When you are working on a studio stage, and you have those big doors closed, it makes it easier to keep things quiet. Put the crew on the bell, holler "Rolling", and people switch to their quiet voices. When you are on set, and location is downtown L.A., on a Sunday morning, you might think it wouldn't get too noisy, but you would be wrong on this day. Seems that the production company making Transformers was shooting some aerial footage, using a couple of Huey Choppers and a camera helicopter. They decided that shooting over downtown, near city hall, which is where we were shooting Standoff, was the perfect place.

No matter how loud your bell is, it is no match for two U.S. Army Huey Choppers. They did the same thing we were doing, and that was take after take, the little camera chopper shifting location each time to get a different view of the Army Craft. At one point, the director called cut, and watched the sky action until he could get enough quiet to shoot his own scene. The flight path that the choppers used took them over the city hall, but also west of city hall, thus giving us time to get some shots in. To the right, you can see L.A. City Hall at about 6:00, which is when I got there. To the left, you can see the choppers over the distant buildings (though they appear more distant than they really are). Just to the left of the two bigger dots (the Hueys) is a smaller and harder to see dot that is the little camera chopper.

In front of City Hall is a power pole with a sign on it. This sign (in the picture on the left) has some of the history of L.A. City Hall, including the fact (noted in an older newsletter) that this was the tallest building in L.A. at the time Superman (the TV show) was shot, and became the visual image of the Daily Planet.

It also cover some of the scandals that hung over L.A. In 1937, the home of Clifford Clinton was bombed. Clifford was on a crusade to clean up the corruption in City Hall and the Police Dept. In 1938, Harry Raymond, a private investigator working with Clifford survived the bombing of his car. Later two L.A. police officers were convicted of the bombing, and the Mayor Frank Shaw was removed from office by a special recall election. He was linked to vice rackets in L.A.

It cool what you can learn when you are standing around set.

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Shark
Sept. 21, 2006
Episode: In the Grasp
20^th Century Fox

This was an exercise in watching other actors and seeing the way they worked. James Woods will tell stories and jokes, and chat between shots, but when it comes time to shoot, he hits his marks and gets his lines. Now, it likely helps that Mr. Woods has been around for a while, but I just get the feeling he likes to tell entertain. Something a lot of us actors are guilty of.

In another scene, there were three actors, a witness, a prosecutor and the defense lawyer, and each had a different way of prepping for the scene. The one that interested me most was the witness, who was going to have to be emotional, on the verge of crying. Between shots, she stayed quite and, sometimes, went over her lines. She didn't interact with the other actors as much in this scene as she did in the earlier one, where her character had no lines and only reacted to things happening on the stand.

Just before each take, she would withdraw into herself, and would say something that was totally inaudible, as if turning on the emotion switch. Her face would set into a distressed look, and her breath would become unsteady. By the time the Director called action, she would be there. Vulnerable and scared. Worked every time.

I saw Jessica do the same type of thing in acting class, when she had to respond to bad news in a scene, and was truly impressed to see how completely devastated she looked, as the tears flowed.

That's the nice thing about background work. If you pay attention, you can learn an awful lot.

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Standoff
Sept. 24, 2006
Episode: One Shot Stop
Location: Downtown City Hall

Last Thursday and Friday, I was an Upper Level L.A. County Sheriff on this show. On Tuesday last, I returned to do it again, but there had been a mix-up with what they needed and who was called. My being there was a mistake, and I ended up having the day off (though I did get a job out of it. More on that with another report). Ten days later I was back on the set in the same role.

On Friday 22nd, I got a call from Mandy asking if I could work Standoff for a Sunday shoot, and I said yes, which explains why I was at City Hall at 6:30 in the AM. After a breakfast, I dressed as the Sheriff again, and headed to set with Donald, who reprised his role as the Upper Level L.A.P.D officer. We were going to shoot the second press conference in this episode, which I was hoping for, because in this scene, that meant being on the platform with the principals when the action happens.

The action is that one of the characters gets shot during the press conference.

