I managed to make it through the scene, but I’d found it hard to slip back into my groove. I worked until a little after eight, hoping Steve noticed. When I got to Dave’s, a little late, he was already cleaned up and on his second slice of pizza, scanning through dailies on the DVD player. I grabbed a slice and beer and settled next to Dave on the couch, ready for the two of us to finally be alone and relax a little. I knew that “our” time wouldn’t start until he was done with dailies, so I munched my pizza and watched somewhat disinterestedly. There on the screen was the freckly face of Red-Haired Girl. Dave had shot her tightly framed, so the shot was an intense close-up.

“What’s her name?” I asked.

“Chloe Johnson.” He concentrated on the scene playing out on the screen. “She has great eyes. I’m trying to shoot her so that you can see the whole scene in her eyes.”

In an attempt to take the high road, I said, “She seemed nice.” (Not.)

“We’re really lucky to have her. She worked with Soderbergh in Traffic and had a role in Scorsese’s last film.”

“Really?”

He was acting as if this was something that should have impressed me, but it left me feeling nonplussed. “Well, if she has such an illustrious pedigree, why is she doing a supporting part in an episode of LA Crime Unit?”

“I actually got them to flesh out her character a bit. Having her on the show is a big plus for us. I even suggested to the producers that they should consider having her character come back.”

“Oh,” was all I could think of to say.

Dave wouldn’t let it die. “Think about it—Chloe’s worked with two of the best directors in the world. They chose her for both of their films when they could have cast anyone.”

“Yeah, you’re right,” I mumbled back.

“She told me that Soderbergh likes to shoot really quick—he operates the camera himself and is so close to the actors in a scene that he can lean in and whisper in their ear.”

“Wow.”

“Scorsese is just the opposite. He could spend up to a week just shooting one scene. He sometimes asks the actors to do twenty or thirty takes of a single scene. Chloe told me that working like that just takes you to a totally different place as an actor. You become the character.”

“You guys sure had a lot of time to talk between scenes,” I said in my best evenhanded journalist voice.

“Well, actually,” he said very carefully, stacking his DVDs neatly on the edge of the table, “we grabbed a quick dinner last Wednesday at Barney’s Beanery. It was after shooting wrapped for the day and we were down the street. That’s when she gave me the 411 on everything.”