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Authors: Ben Elton

BOOK: Chart Throb
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Rodney wanted to say no. He
so
wanted to tell Calvin to stuff it. But he knew what Calvin would do. Calvin would do what he always did when the people he chose to work with tried to say no, or asked for too much money. He’d dump them. Where were the judges who had worked with Calvin on the shows that had preceded
Chart Throb, Pop Goes the Minor Celebrity
and
Rock ’n’ Roll Cooks
? Gone, that was where, back to radio or print. What had happened to the presenters who had preceded Keely? Dumped, that was what, hosting reality TV round-up shows on digital channels.
‘All right,’ said Rodney, attempting to look like he was enjoying the gag. ‘Let’s do it.’
‘Top man!’ Calvin replied. ‘Trent, take us through the storyboarding. No, Emma, you’re reading the Blinger, you tell us.’
And so once more Emma found herself straining to see round the toilet door and finding her eyes momentarily met by Calvin’s. He smiled a special little smile and nodded to her to proceed.
‘This is scheduled for episode three,’ said Emma. ‘You’ve all left Manchester and Beryl is angry because she thinks you’ve been mean to the little sixteen-year-old.’
‘Yes, yes, we’ve been through that, Emma,’ said Trent rather testily, perhaps a little put out that Calvin was appearing to favour his junior colleague. ‘Aviation fuel isn’t cheap, you know.’
‘Right,’ Emma replied hurriedly, glancing down at her storyboard notes. ‘After that Rodney and Calvin exchange amused but guilty glances . . .’
‘Shot that as well. Emma, can we
please
cut to the chase,’ Trent snapped.
Once more Emma seemed confused and risked a glance at Calvin, a glance that could only be interpreted as an appeal for his support. Then her face hardened, as if she was angry with herself for being so weak. If she had been hoping for sympathy she would have been disappointed, for Calvin merely raised a questioning eyebrow.
‘Well, then Rodney’s phone rings,’ she said hurriedly. ‘He answers it and when Calvin and Beryl hear him greet the Blinger they crack up laughing . . .’
‘Ah!’ Rodney butted in eagerly. ‘How can we do that? We don’t know her name yet.’
Once more Emma checked her notes.
‘Calvin will have called her Tina Lite at the audition and that’s how she’ll introduce herself.’
‘You’re going to coach her?’
‘Well, yes . . . obviously,’ Emma replied, nervous at having to spoonfeed one of the famous judges. ‘We always do.’
‘Can we
please
get on with this?’ Beryl shouted. ‘I have a flight scheduled back to LA tonight. My stepdaughter is in
rehab
and dealing with enormous new breasts, if anybody cares.’
And so the fiction was arranged. Emma handed Rodney the mobile phone that was to double as his and dialled the number. It rang and Rodney was about to pick it up, but then he hesitated.
‘Hang on. I shouldn’t have my phone on, should I? I mean I’m on a plane, that’s irresponsible . . . Come to think of it,
you
shouldn’t have your phone on now. We might crash.’
‘Please, Rodney,’ Calvin said. ‘I thought you wanted to be tougher on this series? Isn’t keeping your phone on during a flight being tough? Playing by your own rules?’
‘You think it would make me look tough?’
‘Of course, the naughty boy, the rule breaker.’
‘Well, all right then . . . But I don’t want to actually do it . . . I mean, I don’t mind
pretending
my phone rings but I don’t want it to actually ring. It’s dangerous.’
‘You want Emma to turn off her phone and speak the ring?’
‘Yes, of course. These rules are made for a purpose. Don’t you listen to the safety announcements? Mobile phones may interfere with the aircraft’s navigation system.’
‘No, no. You’re absolutely right,’ Calvin replied. ‘Emma, please speak the ring.’
Just then Beryl’s mobile phone rang.
‘I have to take this, it’s my US agent.’
‘Beryl, it’s
dangerous
.’
‘Fuck off, Rodney.’
