Pick-up dates are like old boyfriends. If enough time has passed, you kind of forget (or romanticize) the reasons why the guy/the production made you tear your hair out, and how you were so happy when it was over, and you kind of even look forward to seeing him/it again.
I am in the middle of trying to schedule pick-up dates for Charm City next week, pick-up dates for Juju the following week, scheduling some edit time for CC, and doing a little pre-pro reconnaissance for the Juju Director/Producer for his project immediately following the final wrap on Juju. Plus my "day job", so it is like I am working two full-time jobs at the same time. Oh, and there is a PBS crew filming some interviews for a documentary at my place right now. My stomach kinda hurts.
But it's all good. Scheduling is just a little bit of a nightmare for the CC pick-ups, more so than the Juju pick-ups. Since Juju's budget is several times the size of Charm City's, they could afford to hire actors who act for a living (and therefore, are often not working). Whereas on my little budget, I could only pay the actors what I call a "PIA" fee, which hopefully covered them for the money they spent on gas and wardrobe, so it didn't cost them money to be in my film (though for some, I know it did). But that means they all have day jobs (like me!) to pay the bills, and can't drop everything to film a few scenes. Still, I am hopeful we can all get together, and really I am looking forward to it. Now that I have another feature-length production under my belt, I feel a great deal more relaxed about the business, and confident in my abilities. It will take some patience, but I will get it done.
There are only a few actors that I need for the pick-ups (5 out of my dozen ensemble cast), and I am anxious to get together with them. I miss them, actually! All of them. I was so overwhelmed with responsibility at the time of principle photography that their weren't many moments that I was able to relax. But the cast had such great chemistry that they seemed to be laughing with each other all the time. It made me happy to see that, and it made me feel like I had chosen just the right actors. Life did seem to truly imitate art... imitating life... the way they all got along. But I was a little jealous at times that I couldn't join in whole-heartedly in the joking around. Just had too much on my plate. That's what comes with the territory when it is your project.
So, we'll see how it goes next week, with both the editing, which I am very anxious to get to, and the pick-up dates, which I am very anxious to check off my to-do list. Starting to think about what lies ahead. Do I start writing another script? I have one pretty well sketched out in my head, I think it would flow pretty quickly if I started putting it to paper. Or do I continue working on other people's projects? Am I down with OPP? Well, it is nice (a) to get paid and (b) to get SOME sleep. I may have the opportunity to do so soon. Adding some more credits to my resume would be nice, and especially since a lot of people who do this solely for a living can't always find a gig, it would probably be unwise to turn anything down, if I am to be serious, and taken seriously, about making a career change.
Productions really are like ex-boyfriends. I know some people don't get people (like me) who can be friends or friendly with there ex(es). And of course we all have those who screwed us over so badly that we never want to see them again (though usually those make for the most entertaining stories). But my philosophy about boyfriends is that I wouldn't have been attracted to them, I wouldn't have stayed with them for however long if they didn't have some good qualities, if I didn't have some fun with them, if I didn't care. So sometimes it is nice to see them again. And with the productions I've worked on so far, I definitely care, and it is important to put the finishing touches on them, to do it right. And like, with boyfriends, it makes it easier if you leave things on good terms, in the event that you see them again, say, at a local theater... :) Hopefully a local theater with your name in lights outside and a packed house inside!
Showing posts with label juju. Show all posts
Showing posts with label juju. Show all posts
Friday, October 17, 2008
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Finish Line
"Juju," wrapped principle photography last night. I mean this morning. It was our second 20+ hour day this week. And I remember thinking what a killer day it was when we ran 15 hours on my set on "Charm City"!
It was quite an education and I am glad to have had the opportunity. I jumped into this business less than a year ago, and it is my fourth film credit (if you only count being writer/director/producer/etc on my own film as one credit). It was great to have done it back-to-back with my own film, as a lot of things were fresh in my mind. Making a movie is very similar to a group of people standing in a circle, every person with a gun in each hand, one of them pointed at the temple of the person to the left, one at the person to the right. We all are hostage to each other. One might think that the director or producer, whoever is writing the checks, has unlimited power, but that is really not the case. There are so many people you need on a set: the DP, PM (by now you must know these acronyms, or you just aren't paying attention), film crew, sound, make-up, props, catering, even down to the production assistants, who depending on the budget, might not even be getting paid at all. Even extras, who, as a group, pretty much screw you over every time. If twenty people swear on their respective grandmothers' graves that they will show up - count on five. On a good day.
