Several moments occurred which I thought I'd share, as it seems people in the world of teh intarwebs can usually use a laugh.
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First, I'm working with a moderately well-known child actor from the Memphis area. This story about him is from the last movie we shot (a zombie film, back in April).
We were trying to figure out how to make the kid look gross, and we put some sort of epoxy on his face to look like rotting flesh. It didn't work, so we had to try to remove it. That stuff was like super-glue, and held fast.
The producer was gingerly scraping at the kid's chin, trying to get the little hanger-on pieces of the dried goop off, and the kid said, "Hey...be careful! Don't mess me up!"
After a couple more minutes, he said, "Don't mess up my skin! I have to film with [REALLY well-known film star] soon!"
I laughed, because he sounded like SUCH a little diva. I mean, he's around 12 years old. Come ON, you know?
He heard me laugh and turned around, and in a completely condescending tone of voice, he asked, "Do you even KNOW who [REALLY well-known film star] IS?!"
That totally broke me up...I laughed and told him I had NO idea who the actor was, and had never seen any of his movies, because I was not only sheltered, but I was also just born yesterday.
The sarcasm kind of escaped him, but I think he got the point that I did, indeed, know who the actor was, and he returned to having his face scraped.
Funny kid. :-)
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Saturday, we're working on a short film that a friend of the director's had written, and it involved a "friendly giant" who had passed out in a field. He's discovered by our child actor, and they talk and hang for a bit. Well, our friendly giant is a black 6'7" former basketball player. He's a BIG guy (not fat...BIG).
Well, as I mentioned, the giant is discovered passed out in a field by a small child. So we spent 2 hours filming the sequence where the giant is discovered, then helped up, by our child actor.
Let me mention now that our entire film crew is white. This is an important detail. Also, we were in Mississippi.
People stopped to ask us if we were alright a few times, because there were no cars on-set, so it probably looked like we were a bunch of eccentric drifters.
One man, however, stopped our kid-wrangler to ask her if "that man" was okay. Oh, we knew who he was talking about.
Now, look at this photo:
All that scene needs is some white hoods.
Am I wrong? MISSISSIPPI, people!
So that was fun. Especially when a Sheriff stopped by to see if we needed any help. :-P
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Today we were filming at a gas station. One of the crew and I were sitting on one of the concrete steps that surrounded a gas pump, and a larger black woman came over to us as we watched filming occurring in a phone booth about 25 feet away.
"Whatchy'all doin'?"
I answered, "Making a short film."
She stared at me so long I wondered if she had heard me at all.
"What? Y'all makin' a sandwich?"
I answered her again, and added that we were an independent film company. She stared at me a while longer, and then went over to her car, presumably to tell them we were making a movie about a sandwich.
You can't make this stuff up, folks.
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