Alice in La La Land

by Sophie Lee

  'Yeah, what a bunch of butt-monkeys!'

  'What a bunch of crack-whore-bums!'

  'We should introduce them to the cats,' Shauna giggled.

  Alice leaned over and hugged her. 'Things will get better,' she said. 'Things will get better. I promise you.'

  From: RebekahBloomfield@AmoebaManagement.com

  To: AliceEvans@gmail.com

  Re: Stop Thief, You'll Wake the Baby

  Fox is looking for another Lisa Kudrow for this hysterically funny sitcom. They have a major star attached for the male lead. Your character's name is Trixie, she is a fashion designer and single mom who inadvertently becomes involved with a professional thief. Think fresh-faced, bubbly adorable . . . just be yourself!

  Joe hasn't seen Cornucopia but we were able to get an advance disc of promo scenes, plus we have sent him your publicity package. Please learn scenes 15 through 18. Audition with Joe Roth, Twentieth Century Fox, Pico Boulevard. (Address and Yahoo Map attached.)

  Love Rebekah

  Sitting in the casting department with seven other aspiring Lisa Kudrows brought out a momentary fierceness in Alice.

  I'm more Kudrow than her, surely, she thought, feeling the mask of shiny determination settle on her features. She wrote down her age as twenty-six on the fact sheet – though a quick check on the Actor's Internet Database would reveal her true age. She'd submitted it honestly at twenty-three when she'd naïvely believed that age didn't matter.

  Alice stared straight ahead. There was a coldness between competitors here which was unlike back home. She guessed the stakes were too high to share a jovial, 'Can you believe how shitty the dialogue is?' Some of these actresses had been auditioning day in, day out for eight years plus. It was vital to stay focused and positive lest you slip into some downward spiralling hell. 'Oh my God, I love the script!' or 'My meeting went so well today!' or 'They were going to give me the part, they thought I was perfect, but they decided to go another way, that's all. If she were blonde, it would have been mine, they said. They'll definitely keep me in mind for the next one.' Yeah sure, Alice thought, while listening to these diatribes. Keep taking your Xanax.

  Exactly one hour after her appointment time, Joe Roth's assistant, a dour-faced teenager, escorted Alice into the lion's den. Joe Roth remained sitting as Alice entered the room and fiddled with his pen. He was looking at Alice's CV with puzzlement. 'Cornucopia was released two years ago, right?'

  He was an imposing man in his mid-forties with a thick head of hair and shiny skin. He wore a large gold Rolex studded with diamonds.

  'No, actually,' replied Alice putting down her satchel and smiling confidently. 'It was shot two years ago, but premiered at the Venice Film Festival last September. It . . .'

  'Oh, okay, so it hasn't got a release yet.' He smiled at her perfunctorily. 'I'll call Faith in and we can get started.'

  'Sure,' said Alice, looking around for a camera. She could see a couch, two fold-out chairs and a number of bookshelves filled with DVDs. Behind Joe were a series of actors' headshots. A hunky male with sparkly teeth who must have been the male lead was flanked by a host of serene actresses whose gazes seemed to say, 'You're just never going to have the sort of confidence needed to get the job.'

  'Begone exoskeletons,' muttered Alice through her teeth, as Joe Roth stood to introduce her to Faith.

  'Alice, Faith is our casting assistant; she'll read opposite you today. Now, let's just sit down and do a read and see what we got.' His tone was smooth and reasonable, as if he were settling a dispute.

  'Fine,' said Alice, smiling at Faith, an exhausted-looking woman in her mid-thirties with short mousy hair.

  'Scene fifteen,' said Joe, looking at her intently. Something in his eyes made Alice feel very small.

  'I'm a thief, Johnny, just like you, only I steal other designer's ideas and sell them as my own. You steal people's dreams,' said Alice, wondering where the opportunity to be hilarious presented itself in the dialogue.

  'You're struggling right now, I can tell,' Faith coun-tered flatly.

  'Please, I'm going to ask you one more time to keep your voice down. You'll wake baby Tyler.'

  'My bad!' said Faith/Johnny. This was a new expression, like 'Talk to the hand', which had worked its way into sitcom vernacular and had probably reached its tipping point.

  'Look, Johnny,' said Alice, gesturing behind her and pretending to pick up discarded baby clothes. 'As you can see, the place is a dump, I need to tidy up, finish my designs by midnight and then somehow squeeze in a few hours' sleep before Tyler wakes for a bottle at three, so if you'll excuse me . . .'