You need ALL of these people and it is a lot of work to keep the peace and keep things moving at the same time. Coming fresh off my own film, it was still raw in my mind the people, events, and attitudes that made my life easier as a director/producer, and those that were counter-productive. "Juju" is the first feature-length project from this director and producer, and I told myself that as Production Manager, I was going to give them everything I wish people had given me, but didn't always come through on. That wasn't always easy to do, especially yesterday. I was nauseous most of the day, seemed to be fighting something flu-like, probably the result of our previous filming day which lasted from 10:00am Monday until after 6:00am Tuesday, and was all exteriors. We filmed at Wayne Shipley's field in Jessup, where the majority of his film, "One-Eyed Horse," was shot. FANTASTIC location and Wayne is the nicest guy in the world (as well as being very smart - he's got a distribution deal nearly locked up and has already sold over 1,100 DVDs). But by four a.m. it was pretty cold and my shoes were soaked from the dew in the tall grass and we were about out of bug repellant. I had arranged for a very nice tent from Absolute Party Rental and a very sanitary port-a-potty from Gotugo, but they didn't offer much in the way of warmth or shelter.
I knew from the start that yesterday was going to go just as long, and put that together with feeling crappy, I was probably a bit grumpy at the start of the production day. But we had a beautiful location at a mansion in Glen Burnie (yes! A MANSION in Glen Burnie!) and the lovely woman who owns the home allowed us to use her furnished, warm, comfortable basement for holding (anyone who is not on set) and catering. I actually found her on Craigslist! I am very wary of going into people's homes as locations, and I try to brace them for the assault. If they haven't done it before, they usually just think it is going to be cool and fun, and it is - but when they first see all that equipment and people rolling in... things can go downhill very quickly. But Mrs. Freeland has had filming at her house before and she was extremely hospitable and friendly, and it was a great place to end the shoot, ESPECIALLY because it rained off and all all day and night.
Super-long days like that can be all right, though. It seems like the first half of the day, people growl around at different stages, and then once everyone has accepted their fate to be stuck together for many, many more hours, everyone sorts of lets go of it. It happened on my set that way a couple times, which at the time made me nervous, because I felt guilty having everyone there so long, and I thought it was just the calm before the storm. But now I know. It was nice in a way to hang out with everyone yesterday. I think we were more relaxed because we could see the light at the end of the tunnel, even if it took us almost an entire rotation of the planet to get there.
It was quite an education and I am glad to have had the opportunity. I jumped into this business less than a year ago, and it is my fourth film credit (if you only count being writer/director/producer/etc on my own film as one credit). It was great to have done it back-to-back with my own film, as a lot of things were fresh in my mind. Making a movie is very similar to a group of people standing in a circle, every person with a gun in each hand, one of them pointed at the temple of the person to the left, one at the person to the right. We all are hostage to each other. One might think that the director or producer, whoever is writing the checks, has unlimited power, but that is really not the case. There are so many people you need on a set: the DP, PM (by now you must know these acronyms, or you just aren't paying attention), film crew, sound, make-up, props, catering, even down to the production assistants, who depending on the budget, might not even be getting paid at all. Even extras, who, as a group, pretty much screw you over every time. If twenty people swear on their respective grandmothers' graves that they will show up - count on five. On a good day.
