My Life as a Weatherman
Part 2
by Mark Evanier
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED 1/28/00
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Last week in this locale, you heard how my roof had started to leak like a Ken Starr grand jury, leading to me becoming fascinated and/or obsessed with the art of weather forecasting. Note that I said "art," not "science." This, in turn, led to me making friends with a local TV weatherman — I'm calling him Hi Pressure in this article — and that led to me being invited to audition for the weekend weatherperson job on his station.
That's where we left off. Let's resume — and, by the way, we're issuing first stage smog alert and a third-stage warning for widespread amateurism…
One trick to being a TV weatherman is functioning in Chromakey. The fancy maps and satellite photos that most of them point to are not actually wall-sized; they are computer-generated graphics. If your local weatherperson is stepping in front of them and pointing out lows, he is probably added electronically to the picture; that is, he stands before a blue (or green) wall and gestures to the corresponding locale on the backdrop.
Chromakey — or some brand-name version like Ultimatte — enables the Technical Director to drop out the blue (or green) and to superimpose everything else in the shot — i.e., the weatherman — over another picture. Thus, his image is superimposed over the computer-created map image and it looks like he's standing in front of it — casting a shadow on it, even. When he points to a certain spot on the blue (or green) drop, it looks like he's pointing to a certain spot on the map.
There are, though, problems. First off, since the blue (or green) is extracted from the video image of the weatherman, he can't wear that color, whichever it is, on his person or he will appear transparent. Secondly, he has to keep his eye on a monitor to see the weather map at which he is supposedly gesturing. But that monitor isn't like a mirror: The image is not reversed. Left is left and right is right and nearly everyone who has ever tried it has, from a lifetime of looking in mirrors, gotten it all backwards at first.
Then there is the problem of time: All TV is based on the selling of time. It is television's most precious commodity. A TV newscast must be tight and it must be on time. You're on live and if you squander thirty seconds, that could be a whole 'nother news item that doesn't get told.
For my audition, I was advised that I would be expected to do fifteen seconds of friendly banter/segue with a newsperson, then a two-minute weathercast to also include a plug for some local and worthy charity event, then fifteen more seconds of conversation with the news anchor in which he or she would ask me some question about the forecast on which I would quickly elaborate. (On most newscasts, "the question" is planted; we'd agree in advance what I'd be asked in supposed spontaneity. But since such conversation is sometimes unplanned and interjected to fill gaps, the question for my test would not be prearranged.)
My mentor's main advice was to make the two-minute weather section two minutes exactly, on the dot. He knew I didn't really want the job but he said that if I did, a sensational way to not get it would be to run, say, two minutes and six seconds. Since I had decided to play by the rules, I took that under careful advisement.
Hi worked with me a bit but the best thing he did for me was to set me up with a gent at the National Weather Service who would be on duty for me to phone just before my audition. This was one of the men who calculated the actual forecast and who probably knew more about weather than I could learn spending the rest of my life in intense cramming. Only later did I realize that this was no real advantage, since accuracy of prediction carried absolutely no weight in this contest.
I trained for a day or two at home. I then had a six-foot projection TV and, on it, I freeze-framed (froze-frame?) a real weather map on it, then I pointed my home video camera at this and at me, then fed its signal to a smaller set. I would watch the smaller set and work on gesturing to the map, standing there in my little suit and tie, feeling for all the world like the Son of Bozo.
Makeshift cue cards were propped on chairs to either side of the camera. Since I hadn't the foggiest notion as to how good or bad I was, I concentrated just on bringing it in at two minutes without sounding like a tobacco auctioneer. That was the toughest part of it, by far.
Then I had to decide what to wear. The station did their Chromakey in green so I selected my double-breasted blue blazer, a pale blue shirt, a red tie and tan slacks. I selected these mainly because they were my only sport coat, my only dress shirt, my only tie and my only dress slacks. To the umpteen reasons I already had to not take the job, I could add having to buy more ties and learn to tie them. The red one was a clip-on.
The night before the audition, I allowed myself the luxury of fantasizing about being brilliant, getting the job and going on from weathermanning, as did Pat Sajak and David Letterman — to name two — to Bigger Things. No matter how I put the vision together in my head, I didn't look too happy and I sure didn't feel like I belonged.
Which is pretty much how I felt, the next day at the studio. The whole thing happened so quickly that my main memory of the day is of worrying that someone would notice that my tie clipped-on.
At 11 AM, still at home, I phoned up the contact at the Weather Bureau and got all the pertinent data for a very boring day, weather-wise. At 1:00, sitting in my blazer and clip-on, I was in a room with five other applicants, every one of whom looked like they belonged on a TV newscast and every one of whom, I think, could routinely be found on one. One fellow had flown in from Colorado for this. None of them seemed to be from the comedy club circuit.
We drew cards to see who would go in what order. I won, whereupon Colorado asked if I would swap with him since he had to catch a plane to do the 6:00 news back home. I said that was fine with me — anything to stay my own execution — and sat back to wait. We were not allowed to see the other auditioners auditioning.
A little after 2:30, I was ushered into the studio where one of the local newsmen was playing the part of "anchor." I was given a few minutes to play in the Chromakey and to read my notes, which had been transferred to one of the station TelePrompters. Then I was on.
