Scott Raab's
profile of Robert Downey Jr. in
Esquire is yet another entry in the you've-got-to-be-crazy-to-be-a-genius-genre, which, as I've said,
freaks me out a little. But it's also just gorgeously written. The lede in particular captures something that I find fascinating about Los Angeles and the movie industry, and that I also feel like I'll never be able to have access to or truly understand:
The back-deck view from the A-List is quiet and spectacular. That's the monstrous ivory Getty Center standing mid ground, and through the haze across the San Fernando Valley, the mountains. There's a woman taking a gentle dip in a pool beyond the far side of the deck, her head bobbing in silent profile.
Here the root beer is microbrewed; all proceeds go to help shelter dogs. The water, an advanced hydration beverage patented for high levels of stabilized dissolved oxygen, is A-list, too. Luncheon — sliced steak and salmon fillet — is being prepped by the chef, Louise, whose shortcake-and-cream dessert will be gluten-free.
Is this heaven, or Pacific Palisades?
I am not making fun. I want to stay here, live here, curl up on the bench and snooze the afternoon away. The root beer is frosty and delicious. The woman in the pool is standing now, shoulder-deep, her back turned, talking on the phone; too soft to hear, her voice floats on the late-summer breeze, hidden by birdsong. Sun-kissed, my tape recorder shines, waiting for our host.
Our host is in a meeting, in the house; the A-list means the meetings come to you. A few moments more and time will jerk forward again, this blissful silence will flee in holy terror, and Robert Downey Jr. will come, calling me the name that only he has ever called me — dude — and I will tell him how happy I am to see him and to see how far he has come since I saw him last.