When they set up the shot, they had to place us, and I worked hard to end up behind the actor whose character get hit. There was a scene shot before the one we were going to be in, and the actor walks down the steps to the platform, and up to the podium. They had not really given us final places, and three of us were standing at the back of the platform. The AD came up and told us to stay there, and when the actor comes down, shake his hand and follow him onto the platform. Needless to say, when the actor got down to us, I put my hand out there first and did the shaking. When he moved to the podium, I closed in behind him and just to the right, staying up on one stair. My fellow Sheriff stood to my right and Gina Torres stepped in front and to the right of me. I had all kind of possible camera exposure on this one, and best of all, when we moved the shot around to the speech, I was left where I chose to stand.

I was now standing 6 feet behind and to the right of the actor who gets shot.

When I did Las Vegas some time back, I was on set when one of the characters was shot, but not as close as I was this time. They handed out earplugs that were cut in half to make them easier to hide in the ear, and warned us that this was going to be noisy. We walked through the shot, and on the line, “We won.”, the actor hears the Director say “Bang”, and drops. We all respond to the pandemonium, though the first time through, Gina Torres, looks down and says, “Oh, Darn!”. I guess some people were more shaken up than others.

On the day (a phrase that gets used a lot on set, meaning, of course, when we shoot) we were reminded that this would be loud, and as the shot taken (by the bad guy) is at quite a distance, we don't hear a gun shot, so we are not supposed to react to the sound, but to the actor falling to the ground.

The cameras roll, background and action are called and the speech culminates with, “We won.”

BANG!

If you have never stood behind an explosive charge, and the noise factor had only been described , and not actually experienced, and a spray of red powered die was more that you might have expected, you will not totally appreciate the moment. My reaction, though completely natural, was way overboard. Or to put it another way, if the guy had actually been shot, I might not have reacted any different. When the take was over, three (count them 3) different production people came over to make sure I was all right, while the actor lay on the mat on the ground. I suspect that take may make a blooper reel. Sigh.

In the following many takes, I had a chance to show that I could, indeed, respond as desired. The good guy is hit, the star kneels down next to him, I help direct the spitting image double of L.A.'s Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa out of harms way, and manage to stay near the principals at all times. Heroic and camera ready at all times. That's my motto.

Living the dream.

Phil...

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“24”
September 28, 06
Episodes: Hour 5 – 6, and Hour 6 – 7
Location: “24's” Secret Studios in Chatsworth

Yes it's true. Jack Bauer has to save the day again! Thankfully, his contract was renewed and he's back on the job. And this season, I may be along for the ride. Just a few weeks back, I responded to a call for background picture picks for a US Air Force General, and was the only one sent in for the interview. The Background co-coordinator liked what he saw and so did the 1^st AD, so I was in. A week later, I was on the set of “24” dressed as a general and medaled up nicely.

I was hired to do the part of a general who would be seen on a monitor, waiting to talk to the President of the United States. I might have gotten some face time, but the director noticed that the actor who would actually be talking on the monitor next to mine was also dress as military (though of a lesser rank), so he pulled me out of the little set I was on (just a desk and some shelfs on the wall behind me). Another background actor was put in my seat, and I walked out of the room, wondering what would become of me. Turns out that they needed someone at the table with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and some of the cabinet. As I am wearing the insignia of a Joint Chief of Staff, it all worked out nicely. Even more so, because I am now sitting just one seat removed from the President.

The set we are on is cool. It took three months to build, and looks real. There are walls of poured concrete, and the thing looks like it was built in the sixty's. The walls of poured concrete are really just plywood, and other materials, and yet you wouldn't know without rapping your knuckles on them. Because this is where the President and his staff will be for much of the show, I will be there with them if all works out, and should get a fair amount of work out of the show.

All I have to do is hope that Jack Bauer doesn't solve the case too quickly, but then the show is called “24”, so it ought to be good for 24 episodes. Now I just have to hope I am not one of the many casualties that mount up on this show, and seeing as they have killed off one President, and jailed his replacement, a simple four star general would not stand in the way of writers if they decided that a noble sacrifice was needed. Maybe I could convince them that the Navy could do with fewer Admirals. One can plan, can't one?