Thom Partridge(Soldier #2):Seb’s a cuck, mate. A total no-guy. But even I felt sorry for him. A whole spread in a French tabloid, with pictures of his girlfriend and Jacob out for dinner, drinking wine and laughing together. Everyone was reading it when Seb came into catering. Fuck me, it was awkward. He asked Clemence to translate the headline.Jacob Steele’s latest squeeze. Seb left the set straight away. One of the runners had to go looking for him. If I had a role like his, I wouldn’t be fucking around, keeping the crew waiting. If I had a girlfriend who looked like Clara Cowan, a girlfriend who was a famous film director, I’d fight for her.
Clemence Thiffault:There’s no fight left in him. Isn’t it obvious? He’s depressed. He has been since he got here, always moping around with those ancient headphones around his neck. Jacob sees it, of course. He’s like a hyena, circling Clara. Heand Seb might as well be snarling at each other. We’re a week out from the end of filming, and people are starting to worry that we won’t even make it. Did Matty tell you what happened yesterday? It’s likeApocalypse Now.
Matthieu Maurois(The thief):OK, I will tell you. We are shooting this scene, the thief in the house, yes? The big brother realises that the thief is in – how you say? – cahoots, yes, cahoots with his little brother. Family jewels, drug money, this kind of thing. It is awkward, this dialogue, because everyone has seen the newspaper, everyone know what is going on. ‘You couldn’t keep your grubby fingers off, could you?’Mon dieu. So, we finish, and Seb has the angry look, and he goes to talk to Clara about something, and then Jacob gets in the middle of it. He says, to Seb: ‘Give us a minute, mate.’
Dustin Fitzgerald:No one could believe their ears. Pin-drop stuff.
Clemence Thiffault:Seb isn’t usually confrontational. But this time, he snaps. He tells Jacob that he and his girlfriend – he says this, ‘my girlfriend’ – are talking.And you’re not my mate. Jacob laughs, repeats this in Seb’s voice.You’re not my mate.And what does Seb do? He grabs Jacob. Just grabs him by the collar, right in front of everyone. Clara’s mortified, obviously. She tells Seb to stop, and immediately, he does. You can see that Jacob is embarrassed, emasculated. He storms off, saying he can’t work with this fucking psychopath. And Clara walks away, too, because everyone’s looking at her.
Eric Matheson:She loves it. Two strapping boys battling over her.
Clemence Thiffault:She hates it. Being the subject of all this gossip. Everyone saying she’s not in control. After it had happened, after Jacob and Clara had stormed off in their separate directions, Seb was just left standing in the middle of it all. Dumbstruck. And we’re all there thinking the same thing.
Eric Matheson:We’re headed for a fucking iceberg, and no one knows who’s steering the ship.
Dustin Fitzgerald:So there I am, rehearsing my lines in the rose garden. And who should turn up but Clara, with Seb chasing after her? I had to duck behind a bush. Clara was saying that Seb shouldn’t have done it, that he’s turning her film into a sideshow. You’ve made me look small, she said. You’ve made me look weak. And Seb said that all she ever cares about is how she looks, and not how things actually are. Clara didn’t like that. She told him he’d never get it, because even though it’s him in front of the camera, she’s the one who gets her life picked apart. I never should have cast you, she said. I never should have come, he said. They haven’t spoken since.
Thom Partridge:Genuinely. She’s directing him through one of the ADs now.
Adèle Durand:It used to annoy Clara, that Jacob wanted to watch all the playbacks. Now she leaves a spare seat next to hers in the director’s tent.
Thom Partridge:And Seb just smokes at the end of the garden.
Matthieu Maurois:Does this sound like a happy couple to you?
Eric Matheson:The party was Clara’s idea, as if we needed further proof that one of her screws has come loose. A wrap party, not on the last night of filming, but the nightbefore. I’m all for it, truth be told. A little debauchery might lighten the mood.
Clemence Thiffault:The last scene tomorrow is the big one, after the brothers have got drunk and trashed the chateau. So, tonight, we’ll all get drunk and leave a mess for them. It saves the set-dressers a job. And it means that Jacob and Seb don’t have to act their hangovers.
Dustin Fitzgerald:Sure, there’s method in the madness. But itismadness.
Adèle Durand:Jacob will be there, right?
Clemence Thiffault:It’s all going to end in tears.
Eric Matheson:I can’t wait.
another actor
Eric is drunk. If the objective was debauchery, depravity, then the cast and crew had thrown themselves towards it with open arms. He and Matthieu had raided ancient bottles of Armagnac from the liquor cabinet. Jacob had made a call and suddenly, somehow, some assistant had turned up with several cases of champagne. Things descended from there. Agathe, the producer, who’d only flown in this morning, was put to bed before any of them. The make-up artist was spotted being sick off a balcony outside, the grip holding back his hair. Two of the soldiers dared each other to skinny-dip in the moat, hoping some of the female cast members might follow. They didn’t, choosing instead to cut loose on the impromptu dancefloor organised by Jacob and Clara. Madame Director has been the life of the party, hair down, arms above her head, drinking everyone else under the table. Eric has tried his best to keep up, but he can’t dance like he used to.
He’s flagging now, so he stumbles upstairs, a champagne bottle dangling precariously from one hand, pausing only for a breather on the antique chaise longue on the landing. It’s here that he rests, eyes closed, clasping the bottle to his chestlike a sword held by a dead knight. He hiccups. He hears them, on the other side of a heavy velvet curtain. Their voices are thick, their words produced with effort. Eric isn’t the only one who’s drunk.
‘You’ve been avoiding me,’ comes Seb’s low voice. ‘All night. All week.’
Seb has been absent tonight. Eric wonders if he’s been drinking alone.
‘Why would I want to be around you?’ Clara says. Her words are even more slurred than his. ‘I’m sick of you. I’m sick of being judged.’
‘You’re wasted.’
‘And there we are.’
There’s a silence. On the other side of the curtain, neither of them moves.
‘I don’t want to be like this,’ Seb says. ‘Always fighting.’
‘You think I do?’
