The Bet (or The Fall of Love) - Part 3 - Tell Them It's a Dream Sequence

I had some problems shooting that film.  I was having trouble with the crew.  I'd select a certain camera set up, and the crew would argue with me, saying that if we shot the film this way or that it wouldn't cut.  So I told Orson (Welles) this and he simply told me, 'Tell them it's a dream sequence.'  So I did that, and the crew starts to fall over themselves to help me.

- Henry Jaglom  on advice he got from Orson Welles


We used to joke that the two jobs that newbies can do on set without much experience are PA and director.  That is not entirely true, as production assistants must know walkie procedure, lock-up procedure, and more, but I've seen those skills picked up pretty quickly.

The director part is another matter altogether.

In Hollywood, writers are sometimes allowed to direct their own films, actors are given their shot, and that turns out just fine in some cases.  People with no film directing background like Nora Ephron often hit home runs right out of the box.  The rule of thumb is that the keys to a first-time director succeeding are a good First AD and a good Director of Photography.

In all of the arts, we shroud certain positions in mystery so as to deter the faint of heart from attempting to conquer them.  Directing successfully involves many challenges, high among them the suspension of disbelief, not only of the audience, but of the cast and crew.  Beyond actually being able to direct, you must look like you are able to direct.  Remember, on low budget indie sets, much of your crew is made up of aspiring directors, and each of them is silently (we hope) measuring you up to see if you are up to the challenge, or if they could do it better.

Over the years, one of my priorities as a First AD or line producer for a first-time feature director is to make sure they look good on set.  A crew will work harder and give more when they feel they are part of something special, and that the director knows what he or she is doing.

Why should it matter to the crew?  They are getting paid, and, after all, aren't they working for the director?   The answer, of course, is that in a perfect world, it shouldn't matter, and they should automatically be there to support the director, but since cast and crew are made up of human beings, they need to be motivated to do their best.

Nothing is worse than that moment when the cast and crew start to question the director.  You see it in little things, like an actor questioning playing a scene a certain way, or a DP making a face when the director asks him to set up a shot a certain way.  It's an attitude that spreads like a virus on set, and it does nobody any good.

It's why I can often be seen whispering in the ear of the director, literally.  I was working with a first-time director on a short once where the director was having a really hard time getting what he wanted out of an actor.  I made an excuse to get the director off set for a moment, and made a suggestion.  The director, a really good-hearted guy, shouts out, "That's a great idea!  Why don't you tell him.  You can explain it better."  He was being genuine, but I wish I could have put my hand over his mouth.  I didn't need the pat on the back, and I didn't need everyone to know it was my idea.  I would have much preferred if they thought it was his idea.

I've said it often; someone is gonna direct, and if the director doesn't do it, someone will.  Sometimes its the lead actor, or the DP, but someone will.

So it came to be that the First Triumvirate was formed on the set of The Bet, with considerable more success and much less blood than the first First Triumvirate.  This union was formed out of necessity, and it was one that made Adam, the director, very happy, even though he was often only an adviser to the ruling parties.

Adam was about 70 at the time, and his experience directing included a few stage plays and radio plays.  At the outset, he would stage the scenes much as you would a stage play, with the actors playing to a non-existent Fourth Wall.  This led to the problem of how JR could actually shoot this and have it work in a cinema.  It would mean playing many of the scenes in long, talky masters, with odd angles for coverage.

Adam's joy came from working with the actors, from discussing motivation and giving extensive background on the plot and the characters.  This is great for table reads and rehearsals during prep, but really time-consuming on set.  Still, it was Adam's money, and it was what made him happy.  What Adam did not enjoy was discussions of coverage.  This is how the First Triumvirate was formed, first unofficially, and, eventually, pretty overtly.

JR, Christine (the script supervisor) and I would discuss the scene.  I would block it so that JR could shoot it, JR would come up with the best angles, with Christine laying out the coverage.  While we were doing this, Adam could talk to the actors to his heart's content.  He actually seemed relieved that everything just seemed to be working so smoothly around him.

Everyone got used to the arrangement, although I insisted there were certain boundaries we would not cross.  We were shooting on 35mm film, and exposing more film than needed is costly.  Adam had a habit of getting so caught up in watching the scene that he would forget to call cut.  He asked me if I would do it, and I thought that was going a bit too far, so I would tap him on the shoulder for action and cut.  That worked out pretty well.

