Chapter 6
Then
What started as a minor skirmish between Ryder and me has spiraled into an all-out war.
At first, I tried to give him the benefit of the doubt.
Maybe that day on the farm was just a one-off.
We all had bad days, right? Actors were notoriously eccentric and temperamental; it was practically baked into our DNA.
I even went so far as to try to smooth things over by killing him with kindness and being extra chipper in his presence, like I could offset his moodiness with my own soaring levels of good cheer.
Big mistake. Huge.
I couldn’t seem to do anything right in his eyes.
To wit: When I wanted to rehearse a big scene ahead of time, he told me he’d rather wing it, that it would turn out better if we sounded “fresh” and “spontaneous.” Without much of a choice, I acquiesced.
Fast forward a couple days, when I learned his definition of spontaneous meant improvising the entire scene, making me look sloppy and unprepared in front of Nate.
Improv had never been my strong suit, and when I confessed as much to Nate, Ryder had the nerve to say, “You know, you should really work on that. Some actors won’t work with you if you can’t do at least some on-the-spot ad-libbing.
It’s a learned skill, but I’m sure with some practice, you can get there. ”
It was like he had a death wish.
And that was only the beginning. In the early weeks of filming, he made a point to go after me in a variety of diabolical ways, each one pettier than the last. He intentionally stood too close or too far away while we filmed, screwing up my blocking and making me lose my train of thought, forcing me to ruin countless takes.
When I mentioned offhandedly that the sound of gum-snapping annoyed me, he started chewing it religiously.
He made snarky comments about how long my hair and makeup routine took, implying that it was holding up production.
(That one cut deep; he knew how sensitive I was about my hair.) He micromanaged our scenes, constantly offering me unsolicited feedback.
He seemed to conveniently “forget” a line every time I was in the middle of a great take, and I couldn’t prove he was doing it on purpose, which made it that much more infuriating.
He even corrected my grammar once when I was mid-conversation with Nate and confused lay and lie.
What kind of nerdy loser even knows the difference? !
But two could play the gaslighting game.
I “misplaced” one of the props he needed during an important monologue, flustering him mid-scene.
I ate a tuna sandwich before we shot in close quarters, then made sure to blow my rancid breath in his face as much as possible.
I effusively praised Jason for his performance, then offered Ryder a backhanded compliment as an afterthought.
And in a truly inspired bit of psychological warfare, I made the Kids Only Club theme song my ringtone and let it play the whole way through every time my phone rang.
I hummed it under my breath between scenes.
I slipped key lyrics into unrelated conversations.
I hoped it blared in his sleep. I hoped it haunted his nightmares.
Look, was I proud of stooping to his level?
No, but if he was going to force me into the dirt, then I hoped he liked mud baths.
And I knew my jabs were hitting their target, because his jaw was clenched so frequently, his face was starting to look permanently lopsided.
The icy glares he shot me—eyes narrowed, pupils darkened, lips pursed—sent shivers rippling down my spine.
And that was another thing. You’d think all this friction would have poured cold water on my attraction to him, but it only seemed to fan the flames.
All that coiled, growly energy, the silent smoldering, the smug arrogance?
It was sexy as hell. It turned me on in a way that made me feel like a traitor to feminism.
It felt like foreplay, albeit the kind that left me frustrated and feverish and never ended in release.
One time after he’d been particularly bossy on set, I went home and dreamt about him, and let’s just say those dreams weren’t PG.
I woke up sweaty and unsatisfied and incensed that he’d somehow managed to invade my subconscious, too.
It was irrational. Inconvenient. Infuriating.
He had a different kind of BDE that was proving to be my own personal kryptonite: Big Dickish Energy.
To cloud things even further, not all of Ryder’s suggestions and unsolicited acting advice were bad.
In fact, I could admit (only to myself, never to him, obviously) that most of his ideas were insightful and surprisingly perceptive, adding layers and depth to our characters I would never have come up with on my own.
If nothing else, his relentless nitpicking triggered my competitive drive, propelling my performance to greater heights.
My desire to outwit and outshine him had never been higher.
I was doing my best work, and I knew it.
