Confessions Of An Attention Whore

“You’ve got big dreams. You want fame. Well, fame costs. And right here is where you start paying: in sweat.”

— Lydia Grant (Debbie Allen), Fame

That Debbie Allen, she doesn’t know the half of it! If only my dreams of stardom required nothing more than limber hips, a sassy headband and the ability to disco-jazz dance on a lunchroom table. But no. The indignities and humiliations I have suffered during my long slow crawl up the ladder of this business we call show — why, the stress of it is making me look far older than my actual age of 27.

I’m not just referring to the insolent comments about me on YouTube (“an embarrassment to the gay community!”), or the many, many ‘auditions’ I’ve had to give in the backseats of late model Toyota Corollas (thank God for Purell!) Nor do I refer to working the red carpet as an interviewer and being harangued by vicious, bulimic PR girls (who all seemed to be Ashley). And it isn’t the arduous, time consuming process of creating my various videos, short films and web series; I am, after all, leaving behind a flawless legacy of cutting edge comedy, social documentation, and high art that will be celebrated long after I leave this Earth.

No. The hitch is getting people to pay attention to this bullshit right now, while I’m still alive.

Look, I don’t want to say I’m bitter, but this morning I actually pissed lemonade. Bitterness is like spandex, it doesn’t look good on anyone. But goddamnit, my videos should have a much larger audience; the only thing that’s ‘gone viral’ for me lately is my herpes. At first I thought, “Hmm, maybe it’s because I’m Jewish — we all know that show biz hates Jews!” It must be my appearance. OK, maybe the camera doesn’t love me, but we did have a one night stand. Perhaps I need a new sobriquet — I considered dropping ‘Mike Diamond’ and adopting a stage name: ‘Awesome Wells’ has a ring to it, or perhaps ‘Marshall Arts’? Or I could go the drag route and call myself ‘Glandular Basset’ ‘Tawny Danza’ or ‘Tequila Mockingbird.’

Instead, I did what any self respecting industry climber would do; I created a Grindr profile, to reach out to my homosexual fan base.

If Madonna ‘I’ve Fallen And I Get Up’ Ciccone can chat on Grindr to pimp out her new album Rebel Heart, then I can certainly utilize it to promote my brand. Oh yes, I did it. My Grindr profile name is Mike Diamond, I use my actual photo, and my description reads: “Hand model. Rodeo Clown. Media Whore. Looking for fans, groupies, sycophants, stalkers. Say hi!”

The responses were swift, and mildly disturbing. Not being very experienced with hook-up apps, I was shocked to discover that modern young homos are almost exclusively monosyllabic: “yo,” “hey,” “sup” and “looking?” were about as complex as most of the messages got.

One fine fellow asked me if I was into ‘skin to skin.’ Bareback? Honey please, I dont even wanna make eye contact! Somebody calling himself ‘MascJockTop’ (who, btw, was totally serving ‘power bottom face’ in his photo) asked if I was ‘Mike Diamond, the Smell Good Plumber.” ‘CuddleBug’ had this to say: “Saw your latest video, gotta say you’ve done better. Funny, but weak.”  I was very touched by ‘BoneSmoker’: “Mike! OMG you’re still around? I haven’t heard anything about you in like 3 years!”

My standard response to all and sundry was ‘Oh honey! LOL!’. I then chucked my Samsung GalaxyS6 across the room of the Gloria Swanson bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel, and collapsed onto the floor, crying hot, bitter tears.

Oh, what was the point? I was getting nowhere. To hell with this endless quest for approval and attention. To hell with fame, to hell with my dreams. Screw it. What good are dreams anyway? Just last night I dreamed I was a bowling ball. I think it stems from my desire to have an Italian car mechanic’s fingers inside me.

Watch Almost Fame-ish below.