by Sophie Lee
'Sure,' said Alice, feeling that this was all part of a wonderful dream. 'I can do that.'
Alice took a deep breath as the director called 'action'. She made a mental note to distil, not to overdo the scene which, despite being comedic, was written in a documentary style. Alice felt her own self recede and the script take over. Anchoring herself at the table for the entirety of the scene allowed her to intensify the underlying emotions at play. It all felt effortless and true.
'Cut!' said Brad. 'Alice, that was great. I don't need anything else, I'm going to have them courier this over right away, and we'll let your agent know. Thanks so much for coming over and doing this. It was great meeting you.'
'A pleasure,' said Alice warmly, not minding this time about him clinging on to her hand. She smiled and looked at him directly. 'See you soon.'
Alice trotted down the front steps as if walking on marshmallows. The sky was still high and blue, the palm trees soared above her and she had a clear run with traffic lights all the way back to the Miracle Mile. The cut on her back didn't even start hurting again until she was approaching her apartment in West Hollywood.
Alice parked the Daewoo and started climbing the back steps. At the top, by the back door, were bags of cat food that had been delivered in her absence. They were the size of meteorites. Neville, the British costume designer who had rented out his room to Alice, was renowned for his thriftiness and bought in bulk whenever possible. The laundry cupboard housed a box of washing powder the size of a small Japanese car.
When I get the job, I can rent somewhere half-decent up in the hills, Alice thought. She certainly wouldn't be sharing with lactose-intolerant cats. There must be enough food here to last them until the next millennium. She panted with exertion. Dragging the sack of Happy Kitty food was like carrying an anaesthetised walrus uphill to an operating theatre.
'Uh, I think we should call Neville and say that there definitely isn't enough cat food,' a woman shouted through the open top of her convertible Mustang as she pulled into the apartment's carpark. Shauna was Alice's roommate. She had been renting the second bedroom in the apartment for six months. She had roomed with Neville up until his departure for New York. After years of eking out a living in LA he had finally cracked it, heading up the wardrobe department on a low-budget indie flick on the East Coast, destined for glory at Sundance.
Shauna was a tall, curvy brunette with the sort of widely set eyes that the camera loves. She was a nineteen-year-old swimsuit model from Simi Valley with aspirations to act.
She parked haphazardly in the space next to Alice's Daewoo. Alice could see down into the back seat where layer upon layer of empty takeout bags were forming a blanket of Jack in the Box waste.
'Alice, stop before I call you an ambulance. I'm acomin' up to help.' Shauna hurled herself up the back steps with yearling strides in a terrifyingly high pair of vinyl boots. The two of them got on either end of the sack of dried cat meat. Shauna toppled over, falling down three stairs and revealing leopard-print underpants. Miraculously, her ankles were intact.
'Holy crap!' she grinned.
When they finally got the stuff inside, the smell of cat food began to mingle with the pre-existing odours of urine and fur.
'Where are those frickin' cats?' Shauna groaned, covering her nose with her palm.
'I don't know, but if they've somehow got into my room again I'm going to drop one of these tonnes of cat food on them from a great height. We may need a crane,' Alice replied, heading down the hall.
'Uh, Alice, I was only joking about an ambulance before, but maybe you do need one. What the hell happened to your back? You're, like, bleeding through your sweater,' she said, talking through her hand.
'Is it still bleeding?' asked Alice airily, 'I hadn't noticed . . .' she paused, 'considering I just had a callback for an audition and have probably got the job.'
'Get out of here!' yelled Shauna, dropping her hand from her face. 'Do we have champagne?'
'No, but we've got Coca-Cola Zero. Let's pop a couple,' Alice suggested, when her cell phone rang.
'Gosh, that might be Rebekah again,' she said, and dashed back to retrieve her satchel from the laundry. Given that Rebekah was the only person who knew her cell phone number, her assumption turned out to be on the mark.
'Oh my God, Alice, I have just heard via Mandy Weinstein that Brad thought you were fabulous. The network apparently want to go with a Name actress but Brad's gonna push for you all the way. Once they see you, they are going to love, love, love you. Hon, you need to get ready to go into the network this afternoon at five to screen test. Can you do that?'