  'You don't get it, do you?' said Johnny, 'I'm here to help.'

  'Alice, I'm going to stop you there,' said Joe. 'Let's try it in an English accent instead. Your American isn't working for me. Okay? Let's mix it up, huh?'

  Alice gulped. She had committed a cardinal sin. Every foreign actress's US accent had to be flawless. Sure, American actors could feel free to do the worst Australian and English accents known to man, but if you fucked with their accent you were finished.

  'Sorry. Of course. I'll do English.'

  Alice needed to mentally switch gears to accomplish the task. Once you had learned something one way it took some dislodging to turn it on its head. The speech cadences, the very character of the piece, changed utterly. Alice heard herself launch into an appalling Cockney accent, and wondered why she had not settled for something milder. She tousled with her script pages in an effort to centre herself but could not find her place.

  '. . . whereas you, me little chum,' she improvised, 'steal people's 'earts an' dreams. Innit.'

  Alice tumbled through the scene sounding like a Dickensian street-sweeper, longing for the whole experience to be over. Finally Joe said, 'Cut.' He looked as though he'd just witnessed a pedestrian suddenly and unexpectedly speak in tongues.

  'Well. Thanks, Alice, one scene is all we need right now. Well done.' He stood up and shook her hand. His palms felt unnaturally smooth, as if he had regular paraffin wax manicures and got other people to take out his garbage.

  'Thanks, Joe, thanks, Faith. I had a blast,' Alice said inexplicably, and headed for the back of the room.

  'It's that way,' Joe directed, pointing at the door.

  'Cool.' She kept her head down, marched straight through casting and took the elevator to the carpark.

  From: RebekahBloomfield@AmoebaManagement.com

  To: AliceEvans@gmail.com

  Re: Wind Man

  Wind Man's girlfriend is an ace reporter for the local news channel. She sometimes also has to fill in for the weather girl. Whenever there is strong wind, Wind Man surfaces to keep the world safe from the changing weather patterns, due to global warming. This is a superhero pic with an important environmental message.

  Your character, Jill, is strong, feisty and gorgeous. Scene 71 takes place at the local television station. Audition at 11 am, Mindy Sherman, Contour Casting, Santa Monica Boulevard.

  (Address and Yahoo Map attached.)

  Love Rebekah

  'He said he wanted an English accent!' yelled Alice into her cell phone, veering momentarily onto the wrong side of the road. ' I wound up sounding like a bloody chimney sweep, circa 1830 . . . oops, that was close . . . anyway, Bek, he was way behind schedule so could you let Mindy Sherman know that I'm going to be fifteen minutes late for Wind Boy.'

  'Man,' corrected Rebekah. 'Well, that's odd because he definitely didn't say anything about an English accent to me, I'll have to find out what . . .'

  'No, no,' said Alice quickly, 'It was just a spur of the moment thing. Let's just leave it, shall we? I'm off to Wind Man now, so just, if you could just let them know.'

  'Will do,' said Rebekah hanging up.

  'Hi Mindy, I'm so sorry about being late,' Alice panted, breathless from the stairs at Contour Casting. 'Thank you so much for re-casting, I mean re-scheduling. Goodness.' She tried to slow down her breathing. 'I just wanted you to know how much I loved re
ading Wind Man,' she said, alarmed at her ability to be false and out of breath at the same time. 'I sure would love to give it a go.'

  Alice threw down her bag and stood by the wall. She held up an imaginary weather-pointer stick.

  'Uh, Alice,' said Mindy, 'We can just sit down and read through. You don't need to do all that yet.'

  'Do you mind, though?' Alice asked sweetly. 'It would help me through all that weather-specific dialogue.'

  'Hold up. What scene have you prepared?'

  'Scene seventy,' Alice replied keenly, 'and I've learned it so I'm fine to be off book.' Alice beamed proudly. It had been a lot of work learning the dialogue, with all its high-pressure systems and south-westerly currents, but she had done it.

  Mindy's face crumpled in embarrassment. 'Alice, that's . . . thanks for doing that but it was scene seventy-one we needed to look at. The scene where she's talking to Harry aka Wind Man, and she begins to suspect that he's leading a double life. You know the one?'

