Screenwriter Blog #9 - Story 8/Scene 5/Sambuca - Story 9/Scene 3/Sony

For the entirety of the shoot I felt we had been very lucky with our locations. This may sound strange considering we had been kicked out of one and almost another, but that’s not what I’m talking about. We had been very fortunate to not have to deal with the bane of many a filmmaker - the public. No crowds of curious pedestrians. No police officers inquiring about permits. Nothing like that. While scouting locations, I had done my best to ensure this would be the case. I knew we would have enough to deal with without this extra burden. And, believe me, I know what I’m talking about. One of my first jobs as a PA entailed stopping regulars from entering a bar in South Boston. And then keeping them from making any fuss about it.

Sambuca was absolutely no different. In fact it was even better in some ways. Not only had Sambuca given us free reign in their restaurant, but the restaurant was actually shut down while we were shooting. We wouldn’t have to worry about keeping anyone from barging in. There was one catch, though. We had to be out by 3:00. No worries. Unlike some of the other constraints we had been put under, we knew well ahead of time what kind of schedule we were working with.

In fact, I really wasn’t worried at all today. This was primarily a dialogue driven scene, once again, with few setups. I felt really confident in Brandon and Nat’s abilities to carry the scene and I also felt really confident that, with our closed set, we would have no problems getting the shots we needed and wanted.

I felt we had some great material to work with, also. A really powerful scene. As you may have read in my previous blog, I hadn't always felt this way. I was feeling great now though.

As an addendum to the scene, we decided to include a portion where Nat and Sally could set the stage for their date. We had somewhat done so in scene 4, but felt the date still needed reinforcing. I called Sally and asked her to show up, saying she didn't need to arrive until the end of the day (I was trying to do my best to better schedule our actors' time.)

Packing up seemed very routine by now. We filled the cars one more time and drove towards Sambuca. It was my mom’s birthday today and I wasn’t sure if I would get a chance to see her. I gave her a call, wished her a happy birthday, and suggested she and my dad come to set.

We arrived at Sambuca and I went inside to find our contact, Melissa Gallagher. Luke had originally met Melissa while he was negotiating a party with Sambuca. He had discovered upon talking to Melissa that she was interested in film. He sent her my way. I spoke to Melissa and inquired if Sambuca might consider allowing us to shoot. Melissa seemed really excited about the idea and had been more than helpful in securing Sambuca as a location. Having somewhat learned my lesson, I had sent a release in advance. Upon arrival I asked Melissa about the release and was informed there might be some issues to deal with. She wasn’t sure if we would be able to use the name "Sambuca" or any of their logos. This wasn’t much of an issue for me (although I would have liked to give them some free publicity in the movie) and told her we could work with whatever. To be on the safe side, though, I decided to not shoot any footage with any reference to the name Sambuca.

Andrea soon arrived and started getting everyone into makeup. It was great having Andrea on set. Not only was she fantastic at her job, but, as I’ve mentioned before, she always brought a great amount of energy wherever she went. As she started working on the actors, we went to work setting up the shots.

Sometimes too many options are far worse than not enough. As stated, we could shoot anywhere we wanted. And that meant anywhere within the restaurant. And that meant Doug and I checked every possibility. After looking everywhere we decided to go with one of the booths downstairs. The lighting was very moody and we really liked that for this scene. Because we were primarily going to be in a stationary locale, David was able to rig up some stationary booms to supplement the lavs. You can read about his setup here.

I was feeling more and more confident as we were setting up. Today was definitely going to run smooth.

One section of the scene involved a few female fans approaching Brandon. We had cast Theresa to play one of the fans, but were still in need of another. The original plan had been to cast one of the girls from the story gathering team (they had finished gathering the night before.) We had decided to cast Jenny as a waitress. So, that left Jenn and Missy. I believe it was Jenn who initially suggested, instead, that we consider casting Max as the other fan.

Max was on the doc crew. He was, and is still, in High School and provided never a dull moment when he was around. I hadn’t really considered using guys as the fans, but was piqued by the idea. We tossed it around a little more. I thought it might be odd to have both a male and female fan. It was then suggested that we recast Theresa as Brandon’s girlfriend and cast Max and Eric Brooks, who was working as PA, as the two fans. Eric seemed more than up for it, saying he had definitely had his share of experiences with crazy fans.

Andrea quickly went to work redoing Theresa’s hair and makeup, informing me a fan would look much different than a girlfriend. I hadn’t thought about this, but she was exactly right.