'Can I!'
'What do you mean? Are you busy?'
'No, I was answering your question with a rhetorical yet affirmative . . . never mind . . . Of course I can! So it's at HBO this afternoon at five?'
'Yes, and if you'll just hold I'll put you onto Charlize who'll give you the address and directions. Oh my God, we're so excited for you right now!'
Alice nodded idiotically to the digital on-hold music while Shauna looked on, frantically mouthing questions. One of the cats appeared and leapt onto a kitchen bench and Shauna threatened it with a saucepan. The cat regarded her and the saucepan with calm disinterest.
'Alice, sorry about that. It's Charlize here. So exciting!' she said breathlessly. 'I've got a bunch of details for your appointment.'
So far LA wasn't panning out to be the horror story that other actors had professed it to be. People had been complimentary and downright effusive in their efforts to be friendly. Now that she was riding a tiny wave of success, folks were swallowing her in their warmth. Alice felt more popular at this point than she had ever felt in her life, and this was a mere callback! She could see why actors who were actually employed most of the time completely lost track of reality.
'Okay, at 5 pm, you will be going to HBO at twenty-five hundred Broadway Boulevard, Santa Monica. Drive through the main gates and go to the casting department and ask for Joel Feirstein. You will be screen-testing, as you know, for the part of Celia Jones, and they need you to prepare scenes one through five. I'm going to courier the complete script over to you "prompto", so that you can get to work. Okay, Alice?'
'Yes, that's great. Thanks.'
Alice hung up and went back to her room to do some emergency digging in her suitcase. It remained unpacked on the floor. There was simply nowhere in the room to hang anything. Everywhere she looked were Neville's belts, necklaces, dresses, wigs, shoes and framed photos of people she did not know. Neville charged her two hundred dollars a week for the privilege.
She decided that the kilt would have to go. 'Shauna,' she announced bravely, 'I'm going to need to prepare. Apparently I need to find myself jeans and a T-shirt. I've been told in no uncertain terms that plaid is not the thing here, and I'm not even sure what plaid is.'
'Well, duh! It's what you're wearing right now, dummy,' she answered, eyeing Alice's skirt.
'Thank you. No need to be offensive. Plaid equals tartan. Just wanted to be absolutely sure. And while we're on the subject: you would never ever say double-oh seven, would you? You would say zero zero seven, right?'
'Well, uh, maybe if we were talking about James Bond we would say double-oh seven, but no. Why?'
'Because my mobile number – sorry, my "cell" number – is three two three, five three five, one double-oh seven, and when I told my manager, she acted as though I were speaking Chinese or something. Hey, do you think these will be okay for the screen test?' she said, holding up a pair of dark denims.
'I guess. Could be smaller and tighter but those jeans'll work.'
'Okay, thanks. Now, for the good of morale, let's chase the cat with that saucepan while we wait for the courier!'
Shauna leapt up and put an upside down colander on her head. 'I'll be Sherlock Holmes and you be zero zero seven.'
At 4.35 pm, security waved through Alice Evans at HBO. She was armed with a dazzling knowledge of scenes one through five
of Rough Beast Slouching, and was dressed in jeans and a T-shirt which, in its figure-hugging capacities, would hopefully erase the memory of any past errors in plaid. She looked around her at the massive scale of the compound and felt she'd really arrived. 'Wow,' she breathed.
It was a bit confusing to figure out which building to enter so she headed for the one with the giant automatic doors closest to her. It had high ceilings, dark-brown terracotta tiles and majestic expanses of glass that looked out onto the parking lot. A receptionist sat behind a large desk at the centre of the space. Alice wondered if she felt as though she were working in a car showroom.
'Alice Evans, I have a five o' clock with Joel Feirstein.'
'Hey Alice, how're you today?' the receptionist replied, handing her a security pass. 'Okay, you need to take the elevator up to the fourth floor, then take a left down the hall.' Alice thanked her and got into the lift. She pressed the up button and started a soft humming exercise to warm up her vocal cords. When she reached the casting department, she was greeted by another receptionist.
