 |
Back to the stage, where I love the new addition to the bathroom graffiti: "If you're not part of the solution, you're part of production." Much waiting and waiting. What's going on? Don't know. More waiting. Finally, it feels like it's starting to get close for us to shoot something and I wonder which scene is up. "What are we doing?" I ask Bethan. "Waiting for Christmas," she replies. More time. A set-up, yes? No. A.D. Clint calls us to set, but Mark wants all these people gone, he's trying to do a private rehearsal with the actors. Wait, wait, wait. Dana is making people's astrological charts.
Next is the first part of the scene where Jonas is showing Melody his Louise Brooks book, pointing to different pictures of her and telling Melody how beautiful Louise is, getting ready to [CENSORED.] Wil runs through the first rehearsal straight, then starts joking with Melanie about the pictures in the book, pointing to different pages and saying in a Beavis and Butthead voice, "She's really old..." Page turn and point. "She uses Depends..." Melanie is giggling. The crew is laughing. Wil, sensing his reputation with the director may be in peril, holds up the book and says in defense, "I'm just turning to whatever pages to point to and say how beautiful she is, and she's just not that beautiful in some of these - I mean, she's dressed like a man or she's old - and it's funny!" Lunch. We notice there are no pies set out for dessert. Just fortune cookies. A little bit of a disappointment. Although an amusing disappointment. Bethan encourages us all to read aloud our fortunes. Mine says I will be visited by friends long absent. That's nice. Dana reads hers, something else nice. Bill reads his, something about his investment being a financial success. Bethan breaks open her cookie and reads, with disgust, a repeat of mine. Then during the meal, we hear the opening words of Happy Birthday, and it's Wil's birthday. So we sing to him and all get ice cream cake. Patrick asks me what my fortune was. "Will you be visited by friends long absent?" he asks. "Everybody got that one." I mention to Julia that I'd like a picture of her and the guys together, and she agrees, but takes it to the crew picture level, announcing for everyone get together for a group picture. So we're instructed to stand outside around the prop truck (brilliant! Some stand in the back, some on the half-raised platform, some on the ground), and a bunch of us lay our cameras in a pile at the feet of the still photographer. When I get mine back, I see that there are no shots left! Oh, no! Did I miscalculate? Was he able to take a shot? I ask him, and he happily tells me, oh, he had THREE on that camera! Great. Don't need my camera for the rest of the day. Back inside, a few of us are hanging with Wil. He takes a piece of foam rubber packing and holds it against his chest like a shield. Someone asks him if he's going to Nerf war. He tells us about the time he took off from acting and worked for a computer company, and he had a stockpile of that really great Nerf weapon that he just knew that they'd take it off the market because it really hurt when you nailed someone with it. Which he did at the computer company and often (he had a little gun arrangement taped under his desk, so he could be minding his own business and innocently hit a button under his drawer and BAM!). And Nerf took them off the market. Back to work. While sitting around waiting for the lighting guys to get a simple insert shot lighting done, Wil and Melanie sit on the sofa, holding the insert book, and Wil begins entertaining us by doing one of his routines. This one is speaking in an automated voice, styled after foreign language tapes, but learning to talk like a production person. "The key grip says, it will take an hour. It will take an hour. The 2nd AD says, Where are the actors? Where are the actors?" He goes through an amazing number of positions' jokes, even taking requests from 2nd AC James without missing a beat. After a while, he says, "Michael Dorn says, Ha. Ha. Ha. I'm on my way to the bank. Ha. Ha. Ha. I'm on my way to the bank." The martini shot (last shot of the movie for this story), Jonas and Melody in the car talking during their date scene. Mark and Dean are the only ones with headphones and can hear what Wil and Mel are saying, the rest of the crew out of it. Again, like Day 1 with them filming the scene with Corin and Steve in the car, Mark gets his tiny crew. On the second take, Melanie mumbles something to Wil and this time he's the one who loses it and starts laughing, apologizing for wrecking the take, but Melanie made him laugh - payback time. That's a wrap. Julia calls everyone over for announcements, first thanking Melanie and Wil on their wrap. We applaud and applaud, Mel and Wil sway in "aw, gosh" embarrassment, bumping into each other's shoulders a little, then more playfully bumping into each other's shoulders, hitting a little harder, cutting glances at each other while bumping, starting to glare at each other while bumping shoulders, then they go at it, playfully violently hitting each other in slap shoulder fashion and Mel calling him a *&#%--yo--^%$&! Everyone laughs. Announcements regarding travel plans to San Francisco for those crew members working the second story of the script (alas, not me - I'm heading to a show in Texas). A few more hugs, I sit down and work on my paperwork. Mark taps my foot when passing and asks me if I want to watch dailies, last chance? I say yes. That stupid purse. |
We're finally really called onto the set for the first scene where Melody and Jonas are together in his apartment. It's a quiet scene where he's asking her out on a date. At the next stage over, people are building some sets for a Lexus ad, so there's sawing and all kinds of noisy equipment running. We try the scene anyway. The noise gets worse. Wil runs the lines, "You know, get you out of your house... and me out of my apartment. My neighbors are remodeling and it's really noisy." |