street from where we were standing to the other side, and moved things around and moved us down some more.
I think at this point Jason first showed up and started signing autographs and posing for photos for the crowd. He had put on a shirt, but there was the fake blood on his chest and all over both his hands. There was a crewcut bodyguard guy with him, who (literally) watched his back, and wouldn't let anybody get too close or around behind him. People swarmed up to him, pushing and crowding to get his autograph, to say hi, to take pictures before he had to go back to work. I don't think I got up to him the first time he came out, but I saw him and he was so beautiful, and I took pictures of him (which when developed were like his eye or his nose or a lock of his hair surrounded by a crowd).
I watched him listen attentively to each person, find out where the camera was, wet his lips and compose his face and POSE and make his face incredibly gorgeous for each and every person's photo with him! I mean, he was handsome already, but when the camera took his picture, he became GORGEOUS. It was truly amazing, how he voluntarily could put on this 'photoface.' Too soon, he had to go back to work.
Oh, at one point, somebody asked if he was coming to FF party and he said he was, and they asked if he was nervous about coming to a party with 450 fans and he said, "Why? I've probably met most of you guys out here tonight already." Just very kind and gentle and funny and down to earth. What was there to be afraid of (he found out at FF party – but that's later in the story!) We heard rumors in Covina that earlier in the day somebody had tried to break into Jason's trailer. This was very upsetting.
I'm not sure if it was at this point that we began to chat with Pasquale the grip. He was a guy standing on the corner, working on the show. A lot of the people there were very friendly. A couple of the security guards were regaling the crowd with stories earlier in the evening, chatting with everybody. Very funny. He was really really nice. He even went and brought us some bottles of water later on. He was the sweetest guy. We found out what a grip actually does – which is something, but it's not exactly electrical. He had all kinds of duct tape, clothes pins, little short pieces of rope etc. – he definitely looked ready to take care of anything that came up! He was in charge of a big light they had around the corner. We were hoping he had some inside gossip, but it turned out we knew way more about the show than he did, because he had just been hired temporarily for that particular
Jason was across the street now, without his shirt, hanging out, chatting with some makeup girls and people on the show. Somebody sprayed him with "Hollywood sweat." A wardrobe person actually lifted up the legs of his pants and pulled up his long long white socks for him! LOL! (His hands were so covered in stage blood, he'd make a mess doing it himself, and I'm sure he totally pounded them down around his ankles running so hard earlier). Not sure if she fixed his shoelaces for him or not. {I want this job}
At one point he sortof grabbed both pant legs and hiked up/adjusted his pants (and himself) before running – and I thought I would faint dead away on the sidewalk! I think this time he started a bit around the corner and was running around the corner and up the street. He started to run – and slipped and almost fell down but sortof cartwheeled his arms and legs and caught himself and regained his balance (did I mention this man is elegant and graceful as a cat?) But see, I was worried and he did almost slip and fall and hurt himself! Poor baby!
Maybe it was at this point that Jason came back for more photos and more autographs and I got to talk to him. In one of the photos earlier (taken by jenerator – thanks Jen!), where he and I are both grinning – He was trying to autograph something for somebody, and he was having an awful time because his hands were so sticky from the stage blood (it had the tacky consistency of partly dried paint). Somebody was offering him a different pen and he said, "I don't need another pen, I need a new pair of hands," and I said, fervently and in my best Mae West voice, "Oh, there is NOTHING wrong with those hands!" As you can see from the photo, my face is SO red and I am grinning, he is also just grinning! : > The man has gorgeous hands. (I couldn't just stand there and hear him talk down his beautiful young hands, could I? LOL!)
Hmm – I don't want anybody to think I just love this guy for his body though (I just love this guy – the fact that he had a beautiful body came as a total surprise and very pleasant 'bonus'! LOL!)
