Still Rolling: The Low-Budget Feature that Shouldn't but Did Anyway

Dear Blogger.com,

I completely understand if you want nothing to do with me. After I abandoned you, and left you to host 50 blog posts all by yourself, it's a wonder that you'll even give me the time of day. But I've returned, baby. And I promise never to abandon you again, unless I sign onto another heavy duty film shoot, in which case, I will completely abandon you again and come crawling back when I'm bored or feel obligated to write.

You see, Blogger, May was a trying month for me. It all began two weeks into April, when pre-production became a WHAT THE SHIT IS GOING ON-fest. Suddenly I was ripped from my desk, forced to gather up what office supplies I could carry into a heinously ugly prop purse with cow print, and do the hardest administrative work I've ever done in what I can only describe as a shanty production office. Every day I essentially had to build and deconstruct my office, setting up fold-out tables and chairs and hauling a heavy-ass printer to and from the car each day. I thought I was going to die.

I LUMPING HATE THIS!!!

And then, production happened.

And suddenly all the feelings of why I love film and film production flooded in. I was working in a team setting. I was getting to think of my feet.  I was up and constantly moving. I was finding small opportunities to be creative. I was talking major walkie jargon. I was low-key stuffing my face with craft services. And I was strategizing shit like it was Risk.

Except I didn't lose friends after it was over.

 The word for it is "thriving." For all the waiting and date-pushing and wondering if this project would even get up off the ground, I finally got to be a part of a feature film. And I loved it.

That's not to say I loved every minute of it. Some times were hard. There were days I just wanted to book it at 90 mph out of Simi Valley and go hide under my bed. I had to deal with being antagonized by one or two higher-ups, sitting on the ground tied up in computer cords in the sun and be generally uncomfortable for 3 weeks, being forced to arbitrarily "fire" an unpaid PA who was smart and hardworking, and trying to reconcile doing what needed to be done versus doing what my boss was telling me to do.

There were lots of on-set atrocities and brands of unprofessionalism I have never seen before-- and consider that I am coming from a background of only student and short films. For Chrissake, two consecutive 10-hour turnarounds when we kicked into overtime on both days?! Illegal, unprofessional, and just kinda not cool.

Soooo deets. Deets. Everybody wanna get those deets. It's kind of hard to give that especially when I'm not sure how much information to risk publishing online, but what I can do is isolate some memorable moments.

17 Isolated Memorable Moments

caution: some name-dropping ahead

Because I learn  from my employers

1. Being on set the first day on a remote ranch in Santa Clarita where we had zero cell reception, thus forcing the entire crew to share a single land line on a phone that could not have been made before 2002. Oh, and for about a solid half hour the line was tied up by the ranch owner talking to someone on the other line.
2. Being asked to drive the director's car around the neighborhood just so the air conditioning would be cold enough when she got back in the car.
3. Watching gargantuan Lou Ferrigno hold up a small, fluffy white dog and recite the line, "I've got a surprise for you!"
4. Watching gargantuan Lou Ferrigno hold up Verne Troyer like a baby.
5. The director needing dogs for a scene and literally wandering around the mall parking lot calling out to people with dogs if they would let us borrow them for our movie.
6. Meeting Paul Sorvino and deciding that he and I probably wouldn't be very good friends.
7. Meeting Jim O'Heir and deciding that he and I need to be friends.
8. Hearing the director shout angrily, "That was perfect! We should have shot that! Why didn't we shoot that? Somebody tell me why we didn't shoot that!" when it's her job to call action.
9. Watching the 1st AD try to get the lead dog to bark by getting on all fours and making growling sounds
10. Participating in the ongoing joke of everyone shouting "Still rolling!" because for whatever reason we almost never cut between takes.
11. Having a new sound mixer come fill in on the last day and take room tone... and seeing everyone simultaneously realize that the first guy did not once take room tone throughout the entire shoot.
12. The day we shot the epilogue which calls for several Australian Shepard puppies being put up for adoption, so we put an ad out on Craigslist to borrow puppies. Sure enough, some dude drove a bunch of cute fluffy puppies to set and generated a lot of distractions because everyone wanted to pick them up... our lead actress even adopted one!
13. Buying the entire crew "second meal" by making the world's most epic late-night In n' Out run:



