Naturally Tan Read online

  He said the next step was to turn my Skype call into a three-minute video to share with the creators of the show and that if they liked me, I would be hearing from them directly. I did not think there was any chance I would possibly get picked for this job. I used to be so uncomfortable on camera, and I thought, There’s no way these people will want to see what I’ll do in a situation where cameras are around.

  But then, a couple of days later, I heard from the creators, who wanted to schedule another call that day. Since it seemed like a long shot, I was feeling real calm and real sassy (that’s my resting state), and I said whatever I wanted. Near the beginning of the call, I called one of them a cheeky bastard. He was like, “Did you really just call me a bastard?” to which I said, “Well, if you’re being a bastard, I sure won’t hesitate to call you that.” They laughed and looked at each other like, “Well, we appreciate the honesty.”

  I’m not very often intimidated by people. In this case, I looked at the creators and thought, You’ve got a job, I’ve got a job. You’re successful, I’m successful. Why should I feel intimidated? If this goes nowhere, I’m happy with my lot in life. When we got to the end of the call, they thought they had hung up, but there was a three-second delay. Before the line officially cut off, I heard the show’s creator say, “Holy fuck!” and he jumped out of his chair. I thought, I may have done all right.

  Later on that day, I got a call from the casting guy, who told me, “You’re the one! I knew it. We’re pushing forward.” He said the final stage was a three-day audition in Los Angeles, where I would meet forty-something other men all vying for a place in the cast.

  I was still adamant this was not my job. In my heart of hearts, I didn’t think this would work out. I didn’t think they really liked me for the job—I thought they were just being kind and wanted to make sure it seemed like they were diversifying with a token brown immigrant. So again, I told them I couldn’t do it. I said I couldn’t take three days out of my life. After all, I was in the process of selling my final business, and I had a lot going on. Selling a business is so stressful. It’s like tax season times ten or like applying for a mortgage for a house that you know is out of your damn price range. There was so much paperwork involved, and the thought of taking a quick sunny break to LA to try to get a job I was determined I would never actually get just seemed so stupid. But once again, Rob convinced me I should go. He reminded me that I had recently said I wanted to make more gay friends. My only gay man friend at the time was … my husband, as I worked every hour that God sent, and I lived in Salt Lake, where making gay friends wasn’t the easiest. He made a fair point that in a room full of forty-two gay men, I could probably make friends with some of them. So that was what I set out to do. I was going to go take advantage of a huge audition and return home knowing I now had some new gay mates.

  We were told the first night of auditions would be a cocktail party, so we could “get to know each other and make friends.”

  It was a chemistry test.

  This made me nervous. I still didn’t feel nervous about the show, mind you, but I hadn’t been out to a bar or club in about ten years, and I knew everyone would be clamoring for attention. My resting state is that I’m a dweeb. I don’t drink, I don’t dance, and no one would ever accuse me of being cool. I get nervous in crowds and just want to skulk off into a corner until I can slip away without anyone noticing I’m gone.

  I arrived at the cocktail party to find what looked like a mosh pit—everyone had crowded around the bar, while the rest of the room remained empty, save for the high cocktail tables they had placed in the center. I wanted nothing to do with that mosh pit situation, as I had no idea how I’d even begin to infiltrate, so I thought, I’m going to station myself at one of these tables. If people want to talk to me, hopefully they’ll come over and chat one-on-one.

  Weirdly, people kept coming over until there was a gaggle of gays with me, all chatting and having a laugh. I’m quite sociable one-on-one and can speak to people for hours on end, as long as I don’t feel pressure to be cool or land a TV job. So this setup was especially great, because I wasn’t trying to get the job; I was just trying to make a friend. And already I had found a couple of people I thought I could be friends with, and still am friends with, to this day!

