“I hope so,” I teased her.
“Not so fast, Buster. I’m a good girl,” she said, as if she was superior.
“Still want to grab lunch?”
She thought about it for a moment.
“Kent would have warned me if I needed to worry about you.”
We found a quick taco place and stuffed our faces. I could eat a few tacos. I think Halle was impressed with how many I consumed. I couldn’t hang out with her for long because I had to go to the set.
TODAY WENT BETTER. Craig was more prepared and we were able to complete the scenes with fewer takes. I found out Halle was in the film when we did a scene with Lori and most of the cast. Lori addressed the student body. Trip was also in the scene. He was eyeballing me and his sister. She gave him a little-sister look and rolled her eyes.
At one point the script had me get separated from my team as we investigated a network of tunnels. I was sent over to another set where they had created a maze of tunnels. It was a pretty slick system. They could reconfigure a tunnel in no time. The walls would just snap into place. I had to be careful not to bump into a wall too hard or it would come undone. I found this out as I did a scene where I had to run from one hiding place to another and went a little too fast. The set guy had been nice about it, but I felt bad. Every mistake like that cost time and money, as Jessup constantly reminded us.
I really enjoyed this part of the movie. I was able to run, dodge, and use my new sword-fighting skills. Some of it was shot with a blue screen behind me, and I had to imagine where the monster I was fighting was. That was hard to do. One of the mistakes I made early on was not looking where the monster was supposed to be. It was difficult to focus your eyes when there was nothing to focus on. I even looked at the camera a couple of times. It was just human nature to look at what was there.
I’d find out about it later when they viewed their dailies. Dailies are the raw footage sent to the producer to review at the end of the day. The director can check the playback on set but doesn’t have time to spot minor errors. They’d have to reshoot some of the scenes I’d done today. Thankfully, Jessup took the news well and I learned a valuable lesson.
WE DIDN’T GET DONE until almost midnight. I walked back to the hotel, exhausted. I really had no idea how the crew and Jessup did it. They’d still been working when I’d left. Kendal and I agreed to work on tomorrow’s script in the morning.
Wednesday January 21
I HAD TO LAUGH. KENDAL figured out they had someone who would help me learn my lines. Agents rarely were on a set and even more rarely did this type of work. The only reason she was here was my age. My dad had talked to Tom last spring and they’d agreed I was not to work without someone to look after me, at least until I turned eighteen.
Kendal was fine with what we’d been doing because she wanted to learn as much as she could. Jessup and his staff were very accommodating and allowed her access an agent normally wouldn’t have. I appreciated the allowances they made for me. That was until Halle offered to read with me. It seemed no one thought I would get any work done if she helped me learn my lines. I thought about throwing a hissy fit, but Jessup gave me a look that told me not to push it.
Trip started to treat me better when he found I hadn’t pushed his sister to sleep with me. Don’t get me wrong, I wanted to sleep with her. Hell, she could get me aroused at fifty paces with just a glance. The good news was the feelings were mutual. We would probably have been going at it like crazed bunnies if I didn’t work twelve to eighteen hours a day.
The other thing that hadn’t happened was my schoolwork. It just seemed I was either on set or preparing to be on set all day long, and I just didn’t seem to find time for school. But I refused to skip my workouts in the morning. I found that if I worked out, it helped me keep my energy all day and I just felt better.
I was finding a lot of actors are health nuts. Their bodies are what make them a living. There had begun to be a good crowd in the hotel gym each morning. I introduced them to thirty minutes of hell. The thing was, actresses are not your normal everyday girls. When they showed up in leotards and bounced around to work out with me, it was about to drive me to distraction. In other words, I was horny as hell.
TODAY WAS A LOT OF fun. Well, not so much fun for me, but the other cast members seemed to enjoy my antics. We filmed a scene on board a spaceship. Craig was in the captain’s chair, and Bree and Elizabeth were seated in front of him. I was off to the side in front of a panel of knobs and buttons and a small screen.
“Okay. We’re going to run through the scene until we all have our lines and blocking right. Then we’re going to do this in one take,” Jessup told us.
It was a scene where we were ambushed and the ship took heavy damage. Jessup had explained they would simulate some smoke and a few sparks on set and then, during post-production, special effects would be added to make the scene more realistic. We were told to act like we were worried. Craig was supposed to be the calming leader and keep us alive.
We finally had run through our lines several times without any errors. Jessup seemed nervous and looked at all of us.
“Okay, no matter what, don’t stop. We’ll only get one take. Are you all ready?” he asked.
We all said ‘yes.’
“Places everyone! Quiet on the set! Cameras ready?”
“Ready!”
“Sound ready?”
“Ready!”
“Scene 85. Take 1! Action!”
“Dropping out of jump,” Elizabeth said.
“Scan for hostiles,” Craig ordered.
“No contacts, sir,” Bree said.
“Stryker, warm up the weapons to be safe,” Craig ordered.
“Sir, yes, sir,” I responded.
That was when all hell broke loose. I had no idea our spaceship was on hydraulics. I was shaken from my seat and rolled to the back of the set where I slammed into the wall.
“What the hell!” I yelled.
“Get to your station, Mister!” Craig screamed.
That was not part of the script. I’d messed up big time, but quickly recovered and scampered back to my seat. The whole time the ship rocked in unpredictable directions. I had a death grip on the console in front of me.
“Report!” Craig ordered.
“Three contacts closing fast,” Bree said.
“Main engine damaged. 85% efficiency,” Elizabeth reported.
“Plotting firing solutions,” I said.
“Fire at will,” Craig reported.
I smashed a button.
“One hostile eliminated. Incoming missiles!” Bree yelled.
There was a tremendous crash and the bulkhead right above me suddenly had a huge dent. At the same time, sparks and flames shot out of my console and it started billowing smoke. The set shuddered and then pitched and I went flying again. It was good that everything was padded, or I could have gotten hurt.
Bree jumped up with a fire extinguisher and put out my console. I staggered up and grabbed the back of Craig’s chair to steady myself.
“Weapons switched to my station,” Craig said.
There was another loud crash as if we were struck again. Somehow, I managed to hang on and not crash across the set again.
“Aw, shit!” I cried.
Again, not part of the script.
“Engines are down, thrusters only,” Elizabeth reported.
“Firing!” Craig yelled.
“Hostiles eliminated!” Bree reported.
I did a goofy little happy dance as the stage quit tipping around.
“Cut!” Jessup shouted. “What the hell was that little dance, David?”
“Sorry, I just kind of got into it,” I said sheepishly.
Jessup had us gather around so we could see playback of the scene. I looked at the remains of the set and understood why they only wanted to do it once. When the video started, I watched in amazement. It really looked like we were on a spaceship. When the shaking and rocking started, everyone laughed at the surprised expression on my face.