Two
Nate
Iwas a little worried about how the first day of shooting for my new job would go. I’m used to filming idiots climbing improbable objects, but I’ve never gone into someone’s house and set up a camera and pried into their personal life.
But I knew what I was signing up for when I left my longterm job as the head producer onJason Climbs Sh!tand took this position as a junior producer onChasing Prince Charming. Despite the difference in my relative power, it’s actually a big step up for me. Jason’s show is huge on YouTube, butCharminghas some of the highest ratings on networkTV. I never in a million years thought I’d get this job when I applied for it.
And yet, here I am. Becca’s kids help mash potatoes, and I mimic (and exaggerate)Thea’s wearied expression a bit to get her to smile. I meant it when I said she didn’t have to pretend to enjoy cooking, but the editors are probably going to use ten seconds of the cooking footage at a maximum, so a couple of smiles are all they’ll need to make it look like she at least enjoys time with her mom. Afterward, Rosie proudly presents us with bowls of mashed potatoes, and wow, they really are the best I’ve ever had.
“You have to open that restaurant,” I tell Becca as we settle in to do one more round of interviews. “The world needs your mashed potatoes.”
“That’s what everyone tells me,” she says, sitting down on her couch again. She’s set the girls up with tablets in the other room so they won’t disturb us—we want to get some footage of her without them, mostly focused on her love life. Kristin goes to wait outside in case we need her again, but she won’t need to interpret when we don’t haveThea in the room.
Becca’s face and hair are less glittery now—I think she snuck off to shake more of it loose in the bathroom while she was getting the girls settled—but there are still flecks catching the light.
Which is not surprising. It took me exactly one “CraftTime with Uncle Nate” session with my niece to learn the terrible truth about glitter: that shit does not come off.
“Okay,” I say. “I’ve got a few more questions for you. What do you hope to get out of being on the show?”
“What do I hope to get out of the show?” She looks like she’s proud she remembered to state the question, though we probably won’t use this one, since it’s a bit self-referential. “Oh, you know. I’m just here to make friends,” she says wryly, a glint in her eyes. “I just want to be the first girl ever to say that on this show.”
I laugh. “You probably will be. But is it true?”
Becca shrugs. “Sort of. I’d like to get to know the other girls and hear their stories. I think being on the show could be an adventure, but it would really be nice to find love.” She smiles tentatively, like she’s afraid to hope for it.
Damn, this woman has a beautiful smile. Everything about her is beautiful, actually, which will probably be true of all the contestants. I expected to be surrounded by hot women on this job, which is definitely different from my last one, where I was mostly surrounded by sweaty dudes in helmets and harnesses. What I didn’t expect was how weird it would feel to have personal conversations with beautiful women and know I have no chance in hell with them. Becca is incredible—if I met her under normal circumstances, I’d have asked her out in a heartbeat.
But she’s looking for Prince Charming. She’s not going to date me, and if she did, I could lose my job.
I just need to get used to this. It’ll probably get easier the more interviews I do.
Becca goes on, and when she runs out of things to say, I ask a few more questions.The questions are canned and cheesy as hell. Her answers are only slightly less so, but she manages to deliver them charmingly.I’meating it up, which means the audience definitely will.
“You’re good at this,” I tell her as we’re winding the interview down.Tape is still rolling, but we won’t use anything I say to her and probably not her responses to me, either, unless she gives me something really good.
“So are you,” Becca says. “I really never would have known it was your first time.”
I want to make a crack back about how it’s not my first time forsomethings, but I bite my lip.This isn’tJason Climbs Sh!t. I can’t turn everything into a sexual innuendo and expect to get a laugh. I don’t want to make Becca uncomfortable, and I definitely don’t want her to feel harassed.
“That is good to know,” I say. “I may have been producing for a long time, but YouTube is a whole different ball game.”
“No doubt. So, are you from LA?”
“Yeah, my family all lives in Pasadena.”
“That must be nice, having them so close.”
“It is,” I say, then shrug. “I mean, we aren’t the type of family that gets together very often, since we’re all pretty busy. But my parents make sure to get us over there for holidays and stuff.”
“How big is your family?” she asks.
“Not very. A younger sister and an older brother—he’s married and has a two-year-old girl. She’s pretty damn cute.”
“Aww, I bet.” Becca’s blue eyes crinkle at the sides with her wide, gorgeous smile. “So did you always want to work inTV?”
I laugh. “No way.” It occurs to me that Becca is starting to interview me, but part of my job is to befriend her. It’s not just about getting footage we can use now—if she comes to trust me, she’ll give me the really good stuff later. It all feels a bit manipulative and underhanded, probably because it is.
But I like Becca, so I try to pretend I’m talking to her because I want to and not because it’s my job.This is easy to do. “I got started on YouTube because I knew Jason from a climbing gym. We started climbing together outside the gym, and I had a cell phone camera, and Jason had a habit of doing stupid crap and being like, ‘Hey!Take a video of this!’The rest is history, I guess. We never really intended to make money at it, but then wedid. I was working atTarget at the time, and I sure as hell quit that job in a hurry.”
