The First Assistant by Clare Naylor, Mimi Hare Read Free Book Online

the moving story lines, I forgot that I’d ever been involved with it and became carried away with what was quite simply a wonderful movie. I laughed, cried, and from time to time thought to myself, “Dammit, I’d be a great producer.” The only sour note in the proceedings, apart from the perfume of the woman in front of me, was the balding studio executive Jason had met before-hand, who spent the entire screening playing with his BlackBerry.
    He was sitting right in front of us, and by the middle of the second act I was ready to kill him with my bare hands.
    “Some people are so rude,” I hissed, but some people were obviously deaf as well because he didn’t flinch. He just kept on drilling away with his little stick on his screen, doubtless telling some other writer/director/producer how “fucking phenomenal” he thought they were and how he wanted to buy their latest movie, utterly oblivious to the fact that another phenomenal writer/director/producer whom he’d raved at and about for months was having his big moment behind him. And if this was how bored and fickle these men were when it came to work, imagine how horrifying their behavior was when it came to women. I shuddered and tried to ig-nore his demented tapping and the eerie glow from his screen.
    When the movie finished Jason still stared numbly ahead. There was
    a shuffle in the audience as people stood up, found their jackets, kicked over their empty Coke cups, and made their exit. I had expected rap-turous applause and standing ovations. In fact, I’d begun to clap myself when the end credits rolled, but it sounded so lame that I hastily turned it into a winter’s day–type hand rub.
    “Let’s go and talk about it outside,” I said cheerily to Jason.
    “I need a cigarette,” he said without moving his lips. I looked around for the BlackBerry-bearing studio executive whose cue it was to come racing toward us with promises of unprecedented marketing spends and Academy Award nominations, but he was pacing by the fire exit on his cell. I tugged Jason to his feet, hoping he wouldn’t notice how resoundingly he was being ignored by the powers-that-be and marched him through the audience, for whom normal life had resumed already. Sex Addicts in Love hadn’t seemed to alter their lives in any way whatsoever.
    Once we were safely secreted away in Ben and Jerry’s on the City Walk, I gave Jason an unreciprocated hug.
    “I can’t even begin to tell you how much I loved it,” I said truthfully. “It was so beautiful, so inspiring, absolutely everything that I always knew it would be.”
    “Diet Coke,” Jason said to the girl behind the counter without even scanning the list. “Grande.”
    “I’ll have a raspberry ripple smoothie,” I said, ordering the first thing I saw on the board. “And the casting was genius.”
    “They hated it,” he said flatly.
    “They aren’t the people who matter.” “Everyone was supposed to love it.”
    “They will. But you can’t expect people who come to test screenings to love a movie about a dysfunctional kid from New Jersey who has an affair with his stepmother,” I told him.
    “I need fresh air,” Jason said as he pulled his Marlboro Reds from his pocket and headed outside. I scurried after him with our drinks and followed him back toward the movie theater, where he took up residence by a concrete pillar.
    “You’ve got to believe me, Jase, it was an incredible movie.” And for the first time since the movie began, Jason looked as if he’d heard what
    I said. He turned his head halfway toward me and examined me out of the corner of his eye,
    “Really?” he asked quietly.
    “I promise.” I leaped overenthusiastically at the breakthrough. I couldn’t bear him being depressed like this, especially as his film wasn’t bad. It was brilliant. “I really thought that it was . . .” I was about to launch into superlatives when a guy walked in the door.
    “Did you just see that movie about sex