Costars (New York City Bad Boy Romance) (2 page)

“The commoners?” I ask.

This is the most surreal moment of my life.
I have no idea how to take him. He can’t really be this conceited, can he?

“You know,” he says, “this is going to be
my sixth Academy Award.”

“What is?” I ask.

“This film,” he answers, “the one we just
started shooting.”

“Are you actually going for the Babe Ruth
thing?” I ask. “You’re trying to call your award?”

“I’d almost say yes to that,” he says,
“only, I object to the word ‘try.’ I’m not
trying
to call anything. I’m simply stating a fact. I’ve read hundreds of scripts and
I’ve done dozens of movies. Trust me. They’d need to screw this up pretty
monumentally for me not to get the Oscar nod. Hey, if you play your cards
right, there might be a Golden Globe or something in it for you, too.”

“Got it,” I tell him.

“Got what?” he asks.

“I was trying to figure out whether you’re
just doing some kind of shtick or if you’re actually this full of yourself. From
everything I’ve seen, the latter is pretty clearly the case and I’m just trying
to keep the stiff upper lip and not mourn the person I thought you were when I
was growing up. That is, until you’re gone and out of my trailer,” I tell him.

“Wow, dramatic,” he says. “Anyway, just
wanted to pop by and offer my services.”

“I don’t think I’ll be requiring them,” I
tell him, “but thank you for the thought.”

“Not a problem,” he says. “It’s my duty as
your mentor.”

“Mentor?” I ask. “When did this happen?”

“The moment we both signed on to play
these parts,” he says. “This is your—sorry, but this is your first real film
and you’re working with real people top to bottom. I know how that can be
intimidating to a new actor, and I think I might be able to help you get
through the initial growing pains with a bit more ease.”

“How admirable,” I tell him. “Your
altruism is truly touching and not in the least bit condescending and
offensive.”

“I’m glad you see it for what it is,” he
says, ignoring my sarcasm. “Now, I should let you get to whatever kind of
voodoo it is that you do as a trailer ritual. Just do me a favor and don’t tell
me if you make any wax dolls of me. I mean, do what you want, but I don’t want
to hear about it. That stuff
skeeves
me right the
hell out.”

“What are you even talking about?” I ask.

“Never mind,” he says. “Keep your secrets.
I’m off to talk to a man about something else.”

“I think unconventional might be too mild
a word,” I tell him.

“Think whatever you like,” he says. “Mark my
words, though. Before filming is wrapped, you are going to come to me for my
sage advice. You’re going to say, ‘Mr. Jones—Damian, you were right. This is a
big, scary world and I was wrong to so casually dismiss your kind offers of
assistance.’ I’m sure you’ll be able to convince me. I just wish we could get
to the part where you appreciate me for the supernatural gem that I really am
and skip all this other nonsense.”

I’ve been so busy trying to ignore the
oozing cesspool issuing from Damian’s mouth that I didn’t notice the door to
the trailer open.

“Emma, they’re ready for you,” Lane says.

“Thanks, Lane,” I answer with a healthy
dose of gratitude.

“Make me look good,” Damian says as I get
up and walk past him out of the trailer.

What a self-important prick.

Lane walks with me toward the set. I ask him,
“Is that guy really as pompous as he comes off?”

“No,” Lane answers. “He’s not really that
pompous. He just likes to mess with new people he thinks may be, in some way,
intimidated by his fame. He thinks that by giving them a bad impression that
confirms their worst fears about him, he can start anew from zero and do a
better job showing them how he’s not like that. I guess he thinks that coming
off like an ass makes him approachable or something, although I can’t imagine
that really working. Of course, the fact that he sees people as playthings
which he feels the need to personally inform is pretty damn pompous, so I guess
the answer to your question is yes.”

“You’re wonderful company, you know that?”
I ask. “Most people would just give a quick answer and be done, but you choose
the less taken road of answering just about everything but what’s been asked.”

“I answered,” he says.

“Not in a helpful way,” I tell him.

From here it’s wardrobe. From wardrobe, it’s
makeup. From makeup, it’s to the set for my next twenty-second scene.

Ah, the life of a movie star is a wondrous
thing, indeed.

*
                   
*
                   
*

Everything’s going fine. I’m nailing my
lines and I’m solid on the acting. Really, I should be feeling pretty good
about myself right now.

That’s what I’m thinking right up until
it’s time for my first scene with Damian.

When he’s not in my trailer acting like
he’s the secret and mystical key to an aspiring young actor’s dreams and
ambitions, apparently he’s on the set, arguing with the director and basically
anyone else that strays too close to ground zero.

It used to be I was waiting for lighting
or my makeup artist. Now I have to wait until there’s nothing even close to the
set that doesn’t meet with Damian Jones’s odd and often contradictory
standards.

After he’s finished a particularly
nonsensical tirade regarding the reflection off one of the framed pictures
hanging on the wall, he takes a moment to pace and I’m just trying to stay as
far away from him as I can.

Unfortunately, that’s become rather
difficult as he’s now walking right toward me.

I turn to leave, but am nearly run over by
one of the prop guys.

If this really is all an act on Damian’s
part, he’s a more skilled thespian than anyone I’ve ever known. He’s absolutely
nailing the role of irritating douchebag.

“Emma,” he says, and I give up hope of
escape.

I turn and face him, responding, “Damian.”

“Things still going well?” he asks. “I know
that it can be difficult being so close to one of the great cinematic gods of
our time, but I’m sure you’ll get used to it. Anyway, I just had a couple of
ideas for you.”

“Ideas?” I ask. “What kind of ideas?”

