'Skipping Ahead' Short Film Shoot

Earlier in June, Neil and I had gone to see Sean McCracken, in a 10 Minute Play Festival.  We saw about seven different 10 Minute Plays and we were immediately captured by the play that McCracken and another girl performed.  So when Sean came to Neil telling him he wanted to film the play/scene, Neil was in.  When Sean's scene partner fell-through, I jumped into the role with open arms!

We had a couple rehearsals to put together an idea of what we wanted to do for filming, and tightened the script so it would run smoothly.  We discussed costume changes, locations, and any other details that needed to be worked out.  Sean had found a great park to film in, Lacy Park in San Marino/Pasadena, Neil had the camera, we had nine scenes to do, with nine different costume changes, and the script was ready for us to rock.

When we got to the park on that Friday afternoon it was kid central (as any park is going to be) so we finally found a bench that was further away from the play area, that was shaded by a nice big tree, and we prepped everything for our first shot about an hour after arriving.  Little did we realize why Production blocks off a whole street when they're filming something because the people walking into the shot, or talking loudly, the kids running by and playing in the trees were all stuff that would have been avoided.  Unfortunately, we can't stop the planes and helicopters from flying overhead or the wind that rustles the trees for minutes on end.  So we'd have to stop and start but I think we all handled it really well and certainly made us all far more patient that day!

First day of shooting...'Maybe we should skip ahead some more!'

A few hours into the shoot, Neil's camera died, but we were able to work around that by having him charge the battery at an electrical wall while McCracken and I changed wardrobe and rehearsed the next scene.  The only other thing that could stop us was that the light changed after being there for five hours.  It was the end of day one and we had done six of the scenes and we had saved all the emotional stuff for our last day of filming.

From happy to angry in seconds...oops ;)

We shot the last three scenes earlier in the morning a few days later and this was where all of our emotions were coming into play.  We had a huge fight scene, a very sad scene, and the opening scene.  I had to get emotional and teary-eyed which actually came fairly easy for a bunch of the takes but by the end of the day, I was all dried up.  Thank goodness we were done after two hours because I had nothing else to give!

Neil did a great job directing us and giving us ideas to play with and change around.  Not only was he the director but he also was editing the entire video and had hours of footage to go through for this 10 minute short.  It was fun to work with McCracken and joke around on-set.  I was able to play all these different characters and felt like Kate Hudson from How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days.  There was a lot of Method Acting going on for me, which means I pull from personal emotions and memories to live currently in that moment; especially on our second day of shooting.  We also used the Meisner Technique which allows quick responses spontaneously with what you're saying in that present moment.

Now we're just waiting on the final finished product and I'll be really excited to share that with everyone :)