An ostrich in our midst

We’re on our third last day of the shoot and by now are such a well oiled machine, that our ship is galloping along at a steady three hundred and fifty knots. The crew and cast all know each other’s foibles and everyone is working well together. I don’t think anyone has slept with anyone else so far although there is still the wrap party on Saturday night to look forward to and even if they had all been humping each other like rabbits, I wouldn’t know about it because nobody tells me anything.

As we cruise along getting our shots all hell is breaking loose in the production office. For the last two days of the shoot we will be filming in the frighteningly capacious ballroom of the Burlington hotel in Dublin where rather than pack it with drunken wedding revellers, which are the usual clientele, we will be using it as a venue for a ‘MASSIVE’ recruitment fair. The word ‘massive’ is important here because when you have a budget like ours you want no requirements to be referred to as ‘MASSIVE’ apart from perhaps ‘the crack’ you were hoping to have at the wrap party with that ‘young one’ from the art department.

The problem with ‘massive’ is that in reality that means shed loads of people i.e. hundreds of jobseekers milling around the place as opposed to the eight that our remaining budget can just about afford. I have in my typical courageous way, left the problem of making a cast of thousands out of a couple of loaves and a few haddock to the production office to solve. I have totally blanked out the last two days of the shoot as though it is not happening and anytime someone mentions it to me I am like the child who sticks her fingers in her ears and repeats loudly “I’m not listening, I’m not listening” whilst her sibling taunts her about having fat thighs or being exactly like her mother or in my case, both. I’m only praying that the production office is not behaving in the same way but I have no way of knowing because of my refusal to face the whole potentially horrid mess.

Normally the job of getting extras falls to the second assistant director. She picks up the phone and calls an extras agency and says “ Hello there. I would like three hundred and fifty people who should dress in smart clothes as they will be jobseekers at a massive recruitment fair next Friday morning at eight o’clock at the Burlington Hotel please” The person at the end of the phone says “No Problem.” The whole thing is over in about 30 seconds and in another two weeks or so the extras agency receives a walloping cheque for all the extras it has provided. In this instance the similarity ends as soon as the second assistant director picks up the phone because in this instance she calls the production office and says “WHERE the F**K ARE WE GOING TO GET 350 PEOPLE FOR FRIDAY?” The production office promptly shouts back similar sorts of expletives and slams down the phone. I don’t know that these are the exact details of what is happening but by the ashen faces of the producer and the production manager I figure I’m in the right ballpark.

We don’t have the money to pay extras and even if we did we don’t have the money to feed them which is the least you can do for people when they give you twelve hours of their time pretending to be someone they’re not.

I suddenly feel deeply sorry for AnneMarie the producer and sidle up to her and suggest that I could ask a couple of distant relatives to appear on the day. She tries not to throttle me and assures me that it will all be fine. Even though it is clearly obvious that she has never told such a big fat lie in her life and I am tempted to ask her to show me the black line that has certainly appeared down the middle of her tongue, I don’t because we’re all adults here and if she has it all sorted well, that’s fine by me.

So I slink away back to our soon to be teetering ship and put my fingers back in my ears just in case AnneMarie changes her mind and decides that I should after all be involved in solving this seemingly impossible task.

In another world

Editors are a funny lot. Some are quite weird and most are very weird. They’re a bit like sound engineers but with shorter hair and better hygiene habits. They spend their lives staring at a computer screen in windowless or blacked out rooms so it’s not surprising that their minds wander to places us normal people cannot reach. Editors like their space. They also like only Mac computers, all gadgets, chocolate biscuits ideally with a toffee filling, takeaways and talking loudly to themselves. Editors don’t like football or any sort of sport. They don’t like starting work before 10 am and they hate directors who yak away incessantly about nothing and who sit too close. This  invasion of personal space is something that directors generally have no clue about so constantly infringe the editor’s “if you insist on being here, you must be sitting at least ten-feet behind me where I can’t see you” rule.

It’s lunchtime on day 15 and I make my daily call to Paul, our editor. For the purpose of this exercise you must imagine me brimming with boundless enthusiasm like a child on Christmas morning or a seal clapping it’s flippers waiting to be thrown a dead fish.

Now imagine Paul as the polar opposite. 

