I just had a job interview... in a cemetery. And an ice cream parlor. And a car. Not in that order. The ice cream was actually first. There was ice-cream-eating while at the cemetery in the car. While being interviewed. My interview for the Letterman internship was a 3-hour multi-part interview in an office, where I interviewed with HR and then went around and interviewed with the heads of all the departments. I thought real job interviews would be similar to, if shorter than, that. Nope... not based on today....
After responding to the Playbill.com ad for a position as his Executive Assistant, I got a call from **** saying it just so happened he'd be in my area, and would I be available for an interview. (How often does a New York entertainment industry executive "just happen" to be around Bloomington, IN?) It sounded like he said something on the phone about being here because he wanted to look at cemeteries, but I thought I must have heard him wrong. (Nope! Didn't hear him wrong!)
So we set the location (not a building -- a corner of two streets), and when I got there and we figured out who each other was, he asked me to get in his black SUV. [Note from 2015 -- "Hey, I'm a stranger to you, so let's meet for this interview on the corner of two streets, and then you're going to get into my black SUV" sounds like a GREAT way to set up an interview and something I should definitely have just gone along with as I did. Very professional. Not at all sketchy. Yep, 2015 me is TOTALLY on board with my behavior here so far.... ] I was dressed in office appropriate attire... as I thought one did at job interviews to be an Executive Assistant.... His tee-shirt and shorts didn't quite match my professional dress. I was feeling very awkward and wondering if the interview was going to be in his car when he asked if I wanted ice cream. I said no thanks, and he insisted. [This scenario is SO not getting any sketchier. Middle-aged stranger asks 21-year-old co-ed to get in black SUV and then makes her eat ice cream. Yeah, so far just a normal professional interview. Definitely does not remind me of anything.] I didn't know what to say, so I let him buy me ice cream (he wanted to know my favorite flavor and if I preferred chocolate or vanilla...), wondering where this was going. He then asked if I could tell him how to get to a certain cemetery. [...21-year-old me clearly didn't watch horror films -- Middle-aged dude gets girl in black SUV, plies her with ice cream, and then DRIVES HER TO A CEMETERY -- Nope, nothing suspicious there.... At least I don't remember seeing a shovel in his backseat.] I responded that no, I wasn't familiar with any cemeteries, and I realized that was my first interview question (well, aside from my preference in ice cream flavors). He condescendingly asked, "Haven't you lived on campus here for a few years? You don't know the area? You can't give me directions around the town in which you live?" Feeling like I had done something wrong, I replied that if he had asked about a restaurant or a bank or the grocery store, I could give him directions, but I had no reason to ever go to a cemetery before [nor should I have right then, either]. So he pulled out a map, handed it to me, and asked if I could at least read a map. I said yes of course, opened it up, and wondered if I should actually direct him to the cemetery or to the mall so I could jump out and run [The MALL!! Choose the mall!]. He kept asking me how long until we got there [Dude, you're not a kid and I'm not your mom, and how should I know?], and somewhere along the way as I was trying to figure out what in the world was going on, he told me there was one particular grave he really wanted to see [Yeah -- mine, perhaps? Really... Should have gone with the mall option]. He asked me some other actual job-interview questions, most of which were insulting: I "look like an actress," so would I "take an assistant position seriously or be off auditioning?"; why is he "supposed to believe" that I want to work in film and television rather than theatre? (Why can't I want to work in both but take a first job in whichever I can get? I don't even understand that question. Why is it a problem if I'm passionate about theatre?)
We finally got there (it's not even in the town, so there is no reason I would know of its existence even if I drove all around Bloomington regularly), and he asked me to jump out and get a map of the graves, which I did [Girls in horror movies always overlook their opportunity to run for freedom... sigh], wondering if he was really looking for a particular grave or for an empty plot. [Empty plot. Duh.] I directed him towards the grave he wanted, he parked the car, I was very relieved that my door was unlocked, and he asked me to lead him to the tombstone. [So the main requirement of his assistant is that she be able to direct him to graves. Mmhmm, that seems normal.] I think somewhere along the line he told me why he was so interested in this tombstone, but I wasn't really paying attention; I was looking around to see if there were other people nearby. [Good girl!] There were. That made me happy.
He was telling some history story about either the cemetery or the dead guy under the tombstone, and I think I was pretty obviously not interested, and certainly not engaging, trying to keep this as short as possible so we could get back to an area where the majority of the people weren't underground.... Before too long, he got back in, I directed him back to campus, he said I was too young to be his executive assistant (because I aged backwards during the interview? How old did he THINK I was? My cover letter said I'd be graduating this summer), but that I should call him when I got to the city and I could intern for him. Then he said he enjoyed getting ice cream with me (ice cream I didn't want in the first place), and I held my breath wondering if the car door would really be unlocked or not. It was, and I got out.
And that was my first job interview.
I consider this first job interview to be a success, both because I lived through it and didn't wind up calling that cemetery home or digging any graves, and because I somehow actually got offered an internship through it. And most of all, because I knew enough not to take him up on that offer. Instead, my first week here I got an awesome job as a production assistant on a new musical with the fabulous Eartha Kitt. The job interview for that one did not involve cemeteries, ice cream, or black SUVs.
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