Shooting Sean

by Colin Bateman

  I couldn't see a problem with the first one, but what did I know, besides the fact that Davie hadn't returned with my drink and the blonde from the bar was walking towards me, smiling.

  'Hi,' she said quietly, 'I'm Alice.'

  'Hi,' I said, 'I'm Dan.'

  'Shhhh,' said the sound man. Alice raised her eyebrows and beckoned me towards a green double-decker bus which I'd somehow failed to notice sitting back against the rear wall of the warehouse. To judge from the trays of cutlery and tea dispensers sitting outside, it evidently doubled as a canteen.

  'Upstairs or downstairs?' she asked as she stepped up onto the bus.

  'Up,' I said.

  'The troublemakers always go upstairs,' she said.

  'Uhm,' I said, leading the way up the short spiral staircase. The upstairs had been converted into a little cafeteria. Davie sat at the nearest table as we emerged, reading a paper and drinking coffee. He didn't look up. There was an unopened can of Diet Coke warming on his table. 'Is this for me?' I said.

  He grunted, I lifted it. I walked down to the front of the bus and slid in behind a table. Alice sat opposite me. If anything she looked even more beautiful in daylight. I started twisting my wedding ring. She looked at it for several moments. I stopped.

  'Sean's inviting you for lunch,' she said.

  I nodded. 'Here?'

  'No,' she said, but looked as if she'd neglected to add the of course not. 'His caravan.'

  I smiled. 'He doesn't mix with the plebs.'

  'Yes, of course he does. But he can work in the caravan and eat at the same time. Have you any idea how absolutely all-consuming directing a film is?'

  'No.'

  'Well, take my word for it. It's two years out of your life. Twenty-four hours a day. A year to prepare. Ten weeks to shoot. Four months' editing, sound, all the post-production stuff, then you have to go out and sell it to the distributors, and once they get it you have to go out on the road and sell it to the punters. It's total commitment. It's your life.'

  I nodded appreciatively. 'So he doesn't mix with the plebs.'

  She drummed her fingers on the table. 'Why you?'

  'Why me what?'

  'Why did Sam Cameron want you to write this book? There must be a thousand hacks out there ready to jump at the chance, a thousand who haven't a degree in sarcasm.'

  I shrugged. 'Maybe he recognises talent. Maybe the fact that Sean and I come from the same place. Maybe he owes me a favour. Maybe he owes me a fortune. Maybe he knows I'll write a good book. Maybe he knows I won't kiss Sean's expensive arse. What does it matter, here I am, I'm here to do a job, Sean's agreed to it.' She looked a little taken aback. I tried the smile again. 'Maybe I could start by interviewing you,' I said softly. 'What exactly do you do for Sean?'

  'You mean what's my job?' I nodded. 'I'm his personal assistant.'

  'What's that, like a glorified PR or do you run his bath for him?'

  She took a deep breath. She glanced at her watch. 'Sean will break for lunch in about half an hour.' She stood up. 'I'll see you then.'

  'Why? I mean, no offence, but I'd prefer to talk to him alone. Or do you have to cut his carrots up for him?'

  Her eyes narrowed. One step too far, or thirty-nine. 'No, I just like to be on hand to make sure arseholes like you don't upset him.'

  'Oh, right.'

  She walked quickly towards the stairs. She glanced back once, her face heavy with a scowl, then clattered down the steps. I watched her cross towards the set, a mobile phone pressed to her ear. The sound guy shouted something I couldn't make out at her and she snapped something back; as far as I could make out the second word was off.

  I had no idea why I was being so nasty towards her, except perhaps it was the only way I could think of preventing her from falling in love with me.

  Or something like that.

  7

  I'd been expecting something fancy, a caravan that was basically a bungalow on wheels, with a jacuzzi filled with bubbly young women and a chef standing by to serve poached vegetables and caviar, six bedrooms, water beds, a TV the size of a cow and enough cocaine to keep the nose rebuilders busy for months. What I got was a dumpy rusty wee thing like my parents used to take to Portrush every year. The kind you didn't get into with a key, you used a tin opener. There was one type of water, cold, and the onboard cuisine consisted of a tin of corned beef and a packet of Tayto cheese and onion. I looked at Sean O'Toole, his millions in the bank, his good looks, his charm, his halo and said: 'Nice place.'

