“Gretchen, the last line is fromMoulin Rouge,” I finally said.
She shook her head. “No, I don’t think so.”
Bee finally broke into giggles as Sunny grabbed the script page from Bee’s hand. “This is definitely fromMoulin Rouge,” Sunny said.
“‘There was a boy,’” I started singing, to prove our point. “‘A very strange, enchanted boy.’”
“If we’re getting technical,” Bee said over my rendition of “Nature Boy,” “I think it was from David Bowie’s brain first.”
“Not to be thewell, actuallyguy, but actually it was Nat King Cole’s song first,” said Luca, wandering in from parts unknown. “And I cannotbelieveyou are just glossing over the iconic Gaga version with Tony Bennett.”
“Iconicis not the word that comes to mind,” Sunny said.
I kept singing, but Luca talked over it. “Nolan Shaw, no one wants to hear your Bowie impression if you’re not going to back it up with a Yamamoto jumpsuit,” he huffed. He waved his hands at Sunny before he swiped the script out of my lap. “And what would you call a Gaga-Bennett duet ifnoticonic?”
“I don’t know. Noisy? Stop slapping me, that’s how I feel!” Sunny said while Luca accosted her with the script page as Gretchen stared down at her phone.
“Shit,” Gretchen mumbled. “It really is fromMoulin Rouge.”
“By way of Nat King Cole,” added Luca. “And enhanced by Lady Gaga.”
“Don’t worry,” Bee said, trying to swallow her laughter. “We could use a less well-known line. Maybe the meaning of Christmas is that God bless us, everyone?”
“The meaning of Christmas is that love, actually, is all around?” I suggested.
“That nobody puts Baby in a corner?” said Sunny.
“There’s no crying in baseball?” contributed Luca.
“I am Spartacus,” Sunny said for good measure as Gretchen glared at all of us in turn.
“This isn’t funny,” she said, pressing her coffee mug to her face and rolling it on her forehead like she was trying to rollaway a headache. “Okay, okay. Pearl’s been having a rough time finishing this script, and I don’t want to make her feel worse. How about the real meaning of Christmas is that love is a gift that we can give year-round?”
We stared at her.
“I weirdly like it,” Luca said after a minute. “It’s like the perfect amount of cheesy and true.”
“That’s the formula,” Gretchen said with a sigh. “Okay, write the new shit on your scripts, please. Before I forget what I said.”
“Why are you doing this movie again?” Sunny asked curiously as Bee and I groped for something to write with. Bee grabbed a brow pencil. I grabbed lip liner. “This whole Hope Channel thing doesn’t seem cohesive with a Gretchen Young brand.”
“I like Hope Channel movies,” Gretchen said, pressing her mug to her head again. “They make me happy. Andhappyandformulaicare not incompatible withsmartorimportant. Also I want my girlfriend to have health insurance. Okay, Bee, Nolan, see you up at the mansion. Goodbye, all.”
After she left, Luca was grinning at Sunny. “She toldyou.”
“Shut up.”
After I was dressed, Bee and I got in the van to take us up to the mansion. I had a scene to shoot after the kissing scene, and she had scenes scheduled for later this afternoon that required a costume change, so this was our last moment together semialone, save for the driver. I turned to her.
“Hey, I’m sorry I didn’t get a chance to tell you I was leaving early. I meant to last night, and then . . .”
She gave me a little smile. “Then you screwed my brains out instead?”
“Apparently, I have a fetish.”
“For wedding dresses?”
“For you in a wedding dress,” I said, and then realized how that sounded. “I mean... not like... I’m not trying to—”
