Jenny McCarthy: The Next McCarthy Era
One name McCarthy is willing to mention in this context-- because he insulted her that completely--is Steven Seagal. When I press her on the subject, the hurt in her voice says she's still freaked. "I went to the audition for Under Siege 2 with, like, 15 other Jenny McCarthys. These girls came in and out of his office and I was last. Steven comes out and goes, 'Hmm, so you're last.' I'm thinking, 'Shouldn't a casting person be doing this?' I go inside his office, which has shag carpet and this huge couch, and he's by himself and says, 'Sit on the couch.' I have my [script pages] and I say, 'OK, I'm ready,' but he says, 'No, I want to find out about you.' I knew what was coming. He goes, 'So, you were Playmate of the Year,' and I was trying to go--" Here, McCarthy breaks off and adopts a Laverne & Shirley blue-collar foghorn delivery: "Yeah, but, like, I lived in Chicago, see, and..."
The accent was apparently no turnoff. "I was wearing this very baggy dress," she continues, "which I always wear to auditions, with my hair pulled back. I'm listening to him go on and on about how he found his soul in Asia and is one with himself and whatever. When I said, 'Well, I'm ready to read,' he said, 'Stand up, you have to be kind of sexy in the movie and in that dress, I can't tell.' I stand up and he goes, 'Take off your dress.' I said, 'What?' and he said, 'There's nudity.' I said, 'No, there's not, or I would not be here right now.' He said again, 'There's nudity,' and I said, 'The pages are right in front of me. There's no nudity.' He goes, Take off your dress.' I just started crying and said, 'Rent my [Playboy] video, you asshole!' and ran out to the car." That wasn't quite the end of it. "I'm closing my car door and he grabs me and says, 'Don't you ever tell anybody.' He won't sue me or say anything because he knows it's true. If I saw him today, I would still say, 'You're a fucking asshole and I really hope you change your ways.'"
Hands folded in her lap, McCarthy says, "Each time it happened, I was getting more and more defeated. I would talk to some girls who'd seen the same bigwigs and they'd say, 'Yeah, I did it.' Like, 'So what?' After Steven Seagal, it felt like the final straw. I called my mom and said, 'Mom, I'm coming home. I've had it. They chewed me up and spit me out.' The next day was the Singled Out audition and that led to everything else."
Ah, Singled Out, the show that made her an Internet pinup within minutes. How did she accustom herself to the attention? "In the house in Malibu where I was living until recently," she says, "the doorbell would ring every night around one o'clock with some drunken teenager shouting vulgar things."
McCarthy continues, "I change my number every four months. Ray [Manzella] doesn't tell me, but I know there have been major situations and he doesn't want to scare me." So what exactly is the deal with her and the nearly 50 Manzella? "He is old, but he's 18 in his heart and hotter than hell," she says, cackling. "It's going to be four years in October that we're together. I don't care when people say anything about Ray and me. They don't see him for what he is. I follow my heart."
But can't the heart suffer when it gets tainted by contract hassles and arguments over career choices? "When we're talking about business, I wear the pants and he wears the jewelry," she insists. "My choice is always the one. If it didn't work that way, it wouldn't have worked this long." What exactly does McCarthy find sexy about Manzella? "I love his skin. Smooth, soft--love it. Isn't that a weird thing? I always tell Ray that when he dies, I want to skin him for a sofa or something." And is there anything in particular Manzella finds sexy about McCarthy, besides the obvious attributes? "He's a foot man. He loves to look at mine. I mean, I'll have no top on and he'll look at my $2 pedicure. Sometimes there's toe sucking, it just depends on the kind of mood we're in."
McCarthy is refreshingly straightforward about her ultimate ambition. "Everybody that comes into acting has that 'movie' thing as their goal," she confesses, "whether they say it out loud or not. You always want to see your face on the big screen. But right now, TV likes me more than movies because there's a lot more for a 25-year-old girl in TV than in movies. I just got an agent for the first time in my life five months ago and he's very into it, except I'm tough and I won't settle for just anything now. Because of the way I started in the business, I don't think I'll be taken seriously until I'm over 30 and my generation kind of grows up with me. Most of the scripts I'm looking at now are for girls in their 30s--you know, like Jennifer Aniston movies. They're not that great, are they? The little roles Cameron Diaz does--like My Best Friend's Wedding and The Mask--where she's cute, but still has this great, funny side to her, are not quite what I want to do, but almost. The great role would have been Pretty Woman, this woman who was like, 'Whoo-hoo!' rough, but still someone you can relate to."
McCarthy is studying with Helen Hunt's acting coach now in her campaign to be taken more seriously. "I want to jump into my bucket of fear and go out and audition for stronger roles," she says. "Now's the time for me to take the time to polish the rough edges and learn to say a line instead of making faces.
"Everything I've done has panned out like it was supposed to happen," continues McCarthy, "but I'm at a point where I have to say I have no idea where it's all heading. Hopefully, if I do the work, doors will open to me. It would totally suck to die and have to say to God, 'You know what? You sent me to earth to not make it and that totally sucked! How about sending me back and giving me the opposite?'"
She laughs when she catches herself making a face at God. Hey, at least she didn't flick her tongue at him.
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Stephen Rebello interviewed Jeremiah Chechik for the June issue of Movieline.