I’m totally lost now. ‘I’m sorry, what right thing?’
‘With Scott Stagg,’ says Sinéad.
I stare at her blankly.
‘Come on, Annie,’ says Sinéad. ‘You know who Scott Stagg is!’
Of course I do. The noughties action star who’s successfully pivoted into everything from family movies to massive romcoms. But …
‘What’s he got to do with Art?’
Sinéad looks troubled. ‘Has he really not mentioned this to you? Shit, maybe I shouldn’t have said anything. Mike shouldn’t have told me if it’s not common knowledge …’
‘Sinéad, you can’t hold out on me now!’ I say. ‘What happened with Art and Scott Stagg?’
She sighs. ‘Okay, I’ll tell you. But don’t tell him you know.’
‘I won’t,’ I say.
‘So you know he was working onLA Medic, right?’
I nod. Of course I do. The cheesy but wildly popular medical drama.
‘Well, a year or so ago Scott Stagg appeared on the show as a special guest star,’ says Sinéad. ‘He was doing, like, a multi-episode arc and Art had written one of the episodes. The whole thing was a big deal. He played Doctor Harris’s long-lost brother who was dying of some rare blood disease. I actually watched it when it aired,’ she adds sheepishly.
‘So what happened with Art?’ I say.
‘Well, I’m just repeating what Mike told me,’ says Sinéad, ‘but apparently Scott Stagg was a total nightmare. Like, he turned up hours late and kept the entire cast and crew waiting. And when he eventually appeared he was a total diva, throwing tantrums and complaining about everything and making the writers rewrite his lines because he thought his character – who was dying, by the way – was “emasculated”.’
‘Lovely,’ I say.
‘Then one day he started yelling at some unfortunate intern and she started to cry and Art had enough. He marched up to Stagg and told him he’d been treating everyone like shit all week and it had to stop.’
‘Really?’ I’m impressed. ‘What did Stagg do?’
‘Mike said he got aggressive and started doing the whole “who do you think you are?” rant but Art wouldn’t back down, and Idon’t know exactly how it escalated but I do know Scott Stagg punched Art in the face. I think he broke his nose. And apparently Art hit him back but he didn’t do much damage.’
‘Oh myGod!’ Scott Stagg is like ten feet tall and three feet wide. Art is about six foot and I suppose he must be pretty fit but he’s not exactly burly and I certainly can’t imagine him in a fight. He wouldn’t have stood a chance against Stagg, and he must have known it. But he stood up to him anyway. I remember him asking me if I had an angry boyfriend because he didn’t feel like having his nose broken again.
‘What happened then? Did Art press charges?’ As soon as the words are out of my mouth I know what the answer will be. Scott Stagg is so powerful he could easily get away with assaulting a random Irish writer who he could claim had provoked an altercation. There’d be no point in Art going up against him.
‘No, he was told not to bother,’ says Sinéad. ‘But he got fired fromLA Medicanyway. And that wasn’t all. Stagg’s people made Art’s agent dump him as a client. Then they made it clear around town that if you wanted to work with Scott Stagg or anyone else on his agent’s roster, you should never hire Art Sullivan again. He was basically blacklisted.’
‘Jesus!’ No wonder Art wasn’t shocked by Bernard when we started atNorthside. He really had dealt with petty monsters before.
‘So, yeah, it basically destroyed his Hollywood career,’ says Sinéad. ‘And of course it’s hard to prove you’ve been blacklisted – I mean, he officially got fired fromLA Medicbecause he’d yelled at an actor and then got in a physical fight with him, which was true and doesn’t look good. Eventually some Irish friend of his told someone atNorthsidethat Art might be available for workand they got in touch with him. Which is how you ended up as officemates.’
I’m feeling a little dazed. ‘I had no idea. About any of this.’
Sinéad bites her lip. ‘Shit, I shouldn’t have told you. Please don’t tell Art you know. Or if it comes up, don’t say you heard it from me.’
‘Of course I won’t,’ I say.
But in the taxi home I keep thinking about how Art’s American career ended. I keep thinking of the reason why he’s slumming it back in Dublin, writing for a show he always despised. He lost his glossy Hollywood life for standing up to a bully. For sticking up for someone. He lost his career because he did something good.
Roo’s still out on her date when I get home; she’s texted me to say she and Daragh have gone for a post-film drink and not to wait up, which I hope means she hasn’t discovered anything terrible about him. It’s not too late and when I get into bed I turn on my laptop and check ifGrand Musicis streaming anywhere. It turns out to be available to rent, and while a part of me balks at the idea of paying money to look at something written by Art Sullivan, eventually curiosity and the fact that it’s only ninety minutes long wins me over.
And …Grand Musicis not bad.