Part Two: Characters: The Personalities
FATE
Miami Ink is not my first foray into the wacky and unpredictable world of reality television. My sister tells me throughout my entire young adulthood that I am a reality TV show wet-dream. So…back when I am young and dumb and 22, she discovers an open casting call for The Real World. We make a bet, hit the road for the audition and I set out to prove her wrong. Hilariously, she is absolutely right and I ascend the ranks, jumping through one hoop after another--always expecting rejection yet mysteriously always being met with approval--until I find myself being flown to L.A. for the final interview wondering how the hell this funny joke has gone so far. Why didn’t you ever (THANK GOD) see me on The Real World or any other lame version of it? Well…that is yet another hysterical story for yet another rainy day.
Needless to say, the process you go through for a 1-day show like Miami Ink is nothing compared to the vast psychological profiling you endure for a show like The Real World. I learn quickly that the people generally involved in creating one of these shows, no matter how big or small, are masters of manipulation; we, the participants, are merely pawns in a pre-arranged and hopefully pre-determined game.
When it comes to life, I always expect the unexpected. When it comes to reality television, I expect the directed. But even in the ultra-controlled environment of “reality” TV--just like life--things don’t always go according to plan.
It all starts completely “normally.” I get to my appointment on time and check in with casting. Everyone I meet is helpful and funny. As I mentioned in Part One, this just happens to be the first day back from a month-long hiatus for the cast and crew. I am the only tattoo they have for the day and some of the artists are still on vacation. Things seem a little hectic as everything gets put back together again, but nothing outside the expected first-day-back
-at-school-chaos. They tell me I have some time to kill so I move my friend’s car and go get a salad and a coffee. I return to the Green Room for the waiting game. I get mic’d. A bunch of us talk about South Park (because I’m obsessed with it) and how hysterical the new season is. An hour passes.
Enter the producer, a typical producer whose enthusiastic energy is directly proportional to the amount of caffeine coursing through her veins. She preps me for exactly the way the whole thing will go down. I wait to be cued to enter the shop. Chris Garver, the artist who will be inking me, will have a quick consultation with me regarding what I want, where I want it, if I want color etc… I am then either instructed to wait there or to exit. Next comes the actual getting the tattoo part where I am to engage him in questions and conversation. Finally, I will return to the Green Room where we discuss my story and film my little “confessional.” Sounds pretty straightforward to me. What could possibly go wrong?
She reminds me of the Reality TV Cardinal Rule: Thou Shalt Act Like None of This Is Orchestrated. Don’t look at the cameras. Don’t look at the producers. Refer to the artist himself and not the entire cast. Act normal, in this completely abnormal situation. And never, EVER, reference the show.
Another hour passes while I sit and think about how this is one of the great paradoxes of Reality TV; it is actually harder to act like there aren’t cameras on you when there are, then it is to act for a camera. Now, I realize that a lot of actors and actresses would strongly disagree with me. This is because the proliferation of reality TV is rendering their jobs obsolete. And I also agree that the well-performed craft of acting is a beautiful thing. But the truth is, it takes a certain gifted person to be able to “act” like they aren’t acting at all; to be able to play a part that is implied, yet never articulated; to be able to recite the lines of an insinuated script, yet never read them; to be able to “act” completely natural in the most unnatural of situations. Certain people are more gifted at it than others. Ami James is one of those people.
It is when I am outside in the door-well waiting to be cued for my natural-looking entrance that I meet Ami, the owner of the store, arguably the protagonist on the show and typecast “tough guy.” His intimidating energy is only the beginning of my unease. Ami is not a bad person; he’s just the type of person who feels compelled to antagonize every single human he comes in contact with no matter what. Giving him a show, an ego boost and a microphone to the world has only strengthened that aspect of his personality like warm water in the Gulf strengthens a hurricane. We all have a friend like Ami--the hostile shit-talker with a chip for each shoulder.
I have the luxury of listening to Ami-isms while I stand outside in the sweaty Miami humidity. When the production assistants (both Puerto Rican) ask him about his recent trip to Puerto Rico he responds, “It was fine, but I forgot one thing about Puerto Rico, there are too many fuckin’ Puerto Ricans.” He is kidding of course, but he is also just being a dick. He tells me his sperm is going for a lot of money on EBay these days and offers it to me at a discounted rate. Ah yes….the bad cop.
He yells at people going by. I tell him I am not nervous until I talk to him. He encourages me not to go in and shake and stutter. He tells one of the crewmembers he has their hat in his car. “Which hat?” the guy asks. “The hat that is better than the piece of shit you are wearing.” Ami replies and proceeds to grab the guy’s hat and kick it into the air. Twice.
This is Ami. Something about him is frustratingly charming. You can’t help but laugh at him, despite the fact that you probably feel more inclined to punch him. I tell him I am going to start lighting a candle every day for whatever poor woman has the saintliness to put up with him on a regular basis. And yet--maybe it’s the intoxicating, steamy Miami heat--but something about his rough edge is sexy. It’s annoying; like an itch in your inner ear.
Enter Chris Nuñez, the typecast “life of the party,” and ladies man. Chris is laid-back, cheerful and relatively down-to-earth given his newfound fame. He has a reassuring nature. The good cop. He approaches Ami and tells him he thinks they should get a screen printer and put it in his garage so they can print some t-shirts themselves. Ami explodes with condescension and immediately craps all over the idea. “When? Between here and the fuckin’ bar? Between this, that and the other thing? When are we going have fuckin’ time to be (imitates the motion of screen printing) in between the little time we have?” Chris appears so deflated I feel inclined to give him a hug.
From the looks of it, they have plenty of time. Although this might be reality TV, this is Hollywood first. And in Hollywood the cast of anything, whether it is a show, music video or movie, does a lot of sitting around. They finally cue me to walk in after standing around for 30 minutes. Ami cruises by on his skateboard. I walk in awkwardly; there are three cameras, two producers and two tattoo artists pointing at me. Garver is sitting at the desk pretending to write or something when I walk in the door. He doesn’t even look up at me when I come in. He has intense blue eyes that convey depth and intelligence...but there is something else too. I immediately get the sense that he is pissed off, but the situation is too weird for me to even give that instinct a second thought. I introduce myself, say I have an appointment and hand Chris the design. He takes it, looks at it and hands it to Yoji, the apprentice, and tells him to trace it.
Chris is the “big brother” of the crew and definitely the most experienced. The producers tell me he is supposedly one of the best tattoo artists in the world. The other guys respect and admire him. When I find out that morning that Garver is the artist doing my tat, I am happy. Although the first time I had ever even seen the show was when my friend Tommy On Demanded it the night before, Garver seemed to be most genuinely nice. I must have caught him on a bad, bad day…..