Celebromancy Read online

  She daydreamed about the press conference, Awakenings, and how fucking awesome her life was at the moment while she pulled and reorganized the cards in the binder. She checked her phone every few minutes, expecting a message from Drake.

  When she’d re-sorted half the binder, she checked her phone again: 3:15. She needed to get back to the set if she was going to be able to give notes on anything.

  She checked her messages again and, on a whim, tapped out the message she’d been wanting to send for months:

  Dear Drake,

  So, here’s the thing. I like you, and I really need to know if you like me or if this is just you being a courteous and generally affable guy who thinks of me as that madwoman with a foul mouth and a mean right hook.

  Can we meet up sometime so you can tell me what’s what and we can get to smooching or not?

  Kisses,

  Ree

  She stared at the message, her finger far away from the send button. She sighed, and deleted the message.

  Instead, she sent:

  Done at Grognard’s. Headed back to set. Catch you later?

  She sighed, restacked the binders, then called over to Grognard. “I’ve got to get back to set. I’ll get the rest of these next time.”

  Grognard gave her the stink-eye as she packed up.

  Luckily, he had many stink-eyes, and this was the one that meant I’m grumpy you’re going, but there won’t be any notable repercussions. Mmm, beer. Though pretty much all of his stink-eyes ended with Mmm, beer. Dude was a brewer, after all.

  Ree stared at her phone the whole way back to set, checking Twitter and her Google Alerts for the postpanel scuttlebutt. It was mostly bland recap, a couple of complimentary notes about how together they thought Jane was for a change, plus Alex Walters’s usual character-assassination tripe.

  “Washed-up Mickey Mouse Club reject turned failed auteur.”

  Wow. Harsh. Does this guy eat his cereal in the morning with Haterade?

  Chapter Three

  Talk the Talk, Walk the Walk

  In less than a year since the new mayoral initiatives, Pearson, Oregon, has become the new Hollywood North, stealing productions away from Portland and Vancouver both.

  Tax credits, cheap rentals, and unprecedented access have helped make Pearson home to seventeen TV and film productions last year, and it looks like we’re set to double that this year.

  Good for the economy, good for writers, actors, and for reporters like yours truly, who suddenly finds herself getting to report a Hollywood beat on Oregon rents and with a more relaxed dress code.

  This year’s big productions include Cosmic Studios’ Blog Wars and One Tough Mama’s Awakenings, written by local writer Ree Reyes. Props to a local girl done good, and for Jane Konrad for bringing some indie charm to Pearson and helping balance out the Big Hollywood.

  So I say, let the show go on.

  —Kelly Dominguez, ThePearsonPatriot.com, May 18, 2012

  One Tough Mama’s production campus was a half-dozen trailers parked in the alley of Douglas Street, as well as a handful of trucks that contained costumes, props, and all the other bits that made a production run. They were close enough to the wharf to be cheap, but not so close that they had to worry about shady “import/export” guys and 3 AM deals.

  All the crew commentaries and TV episodes about TV hadn’t prepared her for what being on an actual production was like. Especially since she’d gone from unknown to working with a superstar in four months flat.

  Ree stood at the edge of the hustle and bustle while people shuttled back and forth with gear, props, and clipboards. She took a breath, smiled, and headed inside. As the screenwriter, it seemed like she needed to always be around, but at the oddest times. She imagined it was a lot like being an on-call doctor or IT lead, except your emergencies ranged from What’s my motivation? to We need a whole new scene. In an hour.

  One Tough Mama was renting a former office building, which they divided into several sets for the production, with room for cameras and equipment on each side. Ree was reminded of a middle school she’d gone to in Maryland, where they had fold-away dividers between classrooms so that they could connect several rooms for “integrated learning.”

  The set was abuzz, with crew members dressing the sets and climbing through the rafters in precarious positions to make adjustments to the lighting, and a small army of production assistants buzzing back and forth.

