The Road to Love *COMPLETED*

Chapter 2: Hollywood Land

They were shooting a scene when I walked onto the set, James stood in a corner waiting for me, it seemed, because as a I walked in I saw him exhaling a great deal of air. He rushed to my side, "Where have you been, you are ten minutes late, Glenn. This is the first day of your job and you are ten minutes late!"

"I am so sorry James I really am, I waited for a bus but there is some kind of strike going on, am I in trouble?"

"You know showing up late for your first day undermines your professional credibility! But thankfully they haven't finished with this scene yet, it's for the supporting cast. They are doing the last take after which they make arrangements for the scene between the hero and the heroine and that is where you come in, you facilitate the work of the director and technicians while they set the scene up, get it?"

"Yeah sure. You have explained all this to me already, James."

"I know. But I want to drill in the facts, no mistakes! I have put my faith in you, make me proud girl!" James said as he dragged me along with him to his supervisor, James reached him and the man looked up from the papers in his hands, "Yes?"

"Glenn Baker, the stand-in for Claire Barry." James announced.

"She's late." The supervisor pointed out matter-of-factly.

I started to plead to him, "I know but..." at this point James squeezed my upper arm to make me stop, he requested him, "Won't happen again, Charles."

Charles gestured in James' direction and pointed to a group of people standing behind him, "the rest of the stand-ins, tell her to join them. I hope she knows what is expected of her?"

"I trained her myself", saying this James dragged me along to join the group of stand-ins, they stood chattering and drinking their morning coffee, they seemed to know each other well, I realized that I was the only stranger in the bunch. James went up to them and told them who I was and one of them (who I assumed to be the stand-in for John Ford because of his height and built) spoke, "Welcome to Hollywood, Glenn! How do you feel?"

I didn't know what to say so I blurted out the first thing that came into my head, "like Dorothy in Oz!" they all had a good laugh with that one, I smiled with relief, at least I knew about the Wizard of Oz even if I didn't know much about the current state of cinema. They soon announced the wrapping up of the scene that was being shot, we were all called upon to take our positions. The snatches of conversation around me made me realize that the name of John Ford's stand-in was Adrian and that we were about to set up for a seduction scene between the hero and the heroine. They made us(Adrian and I) stand close to one another in different places in the room, each time we stood in a specific position the technicians pointed the lights on us from different angles, the camera men told us to move our faces up and down and then left and right, around us some men polished and cleaned the props, the director told them to move certain items from one place to another to see what effect was created. At one point the director battled with his assistant over the usefulness of the tree (a prop) that stood by a fake wall built within the studio. The set itself was a representation of the 1930s Paris, to my inexperienced eyes it seemed as though it was exactly what Paris ought to be but I couldn't be sure. I had heard that the studio spent thousands of dollars just on building these sets; it made me believe in their authenticity.

"Miss? Miss?" I heard a voice in the distance.

Adrian touched my hand lightly, "he is calling you, Glenn."

"Oh, I beg your pardon..." I said to the cameraman and moved to the right side, for this was what he wanted of me. We stood on the set for another hour after which the director asked one of the men to call John Ford. The man rushed out of the set and ran towards the actors' trailers. I think I held my breath for the exact ten minutes it took John to come on the set. He walked directly onto the set and came straight towards Adrian and me, I imagine I was sweating profusely, I believed I was going to be fired any instant now, he looked at me only briefly and walked straight towards Adrian and extended out his hand and gave a warm smile, "Adrian! How's it going?"