Jilly Cooper: Rivals

‘I can read, thank you,’ snapped Cameron, running her eyes down the page. ‘And someone finds someone in bed with someone in the first episode. Jesus, and you’re expecting this shit to go out as wholesome family entertainment in Middle America, where we haven’t seen a nipple on the network for years.’

‘Don’t listen to Cameron,’ said Ronnie. ‘She needs a muzzle in the office to stop her savaging her colleagues.’

‘Shut up and let me read it.’

Ronnie then proceeded to update Tony on the recent changes at NBS. ‘They axed twenty people last week, good people who’ve been there fifteen years. The new business guys are running the place like a supermarket.’

But Tony wasn’t listening. He was watching this incredibly savage girl with her skirt rucked up round her thighs. Christ, he’d like to screw all that smouldering bad temper out of her.

As if aware of his scrutiny, she glanced up.

‘There’s too much air in this glass,’ she said, holding it out for a refill.

‘You’re too old for TV at twenty-five these days,’ Ronnie rattled on obsessively. ‘I work with a guy of fifty. He lives in such constant fear of his age getting out, he keeps on having his face lifted.’

Ronnie looked desperately tired. Beneath the butterscotch tan, there were new lines round the eyes. Cameron chucked the presentation booklet back on the glass table.

‘Well?’ Tony raised his eyebrows.

‘Schmaltz, schlock, shit, what d’you want me to say? It’s utterly provincial, right, but the dialogue’s far too sophisticated. If you’re going to appeal to Alabama blacks, Mexican peasants and Russian Jews in the same programme, you can’t have a vocab bigger than three hundred words. And I don’t know any of the stars.’

‘No one had heard of Tim Piggott-Smith, or Charles Dance, or Geraldine James before “Jewel”.’

‘They’d heard of Peggy Ashcroft. Your characters are so stereotyped. And you’ve got the wrong hero, Johnny’s the guy the Americans will identify with. He’s got drive, he comes from a poor home, he’s going to make it. The Hon Will’s got it already. What’s an Hon anyway?’

‘A peer’s son,’ said Tony.

‘Well, make him a Lord. Americans understand Lords. And they’re all far too wimpish. Americans are pissed off with wimps. We’ve seen too many guys crying in pinnies. You can’t wear your sensitivity on your silk shirtsleeve any more.’

Tony, who’d never done any of these things, warmed to this girl.

‘Go on,’ he said.

‘As a nation, we’re getting behind the family and the strong patriarch again. There’s a large part of the population that want men to reassert themselves, be more aggressive, more accountable, more heterosexual. And you’ve got a marvellous chance with four guys in a house together to explore friendship between men, I don’t mean faggotry; I mean comradeship. It was a great Victorian virtue, but no one associated it with being gay. Today’s man shoots first, then gets in touch with his feelings later.’

‘Is that how you like your men?’ said Tony, getting up to put the video into the machine.

‘Shit no, I’m just talking about the viewers. You’ve got one of the guys ironing the girl’s ball gown for her; yuk!’

Tony filled up her glass yet again.

‘Have a look at this.’

Up on the screen came a honey-coloured Cotswold village, an ancient church, golden cornfields, then a particularly ravishing Queen Anne house.

‘We plan to use this as Will’s father’s house,’ said Tony.

‘Bit arty-farty,’ snapped Cameron, as the camera roved lasciviously over a lime-tree avenue, waterfalls of old roses, and a lake surrounded by yellow irises.

‘Beautiful place,’ said Ronnie in awe.

‘Mine,’ said Tony smugly.

‘Don’t you have a wife who owns it as well?’ said Cameron, feminist hackles rising.

‘Of course; she’s a very good gardener.’

‘Looks like fucking Disneyland,’ said Cameron.

Switching off the video machine, Tony emptied the bottle into Cameron’s glass and said, ‘Corinium did make more than twelve million pounds last year selling programmes to America, so we’re not quite amateurs. Some of the points you made are interesting, but we do have to appeal to a slightly more sophisticated audience at home.’

‘We ought to eat soon,’ said Ronnie. ‘You must be exhausted.’

‘Not at all,’ said Tony, who was looking at Cameron, ‘must just have a pee.’

Alone in the bathroom, he whipped out his red fountain pen and in the memo page of his diary listed every criticism Cameron had made. Then he brushed his hair and, smiling at his reflection, hastily removed a honey-roast peanut from between his teeth. Fortunately he hadn’t been smiling much at that bitch.

Even in a packed restaurant swarming with celebrities Cameron turned heads. There was something about her combative unsmiling beauty, her refusal to look to left or right, that made even the vainest diners put on their spectacles to have a second glance.

Immediately they’d ordered, Ronnie went off table-hopping. ‘Nice guy,’ said Tony, fishing.

‘Very social register,’ said Cameron dismissively. ‘Watch him work the room, he makes everyone feel they’ve had a meaningful intimate conversation in ten seconds flat.’

‘Seems a bit flustered about the blood-letting at NBS.’

Cameron took a slug of Dom Perignon. ‘He needs a big success. Both the series he set up last year have bombed.’

‘Given him an ulcer too.’

Cameron looked at Tony speculatively.

‘I guess you’ve never had an ulcer, Lord Ant.’

‘No,’ said Tony smoothly. ‘I give them to other people. How do the NBS sackings affect you?’

Cameron shrugged. ‘I don’t mind the sackings or the rows, but now the money men have moved in, I figure I’ll have less freedom to make the programmes I want.’

‘How d’you get into television?’

‘My mother walked out on my father at the height of the feminist revolution, came to New York hell-bent on growth. The only thing that grew was her overdraft. She was too proud to ask for money from my father, so I went to Barnard on a scholarship, and got a reporting job in the Vac to make ends meet. After graduation, I joined the New York Times , then moved to the NBS newsroom. Last year I switched over to documentaries, as a writer/producer. At the moment I’m directing drama.’

‘Your mother must be proud of you.’

‘She thinks I’m too goal-orientated,’ said Cameron bitterly. ‘She’s never forgiven me for voting for Reagan. I don’t understand my mother’s generation. All that crap about going back to Nature, and open marriages, and communes and peace marches. Jesus.’

Tony laughed. ‘I can’t see you on a peace march. What are your generation into?’

‘Physical beauty, money, power, fame.’

‘You’ve certainly achieved the first.’

‘Sure.’ Cameron made no attempt to deny it.

‘How d’you intend to achieve the rest?’

‘I aim to be the first woman to run a Network Company.’

‘What about marriage and children?’

Cameron shook her head so violently she nearly blacked her own eyes with her satellite dish earrings.

‘Gets in the way of a career. I’ve seen too many women at NBS poised to close a deal, being interrupted by a phone call, and having to rush home because their kid’s got a temperature of 104.’

The waiter arrived with their first course. Escargots for Cameron, gulls’ eggs for Tony. Ronnie, who hadn’t ordered anything, returned to the table, buttered a roll, but didn’t eat it.

‘Anyway,’ went on Cameron angrily, ‘what’s the point of getting married? Look at the guys. New York is absolutely crammed with emotionally immature guys quite unable to make a commitment.’