It Isn't Funny

The story under this one is actually painful to tell, so it's going to unfold in a series of bulletpoints/snapshots (without pictures)

- We set up shop at the rooftop pool/bar at the Westin Canal and ordered everything we could think of to eat, drink and smoke (cigarettes are like $10 a pack from room service).

- There was a difference of opinion at a restaurant between members of the art department that continued out onto the street outside Storyville Restaurant and created a rift that still exists today.

- On the final day of shooting, the production company was unable to locate any members of the art department, and panicked family members back in Virginia by calling and reporting them missing.

- At check-out, there was great confusion and discussion over whose responsibility an $800 room service bill should be.

- During the journey back from New Orleans, a routine police stop included the phrase "I've gotten a lot of calls about this vehicle." One member of the art department vomited during the police stop. No tickets were issued and the driver's breathalyzer reading was 0.0.

And none of this is funny.

You can't handle the truth

The truth is, I hired these guys because they're bad, not in spite of it. I knew we were heading out of town, out of state, working outside of our field, probably with a wealth of potential for graft, debauchery and general moral debasement, as well as fine dining and beverages.

At the time, I was enjoying a beverage on occasion. Kevin's a prolific boozehound and troubleboy Jason, well, he's that classic combination of fucked-up childhood, poor self esteem and pharmacologically enhanced mental derangement. It's a recipe for plenty to go wrong. Or right. Or both.

August in New Orleans is hot. It feels like a steam hose is spraying you in the face at 8 am. By 9pm, one is coated in salt residue from dried sweat that has reconstituted many times over. We'd wrap, go back to the hotel to shower, and head out for dinner before the kitchens closed, usually 10pm. Finished by 11:30 or so, we'd head into the city to walk dinner off.

About night three, we ventured into a strip club, and this is probably the point things became untenable.

The Battle of New Orleans

Standing in a phone booth in the parking lot of of the Lewes Liquor store, it sounded a little shady, but in all honesty, about half of the things people say to me at the beginning of a job sound that way. People call me to find things they can't find themselves, or to oversee a situation they know is going to get out of control and they'd rather not get their hands dirty.

The guy was telling me that the job was in New Orleans, it involved a motorcycle chase, there was already a stunt coordinator on board, and he and I would set the whole scene up, then, he, the voice on the phone, would swoop in and direct the thing. Pretty straighforward.

I'm going to need a couple guys I said. I always say that because it's always true, especially if I'm going to be so far from all regular sources for things. Everything's harder on the road.

He paused, well you can probably bring one, at a hundred, maybe $150 a day. I let him know that I was going to need technicians that I know and trust and their rates were way above that. And I need two of them. Lemme get back to ya, he said.

I should have been excited, hell, it sounds like a paid vacation on the heels of my regular vacation. but I didn't like it- it wasn't a movie or a TV show, it was an "Introduction Video" for a new CEO of a big computer company to be shown at its annual meeting in New Orleans. It was an Event, a dirty word in my biz. These guys are known to be sketchy, unaccountable, prone to stiff you on the bill if you're not careful...

When he called me back, he had changed his tune: you can bring two guys, we'll fly you down.. What about our tools I interrupted? It was agreed we would rent a minivan, pack it with gear and ride down a day early. This was probably my first mistake.

My second was hiring a guy I'll call Jason. This guy had been my protege a while back, by which I mean he pestered me into hiring him, volunteering on a pay-less indie film until I owed him a favor and got him into the union and onto a big movie. Now his true nature was coming out more: lazy, surly, drugged and drunken and quite possibly mentally ill. But on the plus side, he was available.

So he, myself and the great white shark, Kevin Quick, piled into a rented minivan and drove 18 hours into the heart of darkness, the city that stews in its own crapulence and where corpses wash into the streets when there's a heavy rain, you guessed it..New Orleans.

(part 2 coming soon)

The reel story

So here's what happened: I went to an open call for a Pepsi commercial near Bristol, TN while I was living a post-college arrested adolescence/self-imposed exile. I had always wanted to work in the film business, but had no idea how to get started.