34 BUGERS AND FRIES PLZ

14. Stopping by a Taco Bell drive-thru on this same run to get a vegetarian option, but the line was so long we waited about 10 minutes before realizing we had to get back to set. Unfortunately, by that point about 4-5 other cars had lined up behind us. So the Production Coordinator and I got out and went up to each of their windows and said there was an emergency and we had to get out of the line. We looked official because we were still wearing our walkie head-sets. One guy even asked me, "Are you with the police??" And sure enough the four cars backed out for us. It was a magnificently choreographed feat that almost ended in a fight breaking out between two cars.
15. The point at which we needed one dog to bark to make the lead dog bark, but in order to make that dog bark we needed a third dog to make him bark. So in all we had a chain reaction of three dogs barking at each other.
16. Hearing Judd Nelson say that this film was a sign he should go into retirement. 
17. Unwinding after a long 13-15 hour day of shooting by joining the crew in the bed of the grip truck and drinking beer.

You can sort of paint the picture from there. I'm trying not to be too sprawling with my explanations because I had a feeling that this would be a beefy blog, so I'll try to wrap things up.

So beefy. So bloggy.

What I really want to pen down is my learning experiences from this project. Yes, let's all gather around the campfire and have a come-to-Jesus moment about learning and partaking in "invaluable opportunities." I'm sure we'll all feel better that way.

Shit I Learned from this Project

1. Name dropping is a snowball effect leading to success. You tell a casting agent, "So-and-So is attached to the project," and then they're more inclined to pass it on to their client Such-and-Such. And then you've got both So-and-So and Such-and-Such on the project, so the next agent will be even more likely to recommend it to their client Shake-and-Bake.
2. Always over-budget. Not that I didn't know this before, but I've never seen an aftermath quite so disasterous. It would have been funny if it hadn't involved my paycheck.
3. On set, food is politics. The food you serve your crew is a symbol of how much you appreciate them. Oh, and if you serve them all the same so-so food and then go off and get something better for yourself during lunch break, don't be confused when people think you're a total D-bag.
4. Some actors are total divas when they haven't earned the right to be.
5. Some actors are total divas when they have earned the right to be.
6. Some actors are not at all divas even when they have earned the right to be.
7. Lying is an inevitability in this industry; the true deal-maker is the tact with which you do it
8. Always ask for stuff. Sometimes people give it to you even though you have no reason to ask for it in the first place.
9. In that vein, keep track of how much money people owe you. Most of them are not nice enough to simply give you what you're due.
10. TRULY, the only difference between working on a feature and a short is the length of time you spend doing it. Everything else is pretty much the same.
11. For all the disgusting corruption that exists in making a movie, there are also plenty of people who will have your back and truly think like a team.
12. Being an Associate Producer means absolutely nothing.
13. Always get room tone!

OH AND bonus lesson: don't tell your boss you're planning on quitting unless you're prepared for that to be your last day. I formally quit working for this production company last Tuesday but agreed to stay on until late June. Perfect, just enough time for me to start putting out feelers and resumes, right? Well, it would have been, until I got a call Saturday morning saying that a new girl would be starting immediately and I didn't need to come in Monday.

COOL

SUPER COOL

COOLER THAN  A CUCUMBER

COOLER THAN THIS ICE CUBE

COOLER THAN THE PACIFIC

Yep, so I'm alternating between sending out resumes and twiddling my thumbs these days, and doing my share of pity-pleas for work while I'm basking in #funemployment. But you want to know something awesome? While this job may have taken an extraordinary emotional toll on me, sucked away my energy and social life, paid me atrociously little, and not even left me with a good reference... I worked at a production company for a year!

That's a major foot in the door with lining up another assisting gig! So yay. Yay for life being mysterious and challenging. Still rolling.