Sunday's Sunshine

The Delightful LA Actress was over in England this weekend on business and she brought the sunshine with her.

Work Buddy and I travelled to see her yesterday. Even after getting tangled up in a one-way system more demented than the surrounding architectural monstrosities, we finally find our way there.

The timing was just right. We walk in to find an agent we’ve met professionally and socially at the bottom of the staircase. As we catch up, I glance up the stairs and there is the Delightful LA Actress making her way down toward us.

I looked up and smiled. She looked in my direction. No reaction. I kept smiling as she got closer. Still no reaction.

It had been a while since we last met, but since then there has been a semi-regular email exchange. The last one was only five days ago.

“Hey, honeybun!” I say (or something similar), being very businesslike. “How are you?”

Which does the trick. Her face lights up. She apologises for not recognising me. The weight loss had thrown her. I get a long compensatory hug.

I should point out that I have staggering lapses when it comes to putting names to faces and faces to names. The whole Friends Reunited phenomenon seemed like a great idea until I realised most of the names, listed under the good number of schools I went to, rang absolutely no bells whatsoever.

Luckily, after a brief engagement, the Delightful LA Actress discovers she has a two-hour gap in her schedule that allows us time to find a table in the lounge bar, sit down and order coffee.

Simply categorising her as an Actress is disingenuous. It’s one of many strings to her bow, although perhaps the one she is best known for to the wider public. And she’s aces.

She hit a rocky patch earlier this year with one of her businesses. When I found out what had happened, discovering that it was similar to something that had befallen me some years back, I was apoplectic. Work Buddy and I offered our services to help her get back in a commanding position by creating a strong web presence.

We discussed that and other opportunities peeking above the distant horizon, and everything else in between. In the business almost all her working life, the Delightful LA Actress is anything but one of these wretched Norma Desmond-in-waiting types that I have had the misfortune to meet, work for, or work with. Far removed from the horrible narcissists of frankly limited ability who have bought into this world-revolves-around- me routine, instead she’s witty, fiercely intelligent, and sharp as a tack.

When I write the female characters for the projects we’re starting to put together, I usually have her in mind. If there were more like her around, our work would be a breeze.