Day two of this wonderful madness. Up at fuck o’clock and Marlon was late so I got to have a moment of stop before the van came in to get me. Then off. We have numbered and labelled all the tech now, even though it keeps changing. At one point I literally found myself volunteering to step in as a first assistant director, as this is the thing we are most visibly lacking. The information dissemination. Obviously I can’t come in as first now, and it would be weird. But I’m trying to streamline information dissemination by sending a million WhatsApp messages all the time forever. Nobody really knows when the shot is moving on unless they happen to be standing next to the director. He’s an auteur, beautifully artistic, but very used to working on his own and in a rarefied atmosphere. “Now just … just let the music carry you. Get lost in the music, and an m we will film you!” “That’s not the way it works through me.”
I’m at my usual coalface, quietly stopping things exploding before they become visible. Sometimes it’s impossible to avoid, like when the tech van was sent to an address over a mile from the shoot and then treated like the driver had fucked up.
It’s all made a little harder because I’m being micromanaged by the same person who sent the wrong address so if I even snatch a moment for a coffee after being pretty much the only person with no lunch break and knowing deeply and completely that there’s no way in hell anything is going to explode in the next ten minutes, I still get a call telling me I should move some fucking boxes. The call doesn’t come because I imminently need to move the boxes. No no. The call comes because they’re quick enough to notice I’ve gone off site, but slow enough to fail to understand that they can trust me to do more than my job. “The talent was incoming”. I knew where the talent was. I had plenty of time and time to spare. I needed a moment. I’m made of meat as well, and need to feed and use stimulants.
Which is why this blog might feel rushed. I’m home now and actually feeling very much reconciled and like this is a solid team. This blog is always just the record of a day. I think that the biggest lie of all is the myth of consistency. We change our minds all the time. It is only when we entrench that we start to become Rishi. But we are led to believe that it is somehow shameful to change our minds. Nah. I shift my views with the tide and I hope I will until I die.
There’s an idea of consistency at the core of this. I like them all. They are all competent. We are a big team, working hard, making.
The hours are always long. I’m happy though, doing it. And if I’m moaning into my blog it’s partly because I have already taken sleepy medicine and then realised I’ve got to rush this fucker before I sink into this heavy and delightful cushion of dream that is already beckoning.
AlBarclay 