Act 1, Part 2: The Leveling
May 18, 2014 10:54:18 GMT -5
Terry Roberts, Chelsea Armstrong, and 2 more like this
Post by Deleted on May 18, 2014 10:54:18 GMT -5
None of these people are my friends. They are just over played patterns of nature. They are just living a slightly modified version of someone else's life. Modified version of their laugh, a modified version of their anger, a modified version of their ideas. Those slight differences don't mean much in the long run but to them it is the world of difference that makes them beautiful unique stars...But even those differences are just someone else's differences.
Oh stop whining about it for a second and think. People freak out when you tell them they're not different. Like you took away their reason for living...It is the same when you tell someone their feelings are just chemicals. They are insulted by the insinuation that they aren't filled with magical magicness of happy sunshine elves and are actually a system of fluids (god forbid). It doesn't make it any less real...just different...It forces you to realize what you really are...a pattern!
My job cannot exist without that fact. People have to be graspable and predictable or movies simply wouldn't work. The feelings of love, happiness, anguish and defeat are not excluded just to you no matter how much it feels like it at times. All people feel the same, bleed the same, kill the same; it is our perspective that separates us and creates a delusional layer that makes the rest of us think we're unique. The power of a performance comes from the ability to make a seamless connection thus furthering the suspension of disbelief. To be a good actor, you have to step past yourself and experience the pain of others and understand what it means to be alive. To know that certain feelings create a universal reaction that touches everyone to a core.
Method actors will take time to force themselves to think like the man they are portraying. Often putting themselves through torturous conditions to recreate that real connection to a faded pattern. Such as Daniel Day-Lewis who, for his roll as Oil Tycoon Daniel Plainview, lived in a tent and didn't shower through the filming of 'There Will Be Blood' or Adrian Brody who literally gave up everything he had including his home, his car, his his girlfriend, etc. to get into character for his performance as a Jewish musician living through the Holocaust in 'The Pianist'. They actualized pain that they had never experience to properly portray these people how they truly deserve to be displayed.
Acting is not creating, it is understanding and the reason why so many actors and actresses do charity work is because we have what most of mankind doesn't and that is empathy for our fellow human beings. Though with empathy comes hatred and diving too deep can lead people to a dark and lonely place...'wanna know how I got these scars?'...
~~~~~(J.G.)~~~~~
It was another early morning as I sat at my new dinning room table (seeing how I smashed the old one to bits and all). I was watching the sun rise over a horizon of hills, thinking to myself about how strange the fact is that in all chaotic likeliness someone is doing the exact same thing at this very moment thinking generally the same thoughts...Or the stranger concept that I might be the only person doing this at this very moment and I could be having a moment by myself.
I took a moment and inhaled a sort of grandness that failed to be actualized. I couldn't fully conceive the concept of one-ness that was taking place. It was just a few hours before Timothy's private tutor would arrive, we would discuss the lessons and then the day would begin. If I had to get Timothy a formal education, I wasn't going to let some public schooling schmuck who I didn't know corrupt his head with things people wanted to believe about the world rather than what the world really was...thankless. He was going to be the break in the chain that this world so desperately needed. Getting him started at an early age with the truths of life will not only allow him to properly process and logically contemplate issues for an optimum understanding and solutions but it will also give him time to reach levels I couldn't even dream of...That is if he doesn't let it go in one ear and out the other like most ungrateful bastards of his age. So infuriating to deal with the futility of a child's mind...
Though with the private tutor and funeral costs for Amanda's father (which unfortunately Amanda did not attend because she was off performing. Not that I can blame her, she doesn't handle funerals well.) I am not sure I will have enough to pay Tom Hardy by the end of production which mean I might lose my brain child...How the anxiety stacks, but that is an issue for another time. I know perfectly well what happens when I start to ponder too long on specific things, it snowballs into paranoia and a claustrophobic panic where it becomes difficult to breathe, my forehead begins to sweat profusely and I end up smashing up a perfectly good dining room table and the point is for the pattern to not repeat itself.
I turned away from the sun rise when I heard the sliding of a chair. I stared across the table to see me...a younger me when I still had the scars across my cheek. He stared back with a menacing grin as he placed his intertwined fingers onto the table as if ready with a proposition.