I have to point out this was a strange and unique situation, and it's not something I've ever done since nor is it something I would recommend or condone.  The pure AD in me still cringes as I write this, because it strays into territory dangerously close to disrespecting the director.  In this case, the director was also the producer, and he was funding the film with his own money, and allowing him to go through all of his money and not make the movie or have a movie that wouldn't cut was not a very good option, either.

Plus, we had the advantage Orson Welles mentioned earlier, in that we had a number of dream sequences.  The lead character agrees to be imprisoned for ten years in order to collect on a bet, and he begins to hallucinate.  He dreams of many things, often of his girlfriend Violet in, among other things, angel wings.

No, she isn't naked there - it's a good costume -  but many of his dreams about her are carnal in nature, including wondering what she is doing with other men.  All of this is pretty much in a PG sort of way, as the sensuality is more suggested than shown.

Lest you think the director was a feeble, silly old man, he wasn't.  He was very sharp on other matters, a successfully published author and authority on literature.  This process served him well, and given that JR and our crew had worked so long together, it kept the ship running pretty smoothly.

This blog is far from the only one to share movie set war stories, and the key to war stories are the brushes with near disaster, and not like that fabled army report of "all quiet on the Western front."  What many of us don't remember is that the disastrous days are the exceptions, that if we are doing our jobs, most days the work gets done, and gets done properly.  There is little fun in regaling others in tales of work days when you shoot the call sheet with little problems. (OK, ADs love these stories, because it shows how sharp we are. "We shot 7 2/8 pages today and picked up some inserts!"  These are the little things that make us happy geeks)

A  majority of our days on The Bet went very well, which was good for The Bet if not as entertaining in the telling.  It was as if all of the bad luck we had on Lucky Stiffs was our debt paid, and we were collecting with relatively smooth sailing on The Bet.  If we were not exactly making great art, we were, to quote Shelly Winters from her complaint to Stan years earlier, making the schedule.(First, You Have To Make The Movie - Stan's Guest Blog))

Things were running pretty smoothly on set, while most of the drama was unfolding off-set.  More on that in the next post.

The Bet (or The Fall of Love) - Part 1- Who Could Ask For Anything More?

Days can be sunny,
With never a sigh;
Don't need what money can buy.
Birds in the trees sing
Their dayful of song,
Why shouldn't we sing along?
I'm chipper all the day,
Happy with my lot.
How do I get that way? Look at what I've got.

"I Got Rhythm (Who Could Ask for  Anything More)"
George Gershwin




JR and I were sitting at the screening of The Bet, and one phrase stuck in our head; "What would you do for $40 Million Dollars?"

It stuck in our head because it was intoned by the voice over in the trailer in a deep, pretentious and ominous tone, almost a parody of screen voice overs.

"What would you do for FORTY...MILLION...DOLLARS?"

How did it all start?

It was August of 1992, and JR called me.  We had a gig.

Wait.  Does this sound familiar?  It's August, and JR contacts me and we have a gig for the Fall?  Starts in September?  Preps in Late August?  (Un)Lucky Stiffs - Part 1 - Bringing Up Baby

There are differences this time.  We are still working with JR's basic crew, though we have a new AC; Lorelei is not available.  Jeff and Russell, our gaffer and key grip, respectively, are on board.  JR, Stacey and I have dinner, and we talk about Stacey coming on as 2nd AD.  There is no doubt she is a good fit and can handle the job. Done.

This time, Stan and his coordinator, Dianne,  will be coming on board from the beginning.  This makes a world of difference.  This was JR and my third movie together, and we had done a PSA in between, and now we knew that production had our back.

The film was written and would be directed by a man named Adam, who lived on a nice-sized estate in the New Paultz region of Upstate New York.  We took a tour of his estate, along with his wife, Isabella, before bringing the rest of the crew with us.  Almost all of the movie could be shot on the estate; Adam had written it that way.

For an AD, this is heaven.  No pedestrians or traffic to lock off.  We control sound.  Complete cooperation from the people who own the property.  Ample area for art department to work.  No mass company moves.  Equipment will be easily and securely stored at night, meaning the 2nd AD was not stuck there forever.

