That 4
Friends Movie
Day 11 - Friday
Back at Griffith Park, where it smells like a skunk took
up residence in one of the many tents left overnight.
I thought it would be my lucky day (like a snow day
and everyone goes home or something). I was so
wrong.
First of all, AD Michael pulls me away from making
his list of what we’ve shot and need to shoot (Scary Larry sat next to
me while I was sitting on the curb working on this list and he
mentioned the female camera assistant who has a really negative
attitude -- “She’s the poster child for people who return
to work with high calibre rifles and start shooting,” he
claimed). He wants me to write out dialog changes that Gregg,
Jane, Richard and Harry are making. So I go into Richard’s
dressing room to take notes, and Harry is making it so clear he doesn’t
want his character to be in this scene. So more discussion, round
and round about one thing or another, and I limit my input, which is
efficient, because anything I say occasionally garners a glance of
near-acknowledgement and nothing else. Enough opinions all ready
in the mix.
Anyway, they finally finish and Gregg drags me over
to his laptop for revisions, but he’s too busy laughing and joking with
Richard eight feet away in his make-up chair to type more than a half a
word a minute. So I finally put down my foot and tell Gregg to
pick up the pace, I’ve got loads of other things to do, and he focuses,
which then amazes me how incredibly slowly he types when he’s focused
(I began to understand why it was taking us so long to get revisions).
So all done and I finish some other stuff and then
search for the camera and crew, which is simply not where I thought it
was. So I finally find them, all lined up and ready to shoot, and
I’m thrown to be hurried and missing out. Then the actors call me
over for the revised lines I wrote in my script (they don’t have
Gregg’s typed pages yet), so they go over stuff, and I realize the
continuity nightmare I’m in for – three-person blocking and bicycle
accessories.
Harry gets to play with Vaseline (only we don't have
clearance to call
it Vaseline – he opts for “lube” over “petroleum jelly”), demonstrating
how bikers use it to reduce friction, much to his distaste. (Jane
was originally supposed to put it down her pants as well, but she got
out of it, saying she’ll just go with an “I don’t think so”
look.) “I gotta stick my hand down my crouch for this
scene?” Harry playfully complains. He catches my smirk at him,
and smirks back at me, “This is all for you, Marilyn.” He stops
from saying more, finally saying with a smile, “I was going to say
something else, but I don’t know you that well.” I smile and
thank him.
A few moments later, I decide to grab a Polaroid of
Richard’s Day 3 clothes while he’s sitting down, so I kneel with the
camera and ask him to show his wrists (for the watch), which he
does. I call “Flashing!” and Harry walks in front of me, barely
dusting the picture. I look at him with disgust. He looks
at me, then falls back with faux prima
donna disgust. I immediately back down, pouting, and he
smiles and grabs me, pushing me back in a bear hug and laughing, “I’m
just kidding! Just kidding!”
So a couple of rehearsals, and we shoot – and it’s
harried. I don’t have PA Gabriel to help me with Polaroids
because
he’s too busy placing bikes in the background (we see Jane ride in with
hers, but Richard enters from a different angle and Gabriel’s got to
get his bike next to Jane’s for the pullback). There’s food and
plates and fruit on the table (which Jane eats, so we have to keep
putting out the same number of grapes). So another rehearsal, and
I slink over to Wardrobe Tracy and beg her help, but she’s all ready
making
notes for me. She’s in a good mood – she thought Harry didn’t
like her, and earlier when he said he was going to do the “rest of the
Vaseline off his hands into his hair” bit (when she and Marcy were
reading over the script, they wondered how Harry was going to get rid
of the extra Vaseline on his hand, rub it off on his shirt which meant
another piece of clothing to get Vaseline out of? Tracy wiped her
hand over her hair as a suggestion and they fell apart laughing), and I
laughed and said “Good!”, he smiled and said, “It’s not mine… What’s
the other wardrobe’s name? Tracy? Tracy thought of it!”