You need ALL of these people and it is a lot of work to keep the peace and keep things moving at the same time. Coming fresh off my own film, it was still raw in my mind the people, events, and attitudes that made my life easier as a director/producer, and those that were counter-productive. "Juju" is the first feature-length project from this director and producer, and I told myself that as Production Manager, I was going to give them everything I wish people had given me, but didn't always come through on. That wasn't always easy to do, especially yesterday. I was nauseous most of the day, seemed to be fighting something flu-like, probably the result of our previous filming day which lasted from 10:00am Monday until after 6:00am Tuesday, and was all exteriors. We filmed at Wayne Shipley's field in Jessup, where the majority of his film, "One-Eyed Horse," was shot. FANTASTIC location and Wayne is the nicest guy in the world (as well as being very smart - he's got a distribution deal nearly locked up and has already sold over 1,100 DVDs). But by four a.m. it was pretty cold and my shoes were soaked from the dew in the tall grass and we were about out of bug repellant. I had arranged for a very nice tent from Absolute Party Rental and a very sanitary port-a-potty from Gotugo, but they didn't offer much in the way of warmth or shelter.
I knew from the start that yesterday was going to go just as long, and put that together with feeling crappy, I was probably a bit grumpy at the start of the production day. But we had a beautiful location at a mansion in Glen Burnie (yes! A MANSION in Glen Burnie!) and the lovely woman who owns the home allowed us to use her furnished, warm, comfortable basement for holding (anyone who is not on set) and catering. I actually found her on Craigslist! I am very wary of going into people's homes as locations, and I try to brace them for the assault. If they haven't done it before, they usually just think it is going to be cool and fun, and it is - but when they first see all that equipment and people rolling in... things can go downhill very quickly. But Mrs. Freeland has had filming at her house before and she was extremely hospitable and friendly, and it was a great place to end the shoot, ESPECIALLY because it rained off and all all day and night.
Super-long days like that can be all right, though. It seems like the first half of the day, people growl around at different stages, and then once everyone has accepted their fate to be stuck together for many, many more hours, everyone sorts of lets go of it. It happened on my set that way a couple times, which at the time made me nervous, because I felt guilty having everyone there so long, and I thought it was just the calm before the storm. But now I know. It was nice in a way to hang out with everyone yesterday. I think we were more relaxed because we could see the light at the end of the tunnel, even if it took us almost an entire rotation of the planet to get there.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
"What is Past is Prologue"
Architect John Russell Pope placed four monumental statues around the National Archives Building. Each was cut from a single block of limestone weighing 125 tons. Aitken's "The Future" sits on the Pennsylvania Avenue side of the building. The young woman lifts her eyes from the pages of an open book and gazes into the future. Its base is inscribed with a line inspired by Shakespeare’s play The Tempest: "What is Past is Prologue."
Three weeks of "Juju" completed, and we are taking off a week to regroup, figure out the pieces still left of the puzzle, and schedule our pick-up days. Looks like we can get the last of it hammered out by the end of next week.
I have met some great people and great contacts on this job. The Writer/Director, Boyce, is quite a character. He is a perfectionist and refuses to cut corners. Most of the time he seems very serious, but once in awhile he just cracks me up. He is Nigerian, and has this great accent. On the set, Michelle (DP) is constantly asking him if he is happy (with the picture on the monitor, before she shoots it. I have heard him say more than once, "Happy as a LAAHK." It just seems so funny, coming from this big, stoic man! I guess you have to be there, though.
Stayce, the Producer, is a blast. She is the Voice of Reason, but she is also hysterical, and we laugh all day long. Which is a good thing, because the two of us are the ones that really never can have a full day off as long as this thing is still in production. Dealing with payroll, scheduling, location issues, budget, script changes, personnel... it never ends.
The coolest thing so far in this whole experience, though, has been the rewrites. There have been a few scenes we needed to change drastically, and on the fly. I took the liberty of making changes to a couple scenes to expedite things, and printed them up for Boyce, as suggestions. I thought what I had written might at least help figure out how to streamline some scenes or make changes to keep continuity straight, but Boyce liked the pages and kept them as I wrote them, and we shot them. I was expecting the actors to grumble about having to learn new pages in a day or two, but they seemed to like them, too (or else they are just realy good actors!).