Still, our slow-burning feud escalated a little more each day, like a stair-stepper to hell.
I did my best to keep my head down, work hard, and deliver the best performance I could, while it felt like Ryder worked equally as hard to make me look bad.
And for reasons I couldn’t understand, his ire only seemed to be aimed at me.
While Jason may have caught the edge of a sarcastic barb or two, Ryder reserved the bulk of his antagonism for yours truly.
None of it made any sense. We were getting nothing but positive feedback from Nate, but it seemed like the more he praised our performances, the more vindictive Ryder became.
Worse, I think Nate had started to notice the tension.
Despite my best efforts to hide our hostility, I’d caught him eyeing us with lingering concern more than once.
As a result, I worked overtime to act like nothing was wrong.
“If you’re this upset about it, I don’t understand why you won’t talk to Nate,” Jason said pragmatically one day, after listening to a lengthy rant about Ryder’s latest antics.
Poor Jason. As our most frequent screen partner, he was forced to sit through my venting sessions and play mediator between the two of us. Not exactly the role he signed up for.
But I knew better than to complain to Nate.
This was my first leading role, and I couldn’t risk being branded as “difficult.” Even a hint of high-maintenance behavior was enough to permanently tarnish an actress’s reputation.
No one wanted to hire someone who couldn’t get along with their costars.
Not to mention, Ryder was cast first, and he was the bigger name.
If push came to shove, I knew I was the one who’d be replaced, not him.
Besides, I’m sure this wouldn’t be the last time I’d find myself acting alongside a volatile costar.
I needed to put on my big girl pants and suck it up.
Jason’s advice was to ignore him. He thought Ryder just wanted the upper hand, that it was a silly power struggle I shouldn’t take too seriously.
And maybe he was right, but I worried that all the little jabs and pokes were building toward something bigger, something irreparable.
That what started as a hairline fracture was deepening into a dangerous fault line we couldn’t come back from.
And that day came sooner than expected.
Today we were filming a beach scene, which production had purposely scheduled during a spate of gray, dreary weather.
Filming in direct sunlight posed challenges for the camera crew, as it created harsh shadows that were difficult to shoot around.
Cloudy, overcast conditions diffused the light and were ideal for exterior shoots, which was why I was currently wearing a bathing suit on an unseasonably chilly June day in Seafolly.
While technically I was wrapped in a fluffy robe, underneath it was a retro, skirted two-piece that was cute as a button.
The blue-and-white box print brought out my eyes, and the sweetheart halter neckline boosted the ladies to high heaven.
It was “girl next door” but sexier. It was Mary Ann meets Ginger meets Betty Boop.
The scene we were filming was a flirty one, with me running into the ocean and Ryder joining me shortly thereafter for some playful canoodling and splashing around.
I wasn’t looking forward to it—when I dipped a toe in to test the water temperature, it was much colder than I expected.
I was going to freeze. Where’s global warming when you need it?
While Nate finalized shot details with our cinematographer, Ryder and I were getting our hair and makeup touched up.
He’d been particularly tense since we’d arrived on set this morning, giving clipped, monosyllabic responses to my pleasantries, and at one point, even appeared to be arguing with Nate.
He hadn’t cracked a smile once, not even with the makeup ladies who flirted with him nonstop.
I was already bracing myself for a long day of Rude Ryder.
“He’s so scowly,” I stage-whispered to Francesca, and she smirked as she dabbed some highlighter onto my cheekbones.
“I am not scowly,” Ryder insisted, his scowl deepening.
“Francesca can lend you her mirror, if you’d like to see for yourself.”
He crossed his arms over his chest, eyes narrowing on me.
I loved the hairstyle Phillipe had chosen for his character Holden—they’d taken advantage of Ryder’s length up top to create artfully mussed waves with a slightly sculpted swoop in front.
It was somehow both sweet and sexy. He looked like the love child of James Dean and Cary Grant. “Franny, am I scowly?”
Francesca tried—unsuccessfully—to smother her smile. “You do have that whole ‘tortured artist’ thing going on,” she confessed apologetically, and I shot him a triumphant smile.