Role of a Lifetime II
By: Kenneth Kirk
(© 2023 by the author)

The author retains all rights. No reproductions are allowed without the author's consent. Comments are appreciated at...

kkirk@tickiestories.us

Chapter 2

Brant and I rose a little early the day after Thanksgiving, joined Mom and Dad for breakfast in the nook off the kitchen since it was a bit cool for Mom on the patio.  We chatted a bit, but mostly we shared the newspaper and enjoyed Violet’s Belgian waffles and sausage patties.  We headed for home as soon as we were done in order to get ready for our mysterious lunch at David Dawson’s house.

David’s handsome bearded butler Stephen answered the door, looking quite hot in a crisp white shirt with three open buttons at the neck.  He escorted us quickly through a massive foyer and long hallway into a rear den that opened onto a covered patio and a pool once owned by the old Hollywood star Shelley Winters.  It was a gorgeous poolside setting.  At an ornate oval table, David sat at one end with Harold Gillespie seated to his right.

David was sipping coffee as we approached but stood to give us manly hugs while inviting us to take a seat.  Harold stood, too, grinning and hugging us tightly before everyone sat down.  I noticed Stephen hanging back expectantly.

“Beer?  Wine?  Coffee?” David asked.  “Something else?”  

After last night’s whiskey sours, the thought of alcohol on an empty stomach was not appealing, so I asked for coffee.

Brant was feeling more adventurous, I guess, as he requested a beer.  Later he told me he just needed a little something for his nerves, which he was surprised to notice at the time.

For quite a while as we lunched on shrimp cocktail, a large chef salad, and slices of raspberry cheesecake, we made small talk about all our current projects and everything we had done since we completed Laying Low, which for Brant and me was over a year ago now.  Harold had spent most of the year on a manuscript for a limited series about the AIDS Quilt Ryan Murphy had commissioned.  He didn’t yet know if it would be picked up or not.  Following Laying Low, David had directed a couple of TV episodes, a Hallmark Christmas movie, and a battle-zone-based movie about Iraq.  He said he was tired from the filming in Iraq and New Mexico and was looking forward to something a bit more intimate.

“Which brings me to the real reason I asked you here today,” he concluded.

My curiosity about the business side of the lunch had been building over the hour we had been chit-chatting at the table, so I was quite excited to finally get to the point.  Of course, what the point might be was the big question.

“Yes?” Brant responded instantly.

David smiled at Brant’s eagerness.  “As you know, we’re tracking the success of Laying Low, which I’m happy to say is quite impressive.  Its total budget was about $3.2 million and we sold it to the distributors and to Hulu for a little over $5 million, so we recouped our investment immediately.  To date, after 8 months, total box office in the US is approaching $20 million, which is the highest grossing non-blockbuster during the pandemic.  I’m really proud of that.”

“So are we,” Brant responded quickly.

“Global box office at this point is over $70 million.  It’s not as easy to calculate when much of the viewing is through a streaming service, but let’s just say it’s big.  Very big.”

We all laughed and whooped for a moment or two.

“How does that compare to other big gay movies?” I wondered.

“Brokeback Mountain cost about $14 million and earned about $180 million while Call Me By Your Name cost only $3 or $4 million and has earned over $40 million to date.  You will note that for about the same budget we have earned nearly double what Call Me has.  We may not ever catch Brokeback, but we will definitely be the second-highest grossing gay flick of all time.”

“Wow,” I said with feeling.

“So-o-o-o,” David drawled out, “the studio big-wigs have asked me to consider a sequel.”

Everyone was quiet for a moment as the significance of this possibility sank in.

“Oh, my god!” I blurted out when it finally hit me.

“Uhm,” Brant mused, “isn’t the story of Laying Low pretty much finished with the deaths of the bad guys?”

“In a way,” David nodded.  “But in our post-screening feedback, we found that nobody gave a shit about the mystery.”

I grinned.  “According to my friends, that’s true.  They just wanted to see Brant’s wanger.”

Brant laughed a bit self-consciously.  “Yours, too, whether they admitted it or not.”

I nodded through my laughter.

“That’s the feedback I got from my circle of perverts, too,” Harold added with a lilting giggle.

David laughed.  He withdrew a scrap of paper from his shirt pocket.  Looking at it, he said, “Statistically, only 18% watched the movie for the mystery.  47% watched it because it starred Brant.  16% watched because it starred Sky.  Sorry, dude.  That number would be much higher now.  98% said they would watch another Brant Kimber movie and 97% said they would watch another Sky Ford movie.”

“That’s a relief,” I moaned.

While laughing, David continued, “28% watched it for the sexual content and 3% felt it was ‘too sexy’.  Overall, it was given 1 star by 0.3%, 2 stars by 3.6%, 3 stars by 7.7%, 4 stars by 21.8%, and 5 stars by 66.5%.  That’s an unheard-of high review, guys.  Oscar winners don’t do that well.”

I was dumbfounded by these statistics and I guess Brant was, too, because we both just sat there with our mouths open.

“If ever a movie demanded a sequel, Laying Low does,” David concluded.

We stared at each other in stunned silence until finally David asked, “Are you in?”

“Yes, of course!” I shouted.

Brant put a restraining hand on my forearm.  “Wait a second, Sky.”  He turned to David.  “What would the story be?”

“Excellent question, Brant, and I have to say I don’t know.  I asked Harold a couple of weeks ago to think about that.”  He turned to Harold.  “You want to answer him?”

“Sure,” Harold said.  “That’s something we have to discuss and decide on, but it would not even try to be a mystery.  It would focus on the relationship between Marty and Aaron as they go through some trials and tribulations, perhaps.”

