….
March 14, 2014.
Ryan Reynolds stared at his laptop screen, the glow illuminating his face in the darkness of his home office.
It was three in the morning, and he couldn't remember the last time he had gotten a full night's sleep.
Three months.
Three entire months since that meeting with Regal, and the man had basically vanished from his life.
…and Ryan Reynolds hadn't been sitting around doing nothing. He had been working his ass off, actually - setting things up for Deadpool while the rest of the world watched Regal do... well, everything else.
Reynolds rubbed his eyes and reached for his coffee - cold now, probably his sixth cup of the day.
On his secondary monitor, Twitter was open to Regal's trending topic from a few weeks ago.
The man had appeared on [Who Wants to Be a Millionaire] of all things, and naturally, the internet had lost its collective mind.
Reynolds had watched clips of it during one of his rare breaks, shaking his head in disbelief. While he was drowning in pre-production chaos, Regal was casually winning game shows.
Then there was Iron Man.
The movie had been released two months ago and had become a massive hit. Nothing special, really, just another blockbuster success to add to Regal's growing empire.
The box office numbers kept climbing, the reviews were stellar, and suddenly everyone was talking about the MarvelD Cinematic Universe like it was the second coming.
Meanwhile, Ryan Reynolds was trying to figure out how to make a foul-mouthed mercenary work on a seventy-million-dollar budget.
At first, he had thought Regal was joking.
The man had said he wouldn't be directing, sure, but Reynolds had assumed there would be some involvement.
Complete creative control? No oversight? It seemed too good to be true, the kind of thing producers said in meetings but never actually meant.
Nope.
After that meeting, silence. Complete radio silence.
If it weren't for the regular messages from Samantha, Regal's assistant, Reynolds would have assumed the whole thing was an elaborate prank - some kind of Hollywood hazing ritual for actors trying to claw their way back from career suicide.
But the payments for the team kept coming, always on time, always the exact amount they had discussed.
And with it, the terrifying realization that Regal had given him complete authority over the project.
At least for now, Reynolds thought grimly.
The first order of business had been finding a director.
Reynolds had gone straight to Alexander, Regal's ex-assistant director from his early films.
The guy had just made his debut with a movie called [Whiplash], and Reynolds had thought he would be perfect - someone who understood Regal's vision, who could handle intense character work, who knew how to make every dollar count on screen.
Alexander had turned him down flat.
"I appreciate the offer." he had said over drinks at a bar in Santa Monica. "But I don't want to step into Regal's shadow again. I need to find my own voice."
Reynolds had understood, even if it left him back at square one.
So the search continued, and while he hunted for a director, he had started the seemingly impossible task of translating Regal's 'scenes' into an actual script.
Because that's what he had - scenes.
Beautiful, violent, hilarious scenes that existed in his memory like fever dreams. The slow-motion opening that Regal had described so vividly.
Wade Wilson's cancer diagnosis. The torture that gave him his powers. The fourth-wall breaks that shouldn't work but somehow did.
Reynolds had used the funds consciously, almost obsessively so.
He had hired a few writers - not big names, but hungry talents who got what they were trying to do.
He had even written some scenes himself, surprising himself with how naturally the dialogue came.
Maybe it was because he had spent so many sleepless nights thinking about Wade Wilson, or maybe that strange moment in Regal's office, that trance-like vision, had left something behind.
Whatever the reason, the script had come together over those three months. Perfectly, actually. Better than Reynolds had any right to expect.
Then came the director.
Shawn Levy.
The guy didn't have much experience with feature films, he had started his career directing children's television shows and had recently worked as an assistant director on a few projects.
On paper, he was a terrible choice for a hard-R superhero movie.
But when Reynolds met him, something clicked.
Levy got it.
The vibe, the tone, the essence of what they were trying to create. He understood that Deadpool wasn't just another superhero, he was a deconstruction of the entire genre, a middle finger wrapped in a love letter.
Reynolds had his doubts, sure.
