The Big Sheep

by Robert Kroese

  “And the point of this is?” I asked.

  “Ever wonder what it takes to make a star?” Selah asked. “I suppose everyone has, to some extent. People look at some big-name actor and think, Why her? Or conversely, Why not her? But for me, it’s not an idle question. Flagship bets billions of dollars every year on hot young actors who may or may not be the next big thing. Imagine what it would be worth if you could know, in advance, which bets would pay off. Which actors and actresses have what it takes to be an international superstar.”

  “Like Priya Mistry,” I said.

  “Exactly,” said Selah. “Obviously Priya’s looks help a lot. And she’s a good actor. Not great, but good. But beyond those factors, she’s got something else, what they used to call the it factor. Priya has it, whatever it is. It is what makes her a star, rather than just another supporting actress on some indie drama no one has heard of. Now imagine if you could test someone for it, the way you might test someone for mechanical aptitude or color blindness. What would a test like that be worth?”

  “A lot?” I offered. I was growing impatient with Selah’s show.

  Selah smiled. She continued, “You’ve probably heard my success story. Aging actress-turned-producer makes billions by capitalizing on the entertainment value of the DZ. But that’s only part of the story. I laid the foundations for my success years ago, before I even became the CEO of Flagship. When I was still producing low-budget action flicks, I bought a small research company call Empathix. I’m sure you’ve never heard of it; in any case, they’ve now been rolled into the Flagship empires. Empathix was a leader in what they called empathy metrics. Basically, quantifying the factors that allow one person to relate to the experiences of another. The researchers at Empathix claimed to have identified several measurable personality traits that mark a person as having it. The Empathix people call those who possess these traits sympaths.”

  “Sympath,” I said. “What does that mean, exactly? That the person is easy to relate to?”

  “That’s part of it,” said Selah. “Essentially, a sympath possesses four distinct characteristics: relatability, charisma, poignancy, and allure. The sympath serves as a proxy, an aspirational figure, an object of pity, and an object of desire. That is, the viewer simultaneously thinks of the sympath as a stand-in for oneself, wants to be more like her, feels sorry for her, and wants to—”

  “Wants to fuck her,” finished Keane coldly. “No need to mince words.”

  “Correct,” said Selah, returning Keane’s stare. “Of course, the dynamics are slightly different with males and females, and straights versus gays. And there’s a great deal of variation in individual preferences. But a very strong sympath will appeal to just about everyone, in ways they can’t quite define. These conflicting emotional responses can be confusing to some viewers; some mistake them for love, others for hate. That’s why you get psychopaths stalking actresses or, conversely, people who claim to hate a charismatic actor like Clive Harrow, but nevertheless line up to see his movies.”

  I suppressed a grimace at the name Clive Harrow. The guy was the classic entitled Hollywood jerkwad. And in my opinion, he’d been coasting on the success of his first big hit, December Rain, for a few years now. His last three movies were mediocre at best.

  “As part of the casting process for any of the shows I produced,” Selah went on, “I had someone from Empathix administer a test to any promising candidates. I didn’t put a lot of stock in it at first, but I had Empathix track the success of the subjects, whether or not I hired them for a role on one of my productions. Over the next two years it proved surprisingly accurate at predicting which actors and actresses would strike a chord with audiences. The Feinberg-Webb scale ranges from zero to ten, and it follows a bell curve distribution, meaning that the vast majority of the population ranges somewhere between three and seven. We found that candidates who scored in the eight plus range were much more likely to go on to star in hit shows. As a result, I instructed my casting directors to start considering the Feinberg-Webb results in their casting decisions. I didn’t give them any definitive guidelines, but told them to look at the scores as one factor among many.” She opened the folder she was holding and pulled out a sheet of paper. “The next day,” she continued, “the woman I’d put in charge of casting a new drama I was producing gave me this picture.”

  Keane took the paper. It was a photograph of a girl who appeared to be in her late teens. She looked vaguely familiar, like a cousin of someone I knew.

  “Who is this?” I asked.