'Hi Alice. Can you fill in one of these forms, please?'
'Oh, but I already filled in one of these before,' Alice replied politely.
'We're going to need you to go ahead and fill one in for us too, Alice,' the receptionist answered, as if speaking to a child.
'Oh sure, no problem.' Alice sat down to write out her details. Her pen was missing from her satchel and she asked the receptionist for one. The receptionist smiled, raised an eyebrow, and pointed at approximately fifty pens on a table in the waiting room.
Alice blushed hotly, feeling foolish. She began to fill in the form as two other actresses walked in. Independently of one another, they immediately retrieved forms and pens and sat down to fill in their details. Neither seemed particularly excited to be at the final round of an audition. Alice was momentarily affronted. This was her callback, not theirs! Apart from an alleged British star, she was the only other actress in this competition. How did these two others factor into it? Well, they don't look as much like a British journalist as I do, she thought, sizing up each girl. One was a pale redhead with an ethereal manner. She wore Converse sneakers, carried a battered backpack and looked like the type of girl Alice would like to befriend. But not now; this was war. The other was a thin blonde infinitely younger than Alice and the redhead. Both actresses had what Alice identified as a protective bubble that allowed them to glide about amongst the competition undeterred by any insecurity or doubt. These girls were exoskeletons, good actresses who felt no fear of the competition.
Alice again pondered the strangeness of her career. For example, one of the job requirements was being able to cry on cue. In order to be a good actress, you have to be able to facilitate deep emotions quickly, so these deep emotions need to be hovering close to the surface. Deep-sea fish don't belong in shallow waters, they belong way below in the darkness. An actress's career is punctuated by frequent rejections. During any given rejection, it is unpleasant to have one's emotions close to the surface. They need to be relegated once again to the deep.
Alice went over her script for the umpteenth time, burbling the lines in her head, when a short man in a floral shirt came into the waiting room.
'Hi, I'm Jonah, Joel's assistant,' he introduced himself, flapping a wrist. 'We'd like to get started so,' and he looked down at his notes, 'Molly, could you come this way, please.'
The redhead stood up calmly and handed him her form. 'Hi, Jonah,' she said quietly.
'Hey, how are you? How was Canada?' he asked, cosily linking his arm through hers and leading her down the hall.
'Well, it was a fun job because I got to play a cripple,' Alice heard her say as they headed off.
'Omigod, how adorable!' cried Jonah as they rounded the bend.
Alice tried to quell her insecurities and focused on filling out the form.
The job is mine she said to herself by way of a mantra, and began to steady her nerves. The blonde actress answered her cell phone and began complaining to the caller. She had tiny hands, pale green eyes and resembled a kitten. Alice listened to her explain that because she had the lead in a new Oliver Stone film, it really was beneath her to be here doing a callback for a mere sitcom. Alice sat back in her chair, closed her eyes and tried to tune out.
'Alice?' Jonah called, reappearing in the waiting room. Alice stood up quickly, dropping her form on the floor. She bent awkwardly to pick it up and could feel her pulse under the scab on her back. Jonah looked on, shifting his weight impatiently from one foot to the other, and flicked his head from side to side. Alice got the feeling he did not think she was adorable.
'Wanna come on through?' he beckoned, taking her fact sheet and walking ahead.
'You're from Australia?' he asked, looking back over his shoulder.
'Yes, that's right,' she replied, trotting to keep up. 'I've only been here a week but I'm really loving it, everyone has been so . . .'
'Okay, so let me introduce you to everyone here.' He swung open the door to a room on his right. It was the size of an average bathroom, yet it contained at least fifteen people. Was it possible that they all needed to agree which actress was best for the role? Couldn't at least seven of them watch it on tape at a later time? Alice had performed community theatre to smaller audiences than this.
Everyone looked up at once and scrutinised her. She felt her right eyelid begin to twitch. An imposing man in his late forties got up from his chair to greet her. She noticed Brad, the director, was seated behind him, and was drinking from a Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf cup.
'Hello Alice, I'm Joel, how are you?' said the man, sitting back down and picking up her CV. 'You met Brad and Mandy this morning.'