Watching this unfold before my eyes was very different than watching my words come to life on the set of my own movie. At first I couldn't figure out why it felt so different, or what it was that felt so different about it. But it is dawning on me, and I suppose what it comes down to is control. It WAS very cool to make my own film and do it exactly the way I wanted to. But I had full control of that project from beginning to end, so of course it was going to go pretty much as I had envisioned it. But this film, "Juju," is not my baby. It is someone else's. And they approved what I did and incorporated some pretty good-sized chunks of my writing into the body of this piece of work. They could have dismissed it, or used part of it, or used only the gist of it, but they used it intact, and it worked. It is a good feeling, and it gives me confidence that I will eventually do what I have set out to do in this business primarily - to write.
The overall experience of being Production Manager on this project has been great, and such an education. I have been at the same hotel management job for going on eleven years now, and in that business for two decades. Hotel management is often crisis management, but I could do it in my sleep. I know I can have a job in this industry for the rest of my life if I want it, and there is some security in that. But there is also INsecurity in that, when you have been doing something for so long, and you start to wonder if you will be restricted to doing that and only that for the rest of your life because you have been doing that and only that for so long. You (and by "you" I mean "I") don't really know anything else, and you don't want to start at the bottom in something else. Between filming "Charm City" and being PM for "Juju," I am reassured that my skills in crisis management have not diminished, and I have been happily surprised at how well the skills I honed in my first career are carrying over into my (hopefully) second. I didn't go to school for hospitality management, and I have worked with and trained a lot of people who also did not and went on to do great things in the business. Often they were (mistakenly) convinced that they would at some point need to get a degree in the field if they were to move up. But I always told them, in the hotel business, you can go pretty damn far if you have three things:
!. Common sense,
2. personality, and
3. a willingness to pay your dues, in advance. In other words, never letting the words, "That's not my job," pass over your lips.
The same rules apply to film production, though more specific aspects of the field (writing, directing, camera work) call for more specific skills. But every day my confidence increases that I can have a successful career in this industry, doing what I was meant to do all my life - to write.
For now, the hotel job pays the bills while I learn the ins and outs of production. Then, soon, hopefully the production jobs will keep rolling in to pay the bills while I get my foot in the door with writing. Once I get my whole LEG in the door, I'm going to kick some ASS.
Three weeks of "Juju" completed, and we are taking off a week to regroup, figure out the pieces still left of the puzzle, and schedule our pick-up days. Looks like we can get the last of it hammered out by the end of next week.
I have met some great people and great contacts on this job. The Writer/Director, Boyce, is quite a character. He is a perfectionist and refuses to cut corners. Most of the time he seems very serious, but once in awhile he just cracks me up. He is Nigerian, and has this great accent. On the set, Michelle (DP) is constantly asking him if he is happy (with the picture on the monitor, before she shoots it. I have heard him say more than once, "Happy as a LAAHK." It just seems so funny, coming from this big, stoic man! I guess you have to be there, though.
Stayce, the Producer, is a blast. She is the Voice of Reason, but she is also hysterical, and we laugh all day long. Which is a good thing, because the two of us are the ones that really never can have a full day off as long as this thing is still in production. Dealing with payroll, scheduling, location issues, budget, script changes, personnel... it never ends.
The coolest thing so far in this whole experience, though, has been the rewrites. There have been a few scenes we needed to change drastically, and on the fly. I took the liberty of making changes to a couple scenes to expedite things, and printed them up for Boyce, as suggestions. I thought what I had written might at least help figure out how to streamline some scenes or make changes to keep continuity straight, but Boyce liked the pages and kept them as I wrote them, and we shot them. I was expecting the actors to grumble about having to learn new pages in a day or two, but they seemed to like them, too (or else they are just realy good actors!).
Watching this unfold before my eyes was very different than watching my words come to life on the set of my own movie. At first I couldn't figure out why it felt so different, or what it was that felt so different about it. But it is dawning on me, and I suppose what it comes down to is control. It WAS very cool to make my own film and do it exactly the way I wanted to. But I had full control of that project from beginning to end, so of course it was going to go pretty much as I had envisioned it. But this film, "Juju," is not my baby. It is someone else's. And they approved what I did and incorporated some pretty good-sized chunks of my writing into the body of this piece of work. They could have dismissed it, or used part of it, or used only the gist of it, but they used it intact, and it worked. It is a good feeling, and it gives me confidence that I will eventually do what I have set out to do in this business primarily - to write.