  He smiled and waved me in. He was still in his Brigadier gear. The make-up was thick on his face and hands. He was a movie star, but the closer I got the tireder he looked. It was in his eyes, mostly, and beneath them. 'I'm told directing a movie is a twenty-four-hour-a-day job,' I said.

  'At least,' Sean replied. He cleared some newspapers off a seat. The Sun. The Belfast Newsletter.

  As I sat down there came a brief knock on the door and Alice put her head round. I smiled keenly at her, but if she noticed she didn't react. Her eyes were on his. She appeared to have been running. She said, 'I should sit in on this, Sean,' and began to mount the couple of steps.

  But he said: 'Nah, it's okay. Get some lunch. I can cope.'

  She looked a little peeved. Exclusion from my company often gets them that way. 'But he's . . .'

  'A journalist, I know. But he's working for me.'

  'Actually,' I said, 'technically, I'm working for Sam.'

  'But I have approval over what you write.'

  'I doubt that.'

  He looked at me, then at Alice. 'What's he talking about?'

  Alice sighed. 'I told you. It was in the contract. I told you, Sean.'

  He rolled his eyes. 'And I told you, I've a thousand and one people shouting in my ear every day, I can't remember everything. Tell me now.'

  'It's too bloody late now, Sean.' She looked across at me. 'He's allowed an opinion, and that scares the balls off me.'

  'That would just leave the two,' I said.

  Sean turned blue eyes on me. 'He doesn't look that scary.'

  'I'm a pussy cat,' I said.

  'Yeah,' she said.

  Sean laughed. 'Have you two gotten off on the wrong foot or something?'

  'I bought her a drink at the hotel,' I said, 'and she punched my lights out. But don't worry, it's pretty much par for the course.'

  'She can be a little temperamental.'

  'Please don't talk about me as if I'm not here.'

  'Did you hear something?' Sean asked, looking directly at me.

  'Sean. Can I have a word outside?'

  He rolled his eyes. 'Alice. I'm a big boy. I can look after myself.'

  'No,' she said, 'you're a little boy and he'll play you like a' – she paused, searching for the right word – 'thing.'

  'Maybe you should write it then,' I suggested, 'given your mastery of . . .'

  Sean held up his hands. 'Girls. Please. Remember. I' – and he pointed at himself – 'that's me, I am the movie star. I am the director. Dan, you want to write a book about me; I am contractually obligated to provide material for it. Let's do that. Alice will provide me with a tape recorder so that I have a record of everything I say and can't be misquoted. Your take on everything is your own affair, but please be nice. Alice, I know you're a little paranoid because of this Colonel chap and you think the last thing we need is a motormouth on set stirring up trouble. But believe me, I can handle it. Just send somebody across with the tape recorder.' He turned her round and pushed her gently out of the door. She was in the act of saying 'But . . .' when he pulled the door firmly shut.

  He turned, looked at me, shook his head and said: 'So, have you ever tried crack cocaine?'

  A few moments later, after I'd just kind of shrugged and looked away, he said, 'No, neither have I. Would you like a cup of tea?'

  Two pots in and we were getting on famously. We'd grown up in Belfast within a couple of hundred yards of each other, our experiences divided only by religion, a r
azor-wire-topped peace line and three hundred years of hatred. He was a bit of a joker at school, but not because he was bullied. He had some kind of a belt in judo. If he had the mind to he could have told people jokes and then beaten them up if they didn't chortle. But he'd given up the judo 'because it hurt'. Besides, he got bitten by the acting bug, or more precisely by Elaine Hunter, a teacher who ran the drama club at the neighbouring girls' school and who'd come into Sean's school looking for somebody to play the lead in a production of Grease. The John Travolta part. There had been plenty of summer lovin' after that, and pretty Elaine Hunter could have been arrested for it.

  It was great stuff. He was fifteen, and now here we were sitting over Typhoo tea and he was giving me, literally, a blow-by-blow account of his first sexual relationship. Then there was a knock on the door and a girl's voice said, 'Five minutes, Sean, you'll need to get to make-up,' and a pained expression crossed his face and he said: 'Nobody ever calls me Mister round here.'