  “Her name is Bryn Jhaveri,” Selah said. “Just one of the thousands of girls who came to Los Angeles in the years after the Collapse, looking for their big break. Not much to look at, is she? But then, looks aren’t everything.”

  I studied the picture. The girl was cute, sure, but she was dreaming if she thought she was going to be a movie star. I guessed she was around eighteen.

  “Okay, I’ll bite,” I said. “You’re saying Bryn Jhaveri is one of these sympaths?”

  “So you have some context,” Selah said, “ninety-five percent of the population scores between three and seven on the Feinberg-Webb scale. Ninety-nine-point-nine percent fall between two and eight. Anyone scoring above an eight-point-six is considered a sympath, someone who emotes in such a way that it essentially scrambles the observer’s ability to rationally process the input they’re receiving. The mental barrier we construct between us and strangers evaporates. The viewer relates to the sympath on a purely emotional level.”

  “Logic Kryptonite,” I murmured.

  Selah smiled. “I like that. Logic Kryptonite. Genuine sympaths, people scoring a Feinberg-Webb of eight-point-six or higher, are literally one in a million. Most people never even meet one. Bryn Jhaveri scored a nine-point-four.”

  “How rare is that?” Keane asked.

  “As I understand it,” said Selah, “she’s within the test’s margin of error. The best guess Empathix could give me is that Bryn Jhaveri is one in a billion. We’ve only had one other subject test anywhere close to her.”

  “So she should be a superstar,” I said. “How come I’ve never heard of her?”

  “The Feinberg-Webb results are only one factor in determining potential stardom,” Selah said. “The other two major factors are talent and appearance. Bryn was a reasonably talented actress, but as you can see, she’s no Priya Mistry in the looks department.”

  Keane was nodding thoughtfully, as if he were processing some hidden subtext of Selah’s monologue.

  “So where is she now?” I asked. “Making Frappuccinos at Starbucks?”

  Selah shook her head. “A nine-point-four on the Feinberg-Webb scale is too valuable to waste. You have to understand that appearance and talent are what you might call ‘limiting factors’ to stardom. Neither looks nor ability make a star, but their absence can limit a person’s star potential. Bryn Jhaveri was a diamond in the rough. All we had to do was polish her a bit.”

  “Cut,” said Keane.

  “Sorry?” said Selah.

  “You cut diamonds,” said Keane. “The polishing comes after.”

  “Fair enough,” said Selah.

  “You gave her plastic surgery,” I said, staring at the picture. The truth had finally dawned on me. “You made her into Priya Mistry.”

  SIXTEEN

  Something still didn’t fit. Bryn Jhaveri’s head was rounder than Priya’s. Her hair was dark brown, not black, and her eyes were a dull hazel. Priya’s were blue.

  “It required more than surgery,” said Selah. “I had Empathix reverse engineer a physical form based on Bryn’s Feinberg-Webb results. Basically, I asked them what Bryn Jhaveri should look like in an ideal world. Not just physical perfection, mind you, but the perfect match between appearance and personality. We wanted her not to be just beautiful, but beautiful in a way that precisely complemented her psyche. Form follows function.”

  “But how?” I asked, astounded.

  “Surgery couple
d with gene therapy. We essentially reprogrammed Bryn Jhaveri’s DNA. Changed the shape of her head, corrected the curve in her spine, fixed her facial symmetry, changed her eye and hair color, et cetera. The process took several months.”

  I didn’t know whether to be impressed or horrified. I ultimately decided a little of each was warranted. “How much did this cost?”

  “Between us?” Selah said. “In the neighborhood of two hundred million new dollars. An investment we’ve recouped ten times over with Priya.”

  I shook my head. “So you offer to pay for all these … enhancements, and in return Priya agrees to work for you indefinitely.”

  “Indefinite contracts aren’t enforceable,” said Selah. “That’s tantamount to indentured servitude. We could have signed her to a long-term contract, but there are ways around that as well. As it turns out, Priya surpassed all our expectations, recouping our investment in less than two years, but at the time we assumed it would take ten years or more to turn a profit. There was only one way to guarantee Priya would work for us that long.”

