A Good Habit

So I was walking to work this morning and I passed this park just off 9th Ave. and there on the court was this nun in full habit and Jordans shooting hoops.



Nothing but net.

You Shoulda Seen It!

So I was walking to work this morning and I passed this group of Con Ed workers doing something in the street. Well, this one guy had a metal pipe saw and was cutting steel pipe. And whenever he leaned in to it there was this amazing shower of crimson and sulphur-colored sparks! I didn't feel like taking off my back pack to take a picture but here's kind of what it looked like. It was unbelievable!

Sunday Night, Must Be Time To Dance!

After 13 hours by myself in the editing room up on 55th Street I needed a little human intercourse. Alright, who's snickering back there?!

We were shooting one of the biggest scenes of the show tonight, a club scene that opens the movie. There are dancing girls, all our male stars, scores of club patrons, etc.



The club is on the 20th floor of a building down on 5th Ave. and 27th. The club also has a roof garden. A scene will be shot there tomorrow night but there's predicted rain and wind so I'm not sure how that's gonna go. But the view is unreal. The Empire State Building loom huge and high.


Back inside, Marius set up a long Scorcese-like Steadicam shot following the dancing girls winding their way through the kitchen and finally arriving on stage as the club's owner (Valentin) reads a half-hearted birthday greeting to the assembled revelers. Big set-up. Took four hours before even one take was tried.


After a couple hours of this tedium I'd had a sufficient amount of human intercourse -- alright, who is that?! Who's laughing?! Where are you?!

Aaaaaannd...ACTION!

How Many Syllables Is That?

As you all know, every evening the crew gets a "call sheet" for the next day's work. it tells them where to be, what time to be there, and what's going to be shot - so everyone can be properly prepared. It also tells you where the nearest hospital is, police stations, subways, etc.

But something I love about our call sheets is that, if you look closely at the upper right hand corner, you'll see the daily weather forecast...


It's a haiku. They give us the weather every day as a haiku. The AD Dept. being funny.

Love Is Blue, Part Two, or Up, Up and Away...

Shot today at Chelsea Piers. Chelsea Piers is many things. Shops. Restaurants. Piers. But also it is sound stages. LAW & ORDER shoots here. Clumb-Clumb...! Not sure which one. There's 17 of them now, you know. Clumb-Clumb...! That's the sound LAW & ORDER makes. Clumb-Clumb...!


When in New York, it's not uncommon to hear someone say, "Meet me at 23rd and 'Law & Order'".

Not really. But it could happen.

So yesterday we shot on the ice rink at Chelsea Piers and in a stage at Chelsea Piers.


Above is 1st AD David Cluck. He's thinking something. I don't know what he's thinking. I look psychic to you?

The movie follows the romantic misadventures of three couples. Today's shooting revolved around Igor and Nastia, which is a Russian diminutive for Anastasia. As you know, in Russia diminutives are everything. They're like currency. I was once at dinner with friends in Moscow, and this guy made me a list, right there at the table of - no kidding - over forty possible diminutives for the name Yulia, which is kind of like Julia to us. More than forty!


So in an effort to woo Nastia, Igor takes his object of affection on a hot air balloon ride over NYC. I'm not sure that's legal. You know, air space restrictions and all. But it's a romantic comedy so he does it.

So since shooting a lovely hot air balloon ride over New York is out of the question, the only way to do it is with VFX. So we're on the blue screen stage.



DP Irek Hartowicz is a master at shooting VFX plates. In HITLER KAPUT! his blue screen/green screen elements bonded with the backgrounds as though the entire thing were shot live and in-camera.


It truly is an art. In this case, Irek has to create lighting that looks like it's actually outdoors one lovely afternoon high over New York. Try it sometime. It's not easy.

Anyhoo, here's Marius and script supervisor Oleynka looking at the monitors:


And here's a guy shooting the hot air balloon basket from a high perch:


And here again are Igor and Nastia in the basket:


And here's Marion Douglas all tired and Irek not:


And now I have to go to work. No picture for that.

I Can't. I Won't.

