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PROLOGUE
If you want your children to turn out well, spend twice as much time with them, and half as much money. —Abigail Van BurenWhen my boss told me that we were all going to Hawaii for Thanksgiving vacation, I tried not to panic. I was nineteen years old, and my vacation experience up to that point pretty much consisted of ten-hour trips in my family’s cramped station wagon to visit my cousins in Canada. You’d think I would have been turning cartwheels down Sunset Boulevard. But as enticing as an all-expenses-paid stay at a posh Hawaiian beachfront resort would sound to most people, I was realistic enough—after almost a year of nannying for one of the most powerful families in Hollywood—to know that I’d be on duty for 192 hours straight. I had counted.
One hundred and ninety-two straight hours of running after three children under the age of seven, of sharing quarters a lot more cramped than the ten-thousand-square-foot home we normally occupied, where the air was already tense. Of no room to escape the kids or their parents for one minute.
This “vacation” sounded worse every time I thought about it. Good thing I didn’t know about the other five kids.
The night after I was informed of our upcoming adventure, I decided to be more positive.
Come on, Suzy! You could never afford to travel to Hawaii on your own. This is a great opportunity to soak up some paradise. I tried not to think about our previous “vacations.” Surely this would have a whole different, relaxed, tropical vibe? I called my friend and fellow nanny Mandie to tell her my news. Shelistened intently while I borrowed scenes from postcards and spun my perfect vision of the eight-day trip.
“I’ll be basking on white-sugar beaches, with cute cabana boys constantly serving me fruity drinks in coconut halves. After I distribute the beach toys and reapply sunscreen on the kids, I’ll soak up the Polynesian splendor. Just think, hula performances under torch-lit palms . . . leis draped around me . . . luaus . . . lanais . . .” In my dream-dappled mind, there would be grandparents, aunts, and uncles to lavish attention on the kids. The gentle spirit of the island would permeate our hearts and inner harmony would reign.
But then Mandie started laughing so hard that I was actually afraid she’d lost control of her bladder.
We both knew it was far more likely that the actual scenario would be similar to what a mutual nanny friend of ours had just undergone. Her employer, a well-known baseball player, had brought her along to the famous Pebble Beach golf course, where he was playing in a huge charity golf tournament. The event was star-studded, and she couldn’t wait to rub elbows with some celebrities. But when the other baseball players’ wives realized someone had brought a nanny, they all dumped their kids in her suite and headed off to the tournament unencumbered. She spent three days in a hotel room with nine—count ’em,
nine—kids. She never saw one moment of golf, beach, or sunshine.
I tried to be optimistic, but my spirits wavered when even getting out of the driveway became a massive undertaking. Our traveling caravan included me and my employers, Michael and Judy Ovitz; their three children (Joshua, Amanda, and Brandon); Michael’s parents; his brother, Mark, and Mark’s wife, Linda, and their six-year-old son; and Michael’s business partner, Ron Meyer, along with Ron’s date, Cyndi Garvey, and their four combined daughters. It took two stretch limos just to get the whole group to the airport. Altogether, the entourage totaled nine adults and eight children. In addition, Michael’s friend Al Checchi and his wife, three kids, and nanny would be meeting us at the resort.
After we were greeted at LAX by a professional-looking woman waiting at passenger drop-off, the limo driver unloaded enough luggage to supply an army tank division. We were breezily escorted through security and down a long hall to a door marked THE CAPTAIN’S CLUB. Who knew that airlines provided these private little sanctuaries to their frequent fliers? And Creative Artists Agency, Michael’s company—with his partners, staff, and clients—had probably racked up millions of such miles on the corporate American Express card. Michael waved the whole troupe over to the Captain’s Club portal.
A stone-faced young woman at the desk stopped us. Airline policy was to allow the frequent flier and one guest, and she was here to enforce the rules. She was firm and implacable with a perfunctory pleasantness that was so calm it was irritating. Michael started arguing his case, but she repeated patiently that this was company policy, with no exceptions. No exceptions? Michael’s face began to twitch as if a bug were trapped under his skin. The employee gave the impression of having weathered a few of these type A folks in her day. She repeated the policy clearly and identically several times. I recognized her “brokenrecord technique” from my childcare classes. But Michael wasn’t six.
“I’m sorry,Mr. . . .” She paused, waiting for him to fill in the blank.
He raised his eyebrows and lowered his face closer to hers. “Ovitz. Michael
Ovitz,” he pronounced emphatically, as though there was not a soul alive who would not recognize his name.