Adam and Isabella were a charming older couple, Adam being 70 at the time.  He was an educator and widely published author, president of a society dedicated to the study of a well-known author, and expert in a number of areas of literature.  In our first meeting, I felt like this was someone who I could talk with endlessly, especially since we shared an interest in the author Joseph Conrad, in fact, the screen adaptation of Conrad's Lord Jim is on my short list of favorite films.    The better known Conrad adaptation, of course, is Apocolypse Now, loosely adapted from his Heart of Darkness. We shared a love of theater; he had written and directed a number of plays.  We shared a background and respect for radio; this and two other works of his had been performed as radio plays.

I remember heading back in the car to NYC from that first meeting thinking how idyllic and wonderful this shoot would be.  The cast and crew would have to be housed nearby, but I couldn't imagine that would be difficult.  Stan and Dianne had done some research and I had promised to come up and search out hotels or motels soon.

We would hire most of our PAs locally to save the cost of housing, and the art department were a boyfriend/girlfriend who were local.    We met Rick and Lorrie during our first trip, and they had already begun work on the project.  From the first meeting to the end of the shoot, it seemed that any time I saw Lorrie, she was in the middle of  working hard, dusting herself off from something she was either crafting or painting.  Effort was not going to be a problem with this art department.

Culling the best from everything we did, we brought Matt, the director of Lucky Stiffs, on board as the editor of this project, and he did a bang-up job.

We added some new people to our usual crew, some who would stick with us for shoots to come.  I sat in on the interviews with Stan and Dianne - they both were involved in the interviews.  As previously stated in talking about Stan and Dianne, Dianne was much more than his coordinator.  She was a trusted partner who offered a sounding board for Stan, and she could disagree with him when he wasn't seeing something.  This was later something I sought to surround myself with, either in my immediate support staff, or in a person in the position of "assistant to" the producers, or sometimes both.

This was part of my training as a producer or line producer.  Over the course of time, you will be called on to make many decisions, sometimes simultaneously.  We all bring our collective experiences and observations - more commonly known as our baggage - with us wherever we go.  It's good to have someone you can trust who is there to let you not follow your instincts when those instincts will lead you to mistakes.  The thing you will find about "yes people" is that when something goes wrong, they are nowhere to be found.

As an interviewer, Stan was a male Barbara Walters, chatting with potential crew members in a fashion that put them at ease, so he could get them to reveal more about themselves.  The resume pretty much tells you what they have done; the interview is to discover who they are.

Some of the new people included a bawdy make-up artist named Vera; of  "good Nordic stock", as she would say, Vera was a woman who was friendly and flirty and confident, blonde and statuesque.  She embodied what I would later look for in a make-up artist; which is this: any make-up artist I hire should be able to apply make-up well, it's the basic.  What most people don't recognize is that the make-up artist is  pretty much the first person cast deals with when they report to work.  If they had a good night or a bad night, if they felt good about the upcoming scene or not, if they had a pimple or scar that had chosen the worse time to appear, it's the make-up artists who is going be told first.

I want a make-up artist who can be the actor's confidante, but also know when to cut the conversation and get them on set.  They should be able to make the actor feel great.  They should also know how to protect the actor from the craziness of production, without making the first team PA (the PA with the responsibility of delivering actors to set) or 2nd AD the enemy.

Vera did all of this, and more.  She was my smiling face when I walked in the door, she would make sure my day started out well.  I felt like I was special to Vera, like she really cared for my well-being just a little more than everyone else.  Her magic, of course, was that everyone felt this way.

Vera would become a usual suspect.

We hired a local stage manager named Jane to be the 2nd 2nd AD.  I love me my stage managers, and having someone local was a good thing, someone who knew the area and could take care of things when we were away.

In today's budgets, the AD department is too often given the short end of the stick, and the importance of a 2nd 2nd, a good key PA, are lost.  If producers find the money for a good 1st AD, they then think that anyone can be thrown in as 2nd AD, and 2nd 2nd and Key PA seem like luxuries to them.  There is a reason there is an AD department, and the AD can no more do their job without a good staff than a Gaffer would want to work without a trusted Best Boy.

Another one of JR's sound people, Larry, came on as recordist, and he brought a young, virile kid named Chris as his boom operator.  The significance of this will become clear later.

