The Guru
Emma
I can’t believe I’m doing this. I really can’t.
“Damian?” I ask, tapping my costar on the shoulder.
“Yeah?” he answers, turning around. He turns back to the pair of his groupies that apparently work on the sound staff, saying, “I’ll talk to you later,” and he turns back toward me.
“You remember how you said that you’ve been in the business long enough to know how to deal with certain things?” I ask.
“You did do porn!” he exclaims. “I knew it! Pouty lips like that, there’s no way some skeevy producer doesn’t pick you out for a role in his buddy’s next project.”
“No, I’m not—Damian, I didn’t do porn,” I tell him, after managing to get him to stop bouncing with excitement.
He stops bouncing.
“Oh,” he says. “Well, that’s a shame. I was really looking forward to a viewing party. Oh well,” he says and claps his hands, “how else can I be of service to you today?”
“Well, it’s not porn…exactly,” I start.
A smile creeps back up Damian’s face.
“It’s nothing too bad, really,” I tell him. “I had a boyfriend a year or so ago who took some naked pictures of me and now he’s trying to blackmail me with them and he’s given me 72 hours, 26 of which have passed, to decide whether I’m going to pay him $5,000 a month for the next 17 years or if I’m going to end up on the front page of every tabloid for the first time in my career, only it’s not going to be some kind of bad gossip or award win that’s going to put me there on the covers. No, it’s going to be those stupid pictures that my stupid ex took almost two years ago, and I’m going to be a fucking laughingstock for the rest of my life.”
I realize that I’m breathing a little heavy, so I do my best to relax.
“That’s quite the story,” he says. “You know the guy’s got the pictures?”
“Of course he has them,” I answer. “He’s the one that took them. It was his camera.”
“Yeah, but have you seen the pictures?” he asks.
“Well,” I think back, “no. Come to think of it, I never saw those pictures. You think he’s just trying to lie his way into seven figures?”
“I don’t know,” Damian says. “What I do know is that I wouldn’t even consider paying that kind of cash unless I knew for a fact he had the pictures and copies.”
“He said that he’s already attached the photos to two emails, one to the LA Times and one to E! He told me that if he doesn’t put in a password every so often, they’ll send on their own. Is that even possible?” I ask.
“Actually, it is,” Damian says. “It’s pretty easy to set up, too, but that’s neither here nor there. I’d say the first thing you need to do is contact him and have him give you proof the pictures exist and that he has them.”
“What happens after that?” I ask.
He’s being quite helpful right now. It’s kind of making me nervous.
“That depends on him, really,” Damian says. “If it turns out he doesn’t have the pictures, you call him an asshole and hang up on him.”
“If it turns out that he does have the pictures?” I ask.
“Well, that depends on you, really,” Damian says. “Just how racy are the photos?”
“I’m naked in them,” I tell him, “but it’s not like I’m doing stuff with anyone.”
“Are you masturbating in the photos?” he asks.
“I really don’t think that’s any of your business,” I snap.
“The reason I’m asking is that some pictures of you naked might actually help your career, but pictures of you naked and masturbating are going to alienate a whole lot of people,” he says.
“What difference does it make?” I ask.
“For some people, it’s the difference between heaven and hell. Can you imagine?” he asks. “Anyway, so are you flicking the bean or not?”
“Not,” I tell him. “I’m just naked in the water.”
“Can you even see anything?” Damian asks.
“Well, again, I haven’t actually seen any of the pictures, but I don’t think much is left to the imagination,” I tell him. “It was low tide.”
“Okay,” he says. “So, you’ve got an ex who’s blackmailing you with some old nudie pics you had him take back when the two of you were a thing. You haven’t seen the pictures, you don’t know if they actually exist, but even if they do get out, there’s no sexual contact going on, only nudity. Fuck it,” he says, “I’d save my money and wait for the book offers to start rolling in.”
“Book off—” I start.
“People are into weird shit,” Damian says. “A lot of people are going to say that being betrayed like this humanizes you and a lot of other people are going to say that it humanizes you too much, that your mystique is gone and they’ll call for you to drop out of the spotlight. There are going to be parents groups and church groups that condemn you for acting in a manner that’s immoral and sets a bad example. While women are generally going to be understanding and sympathetic, there are going to be a lot of them that start calling you a skank.”
“What about men?” I ask. “We’ve covered just about every other demographic. How would they react to those pictures?”
Damian smiles and says, “How do you think?”
Well, this is just great.
