Robby had never been one to spend a lot of time in a trailer or dressing room. The rooms were always small, and once you've read the paper and made your phone calls there was little to do. Robby always preferred hanging out with the crew, who were mostly blue collar folks like him, instead of hiding away like some kind of king or czar.
But he knew that on this film a large dose of snobbery was required. As sorry as it made him feel, he simply had to terrorize them all and never let them get close.
He phoned an old friend as he began to put the next phase of his plan in motion. This wasn't any old friend, mind you, and it wasn't entirely a social call. Robby knew the worst thing he could do was to phone his alleged victim directly -- so he was phoning the only man who could set up the meeting between the two of them.
Even though "School, Sweet School" was set in Compton, Robby had based his character on a first year teacher at the racially mixed North Hollywood High. Robby knew it was borderline illegal for the teacher to set up such a meeting between him and Lisa, but he knew that the man would do it anyway. He and Robby had become good friends over the years.
It had always been important for Robby and Trudy to have friends outside of "the business," and the teacher and his wife were the perfect couple for the Rockmans. Pleasant, kind and intelligent, their mere existence reminded Robby and Trudy that there was a world beyond the tinseltrash that surrounded them.
The four became very close over the years, and there was nothing Robby wouldn't do for the other couple. In one of the darker periods of their lives, Robby had even written a rather sizeable check to pay off the teacher's gambling debt. The only caveat was that the man had to join Gamblers Anonymous. He did and has stayed clean ever since. The "loan" was never paid back, nor did Robby ever ask for it.
But Robby was asking for something much bigger now.
Since it was summer, Robby called his friend at home and let the phone ring about ten times before hanging up. He was in no rush. Given that the D.A. was taking the case to trial despite all reason, Robby had all the time in the world.
He was bored out of his mind. He turned on the six-inch-TV just to have a voice in the room. He picked up the manila envelope that Norman had given him containing all the evidence from his case that the D.A. had acquired and lawfully disclosed.
Robby and Norman were to discuss his case later that day, and Robby had already read the file three times. By now, he wasn't so much reading it as killing time. He already knew what he needed to know.
"Yo! Rock-MAN!" shouted Savannah as she pounded on his door. "We need to conversate!"
Robby had wondered if he'd get a chance to speak to the director before he started filming. Truth was, he just wanted to talk to somebody. But he had a job to do.
"Go away!" he shouted. "I'm busy!"
"Just wanna talk about your character, g, 'fore we go to film," she called back.
He screwed off the top of a bottle of Beefeaters, took a swig and spit it in the sink. It was too early to have an altercation with the director, but there were other ways to be rude. He opened the trailer door for her without saying a word, which would be his entire strategy.
By the time Savannah walked in, he was already sitting on one chair with his feet up on another and holding the gin bottle on his lap.
"Yo," she said. "Wha's up?"
Robby shrugged that he was fine. He tilted his head towards a chair for her to sit.
"Thanks, homes," she said as she sat.
"How you doing here, Robby?" she asked. "You comfortable in your new digs?
Robby put the bottle to his lips and tilted it back. He let it make gurgling sounds as he blocked his throat from letting any gin down, then spit back the rest into the bottle.
"Are we not talking today?" she asked as if to a child.
Robby shook his head without cracking a smile.
"Then I'll do the talking," she said unfazed, as she launched into a nonstop diatribe on her vision of the film.
Robby couldn't tell if the girl was purposefully ignoring his rudeness or just egotistically blind to it. Either way, the young director seemed to have a pretty thick skin, and Robby would have to work hard to get under it. But hard work was never something that bothered the ex-star.
Robby was actually impressed with the girl. She had a clear visual style in mind, she described lighting moods and camera angles with ease, and her impressions on the best way to play Dr. Kincaid were very similar to his own. If he had had any faith in the script itself, he might have've believed "Gun Butt" could go somewhere.
"...and whenever he kills someone, he cries," she said. "What do you think?"
This was when Robby was required to pay his respects to his new director, so he took a swig of gin, swallowed a gulp of air, then let it out in one huge loud wet belch.
Then he made a mental note to give another thousand dollars to AIDs research to compensate for his crude behavior.
Savannah knew that Robby was just trying to show her up. But it was her film, and she wasn't going to play his shit. If he didn't want to talk, he'd be forced to listen. If he wanted to offend her with a burp, he'd have to do a lot better than that.
She grabbed the bottle out of his hand and took a swig, then responded with an even louder wetter belch, then passed the bottle back to him and kept on talking.
Who knows how long she would've kept talking had the second A.D. not shown up to interrupt her.
"Ready on the set," he barked.
Robby and Savannah walked back into the medical building and onto the set where they ran into Cheyenne. Savannah introduced the two actors who would be playing the next scene together.
"Nice to meet you," said Cheyenne. "I'm a big fan. I loved your show."
Robby had seen Cheyenne befriending the crew earlier, but he had also seen her cuddling up with Ciggy. He immediately knew how this young beauty got her role and saw it as the perfect opportunity to be a class-A asshole in front of everyone.
"The girlfriend?" he asked Savannah. "I gotta work with the girlfriend? Norman, you never told me I had to work with the fucking girlfriend? What, I can't get a real actress?"
"I took acting lessons," Cheyenne sheepishly said to him. "And I read for the part."
"I'm sure you did, baby," said Robby. "Right after you blew the old Jew."
Norman was sitting next to Ciggy on the director's chairs, and it was his instinct to go give Robby a good talking-to. But as he got up, Ciggy stopped him.
"Actor shit," Ciggy said calmly. "First day jitters. Totally normal."
Cheyenne was ready to cry, and Robby knew it would cost him another thousand dollars -- this time for the junior blind.