Younger Gable: What the hell is wrong with you? You look like a beaten dog.
I snorted as I turned my gaze back outside the window where the sun just ascended beyond the grassy hills, not that turning away was going to make him disappear. This is something I had to address now and I was very aware where it would take me but I was ready...He slammed his fist onto the table as he laughed with a mocking cackle.
Younger Gable: You know, I liked you better with the scars when you knew how gratifying it was to be torn apart.
I ran my hand across my cheek feeling the subtle ridges of stitches passed. I was lucky that the scars didn't leave any visible marks to disfigure my face. Though I did forget the pounding my body took when I received them. I remember hating every inch of myself and wanting to self-destruct into nothingness. My head was shoved through a glass window, my stomach and face were kicked in and I lost War that very same week but yet I remember being empowered for some reason like I was doing exactly what I was suppose to be doing. But now I feel like I am splitting myself up on multiple different fronts and none of them are leading me to greener pasture. Sure I was a champion in WCF but until all of my demands are met I couldn't benefit from it and knowing management, the first few request will be granted but then the rest (and especially the more ambitious demands) will be delayed out of either laziness or disdain for my reasoning.
Younger Gable: You are waiting on other people? Since when was that the way we do business? If we want something then we dive head first to get it because when you wait on somebody else to deliver the goods only one thing happens...You get old, just like Dobbs and Curtin in 'Treasure of the Sierra Madre' when waiting on payment from the contractor McCormick not realizing they got stiffed. I don't know about you but I am nobody's punching bag! You were so much more useful when you were angry and against the world rather than tired and submissive...Show the world you can be alive again and that you aren't just having a lucky streak.
John Gable: I am not Don Quixote. I know what is gone can never come back and those who refuse to accept that are the ones who die digging. I moved on...
Younger Gable: Bullshit. You stopped being hungry. You are full of the fucking scraps they fed you because you didn't feel like causing a ruckus anymore...Boohoo, what happened to your balls? What happened to the Gable who wouldn't have even left Marina in good enough condition to have a rematch for the title? What happened to the Gable that demanded respect and would have knocked Tom Hardy's teeth in at the first sign of an attitude? What happened to the Gable who cared more about being feared than being liked? You use to go out of your way to make people raise an eyebrow but now you would be lucky to get a bat of an eyelash your way. It's because people can smell the scent of defeat on you. They can see that at any moment you will be ready to drop and they will be there to pick your bones and pluck your eyes.
He stood to his feet with his hands planted firmly on the table as he stared a hole right into the side of my head. I wanted to turn just to scratch the itch of my stare meeting his but I resisted the instinctual urge in attempts of trying to get the mental projection to be dissolved and silenced but even as a few minutes go by I could still feel his eyes...my eyes.
John Gable: You know how tiring it was to be like that?
Younger Gable: You mean how tiring it was to be ambitious? To actually have a cause instead of teaming with the enemy and getting fucked at every turn? The problem is you accepted the fact that you are nothing but a human. Me? I still have potential to be better and that really bugs you. You could be me but you would have to give up all this horse shit to even be able to reach where I was. What are you doing trying to live a normal life anyways? You aren't the family man type. I knonw you and inside is something that wants to kill, something that loves being hated, something that wants everyone to suffer simply for the fact that they tried to beat you. Now you settle for the easy man's way out. The distract yourself until you die motif. What a waste of a life.
He plopped back down into the chair then leaned back to stare up at the ceiling and rest his feet on the table. I looked away from the window with an irritated glance, not bothering to move my head, and took a big long look at my younger self. I was reminded of the passion and the fire I had before I fractured my arm and how I felt on top of the world even when I lost because I felt like I would never die. It's not like I wasn't trying now...Hell, I am on a win streak...But that streak doesn't feel real to me because I feel like I let it come to me instead of me chasing after it.
Younger Gable: And seriously, how can you let Chase Michaels of all people interrupt YOUR moment, YOUR ceremony, YOUR time in the spot light? How can you let him make a fool out of you so easily? Him and his little harlot. I would have never let him leave with both of his legs fully able and unscathed. Hell, he wouldn't have been a blimp on my radar but you seem to be the butt of the joke last week. Who the hell are you?
