After all of the non-musical scenes had been shot, the crew started to shoot the musical part. Neither Wang Yang nor Wally Pfister was experienced in this. Fortunately, they had Anne Fletcher. She was the choreographer of Titanic and had a lot of experience in shooting singing and dancing scenes. She knew where to put a camera and which pictures to capture. She was their beacon in this sense.
Of course, the emphasis should be put on pictures—namely, the dancing. As to the singing, they just needed to make sure the characters lip-synced when shooting close-ups. The songs would be added gradually in post synchronization.
David Lawrence signed the contract in no time. Then, he came to Salt Lake City with his songs in no time as well. Wang Yang picked the songs he found satisfying, and then Lawrence taught the leads to sing. At the same time, Anne Fletcher would choreograph dances that fit the style and the rhythm of the songs. Not until all this had been done would the shooting start.
That being said, Anne Fletcher had already choreographed the dances for the scenes where the songs had been decided a long time ago, so the shooting would not be interrupted.
To shoot these musical scenes, the crew had rented two more film cameras to do multi-camera shooting. They’d shot the same scenes so many times that many film reels were wasted. However, they’d also captured a lot of material to work with. As to how to show a certain scene, a certain song, and a certain dance, they would consider it when they did film editing in postproduction.
At this moment, the crew was shooting in the canteen of East High. A camera set up on the second floor of the canteen was rolling. There were assistant cameramen working on the first floor as well, both in the front and on the side. By then, they had shot the primary chorus and group dance. Then came the final part.
Everyone was still dancing. Gabriella and her friends came in with their lunches. Sharpay Evans walked down the stairs in anger. She looked she would cause Gabriella some trouble. However, Gabriella, who was walking ahead of her, suddenly slipped on the wet floor. She lost her grip on the tray. Consequently, the box of French fries drizzled with sauces on the tray sailed into the air. They happened to fall on Sharpay Evans, who was trailing behind Gabriella. Then, Sharpay left, angry and sad.
In the original film, there was a montage here; one second, the French fries were flying in the air, and the next second, Sharpay was dumbfounded with the box of French fries pressed against her chest.
But Wang Yang intended to make it more real. He wanted a shot from the side, with the whole process captured, from Gabriella’s slipping, to the fries flying, to the fries smashing right into Sharpay’s chest. This shot could be inserted to make the dramatic scene more visual and more specific.
Wally Pfister was carrying the camera on his shoulder, while Wang Yang was standing behind. The cheerleaders and the walk-ons were still dancing. He looked at Rachel, who was walking down the stairs, and then looked at Jessica holding the lunch tray. He prayed to himself, “Come on. This must be successful in only one take!” If not, Rachel would need to change her costume and do it again. Being smashed by French fries drizzled with sauces could not be easy or pleasant.
Rachel, playing Sharpay, walked down from the second floor with an angry face. Zachery, who played Ryan, was following her like a servant. Jessica looked around at the dancing crowd. She walked ahead cautiously, and suddenly, she walked into the puddle of water on the ground and slipped. She tipped the lunch tray upward, and the box full of French fries and sauces flew into the air instantly!
That box caught everyone’s attention. Wang Yang closed his fist tightly. He was nervous. The box was falling, but it seemed it would fall short. Seeing this, Rachel hurried to take one step forward so that the box of fries smashed right into her chest! Pressing the box against her chest, where her clothes had been spoiled by the sauces, she looked down, totally stupefied. Then she shrieked, “Aaah!”
Wang Yang waved his fist excitedly. He called, “Cut! Great! That was really great!” Looking at Jessica, he said with a smile, “Jessica, it was a perfect pass. Looks like falling down all the time after all has some benefits too.” Then, he thumbed up at Rachel. He praised her, “Rachel, your performance was fantastic!”
However, Jessica could not cheer up. Looking at Rachel in a kind of embarrassed manner, she said, “I’m sorry, Rachel…” Smiling and shaking her head, Rachel said, “It’s all right. It was for the shooting. You don’t need to feel sorry about anything.” Still pressing the fry box against her chest, she said to Wang Yang, “Yang, shall we proceed to the next scene?”
“Oh, yeah. The next scene.” Wang Yang also realized it was not the time for joking yet. Rachel must be feeling terrible. Although it was work, they really should finish this as soon as possible! Clapping his hands, he called, “Guys, get ready!”
