March 24, 2010

This week i only worked one day - because the jerry show was dark for a few days. On tuesday I was there for studio day. I've come to really enjoy everyone that i work with.. and i'm really excited to be in a TV studio in general. I LOVE telling people i work for Jerry Springer/Steve Wilkos show. I think i may intern again over the summer (not for school credit, just because i love it here). People recognize me by name and a lot of people say I do a great job. I very often go on coffee runs for Rachelle Wilkos (with her credit card) who is the executive producer of both shows (and Steve's wife) to starbucks - the same order every time - caramel apple ciders (no whip cream). I also went on a strange errand to go get phone chargers....... but hey, whatever I gotta do, I gotta do. I'm a little sad that I dont think I would want to work here - I dont know if i'd be able to refuse a job offer from THE JERRY SPRINGER SHOW, hellO! but i may have to, its a super super super brutal job...

Week one billion

So this week was pretty typical. it sort of tires me out to write the same exact thigns every single week - I pretty much did everything I was told, and went on of course massive amounts of errands and met lots of 'different' people.. including a stripper from alabama with a goiter in her neck the size of a football.. and she showed me all of her stripping outfits.. other than that.. typical sunday and tuesday. I'm looking into possbily seeing one of the shows on a day off, i'd get the VIP treatment and would get to skip the line. My schedule is so busy though, with interning and my job (babysitting) and school work and my senior project .. i'm not sure i'll get a day off any time soon. Spring break is soon though (woohoo!)

week 5

Boring sunday again! i'm wondering if my first day on the job was the best it's going to get - i never get to go out to eat with guests anymore! One of the things they had me to (for about 5 hours) was booking .. which is getting people to do the show. They had a last minute cancellation story and needed someone to fly out to CT THAT NIGHT, so I was acting PA for the day. I basically did what the PA's do all day every day when they don't have guests, and let me say that it sucks! I had a gigantic book of voicemails that random viewers of the show left (if you've ever seen the show, you know that they spit phone numbers at you to call and leave messages). My job was to call all of the highlighted numbers (they were highlighted according to the producer i was with), and find someone to do the show. I had to basically call strangers that called the show one day and left a goofy comment, and try to get them to want to be on the show. I had to DIG into stranger's lives to see if there was an interesting story to be broadcast on national TV. Many people hung up on me, and even more people asked me if it was a prank. Honestly I thought it was hilarious, because I used to call the Jerry Springer show as a kid and leave prank messages on the voicemail. What SUCKED is that i had the voicemail list from A YEAR AGO.. meaning these people had called to leave a random comment a year or more ago, and I had to harass them to be on TV.. damn this business is harsh!

Tuesday was typical. I had to steam some shirts for the first time, and had a good time trying to figure out the steam machine for a while.....not.

I had to go to starbucks to get coffees for the executive producer (who happens to be steve wilkos's wife), and I came back with the coffees on time.. but apparently the coffee that leaked on the lid was unacceptable - no one said anything to me, but they hastily wiped away the excess coffee that had leaked on the lid on the trek back to the studio before they gave it to her.. damn! was she really going to be that mad..?

Sometimes when there's no work to do at the studio (rare), we can sit in the production office and watch the live feed of the show that's being taped.. it's pretty cool to see the clothes i put guests in on television.

Week 4

This week at the zoo jerry springer show was a little slow at first. Every sunday I usually have been working with a certain team.. and i'm finding out that i'll be with a different team each week (a team consisting of one producer, an associative producer, and one or two producer's assistant [usually just one], and then either one or two interns.) Today my team was actually pretty boring - i stuffed envelopes at the office for a few hours.. and then went on some mundane errands (going to mcdonalds, getting t-shirts at the studio, fetching coffee and food, etc...) After the catered dinner at the office, my producer assistant pretty much let me go early - they didn't have any guests flying in any time soon to do the show. Each team is responsible for booking shows, and if they don't book guests then there is less work for me. The entire office (all teams for jerry & steve) is there all day long - and a friend i met there told me that they pretty much work all day, every day (yikes!)

Tuesday I was sent out shopping - and im getting much better at navigating through Stamford. Almost all of the places we need to go are within a 5 blocks radius .. the studio being just down the street from the office. Again, i had to fetch t-shirts at the studio. The place where i get them from is in a dark dark balcony above the set -it's pitch black and i have to search through cardboard boxes for black t-shirts, and I need to be able to distinguish size.. ugh.. I also do the usual billion errand run, as well as the usual putting guests in wardrobe, cleaning the greenrooms and putting the guests's things away. I'm getting used to the teams I've been working with for the steve show - and some of the PA's are pretty cool. I met a lot of people who commute from my hometown in Garden City, long island - an hour from stamford! I saw steve throw a shit-fit backstage also, haha.

Week 3

Sunday I had to run errands like the last week i worked, picking up food, coffee, and people. I had to hangout with some guests for Jerry Springer and take them to Buffalo Wild Wings. Because it's my job to "chaperone" guests so to speak, I can't leave their side - whatever or wherever they want to go (among selected choices), I have to take them.. including following them around Stamford as they took a walk. It took me a while to figure out that the two girls that I was with were trying to find someone on the streets to sell them weed.. and I told this to my PA (producers assistant), and she pretty much says that happens sometimes (of course it does, this is the jerry springer show). I spent pretty much the majority of the day with this group of girls - one of them grew so attached to me, she was sad when we parted. The guests are like, "so I'm never going to see you ever again??" it's funny, I guess I did spend the day with them and I'm part of the "experience" of coming to CT as an all expense paid trip to be on a TV show.. it's pretty cool representing NBC. I found out today that some of the interns drive an hour to work here (for free).. and we all have to pay for parking (about $5 a day).. i'm grateful at least i'm working for free from a shorter distance, and for school credit..!

