Chapter 6
“Santi, how can you not see! This actor is impossible to work with! It will be the death of this production.”
“Kim, believe me, I’m really sorry you have not hit it off so well with Dídac. But maybe you could work to ingratiate yourself with him—“
“Ingratiate myself! Me! You’ve gotta be kidding!”
“Kim, look, I don’t know how to say it any other way: first of all, we need to recognize that you are a relative unknown quantity in Catalonia—no, wait!”
Perhaps he had sensed that Kim was about to punch the screen. If only Santi wasn’t looking so damn smug, sitting there in the dregs of some absolutely luxurious banquet, with clearly drunk people sprawled out behind him—a far cry from Kim’s solo lunch.
“This is just the numbers,” Santi went on. “Dídac is a bankable star. The telenovelas, here, the… how do you say?”
“Soap operas!” Kim shot back, “and they ain’t no higher art form!”
“Here, everybody watches the telenovelas, the soap operas,” Santi defended. “Dídac is in all of our living rooms every single afternoon. We love him. He’s almost a national hero. My mum is in love with him, even my dad is!”
“The Swan has killed it in five major cities! We don’t need the fucker!”
“We do! I’m sorry, Kim, and I don’t want to talk contractual obligations, but this was stipulated right from the start.”
“You’re pulling that? Really, Santi? I thought we had more trust in each other than that.”
“Of course I’m not going to go there, but please see it from my side.
It was a real coup for us to get The Swan.
Madrid were muscling in, and we had to go slightly higher than we were comfortable with.
But we have a very short run in a five-fifty seater to recoup, with the possibility of some more income from bolos—one-off provincial gigs—in the autumn if…
it all goes well. But that’s it. It’s a very tight, make-or-break budget. We’re kind of against the ropes here.”
“But these other actors, Joan Vila or Isard Muntaner, don’t they come with a following too?”
“They aren’t Dídac Amat, not by a long shot. I’m sorry, Kim, but Dídac stays, or we fold the production.”
In the silence that followed, Kim caught himself panting, almost hyperventilating.
“We can’t fold,” he said. “On my side too, we have everything invested in this. There’s no safety net to speak of. In the five cities we’ve done so far, it’s been a very tight ship with no extras.”
Santi puffed. “Welcome to the club. Well… I’m glad you’re starting to see this from my side, Kim. Believe me, once you get to know Dídac, you’ll see he’s really a marvelous guy, and a very talented actor. Let me know if you need any help with anything.”
After the screen had gone black, Kim remained staring at it for several long moments.
Then he slammed the laptop shut, and stalked out onto the balcony.
It was a sublime afternoon, not at all reflective of his mood.
The sky was a pale blue bowl of radiating heat, the elegant stone buildings had a quality of baked clay, and the few pedestrians about on the streets were sauntering lazily like heat-struck ants.
Kim was reminded of the time as a teenager he’d hitchhiked across South Australia’s Nullarbor Desert and got stuck by the side of the road without water for several hours.
There’d been an ant colony by his side then too, and he’d watched its relentless activity for hours, amazed by how life still went on regardless, even so far from civilization.
Even as one stupid young hitchhiker sat there possibly dying of thirst for being so unprepared.
If his show flopped, life would still go on.
He wouldn’t be a director, but the Tonys and Dídacs of this world would keep on doing their thing.
No, that was unfair. He often wished he could be more like Tony and less like himself, be more liked, more a part of humanity.
Instead, he felt like this relentless juggernaut, rumbling on, determined that he was destined to greatness, yet by his progress sweeping out of his path the very people he needed to achieve his goal, to become one with what made people human.
After he stopped feeling sorry for himself, he’d go inside, settle down with his notes, and re-plan tomorrow’s rehearsal, this time with a schedule that included that damn actor, Dídac Amat.