  Yancy controlled the room, managing crew and staff alike, almost all of whom Ree had been introduced to and then promptly forgotten all of their names. She could distinguish Bifur from Bombur perfectly, and tell you all about the misadventures of the Real Teen Titans, but real people names? Those were harder.

  Yancy waved her over to the director chair beside him, which awesomely said REE REYES, WRITER. She’d already asked if she could keep the chair (yes), if someone could take a picture of her in the chair (which they did), and if this was all really happening (yes, and we need to get back to it).

  “So, what are we up to today?” Ree said, taking off her bag and sitting in her chair.

  “Jane wants to chat with you about her character. She has some questions about the dinner scene today.”

  “She’ll be in her trailer?” Ree asked. Yancy nodded.

  Ree hopped off the chair, picked up her bag, and headed for the craft services table on her way back out to Jane’s trailer. Ree picked up a muffin and started noshing even as she grabbed a plate.

  Perks of being a real screenwriter #24: Free food.

  Ree took her time winding back through the pop-up city, taking it all in and trying once again to convince her brain that it was all really happening and was not the most epic April Fool’s joke ever. Her life had gone from normal-twentysomething-adrift-in-life to madcap-Urban-Fantasy-lifestyle, but this recent jump to showbiz was almost as estranging as becoming a Geekomancer and integrating herself into Pearson’s occult underground.

  She reached Jane’s trailer, which had her name in yard-tall cursive script painted on the side. Ree nodded at Danny, who stood watch outside. “How’s it going, Danny?” she asked, extending a hand to shake.

  Danny met her hand and smiled, which looked even cooler under his shades. “Not bad. Go on in, she’s expecting you.”

  Ree pulled open the door and adjusted her eyes to the dim light inside as she closed the door behind her.

  It was posh for a trailer, but not as ridiculously gaudy as she’d seen on “behind-the-scenes” shows over the years, with stars whose trailers were both larger and super-way-amazeballs-better-appointed than her apartment. The main room was filled with a Comfy Couch ™, a never-been-used kitchenette, and a media setup.

  One whole wall next to the media nook was filled with bookshelves, holding bound scripts, DVDs (Konrad’s projects, Criterion Collection films, and some film from the category Ree referred to as “Beloved Schlock”), some classical lit, and a selection of SF/F novels that, when Ree had first seen them, had made her reevaluate her opinion of the star.

  It was hard for Ree to dislike anyone who had We, A Wrinkle in Time, The Handmaid’s Tale, The Female Man, The Left Hand of Darkness, and The Lies of Locke Lamora on their bookshelf.

  Jane reclined in the papasan chair that flanked the Comfy Couch, holding script pages above her head and speaking in a soft voice. Jane saw Ree out of the corner of her eye and smiled, leaning forward and tilting the papasan into a more chair-like shape.

  “Good, you’re here.” Jane stood and held the pages out to Ree. “I think we need to take another look at this scene—I feel like it doesn’t hit the thematic notes we need for my character to pop.”

  Ree took the pages in hand, though she knew the scene by heart. She was still a little stunned every time Jane talked to her—the holy crap, you’re Jane Konrad! effect wearing down over time. Ree had been a fan of Konrad since the start and
had had more than a few not-pure thoughts about the woman during their shared teen years.

  Clearing her throat (and her mind), Ree took a seat on the Comfy Couch and said, “Sure thing. I was trying to convey the claustrophia of her family’s disapproval bit by bit, but I can totally ramp it up if that’ll give you more to dig into. It’ll make the parents less sympathetic, though. I can have them contrast a bit more, with maybe the mom more scared of the Awakened and the dad suffering silently, not making waves. How’s that sound?”

  Jane’s eyes lit up. “Sounds perfect. Are you sure this is your first pilot?”

  Ree tried not to blush. Is she just flirting to flirt? Stay cool, girl, you are a professional.

  “Just glad that we’re on the same page. I can tweak those this morning and we’ll be set for the afternoon, if Yancy’s all right with springing sides on folks this late in the day.”