I mumbled a response under my breath, not wanting to show that I was being riled up by all the facts I could spit at myself. I saw a smirk on his face as he swung his legs off the table and leaned in with his ear as if trying to pick up what I was trying to say.
Younger Gable: I'm sorry, I can't here you...what was that?
John Gable: I am...John Gable...
Younger Gable: A little louder buddy, I can't hear ya.
John Gable: I am John Gable, god damn it!
Younger Gable: The hell you are! What is the last notable thing you had to say? If anyone is John Gable it is me! And that is sad because that means John Gable is long gone and buried. You are just a shell being held up with no other choice than to be alive. Have you even thought about your match against Trinity? Do Marina and Stacy worry you for some reason? Are you scared that some undeserving whores are going to come up and steal my title?
John Gable: It is my title! I am the god damn Cinema Champion!
He stood up and slowly made his way over to my side of the table. I listened as every step he took caused the floor under him to creak. I heard his hand slide against the wood as he dragged his fingers along the table...so real yet so dramatic that it almost shattered the illusion. I could see the pores in his skin as he got close. I could see his hair sway slightly as he tilted his head in a demented way like I used to when I wanted to intimidate the producers. I hated him...
Younger Gable: Is that so? You deserve this title? Because as far as I know, normal human beings don't deserve the dirt they walk on; they'd be lucky for someone to throw them a bone. Now are who the hell are you?
My fist clenched as his words slide out his mouth like a snake. I watched him as he stepped up next to me. He place a hand on my should...Damn, it felt so real. Was it real? No, that's ridiculous. It had to be me going insane...It had to be, it had to be, it had to be...I closed my eyes as I let the words fall out of my mouth as if I had no control, almost as if I was the one being projected outward into the world.
John Gable: I am King Leukemia...
Younger Gable: C'mon, say it with some meaning! You have desensitized it to mean nothing with how many times you have said it. Make it into something that strikes a chord again. Give it weight so that it knocks the air out of someone when you shout it! Stop trying to make a trademark and say what you fucking mean!
John Gable: I am...
Suddenly, I felt his grip tighten on my shoulder which caused me to jump slightly. I listened as I heard him breathe...Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. If I reached out, could I feel his skin...my skin? I wanted to reach up and grab his arm but my hand dared not move. I couldn't explain it but it was almost as if I was paralyzed.
Younger Gable: Don't tell me...Tell them. Tell all of them who they should fear. Let them know that their chance for glory is over and that there is no such thing as redemption. Live and breathe your knowledge as if it were your last thought, feast upon your disdain as if it was all the protein and carbs you could ever need. You will learn to be self-efficient, you will learn to be alive once again and you will learn how to never forget your scars...
~~~~~(J.G.)~~~~~
It was a small dark room, almost like an interrogation room with the steel table and a single, dim light hanging overhead showing John Gable with shadows trailing down over his eyes and under his nose. He had his right hand resting on top of the cold metal while his left arm hung at his side. His fingers tapped one after the other...one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four...His breaths were shaking with rage as his gaze refused to be torn away from the camera.
John Gable: I have been wondering for a while now why I truly came back to WCF. I have said before that it was mainly for the paychecks and publicity and there have been times where I have said I am just waiting for my movie to take off but really I came back because I didn't want to get out of bed in the morning. The first week away and I turned into a sack of potatoes that couldn't be motivated if you literally lit a fire under my ass. I was the worst possible thing...uninspired. I came back to prove I didn't let that fire go out but after returning I haven't really felt the heat. I turned into my own worst fear...A complacent competitor who should have left well enough alone. I have complained about those who refused to get out of the way for people who actually have something new to offer but I didn't realize I became one of them. I stopped being Gable and started being a regular, pathetic, noise machine who just spat out sub-par points in the vain attempt to be 'right'.
He used his right hand to scratch under his chin in a sort of antsy-ness as if impatiently waiting to get to a certain point. He nervously chuckled a little as he quickly would glance down at his left arm.
John Gable: I forgot what it was like to feel defeated so I stopped worrying about what I was becoming because if I was winning this much then I must have been doing something right. But the honest answer is I was winning because I was doing everything wrong at the exact right time. I let people carry me when I should have been leading the charge and I let a title determine my worth. I shouldn't let the title make me a champion, I should be making the title a staple of this company. I should be bettering everything I touch instead of living off its hype. It's time to remember how it is to be destroyed. Trinity...
