"Shave and a Haircut...16-bits"

Well, at least we warned everyone it was going to be a late night...
Friday August 17th was an evening rife with selfless sacrifice, great performances, and an overwhelming assortment of Clubman products.
We started with a very light crew...myself, Rebekah and Peter. Rich F. was kind enough to hop in his car and perform behind and in front of the camera, bringing a magical strangeness to the "weird guy in the background" character, The Professor. More than just a moving background object, these types of characters tend to be a difficult balance of un-obtrusive placement and subtle, almost subliminal movement (I wanted to use the term mise en scène really bad there, but I resisted...)
Speaking of placement, we filmed at Erik's Barber Shop. Erik was kind enough to provide us a key and full-access to his time-warp barbershop. When we first walked in there to set up, my first instinct was to sit down in one of the chrome-plated, red-vinyl cushioned seats, flip through a copy of Highlights magazine or 3-2-1 Contact, and wait for my "young man's haircut" to be completed by a smoking, fleet-fingered barber. The smell of talc and alcohol saturated aftershave invading my nostrils...the mesmerizing red and blue spiral of the spinning barbershop pole in the background as my hair clippings fall into view towards the floor...

But alas...we've got a movie to film. Great location. Sarah finally got to bring about the Attendant, bravely delivering perhaps the most difficult mini-monologues in the entire piece. The pen is a cruel, shameless beast, isn't it? Nevertheless, a job well done. Definitely a funny scene. Hopefully we got enough coverage as far as cuts of barber-shop details and minutia. So shiny...

Off to the warehouse. New England Network Group was kind enough to let us film in the loading dock/warehouse there in Salem (thanks Sarah!) Nice high ceilings, stacked piles of stuffy-stuffs, and the unexpected added bonus of the gentle patter of rain against the metal rooftop. A large enough space, we were able to block 3 separate "rooms" out of the existing layout. Brian and Stephen, once again, gave magnificent performances, jumping back in time (in terms of script-chronology) effortlessly. It almost makes me sick how talented these gentlemen are....sick to my stomach...

This was a very late night. We wrapped at 3am-ish, confident that we got what we needed. I couldn't have asked for a more dedicated team of pro's on this project, and I believe we'll have a film that we can all be proud of. We may even wrap this Sunday...right on schedule.

More later...
Mike