  One of them was Karamo. I remember thinking, Gosh, you’re attractive. He makes such intense eye contact, where he looks you deep in the eye as he’s shaking your hand, and it’s like everything else disappears. That night, I thought it was just for me—that I was special. Since then, I’ve learned that little shit is just a highly skilled schmoozer, and he does that to everyone. It’s a skill I wish I had.

  I also noticed Bobby, who was wearing something zany—a brightly coloured suit and very thick-rimmed glasses. He was very animated and really stood out to me.

  Meanwhile, everyone had been talking about how hot this guy Antoni was. I kept looking around the room like, “Who are you talking about?” When it became clear who they were talking about, I thought, Really? That guy? Antoni is obviously incredibly handsome, but he just really wasn’t my type. He seemed like a nice guy, and I wanted him to get the job, but he had a nervous, shy energy about him and seemed way too sweet and angelic. I couldn’t picture us being friends, as I usually gravitate to folks who are a lot more outgoing than I am.

  It’s so ironic that was my first impression of him, because of course, now he is my favourite person on the planet (besides my husband), and I love him more than life itself. He is my brother for life, who is definitely not as sweet and innocent as he seemed at that first encounter.

  Then there was Jonathan.

  Cameron, the manager who had first called me in Vegas, was actually Jonathan’s former manager, and all along he kept telling me, “Look for Jonathan Van Ness—you’re going to love him!”

  Well, out of the forty-two people at the cocktail party, he was the forty-second one I spoke to, at the very end of the evening. And when I met Jonathan, I thought, There is no way I’m ever going to see this guy again. He came up to me and started talking very loudly about his intimate life. I wasn’t used to a person I’d just met speaking so frankly with me about his sexual escapades. I was like, “There is no way I could ever work with this person, and there is no way I could ever be friends with him.” I thought he was a shoo-in for the show, of course, and that he really had something special. But he had so much personality; I didn’t think we would get along. A little over a month later, he, too, became one of my favourite people. Apparently, my initial instincts are very, very wrong.

  For the second round of the callback, everyone played a game of casting speed dating. There were four tables, and at each table there were three auditioners and one producer. They called us in alphabetical order, and since my name starts with T, I got to hear some of the questions being asked of the guys who went ahead of me.

  Each table had a fishbowl in the center, filled with slips of paper bearing topical questions. When it was my turn, one of the producers asked me if I’d like to take a question from the bowl, and I said no. I said, “I’ve heard the kind of questions that are in this bowl, and I have no desire to talk about the last time I flew a kite or what kind of dog I had. I want to ask you questions and talk about things that are more interesting.” They were shocked. I went on, “I’m British. I don’t do small talk. I like to chat about real things. I heard you recently got divorced; tell me about it. Do you have kids? What was the reason for the divorce? I’d love to hear more about that.”

  They were like, “What? You’re asking us the questions?”

  When our time was up, they still wanted to get to know me more, and I said, “That’s why I don’t do fishbowl questions.”

  On the second day of auditions, we were told to bring a personal item. It was supposed to be something that meant a lot, something we could talk about. The whole thing would be filmed.

  I was actually in Vegas again when I got the call to head to LA for this live a
udition, so I wasn’t able to bring anything from home that was personal to me. When it was my turn, I said I didn’t bring anything. But I told the producers the only thing I carry with me is my wedding ring. I explained how my marriage and my husband have shaped my life. I told them how everything I am and everything I will ever be is because of our partnership and what the ring signifies. I went on about how Rob is the most wonderful man in the world, how he is the reason I live in America, how he is the reason I’m going to retire and have children, and how he is the reason everything I’d ever dreamed about was made possible. “There was no reason to bring any other personal belonging with me,” I told them. “I have all I need right here in this wedding ring.”

  At the end of my speech, a few of the producers were crying. Again, I thought, I may have done all right.