Tracy looked up to see him smile at her and praise her joke, so, yeah,
she was in a good mood.
I note on which lines Harry puts his right glove on
and his left glove on, Jane keeps her backpack on her left shoulder
throughout, and Richard’s gloves are on from the beginning of the scene.
So we do the master and everything looks pretty
doable—Harry even tells me after the fifth and only circled take that
on this one he’s only got his right glove on (Thank you, Harry!).
Then we shoot the medium on Jane. Then we move to Richard’s
close-up with Jane dusting the left frame, which bugs me because now
her
hand to mouth movements on the grape eating thing will have to match
the master perfectly for them to cut to this in the edit. Then
Harry’s medium, and now Alfredo’s got Jane standing on the right frame,
and I’m asking him “Are you sure you want to do that? She’ll be
jumping back and forth on the screen” and he says he wants her jumping
back and forth. And I’m like, but her hands to her mouth has
three times the times of bad editing and he’ll be screwed – can’t we
have one take clean on Harry for safety and he says no. I say,
Okay, but you’ll be cursing me in the edit suite and he assures me that
he all ready does.
So everything looks fine, and we move on. So
we’ve moved entirely over for the reverse angle for the rest of the
scene and I check out the actors – Harry’s got the right glove on,
Richard’s got his helmet under his left arm, Jane’s backpack – where’s
Jane’s backpack? So I ask Gabriel, and it’s over there on the far
table, and I stop cold. "What’s it doing over there? When
did you put it over there? Before or after the Richard and Harry
close-ups?" Gabriel stares at me, finally bursting into near
silent explosions of “F**k!” which is basically my reaction. So
we’re looking at each other, both dead dead dead. Gabriel bravely
tells me it’s his responsibility, he won’t let me take the fall, and
I’m thinking him dead beside me or me dead alone, I’m still dead.
Should we ask Jane or Alfredo? Admit fault to an actor or to the
boss? I opt for Jane, since she pays attention to this sort of
thing. So we both slip over to Jane and I ask, “Jane, do you
remember if you were wearing your backpack in Harry and Richard’s
coverage?” She stares at me, then drops her head back and
near-silently cries “F**k!” So the three of us turn to Don to see
if he got it on videotape, and he rewinds (all this while they’re
setting
the next shot and ready to rehearse in any moment) and shows us the
master and Jane’s coverage – he doesn’t have the rest. So what do
we do? Drag the cameras back over and take more time to re-shoot
both set-ups in case we didn’t? I’m shaking, too shaken to cry
but not too far from it. So I solemnly walk past Harry, Richard,
Stand-in Teresa and everybody to Alfredo, who’s discussing the next
shot with Jane. I tap his shoulder to make my confession, and he
turns to me
and says, “I know, it’s no problem.” I say, “No, it’s about –“ and he
says, “The backpack. I all ready know, it’s not a problem.
Darling, we don’t see but her face.” So Jane ran defense for me.
I
ask him if he’s sure, he says he is (I don’t feel too comforted - a
director saying that is like a mob boss saying he won’t hurt you, then
having someone else kill you), and I kiss his cheek and walk back to my
chair. They shoot Jane’s scene, and the actors drag their own
chairs out of the way and toward me. Harry plants his chair next
to me and announces, “I think we should sit around Marilyn!” and he
smiles at me. Richard sits on my other side and Jane hangs around
and they chat about one thing or another, and I feel better, but still
shaken.
