Cold Open, A Tale of Modern Hollywood // Chapter 1. The Establishing Shot

It was a chilly February three in the morning. On a dark winding road just off Marmont Crescent Drive in Laurelwood Canyon the lights were still on at the house on the left, a model of faux-Moorish architecture nestled among the jacaranda trees. As the home of television’s newest, loveliest bright light, Dennie Dearman — star and title character of family drama’s runaway hit, Melody Evergreen — it was not only a reward and a prize, but a refuge against the cold, uncompromising world only a mile or two away.