After two years of writing, many listings in competitions and a couple of weeks before the Cannes Film Festival in France, Samantha receives an e-mail to die for: An invitation to meet with a producer. A script must not gather dust they say, so Samantha heads to the mall and finds a travel agent.
Unfortunately even the last minute deals can be pricy and as one can imagine the bank is not too lenient when it comes to increasing limits on an ordinary job and bi-weekly salary. Samantha maxes her Visa out for the all inclusive travel plan and one star hotel in Nice.
At 16:00 our time Samantha arrives at the airport with 120 Euros, a travel bag stacked with energy bars, cheese, cereal, a borrowed jacket and a script to sell.
Security at the airport is tight and the length of Samantha’s trip raises suspicion. “You fly to Nice, stay for a day and return? What’s your business, Madam?” Samantha decides there’s no time like show time, pitches the logline and gets her seat secured after a totally unexpected reaction: they inquire, wish her good luck and treat her like she’s famous. Samantha starts to feel like Cannes.
Three flights later, a pulsating headache, airbags under the eyes and flight snacks in the bag, Samantha pulls her luggage down the narrow ally in Nice, trying to find the single starred hotel before the sunset. French for beginners doesn't do the trick, but luckily there’s a fellow that walks Samantha to the hotel and thank her for the opportunity to practice his English.
The hotel with the cold-water shower doesn’t have shampoo included, but Samantha finds a supermarket around the corner with everything from bananas to liquor and lucky for her, shampoo.
The night underneath the window has lots of not so kosher activities going on and sirens of police cars patrolling, can be heard into the early hours of the morning.
Around six Samantha ignores the mirror, puts her high heels in the backpack where the script is and sneaker it towards the crowded train station. Festivalgoers with Cannes-badges, cameras and name brand clothes pay and run to platform 2. After 11 Euros for a return ticket, Samantha runs and catches the train just in time. The next train is only in two hours and will make her totally late for THE meeting.
In Cannes the red carpet gets rolled out in front of the hall where Angelina and Brad are to walk later the day. At first Samantha ends up in the wrong line-up for last minute passes, run to the Palace entrance and gets a dreadful picture on the pass to wear for the rest of the day. Looking at the picture totally unnerves her -- so much for the first impressions, but no time to ponder. Five minutes before meeting the producer, Samantha walks the pebbled pathway between the yachts, the waving flags, tents, and drizzling rain and away from the red carpet.
While waiting Samantha frantically recall what to say when meeting with the producer. Pitch, followed by more movies of that kind, then favorite actor and then closing the deal.
The producer is ten minutes late and Samantha follows him to the deck with umbrellas and wine. After the small talk the producer asks his one and only question: “What’s the budget?” Samantha remembers something about low, medium and high budgets and with a certain amount of confidence she says: “High, very high.” He must be an excellent judge of character. He pushes his luck: “Six figures-like?”
"Two Million I would say?" Samantha sees him gasping for air and assures him she’s talking US not in his currency. For the next five minutes he lectures Samantha, burning to pitch, on budgets and ends his pitch with: ”2 million US or Euros or whatever currency is a very low budget movie”.
Samantha accepts the glass of wine. The producer has another meeting, so he runs off with “It was nice to meet with you”, and leaves her on the deck. The kind waiter puts his hand on Samantha’s shoulder and serves her a sandwich.
For the rest of the day Samantha hangs out in Cannes, hides behind the sunglasses, uses her pass to go to screenings, cheer with the crowd when a celebrity is said to be behind the hundreds of flashing cameras and every now and she sits down to drink a five Euro American coffee. Samantha catches the last train back to her one star hotel in Nice.
Early the next morning she checks out and wanders in the streets of Nice, visits the flower market and sits on the beach. By dusk she counts the last of the Euros for the taxi and can’t wait for the meals in flight.
After deplaning Samantha is recognized by the security guard of three days prior to her leaving the country. He treats her as if I walked on that red carpet surrounded by the Paparazzi.
{Samantha still pays off on her Visa card. Samantha still writes scripts. And Samantha still can’t spell budget, but she’s working on that.}
