An overly-eager artist being welcomed into the industry is taken on a bumpy ride as she learns life does not have as many sunny days as she thought. Within the process, she comes to learn that her tour guide is a lot more important to her than she e...
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July 1, 1986 Sheridan, Wyoming
I have a favorite dialogue sequence in the film. It's when Jerome starts, 'Tell me Mary, is it true that you're engaged?' Then, after I confirm my engagement status, he goes, 'Tsk, tsk, what a pity. Sometimes life can be so shitty.' It's the kind of statement that has just enough sprinkle of humor on top that you don't think about it too long. The truth is, life really can be so shitty but while it can be shitty... It can be just as nice. Life can be so nice sometimes.
Soaring on the highs of my life, I was blindly flying through what could have easily been a very shitty part... But it was nice. It was nice because I played my cards just right. If you look back at the premiere in Sheridan, you can see that I did everything just right. You can look back and see just how nice life was. It was in my face, my voice, my movements. This happiness was a contagious one too. My happiness seems to have been an infectious virus of the time because it was not only me. It was almost everyone around me. The exceptions of that almost made it beyond clear that they were not on the high I was on. They reminded me that sometimes life can be so shitty.
Mark stared out the window, mumbling under his breath in annoyance at the grass plains outside of our windows. "Out of all the places they could've chosen..." I glanced out of the window, genuinely in awe of how green the grass was. "Out of all the places."
"They choose fucking Sheridan, Wyoming. Wow," Wendy followed. She wasn't feeling it this morning and she refused to hide that.
Prince wasn't around. He had to make his grand entrance for a series of cameras sent from MTV. Truthfully, that was who was to blame for us landing in Sheridan. A woman won a contest. A contest I had no idea about until I was being flown from New York City to Sheridan on an expedited private flight full of the kind of millionaires and heiresses that you don't see in the news until they show up at a party thrown by the Kennedy family. The band was thrown on a business flight brought to them by a pretty nice airline. Free peanuts on the plane wasn't enough to keep them happy though.
Staring with Wendy, who was the second most annoyed, there was a budding agitation sprouting. Prince was being... Well, himself. Only, this time, his ways were seemingly detrimental. The failure of The Family brought forth the deluxe version of The Revolution. Wendy then had to share her solos with Eric, the stage with her sister, and her rhythmic guitar chords with Miko. Mark was another one unhappy. He was the most unhappy. The band's expansion pushed him to the back, something I'm sure he didn't see coming after Prince cut his solo mission short by persuading him back into the band.
It was like a child with a banana split. It was stacked and he was satisfied. That was the way things were... Him exploring different ice creams and topping, until he made a milkshake on the side and when the milkshake spilled, he poured the rest into his banana split. And so there it was. He had a pile of sugary goop in his bowl. He was a kid so he loved it! Everybody else? Boy, it was a complete nightmare brewing with his every stirring of the pot.
