So now that I’ve blogged about my love of genre subversion, I feel a strange compulsion to contribute my most embarrassing genre-related life experience. Hey, we’ve all got one, right? …Guys?
So anyway, when I was in fifth grade, I auditioned to be on READING RAINBOW. Ten years old is a bit old for that show, but because I was small, we thought it might work.
Until, as like the first question in their interview process, they asked me what I like to read.
Now, I hasten to explain that we were learning about genres in school*, so what transpired next is not entirely my fault.
But suffice it to say that when I cheerfully replied, “Well, my favorite genre is Realistic Narrative,” the interview was pretty much over. And my dreams of TV stardom were shot, yet again.
Rejected by LeVar? Could anything but a life of geekish isolation follow?
*Seriously, we learned the randomest shit at my school. The only other things I remember about fifth grade are the strange properties of soap molecules, and how mean and racist my teacher was.
-->Feed me text
March 9, 2009 at 11:25 am
oh my god. that’s such a beautiful, shining example of nerdiness. aww.
March 9, 2009 at 5:59 pm
I do what I can.
March 9, 2009 at 7:32 pm
Too nerdy for LeVar? Wow, now that’s really nerdy!
March 15, 2009 at 1:52 am
But did you get to meet LeVar? Does he still do that show, by the way? And have you watched the opening cartoon lately? Oh my god, why are all the cartoons from my childhood so trippy and scary when I look back at them as an adult?
Great blog, by the way.
Ben
http://www.benjaminesch.com
March 16, 2009 at 8:51 pm
Now that I have rescued Ben Esch’s comment from the spam filter…
(Ben Esch, by the way, is an author whose debut novel, Suphomore Undercover, I very much want to read, now that I have read several highly amusing interviews with the man on assorted blogs.)
No, I never did meet LeVar, just some poor overworked casting folks. Honestly, for all I remember, it’s possible I was cut by the receptionist in some sort of pre-screening “Is this kid minimally normal enough to audition for us?” dialogue, for which the answer in my case was “Clearly not.”
And, I don’t know about Reading Rainbow, but I do know that in occasions on which I’ve seen Sesame Street as an adult, it’s made my head hurt. I don’t think I’m smart enough for it anymore.
March 20, 2009 at 4:12 am
Elizabeth
Thanks for rescuing me from the spam filter! Also, very glad that you want to read the book. Shoot me an email, and I bet we can get you a copy since you’re an official member of the media and all that.
All the best,
Ben
http://www.benjaminesch.com
March 20, 2009 at 10:18 am
Sweeeeeeet. It’s nice to be official.
Also, you may or may not be glad to know that somebody apparently reached our blog today by searching for “ben esch cute.” The internet is a wondrous thing.
April 13, 2009 at 7:32 pm
Don’t feel too bad about the missed opportunity. One day as I was walking through Central Park, I came across Reading Rainbow shooting a segment. I chatted with one of the production assistants there, and she did not have much good to say about Mr. Burton. (Maybe she used the A word — I can’t remember.) I saw the film crew later (I think they were shooting a scene where Levar is in a rowboat near Bow Bridge), and I could see for myself that the PA was right and that he was not pleasant to work with.
April 13, 2009 at 9:37 pm
Oh man, that’s sad. Isn’t that always the way it goes, though?
Thanks for undermining my regrets
May 20, 2009 at 1:01 pm
[...] whose recaps I followed religiously on Television Without Pity for a time), although given how my prior humiliation at the hands of the phrase “realistic narrative” is burnt into my brain, I [...]