But sometimes you have to trust your gut.
Now, with a director on board, they had spent the last two weeks doing final script revisions.
And this was where things got interesting - or, depending on your perspective, ridiculous.
Instead of booking a proper office or renting a conference room like normal productions, Reynolds had been scheduling their meetings at cafes.
Not nice cafes either.
He deliberately searched for places with the lowest ratings, the emptiest seating, the cheapest coffee.
Levy had been surprised at first.
"Uh, are you sure about this place?" he had asked at their first meeting, eyeing the stained carpet and flickering fluorescent lights of a dive cafe in North Hollywood. "I think I saw a health code violation on the walk in."
"Two coffees." Reynolds had told the disinterested barista, sliding a ten across the counter. "Keep the change."
They had spent the entire day there, hunched over laptops and scribbled notes, nursing lukewarm coffee while they tore the script apart and rebuilt it, scene by scene.
And they made sure never to visit the same cafe twice.
Reynolds knew what people would think if they found out. Ryan Reynolds, the cheapskate. The actor was so desperate to save his career that he was pinching pennies on coffee shops.
Let them think that.
The truth was simpler: every penny they spent on unnecessary overhead was a penny that wouldn't be on screen.
Every dollar saved on fancy offices was a dollar they could put toward stunts, effects, costume design.
Levy understood this, the passion behind it, and instead of complaining, it had made him more motivated.
"Every penny on screen." Levy had said during their second meeting, stirring his awful coffee with a broken plastic stick. "That's the mission."
"Every penny on screen." Reynolds had echoed.
Two weeks of terrible coffee and worse lighting, and they had finally done it.
The final draft sat on Reynolds' laptop, 117 pages of violence, humor, and heart. It was crude. It was offensive. It was absolutely, perfectly Deadpool.
Now came the terrifying part.
Showing it to Regal.
Reynolds glanced at his phone.
Still no messages from the man himself, but Samantha had confirmed a meeting for tomorrow afternoon. Three months of complete silence, and suddenly Regal wanted to see what they had built.
Reynolds was confident in the script.
He had to be - he had bled for it.
But he was also nervous, that familiar knot of anxiety sitting heavy in his stomach. What if Regal hated it? What if three months of work got torn apart in a single meeting?
Worse, what if Regal just shrugged and walked away, leaving Reynolds with a script he loved but no way to make it?
Levy was nervous too.
In fact, when Reynolds had first told him that Regal would be producing the film, the young director had nearly had a breakdown.
"Regal?" He had to repeat as his face went pale. "As in the Regal? Harry Potter Regal? Iron Man Regal? That's the one."
"...nod."
"And you are telling me this now?"
Reynolds had talked him down, but he understood the fear.
Working under Regal's name was like walking a tightrope, one wrong step and you would fall into obscurity, forever known as the person who screwed up a Regal production.
But it was also an opportunity that might never come again.
Reynolds saved the script file for probably the hundredth time and closed his laptop.
Dawn was starting to creep through his office window, painting the sky in shades of pink and gold.
He should sleep, he needed to be sharp for the meeting.
But as he lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, all he could think about was Wade Wilson.
The scarred face, red suit, and the jokes that cut as deep as the katanas.
He had fallen in love with a character made of crude humor and violence, and tomorrow he would find out if that love was enough.
Tomorrow, Regal would give them the green light.
Or he would tear it all down.
Reynolds closed his eyes, but sleep wouldn't come. It never did anymore.
In his mind, he saw Deadpool, chimichangas and all, giving him a thumbs up.
"Don't fuck this up, Reynolds." imaginary Deadpool said.
"Trying not to." Reynolds whispered to the darkness.
Outside, Los Angeles was waking up.
And somewhere in that city, Regal was probably already working on his next impossible project, leaving Reynolds to carry the weight of this one.
Three months of madness.
Tomorrow, they would find out if it was worth it.
.
….
[To be continued…]
★─────⇌•★•⇋─────★
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