Jacqui is a wildly untalented thirty-something actress who’s been struggling in L.A. for years and has nothing to show for it. When she meets a has-been movie star and his even more has-been wife—who believe there is an underground organization working to steal money from and then murder Hollywood stars—she latches onto them. As their lives and ambitions intertwine, it's a dangerous cocktail of desperation, paranoia, delusion, and filmmaking for this threesome, who try so hard and want so much and just can’t cut it.
Cast:
JACQUI DAWN SMITH: 30s, female. A perennially unemployed actor who lives in Los Angeles, California, and has multiple incongruous day jobs. Her given name was something else, but she changed it (not legally) to “have more star quality.” Her looks are remarkably unremarkable. She’s lived in L.A. since she graduated from a private, conservative Christian college in her home state of Indiana, with a B.A. in Theater Arts. At college, there were only around twenty other Theater Arts majors, and nearly all of them were hobbyists. Jacqui stuck out because of how seriously she took her craft. Her talent as a performer is painfully mediocre, and she has no business pursuing acting as a career, but she has ambition in spades. Plays Woman and Journalist in the scenes from the movie The Star Killers.
DONNY CAINE: 60s, male. A B-list—actually, now more like C-list—film actor. He is married to S.E. His goofy looks pigeon-holed him as a “character actor,” but he possesses a bona fide virtuosic talent. Donny was once clean-shaven and rather adorable, but, today, he is slovenly and off-putting, with baggy, dirty clothes and a baggy, dirty beard. Donny’s career began at nineteen years old, when, during his sophomore year of college at a state university in Texas, he was discovered by a respected independent film director. Donny’s deepest desire has always been to be taken more seriously as an actor. Plays The Star in the scenes from the movie The Star Killers.
S.E. CAINE: 50s, female. A perennially unemployed former model and actor, who never truly pursued either career. She is married to Donny. Her name is pronounced “Essie,” short for the first and middle names given to her by her parents, whom she abhors. Her beauty could stop traffic, but this is hard to tell these days, since she dresses like she’s in some kind of punk rock militia and since she somewhere along the road became bug-eyed. Though she has never actually made a film, she fancies herself, as she would say, “an auteur.” She is extremely untalented and has poor taste.
THE STAR KILLERS: One person, any age or gender. “Very L.A.” Plays all other characters:
ACTING TEACHER, DEVELOPMENT EXEC, ACTOR, INVESTOR, PUBLICIST, PERSONAL TRAINER, DIRECTOR, TALK SHOW HOST, PRODUCER, MANAGER, BARISTA, PERSONAL ASSISTANT
