I haven't forgotten you, Miso soup.
Name: Emmaline "Emmy" Mellier (also called Em, Emma, etc.)
Gender: Female
Age: 28
Position: Production manager. Em's job is to handle all the administration involved in creating the film: scheduling, budgeting, staffing, location scouting, transportation/storage/facilities/hotels, and so on. She's in charge of all the logistics of the project, and works from a production trailer on set (or from an office, if the set is close enough). Em is in charge of all the production assistants and coordinators, as well as the script supervisor, location manager, property master, and so on. She exists to enable the creatives - the director, actors, editors, designers, etc. - by making sure they have everything they need to do their jobs. The buck stops with her for all non-creative decisions.
The job keeps Emmaline ridiculously busy, especially during shooting and post-production. She'll work fourteen or sixteen-hour days, or more, and she gets precious little time to herself while she's working for a film. Every day has some new crisis, some problem nobody else can solve. This requires her to have an absolutely no-nonsense attitude. She doesn't screw up very often and she expects the people under her to be pretty much perfect. While it's hard to fluster or upset her, her laser-focus on the job can be mistaken for irritation or displeasure. She's a decent boss despite that: good at delegating, willing to accept responsibility, understanding but enough of a hardass that things get done. She toes the line between harsh and fair surprisingly well, and nobody can argue with the amount of work she puts in, or the results. To make things easier on herself and everyone else, she tends to hand-select people for the jobs in her purview. She doesn't want someone who won't be able to work at her speed, and she's got no reservations about firing people who won't do the work.
Appearance:Em is quite pretty, and when she cleans up, she's absolutely gorgeous - but her job leaves her with no time to care about any of that. None of the pictures I've used are really representative, because she's pretty put-together in all of them. She has a great dress-sense (lots of vintage stuff, fashionable clothes when she has time to keep up with fashions), but that's about it. Most days, there's no makeup, no styling, her hair is up in a tight bun (that progressively falls apart throughout the day), and she wears just a loose-fitting dress and a pair of shoes (always flat, often boots; she'll usually comfortable over professional). She stands about 5' 6'' and walks with a determined stride. Something about the way she fixes her light-green eyes on people make it seem like she's looking not quite through them, but more into them, like she's figured them out already and she's just waiting for them to realize.
A lot of things about Emmy feel like that - like no matter what's happening, she's already figured it out. She's already in control. Certainty rolls off of her like sweat. It's nothing particular about her that can be put into words, it's something less clear, maybe a combination of how she looks and how she moves and the assertive way she talks. It's halfway between charisma and wisdom, and it makes her seem, sometimes, much older than she really is. When people look at her, they don't see just a pretty redheaded girl with tired eyes - they see someone who
is something, who knows something. Emmy's presence is probably her greatest asset.
Personality: On a superficial level, Emmy is lovely: Vocal, intelligent, charming. She makes a fantastic first impression, and it's not an illusion, either. Emmaline is charming, and intelligent, and she's most certainly vocal. She comes across as determined, capable, and hard-working. She can be a little intimidating because of how focused she gets, and it can seem like a lot of her charm is disingenuous, but it isn't: Em is every bit what she seems. The problem isn't that how she appears and who she actually is is inconsistent, but rather that it's that how she appears and who she actually is is much more complex then that, and most of it isn't readily apparent to anybody who might know her casually.
Em has a lot of drive, but she has no idea where or how she wants to use it. She channels it into her work, and she does a great job, but being production manager doesn't make her feel anything in particular. Really, Emmy wishes she was a creative. She doesn't know what exactly she wants to do - maybe acting, maybe directing, but she has no formal training in either. She represses these thoughts; the difficulty of work makes it easy to ignore them, but they never really go away. She talks about it sometimes, mostly when drunk, but she's never had an opportunity to anything serious with it. The dream in the back of her mind is that she'll make the leap from production manager to being a part of the production, maybe even directing, but realistically she doesn't really see that happening.
Emmy gets along pretty well with her colleagues, especially the ones around her age. There's a certain amount of camaraderie that comes from being involved in a big production, and that's one of the things she loves most about her job. Despite her natural confidence, she does get nervous around superiors - producers and directors - but she manages to hide it pretty well in favor of getting the job done. She usually tries not to interact much with the actors, especially if they're big-name ones (they usually have their own entourages anyway). She believes firmly that famous people don't want to spend their day being reminded that they are famous, and if they do, they probably don't deserve their fame. Secretly, she hopes some big-name actor, producer or director will notice her someday and let her try a more creative role, but she never makes that desire plain.
History: The Milliers are an upper-middle class French family who moved to the States because of Emmaline's father, who works in finance, when she was around six years old. Em is an only child and had a pleasant childhood, though she would probably have liked a sibling. She was always musically gifted, and played piano and sang at a young age. Her parents were certain she would go on to study music. They didn't exactly disapprove of film, but they were skeptical of it - the fact that their daughter is consistently employed now is a source of significant relief to them.
Emmy started as a production assistant on smaller projects, and worked her way up quickly. She's worked on a couple of films now, for the same studio and producers but different casts and directors. She's definitely gotten better at (or maybe just used to) the demands it places on her, and she's pretty well-respected because she does it well. She hasn't (yet) had to deal with any really difficult personalities - probably a spot of luck, in Hollywood - and that's made it easier. She tends not to have opinions on the films she works on, including this one. Her job is to see that it gets made, not to pass judgement.
