A black car tore down Hollywood Boulevard, spewing a plu of dark, choking smoke. On the sidewalk, a young woman covered her mouth and coughed, and the young man beside her rushed to pat her on the back.
"Are you all right?" Brian Lister asked with concern.
Maria nodded. "I'm fine."
Then, glaring in the direction the limousine had gone, she exclaid, "Damn rust bucket!"
Brian gently pulled her along. "Co on, don't complain."
Maria coughed twice more before following Brian toward the Walk of Fa.
The mont they reached the entrance, Maria spotted a massive billboard and cried out, "Brian, look!"
Brian followed her gaze to a billboard on the southeastern corner of the intersection—a colossal movie poster, gleaming and vibrant. It depicted a man with his arms raised to the sky, every muscle defined against a red cape and crimson briefs.
Brian and Maria stopped in their tracks, staring up at the poster.
The man on the poster was as imnse as a mountain and as solid as a rock, his fury like a crashing wave, a veritable god of war.
It was the very pinnacle of masculinity.
"300 is coming out soon," Brian said. "The big promotional push is starting. I bet the trailer will be released any day now."
"There's a movie theater nearby," Maria suggested. "Let's go see."
Five minutes later, they stepped into a chain cinema that was bustling with the weekend crowd. A significant number of people were already glued to the large screen dedicated to playing trailers.
"THIS IS SPARTA!"
Maria heard the roar just in ti to see a slow-motion shot of Matthew viciously kicking a dark-skinned man into a deep, dark chasm.
Then, the screen filled with a close-up of Matthew's face.
He stood before a stormy sky and golden fields of wheat, every detail of his physique rendered in sharp focus.
Maria unconsciously swallowed, quickly covering her mouth as she glanced around and saw other won clutching their throats, clearly having the sa reaction.
"What a breathtaking scene."
A low murmur rippled through the crowd.
"Those muscles... I'd love to touch them. I wonder if they're as hard as rock?"
Another whisper followed, and Maria felt a blush creep up her neck. Did these won have any restraint at all? They were all so shaless.
****
After a quick tour of Hollywood and Burbank, Giovanni Salvatore returned to the Armani boutique on Rodeo Drive. He sat at his desk, opened his computer, and connected with the Milan headquarters. Having received the information he had faxed over, they were also hesitant about David Beckham, though so still leaned toward using him, considering the combined star power of the Beckham couple.
It would also bring Victoria into the fold.
Giovanni inquired about the situation but said nothing more. If the matter remained unresolved, it would naturally be passed up to Mr. Giorgio Armani himself for the final decision.
"Gio, you busy?"
Suddenly, a ssage from Donadoni flashed on Giovanni Salvatore's MSN.
"Not busy."
Donadoni sent another ssage: "Just saw an interesting video, the trailer for Horner's new movie. You should check it out. It might help with your current project."
"Got it."
Donadoni quickly forwarded a URL. Giovanni Salvatore clicked it, and a video from an entertainnt news site opened and began to buffer. Soon, a trailer of about two minutes started playing.
It was an old-fashioned epic, and he recognized the lead actor, Matthew Horner.
After just ten seconds, Giovanni Salvatore was glued to his computer screen. Horner was... simply...
He couldn't find the right words to describe it, but his mind automatically conjured an image of what Matthew Horner's body, muscles, and raw masculinity would look like clad in Armani underwear.
Giovanni let out a long breath. After watching the trailer, he imdiately contacted the Milan headquarters and sent them the URL for the 300 trailer.
Perhaps this would finally push those indecisive executives in Milan to make a decision.
The trailer for 300 was released simultaneously on television, the internet, and in theaters. A special section for the trailer also appeared on Matthew's personal blog.
In just 24 hours, the trailer on his blog racked up over a million views.
In this era, that was an astonishing number.
On YouTube, the trailer shot into the top three most popular videos of the day in less than 24 hours, and the public's reaction was overwhelmingly positive.
The Angel Acting Agency's public email was flooded with thousands of ssages requesting an interview with Matthew. So journalists even began staking out his usual spots, hoping to ask him about his physique in the film.
Matthew followed a pre-planned strategy: ignore and deflect, neither denying nor confirming anything.
However, when reporters pressed, a spokesperson for the 300 production swore that every actor had undergone months of intense physical training before filming. Everything, including their bodies, was real, and there had been absolutely no digital enhancent by the post-production team.
This, of course, only added fuel to the fire.
With the production team giving such vague answers and Matthew himself remaining silent, entertainnt journalists quickly found another avenue for confirmation.
Soon, Jessica Alba, Scarlett Johansson, Rachel McAdams, and Adriana Lima beca the primary targets of the paparazzi.
Now that the topic was trending, and since they had long since publicly claid to have dated Matthew, they had no qualms about discussing him.
Before long, entertainnt reporters were quoting adjectives like "exaggerated," "terrifying," and "amazing" from the lips of Matthew's various supposed ex-girlfriends.
Of course, the public had only learned of these alleged short-term relationships from the won themselves, who had leaked the stories to the dia.
From the public's perspective, there was no better way to describe the situation.
"We know they're lying, and they know that we know they're lying. We know that they actually know that we know they're lying, and they know we're all just pretending they aren't..."
Such was the state of the entertainnt industry.
Especially with scandals like this, how could the public not speculate? But Matthew, much like Leonardo DiCaprio, was unmarried and had no official girlfriend, which made him a legitimate womanizer, a playboy, and all the rest.
"Any luck?"
In the car on the way to Marvel Studios, Matthew asked Helen, "Any news from Armani?"
Helen shook her head slightly. "Not yet."
She sighed. "From what I understand, there's a faction at Armani that's keen on signing Beckham and Victoria as a package deal."
Matthew nodded and said no more, his thoughts already turning to the upcoming contract-signing ceremony with Marvel.
"If only you had a celebrity wife or girlfriend," Helen revisited the old topic. "Beckham would be no competition for you."
Matthew shook his head. "Then I'd be tied down."
The car pulled up to the modest office building that housed Marvel. The area in front was already swarming with reporters. The press conference announcing his investnt in Marvel was about to begin.
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