Anyway, later it was my turn. Jason had his pen and he was looking around for what I wanted him to sign, and looked a little perplexed I didn't have anything. I said, "Jason, I don't want anything FROM you, I want to GIVE you something." I told him how I'd come down 5 hours on a bus to NY and seen him very briefly in NY at the WB thing – at which point he asked me my name, and I could almost see him flipping through his mental Rolodex of names/faces/places – I think this guy has 'total recall.' I explained I'd seen him so briefly that we hadn't talked and he hadn't gotten my name, that I'd just told him I was an enormous fan – and so I'd come out to LA to get a chance to meet him – and that I had a gift for him, and when I'd told people online that I was making this gift for him (the honorary degrees), over 100 people had wanted to sign the gift and put their names on it, because everyone loved him so much... At this point, I had taken up too much of his time and the crowd was getting restless for their turn, so I wrapped it up and said that that present was in the bag and a bunch of other little presents from me, along with a note that explained everything.
Again, in his presence as I was in New York, I was totally calm and peaceful. I don't know how he does it, but he just projects this aura of calm and peace and respect and you just respond to him the same way. No matter what horny line you had prepared to hit on the guy, it just dies unspoken on your lips because he deserves better than that! It's so hard to explain the magic this man works! And again, I couldn't actually look at his beauty, but only focus on a spot! I remember thinking "look at his eyes, look at his eyes" – but I got stopped short by his eyelashes, noticing how amazingly long his lashes were – they projected out way further than his eyebrows (and he has deep-set eyes), both top and bottom eyelashes – long and huge – of course there was makeup on them – and he was very made up for filming – and I was looking at his face, looking below the makeup at all the little scars and tiny nicks in his skin underneath (souvenirs of his skateboarding youth?).... just studying him microscopically! Just like in NY, when I got my eyes fixated on one little wavy vein at the base of his throat... Still never got to look at those gorgeous eyes – The man is truly like the sun – when you get too close to him, your senses just shut down to protect you from going blind! LOL! He listened attentively (that's the photo of him with his head down, listening, and my back to the camera, talking to him)
and then he took the bag (his bodyguard guy had to schlep it around the rest of the night for him) and he must've said thanks and shook my hand – and our hands got stuck together from the stage blood! LOL! And I'm thinking "Hmm, stuck together with Jason Behr.. This isn't a BAD thing," but then he managed to pry his hand loose.. I think we laughed - and somebody tapped him on the shoulder and told him it was time to go back to work again. People were very disappointed, but he assured us he'd be back.... I turned and walked away and my legs were like rubber and I was all weak and shaky and happy – my mission was accomplished - Jason had the gifts – I'd given them to him personally, I'd explained about the online fans signing it too – I had a little of his blood on my hand and I never wanted to wash that hand.
His hand isn't much bigger than mine – though my hands aren't small (made me realize how teeny Shiri's face must be, because Max's hands look so huge on her face). He is very very thin in person – there is just less of him than you would expect – very slender and fine boned and all the gorgeous planes of his face. His hair was so beautiful, especially in back where it tended to curve and curl to the right at the bottom (why you see that little lock of hair sticking out on the right behind his neck sometimes in pictures). I took a picture of the back of his hair and the back of his beautiful neck, but they didn't come out great (none of my Covina pix came out great).
And he is taller than I thought he was when I saw him in NY – probably 5 ft 11 or so. (The size of Mr ML – and the shape of Mr ML too – When I got home, I hugged Mr ML quite a lot! LOL! They have very very similar beautiful long slender athletic bodies – except Mr ML has no 6-pack abs and no chestage, because he plays basketball but doesn't work out)
It's funny because I've met several people and if you'd asked me, I would've said they were much shorter than me, yet in photos afterward – we are almost exactly the same height! I guess I have always been tall for a woman and just overestimate my size and underestimate the size of people my height or shorter. Same with NickW – I thought he was very short, like maybe came up to my shoulder (he whisked out of the elevator and past me at FF Party and ducked into the VIP Room), but when I posed for photos with him at the Valentine Party, I was maybe an inch taller? Another weird quirk of the mind of ML
Anyway – JasonB is thin (but not unhealthy!), just very fine-boned and slender; he is tall (but not very) - and he is BEAUTIFUL! And talented. And gracious and kind and gentle and the most wonderful man on earth and truly, like his middle name Nathaniel (at least as reported in that unauthorized biography book) – God's gift! A magical man. I don't think the boy is god, but he does have an amazingly godlike sweet and gentle nature and almost does seem not-of-this-earth. Maybe that's why people say he is mysterious? A mystery wrapped in an enigma. A heck of a sweet and nice guy. Kind. Generous with his time and his attention. Did I mention beautiful?