The woman didn’t respond. She calmly kept typing on her computer as she stared into the monitor. I already had learned in my tenure with “the most powerful man in Hollywood” that there were several things that invariably irritated or angered him. One of them was not being recognized for the influential man he was. This was a bit of a contradiction, since he hated seeing his name in the papers and went to great lengths to keep his picture from being published. Whatever. Today was definitely a day he wanted to be recognized.
“Do you have any idea how many frequent-traveler miles my company has with this airline?” He smirked with the air of someone who always got his way. I thought about backing him up and rehearsed my part in my mind:
Please, miss, lighten up. I have a chubby baby on one hip and a heavy diaper bag on the other, and I would like to sit down.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Ovitz. I don’t know you, and it wouldn’t matter if I did, because the rules are the rules,” she replied with unsurpassed calm. “You can have only one guest come in with you.” Oh dear, poor thing.
Maybe if I wriggled my eyebrows frantically, she’d relent. I tried desperately to make eye contact, wondering what kind of expression would let her know that she was teetering on the verge of unemployment.
From my position just behind Michael, I could almost feel the steam start to rise off his neck. Why couldn’t the woman see his rage? It was absolutely clear there was no way he was going to allow this irritating little bureaucrat to keep him from bringing his entire party into the Captain’s Club.We had a full two hours before our flight left.
Once again, I tried to communicate the situation telepathically.
Girl, look at me. LOOK AT ME! Can’t you see this guy is used to people quaking at the mere mention of his name? There’s no way he is going to wait with his wife, parents, children, and friends with the riffraff at the gate! And now you’ve pissed him off, and the waiting is beside the point. You’re messing with his ego. Save yourself!
Without saying another word to the woman, Michael turned to us. “Take the kids and go sit over there,” he ordered. “I’ll be right back.” With that, he disappeared through the door. By the time he had returned ten minutes later, the woman behind the desk had already been plucked from the room by a large man in a business suit and replaced by another woman wearing a big smile. Upon Michael’s return, she personally ushered us into the elaborately decorated club and offered us lunch.
Michael may have won, but the rest of us certainly hadn’t. It was beneath his dignity to use his sophisticated negotiation skills on such a nobody. His lips were tight and his upper body even stiffer than usual. I got the distinct impression that anyone who even dared to breathe too loudly around him would get a stinging tongue-lashing of their own. No, my boss was far from happy, and when Michael ain’t happy, ain’t nobody gonna be happy. I carefully avoided looking in his direction.
The two hours passed excruciatingly slowly.
Finally it was time to board the aircraft. And what an aircraft it was. Usually when we flew we took corporate jets—fancy but definitely cozy and compact.You could have put six of those on each wing of this plane.
I had a hard time comprehending such massive bulk.We had first-class tickets, obviously, so we boarded first. Good thing they started early because it took fifteen minutes for the entire group to get into the cabin. Between all of us, we took up a good portion of the first-class seats. The tickets alone must have cost almost $20,000. As we all jockeyed for position, the flight attendants helped us stow the carry-ons and find our seats, and I could see the faces of the aristocracy already ensconced in their rows giving us looks of combined disgust and fear. I knew what they were thinking:
How could anyone be so rude as to bring that many children, and so young, into first class? I paid a lot of money to sit here, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to put up with a bunch of screaming brats.
The airline billed this as a six-hour flight, and several of the children, including ten-month-old Brandon, were already either crying or fighting. The poor couple seated just behind us was settling down for their first flight as man and wife. What could they possibly think about the equivalent of a Chuck E. Cheese birthday party invading their honeymoon bliss? They were probably horrified enough to put off having their own kids.
I tried to avoid eye contact with them.
I did have plenty of distractions. First class alone stretched for two stories, connected by a large circular staircase that led to a lounge for first-class passengers. Well, not that I ever saw it, but that’s what Grandpa Ovitz reported to me. It was like flying in a house; everybody had their own wing. Right after we got on, Michael, Judy, Ron, Cyndi, and all the rest of the adults dashed upstairs and left me with the various kids. When and how it had been decided that I would graciously govern all eight children, I didn’t know. Nobody told me, that’s for sure.
It could’ve been much worse.Years later I would hear about how one actress with two young children made her nanny take the kids on the twelve-hour flight to visit her parents in their native country. Somehow, the actress’s busy work schedule always made it conveniently
impossible to get tickets on the same flight as her toddlers. At least I wasn’t flying
alone with my charges. After all, the adults were just upstairs.
