The F List - Alessandra Torre Page 0,35

paintings and heavy furniture had decorated the house. I moved down the main staircase and eyed the Persian rug at the foot of it, wondering how long it would last before Johno vomited on it.

A girl with a messy bun and headset skidded to a stop as she saw me. She paused, then screeched out Dana’s name.

“Use the damn headset,” Dana snapped, appearing off the left side. She saw me, then snapped her hands up as if I was about to step on a bomb. “Hold it right there. Don’t move a single step. TONY!”

A camera hustled into the room, and I scratched the back of my neck as the operator kneeled, the camera angled up to me.

"Yes," Dana breathed. "Yes, this is gold. Cash, continue down the stairs. Please, for the love of God, go into the kitchen, and get coffee. Don't look at the camera. JOHN, leave the girls for a minute and come catch this!”

I was certain, thudding down those final stairs and taking the long path into the kitchen, that something would be waiting there for me. Some big AHA surprise moment that would leave the viewers and me stunned. I slowed at the arch entrance to the large open space, prepared—but there was nothing. The long glistening white counter. A coffee pot percolating by the sink. I opened a cabinet, then another, then five more before I found the coffee cups. They were all red and lined up in a perfect row by someone with severe OCD. I took the cup and flipped the cabinet shut, then reached for the coffee pot.

“That’s it…” Dana said softly. “Zoom in on his abs. Catch all of that beautiful definition.”

I chuckled at the ridiculousness of it all and received an immediate and sharp reprimand from Dana. Looking back, I guess she knew her stuff. That two-minute clip of me coming down the steps and getting my coffee got two hundred million views and birthed ninety-six different memes and gifs. Apparently, tousled bed hair and low-slung pajama pants got a woman's juices going. Add in a steaming cup of coffee, and I had two seven-figure offers on Frank's desk, one from Keurig and one from Folgers. We took them both.

The yelling, which had subsided slightly with Dana's focus on me, resumed, and I took my coffee and followed the sound, curious at what was going on.

I was stepping over a thick tangle of cords between the kitchen and dining room when a carrot flew by my head, the point narrowly missing my eye. I paused and followed the source of the projectile.

Marissa wore more makeup than a clown at a kid’s birthday party and was dressed in a red negligee and four-inch heels. She pointed at the carrot. "You're trying to KILL US. You think we can't taste chemicals? Is that how stupid you think we are? I—Hey Cash—I'm not touching another thing in that fridge unless it comes from Blue Farms Baby."

A production assistant rapidly nodded as she took notes on a pad. A crew member went to reach for the carrot, and Dana yelled at him to stop.

Eileen, who was sitting at the large round table behind a Versace china bowl filled with Fruit Loops, waved her milk-covered spoon at me. “Welcome to the circus.”

I nodded at her and wondered where, in all of this, Emma was.

“You’d think, with all of the cameras, that it’d be impossible to lose a person, but we lost Emma all the time. After the first episode, Dana had us put a tracking device on her car and then, when that didn’t work, in every purse she had. It was funny. As soon as filming would start, and we’d know that Emma was busy, we’d run around and plant trackers on everything of hers that we could find. Was it a violation of privacy? Maybe. But MTV had, at that point, a very sizable investment in the show, and that show really… especially by the end, was one hundred percent focused on her and Cash.”

Glorya Lane, Production Assistant, House of Fame

"I knew, early on, that Cash liked Emma. I mean that he really liked her, not just what you saw on the show. His eyes would move to her, wherever she was. And if she wasn't in the room, then he was looking for her. It was really sweet, but I was the only one who caught on to it. Everyone else… maybe even them, thought that they hated each other."

Paulette Reyes,