Int:
A windowless office, lined with movie posters and movie props.

After tempting fate for months by spending weekends in a warehouse with no heat and standing in the snow, the weather breaks, and of course, now I get sick.  I’m miserable.  My head feels like it’s been overinflated, and my eyes won’t quit watering from the sinus pressure and my ears feel like they’re stuffed with cotton.   It probably didn’t help that I stayed up way too late last night tweaking Summer, but oh well.

So this past weekend we were shooting the interiors for winter.  It turned out to be trickier that I expected.  I wanted to use as much natural light as possible, but turns out, when you have windows that are boarded up, and slathered in blood, that cuts down the amount of light quite a bit.

Saturday we had to dress the set before we could start shooting.  It didn’t take anywhere near as long as I expected it to, and after about an hour and a half, we were all set up and ready to go.  It needed to have that neglected lived in look.  And after all the weekends I’ve been gone doing this, I’m an expert on that subject.   Just picked up enough to prove people live there, or as an old friend of mine (A.J.) would say: “Clean enough to be healthy, messy enough to be happy.”

I think Julian had it worst of all.  It was warm this past weekend, and he’s in some pretty heavy duty snow gear, so I know he was sweating his ass off both days. It seems like if I’m not freezing my cast, I’m cooking them.  But he’s a quiet kinda guy, so absolutely zero complaints.  And then there was the shots with him eating breakfast.  I quit counting after ten, but I’m pretty sure that he’ll never want frosted flakes again.  Ever.  Take after take, he dutifully sold the shot, and took a bite or two; sometimes with condensed milk, sometimes with regular milk.  I’m glad he doesn’t have a lactose intolerance.  By the time we’re done shooting that scene, most of the box is gone.  Karen has a huge cooking pan that she’s been dumping the cereal into between takes.  It’s nearly full.

Of all the things I”ve seen while filming this, somehow, that pan filled with soggy nasty cornflakes is the most gross. (grossest?  I don’t know what the correct grammar is here, so I’ll just finish this thought by stating that writing the blog is funner ;))

After hours of shooting the bedroom scene, we finally get to the kitchen scene.  It’s a long scene, so I’m expecting it to take a while.  We set up, get ready to roll, and then block out the scene.  Now Julian must eat cold ravioli from a can.  Somehow he’s gained 5 lbs. in one shooting day, but he’s managed to sweat off three.  He’s a trooper throughout.  Not a single complaint.  It’s pretty hard to not like Julian.  When he shows up, he shows up to work.

We wrap the days shooting, and while stuff is being packed up outside, I stand and play catch with Clark, Mandy and Julian.  These are great people.  Mandy is the perfect stage mom.  She knows when to pop in, and she knows when to get out of the way.  On Sunday she brings lunch for everybody.  Julian somehow managed to eat.  I’m sure he wasn’t too hungry though.

So we’re down to the last bits.   We have one day of shooting for Fall that requires no cast, and two, maybe three days for Winter and we’re home.  It’s a satisfying feeling.  I’m sure we’ll have some small reshoots to do, and the occasional pick-up shot and insert shot, but we’re almost there.

It’s also a little sad that this journey has nearly come to an end.