Alyson Reed, the player of Ms. Darbus, walked over. Standing behind Rachel, she said in surprise, “What is going on here?” Rachel was so pissed that she could not stop panting. She said sadly, “It’s Gabriella. She just dumped her lunch on me! On purpose! She wanted to ruin all this. And Troy. He and his basketball team are obviously behind this!” She gave Jessica a stare, gnashing her teeth with hatred. She read her line, “After all the hard work I’ve put into the musical, it turns out… ah!” She gave Zachery, who was next to her, a punch because there was no other way she could vent her anger. Stomping, she said, “It just doesn’t seem right!”
Then, Rachel flung her arms, her eyes already red, and she walked up the stairs at a fast pace. The walk-ons on the stairs made way for her, one after another.
“Cut!” Wang Yang called. He said with a nod, “As good as usual. Guys, get prepared for the next scene.” The next shots were all Troy Bolton and his friends. The cameramen and the lighting engineers would need to rearrange the setting. Wang Yang looked at Rachel, standing in some distance. That sad look of hers, as if she had been wronged for so many things… that was fantastic. He felt uneasy somehow. He shouted, “Rachel, good work. You can go and clean yourself.”
Rachel nodded without speaking. She walked onto the second floor of the canteen and sat in a chair. She took the napkin a production assistant gave her to wipe the sauce stains off her clothes. Seeing Jessica approaching, Rachel smiled at her while arranging her clothes. She greeted Jessica, “Hi.”
“Rachel.” Sitting down in the chair next to her, Jessica apologized to Rachel, “Even though this is work, I still want to say sorry.” Shrugging her shoulders, Rachel said, “It’s really fine.” She smiled and thus her dimples showed. “I got paid for that. I’m a professional actress, huh, aren’t I?”
Jessica smiled, but she still felt Rachel was a little upset. She found Rachel had been upset a lot recently. Was it for that reason? In that case, there was little she could do… she answered after thinking, “You are surely a professional. Your acting always only needs one take, while I blow it all the time. How many films I have wasted?! Just think about it.”
“It’s nothing. It’s not us who pay for the films anyway.” Rachel broke into a smile, shaking her head. Then, all of a sudden, she said, “Christmas is on the way.”
Jessica was dumbstruck. She answered with a nod, “Yeah.” The last Christmas seemed to be a long time ago. She said kind of melancholically, “This year seems to be especially long.”
Rachel asked, “Why? Because of Yang?”
Glimpsing at Rachel, Jessica stayed silent for a while. Then, she finally said, “Yeah, I think so. Since I met Yang again, my life has become much more colorful.”
“Cherish it, then.” With a faint smile, Rachel patted Jessica on the shoulder. Getting to her feet, she said, “I need to go to the lady’s room. See you later.”
Watching Rachel walking away, Jessica thought to herself resolutely, “I will cherish it.”
After one day’s shooting and two hours’ dancing practice in the evening, Rachel finally went back to her hotel room. She was looking at her laptop screen sitting behind the desk. There were some photos open on her laptop—photos she and Wang Yang had taken when they’d been visiting Chicago. In the photo displayed on the screen at the moment, Wang Yang was beaming at the Navy Pier with his arms open.
Rachel looked at it for a while, and then she clicked on the next one. They had asked some passer-by to take this one. She and Wang Yang were horsing around as if they were going to hit each other. Recalling those wonderful memories, Rachel could not help but smile. She clicked on the next one, and then the next one. The smile on her face was gradually fading. In the end, it was completely gone, and she looked super cool.
Maybe it was time to let it go! Rachel felt heartbroken. She checked “Select All” with her mouse and then was going to delete them. Her index finger was moving around on the left button of the mouse, but she just could not do it. Gritting her teeth, it seemed she had finally made up her mind…
At this moment, she heard knocks on the door. Then Wang Yang’s voice came vaguely. “Rachel, are you there?”
Rachel was struck dumb. She turned around to look at the door. Another knock came. She let out a sigh and closed the folder. She got to her feet to open the door. It was really Wang Yang standing outside. Rachel was very bothered. She asked, “Yang, what’s up?”
Looking at her with a smile, Wang Yang said, “I just want to apologize. Didn’t get any chance to say sorry to you during the day.”
Shrugging, Rachel said, “For what? It’s just work. I’m not angry.”