The call goes something like this -

Phone rings for an age but is finally answered.

            ME

            ‘Hi! Paul! It’s Lisa!”

           PAUL

            ‘Hi’

  (Subtext – ‘Oh, it’s you again’)

            ME

            ‘Great! So, how are you? How are you getting on?’

            PAUL

            ‘Fine’

 (Subtext – ‘what? what time is it? where am I?’)

Silence…

            ME           

 “ Great!…eh…so..did you see yesterday’s stuff? What’s it like? Is it okay?”

Silence…

           PAUL

            ‘Yep’

            (Subtext – ‘what day was yesterday?’)

Longer silence as I wait for him to elaborate a bit.

Eventually.

            ME

“Great! Eh so did you see the scene where Tom smears the walls with Mud? …how did that work out?... Is it funny? Is it?”

            PAUL

            ‘Yeah’

            (Subtext – ‘which scene?’)

Really long silence

            ME

“Great! And ..eh..the one where he’s in his pants on the stairs?....that one….is that one funny?"

            PAUL

‘Yeah’

(Subtext – ‘oh yeah, I remember those pants. I have pants like them’) 

Unbearably long silence during which I begin to sweat.

            ME

            ‘GREAT!…so…eh…so …eh,  I suppose, I’ll talk to you tomorrow, yeah?’

            PAUL

            ‘Yeah’

            (Subtext – ‘shit, I’m working tomorrow’)

 Phone goes dead.

            ME

            ‘Great!’

Now don’t get me wrong. Paul is an extremely nice chap; a very good editor and we get on swimmingly. That is to say that he has learned to tolerate me, never shouts abuse at me or when I am in the room and I have even seen him smile on several occasions not to mention the one time he actually laughed whilst cutting a scene, which is the ultimate compliment from an editor particularly if you’re making a comedy. Both of us were so taken aback by that spontanious burst of mirth that we had to take a half-day to get over the shock.

I have been very lucky in that I have never worked with an editor that I didn’t get on with. It is vital to get on with your editor – you will be spending weeks if not months together in the same dark room with only each other for company where everyday seems like eternal night and the only respite from the increasing madness that ensues is when the runner arrives with Kit Kats and tea.

There was the one occasion when I was working on a TV drama and we needed to get a second editor to cut a football sequence that was in one of the episodes. I had never worked with this editor and on the night before our first day together I went out and got horribly drunk. So drunk that I was still plastered but also violently hung over when I arrived in work the next day. We made our introductions and I knew immediately that if I did not lie down RIGHT NOW I was going to vomit all over her. Now, normally, editing suites provide at least one couch for clients. I suppose post production houses realised pretty quickly that the new style of director that emerged in the eighties was going to spend most of their time sleeping off drink and drug infused binges so began to provide nice comfy couches for them to recover on. Editors like sleeping directors. These couches are normally leather or some other similar fabric, which is easy to wipe clean with always-at-hand industrial strength disinfectant.

But on this day in this edit suite there was no couch so there was nothing for it but to lie on the floor and that is where I stayed for the entire day drifting in and out of consciousness, dribbling on the carpet and occasionally grunting incoherent instructions at this poor unfortunate girl who made the whole thing brilliant without me and I imagine has thanked her lucky stars that she has never met me since.

See what I mean? Editors are just weird.

Stand tall.

And so the final week of shooting dawns and I have banjaxed my back. If I stand in a natural pose I am bent from the waist at a 45-degree angle. I cannot straighten my knees, my bottom is sticking out in a most unsightly fashion and as my main view is the ground I now see how horribly filthy my kitchen floor is. I have to be on set at 11.00am so need a very quick fix.

AnneMarie the producer organises for me to see an osteopath. I arrive at his rooms at 8am and drag my way hunched like your man from Notre Dame up two flights of stairs. The osteopath is Australian and very chirpy. I am always amazed at how people who move here from the southern hemisphere can ever be happy but he assures me that the constant rain does not bother him. I conclude that he is either in the first flushes of a love affair or on heavy doses of mind-altering drugs. I shake his hand and try not to appear that I am staring at his crotch but as that is the level my head is currently pitched at, it’s hard not to. For the next hour he gently pokes and prods me and soothes me with his silvery voice. I emerge cured yet feeling slightly odd – the sort of odd I imagine you might feel if you ate a load of those ‘funny’ mushrooms that students enthusiastically forage for in forests across the land during weekends in September. 