The other occupants and the flight attendants all eyed me accusingly, the glares suddenly much more menacing. I knew they were thinking:
What gall to bring eight young children on board and be insufficiently prepared
to amuse them for the duration. Just who did I think I was?
Who was I?
I was the one changing diapers on the edge of the seat; the one wedging herself into the bathroom with a preschooler. The one ducking flying peanuts and consoling three little charges as they cried or screamed when the air pressure hurt their eardrums. The one needing the flexibility of an Olympic gymnast to pull down the carry-ons in an attempt to find a replacement for root-beer-soaked shorts.
All of Ron and Cyndi’s girls were very sweet and tried to help out, but this was ridiculous. I sent up a mayday by way of the flight attendant heading to the lounge. Evidently, the adults regarded this with some amusement, because Judy soon appeared at my side, laughing. “For goodness sakes, Suzy, what are you doing with these kids? Why didn’t you come up and let us know you couldn’t handle it?”
Maybe because I knew you’d make a statement just like that one, for everyone in first class to hear. Maybe because I knew you’d roll your eyes, too, just so I’m sure to see how incompetent you think I am. Maybe because wanted to avoid this humiliating scene we’re having right now.
Such was a glamorous day in the life of a Hollywood nanny.
Read a Sample Chapter
You'll Never Nanny in This Town Again
By Suzanne Hansen Random House
Suzanne Hansen
All right reserved. ISBN: 0307237540
Chapter One
Chapter 1: Hotel California
"Sepple-veedah," I tried to sound out the word. My inflection was on the "veedah." Such an odd-looking name. "That's where our hotel is, on Sepple-veedah Boulevard," I told my mother during the plane ride. It was all so exciting. In just one short hour, she and I would be landing in Los Angeles. Home to Hollywood, Disneyland, and Tom Cruise! This would be my first visit to California. I grew up in a town that prided itself on being quite familiar with the movie industry: Cottage Grove, Oregon. Well, kind of familiar. Our claim to fame was that Animal House had been filmed there. Okay, not exactly Hollywood's rival. So you can see why I was nearly bursting out of the confines of my cramped economy-class seat.
The first disappointment was our hotel room on Snapple-whatever Boulevard. It was, to be kind, one step below a Motel 6. When the nanny placement agency had said they would find a reasonably priced hotel in the area, I didn't expect one you could rent by the hour.
We had a view of a congested, dirty, and turbulent street somewhere in Los Angeles. By now-thanks to our cab driver, who wasted no time correcting my pronunciation in his own foreign accent-I learned it was Se-PUL-veda Boulevard. Either way you pronounced it, it was an ugly street in an ugly town. This was not the Los Angeles I had pictured. I couldn't imagine any movie stars living within a hundred miles. The street was lined with telephone poles, a morass of wires running in every direction. The exhaust from thousands of passing cars filtered into our room, and horns honked and sirens wailed throughout the night.
Everything seemed so flat and brown. I craned my neck out of the only window in the room, scanning above the rooftops of dingy discount liquor stores, laundromats, and porn shops to search for the Hollywood sign (how was I to know that we weren't even remotely close?). Not that I could have seen it, anyway, with the curtain of smog that hugged our windowsill, fighting the fumes from the street for entry. Cottage Grove didn't have much of a problem with smog, which I later discovered was a combination of smoke and fog. Based on the odor that pinched my nose and the sting that made my eyes water, there couldn't have been much fog in the formula.
My mother mostly kept quiet. She couldn't have missed my monumental disappointment, but she had always been good at making the best of even the worst situations. Of course, even she had limits. "Oh my, this motel is pretty shady," she trilled, inspecting the coin-operated, make-the-bed-vibrate thing attached to the headboard.
We hadn't even finished unpacking (well, as much as we dared) when the phone rang. It was three in the afternoon on a Thursday, and the nanny placement agency had my very first appointment "penciled in." Could I make it Friday morning? They'd "ink me in." The interview was in Hollywood. Maybe I'd even be able to see the sign. If it wasn't too smoggy.
I jumped up on the vibrating bed. "Hollywood, here I come!" I yelled, bouncing up and down wildly.
During my schooling at the Northwest Nannies Institute (NNI) in Portland, I had learned that nanny jobs came in two main varieties: live-out or live-in. In the live-out situation, you work for a couple during business hours, essentially nine to ten hours a day. These people want consistent care and want to avoid taking their children to a day-care center. Usually, both parents work outside the home, although you might get a stay-at-home mom who could afford a second pair of hands.