For the next few minutes everyone was forced to sit through Beryl’s half of a discussion regarding the timing of the new season of
The Blenheims
, which Beryl was anxious to postpone because she was planning further surgery on the clitoris that she was having built out of the remains of her penis.
‘And tell them to put some fucking thinner in the Botox,’ she ordered. ‘My face hasn’t fucking
moved
since the last injections.’
When the conversation was finally over the team went back to work.
‘Ring ring. Ring ring,’ said Emma.
Rodney feigned surprise.
‘Should have turned this off, I suppose,’ he said, playing his role. ‘But what the hell, I make my own rules. Live fast and leave a beautiful corpse, eh?’
‘
Ring ring. Ring ring
,’ Emma repeated insistently, knowing full well there would be no time to use Rodney’s part-building in the final edit.
Rodney pretended to answer his phone.
‘Hello?’
‘Hello, is that Rodney Root?’ Emma enquired from inside the toilet cubicle, keeping her voice as flat and toneless as possible so as to make it clear that she was not attempting in any way to adopt a character.
‘Yes, this is Rodney.’
‘It’s Tina Lite here, darling. Ha ha. Ha ha. Calvin told me to call. Ha ha.’
‘Oh, hello there, Tina Lite,’ Rodney replied and Calvin and Beryl both pretended to splutter with laughter. Trent had wanted them both to choke on their drinks but Beryl feared for her lip gloss so only Calvin actually spat water.
‘What can I do for you?’ Rodney enquired, improvising gamely.
‘Well, darling, ha ha. Ha ha,’ Emma replied woodenly. ‘Maybe you should think about what
I
can do for
you
, ha ha. Ha ha. Because if you make me a star like you said you would, you gonna find out! That’s for sure! Ha ha. Ha ha!’
‘Well now, listen, Tina, it’s lovely to speak to you. I have to rush now, thanks for calling. Bye.’ Rodney pretended to hang up his phone.
‘There,’ said Calvin, staying in the scene. ‘You
said
keeping your phone on during a flight was dangerous!’
‘Great punchline, Calvin!’ Trent gushed. ‘Everybody covered?’
When all departments had agreed the material was in the bag they moved on. Beryl disappeared behind a coat once more to change her costume, and there was a new shirt each for the men. They moved seats, they stared moodily at each other, they stared moodily out of the window and they all sat together to show what great mates they really were.
Finally Trent and Emma had no more shots left on their storyboard lists.
‘That’s a wrap, guvnor,’ Trent announced.
‘Thank fuck for that,’ said Beryl. ‘Can this thing take me straight to Heathrow?’
‘Just one more shot,’ Calvin insisted. ‘A new one.’
‘What’s that, chief?’ Trent enquired.
‘Leaving Glasgow. Rodney sitting alone.’
‘Fine, chief,’ Trent replied. ‘Any storyline? Any attitude?’
‘It doesn’t matter. Let’s just take the shot.’
Rodney duly sat in the seat that Emma’s storyboard said was his for leaving Glasgow and the camera was pointed at him.
‘Right,’ said Calvin. ‘So, Rodney, we want you a little bit tense, a little bit shocked, OK?’
Rodney knew exactly what he was supposed to be shocked about.
‘Calvin,’ he said, trying to sound unconcerned, ‘you know what, mate? I’ve been thinking about this one and I’m not sure it’s such a great idea.’
‘Look, we may not even use it, mate. I just want to be covered.’
‘What’s all this about?’ Beryl asked rudely. ‘I thought we were finished?’
‘It’s just a wicked little thought of Calvin’s,’ said Rodney, still trying to make light of it but clearly slightly worried. ‘He wants to bring Iona back.’
‘No!’ Beryl gasped. ‘Not Iona of the awful Shetland Mist,
who you fucked
?’
‘Yes, although I thought they were . . .’
‘And
having
fucked her you then fucked off!’
‘Well, our relationship ended by mutual . . .’
‘The ones you publicly prophesied would be big stars and that you would
make it so
?’
‘Yes, well, I . . .’
