Suck It, Wonder Woman!: The Misadventures of a Hollywood Geek (17 page)

1. What color would your Lightsaber be?

OM: It would be a color you could only see if you were wearing special Olivia Lightsaber glasses. That way my enemy would never see it coming. And the color that you would see through the glasses would be called “Spearmint Fuck-Yeah” just because I think that’s an awesome name for a color.

2. If you could have any superpower, what would it be, and why?

It’s a typical answer, but I would really love to be able to fly. I dream about flying almost every night. I’m usually getting chased and the only way to escape is to fly. And for some reason I fly like Super Mario Brothers with a running start. I think about flying all the time. I am obsessed with squirrel jumping. (Look it up.) I know it’s intense and really dangerous but I want to try it one day.

3. What’s the funniest thing you’ve ever seen at Comic-Con?

A guy dressed as Darth Vader making out with Princess Leia. I mean, come on, that’s just not realistic.

4. What is your favorite video-game console ever?

Xbox 360. There are so many great games for it.

5. Favorite song to play on
Guitar Hero
?

Anything by Journey.

6. A criminal mastermind kidnaps you—what comic book hero would you want coming to your rescue?

Superman. Because there’s only one thing that could stop him. And let’s face it—it’s
really
hard to get kryptonite.

7. If you had to pick one
Lord of the Rings
character to escort you to Mount Doom, whom would you take (one does not simply
walk
into Mordor!)?

I would take Sam. Because going into Mount Doom is a death wish. And if I’m gonna die, I’d like to have a good laugh before I go, and Sam makes me laugh the most.

8. Would you rather own a jetpack or a Tesla coil?

Jetpack. (See: all that stuff about flying.)

9. What is your favorite mythological beast (centaur, minotaur, dragon, etc)?

Dragon. Because if I could tame a dragon, I could ride him around and fly. (Yes, I’m obsessed with flying.)

10. How would you survive a zombie apocalypse?

I would get a group of ten people, taking no children or elderly, and we would barricade ourselves in my basement, which is already zombie-ready (because how stupid are you if you haven’t already started preparing?), and wait it out until the zombies took down the city and went on to the next. Then, when they thought we were dead, we would follow them into the next town and take them down when they least expect it. We would begin to hunt them. And then of course, decapitate them, because that’s how you kill zombies.

Which Is Cooler:

11.
Super Mario
or
Zelda
?

Super Mario.

12.
Pacman
or
Tetris
?

Tetris all the way. I’m like a prodigy, fourteen years too late.

13. Ninjas or pirates?

Ninjas.

14.
Battlestar Galactica
or
Firefly
?

BSG.

15.
A New Hope
or
The Empire Strikes Back
?

The Empire Strikes Back.

16.
Raiders of the Lost Ark
or
The Last Crusade
?

Raiders of the Lost Ark.

17. Macs or PCs?

Mac for daily Internet use. PC for gaming.

In these hypothetical situations, what would you do?

18. You find a Magic Hat of Infinite Endurance and now you no longer require sleep. How do you spend all your extra free time?

Eating pie and working off the pie I just ate. That and organizing my house and all of my friends’ homes—I have OCD.

19. You wake up one day to find that scientists have cloned you. Olivia Munn #2 is your exact copy in every way. What will you do with your new clone?

Kill her. A clone is a great idea in theory. But, eventually she will get jealous of me and turn on me. It won’t be good. But, I’d make it quick and painless. After all, it is
me.

20. Your favorite movie director calls you up. He wants to cast you in a big summer blockbuster, to play a comic book heroine of your choice. Would you accept, and whom would you want to play?

Hell yes. And I would be Wonder Woman, or Jayna from the Wonder Twins.

21. You’re alone on a desert island. Or so you think. It’s actually swarming with velociraptors. You have only seconds before they pick up your scent. What to do?

Start swimming.

22. Question #19 was a trap. Your clone is actually a Cylon, which you discover one day when you spot Olivia Munn #2 flirting with your Roomba. You can only assume that a massive robot invasion draws nigh, the fate of the human race resting in your hands…but whom can you trust?

Aha! Well, good thing I killed her! Then when I see my Roomba acting up, I call Shia LeBeouf and ask for his help in destroying the world…or just make out with him before surrendering to the robots.

23. Your ninja dojo is shamed when a rival clan ambushes your sensei, taking him hostage. While in the midst of planning a rescue mission you get a call from Master Splinter. He has learned of your situation and can spare one (but only one) of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles to assist you. Splinter is waiting for your response.

No thanks. I’m gonna go this alone. But please send some extra pizza.

24. You have an opportunity to make out with a shape-shifting wizard whom you find moderately attractive. Halfway through, there’s an 82 percent chance that he will turn into the hottest man ever, a 15 percent chance that he will turn into the ugliest woman ever, and a 3 percent chance that he will turn into a man-eating tiger.

