The following Monday, a courier van pulled into the driveway of Alex's Hollywood Hills home and unloaded five large, heavy boxes. Inside were nearly fifty scripts—the "discards" that Mike Ovitz and the senior partners at CAA had flagged as unworkable, conceptually flawed, or simply beneath the stature of a star like Alex Hayes. Since wrapping up in Louisiana, Alex had an empty schedule and the quiet intensity of a man with a point to prove. He decided to treat the reading of these scripts like a full-time job, locking himself in his study from dawn until dusk.
The first forty-eight hours were a brutal introduction to the reality of the Hollywood industry. Alex realized just how much absolute garbage passed through an agency before a single page ever reached an actor's table. By the end of the second day, he had a pounding headache. Most of the scripts were mind-numbing action films, derivative slasher flicks, and incoherent sci-fi epics with no internal logic. Amidst the trash, he found a handful of mediocre scripts—solid enough to be made into forgettable "filler" movies, but entirely devoid of the "spark" required for a blockbuster hit.
On the afternoon of the third day, Alex unearthed a script at the bottom of the second box titled Total Recall. This project was the definition of development hell, having been passed around Hollywood for nearly a decade with over forty drafts in existence. Every major studio had eventually balked at it; executives thought the premise—a construction worker having memories of a life on Mars implanted in his brain—was too "silly" and expensive for a serious sci-fi audience. They called it an unfilmable mess that would bankrupt any studio brave enough to touch it.
Alex recognized the mind-bending potential of the story immediately, but he knew the draft in his hand would require a complete rewrite, a massive budget, and a sprawling production. Seeking something simpler for his current gambit, he set it aside for later consideration. He didn't want to star in it now, but he certainly intended to produce it later.
By the fifth day, mental fatigue was setting in. That afternoon, he uncovered a thick, dense draft of The Last of the Mohicans. The agency had categorized it as "unworkable" due to the immense production demands of a 1757 setting. While the project faced the usual challenges of historical epics—budgetary concerns, long running times, and questionable commercial viability—Alex saw the potential for a great film. However, it would require significant script doctoring and a director with a singular, gritty vision. He filed it away in the back of his mind to visit later.
By the seventh day, Alex's hopes were almost extinguished. He was at the bottom of the fifth box, his eyes blurred from thousands of pages of dialogue. Then, he found two scripts back-to-back that changed everything. The first was titled 3,000. As he read, he realized this was the early, dark incarnation of what would eventually become Pretty Woman. In this draft, it was a gritty, depressing cautionary tale about drug addiction in Los Angeles, ending with the protagonist being thrown out of a car and left in the dirt. Alex sensed that with a tonal shift toward a modern fairy tale, this could be a film the world would fall in love with.
Then, at the very bottom, he found a script titled Ghost, written by Bruce Joel Rubin. In the industry, Rubin's script was currently "homeless." Every major studio had passed on it. To a traditionalist like Mike Ovitz, it was the definition of "silly"—a man dies in the first twenty minutes and spends the rest of the movie as a transparent ghost trying to save his girlfriend? It was a romance, a thriller, and a comedy all rolled into one "tonal disaster."
But as Alex turned the pages, he recognized it from his dream visions. He saw the potter's wheel, heard the haunting melody of "Unchained Melody," and felt the weight of a beautiful love story. Most importantly, he saw the word BLOCKBUSTER written across every page. In 1988, no one believed a spiritual romance could be a huge success—no one except the man who had already seen it happen.
He picked up his phone and dialed Paula's direct line as the sun began to set. "I found it," Alex said, his voice decisive.
"Really?" Paula asked, sounding surprised. Though she had agreed to let him hunt through the boxes, she truly had no hope he would find a project he actually liked.
"Yeah," Alex replied, a smile tugging at his lips. "It's called Ghost. Written by Bruce Joel Rubin. Find out who holds the option."
There was a long, stunned silence. "Alex... that's the one Mike called 'a Hallmark card with a murder plot and a ghost.' The lead character is a literal ghost."
"I know," Alex laughed. "Isn't that wonderful?"
"I'll get on it," Paula whispered, her voice a mix of exasperation and inevitability, knowing she couldn't convince him otherwise.
"And while you're at it," Alex continued, "I need you to find out the current status of the other three projects I found—Total Recall, The Last of the Mohicans, and 3,000."
There was a long pause on the line, followed by the audible sound of Paula shifting in her chair. "You found those to be good as well?" she asked, her voice tinged with genuine disbelief. She hadn't expected him to find one viable project in that mess, let alone four. "Alex, what are you planning? Are you trying to star in all of them?"
Alex shook his head, looking at the stacks of paper surrounding him. "No, no. They aren't ready for that. In their current state, they need massive rewrites and the help of big studios to handle the production. I'm not looking to jump into them yet—I just want you to find out their status. See who owns the rights and who is attached." He paused, his hand resting on the gritty, dark draft of the prostitution drama. "Actually, go a step further. Try to buy the script for 3,000 if possible. I want that one off the market."
Paula let out a breath that was half-sigh, half-laugh. "I'll do it," she agreed, her tone shifting into her sharp, professional "closer" mode. "I'll get the status on those."
"Then I'll be waiting for your news," Alex said.
As Alex was about to hang up, she spoke again. "Wait, Alex. Before you go... there is one more project that just came across my desk. And I think you're going to want this one."
"Oh? You seem confident. What is the project?" Alex asked curiously.
"It is Martin Scorsese's new film," she replied.
"Scorsese?" Alex asked, though he could already faintly guess what it was.
"Exactly," Paula continued, a spark of excitement in her voice. "It's based on the book Wiseguy by Nicholas Pileggi. They're calling it Goodfellas. It's gritty, it's violent, and it's a total departure from the image the agency wants for you. But Marty thinks you have the edge for it after working with you on The Color of Money. He thinks you'd make a very good Henry Hill."
Alex leaned back in his chair, a wry smile forming. The irony was almost poetic. In the timeline he remembered from his visions, the role of Henry Hill had gone to Ray Liotta—the very man Mike Ovitz had just used to push Alex out of the Oliver Stone project.
By taking this role, he wouldn't just be starring in a masterpiece; he would be turning Ovitz's own power play into a career-defining opportunity. He knew that Goodfellas wasn't just a "good movie." It was a genre-redefining masterpiece that would be studied in film schools for decades.
He looked down at the script for Ghost sitting on his lap. He knew Ghost would be a monster hit—a gift to the audience. And Goodfellas would stand as the definitive artistic milestone of his career.
"I'm in," Alex said, his voice firm.
The silence on the other end was thick with relief. "You are? Even with the violence? Even with the risk of playing a criminal?"
"Paula, it's Scorsese," Alex said, a sense of destiny settling over him. "Working with him is a chance I didn't think I'd get again so soon after The Color of Money. So yeah, I'm sure. Tell Marty I'm his Henry Hill."
"What about Ghost?" Paula asked, her tone tentative. "You seemed so set on using it to humble Mike."
Alex glanced at the Ghost script. He wasn't going to let it go. "We're doing both. Call Marty and fix up a meeting."
As he hung up, Alex looked out at the sunrise beginning to bleed over the Hollywood Hills. Today is a good day, he thought.