Sunday was our first day in the building where we'll be filming half
the shoot: Chaldea Studios. It was also my first day working in a real
studio in roughly a decade. The tempus, how it fugits.
Sunday was also a test of the basic production theory behind the
show. If we have enough time and preparation, so the theory goes, we can
film two to three sketches that share the same location, characters,
and costumes in a single day's filming. If the theory proved true, we
could turn one day's work into material for three separate episodes,
which would greatly amortize production costs and allow us to create far
more content for our dollar. If the theory proved false, well, we'd
have quite a mess.
The page count for this day was so daunting that I put it to lurk at
the end of our schedule. But COVID and production delays threw so many
wrenches into the gears that I had to reschedule the day in the earliest
weeks of the shoot. Which is how, on only our third day of production,
we came to attempt a 13-page day. While understaffed.
How to put this? In violent terms, the cast and crew killed it—absolutely killed it—ripping
through all 13 pages, getting full coverage in addition to alternate
reads and improvved bits, in only eight hours. Which is unheard of. I'm
still marveling a week later. The only comparable day I can recall is
when we knocked out the 8-minute character creation sequence from Dorkness Rising, but that was with a full crew, and it took us ten hours. Ridiculously flouncy hats off to you, folks.
Three down. Ten to go.
Christian was thrilled about shaving his head again
Gabe only had to run three departments this time. The slacker.
Fun fact: Shakespeare was proficient with a zweihander
You were the first Goonie
Monitoring the bullshit
When Maggie learned the day rate
Those are Elizabethan sunglasses. Totally period.
It's best if you don't know
I also make that face when actors pitch
I... I don't even know
Next up: zombie day, and then we're off for the rest of June. [Exeunt Update.]
