Chapter 3
Chapter Three
Raging through his apartment, he stopped to stare out of the one small window in the kitchen to see the brick wall that was across the alley.
He’d messed up that night not once, not twice, but three times, and the other cast members saw it.
He hated the play. Not that he didn’t want to ace comedies, as they were as important or more so than drama, but the play, all of it, was not what he wanted to do.
The plays of the nineteenth century, when theaters filled with people who’d never watched a television or movie, that was what he wanted. Those faces, seeing a man acting a part that made them believe he was that person…
Luka sat in his tiny living room, on his ten-dollar sofa, hating his life, hating the fact that he wasn’t living better.
If only the right play, the perfect role, would come along, and he could live better, do better, he’d finally find what he’d searched for since he was a little kid eating ramen for every meal.
After lamenting his surroundings, he got to work. One voice in the lonely place sang out the lines of the play, over, and over again until he had it right.
“The brutality of the day is not that you sang that song, but it’s that you were so off key.”
He said it in every way he could, and once he found the speech pattern that did it justice, he said it a few dozen more times.
When he got to work the following day, he read the line in rehearsal and nailed it. The other cast members went along with their own lines, and he continued to keep his mind on track until rehearsal was over, and he headed to an audition.
He’d gotten an email from his old professor, Monty Quail. Luka was sure that was a fake name, probably made for him to act, which he did occasionally. Luka had considered changing his too, but he didn’t. His mother would have called him screeching if he had.
They met at the tiny theater on a corner in Hell’s Kitchen. The place was well traveled, sure, and close to a few of the better gay bars, but it was still a tiny theater nowhere near Broadway.
“Luka! How nice to see you again!”
Monty hugged him, and he stiffened, but he hugged back, a little. “Professor, nice to see you too.”
“Come in, please. I have a part that is just for you. I knew it the second I read the script. The perks of seeing all the up and coming actors, I must say.”
He entered the old building, smelling the scent of old wallpaper and dust as soon as the door closed.
Antique sconces lined the walls, but didn’t put out much light, and the red carpeting was worn and tattered.
“Professor…”
“Call me Monty, please. You’re no longer my student, and most of my students call me Monty. Come back to the seats, please.”
They went through curtains that he feared contained spiders or worse, but once he got through, he saw workmen were renovating the place.
The stage was completely gone, and the seats in front were being taken out one by one.
They sat in the back, and Monty waved a hand over the scene.
“They’re converting this place into a nightclub.
They’re keeping most of the scrollwork on the walls, the original woodwork, but…
it’ll never be the same. This is where I came for my very first play, the one that got me itching to be on the stage. ”
As touching as Luke thought the story was, he was more interested in the part, and happy it wasn’t in the dingy little theater.
Waxing reminiscent of the place still, Monty said, “When the stage was lit, you didn’t notice the carpet, how lumpy the seats were. All you saw was the big stage, the actors, the props and backdrops. It was magic.”
“I’m sure it was,” he said, lacking anything else to say.
“I found a play that I would have loved to have here. I have backing, have the writer speaking with the financial team now. I also, from my time at school, know who all the front runners for parts will be, if they want it, of course. You, Luka, were at the top of that very short list.”
That got his attention. “Really? I’m flattered. I’d have to read the script, of course, and know more details, but of course, I’m interested.”
“Good,” he said as he turned and grabbed a briefcase from the floor beside him. “I just so happen to have the script and the details here for you. I know you, at least a little, and I know your ambition much better. I think above all, you’ll want the leading role.”
“Only if I deserve it,” he said sincerely. His hard veneer nearly cracked, but he couldn’t allow that. He’d taken years to craft it, knowing a thin skin in the profession he loved would cut him to ribbons the first time he tried to get a part. Any part.
“You do, Luka. That’s what I said. I knew who would be in this play the moment I read it. Call it my dream cast, and maybe I won’t get you all, but even if only you come on board, then I’ll be happy.”
He wondered if Monty was hitting on him, but Luka remembered a handsome man coming to get Monty a lot for lunches in the cafeteria on campus. Besides, Luka wouldn’t know if someone was hitting on him or not. He found that he was terrible at recognizing flirting.
“Monty…is it still okay I call you that?”
“Yes, Luka, it is.”
The guy had a smile that could light Manhattan. “Your…your number is on here, if I decide to take it?”
“Or if you don’t. Please let me know, but I encourage you to think it through. This play is going to be held beginning right after the first of the year, in February, and it will run for the first six months…on Broadway. In fact, so far, we have a penciled year contract for the Winter Garden.”
Luka’s eyes must have bugged out of his head, the way Monty chuckled at him, and that was how it felt.
“The Winter Garden? Really?”
“I have a big investor. Big. He’s very excited about this production.”
“Who…I mean, may I ask, who?”
“Sure. His name is Benson Carter. He owns Bright Gate.”
“Bright Gate? That new super protection for computers?”
“Yes,” he said with another chuckle.
“Wow. Okay, well, I’ll read this, and I’ll have an answer for you tomorrow.”
“Good. I’ll look forward to hearing from you.”
Leaving in a daze, the folder in his hands, Luka immediately started reading it as he sat on the subway, surrounded by others who had no idea he was about to become a star. If only his own words could get into the hands of someone like Monty…
Not that he wanted the part if it was bad, but to play in the Winter Garden…he’d do anything. That was the big time in theater, that old stage that held the greatest actors of all time, and he could walk in their footsteps…
The script wasn’t terrible. In fact, it was good. It was very good.