Wang Yang nodded. Yeah. It was just work. It was nothing. He had no idea for what he wanted to apologize, either. But that sad look of Rachel’s had been like a stab in his heart. He felt bad about it.
Shaking his head, he said, “No, Rachel. I still want to say it. I’m sorry.”
“Okay. I heard it. What else?” Rachel said in a cold voice. She never let her hand off the door handle as if she was going to shut the door at any minute.
“Eh.” Nothing occurred to Wang Yang. So, in the end, he had to say, “Nothing else…” Seeing Rachel about to close the door, he shouted involuntarily, “Hold up!”
Rachel stopped. Looking at him, she said, “What? You wanna say good night?”
She sounded so sarcastic that Wang Yang wiped his forehead with his hand helplessly. He said, “Yeah. I wanna say good night.” Seeing that Rachel was going to close the door without saying good night back, he let out a sigh. He said, “Rachel, I don’t get it. Why did you stop speaking to me?”
They’d used to speak to each other a lot on the phone or on MSN. They had talked about everything and exchanged their opinions on everything. But lately, Rachel would only speak to him about work. Except that, she was always cold to him. The pleasant conversational atmosphere they’d had in the past was totally gone. Whenever he tried to talk to Rachel, about movies, about anything, she always simply responded, “Oh, yeah?”, and the conversation was killed.
Rachel suddenly smiled. She said quietly, “Yang, you know it. Things have changed.”
Things had changed… Wang Yang fell silent. Yeah, he knew that. He knew things had changed, but they could not talk anymore because of that? He thought to himself kind of self-willingly. He said, “Rachel, I don’t get it. Aren’t we friends? Like, good friends? Are good friends supposed to talk about work only?”
“No, of course not. Good friends can talk about a lot of stuff.” Rachel shrugged. Then, frowning, she asked, “Well, okay. So, what do you want to talk about, Yang?” Looking at Wang Yang in anger, she said quickly, “Movies? Theater? Musicals? Literature? ‘Rachel, I watched The Count of Monte Cristo again yesterday…’, ‘Rachel, a brilliant idea just occurred to me…’, ‘Rachel, you know what…’, ‘Rachel, Rachel, Rachel’!” She said in a trembling voice, “Why do you always come to me to talk about all this stuff? I don’t want to talk, okay?”
Wang Yang was dumbfounded. Rachel took a deep breath. Then, she spread her hands, seemingly amused. She said, “Am I the only friend you have? Why do you come to me all the time? Why me?”
“I…” Wang Yang was speechless. He had a lot of friends, but why did he come to Rachel all the time? He had no idea. He just felt it a pleasure to talk to her. Whenever he was excited by something he had read or he came up with an idea and he wanted to talk about it, he would always go to see Rachel. Rachel was the one who could understand what he was talking about. They could relate to each other, and he felt comfortable having her around.
Seeing him extremely embarrassed, Rachel felt heartbroken. Gnashing her teeth, she said, “Yang, you know what? I’m pretty bothered by this.” Looking into Wang Yang’s eyes, she said with a blank face, “I don’t know what’s on your mind or what you want to get. Tell me, Yang. What do you want to get? A female friend whom you can spill your guts to and share your hobbies with?” She breathed out frustratedly. Looking into the distance, she said, shaking her head, “I can’t do it. It’s not my obligation. My life has been totally disturbed. Yang, what else do you expect?”
“Rachel, I apologize. I’m sorry…” Wang Yang flushed because of shame. He had been too selfish. He thought he could behave the same as before, but he had hurt this girl. Rachel’s red eyes put him really upset. He said again, “I’m sorry, Rachel. I’m truly sorry about this.”
Rachel took another deep breath. She felt that her eyes were burning. Blinking, she said, “You don’t need to say sorry. You really don’t need to… Yang, good night. I need to sleep…” Then, she slammed the door shut. She felt she nearly could not breathe. Leaning against the door feebly, she could in no way get the image of Wang Yang’s ashamed, embarrassed, helpless face out of her head. Trying to control her breathing, she murmured, “Yang, I’m sorry… I just can’t do it.”
Wang Yang buried his face in his hands with his eyes closed. Then, he pulled his own hair awkwardly. He asked himself quietly, “Am I a jerk?”
He punched the wall and then walked to the elevator. After taking only a few steps, he looked back at the other end of the corridor sensitively. No one was there, so he left at a fast pace.