The crew merely looked at each other and rolled their eyes. Robby wasn't the first insane actor they had worked with, and they knew it meant plenty of overtime.
"You ready to rehearse?" Savannah asked, holding in her desire to cut the man.
"Sure," Robby said. "I just didn't think you'd cast a real whore to play a whore."
"Why not?" asked Savannah. "We cast a real asshole to play an asshole."
"Fuck you," he said as he got into position, trying hard to suppress his laughter.
Major Hollywood movies allow for many rehearsals and multiple takes. But on a low budget indie, time can often be more expensive than film stock. This was one of those times.
"We're gonna shoot the rehearsal," Savannah shouted, which basically meant there would be no rehearsal. Just run through it nice and easy, and let's see what you got.
Robby turned to Cheyenne and spoke to her loudly enough for all to hear, "You just better not fuck up my performance, that's all I'm saying."
"Roll it!" shouted Savannah.
And as everybody got set, Robby saw the utter fear in Cheyenne's eyes. So he left his mark and put his lips next to her ear.
"Don't worry about what I say," he whispered. "You'll be great."
All Robby meant to do was calm her down without giving too much of his real self away, but it simply made the poor girl more frightened and confused than ever.
"Speed!" said the sound guy.
"Camera rolling," said the operator.
"Action!" Savannah called.
There was a long pause. Robby had the first line in the scene, and everyone watched him as they waited for him to speak.
"I'm sorry," he said. "What's my line?"
"Cut!" called the annoyed director. "Show him his lines."
And so it went for the remainder of the morning as Robby botched take after take due to fake drunkenness or pretend meanness. The crew saw that Ciggy, Norman and Savannah had made a huge casting mistake, and Ciggy, Norman and Savannah agreed.
Ciggy called over his assistant and whispered, "Call casting, and tell her to line up another Dr. Kincaid. Then get me Gloria because this guy is fired."
And just as everyone was giving up on Robby, he sprang into action and played his part with masterful perfection. He was simultaneously terrifying and loveable. One was compelled to turn away in disgust as he described the atrocities he planned for the film's hero, but the warmth that exuded from his friendly smile and his caring eyes made turning away impossible. It was uncomfortable, it was riveting, and it was a work of art.
"We just got into Sundance," Ciggy whispered to Norman.
Norman agreed. He never thought the scene worked as written, nor did he think Cheyenne could act. But something was happening. The girl was made as uncomfortable by Robby's subtle power as the rest of them. When she was called to hug him, she did so with revulsion. When she was called to curse him, her voice trembled with adoration. There was a vulnerability in her that had not been present at her audition, and the camera picked it all up. Norman didn't understand how, but Robby was making her better.
It was exactly what Savannah had always wanted the scene to be, but she had never imagined it could be this good.
"Cut," she said softly, enraptured by the scene's power. "That was amazing."
It takes a lot to move a film crew since they've pretty much seen it all. As trained professionals they concentrate on their jobs and rarely pay attention to the actual content of the piece. But everyone present that morning knew that they had just been a part of one of those rare, magical movie moments. And they actually applauded.
That was the moment when Robby knew he had scored, and scored big. While he was doing the scene, he was far too immersed in the role to see outside himself. But a clapping camera crew says it all.
"Let's just do one more for safety," Savannah said to him.
Even the most high-tech, big budget movies are ultimately susceptible to human error. Film can get scratched or exposed, or a tiny piece of hair can get trapped inside the camera to ruin a perfectly good take. Even the lowest budget films will always do a second take just in case. Unless they're dealing with a true asshole star.
"That one was good enough," Robby barked. "I'll be in my trailer. Call me when you're ready for my closeup."
And off he walked. He felt particularly bad because he understood the risk he was putting the production into, and decided to send another thousand dollars to cancer research.
"Get back here," Savannah shouted after him. "Motha-fucka! Get back!"
Then she started after him, but Ciggy stopped her.
"He won't do it," he said. "And no yelling or threats is gonna change his mind. He's a real pain in the ass and he's gonna get worse. Think we should fire him?"
"You fucking crazy?" replied the young director. "You see what we got?"
"Then don't antagonize him anymore than we need to, kiddo," advised the producer.
Savannah took a deep breath, weighed her priorities, and shouted, "Moving on!"
"Moving on!" shouted the A.D. "Set up for closeup!"
Robby headed back to his trailer feeling utterly vindicated, but reminded himself not to get too cocky. He still had his closeup, as well as many more scenes over the next three weeks that were far more complicated than this one.
But his instincts had been right and he had the role down, and that was the key!
He arrived in his trailer where he had left his tiny TV playing on a local station, and he was horrified by what he saw. Right there, on one of the local news channels, standing by the front door of Burbank General Hospital was Lisa making a public statement.
"Robby Rockman never tried to rape me!" she said for the whole world to hear. "I made the whole thing up!"
It was the worst thing that could happen to him. It would make page fifteen of the Metro section and no one would ever know. The world would always consider him a rapist.
He jumped back out of his trailer with his car keys in hand and stopped the first person he saw.
"Quick!" he shouted. "What's the quickest way to drive to Burbank General?!"
"It's just a few blocks up the road," answered the nervous intern. "It's probably faster to walk from here."
Robby immediately tore off at full speed. This was not how he wanted to do it, but if he could get there before the press conference was over, he still had a chance!
*** Up Next: "Lisa Tells The Truth" ***
The main characters in this e-novel are fictional and are not intended to portray or resemble any actual individuals, whether living or dead (except for Jeff Abugov who is a real screenwriter, director and producer.) Although certain real people and companies are mentioned in this e-novel, all of the events are fictional and are not intended to portray or resemble any actual events.
Copyright © 2015 Tinseltrash, Inc.