CUT! THAT'S A WRAP!!!!

WOW!!! What an experience... A couple of months ago when Ben called me and asked if I would be interested in Directing the Short " A glance in a Mirror" I was pretty excited, of course never having directed before, I had no idea what I was up against.. but said HEll yes!.. looking back there are so many things I would do differently, but wouldn't change the experience for anything. I was able to negoitate a deal with a production company that would supply us with DVX Cameras.. for those that don't know what they are, these are the same cameras used to film T.V. shows such as Ghost Hunters, Arrested Development, It's always Sunny in Philadelphia, etc. BEN WAS STOKED, to use a term from my childhood. He was like a kid at Christmas.. he was totally jazzed to have that camera in his hands.. in fact, I don't think I got to play with it at all... I gotta change that next time...

Once we had our initial read through with our cast we scheduled a blocking session where we blocked our scenes, we broke for the night and sent our cast home to work on their lines with a new schedule to rehearse in a couple of weeks.. during that time, I halfway worked out a shot list with story boards, of course, again, I had no idea how or what to do, so most of it stayed in my head, which for those of you out there thinking of doing this, is not such a good idea...write it down.. I learned the hard way, I think Ben would agree with this statement, in fact, I KNOW HE WOULD.

I spent quite a bit of time "setting up shots" and building equipment to use during filming, I built a Jib/Crane, dolly track and a few diffuser screens. the one thing I will change in the future is LIGHTING.. that is the key, we had a few REALLY NICELY lit scenes in this film... I mean REALLY NICE.. I can't wait to see them cut... I am very excited for those...
We spent Saturday and Sunday filming.. two very long days.. VERY long.. The crew and Cast were awesome!!!! We had a small cast of three, Coby Stulman as Meg, Joe Ahlert as Charlie, and Anthony Thomas as "The Guy" and a crew of Four including Ben and I, Claire Romano who was also the screenwriter, and Evan Clawson who ran Sound for us... I can't say how proud I am of everyone, and how honored I am to have worked with each of them.. it was truly a Great experience.. one, I can't wait to repeat!

WOW, Has it been that long?

I looked up today and realized I haven't written a thing on my Acting Blog in Quite a while. In my defense I have been pretty damn busy, but that is no excuse. Once we wrapped my scenes of the Indy film "Face First" which has now gone through a title change to "Jack Knifed Wolves", don't ask me what it means.. ask Ben.. he "splains" it so much better than I, anyway once we wrapped, I started working on my screenplay, which, came to a screeching halt, don't know why it just did. I got this great idea for a "sitcomy" type show. I pitched the idea to Ben and we worked up a short treatment for it, after about two hours of sitting on that, I started writing the Pilot, then an episode, then another, then Ben wrote a couple, so here we are with this pretty good little comedy which should be funny as hell. it is to us anyway. Three days ago Ben called and told me about this guy shooting a reenactment of the killing of John Dillinger here in Belton. come to find out the guy had a great idea, and a pretty good knack at getting people to donate equipment, time, energy, and effort, so we "signed" on with them to help them out. Once we got started we realized just how much of an "idea" it was. He had no Storyboards, no shot List, get this He didn't even have a SCRIPT!!! He had 30 period cars, had permits to shut down main street in belton overnight, permits to discharge live pyro (gunshots) but not a word written for his actors to recite.
Sooooo, Ben in typical Ben Green Style, jumped right in the middle of that fire and started pissing on the flames..... He wrote a great little script and then he and I took to the task of setting up shots.. what camera angles to use, when, how, etc. where to use a track shot, where to use a steadycam, where are we going to use the crane or Jib shots..how deep of a shot, how wide...where did our lighting need to come from, typical DP (Director of Photography) work. it was A LOT OF WORK, and I mean ALOT!, in a very short amount of time. We went from Conceptual idea (all this in the producer's head) to an established shot list, time line, and screenplay in a matter of 22 hours. it was a FEAT.. but last night (this morning) when I laid my head down on my pillow and looked at my trusty Iphone at 3:27am, I was pretty proud and very happy with our accomplishments.
This morning, Ben called and the first words out of his mouth were something to the effect of:
"ok, so we are basically cut out of the film", now keep in mind this was about 9:30 or so.. i was working on about 6 hours of sleep, which for those of you that know me, know that is about 8 hours too little.. so I said.. huh? and Ben began to describe to me that the Cinematographer was taking Creative control of the project and would be setting up the story boards, shots, scripts etc. Needless to say, WE WERE PISSED. Mainly because, someone could have told us this was the plan in the first place, but the producer was so "excited" to have someone working on his project he "failed to remember" what he told the cinematographer. WHATEVER! they did however want to keep us on to help wrangle the extras and direct traffic during the 14 hour shoot.. we declined. They also mentioned that they liked Ben's Script, however didn't think they could give him Screenwriters Credit. Let me just say, I have been in the music business for over 15 years now... I understand copyright law pretty well... Ben is in good shape, we have already spoken with my business attorney, and taken the appropriate steps to protect him and his creative works.