He slid his hand down his face and moved it over to behind his neck as he dropped his icy gaze down to the table.
John Gable: Honestly, I don't feel that name fits with there only being two of you and no, managers don't count...I think I am going to call you duplex from now on...Duplex, I honestly have nothing against you and I support your life-styles but neither of your are worthy to hold my Cinema title. You see, when I changed it from the TV title it wasn't just to make me feel at home or to trick myself that I was back in Hollywood. It was a promise I made to make sure I would do all that was in my power to be bigger and better than everyone else, to hold some integrity in this redneck past time. I believe movies are the most powerful force in entertainment and I wanted to set the bar for myself to make sure I didn't sink any longer.
Gable lifted his left arm and placed his hand on the table with the palm turned up. There were a good amount of acupuncture needles sticking out from above his wrist to the tips of his fingers.
John Gable: I have run a tangent from my job as an actor. My job is not pretending to be something I'm not. It is displaying the universal ideas of all people. How to lose a loved one, how to be enraged at betrayal and how to acknowledge the pain of being alive. Now, this doesn't hurt right now. I made sure of it myself that these needles were placed in with very proper care. Are they in the proper spots for the enjoyment of acupuncture? I have no idea but that is far from the point. Marina and Stacy, you both know how it is to be you and how tough that is on its own I am sure. We all make mistakes and we all suffer but you only know your brand of suffering. As an actor I have to deeply analyze and construct another person's agony every time I step out onto a stage or film set. I have played a homeless man who can't afford anything to eat so he has to choose between selling his dog or letting his stomach remain empty. I have played a soldier who had to take lives with an endless amount of regret. I have played schizophrenics who have to face that the world they know is a lie and that even though they see it and believe it, they can't trust anything. It is all fine and dandy to half ass it and go out there and pretend but that would be a mistake in itself in my opinion. I give these characters the full extent of my attention to understand them and why they hurt. I stay up late at night wondering about scenario after scenario thinking about how would it really effect me. I grew to understand their confusion and doubt like no other person could and it gave me something very important in return...a steady mind and a thick hide.
Gable chuckled nervously as he looked towards his needle covered hand.
John Gable: You see, once you understand a new sort of pain, no one can inflict it with any sort of surprise or effectiveness. You start to become numb to anything short of a massacre. Not because you actually hurt but just for the simple fact that you stop expecting better, you stop resisting the aches and instead lean into them, you stop caring about all the small bumps and scratches you get along the way and you start becoming stronger, smarter, rational and you start to understand everything that wants you dead. So, when you start to understand that, you want to take it to the limit.
Gable lifts his left hand and turns it down, hanging it over the table. He motioned downward with a count to three.
John Gable: one...two...THREE!!!
He reaches high and then slams his hand palm down onto the table causing a good chunk of the needles to snap and fly off while others pierced through to the other side. Gable quickly stood up grabbing his left hand and pacing behind the chair mumbling and grumbling with each step.
John Gable: God damn that hurt, haha!
He took a seat again and held his hand out to the camera. Blood was dripping down his palm and off his wrist. There were still needles visible in his hand that were pushed deep within. Gable continued to chuckle nervously as his breath quickened.
John Gable: Now I know it will take sometime to get these needles out and a few of them will have to come out in their own time but now no one could do this to me. No one can ever have the element of surprise of breaking, smashing or piercing this hand. I have become a better person because of it...Trini...Duplex, I respect you plenty but I hate you deeply. You are a threat against me and my work and as an artist I will defend my work to the very last breath. Marina already knows what I will do for this title and surely soon enough so will Stacy. I will devastate and destroy those who think they are God or in this case Goddesses among man. I will tear down Olympus to show that no one will ever live above those on the ground. I am the leveling, I am King fucking Leukemia and I will never forget and I will never forgive. As sure as my hand bleeds I will make you remember that no one makes it out alive. Nothing makes you special, nothing makes you better, you are still human and you are still capable of being broken. You Marina and Stacy as well as Chase Michaels, Mr. Beckman, and all of Pantheon will fall prey to the cancer that speaks and on your death bed, you will know forever until you close your eyes, the name John Gable, Cinema Champion, King of All Media.