  He poured another cup. When I raised an eyebrow he said, 'I'm the boss.' Then his eyes twinkled and he said: 'You'll be wanting to talk to Elaine Hunter, then.' I nodded. He said: 'She won't talk. None of them will. You see, Dan, I always leave my girls on good terms. I'm a restless soul, but I don't make enemies. I could call any of them up today for a natter and they'd have me round for a cup of tea. With their husbands and kids sitting there beside them and none the wiser.' He gave a short wistful little laugh. 'I suppose I used to be a bit of a charmer.'

  'Used to?'

  'Ah, look at me now,' and he pulled at the bags beneath his eyes I'd noticed on the way in. 'Gone to seed.'

  'I think you'll find half the women in the world disagree.'

  'Nice of you to say, but I'm losing it. Hence the directing. Hence the character parts. Still. I can hardly complain, the life I've had.'

  'Sean, you're only forty-one.'

  'But not in doggy years.'

  He winked at me. I nodded and gave a conspiratorial smile, although I had no idea what he was on about. If I looked as good as he did when I reached forty-one, I'd have had a head transplant. 'Do you retain enough charm to work it on Michael O'Ryan?' I asked.

  Sean put down his cup. He stood up. He said, 'Come with me. I want to show you something.'

  We stepped out of the caravan. The make-up girl came towards him, but he waved her away. Fifty yards away across a short expanse of concrete the cast and crew of The Brigadier stood waiting for the star of the show, but he led me away from the set towards the catering bus and then on around the corner of the warehouse, the opposite side to the one Davie had driven me in that morning. As we walked, two guys in too-tight shirts and clicking heels fell into step behind us. As I glanced nervously back I noted that there were distinct bulges visible in their jackets that probably weren't autograph books. Sean didn't seem to notice our companions, although they were big enough to block out the sun.

  As he walked, Sean said: 'I don't know how the fuck he got hold of the script. They're all numbered, they're all printed on red paper to prevent photocopying, they're all security tagged. Anybody tries to take one home alarms go off and they're sacked on the spot, if not executed.' He sighed as he walked. 'Maybe he hasn't even got one. But he knows what's in it. I suppose you can't stop people talking.'

  'How do you know?' I asked. 'He's been in touch?'

  'You might say that.'

  He stopped. I stopped. He nodded forward.

  It took me several moments to realise what it was I was now looking at. A ton or more of blackened, twisted metal. There was a rectangular frame of sorts sitting on a set of wheels, but the rubber had long since been burned off them and both axles were knotted. Glass lay shattered on the ground along with charred pieces of furniture. The caravan might once have contained six bedrooms, a jacuzzi of nymphets and a television the size of a cow, but now it had the best air conditioning in Ireland.

  Sean gave a low little laugh. That's why I'm slumming it in the sardine can. Michael O'Ryan came a-calling.'

  8

  'Trish?'

  'Dan. What's wrong?'

  'Nothing's wrong. Is something wrong with you?'

  'No, of course there isn't. I mean, why are you calling? What have you done?'

  'I haven't done anything. Why must I have done something? I was bored, I just thought . . .'

  'I do not exist purely to relieve you of boredom.'

  'Thank goodness, you don't do a very good job . . .'

  'Dan . . . what do you want?'

  'You.'

  'Oh. Right. It's that time of the day again. You've sex on the brain.'

  'I'm trying to be romantic and you have to reduce everything to sex.'

  'It's me. Patricia. Your wife. You're talking about sex. You are obsessed by sex.'

  'Only because I'm not getting any.'

  'You're getting plenty. Only last week . . .'

  'Exactly! I'm a three-times-a-day man . . .'

  'You were never a three-times-a-day man!'

  'I never got the chance!'

  'Dan, is there something I can do for you? I'm up to my eyes in dishes here.'

  'Sorry. I was only asking for a minute of your time.'

  'Which is about as long as the sex takes. Sorry. That was below the belt.'

  'And an outright lie.'

  'And an outright lie. Usually you manage . . .'