I was looking for a live-in job. Why? For one, I knew paying for housing in LA would eat up my whole paycheck. And two, odds were that families who had live-in help would also employ an official housekeeper. This was a must for me, based on the horror stories I'd heard. Some nannies had become a Jill of all trades, assuming the duties of maid, cook, and personal assistant. They were responsible for doing everything from buying the wife's underwear to booking the mistress's spa reservations.
Carolyn, one of my instructors at NNI, had assured me that job satisfaction depended upon a good match. So I dreamed up my ideal situation. I wanted a live-in family in Southern California with at least two children, preferably three, and I wanted one of them to be a newborn because I loved caring for infants. Religion and ethnic background didn't matter much. My plan was to be on duty during the day and available for extra duty over weekends and evenings. I would have two days off a week, and when the parents were home, I would be free to come and go.
Rookie.
What I couldn't have known was that many wealthy folks are never without hired help for their kids. They arrange their lives so there is a paid caregiver available to them twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week. It had simply never occurred to me that there were people who really didn't want to spend as much time as possible with their children. That there were parents who did not hurry home after work so they could tuck Janie and Jack into bed. That there were, in fact, plenty of little Janies and Jacks in LA whose first words were uttered in Spanish, because they spent virtually all of their time with the Hispanic staff. "Isn't that cute-he's bilingual!" the mothers would brag to one another at charity events.
I would soon find out that LA is one big ladder. Nannies are the people who sit on the bottom rung, entertaining the kids, while the parents climb.
That night, after dinner at the International House of Pancakes, I spent two hours trying to decide what to wear for my interview the next morning. As it was late December, and I had come from the rain capital of the world, my suitcase held only clothing that would be appropriate for winter in Oregon. Mostly black, thick, and warm. And Friday was forecast to be one of the decade's hottest December days in Southern California. I was guaranteed to sweat rivers in my heavy black dress. But who cared about my discomfort-I feared I would look like a moron. Not that I had many options. I comforted myself with the thought that my black dress looked professional: It had clean simple lines, no distracting patterns, and an appropriate hemline. I decided to top it off with small gold hoop earrings and equally conservative black shoes with two-inch heels.
I didn't realize until much later how ridiculous I must have looked. I don't fit in here! my wardrobe shrieked. It only took one glance at my sandalfoot pantyhose to see that.
Finding an address in Los Angeles was more difficult than fishing the letter Z out of a bowl of Campbell's alphabet soup. For one thing, everything was in Spanish. For another, you couldn't tell if you were actually in Los Angeles, Studio City, Hollywood, or half a dozen other cities. Everything ran together, and unlike Cottage Grove, there were no signs that read YOU ARE ENTERING THE COVERED BRIDGE CAPITAL OF AMERICA, POPULATION 7,143. To make matters worse, street names were duplicated in every city. So, you might have been on Sepulveda in Westchester, or you might have been on Sepulveda in Van Nuys, which was in the Valley (what did that mean?) and technically part of LA.
Another problem was the division of cities into their eastern, western, northern, and southern parts. There was a North Hollywood, a West Hollywood, and just plain Hollywood. Where was the sign? Why no East Hollywood to round out the compass points? But more important, where was the Hollywood where all the stars lived? Where was Tom Cruise's house? No one told me that only a small number of famous people actually live in Hollywood. The real celebrity action is in Beverly Hills, Bel Air, or Malibu. And why didn't anyone mention that, besides Paramount Studios on Melrose Avenue, not much moviemaking actually takes place in Hollywood, either?
The placement agency did inform me that my first interview was with one of the top ten chefs in LA. Apparently his restaurant was so popular that it took three months to get a table. I didn't recognize his name. My mom steered the rental car high into the Hollywood Hills, on narrow, twisting old canyon roads. There were many lovely and stately homes in that area; some were beautifully restored to their original 1920s architecture. The address I'd been given matched a small but elegant Mediterranean-style house with a deep green front lawn. I hadn't been in California long enough yet to realize that this unassuming home cost as much as a mansion on ten acres (with swimming pool and tennis courts) would cost in Oregon.
Before going up to the front door, I looked at my mother and said, "Wish me luck. How do I look?"
"Honey, just beautiful," she said proudly. "Don't be nervous. I know you'll be able to explain to the family how much you love taking care of children."
She was right. I wasn't there to interview as a deep-space physicist; I was there as a prospective nanny. I loved kids. And I knew how to take care of them. I even had a certificate to prove it.
