#06 HOLLYWOOD EXTINCTION EVENT

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My phone rang. I didn’t recognize the number, but when I picked up, I recognized the voice. “Put yourself on mute and listen.” It was Corso.

I did what he said, muting my phone. Through my phone speaker, I heard a car door open.

“Trent and Mike?” asked Corso, making sure that they were getting into the right Uber.

“That’s us,” someone said.

It seemed like Corso had called me and then put his phone on the front seat so that I could listen.

The car door closed. One of the passengers asked the other, as if continuing a conversation in progress, “How many of your clients are cloned now?”

The other said, “I’m trying for 100%. Once I have their voices cloned out, I convinced most of them to also add their faces and movements.”

“They agreed to that?” the other asked, sounding surprised.

“Hell, yeah. We loop dialogue, do pick-ups, product endorsements. You know the best thing? I never have to see them in person again.”

Both of the passengers laughed at that.

As I listened, wondering how many laws I was breaking by eavesdropping, I tried to guess what these two did for a living. Agents, personal managers, or lawyers? I soon got my answer.

“Listen to this,” one of them said. I heard the passenger play a recording, probably on his phone. The voice of a famous actor saying, “Trent Anderson is the best personal manager ever in the world. I would die for him.”

Trent, now identified as a personal manager, said, “How do you like it?”

“That can’t be legal. Use of her cloned voice without consent.”

“Who says I didn’t have consent?” Trent asked, then admitted, “I don’t for this purpose, but it’s for private use. My use. Every morning when I look in the mirror, first thing, I play it. It’s part of my wake up routine.”

“A contract-breaking confidence booster?” asked the other passenger. “You shouldn’t have dropped out of law school.”

Trent, the confidence-challenged personal manager, protested. “Don’t judge! Don’t you need something like that? Like your biggest client saying, ‘Mike is my favorite agent?’” Trent’s voice sounded youthful.

The other guy, now identified as Mike and an agent, said, “All my clients love me. I make money for them.” He sounded older than Trent.

“Well, I make more money than you,” Trent said without irony. “I give them more opportunities. They can do more without traveling. I don’t even have to buy them lunch.”

“I bet it wasn’t easy to get them on board.”

“No, it was totally uphill. I told them, ‘Hey, you’re giving up corporality, but now your physical self can be on its own. More time to play pickleball! No getting into makeup at five in the morning. All the things you didn’t like simply disappear. Poof!’”

“Eventually, they went for it.” Mike said.

“You have to get your people to do it. Especially now that you’re moving,” Trent said.

“I haven’t decided yet on the move,” Mike said, sounding uncertain.

Which made Trent push his idea harder. “Once your people get it, they get it. You build a model for their voice, face, and body movements. Then on YouTube shows, anything on a phone, nobody can tell the difference. It looks and sounds like your client. I have a whole series running on YouTube that never needed a minute of rehearsal.”

“That’s because nobody pays attention. Nobody cares about YouTube.”

“You’re wrong. They’re paying attention enough,” Trent said.

“Small screens,” Mike said. His tone was dismissive.

I could hear Trent moving in the back seat, probably turning to face Mike. “YouTube is a cash machine.”

Mike said, “It’s bad art.”

Trent got loud in the small space of the car. “So you want people back in the theaters, Mike? Are you that old school?”

“You’re squeezing the last juice out of the lemon,” Mike said. “It’s not pretty.”

“Who cares how pretty it is?” Trent asked with heat, “I can make a million small deals. You are making one a year.”

The car was quiet for a moment.

“I make more than one deal a year,” Mike said, his voice sounding defeated. “And I’d make more but I’m the old guy nobody listens to.”

Trent seemed to pounce on this. “Oh, when a gentleman agent such as yourself could package a client? The balance of power has shifted. AI can replicate anything, and fake fuckability is just as good as real fuckability. When the camera loves you, it doesn’t matter if you’re real.”

“We’re almost there,” Mike said, clearly not wanting to address that truth. “This broker is good?”

“Yes,” Trent said. “She’s got the portfolio.”

“I can work remotely now,” Mike said with hope, wanting a positive spin.

“If you want to leave the country, she’s got properties in France and Spain,” Trent replied.

The car stopped. I heard them get out. The line went dead. I wiped the sweat from my face. It was getting hotter in Southern California every day. People who could leave were leaving. I stared at my phone, hoping it would ring, to hear Corso say the conversation was a joke being played by two friends. I kept waiting.

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