The glass doors of JTV's headquarters hissed open and Harry Jackson walked in, sun-kissed from his "holiday," and feeling unusually buoyant. Not quite for long.
"About time you showed, your highness?!"
It was the voice of Lisa.
Before Harry could say anything, there was a stack of papers soaring across the reception area and hitting him squarely in the chest.
"What a welcome," he said under his breath, regretting ever coming back from Greece.
"Glad to see you alive and well," then she added to him with a professional-but-definitely-not-friendly smile, "and now read everything you missed."
Then there were more papers, memos, contracts, invoices, actor demands, brand reports, marketing breakdowns.
"Surely I was gone for three months!" Harry exclaimed.
"Exactly. You took a 'business trip' and allowed me to everything on the 'business' side." Lisa was upset. "And I was going back and forth between a Power Rangers Force season two shoot and your fucking new zombie show. I've been inhaling soundstage air and eating company vending machine peanuts. I haven't had sex with my husband for three weeks."
Harry felt all of his excitement fade away as he plummeted into the chair. "Please tell me the board hasn't gotten rid of me."
Lisa crossed her arms. "On the contrary, they are delighted. Merchandise numbers for Power Rangers went up by 13%. Mr. Bean is still making money in reruns in Europe, and your idea for a mini version of the VHS tapes of 'Bean's Best Gags' actually worked. But this is why you have a mountain of paperwork, much bigger than my patience."
Harry groaned.
Lisa continued, counting on her fingers. "The second season of Power Rangers is in production - bigger budget, better suits, and I've already resolved the salary issue with the actors."
"Who asked for a raise?"
"The new Red Ranger. Yes, he has abs. No, that wasn't a valid reason for a raise. But, he got one anyway — his agent."
"Dammit," Harry said under his breath.
"And your zombie series—the one you're calling Dead Walkers, by the way--has completed full production. We have one more month of shooting remaining. We're filming at Warner Bros. Studios Stage 14, Burbank. You rented it, right? Huge soundstage. It's the same one The Matrix used for some of the later filming after their first round of filming."
Harry blinked. "Oh right. That explains the invoice."
"Also, I've been onsite supervising both sets personally. I'm tired. I want a pay increase."
Harry raised an eyebrow. "Okay... I can check on the zombie one today. Has anybody filed a lawsuit against us yet?"
"No. Why?"
"No reason," he said a second too fast already envisioning how a headline might read "JTV's Dead Walkers eerily similar to The Walking Dead."
He of course was aware of The Walking Dead. But in 2001, it had not been made yet—only the general idea, not the script. And the cast they had secured was fresh: Jeffrey Dean Morgan was in as a drifter-turned-survivor (long before anyone would recognize him as Negan), and Evangeline Lilly, rising Canadian actress, played the boss's daughter.
Not perfect, but promising. It would do.
Lisa was unrelenting in her rant until she looked over at Harry, and saw him staring blankly at the wall.
"Are you okay?"
"You accomplished quite the feat while I was gone. But, I'm here now," Harry said, standing, and waving his arms in the air, like a performer. "I'm willing to take care of everything. Now, get out of MY office and leave me alone with my life-long nemesis."
Lisa cocked her head. "Which is?"
"Paperwork."
Lisa stifled a smirk. "Get a secretary."
"What are you, then?"
"I'm clearly not enough for the mountain of chaos you've created. We need a team."
Harry rubbed his temple. "I'll consider it."
Three Hours Later
Harry was putzing around, reading, writing, yelling, sighing, flipping the table—or at least, imagining he were.
"I should've stayed on the beach," he said, scrawling initials on a casting release form for Dead Walkers. "I should've opened a Greek food truck."
At some point he stood up to get some blood flowing and knocked over his coffee on a licensing contract with a toy company.
"I'm dying," he moaned. "Tell Lisa to get started on my eulogy. It better be good."
_____
Later That Afternoon – Warner Bros. Studios, Stage 14, Burbank
Harry walked through the giant hangar-style doors of Stage 14 and immediately felt the cold blast of industrial AC, the unmistakable smell of props made of metal and plastic, and the distant groan of a background actor pretending to be a zombie.
"Sir," said a PA who was standing at the front of the stage. "You must be Mr. Jackson. We were told the producer was coming down today."
"Yeah. How's the shoot going?"
"Pretty smooth. Director is in scene 32 right now. You should speak to him."
Harry nodded, and walked past the people working, navigating wires and props, before arriving at the director's chair.
"Harry Jackson," he said and extended his hand.
The man at the chair turned around--Sam Heller, a mid-tier but well respected TV director known for his character-driven and gritty projects, in his late 40s, soft spoken and wore an unbuttoned utility vest and a baseball cap that looked like he was recently off a survival trip.
"Lisa didn't come today? Anyway, I've heard about you," Sam said shaking his hand. "Young, rich, hungry. The usual nightmare."
Harry laughed. "And you are the one that is trying to make our show about zombies look better than a B-movie?"
Sam shrugged with a smirk. "Trying? We're killing it. Literally."
Harry spent the next hour following Sam around, standing behind the monitors as Jeffrey Dean Morgan improvised some of the scene, dragging a baseball bat through the dirt while mumbling a quiet monologue about survival.
The lighting was grim. The pace was tight. The tone? Atmospheric.