Day 8: A Delicate, Introspective, Beautiful Day

Could I be any more blessed?! It was such an honor to have Elizabeth Griffin and Zachary Griffin on set today. It was a joyful experience to have two of the people who inspire me, make my life possible, and inspired the making of this movie, join us on set, and meet our stars. And Alex Terzieff did more amazing work today. Alex is the best of fight choreographers for film and television. We met years and years (I don’t want to even tell you how many) and years ago. We’ve crewed together on many films, and he was a fighter and fight choreographer for me on "West of Redemption", among many other shows. If I had to describe the man, I would quote Madeleine L'Engle, and say that "he is like resilient pewter". Gentle, sweet, open-hearted human, plus absolute badass fighter and teacher of other fighters. All the film world hopes to hire him, and we have him right here in Washington State! You’d think on a day I gush about my fight guy, that I would discuss some intense action sequence. But, I’m not - instead, I want to tell you about the quiet, heartfelt intensity of our film set. Some days are full of sound and fury, but other days are about silent, focused concentration; bringing to light so much truth and beauty that I have to keep a box of tissues handy. Then, the whole place gets absolutely silent. When you see a quiet scene in a movie, you might imagine that it would be simple to film, with very little talking, and probably simple blocking. But, the truth is, those quiet scenes reveal not just the power of the talent and glory of the actors on screen; they also reveal the intense focus of many, many other individuals; the watching crew, feeding their supportive energy into that quiet. Crouched behind cameras, or tucked into corners, stacked three deep in a tiny space behind a light or monitor, or holding an eight-foot long boom mic overhead - silently, without shaking, without moving, without a rustle - for the length of the scene. All their energies silently focused on the work of the 2 actors in front of the camera. Which can be undone by, say, the loud rattle of frozen peas (remember Jean Harlowe’s string of pearls in Singing in the Rain?) or the creak of a wooden table. Normal, everyday sounds that you would never notice in real life, in film, can tear an audience’s attention away from the story and straight to the prop or set piece. Not what we want! So, the crew jumps into action. Today, the Props, Set Dec, and Sound departments leapt to the rescue, muffling the egregious groans of our wooden kitchen table. Now, in the final cut, the audience won’t be distracted by the cracking of old wood. The audience is free to focus on the cracking open of the human heart. Pictures: Larry and Carol, Lisa B. Hammond, (who was at that moment engaged in muffling the loud table with Bob Martz), Alex and Randy, Camera Friends, P.A. friends, the inevitable Carlos and Ryan stand-in shot, and lastly, Annabel Clark and the wondrous Suzanne Bouchard, in a funny scene with our leads (most welcome, after a day in which our female lead sobbed for most of the day; and most of us with her) - God bless her!).