'Hi Alice,' they chorused.
'Soooo, you're an Ossie. And you've been here how long?' he asked, looking down at the CV. Alice couldn't tell whether he was impressed by it or not. She cleared her throat.
'I've been here a week. I did a tiny bit of promotion for Cornucopia which opened the Venice Film Festival last September and now . . .'
'Uh-huh,' said Joel, putting her CV to one side, 'Great. So Alice, why don't we take a look at the scenes.'
'Okay, sure.' Alice opened her satchel and plucked out the pages, which, although she'd thoroughly memorised the dialogue, suddenly felt the need to hold.
Brad remained curiously silent throughout this encounter. He was sitting beside Barbara, his assistant, who regarded her blankly. Alice wondered why Brad wasn't helming this casting session. She stood up to begin the audition.
'No, it won't be ready by deadline,' she began, and Joel stopped her immediately.
'Alice. It's too big, I really need you to do less with it,' he said firmly. He obviously had no time to waste. The camera continued to run.
'Absolutely, no problem,' agreed Alice. 'You know, I do a lot of theatre work back home and I sometimes have to remind myself that I don't need to hit the back row with my delivery when I'm working in front of a camera.'
'Omigod, that's . . . interesting,' said Joel looking round at the audience, 'right?' Mandy Weinstein, Brad the director, Barbara his assistant and Jonah all agreed. These were the audience members whom Alice could identify; the ones she was yet to meet also agreed with Joel that it was indeed an interesting observation.
'But we need you to just do way, way less, okay Alice?' he reiterated, bringing the subject of theatre to a rapid close.
'Got it,' Alice nodded, and took another breath to centre herself. Why had she said that? Her mouth felt parched and she gulped at the air.
'I'm sorry, may I have a glass of water?' she asked. Jonah flapped to the water cooler and returned with a small plastic cup.
'Just be a sec,' said Alice, taking a sip. The fifteen people assembled watched her drink. Jonah in particular seemed the most irritated and she wondered what he had against her. She hoped her hand wasn't shaking.
'Ready?' prompted Joel with his version of a comforting smile. He had a large nose and when h
e smiled he resembled a cartoon shark.
'Absolutely,' smiled Alice and set the cup down beside her satchel.
She took in her reader for the first time. The reader in an audition scenario is the actor paid a small wage to come in for the duration of the session to read opposite the competing performers. It had the effect of eliciting a better performance than if, say, a casting agent was doing the same job. Casting agents often had one eye on the camera and usually they were not very good actors.
The young actor brought in to read the part of the newsroom boss regarded Alice with cool detachment. He was a short handsome guy of the Tom Cruise genus. She wished he'd give her some encouragement; she was drowning here.
Distil, she thought, distil, and took a big breath.
'No, it won't be ready by deadline,' she exhaled, close to tears, using her frustration and insecurity to fuel her delivery. 'It's as if my desk is a black hole that everyone feels perfectly comfortable pouring their detritus into.'
'Then you're fired,' said the actor and Alice could tell his performance style was of the small but hugely charismatic variety that was so compelling.
He and Alice began to volley through the scene. Alice had no need of the pages now, and was free to explore her character further. As she did so, she gradually became less aware of the many people watching her work. She got up to leave in character, using both her satchel and the little plastic cup as props. She spilt water on her jeans but didn't miss a beat, improvising this moment into the scene and making something unexpectedly interesting out of it. When she launched into the final monologue, she referred to the producer, director and casting people assembled as her co-workers, and even Jonah became the janitor. The reader helped her make these small improvised moments work and she was grateful to have someone so good working opposite her.
At the end of the scene, Joel immediately stood up to both thank and dismiss her. She couldn't gauge how she had gone and felt herself being hustled out. She reached for her satchel. The reader permitted her a tiny smile and Brad nodded to her vigorously. She realised she had left all her pages behind with their multitude of scrawled notes, and she hoped the people assembled wouldn't read them now that she was gone. There were some quite embarrassing motivational statements included with her character notes, plus reminders to both 'breathe' and 'think'. They may have assumed upon reading them that she had recently awoken from a coma.