A tall woman, about thirty-five and quite attractive, answered the door. She appeared to be about seven months pregnant. She introduced herself and showed me into the immaculate living room. The minute I sat down, a rat dog (the small, Chihuahua-esque kind that yip nonstop) came bounding into the room, yapping. I've never really been a dog person, and the little fleabags always seem to know it. Before I could say anything, the rodent ran over and fastened her small but powerful jaws around my ankle as if I were a fresh ham bone. Her teeth tore through my stockings and punctured my skin.
I winced and grabbed the little devil by the neck. Would strangling her cost me the job?
"Oh, Mimi, leave the poor girl alone," the woman said languidly. Why was she just sitting there, motionless? Her dog's teeth were embedded in my leg!
I squeezed harder on the pooch's neck. She finally let go, and I kind of flung her backward, head over heels onto the carpet.
This, of course, caused convulsions of near-epileptic proportions in her owner.
She jumped up, grabbed the little rat, and hugged it so close to her chest I thought she would suffocate the thing.
This was clearly not the job for me. I had been there a scant three minutes, but I actually stood to leave.
Suddenly the woman became apologetic. "I'm so sorry. Mimi can get a little aggressive with strangers."
As the dog trotted toward me again, she patted her hand at the air as if making a feeble effort to shoo it away.
"Are you all right?" she said in a half-sincere way. Was she talking to the dog or to me?
"Um, yes, I'm fine. There's only a little bit of blood. I'll be okay," I offered, blotting the wound with a Kleenex I found in my purse. But it hurt. A lot. I bit my lip. The rodent snarled incessantly.
"My husband is Jacques LaRiviere. I'm sure you've heard of him," she began, rolling her eyes and looking heavenward. "He's one of the top ten chefs in Los Angeles."
Yeah, sure, of course. Who hasn't heard of Jacques? I feigned a knowing nod. It wouldn't have mattered what culinary celebrity she was married to; at the time, I didn't even know who Wolfgang Puck was. I did know this top-ten stuff sounded a bit dubious. I doubted the contest was anything like our annual chili cook-off, where blue ribbons were awarded by the Cottage Grove mayor after he tasted everyone's homemade entries.
"As you can see"-she patted her stomach lovingly-"I'm expecting, so I will need you to take care of little Dominic, our three-year-old. I'm due in March, so of course then I will also expect you to handle Zachary."
Handle? Like a prize Pomeranian?
"And of course I will need you to do the cooking as well." Probably seeing the look of shock on my face, she added, "Don't worry about pleasing my husband. He's never satisfied with any meal he ever eats."
She wanted me to cook for one of the foremost chefs in Los Angeles? This woman must be out of her hormone-saturated mind. I couldn't figure out what would possess her to think that an eighteen-year-old girl could please one of the most discriminating palates in all of LA. Did she know that my previous cooking experience mostly consisted of making bologna boats?
I thought it best to sidestep that whole cooking topic, feebly starting to talk about my love for kids. Mrs. LaRiviere seemed to be dutifully recording my comments, and possibly even her own observations, on a notepad. Or maybe she was composing a letter to her doggie psychiatrist about Mimi's recent trauma. I couldn't tell.
When she was through, she stood up as the dog continued to jump and yip. "Can you let yourself out?" she said, looking at her watch. "I must make a phone call. I didn't realize how late it was."
"Yes, Mrs. LaRiviere, of course," I answered.
The house wasn't particularly large. The living area we had been sitting in was just down the hall from the front door. I gracefully got up to make my exit, the dog still nipping at my heels. I kicked at her in a mildly threatening manner.
By this time, it was noon and stifling outside. As I was about to close the door behind me, the little ankle-biter came bounding out across the front lawn, darting like an escaped convict who hadn't seen the light of day in forty years. Oh great. Mrs. Famous Chef was undoubtedly engrossed in her phone conversation. What if the dog got away, never to be found again? What if she threw her skittering little self in front of an approaching car? Mrs. LaRiviere would be beside herself with grief and would have her famous husband roast my head slowly over hot coals. I would never get a job in this town.
My ever-resourceful mother, seeing the panic on my face and immediately sensing the gravity of the situation, jumped out of the car and joined me in the chase. But sensible heels weren't meant for sprinting, and it took us quite a while to catch up with the four-legged inmate and herd her, in a manner of speaking, back down the street.
As I began to scurry across the lawn, stooping, cajoling, and shooing at the dog, Mrs. LaRiviere ran out the front door, screaming in a high, frantic voice, "Mimi! Mimi! Where is my Mimi?"
Excerpted from You'll Never Nanny in This Town Again by Suzanne Hansen Excerpted by permission.
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