As Andrea worked, I had another issue to debate. Buffalo Trace was one of sponsors. They had made few requests of us, but had asked that, when possible, we make Buffalo Trace visible (either in the short, the doc, or in real life.) Nobody had any issue with this; happy to have Buffalo Trace on board. Since we were in a bar, it had been suggested (I forget by whom) that this might be a great possibility to work Buffalo Trace in.

We had a section where Nat and Brandon ordered drinks and thought it might work to order Buffalo Trace. After further review, we realized that Nat tends to get a little drunk and belligerent in the scene and Buffalo Trace might not appreciate this. We decided instead that it might be better to have Theresa drink the Buffalo Trace. Everybody liked the idea.

We were ready to shoot. Speaking of drinks, we had to find something for Nat to drink other than the shots of whiskey he was ordering. We did some experiments and finally found the right ratio of water to coffee to make a liquid reassembling whiskey.

So, that was settled. Now we were ready to go to work. This was a great situation to be in. I felt that the actors could really focus in on the scene without having to focus on the logistics of moving for the camera. This was important. It was a very intense scene and I wanted to make sure we captured that intensity.

As we were shooting we realized we were probably going to need some extras to establish the locale a little better. We had several people on hand and decided to put them all into makeup.

We continued shooting the scene from different angles, with Nat beginning to fill up on coffee (he had 3 shots in each take) and getting a little shaky. He’s a pro, though, and worked through it. Brandon was holding his own too, and both guys were really living up to expectations.

We were also really lucky to have Erin Grovsnor on set today, working continuity. Restaurant scenes are notoriously bad for continuity, but Erin constantly made sure glasses were always filled to the same level in each shot and was also extremely nitpicky (exactly what we wanted) about everything else.

As we shot some wider shots, we thought it might be a good idea to have customers fill the booths adjacent to where we were shooting. I volunteered as an extra and wrangled Heidi in also. If I remember correctly, we had a very interesting conversation about eating duck.

We finally got all our shots in the booth and decided to get some shots of Nat entering the restaurant. For that we needed more extras. We finished everyone’s makeup and then placed them. We had been running at a pretty leisurely pace today and were actually starting to come very close to our deadline.

We instructed the extras to make lots of clinking noises and talk and look naturally. We cast my parents as extras (the parents of the two fans) also. We got our shots and then quickly moved outside.

Sally had arrived earlier in the day, not wearing what she had worn in the Encore scene. We had expected this scene to immediately take place after Nat and Sally left the Encore together. Therefore, Sally would need to be wearing the same clothes. I asked Sally if she brought these clothes and she said no. She was lying and after enough time had elapsed of me trying to figure out what we were going to do, she went and changed.

Unfortunately, the weather today was very cold, gray, and windy - almost the exact opposite of what the Encore had looked like. We couldn’t really do anything about it, though. We really needed to shoot this section and were going to have to make do with what we could. Sally and Nat decided to improv some talk about the weather as they walked. We figured, if nothing else, this would get some laughs. We set the scene up, got our shots, packed everything away, and then headed back to Luke’s.

These were the last stories. It was hard to imagine everything was almost over. It had been a whirlwind of days, with almost no time for reflection. Knowing, though, that these were the last stories, brought reflection to the forefront. Briefly,though. We still had a whole day’s worth of work to get through.

These stories had been gathered the night before at The Place - a dance club near the Encore. We started watching. The stories were okay, but nothing was really jumping out at us. We kept watching, hoping. We hadn’t been let down yet, and tonight would be know different. We found our story and, I’m not certain, but it may have been the last story we watched.

The story dealt with a lady who was leading a choir. She was wearing a wig and at one point the wig fell off. One of the deacon’s in the church rushed up and put the wig back on - backwards.

We were shooting in the Sony conference room tomorrow. We had decided ahead of time that this needed to be a Jordan scene. We decided that the basic setup of the scene would involve Jordan in a meeting with his label.

So, this is what we pulled out of the story -

A woman is leading the choir and being watched by an audience - Jordan, the star performer, is brought in by his label to review his performance.

It is reveled that the leader is not all she was thought to be - Jordan is told by his label that he is not nearly the songwriter he thinks he is. His faults are laid bare.

The woman, far from being embarrassed, continues on - Jordan, rather than cowering, accuses his label of not sending him any good songs and of playing games with him.

The woman’s wig is replaced, but placed on backwards - Jordan is reaffirmed by his label, but with a twist - if the relationship is to continue, Jordan must reconnect with his brother, the real songwriter of the pair.

With the idea of the scene in place, it practically began to write itself. It was the last piece of the puzzle and everyone felt like it fit perfectly.