Chapter Twenty
INT: NORTHSIDE OFFICES / INT: ITALIAN RESTAURANT / INT: ANNIE AND ROO’S HOUSE
Art Sullivan has never struck me as a natural collaborator. God, I’ve never struck me as a natural collaborator. But to my amazement, working together turns out to be okay. In fact, it’s a lot better than okay.
Once I’ve got myself under control, we spend the rest of Thursday afternoon working on his episode. Which means, of course, that I have to read his script for the first time.
‘I’m getting a coffee,’ says Art, as I open the file in the Northside system. ‘I’m not hovering around here while you’re reading it.’
‘Oh, you actually care what I think of your widgets and welding, do you?’
Art raises one expressive eyebrow and walks out. I wish I could do that. It makes me feel like he’s had the last word, even though he hasn’t said anything.
Then I open his script and start reading.
It’s the first time I’ve encountered any of his work since that short film he made in college. I never watched Grand Music, his feature film that won the Promises Award. When it came out I refused to watch it on principle. I assumed it would be pretentious and irritating, like Art.
But his Northside script isn’t pretentious.
It’s great. I mean, properly great. The characterisation is on point, the dialogue is snappy and warm and real.
His Sarah and Sam scenes are particularly good – they’ve got a real edge to them.
You’d never guess he hadn’t watched a second of the show until a few weeks ago.
I suppose some of his confidence isn’t totally misplaced.
Not that I’m going to gush over him or anything. He doesn’t need his ego boosted any more.
A coffee run to the canteen usually takes a few minutes, but Art returns twenty minutes later, as I’m reading the last page of the script.
‘Finished?’ Am I imagining it, or is his manner slightly less nonchalant than usual?
‘Just,’ I say. ‘It’s … extremely well welded.’
‘Thanks very much.’ Art is his usual self once more. ‘Ready to help me rewrite bits of it?’
‘As ready as I’ll ever be,’ I say, and wheel my chair over to his desk.
And so we set to work.
We start by brainstorming ways of rewriting Ritchie’s hospital scenes.
In Art’s episode, Ritchie is meant to rush there as soon as he hears about Paddy’s accident, and he has a few emotional scenes with the doctor as well as an almost silent scene where he first sees the comatose Paddy.
We need to rework the script so we can tell the same story and make these scenes as dramatic as possible without showing Ritchie’s face.
And Art not only comes up with great ideas but he properly listens to my suggestions and then proposes good ways to build on them.
We spend the whole afternoon bouncing ideas off each other.
The hospital set where the shooting will take place next Friday is out on the lot, which means both exterior and interior scenes can be filmed there.
‘What if we include a short scene of Louisa observing the hospital entrance from the car park?’ says Art. ‘That’ll add a bit of extra tension.’
‘Oh yeah,’ I say. ‘Emerging from the shadows, making the viewer wonder what she’s got planned …’
The ideas keep on coming. What if we add an extra Mozzer beat to make up for the fact that the hospital scenes are now shorter?
What if Ritchie calls Paddy’s phone from home and leaves a heartfelt message on his voicemail instead of talking to his comatose body at the hospital, so Adam can shoot it earlier in the week and we can see him on screen? What if, what if, what if …?
We don’t always agree, but we always find a solution that pleases both of us.
I’ve never had this experience as a scriptwriter before.
In fact, I can imagine that if we weren’t working under these restrictions and extreme pressure, and if Bernard weren’t actively rooting for our downfall, writing with Art would actually be … fun.
But that’s a very big if.
The traffic is awful the next morning and I arrive at the IBC campus fifteen minutes later than planned.
When I enter our office, Art is at his desk, immersed in something on his laptop.
He’s wearing headphones, which is presumably why he doesn’t hear me come in.
When I approach him I see he’s reading a script, though it’s not in distinctive Northside formatting.
Maybe it’s one of his old ones. Written under his actual name.
‘Morning,’ I say.
Art ignores me, unable to hear me over the music tinnily escaping his headphones. I tap his shoulder, and he practically jumps out of his seat with shock as he slams his laptop shut.
‘Bloody hell, McDermott, don’t sneak up on me like that!’ he says. ‘You nearly gave me a heart attack.’
‘I wasn’t sneaking!’ I say. ‘Your music was too loud. You know that’ll give you tinnitus, right? You could permanently damage your ears.’
‘Let me worry about my ears,’ says Art.
I almost ask what he was looking at, but I’m aware that’s nosy and kind of rude. If he was taking a trip down memory lane, reliving his glory days at Slow News Day or whatever, I can’t really blame him.
‘So,’ I say, ‘ready to write an off-screen kidnapping?’
‘Always,’ says Art. ‘Your laptop or mine?’
