The conference room erupted into laughter. Along with several members of the production team, I saw Kai and Thiago wiping tears from their eyes at Lucas’ response. Lee gave me a glare that could cut through steel. Clearly, he did not like being called out by a second grader.
“If you all are about done,” he snarled, “Perhaps Tinsley here can tell us when she was planning on sending out the press release for the children’s hospital visit. Or did she expect us to interrupt our filming schedule without any press knowing; wasting our time, money and resources.”
The room quieted and seemed to lean forward in anticipation of how I would respond to Lee. By now they’ve all heard about the table read. Everyone was thinking that Lee has finally met his match and he’s not happy about it.
“Mr. Wynn. May I see you outside.”
“That won’t be necessary, just do your job,” he said snidely.
Leaving me no choice but to speak publicly, I began, “Mr. Wynn, that press release pertains to an event that up until two this afternoon, no one from the studio knew our cast would be attending. It was made clear in that meeting that I would announce their visit to the local children’s hospital at tomorrow’s meeting and explain the significance behind sending them, i.e. good publicity, something we are in desperate need of.”
“I have no intention of announcing to the entire country that the Falconi cast has made a visit to a local children’s hospital until that visit actually takes place. Not to mention that there is no interruption to filming. Check the schedule you created. This day was already earmarked for PR.”
“Furthermore, I do not presume to tell you how to produce a movie. Nor should you presume to tell me how to run PR for said movie. I will have my assistant, Alex, craft and distribute that press release following that hospital visit. A critical piece of my assistant’s role is to create and distribute all press releases on projects in which I am lead.”
“Now, if you don’t have any other emergent matters, I’ll be taking my son and going home.” The nerve of this guy who felt he could interrupt my life with his bogus attempts to control me.
“You’ll write that press release now. My movie is too important to pass off to some intern. Now get to work, I want the copy on my desk before you leave tonight,” Lee growled at me.
It had been years since I’d had such an unbelievably brash and small-minded client. The very idea that I would craft a press release raving about the success of an event before it even happened was preposterous.
I would probably need to speak to the studio about his behaviour but there was no point in continuing an argument over something that would take me twenty minutes to finish. As I began to guide Lucas outside toward the now empty reception desk to craft the press release, Thiago and Kai ran up behind me.
“Mama, are you in trouble?” Lucas asked with concern.
“No way little dude, your mom is a rock star. She’s the real hero around her for taking on that super villain,” said Kai.
“Speaking of super heroes, would you like to see where we are filming tomorrow’s fight scene?” asked Thiago.
“Would I ever!” exclaimed Lucas. “Mom, can I?”
“You got it bud. And thank you guys. This shouldn't take more than a half hour,” I said graciously.
“No problemo. You know where to find us when you’re done,” said Kai.
“You know you look exactly like the kid they cast to play the young Harris Rutledge,” I heard Thiago say as they walked away. Kai started to look back at me, but I quickly averted my eyes typing away at the press release.
I chewed nervously on my bottom lip. That was all this day needed, for the whole Falconi crew to make the connection between Ryan and I. Too many more situations like this and someone was bound to say something around Ryan.
___
Thirty minutes later I’d fired off the press release and I had laid a bright shiny copy on Lee’s desk. Lee of course had left right after I started working but I chose not to engage as I saw him rushing out the door. I decided I would bide my time with Lee. However, I did send an email to my HR department and the head of our firm letting them know of the disturbances that Lee had caused thus far.
This type of thing happened from time to time with my line of work. Especially in cases like this where a client already had several strikes against them. I’d let the first several instances slide, but I knew that if Lee continued this type of behaviour, it could look bad for my boss not to know about what had been happening.
Clients like Lee always tried to deflect blame away from themselves and their behaviours. Lee was taking a page out of the magician’s handbook. Misdirection was a great way for clients like Lee to keep peoples’ attention pulled away from what he was actually doing by creating drama elsewhere.
I fired off an email to my assistant, Alex, to do some digging. If Lee was trying this hard to start something with me he was probably losing control of a problem he didn’t want the studio to know about somewhere else.
The sounds of fighting, thuds and crashes, pulled me from my thoughts as I walked onto the set. I watched in amazement as Kai flipped Thiago over his back. Thiago landed unscathed and quickly took a defensive position.
The entire scene somehow had me incredibly turned on. Watching two men fighting tapped into all my knight in shining armour fantasies. I imagined myself as a helpless maiden looking on as Kai disarmed Thiago only to have him whisk me off and tear off my bodice before deflowering me.Note to self-Tinsley, tone down the romance novel reading.
“My, my what have we here?” I said getting their attention.
“Hey there Tins,” Kai said. “We were just teaching Lucas here the art of stage fighting. Want to show your mom what you learned?”
I watched in wonder as Lucas ran up to Kai and appeared to sock him right in the jaw. Kai writhed in pretend agony as Thiago lifted Lucas up on his shoulder and carried him around for a victory lap around the set.