“Sure.” She glances at me. “Do you know what we’re doing?”
No, I want to say, I have no idea what we’re doing. I haven’t done this before. I’m not even sure what to expect.
“Yeah,” I say, fingering the press pass in my pocket. “Come on.”
I’ve never been to a press screening before. And, to my surprise, no one seems to be freaking out as much as me. There’s a table set up in the lobby where people show their press credentials to a bored-looking woman with red hair. For a second, I’m worried she’ll ask me questions—why I’m so young, why I only have one press pass when Alice is with me, who I’m writing for—or even just try to make conversation, but she barely looks up as she checks my name off the list. I breathe a sigh of relief.
“What is this about again?” Alice asks, leaning close to me as we walk into the theater. “Am I going to cry?”
“I don’t know,” I say, shrugging. It’s almost comforting to have her so close to me. In a sea of strangers, she’s the nearest thing to a lifeline I have. “You might.”
The movie is about a gay kid sent to a conversion camp and the lasting impact it has on him and his family. Alice isn’t really into Oscar bait, so I’m not sure if it’s wise to tell her. She’ll figure it out on her own.
Most of the people inside are middle-aged and white. At least there are a few women. Alice pulls me toward the front before I can linger.
“We’re too close to the screen,” I say, watching her throw her bag down. Her phone remains firmly in her grip. “I can’t see.”
“Yes, you can. That’s the point of a theater. You can see anywhere.”
“Alice.”
“Josie,” she snaps, looking up. People are staring now. My face burns. “I’m not moving. Go sit in the back if you want.”
“God,” I say, slumping into my seat. “I don’t know why you have to be such a bitch.”
“This bitch is the reason you’re here in the first place.”
I open my mouth to reply, but the lights dim. Maybe they’re starting the movie early to get us to shut up.
There are the normal coming attractions—a Marvel movie, an action-adventure about cars, and a TV documentary about Roy Lennox, this director who has won about a million Oscars and has, according to the trailer, been making movies for over twenty years. Then, finally, the movie starts.
One thing is clear about ten minutes in: reading about it and seeing it are two different things. I’ve read early reviews raving about Marius Canet’s performance as his character, Peter, but their words didn’t do him justice. I’m not sure how my words will do him justice. He doesn’t say much—his character speaks less and less as the movie goes along, as his parents force him away, as he’s forced to leave his boyfriend, as he returns to a family he doesn’t understand—but it’s more impactful, in a way.
Watching him hurts so much that it feels like he’s tearing me apart, slowly, from the inside out. The back of my throat burns with unshed tears.
Other people are taking notes, nodding, but none of them seem as choked up as me. Alice’s eyes are unusually bright, though.
All I can think about is how young he is. Even though he’s Black, his face seems paler in certain scenes, pale enough that I can see everything going on inside him. And he does this thing where he cries and the skin around his eyes gets red. His eyes go searching, everywhere, every corner of the frame, like he’s looking for the audience to help him out. I guess I’ve never seen someone this young who can act and say things without opening his mouth. Not since, like, Quvenzhané Wallis in Beasts of the Southern Wild. Even then, there’s something different about this. Something more mature.
I haven’t had much time to think about interviewing Marius Canet. I’ve been too busy packing and fielding lectures from Mom. But now it’s all I can think about. He’s not established enough for me to have any idea of what he’ll be like. There was an interview I watched last night before I went to sleep, but it was with the entire cast—the actors who play his parents, the counselors at the camp—and he spent more time listening than speaking.
Before I know it, the lights are up and Alice is nudging me.
“Hey,” she says. Sniffs. “Are you crying?”
“No.” I wipe at my damp cheeks. “Are you?”
“No.” She sniffs again. “Of course not.”
We walk out of the theater in silence. It’s only when we’re outside, staring at the pink and purple of the evening sky, that Alice speaks again.
“He didn’t really talk a lot.”
“I guess,” I say, shoving my hands into my pockets. “But he made you feel so connected that it hurt anyway.”
God, I’m supposed to go to a press conference in an hour. A press conference, with the entire cast and crew up on a dais, while the journalists sit in the audience and ask questions. How can I do that? How can I ask Marius Canet questions in front of everyone else? I don’t know him, but it feels too personal. I almost wish I’d gone to the press conference before the screening. Sure, I would’ve lacked context, but at least I wouldn’t have cared this much. Everything gets harder when I care.
“It was definitely sad.” Alice shakes her head, fingers tapping on her phone. “I think his parents made it sad, though. They believed they were doing the right thing for him.”
“Conversion therapy is never the right thing.”
“Obviously.” She rolls her eyes. “I’m just saying the movie did a good job of just—I don’t know. You think these people are evil, right? But that would make things too easy. Peter—he still loves them, even though they sent him to this place to change him. That’s real life.”
I guess