They're building these 10,000 story apartment towers next door. I could never live in one. It's not that I don't trust the engineering. I do. I seriously do. No modern skyscraper has just collapsed of its own accord. It just doesn't happen. But still. Can't. Won't.


She's helping build it.

Coming Soon To A Theater Near You...Finally

January 23rd in Theaters. April 28 on DVD & Blu-Ray.

That's Debatable

So one of my best friends in the world lives in Maplewood, New Jersey with his wife and two sons. His name is also David. He and I and Mark used to live together here in NYC back in the 80's. We had a place on 65th Street. Front apartment, first floor. David would cook mostaccioli and clam sauce and we'd open the windows and blare the Chairman of the Board into the night.

So last night I grabbed a cab and punched my way through Times Square and finally to Penn Station. Object: Maplewood. Mark was already there. And there was debatin' to watch.

At the station you buy your ticket then wait for the track to be posted. When the number comes up the people jump into motion and surge for the door.


And then there's always Desperate Straggler...


Half an hour after trundling along in the dark the train pulls in to Maplewood. It's probably quite beautiful. It's definitely quiet. Which is a welcome change.



David and his family live in a warm house on a beautiful tree-lined street. We had mostaccioli and clam sauce then settled in to watch the debate. Mark sat in a chair.


Thus spake Barack...


After the debatin' was done I had to see David's Sanctum Sanctorum. Up in the attic, a small room filled with books and energy.




I slept on the sofa but was awakened by the four-month old puppy, Tonks, bounding on to the couch.


Pre-dawn conversation in traditionally hushed tones occupied the kitchen as David made tortillas.


Tonks bolted through the house chomping on animal, vegetable and mineral. Until David and his son, Dominic, took her for a walk.


I like these Guatemalan things. Actually, I'm not sure if they're Guatemalan. And I don't know what they are.


Oh, and Barack kicked ass last night.

Takin' It To The Streets

Haven't got much time to elucidate, pontificate, explainacate. So here's a few photos and captions.


Director of Photography Irek Hartowicz considers the situation on 46th Street.


Olenyka the Script Supervisor "listens" to the video assist operator.


The green poster in the background, the one for a production of "Waiting For Godot", that very poster is now framed and hanging in my editing room. It's not a real production. But in the movie, a couple of the main characters go to this really bad off-Broadway show. And that's it.


We cluttered the curbs and sidewalks on 46th Street.


But then the show moved to Broadway and 51st just north of Times Square.


Most film crews are single-mindedly preoccupied with one thing and one thing only; am I getting the proper number of hours off before the next call? Here, Video Assist Guy studied the "one-line" schedule in pursuit of the answer to this very question.


Meanwhile, the three male leads are doing a scene in which they stride resolutely up Broadway...


...and speak enthusiastically.


Later, Marius got the guys to record "wild" lines, lines that I will use in another scene.

Okay, gotta go.

Who Are We?

Every day when I see what the McCain campaign is saying and doing I get heartsick. They are not Americans. They do not believe in traditional American values.

To fully catalog how the Republican Party and its amoral, cynical leaders are chipping away at all the things we treasure as Americans would take volumes and volumes. The sheer, shameless contempt the right wing has for the people of this country is astonishing to consider. But it's there. It's there in the pernicious, feckless race-baiting, the whisper campaign designed to scare you away from voting for a black man, the lies, the anti-intellectualism, the base appeals to the darkest sides of our nature...

It's disgusting. And it's saddening. And it's how the right wing of this country wants to discredit rational thought and science and individual ambition. Because a plutocracy can't thrive with an educated public. And if the American public once again allows itself to be ruled by fear, dragged ever more into the shadows of fascism then we will be able to point to now -- to right now -- as the moment when we decided to sacrifice America on the altar of hate.

Never before has there been a moment of greater importance for the future of ourselves and for our country. We stand at a crossroads at which we must choose the light or choose darkness.

It really is that simple.

Shagadelic

So I'm getting new carpet. They slop on this green glop which dries clear and tacky in about .5 seconds. Then they deal out the carpet tiles like playing cards. This is the pattern:


What do you think?