  Jane shrugged. “I’ve done worse. And we don’t really have time to delay things any more.”

  Ree pushed on the side of the Comfy Couch, since trying to escape it without your full effort was a doomed effort (which she’d learned the first time she visited Jane in her trailer).

  “Great. Do you need anything else?” she asked.

  Jane smiled her broad, unselfconscious smile, considering for a moment as she looked Ree up and down. “Not right now.”

  The star wasn’t glowing as much as she had at press panel, but she still shone.

  Jane held Ree in her gaze as the screenwriter left the trailer. Ree chuckled nervously as she walked past Danny and back to the set.

  Danger, Will Robinson.

  • • •

  Ree spent an hour or so tweaking the scene, writing out three versions and playing them in her brain, until she decided on a winner and emailed it to a production assistant, who brought printed copies a few minutes later.

  She sat in her chair as Yancy held court, answering questions and issuing orders like a sea captain in a storm.

  Rekindling your crush on Jane Konrad will not help your career. Well, it might, but it’s just as likely to sink you if she self-destructs again. Do the work, listen, and learn. Do not dive into the Hollywood Zone, land of fame, fortune, and all flavors of crazy.

  They shot an interstitial scene while the main cast memorized the new sides, and more crew dressed the dining room set for the afternoon’s big blowout. They were scheduled to spend several hours on the blowout, which was the prime rib of act two.

  Ree kept on the outskirts as Yancy led the crew through the shoot, nibbling at the craft services table and snatching up a sandwich before the rest of the production swooped down over the dinner break.

  Jane emerged from makeup and wardrobe dressed in a black halter dress that looked even better than the one Ree had imagined while writing the script. The star’s hair was up and back, braided in a just-barely-SF-inal way that suggested We’re in the future, but not so much in the future that you don’t care.

  The set for the room was larger than the room itself, with only two walls, the other sides open to the world and making room for cameras, lights, and more. The table was set for six with fine china but not too much else. The Richmonds were supposed to be upper-middle-class, as middle-American as she could figure while still being close enough to areas of cultural conflict to make them a good core for her story.

  Ree joined Yancy at the edge of the set. “How are we doing?”

  Yancy eyed the set. “It needs something else.” He turned over his shoulder. “Georgia! Can I get a slight blue filter on the overhead for tone?”

  “Got it!” came a call from above. Ree looked up and saw a woman crawling around in the scaffolding fifteen feet in the air.

  “We’re fine. Just hang around in case the lines need tweaking in practice.”

  If rewriting the scene over an hour was bad, then having to hold up the production because her rewrite was crap in action would probably be akin to the USS Defiant’s cloaking field dropping in the middle of a Dominion fleet.

  But as of yet, her impostor syndrome existed only in her head.

  Ree moved her chair and watched as the TV-making machine spun up into high gear to run through the scene. Thankfully, once the new lines were in place, Ree got to sit back and watch as Yancy worked his magic, a cinematic conductor coordinating the orchestra of people, gear, blocking, and sound.

  For all the “TV about TV” that Ree had seen, the experience of actually being on-set was still something else. When she’d tried to do a webseries a couple years back, it had been a tiny production, with no professional anything, just some friends and digital camera. This was small by Hollywood standards, but it was still the Big Leagues.

  Jane brought a huge amount of energy to the scene, capable of filling up the room with the smallest movements; even a slight nod of the head or furrow of the brow said as much as any of the words Ree had written.

  That was the real magic of film and TV. Ree knew her script was good, but when Jane and the other actors brought it to life, it was amazing.

  No wonder Cinemancers get lost in the little moments.

  Ree’s magic worked off of a personal connection to the characters, to the world, but Cinemancers were both more general and more specific. They used celluloid and AVIs to do cinematic alchemy. Ree had met a few through Grognard’s, and they were obsessive tweakers to the last.

  What will they do with this show when it’s made? Ree thought, a wave of pride carrying her off into a how awesome am I daydream.

  She came back down when the take ended, and stood up to stretch while the crew reset.

