Find a quiet spot, turn the page, and let’s see what this story has been hiding 🌙 ✦ Luke and the props team had done good work.
Two corridors on the first floor of the hospital had been dressed exactly the way Evan wanted.
Uma’s material was gradually increasing too.
Maybe his warning had worked.
The two women were finally able to shoot properly instead of obsessing over tearing at each other.
On the third day at the abandoned psychiatric hospital, the crew had its first actor wrap.
Thompson, the handsome middle-aged actor playing the teacher, had only a few scenes.
Once his final shot was finished, everyone politely applauded.
Evan shook his hand, thanked him for his work, and gave him a prop killer mask as a wrap souvenir.
Tomorrow was Sunday.
Having someone wrap smoothly before the weekend meant the shoot was moving well, and everyone knew it also meant a day off.
The entire crew seemed to be waiting for that rest day.
It was the final chance to breathe before the New Year.
As soon as Evan announced the next day off, everyone left Orange County that night and headed back to their long-missed homes in Los Angeles.
Only three people stayed at the small hotel: Evan, Luke, and Naomi.
Evan had to adjust the shooting plan based on the problems they had found after changing locations.
Luke simply did not want to go back.
He had nowhere special to go.
Returning to Los Angeles only meant returning to a cramped rental apartment.
Sunday morning, Evan woke early, made coffee, and opened his director’s notebook.
Overall, the work had gone fairly smoothly.
There were not many scenes left.
Once the hospital was finished, only scattered fragments would remain.
That put him in a good mood.
The enormous pressure that had sat on him for weeks seemed to be lifting.
The problems and workload of the past several weeks had been far more intense than anything he had handled in school.
Suddenly having a little free time felt almost luxurious.
Evan left the hotel, drew in the morning air, and slowly began jogging around the block.
He had barely exercised for more than two months.
Since waking into this life, he had understood the value of a strong body.
The sickness and pain of his previous life had made him cherish this one all the more.
Exercise had been part of his routine since childhood.
In middle school, he had added boxing and football, those beautifully brutal sports, and he had almost never stopped moving.
Even after weeks away from training, the habit returned quickly.
Sports were woven into American culture, and the four major leagues created more stars than most industries knew what to do with.
There were not many pedestrians out.
Evan controlled his breathing and jogged a slow loop around the neighborhood.
When he returned to the hotel, Naomi was sitting on a sofa in the lobby lounge with a newspaper in her hands.
She was clearly waiting for him.
“Hi, Evan.
What were you doing?” Naomi set down the paper and walked with him into the elevator.
“Running.
I swear I’m under 175 pounds now, maybe closer to 165.
I’ve lost a lot of weight lately.
If I don’t exercise, I’m afraid my body will forget how to move.
If I went back to play quarterback now, I would get flattened.” He chatted with her while opening his room door.
He did not mind her sitting in the living room while he stripped off his shirt and went into the bathroom.
Through the glass shower door, he called over the water.
“Nami, why are you up so early too?
Looking for me?” “I was going to walk around town.
Every day it’s either the set or sleep.
I still haven’t really seen this place.
Want to come?” Naomi raised her voice so he could hear her over the shower.
Evan considered it.
“No.
I want to watch the latest dailies with Luke this morning and adjust the plan.
We also need to see whether anything needs pickups.
There aren’t many shots left, and calling everyone back after we wrap would be a nightmare.” Naomi was not disappointed.
She had planned to wander around by herself anyway.
“Want me to bring anything back?
Food?” “Get me a sausage pizza for lunch.
I’m sick of the hotel buffet.” Evan paused, remembering something.
“And Naomi, walk around if you want, but do not go into the bad neighborhoods.
Stay on the commercial streets.” He thought of her walking alone, blonde and beautiful, into the wrong block and felt his stomach tighten.
In Los Angeles, carelessness could turn into tragedy.
“I know.
I’m leaving.” The door closed.
Evan stepped out of the bathroom in a towel and looked at it for a moment.
He hoped she understood the warning.
This was only a suburb in the greater Los Angeles area.
Even in Los Angeles itself, Evan would not go downtown alone after dark.
The night side of the city could crack a person’s civilized assumptions very quickly.
At night, certain blocks could turn dangerous quickly.
Guns, narcotics, sex work, street crews, and the small wars around them formed the ugly rhythm beneath all that Southern California sunshine.
Evan knew fear distorted the way he read the city.
He had absorbed the era’s headlines about gangs, drugs, and street violence until entire neighborhoods became danger zones in his mind.
He knew that shorthand was prejudiced, but caution, privilege, and distance made it easy for him to keep using it.
His own position was safer.
As a white Jewish-American from a financially secure family, he entered Hollywood with advantages many people did not have.
He understood the industry’s history of Jewish founders and executives, but that history did not make every room welcoming or every connection automatic.
What mattered was that he had money, education, and a family willing to back him, advantages he could not honestly pretend were universal.
“Evan?
What are you thinking about?” Luke’s voice interrupted him.
Luke stood in front of him, puzzled, while Evan stood there in a towel, lost in his own thoughts.
“Nothing.” Evan came back to himself.
“Everything ready?
Let’s go to the meeting room.” Luke’s arrival broke the spiral.
Together, they went to the hotel meeting room they had rented and set up with equipment.
They watched footage and talked through it.
“Luke,” Evan said, “if this movie finds a distributor and actually gets into theaters, that’s a real credit for both of us, isn’t it?” His tone was relaxed.
Luke looked half amused, half helpless.
“Director Rosenberg, first you have to finish every shot.
And I should remind you, once production wraps, your work is maybe one-third done.
Maybe less.
Now that you’re awake, stop dreaming about the theater.” Evan did not mind.
He was only letting himself imagine it for a moment.
He was more practical than anyone.
“Of course.
We still have editing and music.
Thank God there are no visual effects.
But so far, we’re doing well, aren’t we?
Think about it.
Sitting in a theater, looking up at the credits, seeing your own name there.
That has to feel like something.” That was not the kind of thing Evan usually said.
Maybe the easy mood of the morning had released the talkative, half-buried part of him.
“I would like that day,” Luke admitted.
“Of course I would.
I’ve imagined it more times than I can count.
But in the two years since graduation, I’ve worked on at least a dozen crews.
Not one of those films reached theaters.
Maybe one or two even made it to video.” What Luke described was the real Hollywood.
Countless people worked here, fought here, and started productions every day.
Only a tiny fraction reached theaters.
Even direct-to-video releases were not as common as dreamers imagined.
This business was nothing like its bright surface.
Success belonged to a small group, always.
“Then we work,” Evan said quietly.
“I believe this movie will be in theaters.
I believe you and I will sit under that screen and see our names in the credits.
There will be young film fans out there applauding and cheering.
What we have to do now is make the movie as well as we can.” He did not speak loudly, but both of them heard it.
It was not only Evan’s dream carried across two lives.
It was also the reason Luke was willing to handle every dull, thankless job on the crew.
At the door to the meeting room, Naomi stood quietly with pizza boxes in her hands.
She had heard him.
She knew the chances were probably close to nothing, but his words still reached her.
“Hi, workaholics.” She lifted the boxes.
“Sausage pizza and beef pizza.
Lunch is here.
If you don’t mind, I want to watch myself in the movie too.” ✦ ✦ ✦ Ready for more?
CREATORS’ THOUGHTS TheBacklot Thank you for reading.
I hope this chapter drew you further into the story.
Stick around, because there’s still a lot waiting just ahead.