Rowan: I haven’t long had my breakfast. Please stop.
Jayden sent him a photo of two hard-boiled eggs and Rowan snorted at the running joke from when they’d worked on massive action set pieces.
Lila went out shortly after, loaded with bags, just before Ruth put the finishing touches to the smudges of dirt and scratches that built up throughout the course of the film. He thanked her and left, telling himself very sternly that he mustn’t try to catch Lila on her own to see if she was okay. He headed straight for his trailer to wait for his call to set, thumbing through his phone to check he’d dealt with everything before he turned it off and got down to concentrating. The upheaval with Stan leaving the production had changed the schedule again and he needed to get his head into the right space for the scene today. No more thinking about scandals and relationship rumours…or Lila.
This week was now going to be dedicated to a pursuit through the woods – or rather, a coppice of trees on an incline that was part of the unit base so they could clear it as needed for cameras, rigging and hiding the safety mats. And then Billy being captured.
It would be nice to have some other actors to work with. And it kicked off with a fight scene, which he had a lot of experience with.
Although, in comparison to the weeks and months he’d have spent practising the choreography of action scenes when he was in the Helios movies, he’d only had a few days back in London, practising with Antonio, and the actor hadn’t been on set yet. Rowan had developed a shorthand and trust inherent in the relationships he had with his old castmates, which he couldn’t rely on here. Antonio seemed a great guy, but Rowan couldn’t second-guess him – which he supposed would add to the tension of the scene, but he didn’t want either of them to end up injured either.
Antonio was a big man – taller than Rowan, which was rare – and thick set. One of Wesley’s only concerns throughout the audition process was Rowan’s size. He had wanted Billy to look vulnerable and young. Rowan was young enough, but his years of playing a superhero, with strict regimes to build a particular physique actually worked against him. He couldn’t give up the exercising entirely – he’d drive himself and everyone else mad if he didn’t burn off his energy – but he’d stopped weight training and eating such a high-protein diet. That had actually been a joy. Biting into bread had been a euphoric occasion. But the muscles didn’t disappear so easily. He was sure one day, when he was in his middle age, he’d dream of the muscle memory his body currently had – but for this role, it had to be disguised somewhat with the loose uniform.
And by finding absolute giants like Antonio to pit him up against.
Antonio’s size meant that he’d done a lot of action work too – almost exclusively in fact. They shared stories about stunts and set pieces and things that had gone wrong with wires and punches not pulled in time while they were waiting around and blocking out the scene, and Rowan felt better about it.
Then they actually started the shoot.
They ran through the moves from the point Antonio tackled him down onto the mat – all good so far. Rowan crashed forward spectacularly, dust and grass and foliage in his face and then he had to try and struggle to get away. There was a specific set of moves that they worked through and then Antonio’s character got him on his knees and twisted his arm up behind his back…and it all went south.
The cameras came in for close-ups and Rowan – Billy – was trapped. He couldn’t get away without breaking his arm. A genuine spike of adrenalin shot into his stomach, and he found that strange sensation of becoming distanced from reality happening. He could feel Antonio’s massive hand wrapped around his wrist, but it was numb, like he had pins and needles. He was there but just waiting out the take it seemed before they went to focus on Antonio’s face and his dialogue with another actor, Leo.
They did it again and again. His arm began to ache, his palm was sweating, and yet he seemed to lose more and more connection to the scene.
This had never happened to him before.
He didn’t understand what was going on and when Wesley called for a five-minute break, he could see the director wasn’t happy. He asked Rowan to join him at the video village and got everyone else to clear out so they could chat. Always a bad sign.
Rowan walked over and it was like he was sleepwalking. He took a seat and looked over at Wesley. The director leaned forward, hands clasped, and thick black eyebrows lowered. ‘Tell me what’s going on? I don’t feel like you’re connecting with this scene. Is there a problem with it? Something you’d like to change or that you feel isn’t working right?’
‘No. The scene is fine. I’m not sure what’s wrong.’ It was the honest truth. He could hear his own frustration but even that was like he was at the bottom of a well, and his own words were echoing down to him. He rubbed his hands along the material of his trousers, focusing on the friction, stretching his fingers out to press his palms in harder so he felt it. When he clenched his hands on his knees, it was a little better.
He looked up and realised Wesley had been quietly watching him. ‘It was a hard week, last week.’ Wesley spoke softly. ‘Maybe you’ve bottomed out emotionally? I’d understand. Also, there’s extra pressure on you now Stan is off the picture. Do you need some time to deal with that?’
‘Like a break?’
‘Just the rest of the day. Do you want to call it and we’ll chat it over tonight?’
Rowan was already shaking his head. Wesley had taken a chance on him for this role. Even though he’d been in a big franchise, it was the franchise itself that had carried the films – certainly not his name or even the other, much more well-respected, and established actors. They had been a sum of individual parts. Outside of that, who knew whether people would be interested in watching him? Especially in something that Gerrard had pointed out, countless times, was very different in tone and appeal than superhero movies.
He couldn’t let him down. Or disrupt the whole crew again.
He swallowed. ‘No. No. I can figure this out. Tell me what you want again?’
‘All right. We’ll try a few more takes and then – if it still isn’t working – we’ll break for lunch and reset for the next part of the scene. So. You’ve done the struggle, trying to get away, it was all very physical, but now you’re caught and the implications in that moment are rushing in. Fear, panic, desperation.’ Wesley gave him a lopsided smile and clapped Rowan on the shoulder. ‘Just a few easy emotions.’
Rowan gave a small laugh and went back over to his mark. He got down on his knees and closed his eyes, ignoring Jeannie from wardrobe and Ruth as they quickly put him to rights. He had to stay in the moment – this weird zoning-out thing was what was ruining the shot. He was back now, but he had to guarantee he was going to stay there. In the moment.
‘Ant,’ he said quietly, opening his eyes and twisting his head to see the other actor just finishing up with makeup too.
‘Yes?’
‘Can you squeeze my wrist harder, when we do the next take?’
‘I don’t want to damage you.’ The bigger man said it very matter-of-factly, not like he was bragging. Rowan supposed when you were huge man you had to learn to be careful with other people. ‘If I break your wrist, I’ll be in big trouble.’
Rowan paused, his mouth going dry, as a memory rushed at him, so fast it knocked the breath from him. A man behind him, so much bigger than he was, twisting so hard until bones snapped. He forced himself to take a deep breath as numbness tingled along his lips and he felt the fogginess threaten him again. He shook his head and tried to focus. To hold on to the fear that memory brought racing back along his skin like an electrical current.
