Behind Closed Doors

Chapter Thirteen

‘Anthony St. Claire called here when you left to go and visit your parents down in the East,’ Lawrence was saying, and there was this infectious happiness that was sweeping through him. ‘He didn’t relay the message through a secretary; he called here in person. It was his voice. He wants you to call him back as soon as you got his message. Isn’t that exciting?’

Phoenix shrugged. ‘I guess. But the point be say na I no care,’ he said, reverting back into the gutter bastardized pidgin English of the uncouth.

Lawrence sobered up, his infectious excitement developing wings and fluttering away. His face was now a mask of concern and worry. ‘Isn’t getting into the movies the best thing you always wanted?’

Phoenix laughed bitterly, his face a cold mask. ‘That is not what I always wanted for my life. I had wanted to be a lawyer, but then there was no money to help get me through to that, so I had to go and live with an aunt who treated me no worse than garbage. So I had to run away from her in order to go find my fortune here in Lagos. Oh, and guess what; I went to see St. Claire and the man had me go down on him. And please don’t even pretend you don’t understand what I mean.’

‘That’s appalling,’ Lawrence exclaimed, and his voice rang with his indignation. ‘Derek never told me that the man was going to make horrible demands on you. Anyway, if you end up not getting the role, then you can always turn around and sue him for sexual assault. You have paid him with your sex services; now he’ll have to give you the job you asked for from him!’

Phoenix knew that Lawrence was right about what he’d said－ in theory that is. He could never ever think of going to sue the great man for there was no way he could live with his life should he try such. He called the man, and imagine his surprise when the Big Man told him that he’d gotten the job and they should meet to discuss it.

When they met at the Four Points by Sheraton in VI, Anthony St. Claire was brimming with good humor and as they ate their elaborate meal, he enthused about the project with an almost child-like enthusiasm that rendered him very cute. He told Phoenix that after their meeting in his office, he’d had a spark of creativity and had now decided to broaden the story into a trilogy.

‘You will be in the first two films of the trio, my boy.’ Anthony St. Claire forked some shrimps into his mouth and pointed the fork in the young guy’s direction. ‘I hired a team of the required writers, and they had to brainstorm about this, deciding that the influence your character would exert in the movie would be too destructive, plus the fact that you’re an unknown. You are what I call a very risky investment that may rake in millions or have my money washed down the drain.’ He gave Phoenix a shy, tentative smile. ‘But I have no doubt that with your beauty and your sex tricks you’re going to make an instant hit. By the way, I did my research on you and found out that you were once a dancer.’

‘I am a dancer,’ Phoenix corrected him frostily.

Anthony waved one long arm dismissively. ‘Whatever. You used to do your act with live snakes, so my boys had to incorporate your acts into the movie. I suggest you go and start brushing up on your dancing skills, plus, we’ll need those snakes. Soon, you shall dance, and it will be on TV.’

*

Filming for The Desperate Mission trilogy began in early May after two weeks of intense rehearsals. The main stars of the movie were the A-listers, those who felt they ruled the industry, so they kept to themselves and chose not to mingle with the smaller ones, the ghosts, as they were called. But Phoenix had absolutely no time nor wished to fall over them in a bid to please them. He had his snake handler Ali Hassan, and his hectic dance routines and his lines to perfect. And surprisingly, the cast and the crew looked at him in awe, and he was baffled, but it was one of the less pompous stars who went by the stage name Bella Brown that told him point blank that he was one of the movers of the movie and he’d have to deal with it.

Filming began in Lagos, and then was moved down to Port Harcourt, and from there Phoenix and some of the members of the cast flew to South Africa to complete some scenes there. By Mid-July the first film had already been to the cutting-room of the Censors’ Board, certified public-worthy, and was released. On the jacket poster was a picture of Phoenix, the devil-son, half-naked, with a huge python draped around his neck. When the movie trailer hit the screens, the people went berserk in Lagos and the other mega-cities, and they clamored for it. But Anthony St. Claire merely released some thirty thousand copies into the market of some countries in Africa, forwarded them to the cinemas of the UK and North America, but none was released in Nigeria. The copies released sold out within sixteen hours.

Phoenix was shell-shocked at the publicity, and when the movie finally premiered at the Silverbird Galleria on Ahmadu Bello Way, VI, the size of the elite crowd and the youngsters that attended was a shock. They were all screaming as he climbed out of the car that had conveyed him to the venue, and they were chanting his name: ‘Phoenix!’ They went on screaming, and it only got louder as he stood there staring at them all, and the camera lights were popping off everywhere, and he was finally smiling and lifting his hands in a wave. It was unbelievable that he had outshone the stars of the movie with his incredibly lithe body and his fluid dancing moves with the huge snakes. The people were shocked and horrified by him; he was a dream and a nightmare, something they had never seen before and would never see again.

And there were tears in his eyes as he watched the people and smiled his thanks at them, for, without them, he was nothing. Now, he was something; he was a Face, something he had always wanted to be.

Finally, at last, he had arrived.

After that premiere there were pictures of him everywhere, and when the second film of the trilogy was out, his name was everywhere, and the movie raked in millions both on the home front and in the foreign market.

By December 2000, the third film was out, but it was a flop when considered against the backdrop of the staggering success of its predecessors. Anthony St. Claire sent out his people to go and find out why, and they came back and reported to him that it was due to the fact that Phoenix was not in the movie; the people wanted only him.

Phoenix . . .

That was his name, the name people now knew, and he had become one of the super A-list actors in Nollywood. In 2001, he would play the movie that would catapult him to the rank of one of the most Bankable Stars in the whole of Black Africa.