  The next day, I was called back in. The producers had Karamo, Bobby, and me sit in a room and answer questions while sitting in front of a bunch of cameras and producers. They kept rotating different auditionees in and out, but I remained. They also kept rotating in JVN and Ant. That was the day I fell in love with them both, along with Karamo and Bobby. We learned so much about each other within those few hours and were having such a laugh. It went on this way for eight hours. I was one of the only people who sat in that room the entire time. They either really liked what I was doing, or I wasn’t doing enough and they wanted to give me a chance to stop screwing it up. Either way, I was grateful.

  I wasn’t nervous, even with the cameras pointing at me. I just pretended they weren’t there. I don’t know where that ability came from. I just chatted with the auditionees and had fun. I didn’t try too hard. I was just myself. The same Tan France you see on the show.

  At one point, there were five people in the room, and the producers told us there were only five other people in the holding room. It was down to ten. That was the first time I thought, Holy fuck, I might get this job.

  The very last stage of the callback was to do a mini discovery scene. We’d act like we were on the show—we’d ambush someone’s house (just like the opening part of a real episode), I’d go into the closet and take a look and tell them what I didn’t like about it and what we’d need to change.

  This was my first time ever being on camera alone, and I sucked ass. I was so aware of the fact that I was being filmed. I also kept talking directly to the camera, like it was an audience. They were all, “Stop talking to the camera!” But I couldn’t stop. They also told me to Americanize what I was doing, and I got really upset. I was like, “I am a Brit. This is how I do things. I can’t be more American.” And quite frankly, I had no desire to be. I liked not being over-animated.

  I think they wanted me to speak loudly, use my body a lot more, and act a little cheesy, but that’s definitely not my personality. That kinda thing makes me feel embarrassed for others when I see them doing it. There’s no way I could do that myself. I wanted to remain true to myself and show them how I would actually work the scene if I were on the show, not ham it up for the audition and then not be able to re-create that for the actual job.

  Then, after that part of the audition, we were all sent home. In the car on my way to the airport, I remember thinking, Gosh, I sucked at that. There is no way I’m going to get this job. But I had convinced myself that I hadn’t really wanted it anyway. And so, I went back to Utah. Did I really want the job? Heck yeah, of course I did. I just didn’t want to want it, as I honestly didn’t think there was a hope in heaven of me getting it. So, I blocked out the desire for it. Apparently, I’m quite the doomsday-er.

  At this point, however, I had gotten what I’d set out for, which was gay friends. Bobby, Karamo, Jonathan, Antoni, and I had created a group text called “Fab 5.” Mind you, we hadn’t been chosen at this point, but we really liked each other and wanted to stay in touch. I knew that even if I didn’t get it, I wanted to stay in touch with these boys and hang out again. They were wicked.

  I left LA on a Sunday. On Friday, five days later, I got a call from my casting director who said they wouldn’t have an answer until Monday or Tuesday at the earliest. Up until that point, it was such a freakin’ rough five days. I could hardly sleep. Even though I thought I knew the outcome, I would replay the whole audition in my mind and toy with the hope that maybe I would get it and how much that would change the course of my life. Then, with the next breath, I’d remind myself of why it was never going to happen, and they would never be crazy enough to hire a complete novice.

  An hour later, I got a call from a California number. I thought, Oh, shit, they’re calling me to tell me I didn’t get the job. Monday is when they’re telling the people who got it.

  I answered the phone, and before they could even speak, I said, “I’m so sorry. I tried really hard, and I know you were rooting for me. But I was retiring anyway, and so it’s really fine! I’m so sorry I let you down.”

  They said, “I’m so sorry to have to tell you this, but we’ll need you to come out of retirement.”

  I said, “No way! Give it to the other guy! He wants it so badly. I’m going to ruin the show!”

  And they laughed and replied, “We know how to cast a show. You’re going to be amazing.”

  And that was that. I got it.