No guy is worth those chances. I decide not to make out with him and get a mani-pedi instead.

Just a week before
I was going to be on
Late Night with Jimmy Fallon
I had a massive panic attack. How massive? Well, I blacked out and woke up on my living room floor with no one around and went to the hospital thinking I was having a severe asthma attack. That massive. After being hooked up to machines, having a tube down my throat to keep me from choking since my throat was literally closing up, and having numerous tests done, the doctor comes in and tells me I’m having a panic attack. The worst she’s ever seen. And if I didn’t go home and rest and shut my body down, I was at risk of having a heart attack! A heart attack? Isn’t that something old fat guys who eat greasy sandwiches for lunch every day get?

I was shocked. Mentally I was fine. And everything in my life was going great. But as the doctor told me, panic attacks can come when there’s bad
and
good in your life. My body was dealing with a lot and it just had had enough.

I called in to work and slept all day long. And I continued to sleep for basically three more days. On the fourth day, I felt rested and back to normal. Whew—a huge relief.

Then, the day came to appear on
Fallon
and as I was sitting in makeup I felt my chest tightening and my throat closing up. No, no, no. This cannot happen now. I was so excited to be on the show and it was kind of a big deal for me and it would not be cool to get a panic attack just hours before it.

But fuck—it was not stopping. My breathing was getting shallow and my palms were sweating. I had performed on television for thousands of hours and had never had a problem—why was this happening now?

I finally realized why my panic attack was coming up—I was nervous. When I tell people I get nervous before things like this or in front of audiences, they’re always surprised. I know I have a big personality on air, but the truth is I always get nervous. Most of the time, my nerves calm down as soon as I step on stage. Other times, they don’t.

But for
Fallon
, there was something specific that was making me uneasy and once I figured it out, I could handle it better. I had to get all spiritual on my own ass and look inward. So that’s what I did.

And I realized I was dealing with two conflicting emotions: be funny and don’t be funny. Of course I wanted to be funny and make everyone laugh. I really wanted that. But at the same time, I just wanted to be myself and not be “on” so people could get to know my personality better when it wasn’t cranked to ten. So, there I was, about to go do a huge late-night talk show on NBC and I wasn’t sure how to be funny and how not to be funny. Or, really, how funny was the right amount of funny. This may sound simple but it really isn’t. For one thing, being funny is pretty damn hard. To measure it out like baking powder in a recipe for fruity muffins is really tricky. And on top of that, you never know how the audience will react to you. They could totally get your sense of humor and love you, or think you’re not entertaining or likeable and give you nothing. You just never know. And so—nerves!

My makeup artist, publicist, a friend and I pulled up to the front of 30 Rock in midtown Manhattan where they tape the show and there was a large group of fans waiting to take pictures and get an autograph. I always take time with the fans and really enjoy that part of being a performer, but I guess I was running late because a large man pushed people away and whisked me through to a private elevator. I felt like Shakira…or some still-relevant superstar.

When we get to the dressing room, it was this fantastic little room with great style, including tiny little video games decorating the walls. There was a tray of amazing cupcakes, a veggie platter and a gift bag with the softest T-shirt ever made inside. I’m not kidding: this T-shirt was, like, made from the testicles of baby lambs or something.

My makeup artist set up to touch me up, my publicist was asking me a bunch of questions, and a cameraman and producer were shooting behind the scenes for the G4 network. The room, though awesome, was also the size of a closet. There were way too many people in there. It was getting hot and not in the Nelly way (Yay, late ’90s reference!). I could feel my panic attack coming on stronger than ever.

I kicked everyone out of the room and took ten minutes to just breathe by myself. I was not gonna let myself pass out on national television…especially not in my short-ass dress.

It’s funny: whenever you tell people you need a minute by yourself, everyone assumes you didn’t mean
them
. Knock, knock and…a walk-in. Knock, knock and…a head-poke in. Knock, knock and…a need-anything request. You’re truly never left alone at these things. I was like the president in a short-ass dress about to black out cold from panic, except instead of having something important to say or do that would impact the entire world, I just had to do my first late-night talk show.

The producer of the show walked in and we started to go through my questions. I told him how nervous I was and he, too, was surprised by my anxiety. I explained that I’m nervous because I wanted to do a good job. That’s it. I just wanted to do a good job. And as simple as that sounds, it’s a lot harder to do. To just be yourself in front of a studio audience with a band playing and lights and cameras…it’s hard. I started picturing a different life—one where I was a mellow sheepherder living in Mongolia with my family. I would walk with a staff and eat stew for dinner. I would not go on television.

I snapped back to reality. The producer and I walked through it enough times that I began to feel comfortable and then just when I needed one more minute to compose myself, someone grabbed me and walked me to a curtain. Within mere moments that same someone touched my shoulder and told me to walk through the curtain and…I’m there.