I manage to drive myself to the set and arrive in a state of what can only be described as - stoned out of my bin. The Osteopath did mention that after all the manipulation and whatever else he did to me I might feel a little woozy. So that’s what they call it down there in Melbourne or Katoomba or wherever the good drugs come from. Everyone is very concerned when they see me and ply me with sympathy and offers of comfy chairs. I respond with a dreamy grin and a couple of peace signs.

Thank Goodness I am working with Mary Murray (Rachel) and Sam Corry (Tom) today as they are veterans of the screen and know exactly what they are doing as I am no use whatsoever and spend the next four hours either staring at the ceiling, humming nursery rhymes or smiling benignly at all who pass and wondering if anyone notices that I am acting strange. Nobody mentions it if they do and before I know it we’re half way through the day and lunch is called.

By the time our work resumes I have somewhat been restored to my old self and even begin to say clever things like ‘Action’ and ‘Cut.’ We are doing several scenes where Sam Corry is wearing nothing but his underpants. I have, with the enthusiastic blessing of the costume designer, chosen the most hideous pair of y-fronts and Clodagh has dyed them a lovely grey colour – the sort of colour that all sparkly white underwear goes after it has been washed with that elusive black sock that is never apparent when you put the wash in the machine but is top of the pile when you take it out. Socks can snigger – I’ve heard it myself.

Sam has offered up his own ideas for the underwear in a vague hope that our minds will be changed but his stuff looks too trendy – boxer shorts and the like and as I ignore his notions completely and shove him and the y-fronts into the loo to change I suggest that he should regard himself very lucky that I have not insisted he wear a leopard skin thong.

The authority I exert is so empowering and makes me feel so good that once again I reach my full and impressive stature of five foot three.

Suit your Sir

Tom O'Sullivan (Jeremy) and Will O'Connell (Trevor)

It’s Saturday and the last day of our second week of shooting. 11 days in and only 5 days left. We are at last free from the mayhem of filming in town and will be spending all day in an open plan office which we have to ourselves.  It’s very spacious and as we’re filming in only one section the crew immediately bag various free areas where they start spreading out all their stuff. Film crews get very territorial very quickly so boundaries are carefully respected although our lot are very congenial so a standoff is unlikely even if Paddy Sound does invade Ron Camera’s space.

The mood is good and there is even a kitchen from which apparently, real coffee will be served. I wish I drank coffee – it’s seems to deliver such pleasure to so many and a double espresso has far more street cred than a cup of watery black tea which is my brew of choice. I’ve often wondered why I have yet to be courted by Hollywood and rather than it being something to do with talent, perhaps it is more my taste in hot drinks? Americans love their coffee and I can’t see George Lucas or any La La producery types courting me as we sip insipid tea with a nice digestive biscuit on the side.

The three actors today are Sam Corry (Tom) Tom O’Sullivan (Jeremy) and Will O’Connell (Trevor.) We also have three extras who are ‘real’ people from this office who have given up their Saturday to see how things on a film set work (or maybe it was a way of avoiding bringing children to swimming, football and then piano which is the sort of thing a lot of adults seem to have to do these Saturdays.) Whatever, their reason, I’m extremely grateful to have them at our disposal and they rally through the day picking up phones, miming animated conversations to no-one, putting down phones, standing up, sitting down, walking over here then back over there, all in a trojan effort to make their three selves appear like twenty very busy people. It kinda works.

Clodagh our costume designer has a spring in her step today. At last she has been given an actor whose dress code is not ill-fitting polyester suit with grotesque tie. Jeremy, Tom’s boss although a total jerk, has nice taste in suits as does the actor who used to be a ‘suit’ in his previous career and has brought a selection of his finery along. Some actors don’t like to wear their own clothes as they find it weird and difficult to distinguish between themselves and the character they’re playing but Tom who plays Jeremy is happy to help out which is a blessed relief as if we had to hire in his clobber well, that would have been the entire costume budget gone and there wouldn’t have been a penny left to buy our previously mentioned g-strings. Also without getting too personal, Tom is tall and very nicely built and as Clodagh says herself would look fantastic in anything you’d choose to put him including a black plastic bin bag. However, although he has a lot of costume changes today, a bin bag is not one of them.

