I was talking with a new acquaintance this evening who told me that she used to work on the production team of a certain New York film director who is well known for his neurotic tendencies. She described how the producer and key members of the team were out-of-control sufferers from Obsessive/Compulsive Disorder. Working for them was mainly about making sure the food was lined up properly on the tray, that the salt was placed under the bed at night to ensure good luck, or – for one particular person – that any building was exited by exactly the same route through which it had been entered.
She told me that she had found the experience to be quite unpleasant, since these people did not seem to have the bandwidth to treat their assistants with decency – all of their energy was directed toward their particular OCD rituals.
My acquaintance wondered aloud whether this ability to exercise unbridled power was actually detrimental to the people who had it. Perhaps, she said, they would not have become so Obsessive/Compulsive if they had not been given free reign to indulge their OCD. She also wondered how people who have so little room for kindness could place themselves into such a vulnerable position as to rely on people who would eventually come to detest them. Then she said something curious, which kind of turned it around: “Always be nice to the waitress, because she has the power.”
This was a strangely resonant conversation for me because just last night I had finally seen Martin Scorcese’s superb film The Aviator – a 2004 biopic about the strange and tragic life of Howard Hughes. The film makes the case that Hughes’ power – the driving force that propelled him to become the world’s wealthiest man – was another side of the same OCD that ultimately destroyed him. It was his drive to perfection, a compulsive drive that ultimately consumed him and tore apart his psyche, which allowed him to apply his genius so effectively in so many areas.
By the way, if you ever rent the DVD, there is a brilliant and completely unexpected moment at 01:37 which (in typically sublime Scorcese fashion) visually sums up and explains the entire tragic connection between Hughes’ genius and his ultimate doom. It’s a moment unlike any other in the film, and it is also the only moment when Scorcese explicitly allows us inside the mind of Howard Hughes, and lets us see just how difficult it must have been for him to move among the world of ordinary mortals.
After having watched Scorcese’s vision of how much internal struggle could be required for Howard Hughes – the wealthiest man in the world – simply to eat a meal or open a door – activities most of us take for granted – I was struck by my acquaintance’s “waitress” comment. What is this power that the waitress supposedly has (even if she doesn’t want it)?
Trying to understand, I made the connection that a kind of learned helplessness can be a signifier of status in our society, and perhaps in all societies. We could eat far more cheaply (and often better) at home, and yet we go through the ritual of paying rather high prices to have strangers cook for us and serve us food. In a way, whether we consciously acknowledge it or not, the restaurant experience plays out a fantasy of upper-class entitlement: The high price we are charged pays for the rental of make-believe servants. While we are sitting at that table, we are in temporary metaphorical possession of fellow human beings. Within that proscribed space, these people exist to serve us.
So now I wonder, could this potentially be bad for us, this learned helplessness in restaurants and other places – if we allow ourselves to rely upon being served? Could we become slaves to a need to be waited upon – Eloi tended to by unwitting Morlocks – to the extent that we give up our ability act for ourselves?
I don’t think there is anything wrong with the kind of play-acting that we do when we go to restaurants. This is just a train of thought, probably brought on by a random downer of a conversation right after having watched The Aviator. But maybe it’s a good idea, every once in a while, to cook a meal at home.
I follow your train of thought up until the server in a restaurant…I do not see going out to eat as a hierarchy of power. As a writer and a loner, I go out to eat for the company and energy of the people working there. It gets me out of my vacuum and allows me to share it with a tiny part of the world.
And the servers always have great stories to tell, not because they are above me, but because they like me. They trust me with their stories. Most of them are artists themselves. We talk and exchange. They like to order for me and bring me new items that I might enjoy. They do that for people I bring with me to the restaurant too. It’s a fun exchange, (capitalist or not) but I just don’t see it as the server having the power, or that they’re hired servants.
It sounds like your friend was working for narcissistic assholes (And this happens a lot with Producers because many, not all, love POWER) who probably were abused when they were assistants and stupidly thought that their behavior was the way it was done everywhere, which is simply not true…
Your friend had the power of walking away from it and hopefully it didn’t do too much damage to her.
Every time I come upon a group of people like this, I run like crazy. This is a non-negotiable for me and I figured it out a very long time ago. It’s not just in the film business either. I hear about this dynamic in every business including and especially academia….Learned helplessness…People who simply cannot get out of their own way.
Oops, sorry, I clearly didn’t express it well. Apologies. My friend meant it the opposite way: She was identifying with the server in the restaurant – and the idea that people who dine in restaurants can temporarily become little OCD tyrants (sending the wine back, and so forth). We’ve all seen it happen.
My friend was identifying her own situation with that of the hard working waiter/waitress and pointing out that the person being ordered about also has power, of a different sort. As you point out, my friend had the power to walk away.
Of course there are restaurant diners like yourself Bernadette – I’ve seen you in action – who make things warm and friendly and lovely for the wait-staff. If everyone were like you, it would be a better world. 🙂
By the way, in my experience academia tends to vary by subject area. Computer graphics researchers tend to be very kind and generous with each other.
Oh Okay.
Yes it does vary from subject to subject in academia. But why? Is it really because of their fragile little egos? Is it a learned helplessness because of the subject involved? Unfortunately, I believe it’s nurture more than nature.
Correction. I did not mean that every academic is like this. But there are some academics that misuse their intellectual power over students the same way that your friend was misused by the Film Producer. And is it because of a fragile ego?