Gable reached out and smacked the camera violently sending it to the ground and cutting off the rest of the video.
(fin)
Oh stop whining about it for a second and think. People freak out when you tell them they're not different. Like you took away their reason for living...It is the same when you tell someone their feelings are just chemicals. They are insulted by the insinuation that they aren't filled with magical magicness of happy sunshine elves and are actually a system of fluids (god forbid). It doesn't make it any less real...just different...It forces you to realize what you really are...a pattern!
My job cannot exist without that fact. People have to be graspable and predictable or movies simply wouldn't work. The feelings of love, happiness, anguish and defeat are not excluded just to you no matter how much it feels like it at times. All people feel the same, bleed the same, kill the same; it is our perspective that separates us and creates a delusional layer that makes the rest of us think we're unique. The power of a performance comes from the ability to make a seamless connection thus furthering the suspension of disbelief. To be a good actor, you have to step past yourself and experience the pain of others and understand what it means to be alive. To know that certain feelings create a universal reaction that touches everyone to a core.
Method actors will take time to force themselves to think like the man they are portraying. Often putting themselves through torturous conditions to recreate that real connection to a faded pattern. Such as Daniel Day-Lewis who, for his roll as Oil Tycoon Daniel Plainview, lived in a tent and didn't shower through the filming of 'There Will Be Blood' or Adrian Brody who literally gave up everything he had including his home, his car, his his girlfriend, etc. to get into character for his performance as a Jewish musician living through the Holocaust in 'The Pianist'. They actualized pain that they had never experience to properly portray these people how they truly deserve to be displayed.
Acting is not creating, it is understanding and the reason why so many actors and actresses do charity work is because we have what most of mankind doesn't and that is empathy for our fellow human beings. Though with empathy comes hatred and diving too deep can lead people to a dark and lonely place...'wanna know how I got these scars?'...
~~~~~(J.G.)~~~~~
It was another early morning as I sat at my new dinning room table (seeing how I smashed the old one to bits and all). I was watching the sun rise over a horizon of hills, thinking to myself about how strange the fact is that in all chaotic likeliness someone is doing the exact same thing at this very moment thinking generally the same thoughts...Or the stranger concept that I might be the only person doing this at this very moment and I could be having a moment by myself.
I took a moment and inhaled a sort of grandness that failed to be actualized. I couldn't fully conceive the concept of one-ness that was taking place. It was just a few hours before Timothy's private tutor would arrive, we would discuss the lessons and then the day would begin. If I had to get Timothy a formal education, I wasn't going to let some public schooling schmuck who I didn't know corrupt his head with things people wanted to believe about the world rather than what the world really was...thankless. He was going to be the break in the chain that this world so desperately needed. Getting him started at an early age with the truths of life will not only allow him to properly process and logically contemplate issues for an optimum understanding and solutions but it will also give him time to reach levels I couldn't even dream of...That is if he doesn't let it go in one ear and out the other like most ungrateful bastards of his age. So infuriating to deal with the futility of a child's mind...
Though with the private tutor and funeral costs for Amanda's father (which unfortunately Amanda did not attend because she was off performing. Not that I can blame her, she doesn't handle funerals well.) I am not sure I will have enough to pay Tom Hardy by the end of production which mean I might lose my brain child...How the anxiety stacks, but that is an issue for another time. I know perfectly well what happens when I start to ponder too long on specific things, it snowballs into paranoia and a claustrophobic panic where it becomes difficult to breathe, my forehead begins to sweat profusely and I end up smashing up a perfectly good dining room table and the point is for the pattern to not repeat itself.
I turned away from the sun rise when I heard the sliding of a chair. I stared across the table to see me...a younger me when I still had the scars across my cheek. He stared back with a menacing grin as he placed his intertwined fingers onto the table as if ready with a proposition.
Younger Gable: What the hell is wrong with you? You look like a beaten dog.
I snorted as I turned my gaze back outside the window where the sun just ascended beyond the grassy hills, not that turning away was going to make him disappear. This is something I had to address now and I was very aware where it would take me but I was ready...He slammed his fist onto the table as he laughed with a mocking cackle.