The overall experience of being Production Manager on this project has been great, and such an education. I have been at the same hotel management job for going on eleven years now, and in that business for two decades. Hotel management is often crisis management, but I could do it in my sleep. I know I can have a job in this industry for the rest of my life if I want it, and there is some security in that. But there is also INsecurity in that, when you have been doing something for so long, and you start to wonder if you will be restricted to doing that and only that for the rest of your life because you have been doing that and only that for so long. You (and by "you" I mean "I") don't really know anything else, and you don't want to start at the bottom in something else. Between filming "Charm City" and being PM for "Juju," I am reassured that my skills in crisis management have not diminished, and I have been happily surprised at how well the skills I honed in my first career are carrying over into my (hopefully) second. I didn't go to school for hospitality management, and I have worked with and trained a lot of people who also did not and went on to do great things in the business. Often they were (mistakenly) convinced that they would at some point need to get a degree in the field if they were to move up. But I always told them, in the hotel business, you can go pretty damn far if you have three things:
!. Common sense,
2. personality, and
3. a willingness to pay your dues, in advance. In other words, never letting the words, "That's not my job," pass over your lips.
The same rules apply to film production, though more specific aspects of the field (writing, directing, camera work) call for more specific skills. But every day my confidence increases that I can have a successful career in this industry, doing what I was meant to do all my life - to write.
For now, the hotel job pays the bills while I learn the ins and outs of production. Then, soon, hopefully the production jobs will keep rolling in to pay the bills while I get my foot in the door with writing. Once I get my whole LEG in the door, I'm going to kick some ASS.
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Triple Threat
Week 2 of Juju under the belt. Still had our bumps and bruises, but all in all things are smoothing out. I'm still working on figuring out exactly what niche in this field I would like to end up in, but Production Manager seems to suit me pretty well. I work best when I have a variety of tasks, a lot of responsibility (and leeway), and crisis mode, as much as it seems to suck while I'm in it, is where my brain is clicking rapid-fire. I have a good feeling at the end of the day when I can say, "We really pulled that one out of the fire." On a low-budget indie movie set, that happens more days than it doesn't. It is definitely a team effort, though, and I enjoy that aspect of it, too.
Last night we shot this very cool nightmare scene in my attic. The scene called for three children, so I called my aunt and uncle to let me use my little cousin Sean (who was in "Charm City" with his brother Joey) again. Joe is a little too old for what we were looking for, so Irene (my aunt) called some of Sean's friends parents and got me two little girls from Sean's class as well. Kids and dogs can be very tricky on the set, but so far I am three for three, in a good way. Sean and Joseph did a great job in their scene in my movie, my dogs and my neighbor Philip's dogs got their scene in "Charm City" perfect on the first take, and last night went with Sean and his friends went pretty perfectly.
It is very hard for little ones, if you can get them relaxed enough to not be scared or embarrassed, to do certain things like not look at the camera or not smile if it is a serious moment, but all three kids did very well. They are at an age where they are scared of ghosts and when they first got here they were afraid of the attic before they even saw it. But we let them play pool and eat lots of junk food for awhile first and then they were fine and bored and wanted to shoot the damn thing already. Sean had to move these large white pillar candles around very slowly from behind a shelf. He was backlit so it looked very cool and creepy, but because there was so much going on, lots of lights, and about a dozen other people standing in the room, he wasn't scared. Kyleigh, one of the girls, had to rock a (fake) baby while sitting in a dilapidated rocking chair, and silently and without smiling offer the baby to the lead character, Jake. She is such a sweetie, it was hard for her to do without smiling, but we got it. Also, the baby is actually a rubber model of a full-term fetus and it weighs at least 7 pounds. That is pretty heavy for a little girl, but she was a trooper. She would hold the baby out to Jake, and sometimes no one yelled, "cut," so she would just keep holding it until her little arms were shaking from the weight and I would tell her to put it down. The other little girl, Colleen, is a cutie with long red pigtails. She was a champ. When the other two got the giggles, she managed a straight face and took direction from Michelle, whom she had never met before, perfectly. She had to stare down Jake and be the creepiest of them all. It is amazing what lighting can do, change a sweet little girl with freckles into something from a terrifying nightmare! But it also took a lot of concentration on her part and it looked SO COOL. It is definitely my favorite scene that we have shot of this movie so far.
