Drunks, Day 1: The Lay of The Land

The Bar
First days of shoots are always hard for me. It was especially difficult this day because I was directing a film I didn't write. Normally, I'm on the set with all the knowledge in the world that I know every line inside and out. Well, not always, but you get my point. I read the script a couple of times, but didn't commit it to memory like I should have.

Our shoot began May 27th. The bar we got to occupy was great. Had lots of character and all sorts of things to work with. But then, it also had stuff we needed to get around. Like the light coming from the windows. Fortunately, my trusty, creative cinematographer, Hank, was on the scene. We also had the help of Sky, an up and coming camera operator that Theo & Hope, two other filmmakers, discovered. Theo and I stay in very regular contact. As a matter of fact, Theo and Hope are both in this film. Greg, who worked on the now defunct "road" movie, also came on to crew. He ended up with a non speaking roll after the highly amusing barfly that Mike, the actor/producer, had originally given the roll to failed to show up.

Mike, left, and Theo

The bartender who came to let us in, Melissa, showed up about an hour late, but then let us stay an hour later to finish. We were shooting from 10AM to 2PM, but ended up there till 3PM. Once inside, Melissa was very helpful and gave us run of just about everything in the bar. She set up the counters and even went as far as to give us run of the taps to pour real beer.

Once we got set up, we ran through a few scenes, worked out a few details and tried to make up for the missing cast member with Greg. It was an adjustment with Greg since he's much bigger than the guy he was filling in for. The character was more for comic relief given the look of the original "actor". Greg still did great, even though I know he was a bit apprehensive.

Vicki, left and Hope

We rounded out the rest of the cast with Hope, a new actress named, Vicki, the bartender, Chris and an assortment of friends and relatives of Mike.

The first few hours ran slow. I was off my groove completely and was letting my lack of preparation really get to me. I hate to think I got a little nervous, but there were all these people in the bar. I've gotten use to getting things done with just a few people, counting actors. I think I'm just coming up with excuses for the plain and simple fact that I wasn't on the mark.

At least not until the second half of the shoot. We had a small stunt where one of the actors is suppose to fall back off a bar stool and hit the ground. The actor-slash-executive producer brought an inflatable mattress for the actor to fall on. We rehearsed the stunt several times, adjusting the mattress and doing anything we could to keep it from moving so that the actor, Theo, wouldn't break his neck and head. The stunt went off without a hitch and looks great on film.

After that we shot stuff with a guy named, Gerald, who we'd auditioned a while back during an open cattle call at a local mall. Gerald would play our bouncer. He's tall, over 6 feet. Just a big guy. He made short work of the drunks and threw them out into the street.

We wrapped the day with Theo and Mike being tossed into the street and playing it up hardcore. Mike threw himself into a parking meter and Theo ran into my truck, falling into the bed and then out of it with lots of comic edge. It was fantastic.

We didn't get as much accomplished as we thought, but I felt good after we were done.

Little did we know what would await us next.

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