Free Seeing Stars by Diane Hammond Page B

booking in high school. You’re too old to play younger than fourteen, and you’re too young to play older than fifteen, and there aren’t breakdowns for fourteen or fifteen ever . They’re always for twelve, sixteen, or eighteen, so you’re pretty much screwed. Plus, you know, I’m a redhead.”
    “Does that matter?” said Ruth.
    “Name a redhead besides Marcia Cross, Kate Walsh, or Julianne Moore. You can’t.”
    “But that can’t possibly be true,” Ruth said. “Especially what you were saying about getting too old or young or whatever it was.”
    “Bet?” Clara offered cheerfully.
    “Some kids, like David Henrie, just go back home for a year,” Allison told her, “and go to high school like normal kids until they’re legal eighteen.”
    “Who’s David Henrie?” Bethany said.
    “You guys are going to have to watch more TV,” said Allison. “He’s been on That’s So Raven and How I Met Your Mother and a bunch of other stuff since forever. He’s friends with some kids I know.”
    “He’s really cute,” Hillary offered. “I mean, he’s pretty old and stuff now, but he was cute when he was younger, and he’s still kind of hot.”
    “What did you mean about being legal?” Ruth asked.
    “Legal eighteen? It means once you’re sixteen and you either have a high school diploma or you’ve passed this killer proficiency test, you can work as a legal eighteen.”
    Ruth frowned. “But why does that matter?”
    “Because if you’re a legal eighteen they don’t have to give you three hours of school every day on set. So producers like you, because they save money on the set teacher and make you work for those three hours, plus you can stay on the set for twelve hours instead of only eight. So of course if it’s between taking a regular kid and a legal eighteen, they’re going to book the legal eighteen.”
    “Or they could Taft-Hartley you,” Reba piped up.
    “Taft-Hartley?”
    “If you’re nonunion, sometimes a producer will like you so much he’ll tell the union there’s no union actor who can possibly play that role, only you, and if the union gives them permission, then they can hire you.”
    “But that has nothing to do with being legal eighteen or not,” Hillary pointed out. “That’s if you’re nonunion and the show is SAG.”
    “Or AFTRA,” Clara said. “I think.”
    “The American Federation of Television and Radio Actors,” Reba told Ruth.
    “Artists,” Hillary corrected her.
    “ God , you guys,” said Allison. “It’s not like she’s going to remember it anyway. Whatever.”
    Ruth assumed that she was the she in question, but it was hard to be offended because Allison was right.
    “You’ll probably figure it out soon,” Hillary reassured her. “I mean, everyone thinks it’s kind of confusing when they first get here. The first couple of months, my mom used to lock herself in the bathroom every night and cry after she thought I was asleep. Plus she’d sneak in shots of vodka. That was when we were staying at the Oakwood, before she went back to Columbus and I went to Mimi’s.”
    “The Oakwood,” Bethany said reverently. “You stayed there? You’re so lucky.”
    “Yeah. I never told her I could hear her. Then my dad came down for a couple of weeks before she went back home, so that was better. He’s really good with directions and stuff. My mom just got us lost every time. I never made it to a single audition when I was supposed to the whole time she was here.”
    “Yeah,” Bethany said pointedly to Ruth.
    “Ten minutes!” A PA walked through the crowd, shouting. “You’ve got ten minutes, people! Use the restroom, tidy up, and be ready.”
    Ruth sighed. “Did everyone get enough to eat?”
    “ Yes, ” Bethany, Clara, Allison, and Hillary shouted in a chorus.
    “No,” said Reba.

    T HE CAR RIDE HOME AT THE END OF THE DAY WAS CONSIDERABLY more subdued than the outbound journey. By the time they were dismissed, Ruth had gas and the girls