Holiday Party Crashers

Prolific—my new NYC-based management company—had a holiday party Wednesday night. Naturally, I'll go anywhere for some free booze and food.

They dressed up the place nicely for the evening. A lot more welcoming than my first visit. I got to talk with my guy Will a bit more—who I guess is essentially my NYC manager. (I have 3 managers now??) I thought there was a good spread of food there, but Will apologized for it: he'd set up a whole different catering spread but had to change it at the last minute because the head of the company wanted it to be entirely kosher. Chicken fingers, potato croquettes, veggie eggroll things... whatever it all was, it was good enough for me.



[head of the company's gun collection]
I ended up doing some mild mingling. My stomach was bothering me that night so it was hard to get into it. Though it was all laid back, it was more of a networking affair than the Writer's Guild holiday parties. There were more producers and directors there and it was kinda nice not to be in a roomful of bloody writers. Struck up conversations with an indie movie producer for a spell; he said he'd made 30 movies. At one point, this director woman sat next to me on a couch and started chatting me up; when I told her that I was working on a horror script, she began casting it for me with all the people she's friends with. "I know Michelle Rodriguez. Lisa Edelstein—I was just hanging out with her last night. Gerard Butler... but I don't know if he'd do horror. Hugh Grant..." Me telling her that I was writing a horror screenplay turned into an opportunity for her to rip into this huge name-dropping scat session! Skibbity-bibbity-Johnny-Depp!

Will told me there was this other holiday party happening that night that he wished he were going to—Morgan Spurlock's company, Warrior Poets. He had to stay at the Prolific party but he insisted that I should totally check it out. My stomach was still a wee bit messed up... but if there's a party happening that I can get into, I have a hard time saying no... because you just never know what could happen, do you? (I believe the Mormons call it "FOMO"—fear of missing out.)

He tried to get me the information but the guy who had the information was high as a kite that night. He knew it was at Spurlock's SOHO office, though, so my buddy just looked that up and got the address for me. Unfortunately, my friend had to take off to run some errands, so I called up a replacement buddy to meet me at the SOHO space...

There was actually a GUEST LIST at the Spurlock party—I told the doorman my name and said I wasn't sure it'd be on there because it was a last-minute thing. (A last minute thing for me to crash the fucking party!) After searching for my name in vain for a few seconds, the guy just waved us through.




It was a lot more lively at the Spurlock party. I saw the name-dropper woman from the Prolific party arrive a little later. I was just going to have one drink and run because my stomach was still fucked up... but a few drinks in and it started to settle...

Spurlock himself arrived toward the end of the party. My friend Bobby shook hands with him and inexplicably told him what a big fan he was. A few hours of fun and then we stole off into the night.