Miscellaneous: Emmy was in a band in college; they were pretty good. She was vocals and guitar. The name was a little embarrassing. She keeps the album they made in her luggage but never takes it out or talks about it. She speaks, reads and writes fluently in French, but has no accent in English unless she is affecting one.
She doesn't have a Twitter or a Facebook. No time for them. She had a fliphone until the producers bought her something better.
Luke Clemens: Emmy's a little shocked at how young Luke is, and if she's being honest, she thinks his stardom is the only thing that put him in the director's chair - people will go and see the movie regardless of whether he's any good. This irritates her quite a bit; candidly, she thinks she's much more talented than he is, but that might be an unfair assumption. She hasn't see him at work yet, after all. She's promised herself she won't let that feeling interfere at all with her work.
Maximillian Harrison: They haven't really interacted.
Harris Klein: He takes his job seriously, and he does good work. Emmy has a lot of respect for that. Yeah, he's had some problems in the past - but that's personal. Not her business. Of the actors, he's one of the ones she looks forward to meeting the most.
Jake Wilson: Emmy gets along really well with Jake; he works hard and he's always doing his best. She feels like he's a part of the team, and considers him one of the closest friends she's got on the production. She has, in the past, harbored some more specific feelings about him... but she ignored them then and she'll continue to ignore them now.
Phoebe J. Collins: As with Jake, Emmy gets along pretty well with Phoebe. Sometimes, Phoebe's work gets away from her and she loses focus, which can irritate Emmy quite a bit, but they usually get through it fine. Though Emmy can be impatient and demanding when things need to get done, she does her best to understand Phoebe's habits, and she knows the props master will get through it all with a little time and leeway. Phoebe would be Emmy's first choice to relax or party with.
Leo PNB Xavier: Leo does good work, and Emmy likes him a lot. Sometimes, she fantasizes about asking him to dress her up a little - she thinks his taste is fantastic and she's impressed by his knowledge. She knows how seriously he takes his job, and she really appreciates it. His spontaneity can be a problem sometimes (much the same as Phoebe's nervousness), but she knows he's aware of it and keeps it mostly under control.
Amy Ho: All that coffee is gonna kill her. Emmy drinks it too, so maybe she's being hypocritical, but it wouldn't hurt Amy to cut back. Still, if it helps her to do a good job (and she's flawless in that regard), who is Emmy to say no? Amy is probably the most capable of her colleagues, and the one who most understands Emmy's perfectionism. Emmy feels relief in dealing with her much of the time, because it's easier to hold someone to a high standard when you know they can do it (and when they're holding you up there as well).
Vyacheslav Piotr Zolnerowich-Wahlstein: He really believes in the project; Emmy's sure of that. He was the one who hired her, too, so it's hard for her to criticize him on anything. Once she got over her nervousness at being in his presence, she had to admit that he's actually pretty adorable. She's not sure how involved he'll be on-set - what is there for him to do? - but he seems like a decent guy. She's glad he's not as cynical as she imagines most producers to be.
Max Goldstein: Once she met Max, Emmy understood where the production was really coming from. He knows his shit, and she really respects that. She looks up to him, but would never admit it. She's a little surprised he doesn't walk all over Piotr all the time, and that agreed to hire her on, but she knows better than to question him.
Addison Matthews: She's got her work cut out for her. Emmy and Addison haven't worked together before, and Emmy is just praying Addison won't screw up too soon, even if it might be inevitable. So far, so good, but Emmy isn't certain how she feels about people who keep journals and tweet their thoughts on the productions they work on. She knows Addison is probably in this to break into Hollywood proper, and hopes that'll be enough motivation to get things done.
Leila Fox: Her name is probably next to "celebrity" in the dictionary. Everything about her just seems too perfect to be believable, even without a dozen people to do her hair and makeup and dress her every day. That's fine, though. That's part of the industry. Emmy has no idea what Leila's really like, and though she's admittedly pretty curious, she's resigned herself to not finding out. That's not why either of them are here.
Nicholas Lyons: He seems very pleasant, but Emmy's never worked with him before. Even though she's seen films with him in them, she almost didn't notice him the first time he was on set. He's very low-key. Emmy likes that.
Virgil Siegfried Holst: He's good looking, like, really good looking. That's hard to ignore. But other than that, he's an actor, and he seems very Hollywood - lively, always playing it up, always the center of attention. Emmy always tries to fight it, but she has an instinctive distaste for people who are more charismatic than she is.
Ella Lindgren: One day, Emmy swears, she'll go clubbing with this girl. When they both have time. Which will probably be... never. Ella seems like a huge amount of fun, and is talented to boot. Her choleric nature can make things difficult, and Emmy finds that of all the crew, Ella requires some of the most patience (even more than some of the actors), but that's artists, right?
Brett Arlington: She seems pretty down-to-earth for an actress, which is helpful, but it would be nice if she could be on time for once. She takes the whole thing almost too seriously for Emmy, though - the production manager has to worry about what happens when shooting drags on and on because the actors want to get their lines just so.