We have ten scenes to do with the three lads. Jeremy is lazy, arrogant, opinionated and a bully (although I don’t like to openly judge a character too negatively but as this is comedy it’s okay.)  I’m sure Jeremy does have a secret nice side (collects cuddly animals or loves his mother) and valid reasons for why he’s such an asshole – it’s just we don’t get to see them and anyway the actor is revelling in being a complete tosser. Trevor, his sidekick is aspiring to be all of these things and the main focus of their wrath is Tom who does all the real work – theirs and his. The ten scenes track Tom’s journey from subordination to realising that his life needs to change to eventually getting revenge and triumphing over his oppressors.  He does slightly descend into madness along the way but it’s funny and very satisfying and the lads all put in excellent performances.

We end the day and the week on a high and even a bottle of bubbly plonk is produced so we slurp like kings from plastic cups as we wonder what joys the next two days of freedom will bring – probably lots of hangovers.

Film Premiers - the do's and don'ts

I am going to fly in the face of my traditional blog and jump forward a year. Loath as I am to give advice to others on how to deal with certain scenarios, today I am going to offer a few crucial pointers on what to do/what not to do at the World Premier of your first feature film.

1. Do not be five months pregnant with twins in the week running up to the premier. If you are, may I suggest that you STRONGLY CONSIDER not attending said premier and instead lie on your couch at home with you fire lit, having your hideously swollen logs massaged by one of those kowtowing slave fellas you so often see depicted in Cleopatra movies.

2. If you are stupid enough or just too bloody stubborn to NEVER LISTEN TO A WORD ANYONE ALSE SAYS and feel you must attend then read on.

3. Do not bolt down the biggest BLT sandwich you have ever seen with a portion of fries on the side as well as half your partners deep fried fish just before you are about to get dressed for your big night.

4. Do not allow only ten minutes to get dressed and put on your make up.

5. DO spend a lot of your teenage years with your girlfriends experimenting with make-up even if by doing so you means you end up missing a lot of your schooling, sleeping with unsuitable boys and drinking nagans of vodka on park benches. DO NOT under any circumstances instead spend those years doing jig saws of Old Master paintings, listening to phone-in soppy radio shows that make you wonder will you ever be kissed and collecting stamps. Those activities will have NO VALUE whatsoever when it comes to the biggest night of your career.

6. DO NOT buy new high-heeled shoes the day before the event particularly when you have never ever in your life worn anything higher than a Doc Martin boot. (If you can’t imagine what this is like think of that bit in Cinderella when the fat sister shoves her grossly inflated foot into the delicate slipper)

7. DO NOT stand naked in front of the mirror marvelling at how huge your bump is whilst also pondering that you still have another four months to go and what in the name of Jesus will you be able to wear when it comes to that stage?

8. DO punch you partner in the jaw when he likens you to Pavarotti and suggests getting a hoist to swing you into the lift so you can get back downstairs again.

9. DO allow at least an hour to squeeze into those special maternity tights that you have chosen to wear. Half of this time will be spent wondering which bit is in the front and which bit is the back. The other half will be spent crying with frustration and pain as you eek them on millimetre by millimetre. You should perhaps allow another hour on top of that for your now red and swollen eyes and nose to subside after the tears.

10. When you eventually get to the venue DO NOT be insulted when the camera crew and presenters of the glossy TV show that attend these sorts of events ignore you and concentrate all their efforts on any celebrities who have appeared and who have clearly not had to squeeze into tiny cheap shoes that will deform their feet forever. (I saw Stephen Rea’s shoes – sensible and comfy)

11. DO NOT invite your sister, your sister-in-law and your dearest girlfriends as whilst hanging around the now-packed foyer they will suddenly become bored and then notice how badly you have applied the bit of make-up you discovered at the bottom of your wash bag. They will then huddle around you penning you in so that there is no escape, take out their lipstick, lip gloss, huge fluffy brushes with matching blusher and do a quick fix job on you IN FRONT OF THE ENTIRE gathering whilst you gag your protestations and plead for mercy.