Younger Gable: You know, I liked you better with the scars when you knew how gratifying it was to be torn apart.
I ran my hand across my cheek feeling the subtle ridges of stitches passed. I was lucky that the scars didn't leave any visible marks to disfigure my face. Though I did forget the pounding my body took when I received them. I remember hating every inch of myself and wanting to self-destruct into nothingness. My head was shoved through a glass window, my stomach and face were kicked in and I lost War that very same week but yet I remember being empowered for some reason like I was doing exactly what I was suppose to be doing. But now I feel like I am splitting myself up on multiple different fronts and none of them are leading me to greener pasture. Sure I was a champion in WCF but until all of my demands are met I couldn't benefit from it and knowing management, the first few request will be granted but then the rest (and especially the more ambitious demands) will be delayed out of either laziness or disdain for my reasoning.
Younger Gable: You are waiting on other people? Since when was that the way we do business? If we want something then we dive head first to get it because when you wait on somebody else to deliver the goods only one thing happens...You get old, just like Dobbs and Curtin in 'Treasure of the Sierra Madre' when waiting on payment from the contractor McCormick not realizing they got stiffed. I don't know about you but I am nobody's punching bag! You were so much more useful when you were angry and against the world rather than tired and submissive...Show the world you can be alive again and that you aren't just having a lucky streak.
John Gable: I am not Don Quixote. I know what is gone can never come back and those who refuse to accept that are the ones who die digging. I moved on...
Younger Gable: Bullshit. You stopped being hungry. You are full of the fucking scraps they fed you because you didn't feel like causing a ruckus anymore...Boohoo, what happened to your balls? What happened to the Gable who wouldn't have even left Marina in good enough condition to have a rematch for the title? What happened to the Gable that demanded respect and would have knocked Tom Hardy's teeth in at the first sign of an attitude? What happened to the Gable who cared more about being feared than being liked? You use to go out of your way to make people raise an eyebrow but now you would be lucky to get a bat of an eyelash your way. It's because people can smell the scent of defeat on you. They can see that at any moment you will be ready to drop and they will be there to pick your bones and pluck your eyes.
He stood to his feet with his hands planted firmly on the table as he stared a hole right into the side of my head. I wanted to turn just to scratch the itch of my stare meeting his but I resisted the instinctual urge in attempts of trying to get the mental projection to be dissolved and silenced but even as a few minutes go by I could still feel his eyes...my eyes.
John Gable: You know how tiring it was to be like that?
Younger Gable: You mean how tiring it was to be ambitious? To actually have a cause instead of teaming with the enemy and getting fucked at every turn? The problem is you accepted the fact that you are nothing but a human. Me? I still have potential to be better and that really bugs you. You could be me but you would have to give up all this horse shit to even be able to reach where I was. What are you doing trying to live a normal life anyways? You aren't the family man type. I knonw you and inside is something that wants to kill, something that loves being hated, something that wants everyone to suffer simply for the fact that they tried to beat you. Now you settle for the easy man's way out. The distract yourself until you die motif. What a waste of a life.
He plopped back down into the chair then leaned back to stare up at the ceiling and rest his feet on the table. I looked away from the window with an irritated glance, not bothering to move my head, and took a big long look at my younger self. I was reminded of the passion and the fire I had before I fractured my arm and how I felt on top of the world even when I lost because I felt like I would never die. It's not like I wasn't trying now...Hell, I am on a win streak...But that streak doesn't feel real to me because I feel like I let it come to me instead of me chasing after it.
Younger Gable: And seriously, how can you let Chase Michaels of all people interrupt YOUR moment, YOUR ceremony, YOUR time in the spot light? How can you let him make a fool out of you so easily? Him and his little harlot. I would have never let him leave with both of his legs fully able and unscathed. Hell, he wouldn't have been a blimp on my radar but you seem to be the butt of the joke last week. Who the hell are you?
I mumbled a response under my breath, not wanting to show that I was being riled up by all the facts I could spit at myself. I saw a smirk on his face as he swung his legs off the table and leaned in with his ear as if trying to pick up what I was trying to say.
Younger Gable: I'm sorry, I can't here you...what was that?
John Gable: I am...John Gable...