After a half-dozen call-backs, I was cast as "guy on motorcycle". Director Michael Ritchie(!) told me I was the only guy in Tennessee without a moustache, and probably would have given me a speaking part if I had a SAG card. The shoot was three days, and my part was on day 1.
[here's the :30 version, which has no motorcycle guy]

Walking onto the set in the pre-dawn haze, I felt it instantly, the energy of a shooting set. I knew that I was in the right place. Everywhere, a busy army of guys and girls with headsets on were scurrying around. I want to do that, I told the 1st AD, who had kindly befriended me. No you don't he said. That's the worst job there is.

But I wouldn't listen. I got hired as a PA for the additional days that I wasn't shooting. My duties included yelling "Quiet!", looking for people (sample assignment: the radio would crackle, "yeah, there's a girl in yellow named Becky, we need her at camera" so you'd go to every girl in yellow and say are you Becky? and they would all say why, yes I am...

But then the job was over, and the trucks pulled out, and I was left wondering, where is the next commercial going to shoot, the answer of course is: not here.

Years later, I was living in Crystal City, and I saw a '64 Plymouth Fury painted like a DC cop car parked at a warehouse across the street from my apartment. I figured it was a prop for America's most Wanted, knowing that the show was based in Bethesda.

I circled the block on my bike, scoping out the situation. I read the parking passes
in the windshields, sorta stalking them. When a lone figure wallked walked across the lot, I rode up to her and broke into the bit; excuse me, I said, are you with forrest gump? The person, a blond lady with a slight smile said, yes, I'm the art director.

I introduced myself, told her I had experience as a PA and pointed up to the building across the street. I live right there, I said, so you have to hire me. Surely there's a job too dirty or boring for everyone else, and it's almost impossible for me to be late. She thought that was funny and referred me to Willis who does the hiring.


This is where the trail goes cold: to begin with, Willis was never there. It became clear that this otherwise anonymous warehouse in crystal city was the wardrobe, set dressing, props and construction departments, and in my subsequent trips into it in search of Willis, I met most of the staff: production designer rick carter, propmaster ian kelly, leadman polarbear shaw and his band of happy set dressers, including but not limited to the affable billy alford.

When I finally met Willis, he said he couldn't hire me unless he'd worked with me, or if someone he knew had worked with me. Then he asked for my resume. I didn't have one.....with me I said. Willis dismissed me into the ether to fetch my papers, but not before waving a stack of resumes at me and saying these are the people ahead of you who want a job.

Broken but not beaten, I went to Kinko's to construct a history of association with entertainment that could be construed as previous employment. For example, I had been in bands, and carried my own gear. That made me a roadie, or, better yet a
stagehand/ technician. And so on.

Then I printed it onto the brightest florescent orange papaer I could find, the kind that hurts your eyes. I took it back to Willis' lair, but of course he was gone. I put my one page novel of mostly non-fiction on his desk, then grabbed a post-it and wrote- Willis, hire this guy! and signed it -E.

Then I did what seemed like the most logical thing- went for a long bike ride. Upon my return there was a message from Willis that said something like you lucky bastard- the art director says she can use a guy to help her, and asked for you by name.

So there. Glamour and glitz. My team cleaned out the reflecting pool so Tom Hanks and Robin Penn Wright could jump in and meet in the middle. I got my brother Chris hired for a couple weeks, but he was too smart to stick with the film business.

Not me.

Freakily Asked Questions

1: How did you get started in movies?



I've been asked this so much that I've stopped telling the real story because it's too long. When I was working on Minority Report, Sammy Steward and I were approached by a reporter who asked us about working on the Speilberg project. His article described our "studied non-chalance" and "casual mastery".

Hey buddy, I don't have to study nonchalance- I've got it down. As for casual mastery, when you're in the art department, people can ask you for anything. I've had directors ask if I have a streetlight. The casualness I've mastered is in not looking suprised, not stammerring, and not spitting out a profanity-laden sarcasm bomb.

2: What exactly do you do?

It's like a game show- the rules are that someone can ask you for anything, and you have to figure out how, when and where to aquire, find, steal, alter, construct, fabricate or do without the items in question. It's also yourjob to know how much it would cost, and how many days you'll need to complete the list.

