The table read had been running about an hour and a half.
Ninety minutes wasn’t long, but a table read moved fast, and there was no quicker way for a cast to size each other up. You heard what a person could do the instant they gave a line back across the table.
By that measure, the read belonged to one man, and it wasn’t one of the names. Ronan Mercer, the unknown, the name none of them knew going in, had taken it and held it.
Albert felt it as much as anyone. The kid had come in with one impression of Ronan and changed his mind fast. Now he plainly looked up to him. Young as he was, he could tell Ronan was the real thing.
Woody watched all of it. The veteran had spent more of the last ninety minutes reading the room than reading his own sides, and what he found under the surface kept him quietly entertained.
On the surface the read was going clean. Underneath it, more than one of the established names wanted the upper hand back from Ronan.
Ian Wright, cast as Thomas, was the plainest about it. The whole read, he’d been working small angles on Ronan, coming in early on cues, shifting the tempo out from under him, trying to knock him a half-step off. None of it took. Ronan just took whatever Ian gave him and answered it like he’d seen it coming.
Across from them, Jane Kingsley read full-out, holding nothing back.
Woody watched it all and had to work not to grin. ’Would you believe it. Every one of them with real credits to their name, and they’re all watching their step around a kid nobody’s heard of.’ His eyes moved to Ronan. ’And that’s the part that gets me. He acts like that, and it doesn’t look like work at all. It just comes to him. Where does a kid like this come from?’
Henry brought his hands together. "Okay, let’s call it there. Good work, all of you, that read strong. We’ll take a break and run it again with the rest of the cast, soon as they’re in."
Woody raised a hand before anyone could get up. "Before we do that. Jenny, mind if I throw a note your way? Nothing major."
Jenny turned to him, giving the veteran the floor rather than talking over him. "Of course. What is it? Something with the script?"
Woody set an elbow on the table. "So, playing Alphonse. There’s that stretch where Elijah gets going about comedians. Stand-ups, funny men, all that. Thing is, back then there’s no such word for it. To Alphonse and Rose, a man who does that for a living is a jester. A fool. So they’d hear Elijah out and figure that’s what he means, a jester, and Alphonse would set him straight. Small moment, but it’s true to the both of them. Might get a laugh, too."
Jenny caught it at once. "Oh, that’s good. Yeah, I can do that. Let me take it to the writers and we’ll build it in."
Jane added a note of her own after that.
Watching the others chime in, Ronan figured he might as well put in his piece too. "I’m not asking anyone to change lines or anything. But I’ll be straight with you, once I really get into Elijah, I’m probably gonna improvise here and there. Just wanted to give you all a heads up. Hope that’s cool."
A laugh went around the table, everyone but Ian. Nobody had to wonder why. All read, what kept knocking the rest of the cast off balance wasn’t Ronan’s acting. It was the improvising. He’d wander off the page with no warning and land it every time.
Jenny laughed. "Please, don’t worry about it. A writer loves an actor who improvises, saves us the trouble." She said it half to the room. "Plays more natural besides, it always does. And I’m not being lazy, but you go off-book and half the time it hands me a better line than the one I wrote. Which you already did, by the way."
That put Ronan at ease. He couldn’t really help the improvising anyway. Once he was that far into a character, Elijah took the wheel, and Elijah did as he pleased.
Ian sat off to the side and didn’t laugh. It had all gone sour in him. ’Look at him, lapping it up. One decent read and they’re falling over themselves. It’s a table read. It doesn’t mean a thing. Let him try it with the cameras rolling and real weight on him, then we’ll see how easy it comes.’
He didn’t say any of it out loud.
Once everything had been said, Jenny got to her feet, Henry rising with her. "We’re going to grab some food. Tell us what you want and we’ll bring it back."
Jane rolled a shoulder gone stiff from sitting. "Appreciate it. Coffee and a donut from Dunkin’ for me."
Jenny wrote it down and worked her way around the rest of the cast.
Ronan started to get up. "I can help you guys carry it—"
Henry waved him back down. "No need. We’ve got people for that. We’re just passing the orders along. Yours, ours, all of it."
Ronan lowered himself back into his chair. "Oh." He’d taken it for granted that the director and the writer, two of the most important people on the whole project, were about to go run the food themselves. That was the only reason he’d moved to help.
Henry caught the impulse for what it was. The kid was a good sort. "You want anything? There’s a McDonald’s right out front. I can have something sent up for you."
Ronan thought for a second. "A burger and a Coke’s fine."
"Done. Sit tight, we’ll bring it back."
The door closed behind Henry and Jenny, and the room went quiet. It was a natural enough quiet. They’d spent an hour and a half living in each other’s roles, and everyone was a little worn down from it. But there was an awkwardness underneath it, too.
Woody was the one to break it. "Ronan. Before I forget, you’re a natural, you know that? I’ve been doing this a long time, and I’ve never seen anyone act the way you did today, and make it look that easy." He paused. "Got me curious. Where’d you learn to act?"
At that, every head at the table turned toward Ronan, Jane’s included. None of them wanted to say it out loud, but the new guy had sat down at that table and outclassed every one of them.
Ronan felt the back of his neck go hot, no reason he could name. "I, uh... I just sort of picked it up. Came naturally to me."
Woody let out a low chuckle. "Naturally. Course it did." He said it like he believed every word.
Jane didn’t say anything, just watched.
Under the table, Ian’s hand had closed into a fist.
Albert piped up from his seat. "So, does that make you a genius actor, sir?"
The question caught Ronan flat. "Ha—I wouldn’t go that far—"
"Genius?" Ian cut in. "Bit early for that, don’t you think? Anybody can look good sitting around a table reading lines off a page. Real filming’s a whole other animal. The pressure, the takes, the camera right in your face. That’s where you find out what somebody’s actually made of."
Jane’s eyes moved to Ian. He’d been getting under her skin the whole read, the way he kept going after Ronan. She wasn’t thrilled about being upstaged by a newcomer herself. No lead would be. But she was a professional, and she had no time for pettiness like this.
Jane didn’t raise her voice. "From what I saw today, Ronan will do just fine once the camera’s on him. You can keep the commentary to yourself. Especially coming from a supporting part."
The table went still. Ian most of all. He hadn’t expected her to turn on him like that. "That’s... look, I’m just saying—"
"You think nobody in this room can see what you’re doing?" Jane said. "You’ve been going at Ronan all day. What is it, that he got the lead and nobody knows his name yet? So you write him off, judge him, decide you’re the better actor?"
Ian’s face went red. "I—that’s not what I..."
Jane made a small sound of contempt. "Maybe learn what a person’s been through before you decide you’re above them." She held his eyes. "Ronan’s been in this business five years. Five, and unknown the whole way. You think that was easy? He’s only now getting his shot. And you?" Her voice cooled another degree. "A year in, one lucky break on television, and you’ve decided you’re better than a man who’s put in five years to your one."
The whole table had heard every word of it. Ian sat there burning, humiliated in front of all of them.
And the part he couldn’t get past was that Jane Kingsley, of all people, had stood up for a nobody. Cheeks red, he shoved back his chair and hurried out of the room.