What You See in the Dark - Manuel Munoz [13]
“That’s very kind of you to say,” she said, then leaned up to look at the road. They were most definitely on the way down the slope of the Grapevine, but the road curved here and there and the full, unobstructed view of the Valley had yet to come. They went silent again, and she looked once more at the driver’s clean hairline, the square rigidity, and then let her eyes travel briefly down the slope of his shoulder.
This girl is in love with a divorced man and will do anything for him, she’d been told, but the direction had ended right there during the read-through. This girl. A read-through, not a rehearsal. Silently, she had sat at the table with the Director and the other actors and asked herself if she knew what it would be like to love another woman’s ex-husband, but the script said nothing about shame, about moral obligations, nothing about right or wrong. And the Director had long ago put his foot down on any shenanigans about character, about Method, about needing quiet spaces before a scene started: this was a job, not a psychiatric couch.
She pictured running her finger along the edge of the driver’s shoulder and wondered if his eyes would register complicity when they looked up to meet hers in the rearview mirror.
Is that how the European actresses did it, how they lost themselves in their scripted terrors?
You have beautiful eyes, said the woman who had discovered her years ago, a silent-film star. It’s all in the eyes.
“I’m not exaggerating, ma’am. My wife and I both admire you very much, especially in the movies where you sing and dance. You’re an absolutely talented lady. First class! We think you’re just wonderful!”
“Thank you,” the Actress replied, and the moment she said it, she wished she could have given the words more than the note of resignation underneath. She wondered if she had betrayed what she had been thinking just by speaking aloud, and this worried and thrilled her at the same time: it was a private knowledge she wanted to hone, to use during the filming, in order to practice at being a real actress, to use every available tool. Her voice, her eyes, her fluttering tone. That would be all she could control. Everything else, she was beginning to suspect, would be modeled for her.
The driver went quiet again, his eyes back on the road, and she felt sorry for not taking in his pleasure, his willingness to give her praise, even though she had long ago discarded the need for adulation, that small bird singing inside. It was one thing to enter this business for that very reason—she could be honest with herself about that—but it was quite another to let that feeling guide her well-being. She had come from this very Valley to Hollywood as a starlet—a dancer and singer with enough talent not to embarrass anyone—but that was over ten years ago now, and somewhere along the line, she had realized the adoration would not last very long. She should drink it in, every chance she had.
You have beautiful eyes, the silent-film star had told her, as if there were an urgency in using them, as if the silent-film star herself had never noticed anyone taking an indiscreet glance at her lazy eye, drooping a little when she had too much champagne.
“Look,” said the driver. “There’s your view.”
The Actress leaned forward and there it was: the long green Valley flanked on the west by the low coastal hills, over on the east by the towering Sierra, the place she had been born in, had come from, maybe was destined to return to. “Majestic, isn’t it?” she said. “Gorgeous, really.”
“Yes, ma’am. From the Lord’s point of view, everything looks beautiful.”
The road was level, but she could feel the sedan picking up speed. The descent would start soon, and with it the curving roads. She felt her stomach drop heavy for a moment even before they began