Frank–as his friends knew him–leafed through the three page script quickly while leaving make-up. He stopped just before stepping into the white glow of a stage light. His face contracted into a squint and he popped his head up looking for Janice, his agent.
“Janice!”
“Yes, Frank?”
“What’s this?” he said, waving the script at her.
“The commercial.”
“Have you read it?”
“Why? Is there a problem.”
“Um, yeah, it’s filth.”
“Filth? What do you mean?”
“It says I have to talk about licking dead babies while slapping a semi-nude model’s buttocks,” he replied. “Look, there she is!” Sure enough, a tall, lanky blonde wearing only chaps had just made her way onto the stage.
“Hmm,” Janice cooed.
“What do you mean, ‘hmmm?’ Get me out of this!”
“Okay, Frank, hold on,” she told him, holding up one finger and click-clicking her heels toward the director’s chair, where the client’s reps were hovering in anticipation of the shoot.
Frank paced just outside the light, watching in his peripheral vision as Janice flailed arms about angrily and pointed to the script with the sharp talon at the end of her index finger. He eventually just turned and watched as the clients, seemingly apologetic, nodded to her and said something. Janice smiled at last, and he saw her lips form an “okay then” before she came back across to him.
“Are they going to change it?” Frank asked.
“No, they don’t want to change it.”
“So we walk?”
“Um, no.”
“What?”
“You pretty much have to do it.”
“What? Why?”
“They have this whole plan. They know the commercial will disgust people, but they’re just going to release it on the Internet, then they can deny ever knowing about it. You know, there’s no bad publicity.”
“But…but I’m a star! I can’t do something like this.”
“You are a star, baby. That’s why they want you. They know it will get way more hits online with you in it before they have to yank it down.”
“Jesus! But why can’t we just walk.”
“Well, the contract you signed is pretty tight. You forfeit everything if you walk.”
“So what? I don’t care.”
“We flew here on their dime, Frank,” she reminded him. “They paid for the hotel. The dinner last night. Even the girl, Frank. You remember the girl last night.”
“Um…”
“You’d have to reimburse them for all of that.”
“What?”
“Plus a 20% fee.”
“20% of everything we spent last night?”
“No, Frank, 20% of what they were going to pay you.”
“Jesus, that’s–”
“Exactly. Not to mention the clause that would prohibit you from doing any other promotional work for twenty-four months.”
“I signed that?”
“Yep.”
“Jesus!”
“So, you see…”
“I have to do it…”
“Exactly,” she said, grinning back. “So, tell me all about those dead babies, Frank.”
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