Lights! Camera! Pumpkin Log!

November 21, 2014

(Hey, kids — it’s time for a double-dose of science. And not just science, but Secondhand SCIENCE.

Since last we danced, we’ve learned about enantiomers and quantum fluctuation. Double whammy. Science whammy. Double SCIENCE. Mind blown.)

In case anyone’s noticed my absence here for the past couple of weeks — and don’t worry; no one has — I’ve got what I consider a fairly reasonable excuse: I’m shooting a movie.

Well. That’s not exactly true. Other people are actually shooting the movie. Like, competent people who definitely aren’t me and who know how to work a boom mic and light a scene and which end of the camera to look through. All of which is terribly useful when you want to shoot a movie. Or so I understand.

I did co-write the script, though, with my good friend Jenn. She makes movies — or watches other people make movies, though I suspect it’s often both — on a fairly regular basis, but this is my first real “shoot”, from a vantage point somewhere behind the camera. Or in the next room. Or ordering lunch. As one does, when the competent adults are making movies nearby.

“It’s gonna be a helluva weekend.”

(In fairness, I did participate in another of Jenn’s projects a couple of years ago, Viral Video. But I only acted in that. I can’t take any credit for anything that happened beforehand leading to the production of that gem.

Nor can I be held legally responsible. I checked. So that’s nice.)

I’m co-doing other things for this movie, besides writing — but since I’ve never been involved in a shoot, I don’t know what they are, exactly. One might be producing. Or directing. One is definitely lunch-ordering. And I’m holding out for co-head-gaffering. I’ll have to ask Jenn.

Unless that would be co-depending. I’m pretty sure we have people for that already.

Anyway. I think this is going to be a really fantastic, funny film. But we’re still shooting it, so there’s a lot left to do. And several lunches to order. One guy is gluten-free, and we’ve got some vegetarians. So it’s hard work, people.

In the meantime, the production has had it’s fair share of surprises. Like the pumpkin log, which was never in the script, but has somehow become a crucial star of the show. Soon enough, it’ll have its own trailer and probably a makeup artist for when its icing gets smushed.

Or the milk crate/hot seat of an apparently tiny mafia client-slash-victim. Tequila shot dessert rounds. Easily-exhausted attack kitties. Emergency window treatment repair. And the grim subtle joy at the thought of a Toledo Two-Hander.

And that’s just the first half, give or take. In the morning, we’re making magic — or some magic-resembling facsimile — happen again. It’s gonna be a helluva weekend.