Younger Gable: A little louder buddy, I can't hear ya.
John Gable: I am John Gable, god damn it!
Younger Gable: The hell you are! What is the last notable thing you had to say? If anyone is John Gable it is me! And that is sad because that means John Gable is long gone and buried. You are just a shell being held up with no other choice than to be alive. Have you even thought about your match against Trinity? Do Marina and Stacy worry you for some reason? Are you scared that some undeserving whores are going to come up and steal my title?
John Gable: It is my title! I am the god damn Cinema Champion!
He stood up and slowly made his way over to my side of the table. I listened as every step he took caused the floor under him to creak. I heard his hand slide against the wood as he dragged his fingers along the table...so real yet so dramatic that it almost shattered the illusion. I could see the pores in his skin as he got close. I could see his hair sway slightly as he tilted his head in a demented way like I used to when I wanted to intimidate the producers. I hated him...
Younger Gable: Is that so? You deserve this title? Because as far as I know, normal human beings don't deserve the dirt they walk on; they'd be lucky for someone to throw them a bone. Now are who the hell are you?
My fist clenched as his words slide out his mouth like a snake. I watched him as he stepped up next to me. He place a hand on my should...Damn, it felt so real. Was it real? No, that's ridiculous. It had to be me going insane...It had to be, it had to be, it had to be...I closed my eyes as I let the words fall out of my mouth as if I had no control, almost as if I was the one being projected outward into the world.
John Gable: I am King Leukemia...
Younger Gable: C'mon, say it with some meaning! You have desensitized it to mean nothing with how many times you have said it. Make it into something that strikes a chord again. Give it weight so that it knocks the air out of someone when you shout it! Stop trying to make a trademark and say what you fucking mean!
John Gable: I am...
Suddenly, I felt his grip tighten on my shoulder which caused me to jump slightly. I listened as I heard him breathe...Inhale, exhale, inhale, exhale. If I reached out, could I feel his skin...my skin? I wanted to reach up and grab his arm but my hand dared not move. I couldn't explain it but it was almost as if I was paralyzed.
Younger Gable: Don't tell me...Tell them. Tell all of them who they should fear. Let them know that their chance for glory is over and that there is no such thing as redemption. Live and breathe your knowledge as if it were your last thought, feast upon your disdain as if it was all the protein and carbs you could ever need. You will learn to be self-efficient, you will learn to be alive once again and you will learn how to never forget your scars...
~~~~~(J.G.)~~~~~
It was a small dark room, almost like an interrogation room with the steel table and a single, dim light hanging overhead showing John Gable with shadows trailing down over his eyes and under his nose. He had his right hand resting on top of the cold metal while his left arm hung at his side. His fingers tapped one after the other...one, two, three, four, one, two, three, four...His breaths were shaking with rage as his gaze refused to be torn away from the camera.
John Gable: I have been wondering for a while now why I truly came back to WCF. I have said before that it was mainly for the paychecks and publicity and there have been times where I have said I am just waiting for my movie to take off but really I came back because I didn't want to get out of bed in the morning. The first week away and I turned into a sack of potatoes that couldn't be motivated if you literally lit a fire under my ass. I was the worst possible thing...uninspired. I came back to prove I didn't let that fire go out but after returning I haven't really felt the heat. I turned into my own worst fear...A complacent competitor who should have left well enough alone. I have complained about those who refused to get out of the way for people who actually have something new to offer but I didn't realize I became one of them. I stopped being Gable and started being a regular, pathetic, noise machine who just spat out sub-par points in the vain attempt to be 'right'.
He used his right hand to scratch under his chin in a sort of antsy-ness as if impatiently waiting to get to a certain point. He nervously chuckled a little as he quickly would glance down at his left arm.
John Gable: I forgot what it was like to feel defeated so I stopped worrying about what I was becoming because if I was winning this much then I must have been doing something right. But the honest answer is I was winning because I was doing everything wrong at the exact right time. I let people carry me when I should have been leading the charge and I let a title determine my worth. I shouldn't let the title make me a champion, I should be making the title a staple of this company. I should be bettering everything I touch instead of living off its hype. It's time to remember how it is to be destroyed. Trinity...
He slid his hand down his face and moved it over to behind his neck as he dropped his icy gaze down to the table.