Christine, our incredible script supervisor, doubled as wardrobe supervisor, with the costumes designed mostly by the art department.  Christine heading the wardrobe department while doing script may seem strange, but she requested it.  She had started her career in wardrobe, so she was more than qualified, and this gave her more creative input.  Her creative contribution in other areas would be even greater as filming went along.

Her assistant in wardrobe was a pleasant, pretty young girl named Sonya.

The script is based on a short story of the same name by Anton Chekhov, which has actually had a few screen adaptations, usually as shorts.  The best well-known one may be this one with Robert Prosky.



This script adapted the story to America.  The basic story line is this; at a costume party, a wealthy businessman makes a wager with a young law student that he will not be able to spend ten years in prison, and if he can, he will get $10 million, which can balloon to the aforementioned $40 million with investments .  This means the young law student must risk losing his pianist girlfriend.  There is a mix of fantasy and reality, and a reversal of fortune.  For a small film, there were lots of elaborate costumes and special effects, and we all wanted to make sure the look was realistic and not cheesy.

I was one of the few members of our regular crew that was married, but Maureen understood perfectly that there would be times the job would take me away on business.  As Adam was older, we didn't try and shoot six day weeks, as we often did to save money.  This meant I was home for the weekends.

We weren't working 9 to 5, but this was about as close to being on a gig came to being a "normal" job.

Fall is a lovely time in areas like New Paultz.  It has some of the feel of a college town, so there are the newly arriving freshman.  The smell of the Fall always brings me back to my early days at NYU, walking through campus.   The estate was beautiful, and there would eventually be the turning of the leaves, that slight chill in the air that took away the oppressiveness of August humidity.

For NY crews, shoots like this can be a little like summer camp, for better and for worse.   You have to stay on top of them a little bit more because it's too easy to become complacent and relaxed and distracted.  Oh, look, isn't that deer nice?  Look, his doe is following him, how cute.

Hey, we're working here, okay?

In the back of my mind, I knew this was something to keep an eye on.  Still, with everything we had going for us, it seemed manageable, and, after all, this crew always worked hard while still being able to have fun.

Peaceful surroundings, nice people to work for, our usual suspects and some promising new members as crew.  Who could ask for anything more?

When JB Met JR - Part 2 - Through the Walls and Over the Bridges

Walls and Bridges was my first feature as a First AD, and it held its share of challenges.  For what would become the norm rather than the exception, I was working with a first-time director, Uzo, who previously had established himself as a talented print art director.

Some films push the envelope; Walls and Bridges didn't even have an envelope.  The story revolved around a successful African-American commercial artist who has a moral dilemma around the work he is doing with his clients.  He confides in a young White nun who works at a youth center. They fall in love, she leaves the Church and they get married.  His family does not approve, and complications ensue.  At one point, when she is in the hospital and pregnant,  they get into an argument and he hits her.  It isn't in any way indicative of their relationship, but if you want to challenge an audience, have the Black husband hit his pregnant White wife who left the Order to be with him.

Many of the scenes were highly-charged, and I still remember trying to calm a hospital administrator who asked what the scene was about while we were working in a vacant wing not far from a working wing of the hospital.

"Screaming?  Oh, yeah, she screams, but not for long.  Why? Um, they have a disagreement."

When dealing with locations, you try to be truthful, but deal in the truth they can handle.  We knew we wouldn't have a lot of takes of the blow-up before we would get shut down or at least severely restricted, so it was a rough day.

There were other rough days, like the night we were filming on a street corner in Harlem.  We had police assistance, but a crowd did gather around.  I had  the following conversation with a guy who came up to a corner we were blocking off to film a scene where the lead character, Trent, is shot.

HIM: "Hey, what are you guys doing?"
ME: "Just a little movie."
HIM:"Really?  How long are you going to be here?"

It turned out the corner we were filming on was "his office," as he described it.  I did the math quickly, and made a snap decision on what his business was.  I informed him that we would be there all night, accompanied by the police, and maybe he wanted to take the night off.  In the process of talking with him, I shook his hand, and put a $20 bill in it "for his inconvenience."  Did I have to do that?  No, but I found that you get more with honey than with vinegar, and $20 was a small price to pay for him walking away quietly.

