‘We’re Not Watching Television. We’re Making Television’

One vow I made to myself just a little more than two months ago, was to take advantage of my unemployment and do things I never had time for when I was constantly doing things for someone else.

I’ve made good on that promise, including a special trip yesterday to Hollywood to be part of a studio audience for “The Late Late Show With Craig Ferguson.” Who doesn’t love this guy? He’s funny, erudite, highly charming, and very good-looking. It turns out he’s also a genuinely nice guy.

We weren’t allowed on the CBS lot with cameras, cell phones or PDAs, so there are no pictures of those several hours spent waiting in line, waiting for our orientation and then waiting in the tiny, very cold studio, let alone during the actual taping. I’ll download the other photos later for tomorrow’s Wordless Wednesday.

Lunch at 4A
We arrived a little too early to park in the CBS lot and stand in line with our tickets, so we drove around the block to The Grove and Farmer’s Market to kill time. I had my first taste of Pinkberry frozen yogurt, which we consumed before heading into the parking lot to eat the PB&J sandwiches and clementines I’d brought for lunch. Instead of eating them in line, we ate them in Jessie’s Land Rover in lot 4A of The Grove’s massive parking structure – and laughed at this reminder that these are not normal times for both of us.

David from ‘The District’
We ended up taking the long route and initially panicked when we saw a bunch of people lined up for a show appearing like they were heading to a wedding or prom. We in our business casualwear looked woefully underdressed; however, it turned out these people were in line for “Dancing with the Stars.”

Our line over on the next block was much shorter when we arrived. In fact, it had only one guy named David who said he was from ‘the district.’ He’d been on the show before so he gave us a rundown of what to expect and then gave us a tip. Every weekday there’s a guy with a white baseball hat standing in front of Mann’s Chinese Theatre between 11 a.m. and noon handing out tickets to that day’s tapings of shows.

Hurry Up and, Wait, It’s Showtime!
I knew from talking to people on a movie set a couple of years ago, that television was a lot of sitting around for every few minutes of action. We were glad to be at the head of the line when we noticed it growing to well more than 100 people within the last hour. The very small studio seats 108, and we ended up in the front row.

The warm-up comedian told us we were officially “show enhancers” and reminded us several times that today “we’re not watching television; we’re making television.” I laughed so hard and so constantly that I made myself cough. And they were genuine chuckles, some perhaps more from infectious laughter and others because these people are much funnier live than on a recording.

Craig Ferguson was just as sharp and adorable and good looking in person as he is on film. One surprise, these late night hosts don’t “talk” to the audience as much as they do a camera that’s in their face. Unfortunately, those cameras were also in our face, so Jessie and I often had our view obstructed and had to watch on one of the monitors.

The NCIS: Los Angeles Connection
If there’s one thing that will trigger memories of our day in LA, it’s the new show NCIS: Los Angeles.

A film crew was shooting a scene at The Grove while we were there. Then, we stood in line under a giant billboard for the new CBS show that I stared at whenever I didn’t feel like staring at anyone else. And, finally, one of the evening’s guests was Chris O’Donnell, one of the stars of that show. He is cute too.

After the taping, we went back to The Grove and indulged in a decadent Italian dinner of risotto and rigatoni dishes before driving back to San Diego. Try as I might, I nodded off well before 12:30 a.m. and woke only in time to see the remaining 15 minutes featuring comedian Paula Poundstone. Listen carefully and you can hear me laugh out loud. I even tried to clap ahead of the crowd a time or two just to stand out, because, hey, we were making television here and, you know, there's always one in every crowd.