Jesus, Mary, and Joe Jonas
A journey into Reality L.A., Hollywood’s hippest evangelical church
Listen to a Q&A with Jonathan on Medium Playback by pressing play on the audio player above.
If ever you wish to witness the sort of existential panic that Hollywood can inflict upon its denizens, I suggest attending the birthday party of a former child star. Last winter, I found myself at such an event in the Hollywood Hills. It was intimate, populated with the usual species indigenous to such occasions: actors, screenwriters, directors, musicians, models and hangers-on.
“The movie fell apart,” said the actress, as she held court in front of a crackling fire pit on her patio. This particular film was supposed to be an opportunity for her to shed the stigma of the “child star” label. But as projects (and people) in Hollywood so often do, it collapsed. Existential crises are about as common as spray tans in Los Angeles.
As the city twinkled behind the actress that evening, her guests offered advice gleaned from their own experiences of rejection in Hollywood: It wasn’t meant to be. Something else will come along. Things like this take time. Then someone offered this: Have you prayed about this?