The lady at Nutrition looked scandalised. “But didn’t you see the kiss scenes?!”
To be honest, I thought that was a bit of an overreaction. Besides, what kiss scenes?
“I’m sorry, are we talking about the same series?”
She threw a sharp look at her assistant who instantly turned red under the sudden spotlight. “I..I sent him the series you asked me to,” she mumbled like she was suddenly unsure.
While the assistant fumbled with her phone, the lady turned to me. “Which series did you watch?”
“It was called To My Star,” I replied. “It was a South Korean drama.”
She paused, and casting an appraising look at me, said, “And you didn’t see the kiss scenes?”
I innocently shook my head. I felt like a kid who had done his homework, who was then asked if he had done something else too that wasn’t even part of the assignment to begin with. As a matter of fact, I ‘had’ done my homework. After I received a call from Nutrition, they sent me a drama to watch so I could get a sense of what to expect for the role I was going to audition for.
“Wasn’t it a story about two friends sharing an apartment who fall out at one point but make up in the end?” I asked.
“And why do you think they fall out?” She raised her eyebrows.
That got me. That was the part I didn’t understand either. Why did they fall out?
“Um…” I resisted the urge to scratch the back of my head because that would make me look like a clueless, inexperienced child. “That series was pretty anti-climatic,” I said at last hoping that sounded smart enough.
“Because the kiss was the climax!” she turned to her assistant and said in a flat voice, “You sent him a censored version of the series, didn’t you?”
The assistant shrunk into herself. “I’m sorry.”
“It was a Boys Love series,” the lady said to me.
“A what series?”
Then it came to me. Boys Love. That thing the girls in my class kept screaming about.
“A BL series?”
The lady looked slightly impressed that I knew the term, and I also felt a little smug. But knowing the term was one thing, acting in a BL series a completely different ball game. I couldn’t imagine what that would mean for my public image and future prospects as an actor. I had to talk to my manager. LOL. I meant my baby sister.
“A BL series,” the lady nodded. “I’m sure you’ve heard of Frame?”
How could I not have? She was all the female population in my class talked about every spare minute they got. I slowly nodded, half dreading what I already knew was coming.
“So the movie we’re going to make is a BL.”
Bingo. I wanted to run.
“We think you almost perfectly suit the lead character,” she continued. “Of course, we’ll be taking a screen test and all that, but I still want you to sleep on it, give it a thought. It’s the first of its kind in Bhutan. How exciting is that, huh?”
Very exciting. Very damaging to a debutant’s career too. But what could I say? I wasn’t in a position to turn down offers or negotiate my way into things.
She handed me a card that had a simplistic logo of the letter ‘N’ on it. “We’ll contact you about the date of the screen test and audition. In the meantime if you have any questions, please feel free to call us.”
I took the card and thanked her.
On my way out, I couldn’t help congratulating myself for what she said about my being a near perfect fit for the role. But on second thought, what the heck did that even mean?! They thought I was a perfect person for a BL character? I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Looking down at the card in my hand I heaved a sigh. Nutrition. What a lazy name for a company. It sounded like a food and wellness company instead of a talent company.
The narrative they cited on the website went something like this:
The word nutrition is borrowed from Middle French ‘nutrition’, Old French ‘nutricion’, and Latin ‘nutritio’. The word means to ‘feed’ and ‘nourish’ which is what the company aims to do with their actors, to feed them with experience and nourish their talent.
What a lot of bullshit. They should fire their brand marketer.
Someone likely randomly thought of the word, and then gave it an overblown, pretentious meaning. Maybe I should cut them some slack. They were a fairly new company after all, and this was their first movie production too, which is why I thought it was extremely dangerous to venture into uncharted territory. A BL! How did the best day of my life turn into a joke?