  Alice felt her breakfast of Pop Tarts tumble in her stomach. 'Scene seventy-one,' she repeated slowly. Her heart thumped uncomfortably. 'You're right, it was scene . . . I'm so sorry. Do you want to see the weather-reading scene anyway?'

  'Look,' Mindy said smoothly, 'let's just read through seventy-one together first and we can take it from there.' She went to her desk and began rifling around. 'I'm just looking for another copy of the . . .' she began, and looked at her watch. 'Oops, the time . . . oh okay, here it is.' She passed it to Alice.

  Alice sat on the blue-and-yellow couch holding the script. Mindy's office resembled her nana's front room, although her nana would never have owned a cappuccino-maker and a mini fridge.

  'From where she's leaving the station,' Mindy suggested.

  'Sure,' said Alice, trying to remain calm, and scouring the big print to see just what the hell was happening in the scene. Alice was disadvantaged doing a cold read. It meant she didn't have time to get her American accent properly implanted.

  'Harry,' she began, keeping her tone light, 'Heyyy. Where've you been? I swear, you're so mysterious sometimes. What'd you make of the weather? They say there's another hurricane comin' in, bigger than the last,' she read.

  'I know it, Jill. Came to say goodbye for a while.'

  'Where are you going?'

  'News is sending me to cover the storm as it breaks. Gotta get that footage.'

  'Why do they always send you, Harry? It's weird. Why couldn't Dave or Buck go? In fact, do you ever take time off?'

  'Well, I . . .'

  'Listen, Harry, great to shoot the breeze but I gotta run, I have a date tonight.'

  'You have a date? Well, who is he?'

  'Jason, from accounts,' said Alice/Jill.

  'Oh, okay. Well, goodbye, Jill, and take care of yourself. Don't go outdoors once it hits, will you.'

  'I won't,' she replied cheerfully. Alice snuck in a look of puzzlement as subtext.

  'Alice, thanks so much, that was great, but I really need to go. I'll let your agent know if we want you to do something more for us, okay,' Mindy concluded, gathering her belongings.

  'Sure, just let Rebekah at Amoeba know. Thanks Mindy. Great meeting you and sorry about the mix up.'

  Alice was talking to the air. Mindy had already gone.

  From: RebekahBloomfield@AmoebaManagement.com

  To: AliceEvans@gmail.com

  Re: Looly Down Under

  We have set up this appointment with Whitney Meyers and Greg Stanley, the director. The character, Looly, is a fun-loving twenty-one-year-old zoologist. Are you okay with partial nudity? No accent required today, she's Australian. Could you prepare scenes 13 and 73. Audition at 2.15, Whitney Meyers Casting, Venice Beach.

  (Address and Yahoo map attached.)

  Love Rebekah

  Alice sat in Applepan Restaurant on West Pico Boulevard waiting for her burger. She'd arrived at 12.30 and was able to secure a stool at the horseshoe-shaped counter. According to Shauna, these were the best burgers in LA. So far Alice had sampled Jack-In-The-Box (uh-uh), White Castle (too small), McDonald's (bleech) and In-N-Out (excellent). She was curious to sample the famous Applepan burger and sipped root beer and munched French fries while she waited. She had plenty of time to eat and drive over to Venice Beach for her appointment with Greg Stanley.

  Alice tried not to think about financial matters and pondered the possibility of a career change. Having pursued the same dream for the last eight years, she was sadly unqualified for anything else. What were her options? Alice popped a hot French fry in her mouth and mulled it over. Florist? No aptitude with flowers. Starting up some kind of a small business? Zero business acumen. The production side of film? Well, she had produced a play for Belvoir Street Theatre but she was sinking in debt as a consequence. The thought of producing something else that lost money filled her with despair. Maybe she just wasn't cut out for the industry at all. Why on earth hadn't she chosen a less competitive, less flashy career in the public service?

  Alice's burger arrived steaming hot on a paper plate and she actually salivated in anticipation. It was every bit as delicious as Shauna had suggested, and a small blue-ribbon ceremony took place in Alice's head. An Applepan burger stood triumphantly on the podium, its fist punching the air in victory.

  At two o'clock, Alice entered the small house that served as casting office for Whitney Meyers. A queue of actors was lined up right out onto the front porch and some of them had recognisable faces. So much for her intimate meeting with the director. This was a cattle call.

