Dan Wakefield - Selling Out - A Novel

Then everything went black.

Perry could feel his heart pounding. There were tears welling up in his eyes. He was all at once extremely sad and happy. The situation was so poignant, the pain of both husband and wife so real that the viewer had to feel sad, yet there was something deeply human, universal, about it that was oddly uplifting, even ennobling. In the silence and darkness that followed, Perry felt a sense of awe.

“Scene twenty-three, take two!”

The crisp voice jerked him from reverie as the screen flashed to life again, showing the torso of a man with head and feet cut off by the camera, holding the traditional black-and-white slate-board of film production. The hinged upper arm with diagonal stripes was held aloft and then smartly clapped down to signal the new take of the scene.

Perry felt a sudden déjà vu, and he realized he was living now an experience he had fantasized way back in his other life, while he was waiting for the call from Hollywood and watching “Entertainment Tonight.” They had showed some film in production on location, with a close-up of the slateboard announcing the new take of a scene, and Perry had been electrified with the thought, like a precursor of the act, that he would someday himself be involved in such a ritual with his own work. And here he was, not just fantasizing his dreams of glory on a cow path in Vermont, but sitting in a darkened studio on a movie lot in Los Angeles. The slateboard bore in chalk the name of his own show, his own creation.

And now it came to life.

Perry’s story. His characters.

They moved. They walked. They talked.

“Coffee?” she asked.

“Thanks,” he said.

Perry was entranced, captivated. He was amazed at how much more wonderful the words sounded when spoken by the actors, instead of when only read on a page. The only dialogue in this scene were the two words, one word apiece, per actor, the most commonplace words in the most commonplace setting and situation, words that not only were uninspired but almost obligatory under the circumstances.

“Coffee?”

“Thanks.”

But oh, when you heard human beings say them, when you saw their faces, their expressions, those simple words took on another life, new dimensions. Watching and hearing the words being spoken, they seemed now to Perry as profound as Hamlet .

Coffee .

Thanks .

“I can’t explain it,” he told Jane later.

“You just did, love,” she said. “It was eloquent.”

She touched him tenderly.

“No. I said the words, I told you what I felt like, but I know I didn’t convey the actual experience, the amazing feeling of seeing those actors on the screen, bigger than life, saying my lines.”

“I can’t wait to see it myself.”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to wait. We just started shooting.”

“Can’t I see what you’re seeing? The little bits and pieces? What do you call them officially—the ‘rushes’?”

“The ‘dailies.’ But lovey, only the staff gets to see the dailies.”

“My God, do you have to have a national security clearance? It sounds like you’re watching nuclear strategy secrets.”

“I’ll ask Red Simmons if he minds your coming.”

“Who the hell is Red Simmons? Did I miss him in People magazine this month?”

“He’s the director of photography. The head cameraman.”

“Pardon my abysmal ignorance, but how was poor little me supposed to know?”

“Because I’ve told you about six million times, that’s how!”

“You’ve also told me about six million names of other people I’ve never met, along with all the wonderful things they do, complete with your new terrific show biz terminology, and I can’t even come and look at the pictures—or whatever you show biz insiders call them.”

Perry started for the brandy, then stopped.

He went to the couch and sat down next to Jane, taking her hand.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “All this is new to me, and I’m nervous as hell about it.”

“I know. I didn’t mean to jump down your throat.”

“I was just about to get a brandy, and then we’d both be starting in again like we did last night. We can’t fall into that. I have to have my mind clear in the morning. All day.”

“I don’t get any work done either when we do that. Shall we stop?”

“You mean altogether? Go dry?”

“I will if you will.”

Perry tensed; that seemed a little extreme.

“Maybe we should just cut down. Cut out the hard stuff. Nobody out here drinks anything but wine, anyway.”

“I guess that’s more realistic. OK. Just wine with dinner. And we ought to cut back on our eating, too.”

“Great. We’ll diet, then,” Perry said. “And get more exercise.”

He had begun to feel self-conscious about that extra ten or so pounds around his middle. Also, he’d begun to notice that although before he liked Jane a little fulsome and fleshy, out here, compared to these amazing women whose stomachs seemed as flat as ironing boards, she began to look by comparison a little frumpy. Some diet and exercise would do them both good.

“I’m willing,” Jane said.

They shook hands, smiling, and then embraced.

Then Perry pulled away. The fact is he didn’t feel like making love. It wasn’t just the thought of Jane’s frumpiness compared to the sleek California women. Being on the set all day, involved in the shooting, was really exhausting. He simply didn’t have a lot of energy left over for sex.

Perry was high, and about to get higher.

The feeling had nothing to do with drugs, though in fact he’d felt a real rush when he saw the tall director’s chair with his own name on it in big black letters.

PERRY MOSS.

Now all he had to do was climb up onto it, as if this were a commonplace occurrence, in front of all these people whose eyes were on him. They were shooting on location at the little college up north near San Jose, and a crowd of students and faculty had gathered, as people always did around cameras, drawn to the magic of filming.

Perry felt like a star, for all the people who were watching knew he was one, or might be about to become one, just like the actors who also had their own director’s chairs with their own names—MELINDA MARGULIES, HAL THAXTER—along with the executives, NED GURNEY and KENTON SPIRES.

All eyes were on him as he went to mount the chair that had his name on it, and suddenly it seemed a challenge. It looked storklike and flimsy on its crossed toothpick legs. Bravely, he seized the arms as if he were going to mount a wild bronco, hefted himself up and onto the canvas seat, teetering only slightly, silently saying a prayer of thanks as he opened the large notebook that held the script and pointed his nose down into it, pretending to focus on the swimming words.

When he looked up, Ned and Kenton were beside him on their own personal thrones, each looking as comfortable in his perch as if he were born to it. Perry still felt slightly dizzy, as if he might tip himself over if he leaned too far one way or other, or coughed suddenly. He got out his pipe and lit up, hoping that process would distract him from his newest phobia—fear of falling off a director’s chair while shooting a TV film on location and being watched by the natives.

“This is a big scene we have coming up,” said Ned.

“Mmm,” Kenton nodded. “Our happy couple’s first big fight.”

Perry smiled, proud of his drama. This was a scene where Jack thinks Laurie is flirting at a party; he leaves, she rushes after him, and they “grapple” before he runs off and she chases him.

“Kenton?” Ned asked. “Do you see this as a tag-team wrestling match—or something more subdued?”