Who knew that 7 days in a row of filmmaking would be so exhausting? Well, it is. There is no doubt that this is a real marathon that we are running. But it’s also a sprint as we run like hell every day to try and get all of the scenes that we’ve scheduled shot with enough coverage. The good news is that we’ve “made our days” every single day but one and we made that scene up the next day. Today was no different – we got our day and finished right on time.
But, damn, I’m tired. I’m sure I’m not the only one. It’s also difficult because we’re shooting primarily inside of our house, so at the end of the day there’s still no escape from the film because the make-up and wardrobe department are in our bedroom and the camera dept’s gear is in our office. And craft services is in our kitchen. Etc. Not to mention the fact that half of our house is a dressed set. But we’re soldiering on and have no intention of stopping, come hell or high water or childcare challenges (Bea has been with her grandparents all weekend but we have to figure out childcare for Tuesday evening, when we shoot till midnight). We’ve come too far to give up now.
We’ve now shot in almost every room in the house (except for Bea’s room, which we’re trying to keep as a “sacred space” so that she doesn’t feel her whole life has been thrown up into the air). We shot in our backyard last night (and the garden got trampled badly, which breaks my heart a little bit, even though I knew that shooting a feature film in our house would lead to some damage). We’re even going to be shooting in our roommate’s bedroom. She has been very gracious about it and is staying at her sister’s place this weekend. I just realized tonight, however, that we didn’t tell her that we’re shooting a sex scene in her bed. Surprise, Lyvia!
Edsson Morales was on set today, playing the role of Phil, Santiago’s lawyer. Those scenes were shot in Spanish and he did an admirable job of speaking complex scenes in Spanish legalese with a delivery that was naturalistic and convincing. Kudos to you Edsson! Murray ran outside in his underwear and scared our neighbours as they marched in the annual parade of saints put on by the Catholic Church next door. They may not speak to us for a while – but I’m not sure if it will be out of fear or disgust. Or some combination of the two. Lord knows if they heard Murray’s potty-mouth on the set, disgust would win out.
The lab is now struck and April and Joffre rolled the main floor back in time to the arrival of our hero, Santiago, and made the place look like a total dump. It was very convincing, including leftover take out food in styrofoam containers that we’d kept in the freezer so that it wouldn’t start to stink while we waited to use them. It’s a bit surreal to move back and forth in time viz the time stream of the movie world. We shot the beginning, then the end, then the second half of the second act, then the middle of the first act, and so on. In the midst of all this we have to try and remember when we are and what has transpired in order to sustain consistent performances and even keep the characters in the right clothes.
We also did a lot of block shooting today, which means we set up our camera and lights and then shot several scenes in that location from that angle. Then we moved the camera and the lights and shot the same scenes back to back from another angle. Then we did the same thing again, for a third time. Our sound recordist, I’m sure, hated us. Every time we shifted to a new scene, she had to re-mic the actors to suit their new clothes. But it sped up the shooting and allowed us to get much more coverage than we might have otherwise. It was worth the effort.
Tomorrow morning we move the whole unit to a location for two sequences at Lula Lounge, which is being dressed to look like two places. 7 am will come early! So, it’s time to go to bed.
A Brand New You 