High On Arrival by Mackenzie Phillips Read Free Book Online Page B

carpet and took our seats in the theater. My dad gave me a couple Quaaludes and I popped them all at once. All I remember of that first viewing is the opening credits, which started before the ludes kicked in. As they rolled, my name came up on the screen. The people in front of us said, “Mackenzie Phillips, who’s that?” I practically had the same reaction—I’d been Laura Phillips my whole life.
    When I got the part in American Graffiti my manager, Pat McQueeney, whom I’d met through Fred Roos, didn’t like “Laura Phillips” and asked me what my middle name was. I told her it was Mackenzie. People have always thought I was named after Scott McKenzie, my dad’s lifelong friend and one of my favorite people on this planet. Scott sang Dad’s song “San Francisco (Be Sure To Wear Flowers In Your Hair)” to promote the Monterey Pop Festival, launching the Summer of Love. But the truth is that when I was born Scott McKenzie was still known as Philip Scott Blondheim. I was actually named after my great-grandmother on my mother’s side, Sarah Mackenzie. When I told Pat my middle name was Mackenzie, she said, “Oh my God, that’s it.”
    Now, as the people whose heads bobbled disruptively between my fourteen-year-old eyes and the screen wondered who Mackenzie Phillips was, Dad leaned forward and said, “You’ll see.” And after that the night is a blur. I was stoned off my ass. Maybe Dad felt guilty about the Quaaludes. He kept passing me little silver spoonfuls of coke to help me wake up.
    No one expected American Graffiti to be a huge success, but it was an instant classic. The critics loved it and it was nominated for multiple Academy Awards that year. I was suddenly frighteningly famous. I already had some level of recognition as John Phillips’s daughter, but after American Graffiti was released, I was a familiar face. And it wasn’t just my face that was familiar. Suddenly everyone also knew me by the name Mackenzie Phillips. I thought of Mackenzie as my stage name, and for a while I continued to think of myself as Laura. People would say, “I know who you are, you’re Mackenzie Phillips.” I’d say, “Yeah, I’m Mackenzie, but everybody calls me Laura.” But I’m so not a Laura. People were confused. It was too complicated. So I just decided, Fuck it, I’m Mack .
    I was unabashedly thrilled at my new stardom. A few days after I saw the movie with my parents, I went back for more. My cousins Patty and Nancy, a few of my friends from Highland Hall, and I hitchhiked to the Avco Cinema in Westwood to see it again. At the ticket booth I proudly announced, “I’m in it! I’m in the movie!” They let us all in for free. That was such a coup that we went back over and over again. We must have seen that movie thirty-five times. We’d be reciting all the lines of the movie and people would turn around to say “Would you kids shut up?” But then they’d see that it was me and smile. I guess if it was worth paying to see the rude, precocious kid in the movies, it was worth it to have the rude, precocious kid disrupting the show.
    When I wasn’t cutting school to watch myself on the big screen, I was back at Highland Hall. I’d left school to make American Graffiti, and then I’d spent the summer away. Now I was back and things were different. I was different. I’d been in Europe for a few months. The movie was out. I was famous. Highland Hall had a hippie vibe, but I was in the glitter scene, running around Hollywood, wearing dramatic makeup, and leading what seemed like a sophisticated life. At Highland Hall I had my first taste of how fame changes your regular life. I’d done something— it was just work, really, and had nothing to do with who I really was—but it changed how people saw me and dealt with me. There was an awkwardness, a hesitance. My friends—and family too—started treating me differently, like I had some new value or merit that I didn’t have before. It felt odd and