Geoff Nicholson - Bleeding London

“But they teach you that stuff at acting school, don’t they? Go on, do a Yorkshire accent, because I’m from Yorkshire, see, and I’ll tell you whether or not it’s any good.”

“I really couldn’t,” Carr demurred.

“Yeah, you could.”

“I don’t want to. OK?”

Mick shook his head. No, it wasn’t OK. He slapped Carr in the face again, much, much harder this time, putting his weight behind it. Carr was knocked backwards, and he fell against the television screen before steadying himself.

“Leave the face alone, all right?” he said plaintively. “I’ve got a screen test in a couple of days’ time. It’s rather important.”

“Then be a bit co-operative, why don’t you?”

“All right, I’ll do a Yorkshire accent if you insist. What do you want me to say?”

Mick shrugged. “Anything you like. In your own time.”

Carr began to recite Hamlet’s ‘To be or not to be’ soliloquy in a broad Yorkshire accent. Mick let him run through the whole speech. The accent wasn’t bad. It wandered a little, starting out somewhere in the vicinity of Harrogate and ending up nearer Bamsley, but it sounded passable enough. Mick had heard much less convincing accents on television. “Aye, there’s the rub,” was particularly authentic. When Carr had finished, Mick applauded and Carr allowed himself a tiny, self-congratulatory smile.

“The sound of applause, that’s what it’s all about, eh?” said Mick.

“Perhaps,” Carr agreed.

“Must be different with film though.”

“Yes, it’s very different with film.”

Carr had a number of thoughtful things to say about the difference between film and stage acting, and there were a number of anecdotes he used in press interviews to demonstrate his points. Despite the inappropriateness of the situation he was thinking of launching into one of them when Mick said, “One thing I’ve always wanted to ask an actor. Let’s say you’re doing a love scene with an actress and you’re in bed together and you’re naked and you’re kissing and all that, well, it stands to reason you’re going to get an erection. But supposing you don’t fancy the actress, and supposing you don’t get an erection, well, doesn’t that really piss her off?”

Carr looked at him in a kind of wonderment. How could this man seem guileless, so innocent, and yet be so dangerous? The effects of that last slap across the face were still reverberating through Carr’s head. Could Mick really want to discuss acting technique at a time like this, and was he really as stupid as he appeared?

“It doesn’t take much to piss off most actresses,” Carr said ruefully.

“Yeah, sex scenes,” said Mick. “They must be really tricky. What’s that old theatrical adage? Never be filmed having sex with animals or children.”

“Never work with animals or children.”

“I knew it was something like that.”

“You think you’re a bit of a funny man, don’t you?” Carr said boldly.

“Do I?”

“Maybe you should be on the stage.”

“Should I?”

Carr was feeling braver, a little more in charge.

“Look, I’d be really grateful if you’d just get on with whatever it is you’re here for,” he said.

“Well, your gratitude really means a lot to me, Justin, but I’m not yet ready to get on with it, and you should probably be grateful that I’m not.”

He moved towards Carr and gave him a full-blown backhander across the face. Carr jerked sideways as though an electric shock had been sent through him. His jaw snapped shut and his teeth bit into the soft flesh inside his mouth. He tasted blood.

“You see, I don’t care very much about whether or not I spoil your screen test,” Mick added; then, as though returning to a subject they’d been discussing previously, “Of course you’ve never really shown your penis on celluloid, have you, Justin? Have you?”

“No,”Justin said, pain marbling his voice.

“Don’t blame you,” Mick said. “I mean when it comes to showing your penis on screen it’s no good saying size doesn’t matter, is it? These days you know your audience are bound to have seen some pretty hefty guys. These days everybody’s seen some pom movies, haven’t they? And who the hell can compete with those lads? Not that I’m comparing you with them professionally. You’re an artist. They’re just porn stars.”

Carr said nothing. He was not going to engage with this new, crazy turn in the conversation.

“You know,” Mick said, “a lot of struggling young actresses find themselves having to make porn films to pay the bills, and these films can come back and really hurt an actress’s career, can’t they? How about you, Justin, have you got some sordid little movie stashed away somewhere that’s going to come back and haunt you?”

“No,” Carr insisted.

“But then you would say that, wouldn’t you?”

“Look, please,” said Carr, no longer at all brave, no longer able to put on much of an act, “can’t we stop this absurd performance? Can’t you please just get on with whatever you’re here for.”

Mick looked around the room again. It might have been that he was looking for something to steal, but his eyes settled on the video camera.

“Does that thing work?” he asked.

“Yes.”

“OK, set it up for me. Let’s make a movie.”

Carr hesitated just for a moment and Mick took half a step towards him. That was enough to dispel any hesitation. Carr quickly set up the camera so that it was pointing towards Mick, and so that Mick’s high-contrast image, swathed in a blue aura, appeared on the screen of the television. Then Mick noticed there was a cassette in the video machine and that it was recording.

“Hey,” he said. “Wouldn’t it be ironic if you managed to get my face on film and then hand it over to the police?”

He half pushed and half kicked Carr across the room, only stopping when one of the walls blocked his way. Carr fell to the floor and Mick booted him in the stomach a couple of times, driving him into the skirting board, before leaving him to lie motionless. He walked away, grabbed the cassette and waited until Carr was in a state to listen to him again.

Mick said, “You know what they say about some actors, Justin, they say so and so’s such a great performer you’d be happy to hear him recite the London telephone directory. You must have heard people say that. OK, let’s try a little experiment. Let’s see if you’re that kind of performer.”

He grabbed the collar of the white bathrobe and pulled Carr to his feet. He yanked the robe down and aside, then completely off so that the actor stood naked in front of one of the room’s bare white walk. Mick turned the camera to face Carr. The image on the television screen looked pale and inert, bleached of line and colour, and Carr looked a pathetic, abused creature, poorly framed at its centre. Mick threw a telephone directory at him. He caught it ham-fistedly and desperately turned to the first page.

“Don’t bother with that section,” Mick said. “Forget the dialling information, the codes and all that. Start where the names start. And Justin…do it with feeling.”

Carr found the appropriate page and was surprised to find that the entries all began with numbers, the 1 stRoyal Eltham Scout Group, the 5th Putney Sea Scouts, the 15th Wimbledon Scout Group but he read out the names, addresses and phone numbers as clearly and correctly as he knew how. He’d read perhaps half a dozen entries when Mick screamed at him, “No, no, no, Justin. There’s no drama, no light and shade, no passion.”

Carr said he was sorry and began again, making a determined effort to bring drama, light and shade and passion to his absurd reading, though he was far too frightened to really know what he was doing. Mick let him continue for a while before interrupting again and saying, “No, Justin, it’s just not working for me. I tell you what, let’s try the Fs.”