Total pages in book: 61
Estimated words: 57423 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 287(@200wpm)___ 230(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 57423 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 287(@200wpm)___ 230(@250wpm)___ 191(@300wpm)
She sat up, her expression turning distinctly sympathetic. “Someone tried to sex you up when you didn’t want to?”
That was one way of putting it. “She was very aggressive, and it bothered me more than I realized. I think I took a little of that out on you today, and for that, I am truly sorry.”
“Did she look like me or something?”
“Not even close,” he said with a huff. “Like she wasn’t as… No, she didn’t look like you. But she was something of a celebrity. She was a European royal.”
“Please tell me it was Kate.” Her eyes had gone super wide like this would be the best gift ever.
She would so get along with his brother and Martin. “It was not. She’s a minor royal but a major pain in my ass. I’m sorry. I hope you’ll give me a second chance.”
She stared for a moment as though assessing the situation. “Are those Flamin’ Hot Cheetos?”
“My brother’s fiancé swears you like them. His name is Martin, and he’s a big fan.”
Her shoulders relaxed, and he would have sworn that girl…woman…glowed. “That’s so nice. If he has any time, he could come up to the set and have lunch with us. And he’s right. Gimme. I love them, but the camera adds five pounds and…”
“You always have four cameras on you.” He handed her the chips and sat down. It would be a much quieter night than he’d counted on, but he kind of liked that.
She opened them and had one of those suckers in her mouth very quickly. She sighed, obviously content. “Not now I don’t. All right, Rycroft, we start again. And Matt’s probably fine. You’ll know he’s done something wrong if he has to go to the hospital because I kicked him in the balls. Pass me that blue piece. I think it goes here.”
He handed her the piece, and they got on with their first night.
Chapter Three
Ally stood outside the studio and mentally went over everything she needed. The script and her notes were in her bag. She had a list of questions for the director, and she’d made a point to spend some time on IMDB getting to know her costars’ work. She was reasonably sure she could speak to them on an intellectual level.
“You okay?” West was right behind her.
But then he had been for the last couple of days. He was her near-constant shadow. It was weird.
It was unnerving because she was getting very, very used to having him around.
After that initial terrible first day, they’d settled into a nice routine. He accompanied her to the gym every morning and worked out beside her. While he watched sports reports on the overhead TVs, she caught up with social media on her phone during cardio. Then they had a quiet breakfast up in the suite, and she spent the rest of the day teleconferencing with her mom, who acted as her agent and manager, or her publicist, or the woman who ran her socials and complained that Ally wasn’t doing anything interesting.
“I just need a minute.” She hadn’t sent her social media manager the usual flurry of photos of what she was doing because every single thing she did was with West. Or was boring stuff she actually liked to do. No one wanted pictures of her latest knitting project or the 2000-piece puzzle she was working on.
“I had Matt do a walk-through of the building if that’s what you’re worried about. It’s big, and there are a lot of ways in and out, but I’m going to be close. I’m more worried about when you shoot on location. Shouldn’t you have done this table thing in LA?”
“Usually, but the movie’s set here in Dallas. The director is known for his method work. Usually that’s an acting term, but it works for this guy.”
“Method?”
Sometimes she forgot that not everyone had been raised in Hollywood. “It’s a reference to Stanislavski. He was an acting coach back in olden times. Like way old. Marlon Brando old. Anyway, there’s a school of thought that the best performances come from truly inhabiting the character. Some of them never break character even when they’re not filming.”
“And you do this?”
“No. Eww. They call it acting for a reason. Those people are pretentious douchebags. You know they never play like nice people. It would be one thing if some asshole actor was suddenly being nice twenty-four seven because he was playing Jesus or something, but no. They’re always playing some mega jerk, and the rest of us have to put up with him playing out his megalomaniacal fantasies. Jared Leto decided to live inside the Joker twenty-four seven. How do you think that worked out for his castmates?” She’d never had it that bad, but she could imagine.
“That seems like a bad idea from what I know from the comic books.” West was looking particularly all-American hero this morning in his black jeans and T-shirt. He had a jacket on, but she couldn’t forget about the shoulder holster and guns under it. “How does a director do this method thing?”