All That Lies Within (29 page)

“Let’s do this, folks.”

Rebecca noticed that Audrey, the camera people, and others were consulting iPads. She peeked at one of them. On the screen was something called a “Shot List.”

Someone whispered to her, “All of the camera angles and shots, lighting, and other details are determined the night before. By the time everyone gets here for the day’s shoot, they all know exactly what comes next.”

“Oh. Thanks.” 

A young man stood directly in front of one of the cameras holding up a clapboard with the name
On the Wings of Angels
at the top, along with the names of the director, the director of photography, the date and time, the scene, and the take.

“Lock it up… Settle everybody!”

“Rolling.”

“Speed.”

“Scene Three, Take One. ‘A’ Camera mark.” The clapper-loader slapped the clapper.

“‘B’ Camera mark.” A second loud clap followed.

“And, action!”

Rebecca watched in fascination as the scene came to life before her eyes. There was the low murmur of conversations around the café, waiters and waitresses serving customers, and the waitress with the coffee tray approaching Celeste and Harold’s table.

“And, cut!” George called. “Okay. Let’s go again, only this time…”

Rebecca tuned him out. She was not required for this part of the process, as no one had yet spoken a word of significance. Neither main character had uttered a line. The focus was on their actions.

She watched Dara. Take after take, the subtlety of her movements and expressions conveyed mountains without a single word being spoken. She was a consummate pro.

Rebecca sighed as a wave of sadness washed over her. Right now, she should be looking forward to telling Dara that tonight over dinner. Instead, they’d likely both be eating alone. It felt so wrong. A woman like Dara should never be alone.

It’s not like there’s anything you can do about it, so you’d better let it go.

Audrey said, “Let’s take a twenty minute break for a reset.”

Dara stood up and walked away in the opposite direction, without so much as a glance back at Rebecca.

Surely you didn’t expect her to acknowledge you, did you?
Rebecca thrust her hands in her pockets and wandered off in the direction of her classroom. Twenty minutes was enough time to answer student e-mails and respond to requests for appointments. If only it were enough time to heal the ache in her heart.

Dara sat on the couch in her trailer, sipping from a bottle of water. The next part of the scene they would shoot was the piece that she and Rebecca worked on last night.

Rebecca. Dara recognized her clothes as one of the outfits Dara picked out for her on their shopping spree. She looked so damned sexy in it. But she obviously was tired and when they shook hands, Dara could feel the sadness radiating from her even though Rebecca kept true to her word and acted as if they’d never met before.

Dara couldn’t look her in the eye. She was afraid she’d get lost there.
If only you didn’t kiss her, everything would’ve been fine.
Now…
Now, it was all wrong and there was no way to walk it back.

“Ms. Thomas? Two minutes.”

“Be right there. Thanks.” Dara took a deep breath. She needed to put all that aside now and focus on the job at hand. George hadn’t handed them any revision pages yet, so for now at least, they were shooting the scene the way Cal wrote it. Already she felt the tightness in her shoulders, neck, and jaw. It was going to be a long afternoon.

As she emerged from her trailer, she spotted Rebecca in the distance. She was walking with her head down, her hands jammed into her pockets, and her shoulders slumped.

She looks like she’s going to a funeral and this should be an exciting day for her. You did that.
Dara wondered how Rebecca’s first day of distance learning went and how the kids reacted. And whether or not she’d been comfortable in the guest bed last night and how she slept.
All things you’re never likely to know.

The edges of depression sank in and Dara shrugged them off.
You can wallow in it later if you must. Now, you have a job to do.

“All right,” George said. “Let’s see how this goes. Dara, Sam. We’re going to start with the part where Harold starts to open up to Celeste about how he’s feeling.”

Dara nodded and took her place at the table kitty-corner to Sam. Out of the corner of her eye, she spied Rebecca standing off to the side and she thought about her sitting in the chair in the library, reading lines as if she’d leapt from the pages of the novel and was Harold.

“Dara?”

“Hmm?”

“We’re ready any time you are,” George said.

Dara straightened up, took a deep breath in and blew it out. “I’m ready.”

They ran through it three times; each time, in Dara’s opinion, was worse than the previous one. Finally, George had had enough.

“Take fifteen, everybody. Randy? Find me Cal Whiting and get him here in the next ten minutes. He knew we were bringing somebody in to work on the script with him. Why isn’t he here already? Rebecca, let’s see what you’ve got.”

Normally, Dara would’ve gone back to her trailer or to find something to eat. But this was Rebecca’s first big moment as a script doctor, and Dara wanted to be sure she was okay. So she hovered nearby in the director’s chair with her name on it, pretending to close her eyes and grab a catnap.

“Look. The footage is just dead. It’s dull,” George said.

“Do you want me to say something?” Rebecca asked.

“That’s why you’re here, Professor.”

“Okay. Of course it’s not coming to life for the camera. That’s because the words are lackluster and don’t convey the full range of emotions the characters are feeling. See this section here?”

Dara, of course, couldn’t see where Rebecca was pointing, but she smiled slightly as she imagined the very spot they’d gone over last night.

“This line should be the crux of Harold’s entire story arc. This is what drives his point of view, his philosophy on life from this moment forward, and all we get is a throwaway line that has no power in it.”

“I’m sorry. What?”

Dara nearly jumped out of her chair when she heard Cal’s tone. Her immediate reaction was to go to Rebecca’s side and stand up for her. She cracked open one eye to watch.

“Professor Rebecca Minton, meet Cal Whiting, our screenwriter.”

