The new movie

Today we loaded into our hero location in a Beverly Hills canyon estate. We're living thereRight away you could see the electrics have gone way over on everything. Too many lights.
They have EIGHT road runner stands... Three six Ks, three 4Ks, two nine light maxis, two twelve light maxis, one head cart full of open face units: mighties and redheads.\The best boy is running the entire rig on a 1200 amp shock block, even when we're nowhere near the pool. He has a 4-riser Avenger stand, you know, the one that takes an 18K 24 feet high... Too insane. He's got it for the whole time we're here.

THE PROBLEM IS, it's not working. And it's not going to work. Just by the end of today, our last day of prep (we hit the button at 11am) Monday morning - shooting call. Fuck. he hadn't even finished his rig. Only the 4/0 was down. No subfeeders. He has no lights headed up. No power run anywhere near the set we're supposed to start on Monday. Ha! How do you like that?

For myself I had a really good day. There were just three of us grips, but we totally pre-rigged the first two sets. I got spreaders up, points, saftey cables dangling. Just waiting there. I rolled the carts over, set up the set crates, loaded the stapler... I'm lucky because I have two great young union grips, who I'm down with. They're glad to be working. The town is a little slow. I split my kit rental between them, so their rate wouldn't be so horrendous. The hammers are getting $150/hr.

(I just heard a gun go off, very close to here - and someone yelled)

I got deep into rigging the first set today. It was great. I had it to myself. I hung 12X 12 solids, a velvety, fire-proof black cloth very neatly and straight, covering the walls of the room. Just the parts of the room which we don't see actually see in the first master shot. I've gotten really into being a key grip (for now - you know) . I rocked out the last feature I completed as key grip. It was good work I did, and sealed with a kiss. I know my shit, and I know how to kiss. So now on this picture, I'm going to do this blackout. I came up with a system for all the locations. It's kind of a gag, but it rocks.
Fabric. I like it. It's become my favorite part of gripology. Rags and cloth. I love solid blacks. It's great for lighting. There are no unwanted reflections from the camera side on the set... No weird color tempertaure shifts off of wall paper. It makes perfect sense. I heard about grips doing it on big-budget TV shows. the D.P. would have every inch of the set that was not in the shot, covered in black cloth.
Because then you really light from darkness. Like etching. One pours black ink and gel onto a tablet, and draws on it with a needle. So today I got to do it for the first time. I planned to do it on this movie, and rented a bunch of extra rags, and a 5' wide bolt of duvatyn. We're going black. Black is beautiful.
And the cloth does more, it's actually better for sound. Of course. The room is not as bright. The cloth - man. I'm putting my mark on this job with it. I feel emotionally connected to it.
My theory - that I'm testing on this job is that the set will function differently, with that environment. Everyone will behave more professionaly - more somthing. I want to see. The D.P. is already thrilled. I didn't even explain to him my theory about the effect of draping the entire work environment in black cloth will actually have on people.

I think we're in trouble on this job. I had that room prepped and rigged, and the art department had production make us take it down so they could dress the set. I hadn't covered the part of the set that was in shot, but Anna the production designer wanted the weekend to sample different fabrics for curtains. And that makes sense. The only problem is that the set will not be ready until call time on Monday. She had five guys from the art department building another set on the same property today, but she hadn't dressed the first set that would be up on Monday.

I felt a little bit concerned about the lack of visible progress on preparing the set for the first shot up. The first shot of a film with a difficult loaction and an ambitious schedule. And nothing was done. Nothing was done, except I'd covered all the walls with black cloth, and staged my set crates and set tools. I had a couple of apple boxes, a screw gun. The shit that's always needed to inch the production along.

I felt concerned about what we little we had - going into the first day of photography. So I went to talk to the gaffer. I wanted to get an idea of what he planned to do. What lamps he was going to use. What I really wanted to know was why he wasn't getting it going on, but you can't ask that sort of thing. If that's already happening on the first day - o fuck - then you just quit. Take a dive, fake an injury. Skulk off. Over a five week feature it will turn into Rwanda. I've had it happen too many times. You have to make love not war.

So I asked Tommy what he was up to. And he said what the gaffer always says: That he can't just light the air, that he needs a set with furniture, and especially with practical lamps, which will be seen in the shot, and thus are the motivation for the placement of incandescent lights. And all that shit we do. And he's right, but we're still fucked. So he ain't lit! is what he means. And that means it has to be done on monday morning, when EVERYONE is there. There's going to be 50 people there, and 30 of them have never set foot on the property before. It's just not a good time to tie up the set with ladders, and technicians carrying shit through doorways. It should have fucking been done today. and I'm not happy.

The best boy electric came to me tonight, and said it would be at least an hour on Monday before power could even reach set. He said he needed to finish his rig of main 4/0 feeders around the estate. He wanted it to be perfect before he energized it... makes sense right. just like everyone else. He's not going to be ready.

So the fucking art department made me de-rig the room. Fucking stupid. I went to the designer, as polite as I could, asked when she could have the set dressed, just so we could go through steps 3, 4, 5, 6 t infity. just so I could re-do my shit. Monday's going to be a clusterfuck, and the electrics are already complaining that they're not ready because they didn't get enough rigging days. They've already got their excuse. What crap. They're kids. The gaffer is a few years out of AFI's cinematography program. He worked as a camera operator on a reality show for a year. H's always on his cell phone. Styling mothercucker. He doesn't even know the schedule. I had him come look at the first shot with me. Talk about lighting. He didn't even know if the first scene was day or night. He hasn't read the schedule. What a hack. The sad thing is he will make everybody wait. The actors, the director... A lot of togother together people who came to work on time with their fucking pants on.

And most fucking especially, he's going to make my day longer. My poor dog at home. All anybody wants is to make the day and go home. It's a five week feature.

So like I said. At the end of our load-in/prep day, the best boy juicer told me that he would needed at least an hour to cable to set on Monday morning. I don't know why he even told me. He should have told the first A.D., or maybe his boss, the gaffer. On my way to the pass-van that shuttles us back to the parking lot (EIGHT miles away - the other cluster-fuck of this show), I went to see the 1st a.d, my buddy Brian o'Sullivan from Boston, who is a great guy, and got me the job. And I told him what the juicers told me. And his face went white.

I'm going to hit it hard this weekend.

love

vincenzo