“Overall, this really isn’t going to hurt you that much. You’re going to have a lot of people in the media turn on you, but even more will hop on your bandwagon, either because they want to fuck you or because they want to make some cash off the fact that you got fucked,” Damian says. “Overall, though,” he repeats, “this really isn’t going to hurt you that much.”
“So you’re saying I should just tell him to go screw himself and let what happens happen?” I ask.
“I’d start by finding out whether those pictures are real or not,” he says. “Pay attention. So that’s the worst case scenario of you not paying him off. If you do decide to pay him off,” Damian continues, “you run the risk that he ups the price on you or that the million only gets you some, not all, of the pictures, or that he otherwise tries to screw you. Best case scenario, he keeps his mouth shut, keeps the pictures in his drawer, and you end up paying him a shitload of money. Yeah,” he says, “I’d say you’re pretty well fucked.”
“I think the real worst case scenario would be the pictures get released and nobody cares,” I mutter.
“There’s always that,” he says. “I really don’t think you’ve got to worry about something like that happening, though.”
“Why’s that?” I ask.
“So,” he says, “we’ve got a few minutes before we’re halfway through waiting for the next scene to get set up. Why don’t you tell me a little bit about yourself?”
“What? Why?” I ask.
“Call it a favor for a favor,” he says. “So, what happened with the guy who’s blackmailing you? I can’t imagine he was that good of a boyfriend if he’s the kind of person that’s willing to do this to you.”
“He wasn’t,” I answer. “He wasn’t a very good person in general, actually.”
“I’m sorry to hear that,” Damian says. “Isn’t that a weird kind of response to the situation? What else is there to say, though? After a while in the dating world, everyone dates a few people that should earn them a sorry, I guess. Were the two of you serious?”
“I was,” I answer. “I think. I don’t know that I was really all that serious about making it work with him. It was more that I was terrified of not being able to make a relationship work at all. I was just out of high school, and I was really insecure because I hadn’t really dated all that much, and why the hell am I telling you this?” I ask.
“I’m in the room,” he says.
Something in the way he says it convinces me to keep going, so I talk for a while about the nightmare that dating Ben really was and Damian just keeps nodding as I go.
“I don’t know, I guess if nothing else, he taught me that true love is a myth,” I conclude.
“Why do you say that?” Damian asks.
“We all just put whatever we want to see on whomever we’re with,” I tell him. “Most of the time I was with Ben, I didn’t see him as a neglectful, emotionally abusive dick. I saw him as the man that I loved, a man who was so patient with me that even when I was making all of these mistakes in my life, he would still take the time to tell me where I should go from there. It’s a rosy version of the truth, no doubt, but for a while, it was my only truth.”
“I guess you could say that we have a tendency to put our hopes on those we’re with,” Damian says, “but I don’t think that rules out love.”
“What’s love, though, if you’re never sure if your feelings for someone you’re with are there because of who it is they actually are or because they just happen to be fitting your narrative closely enough that you can scrawl out some of the details that you’d rather ignore?” I ask.
“I would imagine being conscious helps,” Damian laughs. “All it takes to see whether or not you really like a person is to spend some time with them. Either you’ll find yourself making excuses for their behavior or you’ll find yourself actually enjoying it. It’s really not that hard.”
“If it’s so easy,” I tell him, “wouldn’t that mean that I should have developed a solid idea about whether or not I like you by now, too? We’ve spent some time together alone.”
“I wouldn’t say that,” Damian responds. “Dinner, maybe, I guess, but I really doubt you were sitting there with that question on your mind.”
“Jones!” someone behind me calls out, and I turn around.
Trey, one of the set’s security guys, is waving Damian over to him.
“Well, uh,” Damian says, “I’ve got to go—I’ll talk to you later.”
“All right,” I tell him. “Thanks for the advice, I guess.”
He didn’t really help me figure anything out, but he did seem to put some effort into trying.
“How much longer do you have to decide?” he asks.
“A little less than two days,” I tell him.
“Okay,” Damian says. “Let’s talk about this more before you make any definite choices here. Until then, see if you can work out a way to see if he has those pictures for yourself. There’s no sense dragging this whole thing on if he doesn’t actually have the goods.”
“Thanks,” I tell him again. “I really do appreciate it.”
“Roxy!” Dutch calls out from across the room, and I walk over to talk to him as Damian makes his way up to the security guy.
“Hey, Dutch,” I say as I come close enough to the director, “are we ready for my next scene yet?”
“Not quite,” Dutch says. “You do know that we’re going to be shooting your big scene with Damian next week, right?”
