“No, I’m doing it for me. He and I used to edit our old family movies together. It was a hobby we loved and shared. During high school and college I used to write screenplays, but—”
Shut up, Dana. You’re blabbering again.
“But what?”
“Screenwriting’s not exactly a secure occupation.”
“Nothing in the entertainment industry is.”
“No.” That was why she’d been so thrilled to land a job with a heavyweight like Hudson Pictures.
She lifted the serving spoon to dish up the food, but hesitated when she realized she was about to fill Max’s plate. It was a bad habit—one she had to break. How many times had she fixed his lunch when she prepared hers? In fact, if she knew he was going to be working at his desk instead of out schmoozing for lunch, then she usually spent the evening before preparing something special and then packed enough for two the next day. No more of that.
She served herself and set the spoon back in the casserole dish, letting him get his own.
He did so. “You’ll have to send your family tickets to the Honor premiere.”
Her fork stopped short of her lips. Who was this man? Usually exhaustion made Max grumpy. It never made him likeable and approachable. “They’d like that.”
“I didn’t know you and my grandmother kept in touch.”
A chuckle escaped before she could stop it. Lillian had been a regular contact since the first day Dana set foot on Hudson property as Max’s executive assistant. The eighty-nine-year-old might be subtle, but she was effective.
“Are you kidding me? I run your world and she checks to make sure I’m doing it correctly and to her standards. She has a soft spot for you. Don’t tell her I said so, but I think you might be her favorite grandson.”
A tender smile curved Max’s lips and the love in his eyes made Dana’s breath hitch. If he ever looked at her like that, her new resolution to get over him would crumble.
No, it won’t. You’re past that. Remember?
Right. She’d promised to say yes to the next guy who asked her out. She might even sleep with him because it had been…forever since she’d had sex. Well, a couple of years anyway.
Step one in her twelve-step guide to getting over Max Hudson was to immerse herself in another man…or three.
Yeah, right. You never learned to juggle men.
Maybe it was time she tried. At least her heart would be safe that way.
Except for one fizzled relationship, she hadn’t dated all that much since taking the Hudson position. Luckily she lived in an apartment building populated by attractive actors waiting for their big break. When she had to attend a Hudson Pictures function she asked one of her neighbors to accompany her. That way she always had a good-looking guy on her arm, and she did them the favor of giving them exposure and introducing them to a few powerful people in the biz. A win-win situation.
She pulled herself back to her present. “In all the years I’ve worked with you, you’ve never worked with an associate producer. What will my duties be?”
He seemed to ponder as he ate. “You’ll liaison with the cast and crew.”
“I’ve done that before.”
“You’ll be responsible for checking location details, making sure each of the cast has what he or she requires and you’ll be troubleshooting.”
Not what she had in mind. “This is beginning to sound like my old job.”
“And until I have a new executive assistant it’s my job. I’m delegating.”
“Max—”
“Don’t ‘Max’ me. You asked for this, Dana.”
“If you’d look at the résumés piled on your desk, you might find a new E.A.”
“I have looked and none of the applicants has your qualifications.”
“That’s because I was overqualified.”
He frowned. “I don’t have time to train anyone right now, and neither do you.”
“But—”
“I’ll also need you to check the log sheet.”
She blinked at his change of subject and nearly groaned. Writing down each scene as it was filmed was mind-numbing. Checking it against the film was doubly so. She sighed. “What else?”
“Make an edit script.”
Boring desk work. But, okay, she knew that was part of the process. She forced herself to keep eating although he was killing her appetite.
“Capture the footage and back it up. You do know how to work the editing software, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
She’d spent a lot of her nonwork hours learning the computer program that stored the dailies digitally on a hard disk. A good producer knew how to get his hands dirty in every phase of production. Putting the clips in order was busywork, but at least she’d get to see the raw footage and get a feel for how the film might come together. That part was exciting.
Max’s vision for the story would determine the final product. His editing would set the pace, tone and emotional impact of the film and a million other things simply by the clips, shots and angles he chose to include or cut. Even the sound he chose would affect the final product. While editors might not get much of the credit, the editor could make or break a film.
And then something struck her. “Wait a minute. This is beginning to sound more like editing than producing. And why are you giving me the tedious jobs?”
Max didn’t even blink at her accusation, nor did he deny it. “Because right now that’s what I need you to do. The producer’s primary job is to keep everyone happy, on schedule and under budget. Someone has to do the grunt work, and you need to learn from the bottom up.”
She sat back, her appetite and her enthusiasm gone. “I have a degree in filmmaking, and I served several internships with Screen Gems at the Wilmington studios.”
“You haven’t used any of that knowledge since you graduated, and the technology has completely changed in what? Six, seven years?”
“About that. But I’ve done my best to keep up.”
“Good. Then maybe you won’t slow me down. We’ll move faster if I don’t have to stop and explain things every step of the way.” Max took a few bites of his breakfast. “I’ll also want you checking for continuity errors, specifically the clocks, candles, setting, cigarettes or anything else that might be an issue. Make sure they haven’t changed from shot to shot. No short candles that suddenly get tall.”
“That