The newsman did the last few lines of a story about the demolition of a Hollywood landmark, then turned to me and mispronounced Evanier handily. I reached into the vast storehouse of Trivia that I pass off as a brain and added a few quick facts about the Walk of Fame, then stepped gingerly into two minutes of explaining that tomorrow would be exactly the same as today and that the day after would probably be exactly the same, too.
It would probably make for a funnier article here if I could report that I stunk, and I would have no qualms about admitting it. Amazingly, I didn't stink, which is not to say I had any flair for this line of work. The very first time in my life I went bowling, I got a strike: Beginner's Luck. I then proceeded to lob gutter balls the rest of my life, toppling pins only if they were in adjoining alleys, soon to give up bowling forever.
Even as I was delivering the five-day forecast, I sensed that whatever competence I was displaying was more Beginner's Luck. I knew I'd never again appear before a TV camera with as much aplomb and I am, to date, correct.
Following a pitch for a mythical bake sale out in La Habra, I finished precisely as the Stage Manager signaled the end of the two minutes. The newsman turned to me and said he was off for a week of R-and-R in Washington, D.C. "So how will the weather be back there?"
I had no idea but, hey, this wasn't being broadcast. I explained that there was a major cold snap engulfing our nation's capital. "In fact, there are even Congressmen with their hands in their own pockets." The crew tittered and the Director, over the loudspeaker, could be heard to say, "…and out. Very nice, Mark. Very professional. You want to do another one?"
It hadn't dawned on me I would get two shots at it. I shrugged and said, "I'm sorry but that's as good as I get."
The Director thanked me and I tried to hurry from the set. And I would have made it, too, had not the microphone still been clipped to my clip-on tie and jerked me back. As the Stage Manager freed me, he said, "The guy before you did eight takes."
He was probably complimenting me on my guts. Actually, I just had a tremendous need to get out of there. I went into the Men's Room, put on my street clothes, wiped off some make-up they'd slapped on me and left. Quickly.
I still can't explain fully, my feelings of that afternoon. I know I sure felt like I was doing something I shouldn't be doing; that even though none of my anticipated disasters had occurred, that "I shouldn't be here" feeling was unmistakable from the moment I walked in until I was back in my jeans.
The closest I can come to describing the feeling is this: In the last few years, we've had a flurry of "body-change" movies in which, through some strained machination, a nine-year-old boy winds up in the carcass of an adult, passing for one.
In every one of those movies, there's a scene in which the kid is in a serious business meeting with all these adults in suits and real ties, adults who belong in the meeting, know what they're doing. And the kid is fumbling about, acting like he belongs, hoping no one will get hip to the fact that though he looks grown-up, he's really nine years old.
That's how I felt: I was afraid they'd figure out I was nine.
I went home, called Hi Pressure and thanked him for arranging things. I told him I hoped I hadn't embarrassed him, and then forgot forever about my career as a TV weatherman.
Three days later, my writing agent called me in a state of utter bewilderment: Stu had just gotten a call from someone who wanted to discuss my becoming the weekend weatherman on the local news.
I hadn't told him a thing about it. I hadn't told anyone about it. My closest friends will find out if and when they read this. "I told them they had the wrong guy," my agent continued. "They insist you're their pick." I was starting to tell him the story when a Call Waiting beep interrupted us, I put him on hold and discovered the News Director of the station calling me on the other line.
"I just wanted to welcome you to our little family here," he said. "I was very impressed with your audition."
I started to tell him I didn't think I wanted the post but I couldn't figure how. He said, "After your guy gets your deal straight, give me a jingle. We'll work out when you start and we'll grab a bite and discuss how to goose the broadcast a bit."
I stammered out my thanks and returned to my agent waiting on hold, fascinated to hear how I'd gotten myself into this fine mess. I told him the whole story and, at its close, he asked me the question I had never expected: "Do you want the job?"
"No," I answered. I guess I wanted to know I could do it if I wanted to."
"Well, at least now you know," he said.
"Not really. I still think that if they put me on the air, I'd start making Shemp Howard noises and just stammer for two minutes exactly. Listen, would you call them and tell them…something? Anything?"
"You have any suggestions?"
I said, "Tell them a pilot I wrote just got picked up. Tell them I'm sorry I wasted their time and tape but I'm obligated to the other project."
I could hear my agent shaking his head. "Okay. If you're sure this is how you want it."
"I'm sure."
"You want to think about this for a day or two? I can put them off, not return their calls. I don't want you to call me next week and say you wished you'd taken it."
"I won't," I said. And I didn't. Nor have I had any such wishes since.
I phoned Hi Pressure. He didn't understand why I was turning down the job but he did accept that I was serious and didn't try to talk me into it. Two weeks later, he called to tell me that no one had gotten the post yet; that they had sent the talent scout back to make the rounds of the nightclubs again. Eventually, they found someone who was good at the job and, more important, wanted it.
That's really the end of the story except to say that my writing career has since paid for a real, non-porous roof and for repairs on all the destruction wrought by its predecessor. The new roof doesn't leak at all and that's a good thing…
…because, though Hi said it wasn't going to rain tonight and the weathermen on the other channels all said no rain, and the National Weather Service said no rain, and the services I can access by computer all said no rain, since I started writing this, clouds have rolled in from the Northwest. And darned if it isn't pouring outside my window.
And get this: For the first time in a long while, since the first roof began playing Water-Pik, I'm not unhappy it's raining. Actually, I'm just delighted that I don't have to drive home from a studio in it and then go in tomorrow and explain to all of Los Angeles why I said it would be partly cloudy with low humidity.