I am of the opinion that this meeting-the-fans persona is just that – a persona that Jason 'does' to deal with the public. It is beautiful and charming and gentle and lovely and loving - but on some level, I think it is 'an act.' He projects this aura and I think it helps to protect him. And I think it is wonderful that he is so wonderful with people – he could just as easily be some snotty stuck up little jerk, right? But he is so totally not!
And then you don't feel so stupid for loving and admiring the guy so much, because he is just so good. A gentle man, and a gentleman. A guy you would gladly leave all your earthly possessions behind, just to be with.... Sorry, carried away for a minute! [But I guess it's a good thing JasonB went into show biz and didn't form a religious cult or anything!]
And despite all the stories about him chain-smoking so heavily – he totally had no odor of cigarettes on him or on his clothing (or any odor on him, which is pretty amazing, considering all the hard running the boy had done that night). And he did not smoke in front of anybody that entire evening – I don't think anyone saw him with a cigarette. I think he is very careful about not being photographed smoking, to be a good role model or whatever. And despite smoking, he is in wonderful shape, to be able to run like that! Didn't double over and hack or anything! (But he still should quit! I want him to stay young and healthy! Smoking gives you wrinkles and cancer and bad stuff like that!)
I was floating on air pretty much after that, even though it was probably 3 or 4 in the morning. I was on an adrenaline high, jumping around, doing karate kicks and scaring my roomie Sarah, who was sure I would tear something or kick somebody in the nose. I was just so happy! I found a bag of some Crispy M&M I'd brought with me for provisions – they 'd totally melted on the Paramount tour in the sun and fused together into a very nasty-looking mass. But they tasted pretty good!
Okay, so you're probably wondering – what was in the bag? What did I give Jason? Well, I posted them on Roswell2 after I got home as promised, so the 100+ people who 'signed' the gifts know I made Jason three honorary college diplomas - a Bachelor of Acting, a Master of Body Language, and a Doctor of Osculation [kissing] degree. They were printed on parchment-like paper and framed in box frames, and imho, pretty funny but nice. Had cool Latin mottoes and such. I hope he liked them. Hope he keeps them and hangs them up someplace. (I know people who never got to go to college sometimes feel like they missed out on something, and I think JasonB is certainly smart enough and accomplished enough and has worked enough years in his field to merit these diplomas!)
The rest was little stuff from me – a pull n' go toy NASCAR racer I sent away for from Kellogg's cereal for him, a little 'finger skateboard' I bought in a country store in Western Mass; I slipped my copy of "Ask Mr. Bear" in there as I thought it might be something the Behr family should own a copy of; an individual serving box of Cocoa Krispies, from the cereal I brought with me to LA for 'provisions' because I know he likes those (what boy doesn't?); and a Krispy Kreme donut travel mug, T-shirt, and hat! I know it was too much, but I couldn't help myself! LOL! (Though I am pretty sure he is not geeky enough to wear them all together! Probably too cool to wear them at all. But maybe the mug will be useful? And I bet he scarfed down the box of Cocoa Krispies dry, in the car before he even got home! Kind of like me and the melted M&M's – at 4:30 a.m., it's just the thing!) And a note to explain everything, especially the diplomas. The hat was really really nice, though I don't know if he'll ever wear it. sigh. Made me really happy to give him that stuff anyway. And a gift is a gift, and once you give it to a person, what they do with it is entirely up to them!
(to be continued...
[ 07-08-2003: Message edited MyrnaLynne ]