  We hung up, and I screamed into my pillow. Then I instantly got up, grabbed my keys, and headed to the hospital where Rob works to tell him the news. The whole ten-minute drive there felt like I was watching a movie of someone else’s life. I just kept screaming, “Holy shit!” in my car. I truly couldn’t believe that they’d chosen me. I had gotten it. I had to keep telling myself that this was real. I was going to be on a show. Even though I knew it was true, part of my brain was trying to convince me that it was all a dream. It was the weirdest feeling.

  When I got to the hospital and parked, the walk to Rob’s office was intense. I was practically giddy with excitement. I didn’t run (South Asian guys can’t run in hospitals, either), but I was desperate to get there and tell him. When I arrived, he was sitting at his desk with people milling around it. As soon as he saw me approach, he knew instantly from my smile that it was good news. He whisper-screamed, and I whisper-screamed back. We hugged so hard for what felt like minutes. I’ll never forget how proud he made me feel.

  The casting directors let me know the cast was Bobby, Karamo, Jonathan, and me. They hadn’t yet decided on the food guy and were considering someone else. But of course, we all wanted it to be Antoni.

  I didn’t hesitate to share this opinion with the casting directors. I called them and was like, “I love Antoni. It has to be Antoni.” I sent them impassioned messages telling them why this was so. They were like, “Bish, know your place. You don’t get to decide.” But the other boys and I were so pushy about Antoni being the one that they brought him back out for a second audition. And lo and behold, Antoni got the job, because on that second audition, he showed just how perfect he was for the show.

  We were told that filming would start in four weeks and we were moving to Atlanta for the summer. When we got to Atlanta to start filming, shit really got real. It was a big crew, there were a lot of cameras around, and everyone was talking about how huge this show would be. Every day for three weeks, I was in a panic. I couldn’t stop thinking, I’m doing the worst job ever. There’s no way I’m good at this, and I will never feel comfortable enough around a camera to be myself and, more importantly, to be happy.

  It really hit when we wrapped on Cory the cop’s episode. That had been shot as the second episode, so I had two weeks under my belt at that point. I hadn’t gotten any real feedback, so all I had were my own opinions on my performance, and because I’m always my own worst critic, I’d convinced myself that I sucked on camera. I worried I was too quiet and not fun enough for the rest of the cast. I felt like I was bringing them down. I also didn’t understand so much of the terminology, and I felt stupid asking, so I didn’t. This meant I was always making technical mistakes, like not knowing when I wasn’t in sh
ot or when the camera couldn’t see my face properly. All of this to say, I was the reason I was struggling so much. I didn’t do all I could to learn the things I didn’t know, and I was making set life harder for myself.

  Late one night, I couldn’t take it anymore. I went to the apartment of the show’s creator, David, and knocked on his door. He could immediately tell something was wrong. I sat on his couch and cried and cried. “I’m not doing well, I can’t do this job, I’m ruining the show,” I told him. “I want out of my contract. I know you guys are going to fire me, so I’ll go now and won’t take any legal action if you don’t take any legal action against me.” That was how convinced I was that I wasn’t doing well on the show and that I would never make it in this industry.

  I had been watching the other boys on set, and I couldn’t be like them. They never seemed nervous; in fact, they were the opposite. They were expressive and dramatic and American. They would wear the heroes’ (clients’) crazy clothes and play with toys and make jokes. All I knew how to do was be this more reserved British person.

  The producers kept saying, “Energy! Energy, Tan!” I was trying to act like a showbiz person, and it just wasn’t me.

  I explained to the creator that I didn’t fit in because I couldn’t be something I’m not. I don’t do slapstick. I don’t do over the top—I do snarky. I’m not American. Brits don’t love to be cheesy. I’m not willing or able to be someone else.

  He looked at me and said, “But the best moments are when you’re you. Please don’t put this pressure on yourself.” His words made me understand that I could make this experience my own. All this time, I thought they wanted to me to be a person I wasn’t. It took David telling me to block out all those thoughts and just be myself that really spun it for me. They had hired me for who I truly was, not a character I wasn’t willing to play.