“Well,” he says, “we’ve never worked
together before, and I thought maybe I could give you a couple of ideas on
motions and tones you can take to get the best response out of me.”

“Acting tips?” I ask. “Are you seriously
trying to make your performance my responsibility?”

“Well,” he says, “at the end of the day,
it’s everyone’s responsibility, including mine. If there’s anything I can do to
help get the best out of you,” he winks, “you just let me know.”

I’m pretty certain he just propositioned
me.

Twelve-hours-ago-me would have ripped her
top off, shoved it (the top) into her own mouth—for reasons which are unclear
to me still—and leapt spread-eagle through the air at such a suggestion.

Twelve-hour-ago-me was an idiot.

“What did you have in mind?” I ask him.

“Well, I was thinking that if you say this
first line with a kind of restrained anger, something just boiling to the
surface rather than going straight explosive on it, that’d really be the way to
go with the scene. We’d have somewhere to go, you know,” he says.

“What did you think I was going to do?” I
ask. “Did you think I was going to come into the room screaming and throwing
stuff?”

“A lot of people would,” he says. “But
you’ve got to remember, this is Glen on the screenplay, so you’ve got to
realize that there’s more to the page than the sum total of the words on it.”

“And you’ve got the only correct
interpretation of it?” I ask. “You sound like you’re trying to start a
religion.”

“How were you going to play the scene?” he
asks.

“I was thinking that I would come into the
room, see him sitting in the chair by the dresser and start soft, but
deliberate so that I could build into the climax of the dialog,” I tell him.
It’s exactly what he was saying I should do, and I know that he knows it. “By
the time you get into the room, I’ll be yelling—otherwise your character would
never hear me well enough to know what’s going on—but I wasn’t just going to go
in their guns blazing.”

“I think that sounds like a brilliant
plan,” he says.

Maybe I’m reading too much into it, but
I’m happy enough that he doesn’t know I was absolutely planning on coming into
the room at the beginning of the next scene breaking a few things while I
screamed at Mack, the guy playing my husband in the first twenty minutes of the
film. I had the whole scene played through in my head. That blue lamp was going
to be the first to go.

I was going to try and show Damian that
I’m just as worthy of being here as he is by playing strong right from our
first scene together. Instead, I’m going to be doing exactly what he tells me
to do because there’s a reasonable chance he’d ridicule me otherwise.

“You’re pretty,” he says. “You haven’t
done any porn, have you?”

“Excuse me?” I ask.

“You’d be surprised how many people in our
business have dabbled,” he says. “Most people who start out that way don’t really
make it past the occasional cameo or early morning talk show, but there is a more
substantial population than you’d think who owe very successful careers to the
fact that at one point in their life, they fucked for money. I’m not saying
everyone does it. I’m just saying that I’ve been around it enough to have some
wisdom on the subject if that’s something you’d like to talk about.”

“I haven’t done any porn,” I tell him,
“but thanks for asking. It wasn’t presumptuous or asinine at all.”

“You’re sarcastic,” he says. “I wonder if
that’s because you’re seeing the humor in the moment or if you’re hiding behind
a smile, hoping that nobody sees what’s really going on inside you.”

“We’re ready,” the prop guy calls out to
the director who makes a few last minute adjustments before we’re anywhere near
action.

“You think you know everything about
people,” I tell him, “but you don’t.”

“I never said I know everything about
people,” he answers. “I just know what it’s like to show up on set and feel
like, at any moment, everyone’s going to realize just how far from good enough
you really are and they’re going to send you back to the Midwest or wherever
you came from. The ones that end up doing porn are usually from the Midwest,”
he continues, “that’s why I’m asking.”

“I’ve never done porn,” I tell him.

He was right on the verge of saying
something helpful. I’d thought he actually
did
say something helpful, but he just kept talking until I was cured of that
opinion.

“I was right about the rest of it, though,”
he says, “wasn’t I?”

“No,” I tell him. “I know that you’d love
to see me as some shriveling neophyte who’s so overwhelmed by the big lights
that she feels helpless without your guidance, but I’m here because I earned it,
you smug son of a bitch.”

“Calm down. I’m not saying you didn’t earn
it,” he says. “I’m just saying that I know the feeling.”

“Let me guess,” I start, “this is the part
where you tell me how you used to feel that way when you were first starting
out, right? It might be thoughtful if it weren’t so incredibly condescending.”

“You’re not quite right,” he says. “I
still feel that way.” He leans toward me and whispers, “Do you really think
that I would get as belligerent as I just did because I looked the wrong way
and got light in my eyes? I did that because I’m terrified of everything that
comes after he says action. Every second those cameras are going is a separate
opportunity for me to fuck it all up and bring an end to my career, just to
prove how not good enough I really am. I’m not saying you feel that way because
it’s a weakness or some obstacle you’re just going to get past. I’m saying you
feel that way because it would be inhuman not to.”

“All right, and Emma, you’re out of the
room, coming in to confront your husband about the affair,” Dutch, the director,
calls out.

I walk to my place off camera and wait for
my cue.

This is the part of the movie where
Charlotte, that’s me, comes home to find a half-naked woman climbing down the
drainpipe from the bedroom window on the second floor and confronts her husband
about it.

As this is a comedy, my husband is a
well-known, septuagenarian standup comic and Damian comes into play here, as
he’s my husband’s granddaughter’s English tutor who overhears the argument and
quits his job in solidarity with my character leaving her husband—it’s kind of
a reverse Jerry Maguire moment.

This isn’t my first scene of the day, but
it will be the first one with Damian. I’m not entirely sure how he did it, but
with his confession, I’ve forgotten myself to the point that, if I’m not
careful, I’m going to end up liking Damian Jones.