thundercats, ho.

Have you seen Howl's Moving Castle? or anything Miyazaki lately?


If you love somebody, his movies make your insides turn to mush.

550!

Happy 550 pictures!!!



CANON PowerShot SD600 is the best of the Digital Elphs EVAR

weekendz y0

Where to start, Mr. Blog?



WTD days 14-15
The last couple production days were hectic. Our move out of Bayonne was less than smooth, and in the end I wound up getting home at around 4:30 in the morning. During the move I had less than 'E' on the gas-o-meter, and when I and Craig (the intern turned PA) could finally find a place in Brooklyn that sold Diesel, I had to shell out paper monies out of my own wallet in order to fill 'er up. Craig is funny to work with, a real class clown like my lil bro. When we're not throwing Adam Sandler quotes back and forth during work, we're doing push-ups on the sidewalk or some other nonsense. Trinidy, Mia, Craig, John...working with friends rules.


Yesterday Z and I had a serious talk about my lack of work around the apartment, which deep down I knew had to increase sometime soon. Being pretty much destroyed when I get home on weekdays and needing to catch up with sleep / fun things on the weekends was leaving me no time to do things that I SHOULD BE DOING, like cleaning, groceries, laundry, paying attention to Z .. y'know, general upkeep. She'd been doing the bulk of it since we arrived in April and I totally appreciate her willingness to support us through these testing times. It's finally come, though, where I have to start pitching in more, regardless of whether I have "the time". After our chat we were like a Tag Team Hurricane, sweeping up all the crap and organizing/cleaning. We ate at a Czech restaurant with a boar's head on the wall, and it was glorious.



8:00 SUN
I had a dream last night that I was throwing an All-Chad-Affair concert/show thing, where I put the best parts of me on display. During the planning stages, though, X-Strike shows up and wants to do something, new scenes for River City Rumble, live on stage, improv. I kept waking up from this nightmare until I just HAD TO stay up and not sleep any more.


9:30AM SUN
Our neighbors one apartment below have moved out, leaving us with TWO FREE AIR CONDITIONERS. Well, we held out for most of the summer, and yet fate has decreed that we should render our apartment's temperature until it submits to the cool. Rob (or was it Matt?) and I sliced our hands open on the AC's metal grating - in the same exact spot. He carried one up through the fire escape after our first journey up the stairs made the thing leak all over the place, and on me. It's strange...all four of us are so compatible that we would have been fast friends, but we never hung out - no time. Sometimes I look at the free time that I have, cancelling movie dates and golfing expos with friends to do practical "have to do it!" things, and sigh. This amazing life has no room for hanging out, and I miss it. I miss friends.


IMAGE DUMP

WTD day 13

We later found out that he was a cop (those are our 'no parking' cones).



Our second last day in Bayonne. The medical building demanded autographed pictures of Lucy Liu, and I said I'd see what I could do. This essentially means "no" in Chad-Speak, I'm learning that about myself. It's a passive-aggressive no, it's the no that says "I'll try, but I suck so probably not".

It took me 30 minutes to turn off the Church's discoball the other day. I simply tried every single switch in the place, and when looking for more switches proved fruitless, I called on the help of a teenager who was there to watch the office late-night. We figured it out, and thus put an end to The Mysterious Disco Ball Mystery.

Not much has happened in the last two days. There's so much free time that I'm actually bouncing ideas off of the other PAs for stories and musicals and stuff. It's fun. Right now, Dan Glockner, a PA, is flying back from Miami. He flew down there, for one day, to see the cast/crew premiere of Miami Vice, a movie he assisted on. He seemed really psyched and gave up a day of work to pay big $$ to fly down. It makes me wonder what I'll be doing during the premiere of THIS movie - cuz mark my words, it'll be in national theatres.

This Saturday I'll be driving golf balls (always a good time) with a great new friend, John Acardo, and after that it's SERIOUS DATE TIME. Anybody got a suggestion for a date activity in the greater NYC area? I'll seriously read them all.