So we film the wide shot on the three (a reverse
angle on the previous scene with them walking from previous
conversation to their bikes), which pans over to the 2-shot with Harry
and Richard (did Harry mention he really doesn’t think he should be in
this scene?), and AC Linda mentions to me after the first take that
this probably doesn’t matter to me (the polite pre-phrase to a
continuity concern), but that extra in dredlocks was wearing a black
hat
on the first master and not on this reverse. So I look for the
extra-wrangler 2nd AD Steven who is nowhere to be seen and I have to go
to dredlock man and ask him if he was wearing the hat before. He
smiles sleepily at me and says, “I was when we did the other thing, but
not this time.” So I tell him this is still the other thing, put
it on. And they’re still setting up the second take, so, still no
Steven to be seen, I loudly announce to the extras to remember that
this is the same scene, so please wear the same stuff from this
morning. Then AD Michael sarcastically says “That’s what we’re
here for,” and Key PA Craig (apparently today’s extra wrangler) smiles
at me condescendingly, and Alfredo announces, “Marilyn! Thank
you, Marilyn,” and no one applauds (but Tracy later thanked me, saying
someone needed to tell them).
Lunch.
A crewmember tells me there’s a change in the
scenes, reworking a lot of the dialog, so I go in search of Alfredo,
because all AD Michael can tell me is they’ve changed some stuff.
I mention to Michael that I’m going to talk to Alfredo, and he
instructs me to wait until Alfredo gets back because he doesn’t want
anything to delay Alfredo. I tell him I understand, I’m just
going to discuss it with him while we’re walking. He commands me
to wait for him here, and I snapped. “When he gets here and you
two make eye-contact, I become the invisible woman!” I hissed at AD
Michael. He looked at me and let me go without another word.
Next we do the dolly shot of Thomas entering the
shower alone. 1st AC Linda walks over to us and asks Alfredo,
pointing to the monitor for a point of reference, “Where does Thomas
come from?” And Alfredo says, “New York, I think.” Linda
doesn’t hesitate, “Then we don’t have enough film.” “Camera
reload!” I cry.
I ask Alfredo how he wants me to copy my notes for
him. We’re talking two weeks of notes build-up that Alfredo needs
going into the edit suite over the weekend. I ask him, nervously,
if he wants me to do it, and he says No, we have too many assistants
for me to have to do it myself. Yea!!! So I ask Jennifer,
then Alice, who can I borrow for this job? Alice gives me her
assistant, Jessica. Jessica is an AFI alum who poses as a hotshot
producer, which is really annoying when you need her to answer the
phone or make copies. She says she’ll get to me after a while and
I finally tackle her and say let’s discuss this. Gee, she just
doesn’t know, hmm… it will have to be either her or me…hmm… I look at
her and say Alfredo says I’m not doing it. Okay, she’ll do it.
So we’re finally at the heavily anticipated shower
scene, where Thomas, Richard and extras will semi-disrobe and get under
running water – very uneasy for the actors (Richard all ready
feels like a stick and he’s not looking forward to comparing physiques
with Thomas), the sun is sinking so it’s getting cooler, Thomas gets a
take or two done, then I hear him yell “Don’t shake your head and walk
away from me!” and I know right away who he’s yelling at. So I
look up and confirm on the AD Michael sighting. Richard leans
over me at the monitor and says, “That water better be damn hot when
I’m
in there.”
So Transpo Chief Tony introduces me to his
granddaughter, who’s going to film school taking - what else? - script
supervisor classes. I laugh out loud, I’m way past the point of
loony now.
Wrap and back to base camp, and I’m furiously trying
to finish my notes so I can give Jessica my notebook. She’s in a
huge hurry. Hurry, hurry, hurry. I hurry, get done, second
meal arrives for us remaining few, and suddenly Jessica has all the
time in the world to eat and, how about that, I’m annoyed.
Gabriel, who has spent this week being moon-eyed over Carrie, the
doe-eyed former cheerleader assistant locations person, is hanging with
Carrie, film-runner Rob, assistant prod coord Keri, prod coord Jennifer
and craftservice Marti – all sitting around a car radio waiting for the
results of the big basketball championship. During this game,
PA Kent distributes bags of Redi-Pak salad to us from the discarded
props boxes. Someone starts a makeshift pitch game with one bag,
Gabriel says Stop or it will break and toss salad all over the – and it
breaks and lettuce goes flying. Carrie thanks everyone (her
responsibility to leave the place clean).
We go home.
That 4
Friends Movie
Production
Journals - On the Set
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