“That’s good,” Brant nodded.  “Play to the strengths of the original.  Any ideas yet?”

“There are several sort of standard relationship dramas we could appropriate.  Death of a parent.  Financial problems due to loss of job or closing of company.  Maybe a terrible illness or a near-fatal accident.  An affair.”

“Those are all so negative,” Brant moaned.  “Such downers.”

A moment passed and an idea formed in my brain.  “How about something more positive, like getting married or adopting a child?” I asked.

“Possibly,” Harold nodded unconvinced, “but they don’t offer a lot of built-in conflict.”

“How about striking it rich?  Hitting the lottery or something.”  Brant said.

“Is there something a little more specific to the gay community that creates conflict in a relationship but isn’t such a downer?” David asked.

“Well,” Harold started.  “The questions that are different are coming out, marriage, adoption, and what happens if one partner becomes incapacitated or dies.”

“These guys are already out in the movie,” David pointed out.

“They could go through something in connection with deciding to get married,” I said, “but, frankly, that’s not a major concern right now for most of us.  If you want to, you can do it anywhere.”

We all seemed stumped for a while.  Slowly an idea creeped into my brain.  At first, I didn’t like it and tried to push it down, but it wouldn’t stay down.  Finally, I knew I had to share it with the group.

“What if,” I said dramatically, “it was something sort of unique to gay relationships, not totally, but kinda?”  While they all looked at me trying to understand what I had just said, I continued, “Something that has the potential to wreck a relationship but could be really good.”

Everybody had a disoriented, confused look on their faces I found amusing.  “And what if the whole concept is very sexy?”

“Let me get this straight,” Harold said.

I chortled at his choice of words.  “Nope, it’s gotta be gay!” 

“All right, smart-ass,” Harold replied.  “Let me be sure I get this correct.  It’s uniquely gay, sort of.  It could be bad or good for a relationship.  And, it’s sexy.” 

“Yep.”  I could see his mind hard at work for several seconds as the others just looked a trifle stupid.

“Okay, I can’t think of it.  What is it?” he asked with a touch of exasperation.

“A throuple,” I said quietly.

Harold’s eyebrows reached for the ceiling as Brant and David looked even more perplexed.

“What’s that?” Brant asked as David simultaneously said, “A through pill?”

Harold locked eyes with me and we both exploded in laughter.  “Oh, jeez, that’s a great idea, Sky,” he said, suddenly serious.

“Care to share?” Brant said with a hint of irritation.

“A throuple,” Harold pronounced carefully.

“So?” Brant obviously didn’t know the word.

“Honey,” I said, stroking his arm to try to placate him.  “A throuple is a committed three-some.  Three guys in a relationship.  Like a couple but with three.”

Now Brant’s eyes widened as David gasped.

“Think about it,” I said.  “Aaron and Marty somehow meet another guy who intrigues them both.  The movie focuses on how this guy becomes a third in the relationship and how Aaron and Marty deal with that.”

“Oh, I don’t know, hon,” Brant said.

“It does have a lot of dramatic potential, David,” Harold said, ignoring the potential stars.  “There would be a lot of possible problems as the three of them try to work out the rules of their new and pretty much unprecedented lifestyle.  I actually know a throuple living in San Francisco, so I could get story ideas from them.”

“Intriguing idea,” David said in a very neutral tone.

“Somebody else?” Brant asked, disbelieving.  “Bring some dude into our relationship?”

I knew Brant wasn’t liking it right now, but the idea might grow on him.

“And everybody would watch to see the third guy and all the sexual possibilities,” Harold continued.  “Would the lovers break up or form the three-some, the throuple?”

We were interrupted by Stephen’s arrival with a much-appreciated tray of daiquiris.  I’m sure he caught the bizarre mood that consisted of equal parts elation and trepidation. 

“Do you want to have sex with somebody else?” Brant asked me with hurt in his eyes and his voice.  It was a sudden shift.

“Oh, no, honey.  You’re all I want.”  I waited for a response.  When none came, I added, “But if it was the right move for us professionally, I think it would be worth it.”

“I don’t know,” he said, still appearing to be hurt.

Much more confident, I said, “Let’s talk about all that in private.  It’s not an issue if David and Harold choose a different primary plot.”

“To be honest, this sounds like a box-office rocket ship to me,” David said.  “We know a large group of the public loves to watch you two getting it on.  If we added a third to that in this way, then it could be incendiary.”

“Let us discuss it,” I said, “and we’ll talk again soon.”

“Okay,” David agreed.  “If it makes any difference, the new budget would be considerably bigger and would allow us to pay you both considerably more than on Laying Low.”

“I’ll try to come up with some other scenarios,” Harold said, “but I agree with David, this could be a very big film.  I’m afraid it will be hard to top this idea.”

“Thanks for lunch and the offer, David,” I said.  “Right now, I think I need to take my hubby home and find a way to convince him I still find him the most attractive man in the world.”

David chuckled.  “Please do that.” 

********* 

Our car doors had no sooner shut than Brant turned toward me and said, “I thought we were together forever, babe.”

Startled, I grabbed his hands and kissed them.  “Oh, sweetheart, we are.  We’ll both say no to this movie if we think it will hurt our relationship.  But let’s think it through carefully because Harold and David are right: Such a movie would be a very big money-maker for all of us.  It would be an absolute must-see movie for every gay guy who could muster up the price of admission.  It would set download records, you can be sure.  If you think Laying Low added fuel to our careers, I think this would be two, no three times as powerful.  We’ll talk it out later.  Right now, I want you to take me home and let your spectacular cock remind my teeny-weensy hole that I am completely yours.”

He did and it did.

To be continued...

Posted: 02/10/2023