  “You own Priya Mistry,” said Keane.

  “Exactly,” said Selah, with a smile.

  “Hold on,” I said. “Indentured servitude is illegal, but slavery is totally okay?”

  Keane shook his head. “They don’t own the person Bryn Jhaveri. They own the persona Priya Mistry. Don’t you see? They created a fictional character named Priya Mistry and then altered Bryn Jhaveri to look like her. They own Priya Mistry just as surely as Disney owns Mickey Mouse.”

  Selah gave Keane an impressed nod.

  I was trying to wrap my head around this idea. “So the person who hired us,” I said. “That was Bryn Jhaveri?”

  “Correct,” said Selah. “She may have represented herself as Priya Mistry, but she’s not legally empowered to enter into a contract as Priya Mistry any more than Mickey Mouse can buy a Lamborghini. Her legal name is Bryn Jhaveri. She’s contracted to play a character named Priya Mistry in public life. Part of her contract is also to play Priya Mistry playing Aria Velazquez on DiZzy Girl.”

  “What about the Prima Facie commercials?” I asked.

  Selah smiled again. “This is where it gets complicated.”

  “Oh,” I said. “Is this where that happens? Because I thought we passed complicated when you explained how it’s okay for you to own a human being.”

  Selah continued, undeterred. “As I mentioned, Priya’s success surpassed all our expectations. There are only so many hours in a day, and Bryn works a grueling schedule on DiZzy Girl. We decided it was in everybody’s interest to … well, let’s say, franchise Priya.”

  “You made copies,” said Keane.

  “Yes,” said Selah. “Other actresses, who superficially resembled Priya, and who also scored well on the Feinberg-Webb test. We had them altered to be identical to the original Priya. We couldn’t use the copies in a feature film; they don’t have Priya’s charisma, and some of the more observant fans would notice subtle differences in personality. But for a thirty-second commercial, the copies work just fine.”

  “So Priya doesn’t remember making the commercials because she didn’t make them,” I said.

  Selah shook her head. “Priya did make the commercials. Bryn Jhaveri doesn’t remember making them, because she didn’t. But Priya did.”

  “Unbelievable,” I murmured. “So how many Priyas are there running around Los Angeles?”

  “Currently, there are three, including Bryn. I have plans for more, but I prefer not to get more specific than that. Each of them travels with her own bodyguard and has her own set of handlers. Generally, no one on set is aware that the actress they are working with is not the ‘real’ Priya Mistry. Or, more precisely, that she is merely one instance of the real Priya Mistry.”

  I shook my head, trying to comprehend the logistics of all this.

  “As you can imagine,” Selah went on, “this all can get rather confusing for Bryn. Playing a character twenty-four hours a day can do strange things to your head, and sympaths tend to be emotionally volatile in any case.”

  “Does she know about all this?” I asked. “The other Priyas?”

  Selah nodded. “Yes. Well, she was informed at one point. It’s hard to say what she ‘knows’ anymore. These days Bryn is so wrapped up in playing Priya that we try to shield her from the existence of the other Priyas. Whether we’re helping or harming her, I honestly don’t know. We have some of the best psychologists in the world consulting on her case, but obviously her specific circumstances are unprecedented. There’s no consensus in the mental health community on how to maintain the sanity of a person whose whole existence is a fiction.”

  “So you just get as much use out of her as you can and then discard her,” I said. “Chew her up and spit her out.”

  “First of all,” said Selah, meeting my glare, “Bryn chose this life. She was informed of everything in advance. She was a consenting adult, certified as sane.”

  “By the same psychologists you’ve got salivating over her impending breakdown?” I said. “That worked out well for them, didn’t it?”

  “Second,” Selah continued, “it’s in my interest to keep Bryn sane and healthy for as long as possible. And if she ever does develop some type of serious psychosis, she’ll have the best care on Earth.”

  “A padded cell with a silver lining,” I said. “That’s vastly reassuring.”