My nerves didn’t go away instantly. But I was able to acknowledge they were there, deal with them, and just be present.

Oh, and did I mention who was also on the show that night? Artie Lange. Yep, from the Howard Stern show. I met Artie once and he was a great guy. He actually talked about meeting me on his show the next day and for one morning I was a hero to all my guy friends who listen religiously to Howard and Artie. “Ohmygod, Olivia! Artie’s talking about you on Howard!”

Artie is a great, sweet, funny, lovable guy. But he has been known to often “take over” interviews. Not in a malicious way. Just in the way that he’s a comedian and when he sees an in to make a joke, he takes it…and can do that over and over. I’ve seen him do it with other people. And I was warned he might do that on
Fallon
that night, but I wasn’t worried at all. I wasn’t worried about anyone. My anxiety was the only thing that could do me in. Unfortunately, my anxiety was proving to be like a 285-pound cage-match champion.

But then something beautiful happened. I’m not quite sure at what point in the interview this happened exactly, but my nerves just fell away. I just sat back and had fun being in the moment with Jimmy and Artie. All anxiety vanished.

I knew with my first joke that the audience got my sense of humor. Jimmy had asked if I liked technology, or if it was just something I talk about on my show. I responded with, “Yeah, I like technology. I mean, I have a computer.” And when the audience laughed, I think that’s probably when my nerves released their hold on me.

Later in the show, Artie made a joke about being on ecstasy and “banging that tuba,” pointing in the direction of The Roots, Jimmy’s house band. The whole audience cracked up. And while they were laughing I looked over at the tuba with this massive hole in it and thought to myself, “Well, Artie did say his girlfriend was twenty-five…maybe he’s got something going on.” But instead of internalizing that comment, I turned to Artie and said, “Artie, if you can get friction with that tuba, you deserve a twenty-five-year-old girlfriend.” The audience erupted in laughter. And Artie was practically speechless—well, as close to speechless as he ever gets—screaming, “Nice! Nice!” over and over, and Jimmy was out of his seat jokingly telling everyone to calm it down.

“Artie, if you can get friction with that tuba, you deserve a 25-year-old girlfriend.”

After the show Artie came up to Jimmy and me and said, “She had the best line of the night. That friction line was hilarious.”

I was so happy. As entertainers and comedians I respect both Jimmy and Artie so much (not to mention the king of New York comedy himself, Lorne Michaels, who I had passed in the greenroom right before the show.) And to know that I had made them laugh and I’d surprised them, was a high I had a hard time coming down from. It was beyond what I dreamed it could be.

During the commercial breaks producers and executives had been running down to the set saying this was the best show they’d ever had. And Jimmy came to my room later and said, “There are shows that you dream and wish to have, but you never think you can get them. This was that show.”

It was, in a word, amazing.

I hate to write out every moment of the show because that would be too grandiose. But I can say it was up there as one of the best moments of my life. I’m gonna say Top-3 best moments of my life.

The show ended with Jimmy and me playing Ping-Pong and I brought out my “secret partner”—Susan Sarandon. Yes. Susan Fucking Sarandon. I swear this is true: just days before Jimmy’s show we had dinner for the first time and became fast friends. Jimmy had asked her to play Ping-Pong on his show in the past, but she declined because of a hurt wrist. But Susan co-owns a Ping-Pong club called SPiN in New York City and we had been practicing there together. The Ping-Pong game was between Susan and me and Artie and Jimmy. And it was not staged at all—other than the fact that Susan forced Jimmy to use a ridiculously small paddle. It probably goes without saying on this fairy-tale evening, but Susan and I brought the win home! What. Up.

I have to say I’m very happy we won that game. Because if you watch the match, I gave up the second point when I hit the ball off the table. When I did that, Susan said to me under her breath, “Come on! You can’t hit like that.” The fear of disappointing my new best friend, Susan Fucking Sarandon, was enough to get me focused and help us house Jimmy and Artie. We went back to SPiN that night and had a celebratory dinner and more Ping-Pong. I mean, really, what a goddamn perfect night!

I usually keep my head down and even when something good happens for me, I look up briefly, and throw my head back down. I guess I feel like if I keep it up too long, I’ll get hit by a bus or something and it’ll all go away. But this time, for this show, I let myself be excited and, dare I say, proud about how I handled it.

It’s rare moments like this, when I allow myself to be excited about how life is turning out…and I think back to the little Olivia who just wanted to make people laugh so much—the one with the ridiculous Disney outfits, the one who had to bribe her “friends” to let her be the dog who stayed outside while playing house, the one who once tried desperately to fit into any clique that would have her. It’s moments like this where I wish I could tell her: It’s all gonna turn out fine.