Oooo...K

I guess there is no such thing as a smooth shoot. I'm sure there are different degrees of not-quite-smooth, but any filmmaker must have spent at least a night or two lying awake, trying to figure out a way to solve a problem. The history of cinema has countless examples. In fact, I invite you to comment on this post with examples. I'd just start the ball rolling with "Bladerunner."



So, back to my story... due to family and work commitments Gabrielle Reidy, our wonderful actress, would only be available to shoot from the 30 July for a brief period, before going to Croatia and Belfast to shoot a new HBO series about the building of the Titanic. I'm trying to say this with nonchalance, but I'm actually so proud of her I'm bouncing around like tennis ball. Gabrielle is not only one of the two protagonists of "Fallen," but also a great friend of mine and I'm super happy about her new HBO gig. She's a truly amazing actress... watch her and see.

My window of time in which to shoot "Fallen" got a little smaller when I got an email from Kieron Jecchinis saying he would start rehearsals for a new play on 1st August. That means I have 30 and 31 July to make the short. It wouldn't be too bad if it wasn't that we needed 3 days to make it work because Kieron's character has a beard for half of the film and for the second half he's clean shaven. The beard pretty much dictated the shooting logistics. But now I have to do it in 2 days... so... how do I? Well at 1.45am this morning I had my eureka moment and realised I could incorporate the shaving of the beard into the story. Not only that, but I could make that happen at the beginning (both in terms of story's time line and in shooting order) and that would allow us to shoot over 2 days, simplifying the logistics. This with no damage to the story. On the contrary, it actually highlights some time changes which otherwise would have seemed too ambiguous or confusing.

So there we go, first problem solved. In my next post I'll tell you more about wardrobe issues...