still solid. We’ve been debating this for a long time, trying to figure out the life span of the show, and at what point we should elegantly fold up our tents and go home, before we start to slide. We’ve been discussing it with our wonderful writers for months.” He paused. “As much as we hate to do it, our decision is that we’ve really done it. We’ve stretched as far as we can go. We want to go out on a high, not when people start switching to other channels when we come on. So the bad news is that when we wrap in June, that’s going to be it. The show is over. But the good news is that you’ll be free to pursue all the other projects that I know many of you are itching to do, feature films, other series, Broadway shows. I know several of you are ready to spread your wings, and now you can.
“For those of us who have settled into a comfortable routine here, including me, this is a good kick in the butt to get us going and become more creative again, and reinvent ourselves. We’ve had a great run, folks, and now it’s time to take a final bow, and leave the stage.” There was dead silence on the set when he finished, and then an explosion of chatter and exclamations as everyone started talking at once. Their contracts would determine how they got paid, but none of the contracts had showed up yet for the new season, and this was obviously why. The show was over, and they only had a few weeks of shooting left before the hiatus, and this time it would be permanent. The show was over. They didn’t want to wait to be canceled by the network one day. They wanted to leave on a high, and for a minute, Gemma was too shocked to speak to the actors standing next to her.
“Fuck,” her co-star said to her, “and they call that good news? I have three ex-wives and five kids to support. Shit. I never saw that coming.” He looked panicked.
“Neither did I,” Gemma said, “and I only have me to support, which is bad enough.” In the past ten years, she had grown comfortable in a lifestyle that she couldn’t manage without the show, and thinking it would go on forever, she hadn’t saved a penny, and lived a life of first-class travel to luxury hotels at fabulous destinations, drove a Bentley sports car, spent a fortune on jewelry, expensive restaurants, and had a heavy mortgage on her house. It was a major shock, and would take some serious figuring to slim down her overhead. Everything but her mortgage would have to go. She didn’t want to lose her house. She had to call her agent immediately to find work. Hopefully she’d be in major demand for another show. She’d only done minor things on the side for the last decade, a perfume campaign, a hair products line, an occasional appearance on a movie made for TV, and one in a feature film. She didn’t need the work and didn’t have the time, and she liked playing hard during the hiatus, frequently in Europe. She hadn’t had to seriously look for a job in ten years.
She left the set quickly after the announcement, and didn’t stick around. She called her agent when she got home, and he came right on the line. He spoke even before she did.
“I know. I just heard. I’m going to have a dozen calls by five P.M. I didn’t expect that at all.”
“Neither did I. Our ratings are through the roof,” Gemma said, still in shock, and a little angry now. It seemed so unfair. And it was going to turn her whole life upside down, in a very unpleasant way.
“We should have suspected it. Abrams always closes his shows on a high, and this one really outlived all the predictions for it, and the projections. But ten years is ten years. Who knows, maybe he’s right. And I’d rather be looking for work for you after a hit, than after a show that went down the tubes, so there’s something to be said for that.”
“How fast do you think you can find me work?” Gemma asked, sounding worried. It was no surprise to her agent. All his clients did the same thing. They lived high on the hog when they were on a hit show,