I get tired of the easy ones, like making a school look like a school. Plane crash on water is much more fun....


or Revolutionary War battle scene, complete with smoldering ruins...



3: Do you meet/ party with/ hang out with the stars?

Star avoidance is a keen art. They're called stars for a reason- get too close, you'll get sucked into their gravity and burn up. Best to view them like everyone elso, in a darkened theatre. Actors are trying to do a job, a difficult one at that, and don't need more distractions.

We'll discuss this further at another time...

Dad works at night (sometimes)

Rolling up 95, I was really unsure what the first venue would be like. It's been a long time since I'd been to a punk rock show in a church basement. Last time was 1992, when Ad-roc and I went to Florida avenue to catch Circus Lupus, Trenchmouth (from Chicago) Tsunami, and some other band that we missed. It was an earnest affair, 5 bucks at the door, earplugs optional, Trenchmouth an amazing blur of polyrythmnic noise-core mixed with odd melodic wanderings. But that was then. Philly was now.
For reasons that remain obscure, there is no parking in the entire city. Until you finally pay for a lot, then there's an open spot right in front of the address you've been circling. That's one thing that makes philly so weird.

If you believe random things have meaning, what would you make of the following: a flyer taped to a pole that reads:" IF YOU WERE SENT HERE TO FIND SOMEONE- IT'S A SCAM! YOU ARE NOT A SECRET AGENT!" I was too dumbstruck to even snap a photo.

The First Unitarian church is a block-long monolith with stinky ginko trees in front of it. We shuffled down and in to the basement. Dudes were setting up, and we made contact with our guys. They gave us the skinny, we scoped it out and yada yada, the lights went down.

I climbed the stage left PA tower while Bentley crouched on the stage right stairs and fought a fistful of elbowy still photogs. Once The Dillinger Escape Plan came on, the place exploded.

Bobby's grumpy

Normally, a key part of my job is avoiding actors. Not just for the sake of job preservation by maintaining distance from the focus of attention, but also because the mechanics of what the art department does dovetails with the actor's job. When we're finished with the set, they bring on the actors.

But the relationship between the us and the director is the exact opposite. It needs to be open, cordial, frank, clear, and nearly constant. We are his hands as he paints his canvas. He'll call our name a hundred times in one day. I learned a decade ago to watch the director's eyes, body language, tone of voice, to search for clues as to what else he's thinking, and therefore, probably going to ask for.

So when George Clooney glides onto a set, and a palpable hum settles over the set, I'm immune to it. I'm watching everything that's not an actor: the flowers, the tables, the chairs, the paintings. If he bumps into me, I'll say excuse me, if he says good morning, I'll repeat it, but there will be no meaningful exchange.

But when Robert Deniro is the director, I get a little tingle when he steps up to the monitor and starts barking out orders to the extras. He yelled at the extras to put down their drinks. You can go to Mc Donald's when you leave here he roared. Nice. Welcome to Bobby D's acting camp.

I kept hearing that voice while not looking at him, and it takes a second to remember that's your boss telling you to do something. I would get lost listening to the timbre and tone and not hear what he was saying. Not very professional, I suppose. But hey, c'mon Bobby, who wouldn't?

Besides, we were busting our ass on this show. To begin with, on our prep day, it rained like a flood out of the old testament. And since this is a period piece, we
have to change everything: the street signs, meters, cars, even the lines on the road.
I kept three raincoats on constant rotation. When one got soaked through, I hung it on a wardrobe rack we rigged up in the back of our truck. Fortunately, I had the best help an art department can get, a pair of rock solid set dressers who can keep a good attitude in the face of insurmountable conditions, as long as lunch is good, which it always is.

As wrap was called, and everybody wanted a piece of Bobby, he walked right toward me, as if to say thanks, good job, see ya. As it turned out, his driver had pulled up on the curb behind me, so moving my way was coincidence. I told him thanks for bringing the show to DC. He grinned in a way I hadn't seen the whole shoot and said, sure, you got it.