Tuesday was hectic, i met a few other interns at the beginning of the shift - but i've realized that i am the only intern on tuesdays past 8 pm (i'm there til 10), and I get stuck with the residual work that the lazy jerry springer interns leave behind (on tuesdays i help with the steve wilkos show, which is filmed at night - jerry is filmed in the morning).. many times this means cleaning the green rooms of all the clothes from the ENTIRE day, and being the only intern to clean the green rooms at the end of the night.. but everybody is so nice, and I think that being the only intern makes me look good to my supervisor :)

OH and the minute i walk into work JERRY SPRINGER walks past me and a bunch of people and says, "goodbye"! haha!

and later that night.. I saw steve getting out of his dressing room haha

week 2

So this week the jerry springer/steve wilkos show is 'dark', which means they don't film - I asked one of the driving PA's why this is - and he said it's because most of the producers work 80 hour weeks and every once in a while they have time off - works for me!

I'm not worried about making my hours though- i only need 10 hours a week as part of my requirement, and I'll be working 15-16 hours every week for this show.

February 9, 2010

Today was my first studio day. Today was SO hectic!! I got there at 3pm, and as soon as I got there someone was coming up to me asking me if I had a minute to do something for them. I have a shiny NBC sticker that says INTERN, so I guess I might as well paint a gigantic target on my back. EVERYONE was like hey do you have a minute?!?.. but it was exciting though. Everyone there is so nice, and even if they don't know who you are they all say 'hey how are you!? Security guards stand backstage before the shows, and there are producers, associative producers, producers assistants, interns, and stage crew running amok everywhere. As soon as I got there, i had to put things in "lock-up".. which means we put their belongings away in a safe place. Also, the guests are required to stay in their green rooms, so we occasionally have to "babysit" them as they go for a smoke or to a bathroom break. Sometimes, it's all about keeping the story intact. So then right after I did lock up, i had to "pull" wardrobe.. which means they give me sizes, and I have to find good outfits for the certain guests to wear on the show. Oh and BY THE WAY there are about a billion rules to abide by for show days, pertaining to wardrobe and conduct in general. I CANNOT say guest's name out loud in the halls between green rooms, because sometimes we have secret guests! We call them by what green room they're in. For example, Monica is in Green Room 1, so we say, "hey can i bring the girl in g1 out for a smoke?" because guests cannot ever run into each other while backstage at the studio. And for wardrobe of the guests there are certain things we cannot put them in, like no white shirts, no stripes, no crazy patterns, spanks under ALL dresses and skirts, no jewelry for jerry springer show, heavy women MUST cover up their upper arms, boys must wear nice shoes/slack and look presentable, and girls must also look relatively dressed up with hair and make up also done. Picking wardrobe is nerve wracking! there's no one really telling you what to do, so I'm walking blindly into the wardrobe to pick out what I think is a good outfit. Luckily, one of the staff members that is in charge of wardrobe gave me a quick run-through of what I should know about wardrobe. I pulled outfits, and i was successful in the end - the guests liked what i put them in and the producers approved (which is the most important thing).

After running mundane errands like walking to get coffee/food or driving in a taxi or company car with a travel PA to go pick up guests, some sort of producer person (not entirely sure of his job title)walked up to me in the studio, handed me a company "petty cash" credit card and said "hey, you look like you know how to dress. I need wardrobe for my guest, she's super skinny but I want you to make her look HOT but young, but relatively tame. I want her to look like she jumps off of a magazine cover. Go to the mall, call me when you're done, we need it soon. Brian will drive you, he's outside right now." UMM, OKAY! I was pretty afraid but it ended up being fun. I spent the next hour or so in my favorite clothing store Forever 21 picking up any cute outfits I saw for wardrobe for this girl (with all of the wardrobe rules in mind). After all of the time contemplating the requirements with the cute and workable factor, I headed to the cash register. And then they told me they couldn't sell me any of the stuff because I didn't have a photo ID for the credit card i was using!!! Well, Obviously it's a company card it says Jerry Springer right on the damn card! and I thought my intern sticker would help, but nope. They refused, and I panicked and called the producer who had sent me out on this mission. I told him what happened, and he said "well then screw it and run to macys and get other stuff. But hurry we need it very soon like 10 minutes, call us when you're done kbye." I wanted to cry! Are you serious? I have like 10 minutes to do an hour's worth of work and macy's is 5 minutes away!! I ran to macys and threw some semi good looking things together from the tiny junior's section at macys. The saleslady here heard my story as I was on the phone getting ride back and definitely didn't refuse my sale! I ran out of there and into the cab as fast as i could with nearly $200 worth of girls clothes from macy's, and in the end the producers LOVED what I had bought, and we ended up saving the rest for the permanent wardrobe. Whew! For the rest of the night, I cleaned the green rooms and cleaned up wardobe. All in all, it was a very successful and tiring day. I think the key is not getting overwhelmed and focusing on the task at hand instead of freaking out. I will work every tuesday at the studio from 3-10 from now on, and it is definitely exhausting but yet very rewarding work.