“Okay,” I said. “But the money still has to come up.” She nodded.
In traffic on my drive home on the 10 freeway, I heard from my agent that the rate had increased a decent amount with an added bonus for overtime. I hung up and rolled down the window, feeling the air from passing cars. I figured, What the hell. Who watches music videos anymore anyway?
The shoot for the video was at a large studio in Silver Lake, only a fifteen-minute drive from my loft. I arrived with an empty stomach, having made sure not to eat too much the night before because I knew I’d be naked—topless at the very minimum—on set the next day. I poured myself some coffee from the craft services table and looked around. Diane hadn’t lied. I was glad to see she had filled the set with women: the DP, the stylist, the props designer, and the makeup artist.
The two other models who were taking part arrived and sat in chairs next to me facing a long mirror: a striking, soft-spoken Black woman with a French accent who introduced herself as Jesse, and a blonde named Elle, who caught my eye in the mirror. A makeup artist’s assistant applied red lipstick to her mouth as she put up a hand to gesture hello.
“Do you feel comfortable?” the costume designer asked as I tried on various different white undergarments and plastic see-through tops and shorts. She explained that these looks were for the censored version of the video, which we would shoot at the same time as the unrated, naked one. I liked her immediately: she had bleached hair cut into a pixie and wore Doc Martens and was the kind of girl I’d want to be friends with but hardly ever met on jobs. Diane came to the makeup room to check in with me before we began. “Do you feel good?” she asked. I ran my hands over the white underwear and nodded. I felt like I was a part of the team.
I went to the set to shoot first, leaving Elle and Jesse in the hair and makeup area. A woman only a few years older than me, wearing a white jumpsuit, introduced herself as the props manager.
She pointed toward a long table filled with various objects that were to be used in the video. “What do you want to start with?” I picked out an oversized Styrofoam hand with red nails. She handed it to me proudly; she had made it herself.
“Do you know we have farm animals coming later?”
This wasn’t something I was used to: cool women around my age being enthusiastic about the job we were working on. My mood shifted. Maybe this day would be fun.
The song, which I had never heard before, began blaring across the giant soundstage. Three beats thudded in the air before a voice called out, “Everybody get up!” Olivia smiled at me from behind the camera. “Just have a good time, dance how you want!” Diane yelled through a megaphone from the dark beyond the brightly lit, pristinely white stage. I danced ridiculously, loosely, the way I would to entertain my girlfriends. I was surprised to find I was enjoying myself. Diane cracked up through her megaphone.
Robin Thicke arrived later. I was posing on all fours in underwear, a red toy car in the arch of my back. He kept his sunglasses on and waved to me and the crew, flashing a smile as he walked toward the makeup room.
Hours passed. Jesse and Elle joined me onstage along with Pharrell, Robin, and T.I. We all barely spoke, aside from some quick introductions made by Diane, the musicians giving us a nod. They were the talent, we were more like props. I wasn’t bothered; I was there to work. The animals showed up and I held a lamb in my lap, observing. Robin focused his attention on Pharrell and T.I., his teeth showing as he threw his head back in laughter, his eyes still covered by dark sunglasses. They smiled politely but did not return his animated enthusiasm.
Under the lights, our plastic shorts and tops fogged up with heat and sweat from our bodies. The smell of alcohol leaked from Robin’s body as he alternated between lip synching and actual singing. The song started up for what seemed like the millionth time that day—the same three beats filled the room in hard succession. Diane continued to yell directions through her megaphone. We stripped down to our flesh-colored thongs for the unrated version. Pharrell and Elle smirked flirtatiously at each other. I put on ludicrously tall white platform sneakers and danced in front of the rest of the cast.
“Let’s get these ladies a drink,” Robin said to one of his assistants, and within minutes someone brought us red plastic cups half filled with ice and alcohol. I took a few sips, but I’d never particularly liked vodka and I was too hot and worn out from shooting to drink any more. The song started up again.
“Hey, hey, hey!”
Jesse looked over at me and shook her head. “Too hot,” she mouthed, running a hand over her slicked-back hair. I continued to wiggle around the stage, trying to recapture the fun I’d been having entertaining Olivia and Diane. I rolled my eyes at the antics of the famous men we were working with.