  “What would you have me do?” asked Selah. “Suppose I release Bryn into your hands and give you unlimited funds to care for her. Then what?”

  “She’s an adult,” I said. “She doesn’t need anybody to care for her.” I looked to Keane for support, but he seemed lost in thought.

  Selah laughed. “Bryn Jhaveri wouldn’t survive a month in the real world. Her whole life for the past five years has been a fiction. She can barely keep it together with a full-time staff looking out for her.”

  “Because you made her into this thing, this creature!” I snapped. “She was just a kid, desperate to be famous, and you’ve made her into a monster. Taken over her life, destroyed any chance she has for a normal existence.”

  “I made her into a star!” Selah cried. “Gave her a life that most people can only dream of!”

  “Your benevolence is overwhelming,” I said.

  “I gave her what she wanted,” said Selah coldly. “What she begged for. And I gave billions of people what they wanted without even knowing they wanted it. Priya Mistry, a woman they can admire, pity, sympathize with, lust after. And yes, I got very, very rich in the process.”

  “And all it cost is one little girl’s soul,” I replied.

  Selah sighed. “What you fail to understand is that while I created Priya Mistry, I didn’t make Bryn Jhaveri a sympath. I didn’t instill her with the need to be famous. I just made it possible. Would she have been better off as a frustrated actress, waiting tables in between tampon commercials? Maybe. But who am I to make that decision? Who am I to say to Bryn Jhaveri, No, the risk is too great. Your dream will have to die.”

  I snorted at this. “Have you heard enough?” I asked Keane. “I’m ready to get the hell out of here.”

  “Wait,” said Selah. “You haven’t seen the best part.”

  “What’s that?” I said. “The operating room?”

  Selah smiled and spoke into her comm. “Camille, could you please send Bryn Jhaveri in?”

  A woman who looked very much like Priya Mistry walked into Selah’s office. She looked, I suppose, as much as it’s possible for someone to look like Priya Mistry without actually being Priya Mistry. Nobody was Priya Mistry, I told myself. Priya Mistry was a fictional character, like Mickey Mouse. Keane and I stood to greet her.

  “Hi,” she said quietly as she approached Keane and me. “My name is Bryn. We sort of met the other night.”

  I shook her hand dumbly. She seemed calm but slightly embarrassed, like a coworker coming into work after a not-fully-remembered night of overindulgence.

 
; “Hi, Bryn,” I heard myself saying. “I’m Blake Fowler. This is Erasmus Keane.” Keane was once again doing his duckwalk, trying to observe Bryn from all angles.

  Bryn laughed shyly. “I know,” she said. “I remember you.”

  “You do?” I asked.

  “Yes,” she said. “I came to your office. I was … distraught. I suppose you could say I was not myself. But I do remember it, like a dream.”

  “Why did you come to our office?” I asked.

  “I thought…,” she started. “I was confused. Sometimes I get so wrapped up in being Priya that I forget I’m not her. But then things don’t fit. There are still parts of my life where I’m not Priya, and there are the other Priyas, and people watching me.… It can get confusing. And the people around me, people like Roy, they don’t know the whole story, so they start telling me I’m imagining things, which just makes it worse. Everybody around me insists I’m Priya, and I start thinking there’s this conspiracy, that people are out to get me. I heard about Mr. Keane somewhere, I can’t really remember where, but I started thinking he could help. So I sneaked away to find you.”

  “Have you seen us since that night?” asked Keane.

  “I don’t think so,” she said. “But my memory is a little fuzzy. I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” I said. “You’ve been through a lot.” I figured that whatever else was true, that was a safe statement to make. Evidently, she hadn’t seen me on the set or at the party the night before. Either that, or she had forgotten about it.

  “What about Noogus?” Keane asked.

  “Sorry?” asked Bryn.

  “What can you tell me about Noogus?”

  Bryn blushed and looked for a moment at Selah, who was observing her dispassionately.

  “Did I tell you about Noogus?” she said. “I don’t remember. Noogus was my teddy bear. When I was very little.”