John Gable: Honestly, I don't feel that name fits with there only being two of you and no, managers don't count...I think I am going to call you duplex from now on...Duplex, I honestly have nothing against you and I support your life-styles but neither of your are worthy to hold my Cinema title. You see, when I changed it from the TV title it wasn't just to make me feel at home or to trick myself that I was back in Hollywood. It was a promise I made to make sure I would do all that was in my power to be bigger and better than everyone else, to hold some integrity in this redneck past time. I believe movies are the most powerful force in entertainment and I wanted to set the bar for myself to make sure I didn't sink any longer.
Gable lifted his left arm and placed his hand on the table with the palm turned up. There were a good amount of acupuncture needles sticking out from above his wrist to the tips of his fingers.
John Gable: I have run a tangent from my job as an actor. My job is not pretending to be something I'm not. It is displaying the universal ideas of all people. How to lose a loved one, how to be enraged at betrayal and how to acknowledge the pain of being alive. Now, this doesn't hurt right now. I made sure of it myself that these needles were placed in with very proper care. Are they in the proper spots for the enjoyment of acupuncture? I have no idea but that is far from the point. Marina and Stacy, you both know how it is to be you and how tough that is on its own I am sure. We all make mistakes and we all suffer but you only know your brand of suffering. As an actor I have to deeply analyze and construct another person's agony every time I step out onto a stage or film set. I have played a homeless man who can't afford anything to eat so he has to choose between selling his dog or letting his stomach remain empty. I have played a soldier who had to take lives with an endless amount of regret. I have played schizophrenics who have to face that the world they know is a lie and that even though they see it and believe it, they can't trust anything. It is all fine and dandy to half ass it and go out there and pretend but that would be a mistake in itself in my opinion. I give these characters the full extent of my attention to understand them and why they hurt. I stay up late at night wondering about scenario after scenario thinking about how would it really effect me. I grew to understand their confusion and doubt like no other person could and it gave me something very important in return...a steady mind and a thick hide.
Gable chuckled nervously as he looked towards his needle covered hand.
John Gable: You see, once you understand a new sort of pain, no one can inflict it with any sort of surprise or effectiveness. You start to become numb to anything short of a massacre. Not because you actually hurt but just for the simple fact that you stop expecting better, you stop resisting the aches and instead lean into them, you stop caring about all the small bumps and scratches you get along the way and you start becoming stronger, smarter, rational and you start to understand everything that wants you dead. So, when you start to understand that, you want to take it to the limit.
Gable lifts his left hand and turns it down, hanging it over the table. He motioned downward with a count to three.
John Gable: one...two...THREE!!!
He reaches high and then slams his hand palm down onto the table causing a good chunk of the needles to snap and fly off while others pierced through to the other side. Gable quickly stood up grabbing his left hand and pacing behind the chair mumbling and grumbling with each step.
John Gable: God damn that hurt, haha!
He took a seat again and held his hand out to the camera. Blood was dripping down his palm and off his wrist. There were still needles visible in his hand that were pushed deep within. Gable continued to chuckle nervously as his breath quickened.
John Gable: Now I know it will take sometime to get these needles out and a few of them will have to come out in their own time but now no one could do this to me. No one can ever have the element of surprise of breaking, smashing or piercing this hand. I have become a better person because of it...Trini...Duplex, I respect you plenty but I hate you deeply. You are a threat against me and my work and as an artist I will defend my work to the very last breath. Marina already knows what I will do for this title and surely soon enough so will Stacy. I will devastate and destroy those who think they are God or in this case Goddesses among man. I will tear down Olympus to show that no one will ever live above those on the ground. I am the leveling, I am King fucking Leukemia and I will never forget and I will never forgive. As sure as my hand bleeds I will make you remember that no one makes it out alive. Nothing makes you special, nothing makes you better, you are still human and you are still capable of being broken. You Marina and Stacy as well as Chase Michaels, Mr. Beckman, and all of Pantheon will fall prey to the cancer that speaks and on your death bed, you will know forever until you close your eyes, the name John Gable, Cinema Champion, King of All Media.
Gable reached out and smacked the camera violently sending it to the ground and cutting off the rest of the video.
(fin)