  Alice found a seat on the end of one of the couches in the lounge/waiting room. Actors and actresses were seated on the brown wicker chairs, the couches and the floor. Alice plucked a fact sheet from the coffee table and automatically wrote down her age as twenty-seven in the space provided. She looked round the room. Every actress seemed younger, thinner and more beautiful than the last. They were pre-botox, shiny-eyed and self-assured in their youth. These were Hollywood zoologists, and Alice felt not only one hundred years old but overweight and unattractive to boot. What the hell did she think she was doing sampling burgers all over LA? These actresses looked as though they hadn't eaten in weeks, let alone a burger and fries and a piece of apple pie for dessert right before the audition. Well, they probably all do really crappy Australian accents, she consoled herself, and finished off her fact sheet with a flourish. She knew she was in for a long wait.

  Over an hour passed in the waiting room and Alice watched a variety of actors and actresses come and go. She recognised one red-headed guy as having just appeared in a Doug Liman indie hit. He looked inordinately pleased with himself and Alice wanted to punch the expression right off his face. She saw another ex-pat Australian actress who she knew by sight but had never been introduced to, and held back from going over and shaking her hand. Execrable as it was, this banana and anchovy pizza was hers.

  At 3.17 pm, Whitney Meyers ushered Alice into the office and she shook hands with an enervated Greg Stanley. He was wearing cargo pants and a long-sleeved Ramones T-shirt. Whitney apologised for the delay and asked Alice if she'd like a glass of water. Alice declined.

  'Soooo, Alice, how are you?' Greg began, fidgeting with a piece of paper that may or may not have been her CV.

  'I'm great, how are you?'

  'Could you make sure that second tape goes over to Paramount on the next courier, Whitney?'

  'I'm really loving it here, really looking forward to doing a bit of press for Cornucopia and . . .' Alice continued.

  'Sorry, Alice . . . that's great. How old are you?'

  'Twenty-seven,' Alice replied, wobbling on her wedge-heeled shoes. She knew without doubt the outfit she'd chosen was wrong, that it sent out the wrong message. Was it the long sleeves? The shade of denim? It wouldn't matter what she'd worn, nothing could make her look twenty-one when her thirtieth birthday was only a few months off. Alice had a sudden urge to scrub herself vigorously with a toilet brush.

  'Uh-huh,' Greg replied
, smiling at her inscrutably. 'Okay, Alice, let's take a look at what you got here.'

  Whitney stood poised beside camera with script pages in her hand.

  'Absolutely,' said Alice, dropping her satchel on the floor.

  'Scene thirteen, Alice?' Greg suggested, pleasantly.

  'Got it.' Alice had a nasty suspicion that Greg thought she was too old to play the part and was going through the motions until the next teenage zoologist walked through the door. 'Action,' he began.

  Alice looked at Whitney and furrowed her brow. 'You can't pick those, they're a protected species. In case you hadn't noticed, this is a national park,' said Alice/ Looly. What sort of a name was Looly anyway?

  'Would it make a difference if you knew I was picking this flower for you?' said Whitney as Chuck Gooly. Clearly the names were comedic.

  'Not at all. It's my job to protect the plants and animals in this jurisdiction.'

  'I'll just put it back then.'

  'Why aren't you wearing a hat, mate?'

  'I have a large head. A lot of hats don't fit me. Also, I think I look better this way.'

  'Really? Gunna be a hot one today, so make sure you've got sunscreen on,' said Alice/Looly, trying to be charming, cross and overtly Aussie at the same time. 'If hats aren't your thing, that is.'

  'Good advice,' said Whitney/Chuck. 'Hey, do you happen to know the way to Champs Canyon?'

  Alice shook her head with a wry smile. 'Stone the crows, not another Yank chasing fool's gold,' she said.

  'You know about that?'

  'You're not the first and you won't be the last,' said Alice/Looly. 'It's twenty miles north,' she added, pointing into the distance and shading her eyes from the imaginary glare of the sun. Why would she would be talking in miles instead of kilometres? 'Just follow the signs to Snake Ridge. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have work to do.' Alice/Looly swatted at a fly and turned to leave, allowing one cheeky smile, as if her character was thinking, this guy is an absolute goon, but there's something cute about him I just can't resist.

  'Cut! Great, Alice. Loved that little . . . thing you did at the end,' Greg enthused, waggling his fingers round his mouth. 'Why were you waving your hands around though?'