Now, those that know me know I have been on the set of Friday Night Lights more than a couple of times, (GREAT CREW BY THE WAY) Been on a Showtime set, Been on set with Oak Films and Bobby Moresco (Crash, Million Dollar Baby, 10th & Wolfe). Real professionally run, scheduled sets. This little adventure in Belton Texas was a NIGHTMARE! We wish them all the luck in the world with this production, and hope it goes off without a hitch, I just wanted everyone to know exactly why we were not on set anymore.

Ben asked me to direct a short film that a young lady by the name of Claire Romano wrote and I am really psyched to do so. It will give me the opportunity to be creative behind the camera. And, since Coby is attached to it, it will give me a chance to get back at her for slapping the crap out of me and treating me like, you know what, on the set of Jack Knifed wolves. She is in for it, she just doesn't know it yet!! insert evil grin here. We are "planning" for an August shoot, and have all the filming done by the end..hopefully!

So once we get that in the can, Ben and I can begin to work aggressively on our sitcom, we have an In at a major network and we are intending on pitching it to them as soon as we get the pilot filmed, which should be in the next three months or so.. If you are looking to do something, we can use all the help we can get from extras, acting, grip work, to PA work, and WE WILL GIVE YOU CREDIT, as well as a pretty nice package on the back end if it should get picked up.

The Finale - Damn it was friggin COLD!

Between getting my ass slapped around by Coby (which Julie is still pissed about, not that I got slapped by Coby, just that she didn't get to do it and call it art) and being tied to a table on the coldest recorded night of the year, I think I just might have pulled this Will character off.

I hope so anyway. Last night we shot the finale of the movie. It was the longest shoot of the movie so far, for me anyway. Normally when I am on set of a film or show, there is a lot of "stand around and wait", "go to holding and wait for someone to call you, hang out at the craft services tent, someone will be around soon", Not so much on a Ben Green Film, which by the way makes the day go by quickly, last night someone said, "wow, it's 11:00" next thing I know its 1:20 am and I am on my way home. After a 30 minute shower to clean the blood and make-up off, I crawled into bed at about 2:15 essentially ending my day that began about 5:15 am the day before.

It went fast, but it was friggin cold in the work room of the theatre strapped to that damn table. For one scene I had to (in the words of Ben) "Arc Blood", it took me about 20 tries with water before I was willing to "try" with the blood (I didn't want to make too much of a mess, waste blood, or look like an idiot, which I think was a total waste of time) I could just hear all the experienced guys thoughts . . . "friggin amature". Just kidding, actually everyone was very supportive, between Joyce and Coby keeping me cleaned up and keeping my shirt from riding up, I felt like a star there for a while. Anyway after all that practice we got the “blood arc” in two takes, so I hope it came out well and Ben wasn't just wanting to move on!
Will's fatal gun shot is another story, we had a Squib set up under my shirt using a technique Ben found on the internet, it was a really cool idea and it worked great each time, but because of over compression during my death scene, it resembled something seen in a Kill Bill film, blood just came spewing out of my body and actually hit the ceiling of the work room, they are easily 15' high ceilings. On film it looks like a geyser erupted from my chest cavity, Ben says he can fix it in post; I look forward to seeing that.

Rafael came in from Houston to play a part in the film. It was good to finally meet him, everyone around the theatre has been telling me since the day I started hanging around there what a great guy he is, and it was nice to finally understand what they all meant, he made it look so easy sliding in and out of character. He was a lot of fun to be around; I hope someday to work with him again.

One big thing happened last night, and I have to give her credit for it. Last night Coby made a comment about something that essentially ended my writer’s block of almost two months. I think I finally have a conflict for my character in my screen play thanks to her, now I just have to make it happen. Coby asked if she could be in it when we film, and I said yes, what she doesn’t know was that from the first night we read together, I started writing a part for her and was hoping she would want to take it, funny how all that happens. Anyway all in all it was a great night; I can't wait for the final product to be finished.

Will Is still Alive!

