Pamela Anderson - Star Struck

The little group just outside silently regarded the door straining at its hinges.

“You think it’s gonna blow?” Theresa asked mischievously.

“Should we do something?” Missy wondered aloud, unable to look away. “I mean, do you think they’re all right?”

“Are you kidding?” Billy laughed.

“I wouldn’t mind doing that,” Skip snorted.

“I wouldn’t mind it if you could do that,” Billy said, laughing harder.

“I wonder if we can get the trailer next,” JC said, grinning, taking Theresa’s hand.

“Is everything okay?” Steph inquired, approaching the trailer warily.

“Oh, God!” Star’s scream rang out from inside the trailer, accompanied by their violent pounding against the door.

“Should we do something?”

“You got a cigarette they can bum afterwards?” Skip asked with a knowing smile.

“Fuck yeah,” Jimi shouted, loud enough to be heard back inside the soundstage. “Baby, baby… all… fuck!”

“Oh,” Steph said. “I heard there was trouble. When do you think they’ll be done?”

“That sounded like the end to me,” Billy said, trying not to laugh.

“Well, I mean…,” Steph began.

“Come on, JC,” Jimi said, emerging from the trailer. “Let’s go get some supplies for tonight.” He stumbled out of the trailer, smiling at everyone, climbed into his Testarossa, lit a cigarette, and left.

“Shit,” Star said, walking out the door of the trailer. “I’ll need an hour-and-a-half shower.”

“Got it,” Steph said, departing.

It was so simple.

Star had a new secret weapon. Well, it wasn’t that new, but she had a new strategy for using it.

The real challenge became keeping Jimi happy and her hair, makeup, and costumes intact for the next scene. Star joked she was going to write a book of “safe” sex tips—positions to maximize pleasure while preserving hair and makeup. It was a strange peace and there were still delays, to keep the production consistently and very publicly a week behind schedule. But it kept everyone happy at least, but wary of the next delay as the production moved forward.

And so it was, with everyone lulled into a false sense of security, that the fateful day arrived.

Star was really thin and exhausted and kept going fueled on adrenaline and coffee. Jimi was there at her side all the time, but that only meant their sex life was vigorous and more active. Star didn’t mind so much, except that she was trying to make a movie.

The day that everything changed was a particularly physically challenging one for Star. She was doing most of her stunt work. The day’s stunt was one that might well have been given over to the professionals. It was a judgment call, but whatever the verdict, it was the most strenuous stunt work Star had done to that point on the shoot.

The shot called for Star, captured by the movie’s villains, to be hung upside down and hoisted several stories into the air to participate in a fistfight with men on an elevated catwalk.

“And wearing a rubber bodice, high heels, and enough hair spray to hold up a Dolly Parton tour,” Skip said, shaking his head in disapproval as he helped her get ready. “It’s too much. Your stunt people should be doing this.”

“It ain’t fittin’. It just ain’t fittin’,” Billy said in his best Hattie McDaniel.

“Fiddle-dee-dee,” Star said, sawing the air with an imaginary fan.

“It ain’t fittin’.”

“Star, you okay to do this, babe?” Jimi asked, distracted. “I’m good if you’re good, but if not…”

“No, I’m fine,” Star said, pleased by his show of interest, but not wanting to risk shutting down the production. “It’ll be fine.”

“Okay, then,” Jimi said, edging toward the door. “It’s just, well, JC and I need to go get some cigarettes.”

“You boys run on,” she said, knowing that his absence would speed up what was already promising to be a long day.

“Cool,” he said, leaning in and smearing her makeup with a substantive good-bye kiss. “Sorry Billy,” he added sheepishly when he saw what he’d done.

“Well, that move’s not going in the book,” Billy snorted, only slightly amused.

Heading out the door, Jimi closed it behind him.

All anyone knew that day was that Jimi had left the set and Star was ready on time and the shoot began on schedule. Skip hid his eyes as Star was strapped onto the steel beam and hoisted high above the studio floor. Once she achieved the desired height, a trapeze swing was lowered from the ceiling so that Star could sit upright between setups until they needed her. It was somewhat more comfortable, but not a lot, and it required Star to swing backward, grab the ropes, and hoist herself onto the bar, where she sat with her legs more or less straight in front of her, still lashed to the I beam for the sequence.

It was hideous.

And it was the only comfort available to her in a long, long day of shooting. She’d slip off the swing, they’d get a couple of shots of her fighting, swinging, and hanging upside down as she met the enemy on the steel catwalk across from her. Then she’d perch on the steel bar of the trapeze swing and sip lukewarm coffee through a straw. And then they’d film a bit more.

Finally, she was finding a use for the gymnastics training she’d had from the time she was nine years old.

It was getting done, but it was difficult and exhausting.

They had been at it for several hours when, in the middle of one of the fight sequences, Star began screaming and writhing, taking out two of her opponents and almost knocking a third off the catwalk.

There was a moment of uncertainty. It was a fight sequence and it seemed that Star might either be out of control or trying to dial up the action.

Skip’s lips disappeared and his mouth became a line between his nose and his jaw as he watched the action and tried to keep quiet. Billy squeezed his hand.

“Cut,” the director called. It had looked great and he was glad they’d gotten it, but it wasn’t on the storyboards, so he wasn’t even sure they could use it. “That was amazing, Star, but save your energy. Let’s try it again, from one, and just the movements we’ve discussed.”

Star hung limply from the I beam.

“Star?” the director called through the bullhorn he was using to direct the sequence. “You ready?”

No response.

“I think she’s out,” one of the players called down from the catwalk.

“Oh, God,” Skip said, leaping to his feet. “Get her down from there now.”

The crew, uncertain, were slow to react, as Skip, not the director, had issued the directive.

“Cut her down, cut her down, cut her fucking down,” Skip began screaming, near hysteria when no one responded to his earlier plea.

Billy rushed out to her and caught her in his arms as she was lowered from the ceiling. The grips began untying the lashings that held her ankles to the I beam, but Skip grabbed a box cutter and slashed through the bindings and safety straps.

Once she was freed, Billy and others carried her to the trailer, where they laid her out on the sofa.

Missy rubbed Star’s wrists with ice as Billy checked her head for blood.

A number of the crew and some of the cast gathered outside Star’s trailer door to find out what was going on. Theresa tried to reach Jimi. As it was, she only got both his and JC’s voice mail.

Initially, it was thought that Star had hit her head on the railing and knocked herself out, but there was no bump or blood or other obvious sign. Star moaned as she slipped marginally into consciousness. “Mom?” she groaned. “I didn’t start it, I swear.”

Slowly, Missy began to unlace the rubber bodice, and Star sat up, screamed out in pain, and passed out again.