wardrobe storage area: three white T-shirts and a pair of running socks, a couple of pairs of khaki shorts, a pair of Moroccan leather sandals, and three hats—a derby, a straw Panama, and a wool fedora. I also have a pair of gold cuff links that he wore in Pacific Coast, a wristwatch (a stainless steel Seiko, not a Rolex), a pair of reading glasses (+2.0 magnification), and a tattered paperback copy of The Stranger(which he told a film critic at the New York Times is his favorite book, but I’m not sure if he’s actually read it. I’ve never seen him reading anything but a script). I’ve managed to obtain other clothes and trinkets of his, but I sold them on a sort of black-market website. I don’t sell anything on eBay because someone from Sony would probably catch me. Other things of his that I’ve picked up—an empty cherry jar, a half-used bar of Irish Spring (two stray hairs included), an old razor, a blank checking deposit slip, a few yellow pencils with teeth marks near the erasers, a stray wooden button, receipts from Starbucks, salt packets from the Habit and In-N-Out Burger, several sticks of Doublemint gum, silver foil intact.
Perhaps the best find of anything that I’ve ever collected: his cell phone numbers. They were written on a little yellow slip of paper that he’d wedged into the frame around one of his dressing-room mirrors. I suppose it might be hard to keep the two different numbers straight, but if he can remember all of those lines, I don’t really get it. I knew they were his because I called them to make sure. When he answered, I said nothing and hung up. He sounded like he’d been sleeping, and even if he hadn’t been, I knew that I was being a jerk, not saying anything, not even “Sorry, wrong number.”
If I ever did call and talk to him, if I ever said who I am and asked for his tolerance and patience and he agreed to talk to me for a little while, I have the interview questions ready. I’d like to make a documentary about him. One of the reasons I’m so interested in him is because he’s the kind of actor other actors respect, and he doesn’t ever really seem to fuck things up, aside from the tranny movie (which John Waters was supposed to direct, but the rumor is, he wanted to cast Keanu Reeves in the lead, not Renn Ivins). I’m not sure how Ivins keeps doing it, how so much of what he touches seems to blossom or at least not to wilt. My documentary project probably won’t ever happen, but if I did have a chance to ask him my questions, I have a pretty good idea how he’d respond to most of them.
THE IMAGINARY IVINS INTERVIEW
Jim M.: Of which role are you most proud?
Renn Ivins: I like something about all of the roles I’ve played, but if I had to choose, it’d probably be Javier’s Sons. We shot most of it in Peru and I got to see Machu Picchu for the first time. It’s really an amazing place, and to think they built it before the discovery of electricity or the invention of the steam engine.
I also felt even more respect for human rights workers after making this film. They’re extraordinarily brave people, living and working in strange, hostile places, and fighting for abstractions like justice, peace, and equality, things that most of us take for granted in America.
JM: What was your least favorite role?
RI (laughs): Oh, I’ve liked every film I’ve made.
JM: That’s a diplomat’s answer. What’s the real answer?
RI: If you really have to know, I’d say that it was Broken English. Not because I didn’t like the cast or the director, but a lot of things didn’t turn out the way they were supposed to with that film. We were going to shoot it in Toronto, which is where quite a few films are made now because Canada doesn’t charge as much as a lot of places do for permits and other things you need to make a film. But we ended up having to shoot most of it in Cleveland, which was fine, overall, but I’m still not really sure why. Also, one of the stunt people, a young woman named Paisley Braun, died while driving a car off a bridge, which is supposed to be a pretty routine stunt. You can imagine that