As a vice-president of publicity at a small Hollywood
studio, Alexis (Lexy) Manning is good at worrying about
everyone except herself. She spends her days returning
calls and avoiding calls from movie stars, musicians,
directors, promoters, agents, publicists, stylists and her
mother. She spends her nights at hot Los Angeles premiere
parties, Sundance and Cannes, working to get her studio and
its stars in the media spotlight so that people around the
world will want to see the film the moment it's released.
She loves her job because she loves movies, referring to
them constantly and surrounding herself with people who
understand her movie references.
Lexy has been planning to marry David Rothstein (better
known as aspiring actor Deke Rothrock) when their three-
year relationship deteriorates into a stalemate argument
about whether to raise potential future children as Jews or
Catholics. David's Jewish ultimatum is making a shiksa like
Lexy very nervous, especially when she admits that David is
never going to be anything in life except a conceited
bartender looking for his big break in Hollywood. This is
the beginning of the beginning of the end, and Lexy has a
long way to go before she'll get any closure.
Her studio just bought a new film at Sundance and she's
oddly attracted to the director, who reminds her of her
high school boyfriend. Her cat has an unidentifiable and
expensive illness, her younger sister Molly is also
recently un-engaged and coming to visit, David still hasn't
moved his stuff out of their shared apartment, her friends
are trying to set her up and her parents have given up and
spent her wedding money on a boat! Why couldn't Lexy's life
be more like the movies that she loves so much?
I loved the name-dropping of Hollywood stars, the timely
movie references and seeing the inner workings of movie
publicity. Most chapters contain a "call sheet" from Lexy's
assistant that gives the reader unique details of her
contacts and communication. Alexis Manning lives a fast-
paced high-stress life, and I found it refreshing to see
her using her personal assistant, a cleaning service,
expensive bath products, emergency therapy sessions, junk
food, massages, shopping and lots of movies to get through
each week. She's not a super-woman, and I didn't always
agree with her decisions, but this entertaining story kept
me crossing my fingers for good weekend box office numbers
while I rooted for Lexy to find her own kind of happiness.
Lights! Camera! Ultimatum!
When movie studio publicity V.P. Alexis Manning's fiancé --
Jewish bartender/actor David a.k.a. Deke -- goes home with
her for a holly jolly Christmas in Vermont with her family,
there's a chill in the air and it ain't just the weather.
Overwhelmed by the Christianity of it all, David confesses
that he can't marry Alexis unless she converts to Judaism.
Alexis might not know exactly what she wants to do with her
life...but she knows she doesn't want to spend it
pretending to be something she's not. Alexis believes in
only one religion -- movies. So with her well-scripted
romance on the cutting-room floor, she begins replaying
favorite film scenes in her head and breaking down her own
life into dramatic clips, searching for the right ending.
If only she were Julia, or Demi, or Meryl, things would be
different.
Get me rewrite!
Is Kirk, the hot new director of her latest project, meant
to be Alexis's leading man? Or are she and David headed for
a dramatic act-three reunion? And what of Andrew Sullivan --
the proverbial One That Got Away? Between film festival
dramas, uncontrollable actors, egotistical directors, a
heartbroken sister, an ailing, peculiar cat named Little
(and her accompanying astronomical vet bills), and
fantasies about simpler times back in New England, it's all
Alexis can do to keep production on schedule. But surely
there's a happily ever after for her -- and hopefully for
Little, too -- before credits roll.
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