"We have speed!"
   "Speed!"
   "Slate it!"
   "Major Dad, episode thirty-one, 'The Banquet,' act two, scene one: Phone call from the Vice President. Take one. Quiet!"
   "In five, four, three, two... "
   A man wearing a headset, the stage manager, waved his hand.
   "Action!" the director shouted.
   I watched as Dan Quayle, sitting behind a replica of his own desk, stared past a replica of his own telephone to a cue-card man squatting beneath a camera. But Quayle didn't speak. He just stared.
   "Sir? Is there a problem?" the director asked, reasonably, after about twenty seconds.
   "I was waiting for the phone to ring."
   "The phone did ring, sir. In the script. We'll add the sound effects later."
   "Oh. Sorry."
   "No problem, sir. Let's try it again, please. Keep it rolling!""
   "We have speed!"
   "Speed!"
   "Slate it!"
   "Major Dad, episode thirty-one, 'The Banquet,' act two, scene one: Phone call from the Vice President. Take two. Quiet on the set, please!"
   "In five, four, three, two... "
   The stage manager waved his hand.
   Quayle paused, again.
   "Sir? Sir?"
   "I was waiting for 'Action!'" Quayle said, with the innocence of a seal pup.
   "Go after the stage manager's hand signal," the director calmly explained. "When he waves his hand, you go. Keep it rolling!"
   "What about the phone? Quayle asked.
   There was a pause.
   "We're out of film!"
   "Re-load!"
   "Break!"
   "We're on a five!"
   "We'll figure it out, sir, during the break," the director said, reassuringly.
   People started running every which way. Then Quayle signaled to me.
   "A cup of coffee, please?" He had me pegged as a gofer. Okay, fine, I thought. Let's have some fun!
   "Would you like lemon with that?" I asked. He gave me a weird look.
   "Lemon? In coffee?"
   "It's all the rage out here, sir."
   He thought for a moment—at least it looked like thinking—and then he nodded.
   "Okay—I'll give it a try."
   I panicked momentarily—I had no idea where the coffee machine was—but then Quayle took matters into his own hands.
   "Coffee with a twist of lemon," he requested of a young kid who wandered by. The kid wasn't sure he heard him correctly—but he certainly wasn't going to question the Vice President of the United States—so he dutifully went off to get the order. Probably a network vice president.
   "Places, everyone!"
   There was some scurrying about, Quayle's face was powdered down, and then—hardly able to contain himself—the cue card man held up a piece of cardboard cut in the shape of a telephone.
   "This will be the telephone ringing!" he yelled out, and Quayle nodded appreciatively.
   "We have speed!"
   "Speed!"
   "Slate it!"
   "Major Dad, episode thirty-one, 'The Banquet,' act two, scene one: Phone call from the Vice President. Take three. Quiet on the set, please!"
   "In five, four, three, two... "
   The stage manager waved his hand.
   "Action!"
   There was a moment of suspense when it seemed like Quayle was freezing up again—but then the cue card man waved the cardboard telephone, Quayle looked at it, nodded, and—
   "Cut! Sir—don't look at that telephone. Look at the real telephone."
   "The real one?"
   "The one on the desk. In front of you."
   Quayle looked curiously at the phone on the desk. "You mean, this works?"
   He picked up the receiver, listened, and shook his head.
   "It's a prop, sir, but it's supposed to be real," the director explained, calmly. The stage manager removed his headset and looked off in the distance, trying desperately not to laugh.
   "I thought you meant, like, a real phone," Quayle said. "Sorry."
   "No problem, sir. Let's try it again."
   "We have speed!"
   "Speed!"
   "Slate it!"
   "Major Dad, episode thirty-one, 'The Banquet,' act two, scene one: Phone call from the Vice President. Take four. Quiet on the set, please!"
   "In five, four, three, two... "
   The stage manager waved his hand.
   "Action!"
   The cue card man waved the cardboard telephone as subtly as possible. Quayle didn't look at it, picking up the "real" phone in front of him.
   "Let me speak to the Major, please. This is Dan Quayle... " He pretended to listen for a few seconds.
   "Hello, Mac? This is Dan Quayle. I just called to say how sorry I am that I can't attend your banquet. Marilyn and I will be traveling overseas, but believe me, if there's one place on earth I'd like to be, it's out at the camp with you marines... "
   He pretended to listen again. It was obvious he was still listening—I knew he was still listening, and the director knew he was still listening, and the stage manager and the cue card man and the cameraman and the production assistants and everyone else knew he was still listening—but the kid Quayle sent for coffee didn't know he was still listening, and he stumbled right into the shot.
   "Cut!" Now the director was losing it. "Who the hell is that?" he asked, hoping as soon as the words were out of his mouth that the kid wasn't Quayle's cousin, or nephew—or son!
   "It's my fault," Quayle said, nobly. "I asked him to get me some coffee."
   "We're on a five," the director muttered. Exasperated, he walked over and sat on the edge of the Vice President's desk. Quayle, in the meantime, was stirring his coffee—the coffee with the slice of lemon attached to the rim of the cup. I didn't know whether to run away or get closer. I got closer.
   "Mike, is it?" Quayle asked him.
   "That's right. Do I call you Mr. Vice President?"
   "Call me Dan."
   "Fine, Dan."
   "Sorry for the delays. That last thing was my fault—"
   "No problem, sir. We do twenty, thirty takes sometimes," he exaggerated wildly. "It's the way we do things out here, the name of the game. Besides, we'll protect you with cutaways and different angles and—"
   He stopped in mid-sentence as Quayle squeezed the lemon into his coffee.
   "Is that... coffee?"
   "Yup."
   With that, Quayle raised the cup to his lips, blew the steam away, sipped, and then—POW!!!—a perfect "spit take" right in the director's face! I mean, perfect. A classic!
   Isn't it ironic that the Vice President of the United States executes the perfect "spit take" on a TV sitcom and no one sees it because it happens during a break? Well, I find it ironic.