Backstage Romance: An Austen-Inspired Romantic Comedy Box Set by Gigi Blume (ebook reader with highlighter txt) 📕

“So, what’s he like?” I pried.

“He’s nice.”

Apparently, she considered this description sufficient enough. Getting information out of her was like reading Proust’s In Search of Lost Time from start to finish within one lifetime. She wasn’t much of a talker. In short, after some probing and unabashed bribery concerning ice cream, the little I could extract from her was that he was a very polite, gentlemanly sort of fellow. Her words, not mine. The girl watched too much Masterpiece Theatre.

But after a long day of rehearsals, I conceded that, true to Jane’s nineteenth-century description, he really was a polite, ‘gentlemanly sort of fellow.’ He was all smiles all the time. Everyone was smitten by him.

But his friend Mr. Action Flick, I’m sorry to say, didn’t disappoint in the boorish department.

My assessment of his character was spot on, and everyone in the cast soon discovered he was the most ill-mannered, self-centered, arrogant man ever to be birthed from the bowels of Hollywood.

2

Loathe Pie

Beth

The first few days of rehearsals were a whirlwind of arpeggios and pitter-patter tongue twisting, glorious Gilbert and Sullivan nonsense. Fitz wasn’t at all easy on us. He expected perfection, and after losing all sensation in my lips for an hour, I was about to shove the many cheerful facts about the square of the hypotenuse up his modern major falsetto.

“Again,” he’d say. “Take it from the pickup to measure one hundred and twenty-six.”

It felt like one hundred twenty-six pin pricks in my lips. Might as well have gone to the dentist.

I did have to admit this was what I signed up for. But I was so freaking tired.

I worked a hodge-podge schedule at Lucas Lodge, a swanky establishment on Santa Monica Boulevard, owned by the father of my childhood friend Charlotte. I couldn’t tell you what his concept was when he first opened the lodge, but it turned out to be an eclectic mixture of sports bar, gastro pub, teahouse and a novelty dining experience. All the staff was required to wear renaissance costumes in varying degrees of historical accuracy. We wore name tags that labeled our rank in the Lucas Lodge realm. I was Lady Elizabeth, my friend was Princess Charlotte, and we were all to address her father as Sir William Lucas. We could never abbreviate it by calling him Sir or even Sir William or heaven forbid Mr. Lucas. We were to use his complete title every time we mentioned him or spoke to him.

It was, perhaps, the closest my friend’s father could get to performing. Charlotte mentioned once her father was a frustrated actor in his youth but inherited the restaurant before she was born. He transformed it into his own creation and became quite successful despite himself. I think it was part accident, part dumb luck, and part location being situated close to several studios and talent agency offices. It was also less than a mile from the Gardiner Theatre.

During the 90210 heyday, Aaron Spelling brought an entourage of Hollywood gatekeepers for lunch, and the rest was history. Now, we got a handful of celebrities and big shot producers every week.

Night shifts at the lodge took their toll, and I didn’t have time to memorize the gazillion lyrics by the next day’s rehearsal. (Even in the shower) So now, I felt Fitz’s laser eyes burn holes in the top of my head as I tucked into my sheet music. It was probably my imagination, though. Then I noticed one of the pirates across the room. His mouth moved, but he didn’t even make any attempt to pretend to sing the right lyrics. It looked like he was repeating watermelon, watermelon over and over again. I leaned over to Jane and whispered, “Who the Zuco is that guy?”

Jane laughed. She knew I didn’t like to cuss. Instead of curse words, my thing was to replace expletives with characters from musicals. This was my Grease day.

“That’s Denny,” she replied. “He’s Cole Forster’s nephew.”

I furrowed my brows and stole another glance in his direction. “He looks like he’s auditioning for Bad Lip Reading.”

I couldn’t help staring. It was like watching Milli Vanilli in a train wreck. My mouth might have been hinged open with incredulity. Crazy Lips Denny shifted his gaze toward me and locked eyes with mine, giving me a sly wink. Ugh, Rizzo! My face went hot, and embarrassment flushed over me. Goodness, he thought I was checking him out. I didn’t find him remotely attractive. Then, trying to avert his stare, I turned my head only to see Will Darcy giving me the stink eye, unabashedly staring me down. What was his deal? Was he making a mental list of the many cringe worthy facts about Elizabeth Bennet? I had to tear my eyes away before he also thought I was into him.

Ugh!

Lydia, who sat next to me, coquettishly smiled in Denny’s direction and dramatically crossed her legs so her skirt could inch up a little. Holy Rizzo and Frenchie. Now all the guys in the cast would think we were a couple of boy-crazy psychos. That wasn’t the way I’d hoped to make my professional debut. I grimaced and buried my face deeper into my sheet music.

“I’d like to be conjugally matrimonified with that guy,” Lydia chimed between stanzas. “Well, not the matrimonified part.”

Typical Lydia.

I rolled my eyes at her lyric quoting and snickered. “Musical theatre boys are a special breed, Lydia.”

“It’s Lettuce, thank you,” she corrected. “And I’ll bet my bra that one is straight.”

“You don’t wear bras.”

“Shhh. Spoilers.”

She shrugged and scanned the room. “Who do you think we’ll be matched up with?”

“What?”

“Matched up with,” she repeated as if I didn’t speak English. “You know… the Stanley sisters all get matched up with pirates and cops in the end. You’ll probably get matched with the Pirate King. That’s the way they usually do it.”

I kinda knew that. The delicious Kevin Klein played the Pirate King in the movie with Linda Ronstadt. He was