TEARS FROM THE MOON

Chapter 23.

I was nervous.
So nervous that I hadn't been able to eat anything at all for at least 24 hours.
How could I be like this?

The fact was, today was my first acting scene with Alan Rickman.

Over the last week, I had been doing a few takes that did not involve him. In fact, so far I had not even witnessed him anywhere around. Granted it was a big enough place for you to be able to hide yourself away from everyone, but there was no mention of his name either.

However, I had really enjoyed my first week at being a fully fledged film actress, although admittedly I had quite a lot to learn, as pointed out by my nemesis, Maddie Dawson!
I had even had to do a scene with her, when we had to act all pally pally, for we were supposed to be the best of friends!
She in actual fact was playing Christina's closest confidant, Isabelle Smythe in the film and her acting really fooled me into believing that she really did like me!
Although when David McIntyre said "cut" she would quickly walk away and revert back to her unhappy, sullen ways.
David McIntyre our director, by way of contrast was a wonderful man, not the ogre he was portrayed as being. In fact he was kind and extremely patient, particularly with me.
It would seem that despite his huge success, he was a totally grounded human being.

Today, I had been required to arrive on the film set late afternoon and upon my arrival I was quickly whisked away to a location spot a couple of miles towards the outskirts of London. This was a treat indeed, for most people had to do their acting inside studio's. I had been here just over a week and already I was sent on location.

The spot was on an industrial area of the River Thames. Not exactly very glamorous, but the script demanded that I was to meet Jonathan here as the sun was setting to discuss our future lives together.
Film making is a terribly funny business and unlike doing a stage production where there is a beginning, a middle and an end, with film making it just does not happen like that. You are all over the place and this scene is in actual fact one of the last one's in the film.
I would be required to draw on all my acting prowess to obtain the best for Christina's character and how far in the story she had come. So I really had to imagine that we'd already done all the sexual scenes together and from being a shy, nieve young girl she had now grown into a very self assured and extremely confidant grown woman.
This scene was even more nerve wracking for me though as I would also be required to passionately kiss Alan Rickman!

I had been lying awake for most of last night worrying about it and hoped that now, as well as the distinct lack of food, I in fact wasn't looking too tired or drawn.
This was one of the moments during this whole film making business I had actually been dreading. Not because I didn't want to kiss Alan, for I wanted that more than anything, but I was just so nervous about it. This was however made so much worse by the fact that the last time I had actually seen Alan Rickman, I was exceptionally rude to him.
Now after hearing everything he had done for me, gosh I felt guilty too!

I arrived on set plainly feeling the effects of hunger, tiredness, nervousness and guilt.
This was not good, not good at all and I begun to wring my hands. At least there wasn't as many of the crew in attendance like there would have been back at the studio. And the only two actors that were here was just going to be Alan and myself as we were the only two in this scene!
So I was very glad that I wouldn't have too many people witnessing my first awful, fumbling attempts at kissing an actual movie star.

My stomach suddenly twisted at the thought of it all and I could now feel the heart beat in my chest starting to get more and more erratic.
I breathed deeply in an attempt to calm myself down, but it wasn't really working as I was now beginning to feel quite nauseas.
I looked around at the hive of activity that surrounded me. Sound engineers and camera crew were positioning themselves to get the best possible shot, whilst others were out with pieces of tape, measuring distances for both the sound and light. It was all very hectic but everyone seemed to know exactly what they were doing, whilst I just stood there and watched.
I was getting used to it now though. In film making there is an awful lot of standing about and waiting around for the actors. The real bulk of the work is actually done by the crew. They were always busy.