And he was being given the lead, if he wanted it.
The second he got home, he started memorizing the lines, going over every single one in his mind, getting more and more pissed at himself for any missteps.
Skipping dinner that evening, he worked through until almost one in the morning but set his alarm to call Monty and tell him he’d take the part.
“I knew you’d take it, Luka. It’s perfect for you.”
“When do rehearsals start?”
“Next week, first week in August. Then, we’ll work four days a week on it, depending on everyone’s schedule. I know a lot of you have prior commitments, so I’m not holding anyone to that rigid a schedule until November.”
“November? Monty, not to argue with you after you’ve given me this opportunity, but how will any of us be ready for February if we’re not working on this more?”
“I have faith in all of you. Work on your own for now, as I know you will, and I’ll set you up with some people to work in pairs and more once everyone’s signed on. I’ll bring the contracts to you when I get them all drawn, and we can begin.”
With his stomach in knots, Luka nodded and felt a tear slide down his face. “Thank you, truly, Monty. I’ll do my best. I swear to you.”
“I know you will. Just do me a favor, and don’t be too hard on the other cast members. You’re a perfectionist, I know, but not everyone is going to give ten thousand percent like you.”
“No disrespect, but then why would you hire them?”
As Monty laughed, he said, “I’ll call you soon for the signing. Goodbye, Luka.”
After the call ended, he picked up the script again, fearful that the potential of the play wouldn’t be realized if everyone wasn’t working as hard as he was. Not that he had power over that.
A lot of his fellow castmates hated him because he refused to give more than his full attention to a project.
They didn’t understand. Most of them were kids whose parents had given them everything.
They didn’t know what it was like to go hungry and have that hunger grow from simply needing a meal to needing so much more.
A roof that didn’t leak, a bathroom and kitchen without roaches, clean, new jeans without holes that didn’t ride up to his calves.
There was nothing he wouldn’t do to keep from going back to that. Working his way through school to live in the dorms, since his scholarship didn’t cover that, and working extra hours to eat decent meals in the cafeteria, only picking things that were healthy, and fresh.
No way would he go back to that.
So, he went to get some food, a few bananas, oranges and whole-grain bread — and then got home and absently snacked on them while learning his lines.
When, two days later, Monty came over with the contract, Luka couldn’t believe the money he’d be making from the venture. “This is…normal?”
“Yes, Luka. The star of a Broadway show is always paid well. Now you just have to earn it, and I have no doubt you have the script is already memorized, and you are working night and day on perfecting the part.”
Hating that someone knew him so well, Luka said, “Memorized, yeah, but…”
“Luka, don’t get me wrong. I admire your work ethic. More need it, believe me, but let yourself have some fun too. Other actors would be out celebrating after getting offered the part of a lifetime. Please try to enjoy this a little too.”
He’d argue, but it would do no good. No one truly understood, and he couldn’t make them. Not unless years were spent in abject poverty would anyone understand. “I’ll try,” he said noncommittally.
“Well, good. I’ll see you soon.”
The cast was meeting for the first time that summer in a smaller theater that was a few blocks from the Garden. Two of them, he knew from the university, and the others he knew by name only by a few of the programs he’d saved from his favorite performances.
He tried not to come off as an asshole, but it wasn’t easy listening to them catching up. Most knew one another by casting calls, where a person could sit in a room filled with look-alikes for hours while each was taken to the back and auditioned.
They tried to engage him, and he tried to reciprocate, but he wasn’t good at small talk. He wanted to get to business, so he shoved his fists between his knees and waited until they were ready to get to work.
It was over an hour, but finally, they began talking about the play. Everyone was extremely excited, and when they talked about their parts, they waited for Luka to reveal his.
“I’m Adrian. I’m…I’m the lead.”
All stared at him, their jaws dropped or their lips thin slashes on their faces. Finally, one said what he was thinking. “They chose an unknown?”
“It’s Monty,” Selina said, who’d be playing his older sister. “We all know Monty or know of him. He wanted me to be in it. I was in his class the first year he was teaching.”
“Well, Monty knows his stuff,” Andrew said, as he nodded in Luka’s direction. “Welcome aboard.”
Monty knows his stuff. Well, Luka had always liked him as a teacher, and he directed their class plays. Luke hoped that translated to the bigger stage.
Getting the rehearsal schedule going, they all set the dates and times in their phones before they said goodbye. As he left, he ran into Monty. “Damn, I knew I’d be late. How did it go?”
“It was fine. We’re doing smaller rehearsals starting Thursday, on top of those with you.”
“Good! Listen, I’m having a cast party, which is what I wanted to tell you as a group today, but I’ll have to call everyone. I’m hoping you come. You’ll meet the behind-the-scenes people, see some of the wardrobe choices and get fitted, but also, well, just to get to know everyone involved.”
He hated parties, but they were an unfortunate part of the job. “Sure. Let me know when and where.”
“Actually, the producer is setting it up. I’ll let you know when I know. It’s good to have you on the cast, Luka. I think you’re gonna kill this part.”
While he liked someone having faith in him, he was the one who’d judge. “I’ll try not to let you down.”
“I’m sure you won’t.”