Chapter 53.5: Vold-a-bort (Patreon)

Chapter 53.5: Vold-a-bort

Leavesden Studios, UK. May 2010.

“C’mon then, Robbie, tell me how you want me this time. Potato sack or princess?” I strode in front of him, my arms outstretched, and hands cupping constantly as if asking him for uppies. Scratch the ‘as if’, actually; that’s exactly what I was doing.

He bent down as low as he could from where he was towering over everyone on his raised platform. A production assistant hurried over, knelt, grabbed my foot, and boosted me into Robbies’s grunting embrace. One hand around my upper back, and the other cradling my thighs. Princess it was. I didn’t deserve any less. “You weigh a metric ton, Bas. And my ruddy belly gets in the way of the lift. We’re both too fat to be doing this.” Robbie Coltrane casually devastated my ego - rather inaccurately, I might add. I was all muscle, thank you very much. “Can you not use a body double, even just for this?”

As an act of revenge, I shimmied in his grip - ostensibly to get cosy for the take, but really I wanted to rub my fat arse in. The cables weren’t holding me up by themselves, after all. “Think of the children, Robbie. Think of the children. I always do. Imagine how devastated they’d be if they paused the screen and discover it’s not my corpse you’re holding.” I didn’t even bother feigning innocence. 

Normally, for these sorts of scenes where Hagrid had to appear statuesque within a hurdle of other actors, we used a scale-double and stuffed them in a Hagrid suit. Given the way the shot was framed, though, Robbie had to do the literal heavy lifting for once. 

“They’d rejoice - though they shouldn’t.” He grunted while grousing again. Good. “As would I - stop squirming, will you!? Want me to drop you, or what?”

“Preferably, yes. Hard.” I jabbed my thumb at the crash mat tucked next to the edge of his soapbox. “How d’you expect me to work if I’m not at the office?” Making sure that I was squarely tucked in, the PA ran off set.

Alfonso called out as soon as the assistant exited the frame. “Places, everybody, quiet on set. Action!”

[Soot stained students stood packed like sardines on the stairs of Hogwarts’ entrance. Machine-made smoke billowed in the air as the crumbling edifice of the school acted as the pin-drop to the encompassing silence.

Voldemort and his army of death eaters marched into the courtyard, announcing their victory. Craning necks suddenly locked on to my dangling one in Hagrid’s shell shocked carry. 

Wailing calls of ‘Harry!’ echoed only as far as Voldemort would let it. “Harry Potter is dead!” He swanned in alone. In the middle of a ring created by a crowd on tenterhooks. He spread his arms wide; his gnarly, grimy smile wider, and let his words and silky robe float in the wind. 

The tension was thick. The camera panned and whirled around to faces struggling to swallow the news and their tears. But instead of cutting it. “NYEHEHEHE!” Voldemort, unfortunately, severely undercut it.]

“Cut!” Leaving only one thing for Alfonso to do. 

“I hadn’t quite burst into laughter, but my ever so slightly shaking shoulders signified it was a near enough thing. “Right, I warned you!” Though Robbie, as he allowed me to topple over on to the mat, didn’t appreciate my restraint.

Coincidentally, I expect Ralph Fiennes was going through similar emotions as Alfonso judged his performance. “Ralph, can you maybe play this scene less ehm, how do you say… goofy?”

“Oh! Is that really how it came off?” Ralph was knocked right out of character.

“Yes.” Alfonso wasn’t one to mince words - especially when it came to a chewed up performance.

“… I see.” Ralph carefully rubbed his bald cap - probably lamenting that he’d have to keep it on for even longer now. “Very well. Allow me a moment to re-evaluate.”

–

It took a couple more days for the scene to finish filming to our director’s full satisfaction; a little more than the schedule had reserved, but we had enough cushion to compensate. Or, at least, I’d thought so. 

David Heyman, as he dragged me along behind him, was working off a different timetable, apparently. And since my input was required for our next meeting, I was being sufficiently harried both on and off the camera, too. “We’ve set up the conference call with Jeff Robinov.” Voldemort, it seemed, wasn’t the only bald villain I’d be encountering. “Best not keep him waiting.”

As we entered the designated office for the video call, the ink-stained and paper-cut dregs who belonged to the administrative arm directly under David greeted us. 

Each of them feverishly raffled through sheafs of papers that I suspected had little-to-nothing to do with our pending conference. Mostly because they were all hiding themselves behind a fortress of haphazardly balanced files, folders, and folios in the futile effort to shield themselves against the storm of swearing pouring out from the blank monitor’s speakers. “I can’t see shit! Remind me again how much I’m paying Cisco for all this crap? Get those fuckers on the phone - and use something they didn’t make us buy so that it’ll actually be useful for a goddamn change and tell them to fix their crap ASAP. Waste of my motherf-!” With a click and a buzz, the blackness on the screen was replaced by pixels flickering to life. Quite unlike the lone IT technician who’d been fiddling with the wires, flouncing on his back, and finally laying down to rest. 

Our head exec from WB headquarters could finally see, but I’d sincerely hesitate to declare that our vision was any better. A vicious beak and widow’s peak; both stuffed almost all the way inside the finicky bits of the lens. “Jeff, this is David. Can you see us? We’re having some difficulty receiving the full view from your end. Would you mind stepping away a few paces, please?”