So in the last two months a lot has happened in my attic. A crazy woman of the Victorian era has chopped off a man's head with an axe, a greedy narcissist is visited in his nightmares by demonic children, and in between, a sassy middle-aged artist rediscovers her creative side and rebuilds her studio. Similar scenes have played out all over this building. When these three movies are completed, I want to watch them as a triple-feature. That will be a great lesson in the versatility of a location like this, and how lighting, acting, and the script can totally change the mood of the same room.
But today is Sunday, our day off, and I get to watch FOOTBALL!!!! I am so excited. Except I fear that I am not going to be able to see the Steelers game (die-hard Pittsburgh girl here, that is the "Steel" in "Steel Corset Productions") since they are playing at the same time as the Ravens, and I only have regular cable. At this point I'll take anything that can distract me from anything movie-related for a couple hours. Cuz then I gotta get back to work this afternoon/evening and map out our last week and a half of production, as there are several locations in flux. It will all work out, though, it always does. One more week and I'll have all these people out of my house! Then we move to the studio in Beltsville for a few days. Like my film, we had to add another three days of filming onto this one. So next time I plot and plan out a feature length production down to the minute and think I have it perfectly, reasonably scheduled, I will then scrap the whole thing and add three days to whatever I came up with at my first pass.
Gotta go spend some snuggle-time with my dogs before starting the day. Haven't had nearly enough of that in the last three months!
Last night we shot this very cool nightmare scene in my attic. The scene called for three children, so I called my aunt and uncle to let me use my little cousin Sean (who was in "Charm City" with his brother Joey) again. Joe is a little too old for what we were looking for, so Irene (my aunt) called some of Sean's friends parents and got me two little girls from Sean's class as well. Kids and dogs can be very tricky on the set, but so far I am three for three, in a good way. Sean and Joseph did a great job in their scene in my movie, my dogs and my neighbor Philip's dogs got their scene in "Charm City" perfect on the first take, and last night went with Sean and his friends went pretty perfectly.
It is very hard for little ones, if you can get them relaxed enough to not be scared or embarrassed, to do certain things like not look at the camera or not smile if it is a serious moment, but all three kids did very well. They are at an age where they are scared of ghosts and when they first got here they were afraid of the attic before they even saw it. But we let them play pool and eat lots of junk food for awhile first and then they were fine and bored and wanted to shoot the damn thing already. Sean had to move these large white pillar candles around very slowly from behind a shelf. He was backlit so it looked very cool and creepy, but because there was so much going on, lots of lights, and about a dozen other people standing in the room, he wasn't scared. Kyleigh, one of the girls, had to rock a (fake) baby while sitting in a dilapidated rocking chair, and silently and without smiling offer the baby to the lead character, Jake. She is such a sweetie, it was hard for her to do without smiling, but we got it. Also, the baby is actually a rubber model of a full-term fetus and it weighs at least 7 pounds. That is pretty heavy for a little girl, but she was a trooper. She would hold the baby out to Jake, and sometimes no one yelled, "cut," so she would just keep holding it until her little arms were shaking from the weight and I would tell her to put it down. The other little girl, Colleen, is a cutie with long red pigtails. She was a champ. When the other two got the giggles, she managed a straight face and took direction from Michelle, whom she had never met before, perfectly. She had to stare down Jake and be the creepiest of them all. It is amazing what lighting can do, change a sweet little girl with freckles into something from a terrifying nightmare! But it also took a lot of concentration on her part and it looked SO COOL. It is definitely my favorite scene that we have shot of this movie so far.
So in the last two months a lot has happened in my attic. A crazy woman of the Victorian era has chopped off a man's head with an axe, a greedy narcissist is visited in his nightmares by demonic children, and in between, a sassy middle-aged artist rediscovers her creative side and rebuilds her studio. Similar scenes have played out all over this building. When these three movies are completed, I want to watch them as a triple-feature. That will be a great lesson in the versatility of a location like this, and how lighting, acting, and the script can totally change the mood of the same room.