“My big scene?” I ask.
“Yeah,” Dutch answers, “the intimate scene between your two characters.”
“Okay, yeah, what about it?” I ask.
“I’ve never worked with you before,” he says, “so I don’t really know everything you can do. One of the things that’ll kill a movie like this faster than an outbreak of salmonella in the popcorn butter is a romantic pair that doesn’t look good showing their affection with one another.”
“What are you suggesting?” I ask.
“Jones has been in this business a while, and I’ve even had the chance to work with him a couple of times. He knows what I like to see from a pair,” Dutch says. “The two of you should set up time to go over your mannerisms that way.”
“All right,” I answer dismissively.
“I’m serious,” he says. “I can’t have a romantic comedy where the guy and the girl look like they’re kissing their relatives.”
“Look, I know that I’m not all that experienced in major films,” I say, “but wouldn’t it work just as well if I talk to an acting coach?”
“Look,” he says, “I don’t care about your performances after this movie. What I care about is that the two of you look good kissing and all that other stuff.”
“So what do you suggest that Damian and I do to make sure we’re on the same page?” I ask.
Dutch smirks and chuckles, saying, “I’m sure the two of you can figure something out. Whatever you do, just do it before next week. I really can’t afford to hold up shooting because the two of you don’t know how to look like you’re actually comfortable kissing each other.”
With that, Dutch spots someone else that he needs to talk to more pressingly than me and he runs off after him.
All around, people are going.
Everywhere around me, people are walking with purpose, performing their tasks, moving on to the next one: all of them have something to do.
Me, on the other hand? I’m in between takes and the only thing I have to do right now is figure out a way to make it look like Damian and I have the kind of physical chemistry that will translate onto film.
It’s not hard to fake arousal, but faking intimacy—not just physical or sexual intimacy, but emotional, spiritual closeness? That’s one of the more difficult things an actor can be asked to do, though we’re asked to do it all the time.
Everyone I’ve talked to in the business has their own way of dealing with it.
Some people pretend that whoever they’re supposed to love on film is their spouse or their mistress, or in one rather odd case, a 1994 Honda Accord—I have no idea how that one actually worked, and I have no inclination to change that fact.
Me? I’ve never really been put in a position where that kind of thing would really matter.
You do your best when you’re paying your dues in the B-movies or theater or commercials or whatever you’re doing while you’re waiting for your big break, but a director who’s making a film about a giant shark and a giant leopard doing battle on the streets of Manhattan isn’t going to bother telling you if your attraction for the man who just killed a dozen cultists and decapitated a golden statue doesn’t come across as believable.
Shit, if it were believable, it would probably ruin the movie.
So, here I am, just standing around, waiting for something to happen.
Eventually, I’m going to figure out what to do about Ben, but I have serious doubts that that’s going to happen before my time’s up. I would just call him now and set up a time to see the pictures he’s blackmailing me with, but it shouldn’t be much longer before I’m due on camera and I really don’t want to have to call Ben twice.
For now, though, I’ve got nothing to do, so I just wait for Damian to finish up his conversation with Trey the Security Guy.
I’m not waiting long.
“Hey there,” I say, walking over to Damian as Trey leaves.
“…hey…” Damian responds, staring after Trey.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“Oh, it’s just one of those—it’s this…it’s nothing,” he says finally.
Damian’s pale and sweating. Whatever’s bothering him, though, it doesn’t seem like he wants to talk about it.
“I think you and I should schedule some time to meet up over the next week or so,” I tell him.
“Why’s that?” he asks. “Oh, right,” he says, “the whole blackmail thing.”
“Yeah, I’m probably going to want to talk to you more about that,” I tell him. I shouldn’t be this nervous. “I talked to Dutch, though,” I start again. “He said that he doesn’t want us to…I mean, he thinks it would be best if we looked like we were…”
It’s really not that hard to put into words, but I’m having one hell of a time trying to figure out how to do it.
“I don’t know what you’re asking me,” Damian says absently.
“Dutch wants us to figure out a way to make it look like we’ve got sexual chemistry,” I tell him. “Do you have any ideas?”
“That’s what you’re worried about?” Damian asks, finally smiling a bit. “We can knock that out in a weekend. Just to let you know, though, this is one of those life situations where transference is a very real possibility.”
“Transference?” I ask. “You mean like when a patient falls in love with their therapist?”
“Same thing,” he answers. “Just try not to fall too far in love with me, though. I have a lot on my plate right now.”
“Yeah,” I scoff. “I’ll try to keep a handle on that.”