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Author's note: This chapter has benefited greatly from editing by Nick, as well as the gracious loan of Duncan from Road to EGOT (which I greatly enjoy) by ManUnited1086. Apologies for the long delay between posts as personal commitments have crept up, but on the plus side, the next 4 chapters are fairly well plotted!
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This is the seventh in an open ended "celeb harem" story putting together two of the greatest franchises known to Man, Baywatch and the Victoria's Secret Angels. Outfits and references are based on real life look-books and clips.
A month in St. Barts has been fruitful on the Victoria's Secret side, but now our hero finds out just how much more he has to learn to produce an HBO epic. Time for old, and new, allies....
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< Messages___________ Seth ___________Details
I will let you know next steps
_____________Yesterday 2:43 PM
__________________________On its way to tricia
Thanks
_____________Yesterday 8:52 PM
_______________________Had the call. Went well
What did they ask?
Just play it straight
__________They're moving faster than we thot
How do you mean
__________________________Dont worry bout it
Don't WORRY?
______________Today 6:38 AM
???
_________________We WANT them to move fast
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After a month away in tropical paradise, the plush offices of HBO's Los Angeles location didn't quite hold the same appeal as when I had first walked in through the door, armed with nothing more than an idea. Thanks to pulling some favors from my day job in real estate, I was sitting in a trendy Starck-inspired chair before Michael Lombardo, President of Programming.
Believe me, this was an intimidating meeting. Michael personally greenlit every original series coming through HBO. After the runaway success of Game of Thrones, I knew he was hungry for the next hit for when the series came to its inevitable end. I had pitched Baywatch Secrets to him as a gritty successor to one of the highest rated TV shows of all time, but it was his idea to connect it to the broader DC extended universe in direct response to Netflix's tie-up with Marvel. And so the money was found, a pilot ordered, and I found myself Executive Producer of a show that would live or die based on whether he liked it or not. Basically, Michael was my sugar daddy.
And Daddy wasn't happy.
"You didn't get a single contract?" The silver haired executive never raised his voice if he could achieve the same effect with an eyebrow. "What the hell were you doing down there if you didn't get a contract?"
I blinked. "I have verbal-"
"You have verbal nothing, Mike. You know what verbal is in this business? No? Want to guess? You're selling a house, do you take down the fucking sign when someone -tells- you they're buying?"
"No, but-"
"If we don't have Victoria's Secret Angels on the show, does it make any sense to call it Baywatch Secrets?"
"Look. I know these girls. They want this. It just wasn't the right time or place to-"
"Mike, while you were fucking around down in Guadeloupe, we attached Jeremy to this project, did we not?" I nodded, still flattered that they had signed him up to direct our pilot. Jeremy Podeswa came with an impressive track record, having directed some of HBO"s best Game of Thrones episodes. "You know why?"
"Look, I appreciate you're committed to this. So am I, and-"
"Emmy, Mike."
"M-E?" I asked, repeating the syllables but not quite comprehending their import.
"Emmy? THE Emmies? Little angel statue holding a ball?" I couldn't help but glance at Michael's impressive collection lining up the top shelf. "Guy's been snubbed for his Emmy more times than we care to count. This show is his chance. IF... he has a decent script. And where are you on that?"
We had agreed that I would find the writer who came closest to our vision for the series. I didn't need reminding how critical the plot elements in the pilot would be. "I have a guy in mind. I'm meeting him this afternoon."
"Get me a writer. In writing. I want the creatives working early and often on this, Mike." He indicated the end of the meeting with a curt nod at his door, and went back to his computer. Thoroughly abashed at how much work I had left to do, I made to get up.
Just as I reached to close the door, Michael spoke again, the reflection of his scrolling screen forming a faint hologram in his stern glasses. "And what about the men?"
I paused. "What men?"
"Give me fucking strength. Men, Mike. You're going to have an all-female Baywatch?" Michael sighed melodramatically, and cast a critical look at me over his glasses. "Look, I'm putting a real casting director in charge. 7pm tonight at the Grove. He'll talk you through it."
"Understood. Just...it wasn't Guadeloupe, by the way."
"What?"
"The island. It was St Bart's. Not Guadeloupe."
"Are you deliberately trying to piss me off now? Get the fuck out of here before I decide I should get a new show-runner too."
And that was that. I was dismissed.
My head was a mess as I made my way back to my car. Halfway through the lot, my cellphone buzzed. Crap, two missed calls. "Stace?"
"Finally! How'd it go?"
"Oh babe... you ever seen a lion mauling a gazelle? It was worse. Hang on let me switch you to Bluetooth..."
I filled Stacy in on my disastrous meeting with Lombardo as I headed back to Beverly Hills. She had helped me run point on things in LA while I was gone, but had been called to an assignment in Europe at the last minute before I got back. I hadn't seen her since I left for St Bart's, and found myself missing her touch and her smile. We had become very close in the last two months of collaborating on this new project, and emotions were stirring that I hadn't felt in decades.
"So wait... are you supposed to hand over casting to this guy or what?" Stacy sounded increasingly anxious. She had her own career reboot riding on this too. "Are they trying to just take over our show? What are you gonna tell Carmen?"
I shrugged, to no one in particular. "We'll know more when I meet this guy. Lombardo's right though, I know jack shit about running a tv show. Right now, I think I'm just about still in charge, though. We have to trust that HBO know what they're doing, Stace."
Our call ended as I pulled up in the cul-de-sac of an elegant two-story house with a contemporary/Mediterranean design. It wasn't quite a McMansion, but then it wasn't far off, and I knew the interior was every bit as fine as the exterior, if not more so. Sprinklers sputtered to life, peppering the well-trimmed hedges as I strode up the steps to the arched doorway.
A familiar-looking blonde woman in a dark blue top and designer jeans answered the doorbell. Seeing my look of confusion, she turned back and called down the hallway. "Either you got me a stripper and I love you, or your agent is here!"