I glance at the call sheet, “Forty five minutes?”
Danny nods, “Will you run these with me?”
Huh?
I see a faint trace of red on his cheekbones. “This is an important scene and I just need to go over them with someone.”
“Oh, uhm,” I say. Read lines with Danny Covington? “I can see if Adriana is available?” Adriana is the female lead, and definitely more qualified for this than me.
“Freckles,” Danny says softly, “Please.”
Biting my lip, I gently take the sides out of his hands. “Okay, but don’t laugh, I don’t think I’ve read out loud since school.” I plop on the couch in front of him, clearing my throat before I begin.
I immediately feel stupid, the lines coming out stilted and forced. It’s like I’ve completely forgotten how humans speak. I clear my throat and try again.
“The risk is too high, no one can know.”
“Is that supposed to be a Scottish accent?” Danny cuts in.
“Do you want my help or not?” I snap, flustered.
His lips shake and I narrow my eyes at him.
“Sorry, please continue.”
I make a show of smoothing out the paper and we start again.
Danny knows every word of course, and the scene runs seamlessly until I trip over my words. It’s worth it though, to see Danny grin at my fumbling and to see calm wash over his tense shoulders.
We finish the scene and I slap my thighs, pushing to stand up. “All done.”
Before I can take a step, Danny’s hand catches my arm, his large palm nearly twice the size of my wrist.
“Can we do it one more time?” He looks up at me pleading. With a huff, I sit back down.
“Fine, but I’m going to go for a Scouse accent next.”
Danny makes me reread the scene until I’ve nearly run out of accents, so when I get a text saying the car is ready to take him to set, I’m confident he’s ready for the scene.
That confidence quickly evaporates once we arrive on set and find Mr Covington lounging next to the directors chair.
The scene starts off strong, mainly because Danny refuses to look at his father. Until after the first reset, which has Danny and Mr Covington sharing a tense, loaded glance from across the room.
From that point on, disaster strikes.
I know Danny can do it backwards. He should be able to do this scene and following the run through in his trailer, nothing can really explain his need to bark “Line!” every five seconds.
Lauren, the 3rd AD is trying to be patient but I can tell by the vein popping in her forehead that she’s getting frustrated. And a better word for frustrated would be pissed.
“We need to take this to Fraser, you know he isn’t part of this,” Lauren feeds him, calmly.
Danny clenches his jaw and nods, shaking his shoulders out.
“Okay guys, let’s try this again,” Lauren shouts to the crew.
I watch as his cue comes and goes, the flush in his cheeks and the tick in his jaw a pretty clear sign that this isn’t going too well. In case anyone wasn’t aware.
I glance around at the crew and notice more than a few eye rolls and scoffs.