Well Coby and I have completed one of our scenes. About a week ago or so we met over at Joyce's Apartment and shot our first scene. Everything went great, and I figured out that I could crack her up a little with an involuntary facial tick, it was totally by accident at first, however now that I know, it is my little weapon! (insert evil grin here). It was hard to be a mean guy, fun, but hard. Coby is so cute and sweet its difficult to look her (character) in the eye and force yourself to want to beat the hell out of her for being stupid, I'm so not that guy, and the really mean scene has yet to be shot, that'll be fun. Joyce was shooting some photos (behind the scenes kinda shots) and I was hoping to post some up soon, but haven't seen any on any of Ben's blogs yet. Maybe soon.
Tuesday night Ben, Jamie, and I did some of my solo scenes (that sounds so wrong) anyway here we are clippin away, I'm taking drugs, cash and a gun out of my bag get throught that, and some guy just walks through the front door, we all kinda looked at each other like one of us should know who the hell this guy is and he says "is this 1102?, this isn't 1102 huh?" we all say no and he walks out. I look at Ben and said "good thing he didnt walk in here two minutes ago when I had a gun in my hand, and in character, He Would have freaked!" We move the shoot outside, and along the road and believe it or not it was pretty damn cold in a Tshirt in December at 8:00 at night.
Looking over Ben's shoulder at some of the shots I have to say I am really looking forward to seeing the final product. Ben has a really good eye and sees things in cool angles, I like working with him, plus he has no idea, but I am soaking up all of his experience for future use.....
With that said, my screenplay is still in a holding pattern, hopefully one night next week I can spend some serious time working on it. I have found that it is a lot like my music, it is going to have to "come to me" I can't force it, which is not like me at all. . . . .

Character Development

Probably one of the most interesting things I have done in a very long time happened last night. Coby and I met Ben at his apartment with the intention of working through a couple of scenes, but as we got started Ben asked us who we thought our characters were, where did they meet, how long have they been together? We spent the better part of an hour answering those questions and developing the "back story" that needs to be in place for our characters to react to each other. We never broke out the scripts (mainly because Coby and I both thought Ben would have some, and he thought we would bring ours, I seriously thought mine was in the car, but it wasn't, it was trapped at the office). Anyway, I learned a lot about the way Ben writes and his vision of the characters. I had a great time and I left there even more convinced this is going to be a great project.

Friday Night Lights

Well, Weds. came and I sat down to watch Episode 3 Season 3 of Friday Night Lights on Direct TV channel 101. As the party scene began, you can barely make me out, if you know to look, as the coach and wife make the drive up the driveway we walk in front of the vehicle. Once they enter the home, you can see me standing in the middle of the living room looking up and around at this enormous home, It's pretty obvious, and kinda cool. I am standing with a young lady with long blond hair and we are pretty much the only two in the room, its pretty obvious. Later on outside by the pool you can see me just to the right of the Coach , walking toward the camera. Anyway, My mom called the other day, I answered the phone, and the first thing that she said was " I saw you Four times!" of course she was pretty excited, as was I.

I found out the movie I was involved in last year "The Kings of Appletown" has had it's Sneak Premier out in L.A. and as I understand it was really well received by the kids. It is scheduled for a December 12th Release, As of yet I'm not sure if it's going to go Nationwide or just released in certain markets. I am looking foward to it, and have been trying to find a link to a preview, however haven't been able to find it.

I mentioned earlier about being cast in a new Ben Green film with a working title of "The Incident", I got an email a little while ago from Ben, who wants to have a rehearsal this week, so I am pretty stoked that we are moving forward on the project. It's a pretty cool story and should play well. I've been fortunate to work with one of the cast members, and had the pleasure of meeting my "significant other" during the read through, I really think this is going to be a fun movie to film.

My screenplay is at a total standstill, I am going to try and work on it a bit while Jules is out of town this week. I have a severe case of plot block. I have no idea where to take my main character, he's kinda hanging out there needing something to do, so I gotta figure that out. Once I do, I think it will take off pretty quickly from there.

Last Minute Casting

Last night my mom came into Austin for a business meeting, so Jules and I drove down to take her to dinner. We had a great night and great meal and had some much needed time to visit. We decided to stop by her Hotel room for a cup of coffee before the drive home. Around 9:30, while we were visiting, my cell phone rang, on the other end of the line was a casting director that I had never met. She was in need of a last minute addition to the following days call and cast me as a Funeral Patron in the new Claire Danes movie "Temple Grandin". It was a very small, intimate scene, with only about 20 extras and three principals on set. Let me just say that the whole cast and crew were Awesome, from the director to the drivers, everyone was friendly, and very helpful. Also on set with us today were Julia Ormand and Catherine O'Hara, two wonderful ladies. One thing that I will say about Clarie and Catherine both, they are as down to earth as any "stars" I have ever been around, during our lunch break, both grabbed a plate and sat right down in the middle of all 125 of the cast crew and extras to eat. That is not to say that Julia is not also very down to earth and friendly, I just didn't see her there during lunch, however I was very impressed with them all. The day started for me at 5:00 am to drive to Austin to make call on time, we finally wrapped the scene at just past 5:45 pm, It was a very long day but, well worth it.

Since I was on set all day, I had no time at all to work on my screenplay, which is coming along, but slowly. I am looking forward to getting a little further along on it, and everyday I write I "see" the scenes unfolding in my head, I just hope they are as interesting to everyone else as they are to me... till next time.