  'Please put Little Stevie on before I drive home and divorce you.'

  She put Little Stevie on. He said, 'Daddy, have you bought me my present yet?'

  'No, son, I . . .'

  He put the phone down. Sometimes I think he didn't inherit any of my genes at all. And then I remember that he really couldn't have inherited any of my genes at all, and that the periods during which I forget that fact are getting longer all the time.

  I needed a drink. I went down to the bar. Alice found me there an hour later and said, 'You're looking . . . the same.'

  'I didn't have time to get changed . . . work . . . Do you want a drink?'

  'No,' she said, 'we have to go.'

  She turned on her heel. I took a respectable minute to finish my drink, then followed. She'd evidently had some trouble parking; she was a couple of hundred yards away across the car park. She was wearing a short white skirt and a denim jacket. I watched her walk. If I hadn't been married, if she hadn't disliked me right from the start, I would have been quite prepared to give her a minute of my time. But I was, and she did, so I waited for her to bring the car to me.

  We were destined for Sean O'Toole's Killiney retreat, and we drove there in virtual silence. I managed to find 'London Calling' on the radio. She switched it off. She rolled down her window, I followed suit. She tutted and rolled hers up, then tutted again as she tried to fix her hair, as if the wind from my side was going to ruin it any more than her own.

  She had a buzzer to activate the security gates at the entrance to Sean's abode, big solid gates attached to concrete pillars. Two sets in fact, presumably so that you could see nothing of the house beyond, when the first set opened. There was a tall wall around the gardens, but the house itself was built on a slope which allowed it perfect views of the spectacular bay below. It was early evening and the sun was out and the sea was calm. There were boats and yachts and families sitting in the sand. The DART line ran far below and there was a hotel with a large car park, and I'm sure there were people looking up at the house wondering who exactly lived there and wouldn't it be lovely. And it was. It wasn't a particularly big place by movie star standards, I supposed. Madonna would probably have found it quite compact. But it was nevertheless an imposing building by out-of-work-and-owed-a-lot-of-money journalist standards and I gave a low whistle as Alice drove slowly up the driveway.

  'Bet he doesn't cut the grass himself,' I said. She managed a brief smile.

  'I'm surprised he's invited you,' Alice said. 'He's got one hell of a lot of work to get through.'

  'What, like learning lines?'

  'That's the leas
t of his worries. We've one more week of filming to go, then usually you'd have a nice leisurely four or five months in post production. Sean's given himself a month. He's editing on the hoof.'

  She pulled the car into a gravelled parking bay. A security guard, one of the two that had accompanied me earlier to the burned-out caravan, appeared from behind a small hedge and gave us the once-over, then disappeared. Perhaps he cut the grass.

  I said: 'What's the rush?'

  'Cannes is the rush.'

  'The film festival?'

  'The film festival.'

  'I don't understand, what's so special about . . .'

  She had been in the act of getting out of the car, but she pulled the door closed again and said in a lower voice, 'The Brigadier is going to be a wonderful film, Sean is a great director and he's written a great script. But it's low budget, it's black and white, there are no special effects and the accents are as thick as shite. No studio is going to touch it with a bargepole, even with Sean's name attached . . . especially with Sean's name attached. They worry that it could affect future box office . . .'

  'As in, I saw that pile of poo that was The Brigadier, he'll probably be just as crap in Lethal Alien Cop Six?'

  'Exactly. But Cannes is the place to take a film like The Brigadier. You get extra marks for being black and white, they presume you're an intellectual if you've jazz on the soundtrack and if you resolutely refuse to compromise your art by providing subtitles and they haven't a clue what the hell your characters are talking about, then you're virtually certain to walk off with the top prize.'

  'You sound quite . . . I don't know . . . cynical?'

  'Cynical, realistic. I've been there the last six years in a row. That's how it works. In cinematic terms the continental Europeans like contemplating their own arseholes, but at the same time they're totally in awe of Hollywood. They won't admit it, of course, but when a movie star comes to town they go bananas. Just picture what they'll do when Sean arrives with The Brigadier. The best of both worlds. And then the American studios will have to take notice. They'll pay a fortune for it and shower it with Oscars and Sean'll have what he craves most.'