12. If you feel you must ask them DO make sure that they are collected from their homes by an armed guard, their bags searched for any alcohol, breathalysed and then escorted directly to the venue just in time for the film to start so that they are given absolutely no opportunity to go for a few pints beforehand otherwise well, just read number 11 again.

13. DO not invite the actress who has two-year-old twins who then proceeds to give you graphic details of how you are likely to fare over the next four months.

14. DO (and I know this one is quite contentious given your current condition,) drink alcohol. It is THE ONLY WAY you will get through the evening intact. There will be no dignity involved but at least if you’re drunk you won’t care.

15. But most importantly, do as I say in point number 1. Then you will have a great night.

 

Last man standing

It’s day 12 and I’m looking at the call sheet. Today, we’re shooting in and around the city centre all day with eight scenes to shoot and four location moves. We’ll be in the thick of all the shoppers again (arrrrgh) and in a shopping centre as well as shooting scenes on the street with Shaun Dunne (Vinny) prancing around in a white polyester John Travolta ‘Saturday Night Fever Suit.’ Great. I’m sure no-one will bat an eyelid at us or bother us for one nano second. I almost expect to turn the page to find that I’ll also be shooting with a horde of three year olds in a china shop and a rabid dog who runs amok in a packed train station. My throat feels dry, my head hurts and I haven’t even got out of bed yet. I wonder can I pull a sickie?

As industries go, the film business is not like the civil service or any government organisation or well, any other job really. People generally come into work if they’re sick, even of they’re really sick. It’s as though we feel we are indispensable and that the shooting day will not be achieved; that the whole thing will go belly up if we are not there and that people may even die because someone like me cannot be there to tell them to say their lines louder or to move an inch to their right. (Now you know what a director really does.) So, it’s not unusual to see a crewmember hobbling around on crutches crunching on horse tablet painkillers as they dress the set or a carpenter wandering around with a big bandage wrapped around his head from where he impaled himself on a nail the previous day. No one ever wants to appear to be the weak one.

I once worked on a job where a stunt man had to gallop a horse upstream against a raging river. The riverbed was completely covered in rocks any one of which could kill you if you even looked at it. Once the horse had accelerated to full throttle, someone then shot the stuntman who had to throw himself into the river. Although he appeared a pretty hardy chap I thought that the whole thing seemed a tad insane if not downright suicidal. After three takes of him crashing onto the rocks it was deemed the shot was got and the poor fella was helped away stunned and bloodied and as far as I could see, in immediate need of the last rites but no, as he was being stretchered away he was adamant (in between bouts of unconsciousness) that he was fine really and was happy to do it all again.

I did once pull a sickie and still wring my hands with remorse when I think about it. It was 1987 and I was a trainee assistant director on a commercial. I was to cycle to the producer and Director’s house for a lift to the studio and woke up late. I nearly puked and ran to the nearest phone box and called and told them that I had been knocked off my bike. They were hugely sympathetic and told me to take the day off. They even paid me for the day. I was totally wracked with guilt and haven’t quite got over it yet and every time I get on my bike, still expect to be punished for my actions by being crushed to a pulp by a bus .

Oh and there was the day I pulled a sickie on a shoot ‘cos I drank  a bottle of tequila the night before.

I didn’t feel very guilty about that one only because I was way too busy trying to die.

All of these thoughts bolster my nerve and I remember that should I feel weak or there be some unforeseen accident, our make up artist has been armed with a tub of Sudocream, a pack of Disprin and a selection of plasters.

The show will go on.

Get a real job

Q: How do you know if a director is famous of not?

A: In photographs a famous director is always seen pointing and if you’re seen pointing in a photograph in a publication such as Screen International you’re really famous and have probably been nominated for an Oscar.

I am not quite up there with those chaps although was once photographed biting my nail which in my calculations means that although I am not famous, a famous person once saw one of my films - Martina Navratilova, Aspen Film Festival circa 2001 – the film was ‘Half Full, Half Empty’ and I know this ‘cos the writer of the said project saw her there.

We are over half way through our 18-day shoot and things have gone swimmingly until now. I have not had one tantrum and no one has as yet to put me up against a wall to throttle the living daylights out of me.

