What’s it like to be on call 24/7 as the personal assistant for Memphis hip-hop titans Three 6 Mafia? Blender investigates.
"Careful, man!” says Juicy J, as his overstuffed duffel bag goes tumbling to the floor. “I got a fuck doll in there!”
It’s Sunday night at the JFK Airport baggage claim, and my workday is just beginning. In the hopes of getting an up-close, unvarnished look at life on hip-hop’s A-list,
Blender has embedded me as Three 6 Mafia’s personal assistant. For the next 36 hours I will be at the Memphis rap duo’s beck and call—shadowing their every move, attending to their every requirement, serving as their Farnsworth, their Turtle and their Grizz and Dot Com all rolled into one. Blunts will be rolled. Sizzurp will be poured. Ho’s, with any luck, will be procured.
But right now things are off to a rocky start. First came the incident with Juicy’s bag. Then I mistake an old lady’s suitcase for DJ Paul’s and almost abscond with it. (Sorry, Louise Rosenfeld of Brooklyn, New York.) While rectifying the error, I spot Paul waiting in line to buy—
sigh—his own beef jerky. It already feels like failure.
The truth is, I’m a little nervous. Three 6 Mafia got their start in 1991 as horror-loving hooligans who rhymed about Lucifer and the occult. Though they’re now well into their 30s, avowed Christians and even Oscar winners (for “It’s Hard Out Here for a Pimp,” from
Hustle & Flow), they still have a reputation as class-A troublemakers. They once made one of the
Jackass guys eat a plate of horse shit. Another time, while filming an MTV reality show, they got booted from their L.A. mansion because one of their hangers-on peed on a neighbor’s lawn. (The neighbor happened to be Jennifer Love Hewitt.) Who knows what fresh humiliations await?
“Horse shit?” scoffs DJ Paul. “Man, you going to
jail tonight!”
The day before my servitude starts, I place a call to Dionne Mahaffey-Muhammad, the founder and CEO of Celebrity Personal Assistants Inc. CPAI bills itself as “the premiere consulting firm and preferred partner to celebrities, athletes, executives [and] politicians.” So what advice would Mahaffey-Muhammad give to an untested greenhorn who’s never even set foot on a red carpet?
“First of all, it’s not banker’s hours,” she says. “You’re going to be on the clock 24/7. You have to be flexible. Second, celebrities have very dynamic lifestyles. You have to adapt—anticipate their every whim. Understand where the gaps are and be ready to fill them. Always remain professional. Remember, you’re not their friend—be cordial, but don’t forget you’re there to serve. Listen closely. Take lots of notes. Never violate their confidentiality. And most importantly, you
have to be organized. Do you have a BlackBerry?”
Er … no … “A datebook?”
Uh-uh. “Basic organizational skills?”
Definitely not.
Mahaffey-Muhammad is quiet for a minute. “I think you might be in trouble.”
The first real test comes Sunday evening, when Juicy calls with a mission. The guys want mimosas in the morning, so I’m tasked with tracking down fresh-squeezed orange juice and two bottles of champagne—“Cristal,” Juicy says. Seeing as it’s nearly midnight on a Sunday, this proves difficult. The liquor stores have long since closed, and the bars aren’t very keen on selling booze to go. The first two turn me down flat; the third accuses me of being a cop. Finally I decide to play the fame card. “You know the rappers Three 6 Mafia?” I ask bartender No. 4. “They’re having a party tonight, and they really need some champagne.”