He thanked me, and seemed to get it.  Then, he turned around, and said that he didn't like to take anything for free, and that he could give me $20 worth of what he was selling, and that maybe I would buy more?

Was he kidding?  No, I wasn't interested in buying drugs, but thanks very much, now go away.

He got really upset.  What did I think he was selling?  I told him I didn't know, but I probably didn't want it on me, and hey, I said jokingly, I'm working and don't indulge when I work.

"Hey, man, you think I sell drugs?  You think I'm some crack dealer?"  I assured him I didn't know what he was selling.  He proceeded to pull out a pocketful of small pieces of paper.  On each of them was a pre-paid telephone card code.  What he sold, you see, was stolen credit card numbers and stolen pre-paid phone card numbers (this was a big illegal business pre-cell phones, when people depended more on pay phones).

He emphatically made the point that he only sold these (albeit, stolen) card numbers, and would never consider selling drugs.  After a short speech about the evils of drugs and the pariahs drug dealers were in the community, he handed me two slips of paper.  "They're worth ten dollars each," he said angrily.  "I don't take no hand-outs."  With that, he walked away.

Got to admire a man with principles.

Later that night, we were rehearsing a scene where a gun is fired.  When we did the first run-thru with the prop gun, one of the onlookers behind the barricades yelled out, "damn, my piece is bigger than that."  How reassuring.

After some initial problems, we actually hit a good speed at one point in the shoot.  We had an incredible sound recordist named Bill Kozy, who, while he is still an excellent recordist today, also does quite a bit of theater and film acting work!

My favorite joke with Bill was that "sound isn't important in this scene."  We all have heard the lies that men tell women; two of the biggest lies told on set are "sound is not important in this scene," and "we'll fix it in post."  Those words are always said by people who will definitely be nowhere in sight when the problem comes up in post.  Bill was the first of many talented sound recordists I've worked with, and the difference that it makes in post is immeasurable.  One of the biggest things that hold up small indies is bad sound, and the cost of fixing it in post is so much more than taking the moment to get a wild track or get that room tone on set.  Bill was great at working with me to move on when we needed to move on, and to be insistent when that was needed.

Still, I got a great deal of pleasure out of playing with him and telling him that sound was not important in a given scene, where he would make a sheepish face and say, "aw, don't say that JB."

The other lie, that "we will fix it in post" is told to the script supervisor.  I dare say that there are "gorilla filmmakers" (I HATE that term - more on that in later blog post) that have never dealt with or understood the value of a good script supervisor.  The job of the script supervisor is both creative and clerical, big picture and minute.

Of course, when it isn't "fixed" in post, and a character's scar moves from one side of his face to the other, or the cigarette he is smoking magically gets longer, it is the script supervisor who is left cringing at the screening.

We had an exceptional script supervisor, Christine Gee.  Christine went on to work on numerous projects - she was the script supervisor for the run of The Sopranos, among others.  She also taught script supervising at Brooklyn College.

Christine often functioned in an unofficial role as den mother; always available for help when needed, a source of encouragement, and also, when needed, a stern voice of reason.

Christine was the first to point out that we were shooting too many entrances and exits that would later get cut - she was correct.  This was part of the big picture.  I think it was during discussion with her that JR, or someone, referred to the film as "Entrances and Exits."

When we shot those entrances and exits, though, Christine knew every detail.   Remember that we were shooting film, so we had no instant dailies.  One day someone gave the address of an adjacent house as one number, and Christine said it was a different number.  "I can check my notes, "Christine said," but I don't have to.  I know its (this number)."  The other person wasn't so sure, and wanted to bet on it.  Christine was sure.  When dailies came back and her instinct was confirmed, she didn't gloat - just quietly put her hand out for the bet to be paid.

Small picture.  We didn't question her very often after that.

My time on that film, and others to come, made me something of a traditionalist.  In a digital indie film world now where jobs can overlap departments and directors sometimes don't even realize what each position does, (I am so sick of seeing notices for an AD/script supervisor - they are totally different jobs!) I was fortunate to work with a great staff and crew on modestly-funded projects.

The next blog post will finish the story of Walls and Bridges, with a lesson in one of the unpleasant parts of production.

(N.B.  As I post this today, it is Christine Gee's birthday, so, for the first time, I will make this the Christine Gee Tribute Post.  Happy Birthday Christine!)