AUGUST 9, 2007
BROKEN RULES...BROKEN BACK

What can I say?

This episode was a joy to work on...oh, and excruciatingly painful.

After all, it's not every day they tell you your director is going to be Otter from Animal House (joy), and then later, while brushing your teeth one night down in Miami, you cough and slip a disk in your back (for the record? excruciating).

First, Tim Matheson is one of the most prepared, likeable, and talented directors with which I've had the privilege of working – and I'm not just saying that because he took me out to dinner one night and force-fed me alligator. Down-to-earth, humble, and nice – do you know how hard it is to find nice in Hollywood? Like trying to find leather pants at a PETA convention – no matter how many people came up for Tim's autograph or stopped by to say they were fans, whether we were in the middle of a location scout or the aforementioned gator dinner. Never impatient, always gracious – it was this I noticed especially, on the morning he found me struggling my way out of a cab, bent over like the Hunchback of Notre Dame. Or at least, I think I remember noticing this about him, then. I'd had some Dilaudid by that point, so I can't be sure.

It had started the night before, only the second day of prep – 11 p.m., to be exact – when I got a little toothpaste in the back of my throat (you know how you do), coughed, and then felt something in my back just go, immediately dropping me to my knees on the bathroom floor, unable to stand upright. It was a pain like I'd never felt before – sharp, sick, and completely incapacitating. After twenty minutes on the tile, I finally managed to crawl to my hotel bed, and even then I moaned it out for four more hours before I finally gave in – "Okay, Mere, yep: I think your spine squeezed out a part of itself" – and called a cab to the ER, then crawled downstairs to the hotel lobby.

Humiliatingly, I had to ride in the back of the cab on all fours. Even more humiliatingly, the bellman had to put my shoes on for me before I could do this. The rest of the ER visit is cloudy; there were doctors and nurses and pills and shots and finally, around 5, a couple hours of blissful unconsciousness. When at last they roused me and packed me back into a cab, I arrived at the hotel to find the locations van idling in the driveway, waiting for me, with Tim in the front seat no doubt wondering "where the hell that flaky writer chick" was. But when he saw me take a few shuffling steps toward them (which, thanks to all the pills and shots, could not possibly have been in a straight line), he was immediately out of the passenger-side door, demanding I head upstairs to my room, insisting that I forget everything else, it was handled – and hey, you gonna argue with the Vice President of West Wing?

In fact, everyone on the production side of Burn Notice was extremely solicitous and caring. Along with thanking Tim, I'd like to take this rare opportunity to publicly thank the entire cast and crew, especially Simi Wein, our Production Coordinator – who sent over a care package of food, knowing I couldn't leave bed for two days – Carlos Vega (for his multiple trips), Javier Arnesto of Transportation, Craig Siebels (Art Director), our tiny little Hair Stylist Couqui Collazo, Terry Miller (Producer), and Mama EK Keratsis (Production Supervisor).

In the end, I returned to work two days later, still looking like an allen wrench – but comforted by the knowledge that even though my back hurt, these guys had it.