HOLD A SCORPION

An aging actress turns amateur investigator after word gets out that she knows more than she’s telling about the pedestrian victim of a car accident.

In the wake of her actress mother’s death, Diana Poole, a fading star in her own right, is just trying to make it to her next audition. She’s too old and wise to get mixed up again in Hollywood, especially after breaking one of her own rules by getting involved with co-star Peter Bianchi on the set of her last film. Lesson learned, Diana is set to move on from Peter even if he can’t stop showing up at her door or calling her about her Twitter posts on their status. Out on the town with her friend and neighbor Ryan Johns, Diana sees a woman wave to them and move as if to approach them. But the woman, a stranger to them both, is run down before she reaches them. Diana and Ryan, both spooked by the death, react in very different ways. Ryan immerses himself in a new relationship with a woman Diana grows suspicious about when she sees the two of them, of all things, running together. Diana herself seeks closure through learning the identity of the woman. Her suspicion that she may not be the only one investigating is confirmed when she’s held at gunpoint by a man who insists she knows more than she does. Daunted yet determined, Diana also learns that investigator Leo Heath, her boyfriend who never was, is also looking into the case. Maybe Leo can convince Diana to protect herself from whatever it is the mystery woman was trying to tell her.

Howe (City of Mirrors, 2013, etc.) sets her story in Tinseltown, but her characters lack the pop of classic Hollywood despite hints throughout at her ability to do more.