But today is Sunday, our day off, and I get to watch FOOTBALL!!!! I am so excited. Except I fear that I am not going to be able to see the Steelers game (die-hard Pittsburgh girl here, that is the "Steel" in "Steel Corset Productions") since they are playing at the same time as the Ravens, and I only have regular cable. At this point I'll take anything that can distract me from anything movie-related for a couple hours. Cuz then I gotta get back to work this afternoon/evening and map out our last week and a half of production, as there are several locations in flux. It will all work out, though, it always does. One more week and I'll have all these people out of my house! Then we move to the studio in Beltsville for a few days. Like my film, we had to add another three days of filming onto this one. So next time I plot and plan out a feature length production down to the minute and think I have it perfectly, reasonably scheduled, I will then scrap the whole thing and add three days to whatever I came up with at my first pass.
Gotta go spend some snuggle-time with my dogs before starting the day. Haven't had nearly enough of that in the last three months!
Sunday, August 31, 2008
No time for love, Doctah Jones
Just finished Week 1 of production on, "Juju," so I have not had a lick of time to touch anything having anything to do with, "Charm City." But that is good, gives me a month or so away from it to get some perspective before attempting to edit or even to schedule the 2-3 days of pick-up shots that I need to complete photography. We have two more weeks on Juju, possibly even a little longer. Then one of the actors I need for pick-ups for Charm City is out of town until the second week of October, which I am actually glad for, I really will need a break after this.
Every production is its own education, and I am learning something new every day, especially about SAG (Screen Actors Guild) rules and payments. There are seven SAG actors on Juju, and about a dozen non-union actors. Although the paperwork can be a pain, if you are an actor, which is not the most secure job path in the world, I can see why actors work hard to get into SAG. Among other benefits, SAG actors get overtime after 8 hours on the set. Non-union actors usually get a flat rate, no matter how long the day goes - Wednesday we shot for NINETEEN hours. One of my non-union actresses is pretty sick right now, but she's not in the hospital because since she is a working actress, and non-union, she has no health insurance. It is such a difficult way to make a living. There is really nothing glamorous about it.
Which is true for most if not all jobs having to do with filmmaking. It is a lot of hard work. But when it is all said and done, hopefully you have a great piece you can be proud. I don't have children, but I think making a movie is a lot like what I have heard about childbirth - it is a pain that you forget. When you are in the midst of it, you may find yourself wondering why you thought this was a good idea, swearing you will never do it again, and possibly demanding pharmaceuticals at the top of your lungs to help you get through it. But then you have this beautiful creation that you had a hand in manifesting, and you start thinking about doing it all over again, because you only remember the good stuff.
At least that's how I HOPE it works. I'll let you know when my movie is done!
Every production is its own education, and I am learning something new every day, especially about SAG (Screen Actors Guild) rules and payments. There are seven SAG actors on Juju, and about a dozen non-union actors. Although the paperwork can be a pain, if you are an actor, which is not the most secure job path in the world, I can see why actors work hard to get into SAG. Among other benefits, SAG actors get overtime after 8 hours on the set. Non-union actors usually get a flat rate, no matter how long the day goes - Wednesday we shot for NINETEEN hours. One of my non-union actresses is pretty sick right now, but she's not in the hospital because since she is a working actress, and non-union, she has no health insurance. It is such a difficult way to make a living. There is really nothing glamorous about it.
Which is true for most if not all jobs having to do with filmmaking. It is a lot of hard work. But when it is all said and done, hopefully you have a great piece you can be proud. I don't have children, but I think making a movie is a lot like what I have heard about childbirth - it is a pain that you forget. When you are in the midst of it, you may find yourself wondering why you thought this was a good idea, swearing you will never do it again, and possibly demanding pharmaceuticals at the top of your lungs to help you get through it. But then you have this beautiful creation that you had a hand in manifesting, and you start thinking about doing it all over again, because you only remember the good stuff.
At least that's how I HOPE it works. I'll let you know when my movie is done!
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