‘It’s officially my episode,’ I say. ‘So I suppose we use mine.’
‘By the way,’ he says, when we’re settled on the sofa, ‘your script’s brilliant.’
I give him a sidelong glance. I haven’t forgotten what he said about my first draft. ‘But …’
‘No buts!’ says Art. ‘It’s great! Like, it would be great even if you hadn’t written it under these insane circumstances but as it is …’He shakes his head. ‘It’s kind of miraculous. I mean, it’s better than mine.’
He sounds so genuinely surprised by this that, even though I’m offended by his amazement, I can’t help laughing. ‘Wow, praise indeed!’
‘Sorry!’ says Art. ‘It’s just … it’s good, McDermott. It’s really good. They can’t pretend it’s not. Even Bernard.’
‘Oh,’ I say. ‘Thanks.’
‘It’s just a pity we have to rewrite big chunks of it,’ he says.
And that’s what we try to do. But as the hours go by, we keep coming up against the restrictions.
In my episode, Ritchie spends almost all of his scenes in the hospital pouring his heart out to Paddy (these scenes should have been a real showcase for Adam Pender’s acting), before finding out that Louisa is behind Paddy’s accident and Amanda and Joe’s disappearance.
Then, when he confronts Louisa, who’s been spying on him at the hospital, he gets kidnapped.
It’s going to be very, very hard to rework all of these scenes without the viewer ever seeing Adam’s face.
The only person viewers will actually see on screen in the big kidnapping scene is not fan-favourite Ritchie but Louisa, who has only been on Charlemont Street for a few weeks.
Casual viewers who tune in to see the big anniversary episode won’t even know who she is.
They’ll only see Ritchie from behind, played by a double.
Even with Adam dubbing in his lines later, it’s not exactly going to be dynamic.
It is, by a long way, the toughest challenge we’ve had since we arrived at Northside.
‘How about if we bring Mozzer into the hospital just before Louisa kidnaps Ritchie?’ says Art. ‘At least she’d liven things up a bit.’
‘She’s on her date, remember?’ I say. ‘She’s hardly going to abandon her old flame to see poor old Paddy.’
‘Of course she won’t,’ he says. ‘God, my brain is melted. I think I need another coffee.’ He looks at his watch. ‘And lunch. It’s nearly one already.’
‘Come on,’ I say. ‘Let’s go to the canteen.’
Art’s phone buzzes with a text when we reach the lobby. He glances at it and says, ‘Sorry, I should answer this. I need to let my mates know I can’t make it to football tomorrow.’
‘Were you meant to be watching a match?’ I say.
‘No, playing one,’ says Art. ‘Well, sort of. Some of my school friends have a five-a-side football thing and I said I’d join them.’
‘Really?’ I wouldn’t have thought of him as a hearty sporty type. ‘Do you actually like football?’
Art laughs. ‘Don’t sound so surprised, McDermott! Yes, I do. I’m pretty good, as it happens.’ Of course he is. ‘Also, I need the exercise, seeing as I’m spending so much time working. And,’ he adds, ‘it’s a good way to make sure I see my friends.’
I think of our conversation about figuring out how to find a new rhythm with old pals. It looks like Art’s managing it.
Good for him, I think. And I mean it.
When we arrive at the coffee counter Susan is paying for a large latte. She’s with a vaguely familiar middle-aged blonde woman in an incredibly chic dress, heels and statement necklace. Far too glamorous to be a Northside staffer.
‘Ah, Annie, Art!’ says Susan. ‘Have you met Triona Clancy? Triona, these are our two new staff writers, Art Sullivan and Annie McDermott.’
The head of drama. Bernard’s boss. Our boss too. The woman with the power to decide Northside’s fate.
Art gives her one of his most charming smiles and extends his hand. ‘Great to meet you.’
Triona shakes it but she doesn’t smile back. ‘Susan tells me you’re both settling in.’
‘We’re trying.’ Shit, did I sound a bit prickly there? I didn’t mean to. Not in front of the big boss.
‘I hear you’re writing the anniversary episodes,’ says Triona.
‘That’s right,’ I say.
‘Bernard told me a lot of the action has to basically take place off camera now,’ says Triona, ‘thanks to Adam’s accident.’ Oh God. I’ll bet he loved telling her all about that. And how it was all my fault. ‘But Bernard assures me there’s really no alternative now Adam is out of action.’
Because of me.
‘Not at such short notice,’ says Susan firmly.
‘Well.’ Triona’s expression is severe. ‘It’s not ideal. Northside really needed something big for the anniversary. Something that would make a splash, get people talking about the show in a positive way. It’s under a lot of pressure, both internally and externally. You know that, don’t you?’