Hurricane Ophelia, Coke Advice, and #MeToo
Nappoholics Anonymous is a weekly column featuring twelve random thoughts by actor Tony Nappo. Some are funny, some are poignant, some bother him, and some make him weep from sadness while others make him weep for joy. Here are his thoughts: unfiltered, uncensored, and only occasionally unsafe for work.
1. Sage words, this week, from Woody Allen: Never judge a man until you’ve harassed a mile in his shoes.
2. Featured Artist of the Week
Had the good fortune to spend last week in a room full of super-gifted actors and this guy, Jack Nicholsen, was one of them. Solid actor and musician, beautiful singer, intelligent and thoughtful man who exudes a very positive energy wherever he goes. But why I chose to feature him is his laugh. It’s so pure and comes from deep within his core, and he even makes a distinctly identifiable “ha” sound, which is rare.
So, if you seem him around, maybe give him a tickle.
3. The next hurricane headed for the Caribbean has been named Ophelia. Now, I’m no hurricane naming expert, but Ophelia? Isn’t that just kinda ASKING for the worst possible ending?
4. I’m not proud of it but, when I was younger, I was part of this Dove soap campaign that only ran in Italy.
5. Saw an episode of that show Young Sheldon. It’s exactly like The Wonder Years except that it really fucking sucks.
6.
7. Maybe it’s a bit early in the season to be thinking of the Leafs winning the Cup, but this week I found myself wondering if there is any possible way we can somehow lose Bill Barilko again and find him in and around May or June. Just in case.
8. Best piece of advice I ever got from a beverage.
9. I’m not saying that the Equity contract I recently filled out was outdated. But the line asking for my fucking fax machine number certainly did.
10. Caught half an episode of the new Will & Grace. I couldn’t help but wonder which would be the higher dollar figure: the money spent on makeup for a full season of this show or all the money that KISS has spent on makeup in their entire career.
11. I, too, take Brendan Gall’s pledge.
12. Reading all the #metoo posts broke my fucking heart, but that’s just too fucking bad for my heart, isn’t it? I didn’t have to personally live through any of it. I didn’t have to continue to live with it or feel any shame or self-blame connected to it. And I didn’t have to live with being ignored or dismissed when I had the courage to expose it. Caring about those who did have to go through any of these experiences is the very least my fucking heart can and should do.
As a younger actor, I constantly flirted with and hit on women. Constantly. There was some hole deep inside of me that needed to be filled with their attention and needed to be wanted by them. It was never about power. It was never about control. It was about need. I never felt attractive enough or cool enough or anything enough growing up and, as I aged, I found my self-worth, to a large degree, in how many women I could sleep with. There was some belief instilled in me early on that the more women I could sleep with, the more of a man I would be. I wasn’t always honest. I wasn’t always faithful. I know that I hurt people. Eventually, I was the guy who women warned each other about. To be clear, I never assaulted anyone. I never wanted anyone who didn’t want me, but still. I was not a good guy to women. As I grew older, I began to see how pathetic men like I were. How incomplete we were. How little we really had to offer anyone or the world. And I started to try to be better because I didn’t feel good about who I was or how I was viewed or who I was clearly going to end up being in the end. It was a very long road and involved many, many slips and mistakes, some I will regret for the rest of my life.
It’s really obvious that harassment and assault and rape are wrong. I’m not talking about that here, really. I’m talking about a way of viewing and using women for one’s emotional and psychological needs that is not respectful and not right. It is shameful. I’m talking about objectifying women. Plain and simply. I’m talking about being a willing participant in the accepted sexism that goes on around us daily because it benefits us to do so. I’m trying to talk, ultimately, about the possibility of undoing the idea (in the heads of most but not all men) that women are there to be conquered or collected to feed the desperately weak egos of empty men. And I know that it is possible because I have done it. The final straw came when I hurt someone that I had loved more than anyone I had ever known.
I’ll be fifty years old in February and I am happy with who I am now. I don’t even flirt anymore at all—either at work or in life. I am a father now. I am a veteran actor with this column as a platform, someone who can be an example in an industry where women are mistreated and used and abused regularly. I am sincerely sorry to those people that I have misled and hurt and disappointed. You didn’t deserve that. This wasn’t an easy thing to write. But I felt like I owed it to the women I hurt who may be viewing my support as insincere or hypocritical or self-serving. And also to those of you who follow this column and support it. I’m pretty aware of how “liked” I am, in general, and how I’m thought of as a no-bullshit guy or a fun guy or whatever the fuck it is I am thought of, but I’d rather those thoughts be based on my entire truth than just the selected highlights.
Thanks for hearing me out.
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Tony Nappo
Tony is Italian, he’s from Scarborough, he’s an actor, he’s a father, he’s a really good house painter, and he doesn’t believe that most things matter, ultimately, at all.
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