Beryl roared with laughter. ‘Oh, this is
brilliant
, Calvin. One of your best yet.’
‘I must say I thought it had potential,’ Calvin agreed, smiling.
‘Potential! It’s better than that. Come on, Rodney, you dug yourself into this one. Leaving aside the fact that you shagged the ass off that poor little Scottish Minger then dumped her, you
said
you’d make her crap band into stars and you didn’t. You’re
always
saying some zero or other could be a star and they
never
are. It’s about time you explained yourself.’
Rodney sat, biting his lip, his eyes half furious, half confused.
Calvin winked at the cameraman, who understood exactly what was expected of him and swung his lens round to cover Rodney.
‘Got it?’ Calvin enquired quietly.
‘Got it,’ the cameraman replied.
‘OK, Trent,’ said Calvin. ‘That’s a wrap, let’s get Beryl to Heathrow.’
Rodney was surprised. ‘Aren’t we going to take the shot then?’ he asked, relieved.
‘No, don’t worry about it.’
Who’s That Girl?
Trent accompanied Calvin back to London in Calvin’s huge Rolls-Royce. Driving through the car park they passed the coach upon which Emma was about to embark with the rest of the crew. She was standing by its front door, struggling with a large bag containing the various files from which she had been working, her broken glasses perched on her nose. There was a goodish breeze blowing and it filled out her hair most attractively.
‘That girl,’ Calvin said, staring at her through the blacked-out window. ‘The blonde one who was stuck in the toilet on the plane. I remember her from the last series. She did well, didn’t she?’
‘Yo, boss,’ Trent replied. ‘She’s a good kid. Got some prospects into the finals. We made her a senior.’
As the car passed, Calvin eyed her in silence. He did not know why he had asked about Emma; he employed any number of pretty girls and he never asked about any of them. Emma was not even his type. Far too short. His soon-to-be-ex wife was six foot four.
‘Her name’s Emma,’ Trent continued after a pause. ‘Emma Lee-Murray. Still happy with her? Did she fuck up today? Anything you want me to say?’
‘No. Nothing. Forget it.’
He remembered her clearly now. She had come to his attention towards the end of the previous season, working on the studio finals. Very little had passed between them but he did remember that he had noticed her. She was very . . . very . . .
Sitting back in his car Calvin wondered what she
had
been. Why had he noticed her then? Why was he thinking about her now? What was she very . . . ?
Was the word ‘nice’?
Calvin rather thought that it was. The girl was nice.
He had noticed her being nice to the crew. He had noticed her being nice to the contestants. Not professionally nice. Not ‘I need you to do what I tell you so I’m going to be nice’ nice, but genuinely nice. God knows, he had even noticed her being nice to the studio audience and that was a hard thing to do in the complex mayhem of a finals night when five hundred lunatics had been whipped up into a gladiatorial frenzy.
She had even been nice to him in a funny sort of way.
Not that there had been many opportunities for pleasantries between the busiest and most successful man in show business and one of his army of employees, but nonetheless he remembered that he had felt her warmth. She was honest, which he liked, and her smile was real.
Yes, he had certainly noticed her. And now he had noticed her again.
Funny, that. He had not given her a thought in the intervening nine months. How could he? He had made an entire series of
Chart Throb USA
while also developing any number of new additions to his worldwide entertainment empire. And he had got married. Yet here he was, noticing her again.
Of course she
was
pretty in a small, cute-ish sort of way. But definitely not his type.
Not his type at all. She was too . . . nice.
Birmingham
‘It’s show two and the search has taken our intrepid judges to Birmingham, where enormous crowds of hopefuls have gathered.’
Whatever Keely might have claimed in her breathless introduction to episode two, on the day on which the enormous crowds had gathered in Birmingham our three intrepid judges were nowhere near that city. It would
look
like they had been in Birmingham on the same day as the crowds of hopefuls because the footage taken of that crowd, when broadcast, would be preceded by the footage taken in the private jet of Calvin, Beryl and Rodney looking moody high over RAF Brize Norton.

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