Day One

It begins.

I should back up for just a second to mention that, on my way down to the Village, where the first day of shooting was, well, shooting, I passed a gas station. It struck me because it seemed weird.


Lukoil is a Russian company. About as Russian a Russian company as there is. So to just happen upon a Lukoil gas station here in the west Village seemed unusual and providential. Do with this what you will.


So the first day is about a scene in which two of our playas bring home several members of a visiting Russian volleyball team with the intention of, well, scoring some goals. But alas, when the games begin the men discover to their horror that their...equipment... isn't working.

Below are Marius (far right) and most of the cast of today's scenes.


The girls playing the assorted members of the volleyball team are Russian non-actors, cast here in New York for their obvious attributes. In all, they're doing a great job.


One of the three male leads is Alexei Chadov. He's one of the biggest stars in Russia. Think Keanu Reeves but good.


The apartment standing in for the character's apartment is actually the home of Ed Bennet. Ed owned VH-1 at one time. The place is stunning. It had to be dressed down a bit to make it appropriate as the home of a dentist. In the basement is a recording studio.


Among others, Annie Lennox has recorded here.


Back upstairs, work proceeded apace. The volleyball girls loitered.




Although I think to loiter you have to be standing up.

One interesting anecdote... In the scene, a couple of the girls are shooting video of themselves using one their phone cameras. The screen on the flip phone just has a green patch where the video will be added later in VFX. But no one could decide quite how to shoot this. So I suggested just using the video feature on my little digital Elph camera. Irek the DP was amused by the idea...


But finally, that's exactly what we did. So when you see the movie and you see one of the girls showing the video to another character, the video was shot with my little still camera.


I'm not entirely sure what Marius is so concerned about. It's gonna work.