  The scene took over three hours, between the reaction shots, over-tos, and all of the coverage that it took to be able to piece together a multicamera show. And with the destructible set pieces for Allison’s blowup (the props for melted plates and burned chairs were awesome), every run-through left a lot of work to do to refresh the set.

  After the twelfth take, Yancy nodded to the director of photography, then said, “That’s a wrap! Take five and then we head outside for scene twenty-three!” Yancy returned to his chair. A PA handed him a water bottle on the way, which he opened and swigged.

  Yancy turned to Ree. “Good work. Can you stick around for the next one?”

  Ree held back a shit-eating grin. He might as well have said, Would you like a free margherita truffle oil pizza from Turbo’s and a bottle of 2007 Silver Oak Cabernet Sauvignon?

  Chapter Four

  Dining with the Stars

  Jane Konrad’s career has been one filled with exceptions to the rules of Hollywood. Most child stars don’t make the transition to adult fame, but the star of the then-edgy 1995 remake of My Two Dads (with gay parents instead of romantic rivals) and Mermaid High School (1999–2002) weathered a few shaky years in her late teens, including the critically-praised but instantly-cancelled 42 Heinlein St. and a short run of middling romantic comedies—Eyes on the Prize (2003), Rudolf’s Return (2003), Love At First Bite (2004)—Jane returned to work with Yancy Williams, the director who discovered her for My Two Dads.

  The mid-2000s are regarded as the pinnacle of Konrad’s career, when she found commercial success with deeper films. From her fan-favorite role as Ms. Marvel in the Marvelman film to her Golden Globe nomination for Y: The Last Man as Hero Brown and the Sundance hit Young Love.

  In 2010, the twenty-eight-year-old Konrad dropped out of the spotlight, then fell back into it with a series of DUIs, topless candid shots, and a much-televised revolving-door year of rehab and counseling.

  —Staropedia, “Jane Konrad,” updated November 17, 2011

  Shooting for the day wrapped up around eight. Ree had the night off from Grognard’s, so she was waiting at a bus stop three blocks away from the set when her phone played her text-message sound file, straight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail: “Message for you, sir!”

  Ree pulled o
ut her phone and read the message from Drake:

  Apologies for not responding sooner. And for my absence today. I’ve been waylaid. Do not worry, all is well.

  Ree looked at the message, cocked her head to the side to try to decode Drake-speak, then read it again.

  Waylaid? But not something dangerous? she wondered.

  Something explode in the apartment?

  she texted in response.

  The bus still hadn’t arrived when his response came several minutes later.

  Not that kind of waylay. More later.

  Huh. Drake wasn’t the sort to blow her off.

  But a minute later, she got another message and thought—hoped—Drake had reconsidered, but then she read:

  Want 2 do dinner? Love to chat about Act 3.—Jane

  Buh?

  Either someone else named Jane had mistakenly texted her with a plausibly applicable message, one of the Rhyming Ladies was pranking her, the universe was being really cruel—

  Or she had just been invited to dinner by Jane Fucking Konrad.

  Before realizing that she’d moved, Ree was out of the bus stop enclosure and halfway down the block back toward the set.

  If a movie star asks you to dinner, you say yes.

  Even if they turn out to be creepy, you get an expensive dinner and a story. This aphorism is void where prohibited (i.e., Scientology compounds).

  Ree nodded to Danny as she approached, then took the steps in one bound before knocking on Jane’s door.

  “Come in!” Jane shouted from inside. Her response came fast enough that it jolted Ree a bit.

  She stepped inside to see the trailer, which was bigger than her first two apartments out of college. But her eyes slid instantly to Jane.

  The star had changed out of her character outfit from the shoot into a club-ready getup, one that was way more Ke$ha than Awakenings’ Allison Richmond: short (but not mini) skirt, a shoulder-less top held together by a steel ring above the chest, and about a dozen bracelets on her left arm. Her hair had about three times the volume it had that morning.