"Jesus. Okay, cut. Hey, kid, take a break. Go over to the food table there and grab some snacks. I'm just going to have little talk with the Doughboy here." The director got up from his chair, eyes bleary from the 54th take and his body trembling with the caffeine shakes.
The boy is led away crying by his mother on set.
"What did he mean he was going to waste me, Mommy?"
"Oh, don't pay him any mind, Billy. That's just the Doughboy trying to be funny. You know those dough people, they just have a different sense of humour is all."
The director walks over, crouches down to get on the Doughboy's level, just like he learned to do with children and gives him a big smile.
"Talk to me, Doughboy. What's the problem. Whatever you need, I'll take care of it."
"Stand up you piece of shit. I hate it when a man grovels. Do it again and I'll have you directing porn flicks out in the Valley. And did I say anything's the matter?"
"No, no," the director said, rising quickly from his haunches. "It's just I think you're unhappy with the kid and I just, I don't want any more parents getting all lawyered up just because you threatened to waste a kid on set."
"Is this about that last commercial we shot. Because that kid deserved it. I'm mean, come on, that kid didn't poke me, she almost squeezed the prostate right outta my ass."
"Hey, you'll get no complaint from me. I'm on your side, remember? That kid was a brat, it's just that did you have to grab her mother's tits. The fact that her husband's an attorney and he happened to be on set that day, shit we barely got out of that one alive. And the Pillsbury guys, well, they took a beating on that one. Good thing it got settled out of court before the papers got wind of it."
"Hey, the kid was squeezing me, I grabbed on to the first thing I could see to try and pull myself to safety. That it was the kid's mother's tits, well, that's just too bad for everybody, except me maybe because I got a good feel but I'll tell you, I don't think they were real. These showbiz moms are all the same. Kid makes the parents a boatload of money, bingo, it's a boob job for mommy and daddy gets a new Lexus."
"Jeez, keep it down, will you. They can hear you over there at the snack table."
"Who gives a shit. They think they can do better, let'em go work with that Green Giant prick or his sprout sidekick. Kid can eat slimy vegetables all day instead of cinnamon buns. You hear that, kid," the Pillsbury Doughboy yelled over at the snack table. "Go ahead and eat slimy vegetables for all I care."
"Christ, keep it down. What th'fuck's wrong with you? Did you take your meds today? 'Cause this isn't the Doughboy I know and love."
But Doughboy wasn't paying attention. Instead he was eying the kid's mother who was midway leaning over the snack table when he had started yelling.
"Lady," Doughboy continued. "Why don't'cha shove another five or six of those toaster strudels down your gullet. Otherwise how else we gonna find your bony ass in those baggy track pants."
"Doughboy," the director yelled. "Enough. We gotta talk."
"You wanna talk? So talk. I'm listening. Better yet, why don't you listen for a change. Number one, I'm sick of working with these kids. I'll work with their moms no problem but these kids, they think I'm some kind of plushy. Remember that kid who shoved me down his pants, rubbed me all over his goddamn weenie before you called security, I mean, c'mon Tony, work with me here. The shit I gotta take, I just can't take it no more. Give me a fat mom with a mustache any day. She can poke me all she wants but these kids, I'm telling you they're nothing but trouble. They're not respecting the Doughboy here and I've got the bruises to prove it."
"Listen, Doughboy, I know what you're saying. But can't we just get through these few final takes, no trouble and then, I swear on my mother's grave, we're gonna fix everything, get it all straight. No more kids, just moms and, hey, how do you feel about monkeys?"
"Long as they're wearing diapers I don't see any problems."
"Okay, that's great. By the way, your agent called."
"Mickey called? Okay, gimme a second here, I gotta call him back, get me and the shyster on the same page."
The Pillsbury Doughboy pulled out his tiny cell phone and gave his agent a call, drumming his little fat fingers on a photo-shoot shellacked croissant while he waited for Mickey to pick up.
"Hey, Dough-baby, what's happening. How's the commercial going?" Mickey sounded like he was talking through a toilet paper tube.
"That's what I wanna talk to you about. Listen Mickey, we've been together now, how long? Fifteen, twenty years or so."
"Through thick and thin my friend, through thick and thin."
"Exactly and it's looking a little too thin for me at this point in my career."
"Thin? You gotta be kidding. You're the goddamn Pillsbury Doughboy for christ's sake. And who put you there? Eh? Me, that's who. You're more recognizable than Coca-Cola. Or Oprah Winfrey. Or Tom Cruise. I parachute you down into the middle of the Amazon jungle, bunch of headhunters find you, they'd be all, "Holy shit, it's the Pillsbury Doughboy, don't cut his head off, he's our numero uno amigo." Families everywhere are counting on you. You're bigger than Jesus. Even in the middle of the Amazon somebody's baking Pillsbury Crescent Rolls at this minute. Thanks to you my friend, thanks to you. So what are we talking about here, Doughbaby, what's bugging you because if anyone's got the antidote, Mickey does."
"That's exactly it, Mickey," the Pillsbury Doughboy said. "If I'd got bitten by a rattlesnake and you were the antidote, I'd be dead. I can't take any more of this Pillsbury shit, kids poking me in the ribs and me giggling like a little schoolgirl who just farted during the Lord's Prayer at Catholic school. Remember when you got me that part in Ghostbusters. Well, I wanna do more of that. I wanna be on the big screen, not some little fat doughboy on TV. I wanna do maybe a Mission Impossible movie, one of those Bourne Supremacy things, fuck get me a part on Star Trek, I'd be good in outer space. I'm sick of getting poked in the stomach fifty fuckin' times a day."
"Okay, okay, calm down. Now you know, technically, that wasn't you in Ghostbusters. That was just some CGI shit and they just paid us money to have the rights to use your image for the movie. And as I remember you blew it all on hookers and coke. And remember when they invited you to the set and you showed up drunk and got into that fight with Bill Murray. So, you're a tough sell these days, what with all the insurance and your instability we're lucky we still have Pillsbury so let's finish this job and then I'll pull some strings, see what I can do. Maybe get you on to one of those reality shows. Are we copacetic here or what?"
"Okay, sounds good. Reality show, eh? Hey, maybe you can get me on one where all these hot broads wanna marry me. You know, I'm in a Jacuzzi, they're all surrounding me, rubbing themselves up against my dough-soft body."
"You got it, kiddo. Now go finish that commercial."
The Pillsbury Doughboy waddled back on to the set. "Hey, Tony, get the kid over here, let's finish this thing. One take and then we're done. The Doughboy's back in business again."
"Baby," the director said, motioning the mother and the kid back in front of the camera. "You never left."
"Oh, and warm me up one of those crescent rolls. I wanna fuck it after the shoot."
With the lights on and the camera rolling Doughboy suddenly transformed, immersing himself in the role, reaching deep within his doughy body to find the cute, little doughboy hidden inside who nevertheless had a troubled upbringing. He brought everything he could to the scene and after he'd tap-danced on a croissant, been poked in the stomach and shared a laugh with the kid there wasn't a dry eye in the room.
"That was beautiful, just beautiful," the kid's mother said, wiping a tear from her eye.
"I know, I know" the Pillsbury Doughboy said. "Now get outta my way, I've gotta crescent roll to screw."
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