James
Caan. Not even particularly very good, but you can’t say you don’t get a full
serving of Caan with extra Caan on the side every single time. Maybe that’s
because Caan brings the fire. When Caan talks about auditions, Caan says other
actors try to take food off Caan’s plate but he takes food off of theirs
instead. Caan shows up and delivers and that’s why he books, bro.
Caan
has one night stands at Burbank steakhouses and there’s nothing you can do
about it. He hooks up all the time. Caan forgets about these women tomorrow but
they talk about him for the rest of their lives. Caan can’t even walk down the
street in Orlando. They love him down there.
When
you work with Caan you understand why he’s been doing this for years and you
are nobody. When it’s time to shoot, Caan is the last person they bring to set
because really what else is there? The other day one of the extras straight
geeked out on Caan and he actually spoke to her. He said, “Where are you from?”
and she said, “Cleveland!” and Caan shook his head knowingly, looked off at the
clouds and said “Cleveland Ohio.” That extra was promptly fired. On the way to
lunch, the director said to Caan, “I’m really sorry she spoke to you Jimmy, but
you handled that perfectly you know,” but then get this, Caan opens the door to
his trailer and says to him, “Terry, just keep the animals in the zoo next time.”
Caan
will run up stairs. Caan will get his legs maimed by a lunatic. Caan will fall
in love. Caan will find the lens. “Welcome to show business,” Caan says. Caan
will play possum until the time is right. Caan makes out with hot ladies on
screen and when he does he really goes after it. Before the director calls
action he gently informs the actress, “Just so you know, I’m really going to go
for it,” and then the actress gets a facefull of Caan smashed into her own and while
he sweats under the hot lights both of their makeup merges with the others and
Caan sweats more and says, “Mmm, Mmm,” while he keeps both of his lips entirely
shut and breathes through his nostrils onto her face. When the director yells “Cut!”
the actress politely wipes her mouth off with her hand and Caan says, “So how
long have you been in LA?” and then has goes to have lunch alone in his
trailer. Caan gets different food than the other actors.
Caan
laughs insanely hard at his own jokes, startling people and taking hold of your
arm while it’s happening. Caan will make you feel like an idiot. Watching Caan’s
face navigate his rich inner world of emotions on screen is a sensation matched
only by his explosiveness. Caan makes only the most obvious choices but he does
so at full Caan velocity. Caan cries. Caan begs, commands and condemns. He does
them because he knows you don’t know how so he will show you. The last
Christmas Caan spent with a girlfriend’s family, he showed up in an evergreen
turtleneck and merlot colored blazer. He told them all stories about “Francis.”
When Caan and his girlfriend went home, her Dad tried to say something but her
Mom interrupted him by saying, “Just give me a minute to come back to planet
Earth here.”
When
Caan is at the urinal he farts long and hard and it reverberates off all the
tile and porcelain and if you start laughing Caan hits you with a look that
obliterates you and grinds you into dust. In Burbank, if a waiter asks Caan
what he’ll be having he answers “The brisket, champ” like it was the dumbest
shit anybody’s ever asked. Caan’s knuckles are covered in hair and bejeweled
with diamonds and gold. Caan once made love to a girl in Thailand and afterwards
wore thongs for a month but now all of his boxers are white. Caan once told
Will Ferrell, “Kid, in this business, you’re either in Heaven, Hell or Pasadena.”
Ferrell and his friends still laugh about it all the time, but meanwhile Caan
is getting fucking paid, okay?
With
the growth in popularity of “Star Trek,” Caan’s already heard all your gay
jokes about “The Wrath of Caan,” and they straight blow, dude. Maybe you can
grow up though? At the afterparty for
“Misery,”
Kathy Bates put her mouth right next to Caan’s ear and whispered, “Do you know
what you do to me, Jimmy?” Caan smiled and never spoke to her again. Caan gets
emails for dick pills and looks at them sometimes.
When
Caan dreams, sometimes it’s of a day when he was seven and his Dad took him to
Yankee Stadium. The sun was hiding behind the clouds but it didn’t rain. Caan
almost caught a foul ball but it bounced off the concrete over his head and
into the hands of a fat Armenian man who’d been drinking. Caan stared at him
awhile before his Dad told him there’d be plenty of other chances. The Yanks
lost 7 to 3 but Caan talked about the game forever until his friends told him
to just shut up about it already.
Caan’s
got the top down right now and boy, didn’t this town used to be something?
Ben Seeder is a special contributor to Total Bozo