“Oh. Nice to meet you.”

“George? This is who the studio brought in to work on the script?”

“That’s right.”

“And when they told me they were bringing someone in to work with me nobody thought to tell me she was a what, an academic?”

“I’m telling you now.”

There was a tense moment of silence.

“Rebecca was just pointing out that this section here needs some work.”

“Really? And the academic’s credentials might be?” His tone was derisive, and the hair stood up on the back of Dara’s neck.

“She’s the foremost scholar of Constance Darrow’s work.”

“Does she have any experience working on a screenplay? Do you?”

“I…um…”

It was all Dara could do to stay seated and seemingly relaxed.

“Exactly. As I said the other day, there’s nothing wrong with the script, George.”

Stand up for yourself, Rebecca. Don’t be intimidated by him.

“If you’d just take a look at what I’m suggesting, you’ll see what I’m talking about. If you shoot it and it isn’t better than what was originally written, so be it. This is one of the most critical scenes in the book—”

“That’s the problem, Professor,” Cal said derisively. “This isn’t a book anymore and this ain’t a classroom.”

“You didn’t let me finish. I was going to say,
and
the movie. It’s also one of the most important scenes in the movie and that’s just not in here right now as the script is written. I’m telling you the adjustments I’ve made here bring Harold’s state of mind leaping off the page and lay the groundwork for everything else that follows.”

Atta girl.

Silence ensued while no doubt George and Cal reviewed the changes Rebecca had made.

“I’m inclined to agree,” George said. “I’m going to shoot the scene again with Rebecca’s changes and let’s see how it looks. I’m optimistic. Something I haven’t been up until now.”

Dara could almost feel Cal seething from ten feet away.
Don’t worry, Rebecca, honey, I’ll take it from here and sell the hell out of the scene.

“Randy?” George said. “Get everyone back here. I want to go over a few changes with them. I think we’ll be able to do this on the fly. I hope so. We’ve already wasted enough time and money today.”

Dara and Sam spent half an hour rehearsing the rewritten scene and then George declared it time to put it on film.

Rebecca, still shaking from the unexpected confrontation with Cal, wrapped her arms around herself and retreated to what she hoped was a safe distance to watch the filming. For the first time since the meeting between her, George, and Cal began, she chanced a look at Dara.

Dara was staring back at her for a fraction of a second before she turned away. Rebecca could’ve sworn she winked.
Now you’re just imagining things.

“Places everyone. Let’s have some quiet and get this thing done.”

In the end, they shot four takes, and George declared the fourth one a print.

Audrey called out, “That’s a wrap for today, folks. Good work. See you tomorrow.”

Rebecca started to walk away, but George stopped her. “Rebecca and Cal. I need you here for a minute.”

Cal stood across from Rebecca, legs shoulder width apart, arms folded tightly across his chest. George took a position between them.

“Okay. Cal, I know you may not like it, but I don’t have to see the dailies to know that we finally got something worthwhile today. That’s the first time since we started shooting a week ago. I want you to work closely with Rebecca here to re-imagine the script based on the perspective she brings to the table.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the script the way it was written. I’ve been in this business a while now, George, and I’ve got some hits under my belt. I’ve got a proven track record. I have no intention of letting some literary scholar who’s probably never been on a soundstage until today, rip apart my work.”

“It’s not my intention—”

George stopped Rebecca with a hand on her arm. “I’m sorry you feel that way, Cal. I’ve got a few hits under my belt too, and an Oscar or two to show for it. What you wrote is crap compared to what this ‘literary scholar’ pulled out of the actors this afternoon by virtue of rewriting three pages of dialogue. You don’t want to work with her? That’s fine by me. Because you’re fired.”

“Wha—What?”

Rebecca gasped.

“You’re fired. Get off of my set. And don’t ever plan on working on another one of my pictures. Are we clear?”

“You can’t—”

“Oh, but I just did. The studio checked the terms of your contract, Cal. I’m on solid ground here. You were given an opportunity to work with the script doctor and I clearly just heard you refuse. Goodbye, Cal. Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.”

Cal gave Rebecca a withering look and stalked off.

“You okay?” George asked.

“Me?” Rebecca pointed at her own chest and raised her eyebrows. “Ah. Just another day at the office, right?” She smiled sheepishly.

George threw his head back and laughed. “I like you. You’ve got guts and I appreciate that about you. I also like what you wrote today. That was genius. You keep that up and we’ll have ourselves a movie here.”

“That was the idea, wasn’t it?”

“That was the rumor.” George guided her toward the soundstage exit.

“Did you really need to fire him?”

“That’s been coming for a while, Professor. That’s not on you. That’s on him. He made it hard to work with him.”

“Can I ask you something else?”

“Shoot.”

“Is it always like this around here?”

George laughed again. “Stick around. You’re about to find out. I’ll have Audrey get you up to speed right now on the software and the pages for tomorrow. But to give you a head start beyond that, I’m planning for us to shoot as much in order as possible. So you might want to get cracking ASAP on the next three scenes. E-mail the changes to Audrey and cc me and Randy. I’ll make sure you get all our contact information. We’re going to need the next scenes as early as you can get them to us tonight so that we can get the revised pages out to the actors. I don’t want to lose any time on this. I’m thinking I’ll put in a late call for everyone tomorrow—maybe eleven o’clock—to give the actors time to memorize the new lines and the crew time to make any necessary changes to the setup. We can rehearse before lunch and shoot afterwards.”