‘Oh, you actually care what I think of your widgets and welding, do you?’
Art raises one expressive eyebrow and walks out. I wish I could do that. It makes me feel like he’s had the last word, even though he hasn’t said anything.
Then I open his script and start reading.
It’s the first time I’ve encountered any of his work since that short film he made in college. I never watchedGrand Music, his feature film that won the Promises Award. When it came out I refused to watch it on principle. I assumed it would be pretentious and irritating, like Art.
But hisNorthsidescript isn’t pretentious. It’s great. I mean, properly great. The characterisation is on point, the dialogue is snappy and warm and real. His Sarah and Sam scenes are particularly good – they’ve got a real edge to them. You’d never guess he hadn’t watched a second of the show until a few weeks ago. I suppose some of his confidence isn’ttotallymisplaced.
Not that I’m going to gush over him or anything. He doesn’t need his ego boosted any more.
A coffee run to the canteen usually takes a few minutes, but Art returns twenty minutes later, as I’m reading the last page of the script.
‘Finished?’ Am I imagining it, or is his manner slightly less nonchalant than usual?
‘Just,’ I say. ‘It’s … extremely well welded.’
‘Thanks very much.’ Art is his usual self once more. ‘Ready to help me rewrite bits of it?’
‘As ready as I’ll ever be,’ I say, and wheel my chair over to his desk.
And so we set to work.
We start by brainstorming ways of rewriting Ritchie’s hospital scenes. In Art’s episode, Ritchie is meant to rush there as soon as he hears about Paddy’s accident, and he has a few emotional scenes with the doctor as well as an almost silent scene where he first sees the comatose Paddy. We need to rework the script so we can tell the same story and make these scenes as dramatic as possible without showing Ritchie’s face.
And Art not only comes up with great ideas but he properly listens to my suggestions and then proposes good ways to build on them. We spend the whole afternoon bouncing ideas off eachother. The hospital set where the shooting will take place next Friday is out on the lot, which means both exterior and interior scenes can be filmed there.
‘What if we include a short scene of Louisa observing the hospital entrance from the car park?’ says Art. ‘That’ll add a bit of extra tension.’
‘Oh yeah,’ I say. ‘Emerging from the shadows, making the viewer wonder what she’s got planned …’
The ideas keep on coming. What if we add an extra Mozzer beat to make up for the fact that the hospital scenes are now shorter? What if Ritchie calls Paddy’s phone from home and leaves a heartfelt message on his voicemail instead of talking to his comatose body at the hospital, so Adam can shoot it earlier in the week and we can see him on screen? What if, what if, what if …?
We don’t always agree, but we always find a solution that pleases both of us. I’ve never had this experience as a scriptwriter before. In fact, I can imagine that if we weren’t working under these restrictions and extreme pressure, and if Bernard weren’t actively rooting for our downfall, writing with Art would actually be … fun.
But that’s a very big if.
The traffic is awful the next morning and I arrive at the IBC campus fifteen minutes later than planned. When I enter our office, Art is at his desk, immersed in something on his laptop. He’s wearing headphones, which is presumably why he doesn’t hear me come in. When I approach him I see he’s reading a script, though it’s notin distinctiveNorthsideformatting. Maybe it’s one of his old ones. Written under his actual name.
‘Morning,’ I say.
Art ignores me, unable to hear me over the music tinnily escaping his headphones. I tap his shoulder, and he practically jumps out of his seat with shock as he slams his laptop shut.
‘Bloody hell, McDermott, don’t sneak up on me like that!’ he says. ‘You nearly gave me a heart attack.’
‘I wasn’t sneaking!’ I say. ‘Your music was too loud. You know that’ll give you tinnitus, right? You could permanently damage your ears.’
‘Let me worry about my ears,’ says Art.
I almost ask what he was looking at, but I’m aware that’s nosy and kind of rude. If he was taking a trip down memory lane, reliving his glory days atSlow News Dayor whatever, I can’t really blame him.
‘So,’ I say, ‘ready to write an off-screen kidnapping?’
‘Always,’ says Art. ‘Your laptop or mine?’
‘It’s officially my episode,’ I say. ‘So I suppose we use mine.’
‘By the way,’ he says, when we’re settled on the sofa, ‘your script’s brilliant.’