Free Screen Play by Chris Coppernoll

conductor’s baton.
    It was spontaneous, an instant flash of inspiration. Everything clicked and I could feel the intuition showing me how to move. Ben’s original blocking worked fantastically, but there were a million and one ways to play Audrey Bradford. Mouldain had written layers into his play. There were depths to plumb in his work, harmony notes that vibrated both beneath and above the melody line. Savvy actors and directors could pluck a moment like the strings of a harp and turn a scene on its edge.
    My eyes opened, and I could almost see the red velvet curtain opening in front of me, hearing the guide wheels squeaking along their track as the grips pulled its fraying rope. Around me, a three-walled apartment belonging to the deranged Audrey Bradford decorated my imagination. In front of me, a red-cushioned sea of theater seats, the ocean floor, waited.
    I tossed aside Ben’s blocking, moving left instead of right, making up my own marks as I triggered Audrey’s words and phrases. My turns were crisp and fluid. The rubber soles of my shoes squeaked like a basketball player pivoting on the court.
    I saw two young dancers arrive early to the studio for their lesson. They watched me from the doorway, their energy and presence feeding my performance. The rhythm and cadence of Audrey Bradford’s words snapped from my mouth like icy branches in a winter’s storm.
    Helen always played the scene’s emotional finale by piercing the audience with a near shriek of her voice. I could feel the pressure too now, building inside of me, but I lowered the tone of my voice and the gaze of my stare to a spot just above Ben’s forehead. Audrey Bradford’s words came out with startling transparency and emotion, a whisper under pressure that sent a chill up my spine when I spoke.
    I waited for Ben to say something, anything, aware that my heart was beating like I’d just finished an aerobic workout. I exhaled a huge sigh to wash away the scene.
    Ben sat motionless, his feet planted, lips pursed. He nodded his head ever so slightly, with his chin perched on top of his curled fists. Eventually, a sly smile bent the left side of his mouth slightly higher than the right.
    “That’s exactly why I wanted to do Mouldain. He’s such a genius .” Ben stood up again, reanimated and talking faster. “You get all the layers in his script, don’t you, Harper?”
    “Yeah, I guess so. I see the possibilities.”
    Ben scoffed. “Yes, possibilities . You’d think as director I’d have the freedom to portray some of those possibilities and do whatever I wanted creatively. But with only forty-two shows, and having to promise my partners we’d at least break even, I’ve had to roll this production straight up the middle. Don’t repeat this, Harper, but while we have a really strong, good show—we don’t have a great show, not yet anyway. A great show requires taking great risks.”
    “From what I understand, this production’s been all about risk taking.”
    “Offstage, yes. But onstage, I’ve only succeeded at bringing the show out of storage, dressing the stage more or less the way it was done fifty years ago,” Ben said. “I just didn’t have the time, money, or clout to both revive and reinvent Mouldain in the same production.”
    Ben dropped his head and shook it like he’d worked himself to the point of exhaustion for four years only to miss the game-winning shot at the final buzzer. He raised his eyes to look at me. “But thank you, Harper, for at least showing me what might have been.”
    “Thanks, Ben. That means a lot, more than you know.” So far, I’d felt like the production’s family dog. Allowed to come in from the cold, but not an equal member.
    Ben glanced at his watch again, suddenly aware of the time. “If it’s any consolation, you’ve also helped me work out one of my staging quandaries with Helen. So this has been fruitful in several ways.”
    He picked up the leather satchel leaning against his