“Oh, yeah, I see you now. There. You. Are.” In spite of David’s request, Jeff buried himself even deeper into the camera. I could almost see our reflection in his pupils until his breathing fogged it up. “My two problem… solvers.” Done menacing id for the time being, Jeff pulled back in his seat, rested his elbows on his expansive (and no doubt expensive) desk, and practically hunched over the webcam in front of him. He did his best to ensure he was physically looming over us across even hemispheres. “Alright folks, let’s kick it into high gear. You’ve got my attention for another ten minutes - make ‘em count. My secretary tells me you wanted to talk about the premiere for Hallows part one? What’s your issue with our standing plans?” Jeff wanted it snappy. Which was made clear in his words, tone, and the clicking of his fingers.

“Then we shan’t tarry. As you yourself are well aware, we have two major functions requiring the presence of our cast occurring very nearly back-to-back. The part one movie premiere in July, and preceding that, the official launch of ‘The Wizarding World of Harry Potter’ at Universal island of adventure this coming June. As I reviewed the provided event schedule, I couldn’t help but notice that between the preparations, flights, the event itself, and the return to office, we risk losing out on an entire working week purely for a five-minute park parade at Universal. Not time we can unduly afford at this juncture, I’m afraid.” Unfortunately, in typical Brit fashion, a succinct discussion entailed David waffling on too much.

Which grated on Jeff’s crepe-thin patience. He immediately interrupted David. “Thanks, but no thanks, fellas. No way I’m entertaining that. Production’s lack of time management isn’t my problem. Figure it out. You will attend Universal. End of discussion.” Jeff started stomping about and almost sent us packing then and there. 

So I decided to make myself the elephant in the room and gave a truncated explanation. “Not what we’re saying.” No point saying ‘if you’d only let us finish,’ because he never would. “Our solve’s simple. Postpone the park event to July - add it to the premiere pit stops between London, LA, Aus, and Japan.”

Jeff sneered at me like I’d just told him to pay his real taxes. “Why the fuck would I do that? It’s just some token face time with the fans, anyway. Stop being so prissy about it.” 

“Token face time that wastes a week?” And as far as making appearances went, at least I was still attempting to keep mine - unlike a certain someone, Robinov. 

David sensed my growing irritation and stepped in with his chiselled jaw so I could keep my level head. “We’ve already forwarded you a prospective timetable. By adding just a single extra day in July, we recover a quarter of June as a whole. Not to mention saving on logistical costs.”

“Beats just smiling, waving, and immediately bouncing.” I added. Truth be told, I had an ulterior motive. “We can even make a proper day of it. A private tour of the park. A special screening of the movie while there. My idea? I’ll kidnap the kids from my old foster home, wrangle up a few local child care homes and basically make the day about them. Harry and co. introduce kids to the magical world, and all that. Frame it however marketing wants to. I can foot the bill if WB’s pockets are looking light.” Not like I wouldn’t earn it back on the back end, anyway. Plus, this way I get to spend my birthday with Mrs Stephens and the kiddies get something fun to do for summer hols. Win, win, win as far as I’m concerned. 

“You must admit, Jeff. It’s good optics, too.” David jumped in with savvy aplenty and appealed to the Hollywood executive’s worse nature.

Jeff just barely halted his knee-jerk refusal. “Does it?” He quirked his eyebrow at someone off screen - presumably his secretary, who handed him what I guessed was David’s proposal. He hummed noncommittally as he skimmed through it. “Huh. What do you know? It does.” He put the papers down, slid them to the side, and refocused his attention on us. “Gets me wondering who I should fire for this oversight. Not you two, though. Oh, no, no, no. That’d be making a huge fucking mistake, hm.”

Sidestepping that cloyingly creepy comment, I clapped my hands, my thighs, and made to leave. “Sweet. Lemme know when we’ve got written confirmation, and I’ll book the tickets.” 

“Hold your horses there, Rhys. Don’t be racing off without my permission. I’m cool with shifting the dates on Harry Potter land or whatever it’s called. But we’re not doing the bleeding heart charity nonsense.”

“And why,” the hell, “not?” That last little dollop of politeness was all I had left. 

“Because you’ve made the fatal mistake, Bas, of misconstruing good publicity for the movie and franchise, with good publicity for yourself. And before you open that smart mouth of yours - no, they’re not one and the same. You wanna wipe UNICEF kid’s noses? Go right ahead, but do it on your own dime -”

“I already suggested that-” my enamel eroded slightly during that ground out sentence.

“And your own time. Would we have Harry Potter headlines hobbling every other step of entertainment news? Undoubtedly. But I know for an unassailable fact that your name’s liable to crop up more than anything else. And, to me, that’s unacceptable.” He swiped his wrist to brush off any further discourse and turned to his seccie off to the side. “In fact, send this down the marketing pipeline. I wanna keep that private screening idea but sell it to the fat pocket Potter nerds. What do you say? Rent out the park, reel in the whales, and have ‘em spout half a K a pop? That’ll earn back a good chunk of op cost beyond the weeks of positive press.”

Did this guy just seriously take my attempt at altruism and swap it for a quick buck? “Yo.” I let heat seep into my voice without an ounce of warmth.

“Hm? You’re still here?” Jeff starting clacking at random buttons on his keyboard, “how do I turn off this fuc-!” bzzt. 

“He rather neatly put the kibosh on those plans, didn’t he? Better half than nothing, I suppose.” David chuckled awkwardly while trying to pat me comfortingly on the shoulder. “Well, Bas, I must say, while our new itinerary may garner Harry Potter, and by extension you, another slew of fans. I very much doubt Jeff remains one of them.” 

“Tsk.” There’s a lot I wanted to say in this moment, but not a word of it was poised to be remotely nice. So I kept quiet.

As slighted as I was rightfully feeling, I didn’t let it show - too much, at least. The only people for whom I truly felt sorry for were the admin staff. Who, taking one look at my disgruntled face, ducked back beneath their file forts.