Grace After Midnight_ A Memoir - Felicia Pearson [48]
But by showing my reality, these motherfuckers are changing my reality.
The shit’s confusing.
By showing who I really am, they’re changing who I really am.
I’m seeing that light again.
I’m feeling that love.
I’m thinking about closing down my shops. I’m thinking about not hitting the block anymore.
If I keep hitting the block, I’ll fuck up this acting business. I’ll fuck up everything. Getting other niggas killed or locked up. I’ll get sent back to jail or I’ll be killed.
Ain’t no way around it.
The only way to leave my fucked-up reality is to throw myself into the pretend version of my fucked-up reality.
If I move toward the light—the light of the cameras, the light of the beautiful people who are running The Wire and acting on The Wire—then I escape the darkness.
The Wire is throwing light on that darkness.
That’s what the show’s about.
That’s what I’m about.
My new life.
My new direction.
New light.
New hope.
New everything.
NEW SNOOP
New Snoop—the Snoop that’s finally closed down her shops—is trying to make sense of this scene about a nail gun.
But the scene don’t make sense and New Snoop’s feeling stupid.
That’s how it went in the beginning. I’d get some scripts that didn’t make sense to me. I had trouble with the script supervisor, the gal who helps you with your lines. She was getting on my nerves and it took me a while to get used to her. Fact is, I never forgot my lines. I memorized them cold and never missed a beat.
I was still a little uneasy, though. Other than down at the courthouse, I’d never been around so many white people. It was a new experience. I didn’t know what half of them did. I didn’t understand how film works. I was nervous.
The thing about me, though—the thing I learned from the streets—is not to show it. Keep my cool. Make it seem like I got my shit together.
That’s what Snoop the Character is all about. And that’s what Snoop the Actor has to be about too.
So I followed the directions I was given. I bonded with a couple of the actors. Michael K. Williams plays Omar. He’s the one who got me through the door. Jamie Hector plays Marlo, the gangsta who hires me to kill niggas. Sometimes Omar, Hector, and I would hang out after the show. Sometimes they’d give me little pieces of advice about how to read and interpret a script.
The directors were cool. If I thought a line didn’t flow right or read real, they let me change it up. If I said, “This ain’t something Snoop would say,” they’d say, “Well, how would she say it?” I’d say it my way, and my way almost always won out.
There’s a character on The Wire called Proposition Joe. His real-life name is Robert Chew, and he’s also a drama teacher. During the shoots, the producer suggested that some of the younger actors, including me, go to Robert for a few tips. He’s a beautiful man who talks about emotions and instincts and relaxing in front of the camera until you’re in the moment of the action. He talks about acting with your heart. My heart was open to Robert because I wanted to learn.
My heart was beating fast that day I read the nail gun scene. I didn’t get it. I called in Ed Burns, one of the writers, and told him plain, “I got no fuckin’ clue what’s happening here.”
He explained that Snoop had been sent on a job to find the best nail gun out there. “You ever been in a hardware store?” he asked me.
“Sure,” I said. “When Pop was alive, I went all the time. Him and me lived in hardware stores.”
“Well, that’s all it is. You’re walking through the door, inspecting all the merchandise. You come up to the clerk and ask his advice. He sells you on the biggest nail gun in the store. You’re happy. You buy it for cash and tip him extravagantly. You’ve scored.”
“So it’s kinda like I’m going on an errand for Pop,” I said.
“Exactly. This is a big scene because the nail gun you buy will board up deserted houses filled with the bodies of people you’ve killed. It might sound like a routine errand, but it’s not. It’s sinister, but you play it matter-of-factly.”
Next morning I was ready to be sinister. When