But today could be the day. We are shooting exterior pretty much all day, have four location moves and 16 scenes to shoot. We start at a graveyard out of town and then move several miles to a park and then into the city centre where we have amongst other things a bunch of scenes to shoot in one of the busiest shopping districts (Capel street) and then some night work. It’s the sort of day where you really would much prefer to stay in bed sticking hot needles in your eyes.

The day starts off well enough. We need an angry mob for the graveyard and although it’s very hard to get people to give you their time for nothing, the production office do a fine job in getting a selection of people who between them make up a very nice rabble with a even nicer range of foul expletives that they are happy to holler as they chase our heroes. Given that they have to run at full tilt for about a hundred meters and that one of them is also pushing a woman in a wheelchair I am kind and only make them do it about fifteen times. What a trooper I have turned out to be.

We complete our two scenes at the graveyard and leg it to the park where we have 3 scenes to shoot and about an hour to shot them in. When you are shooting out and about like this you are at the mercy of real people who often take an overly keen interest in what you are doing and won’t leave you alone until they have reaped satisfactory reposes to their gazillion questions – what are you doing? Are youz making a film? (again) Is there any stars in it? Can I be in it? Give us your watch.

There are also the other types who take umbrage to the fact that you have put the camera right on the spot where they want to stand and so you’d better move it now ‘cos they have rights ‘cos THIS IS a public place.

You grit your teeth and move the camera five inches and try to focus on the positive, whatever that may be. We get two scenes done and are already over our allotted time and by now should be in town instead of still standing in this bleeding park waiting for the hoards of schoolchildren who have suddenly appeared to stop waving and jostling with each other to get in shot. We also have no tea or coffee or buns or anything to distract us so moral is descending fast. The third scene here involves a moving car and two actors, one of whom has to drive. Now, if you have ever spent more than ten minutes on a film set with a moving vehicle you will already know that this sort of scenario has all the requirements for disaster  (and occasionally emergency transport of all the cast and some of the crew to the nearest trauma unit) and my common sense tells me to dump it and replace it with something else. So I have a quick huddle with Nuria the DOP and we come up with something much simpler. I change the dialogue and brief the actors and in ten minutes we’re out of the child-infested park and on our way into town. Just in time for rush hour.

In the process of getting into the city we lose half the crew who have either been swallowed up by some insane one-way system or have much more sensibly gone home. I of course arrive on set first ‘cos have no equipment to pack and unpack and begin to pace frantically as the seconds tick away and the enormity of what we still have to shoot overwhelms me. If I thought the park was a challenge, this scenario is a billion times worse. My teeth are clenched as is my bottom, ears and hair. It’s a three lane one-way street and is already choc a block with traffic and crazy cyclists and irritated people stomping along the pavement trying to get home as fast as they can. We set up our camera right in their way. The shot is of Dave’s Ma as she makes her way down the other side of the street into a pawnshop. Simple you’d think except that every time we get her into her start position and the crew are ready to roll, a bus stops right in front of us and instead of us seeing Maria (Dave’s Ma) we get a load of bored people sitting on the bus who spot our camera and proceed to squish their faces up against the glass to make what they think are hilarious faces. We also get a million people pushing past us with such greetings as ‘get the f**k out of my way’ or ‘No, I will not f**king stop, I don’t give two sh*ts what youz are making’ We get the shot (which ends up in the cutting room floor anyway) and move on. Very rattled.

There is a slight reprieve from the madness whilst we shoot a scene in a restaurant and as the actors are so good and funny, I even spot a couple of the crew smiling. I decide to lead by example and laugh out loud but moral has not quite been restored to normal levels and they look at me as though I am nuts.

Before we know it we’re back outside. It’s dark and although the traffic is not so dense it has now been replaced by lots of drunken people. I wonder will this day ever end. Our two actors are meant to be drunk so blend in perfectly with everyone else around them. But we are stoic and battle on in an attempt to be impervious to the puking and staggering and general mayhem that surrounds us. As we do our final shot, two guys walk past the camera. One of them turns around and proceeds to unzip his fly and takes out what those of us who are doctor’s daughters like to refer to as his ‘lad’, which he wiggles around for maximum cinematic effect.

What a perfect end to a perfect day.