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Samuel is:- secretive, brave, traumatised.
Samuel wants:- to get his life back to normal after 2 years in Afghanistan.
Obstacle:- he has top secret information that the FBI want from him.
‘You up for Samuel?’ the guy asked.
‘Hmmm,’ I murmured, looking up again.
I didn’t want to engage in small talk, I wanted to sit quietly and go through my lines again, but I could hardly ignore him, could I?
‘Same. Have you worked with Lightning Productions much?’ he asked.
‘No,’ I said. And then, when I realised I was expected to elaborate: ‘Never. You?’
‘Yes. Yeah, I have.’
Course he had.
‘So you’ve not met the casting team?’ he continued.
I shook my head.
‘They’re great. If they like you, they’ll get you in for absolutely everything.’
I tried to look suitably impressed whilst simultaneously drying my clammy hands on the legs of my cargo pants.
The perky assistant danced back into the room.
‘Jack, right?’ she said, pointing at me as though she deserved a medal for remembering my name, which I’d confirmed to her all of about five minutes ago. ‘I nearly forgot to tick you off my list. That wouldn’t do, would it?’
I smiled and went back to my script. How the fuck was I supposed to concentrate with all these people talking to me non-stop? And then, before I could read a single line, a door opened.
‘Good job, Seb,’ said a man with a weird transatlantic accent. ‘Stay near a phone, OK? They’re doing call-backs this week.’
Oh great, just what I needed. It was Seb from drama school and he was the very last person I wanted to see.
I made the mistake of catching his eye as he strode over to the lift.
‘Jack, mate!’ he crooned, doubling back and coming over. ‘You’re up for Samuel as well, are you?’
‘Uh-huh,’ I muttered, sneaking a peek at the casting director, a short guy wearing a navy V–necked jumper, two-day-old stubble and glasses. Trust Seb to be all best buddies with him.
‘Look I’ve got to get to another casting, but we’ll catch up soon, yeah?’ said Seb. ‘Let’s get the LAMDA crew together for a drink, shall we?’
‘Definitely,’ I replied, mustering a minuscule amount of enthusiasm from somewhere. ‘Good idea.’
Seb flicked his head towards the open door to the audition room. ‘Fingers crossed one of us gets it, eh?’
I crossed my fingers. ‘Yeah. Hope so.’
It was all completely fake. Seb was the most competitive person I knew and had been the same all the way through our three-year BA in Acting. If he didn’t get the part, there was no way on earth he’d want me to.
‘Travis, come on in,’ trilled the casting director to the guy next to me. I might have guessed he’d have a name like Travis.
There was lots of back slapping and how you doings? and the door shut behind them. How come everyone knew each other? I didn’t stand a chance. In fact, I wondered why they’d bothered calling me in at all when they probably already knew who they were going to give it to, anyway.
I took a few deep breaths, trying not to let my confidence disintegrate into a million pieces before I’d even given it a shot. I was here now; all I could do was my best.