IMAGE DUMP!



In other news, one woman got the opportunity to speak the truth. Our government sucks.

WTD day .. 11

Another day in Bayonne. Ho-hum.

We had a couple people drop out of the production, which happens, but they were good friends and it is really odd not working without them around. I won't elaborate, but I miss 'em already. On the other hand, their absence is giving others their time to shine, and is actually pulling us closer as a department. (yes, Danny G, I still believe that I'm a PA...=)

ANywho, today was the easiest day in my memory, and although tomorrow will be more of the same, it'll probably go slower now that all the issues I slowly resolved are, well, gone. Tomorrow will feature 'Violet' playing basketball, which I'm guessing will be a freaking hoot to watch. Nobody plays better ball than 5'3" azns!


We have three more days at our Gumshoe Video set in Bayonne, and then 11 more days of shooting. After that, I plan on kicking back at the lake house with my bros - which will kick ass.

kudos to the Riley Twins

This one goes out to Shael and Devon Riley, who shook the foundations at CLub Midway tonight. Literally. The freaking iPod running to the speakers was blasting WAY TOO LOUD and at points my crotch was literally vibrating to "King of Bullshit Hill". I held the camera, they lit the Rock Fire.

Keep working on your live show, Rileys, and your spark will blossom into a fire flower. WAOOOOOOOO!!@#

WTD Tieday

I wish I had a picture to show you of Tie Day.


Tie-Day Fri-Day was today on set, and Production was ablazin with ties. Myself, Anthony, Nick Bell (the originator), Danny Glock (I loaned him one...crap, and never got it back!!@) and Clint all rocked the ties. It was a great show of style and unity. It's too bad that it all had to come to a tragic end.


At around hour 2, raindrops began to fall. Within twenty minutes, it was a full-on thunderstorm, complete with lighting, hard rain, and super-loud noisy cracks o thunder. Production halted and I was caught running back to holding without my rainsuit. Frigging sucked. I got soaked, and for awhile we were all scrambling to waterproof the set, which was flooded due to water that leaked in from an air duct in the ceiling. The rain was so heavy that both sides of the street were a raging river - spanning 5 feet from the curb sped a 2 foot deep current of drainwater. I grabbed upson board off the unit to soak up water on set, and before I could cross the street with it, the board was completely soaked through. Our efforts were futile.

When the storm cleared, all ties were off. Clint and I got extra shirts (his was this horrible 'Thug LIFE' cereal box nonsense) yet Dan, still soaked, remained on tie duty. During this period my bosses, Marshall and Shane, got me a fresh outfit, shoes and all! They rock so hard. The shoes are gawdy and stand out like a sore thumb, which I loved. I wore 'em and my new non-descript outfit with pride.

*****

We holed up in a local comic book shop that I had scouted unsucessfully weeks earlier. St. Vincent's was having a prayer meeting during our dinner hours so we had to find an alternative. When we come back next week I have to go back and buy up some old school cards and comics, which they have in abundance and are dying to get rid of. Not only is the owner retiring, but he said that they just don't sell. Trading Cards, like YuGiOh and Magic are the thing kids are into," he told me. At one point we were just hanging out, shooting the shit, and he puts on an episode of Kung Fu...where David Carridine whups some injuns hard. Kicks a horse's head clean off - that sort of thing. I really had a good time hanging with that dude...can't say the same thing for our Teamster Captain, who is the biggest asshole this side of Old Faithful.

PS, I had a chat with Cillian's dad as he calmed down his grandson. It was Take The Family To Work Day just as much as it was You're Gonna Get Rained On Day. We talked about Ireland, film, my frigging destiny, stuff. Once more, the Murphys are really cool. Cillian sits with the crew at lunch every day, which is unheard of. I throw a 'hey!' every once in awhile at him, and he does something back. We're awkward, together.

PPS, end of the day (4am) we all kicked back with some beers and told stupid jokes over walkie. I love my job. image dump

Tomb Raider: Legend

I just finished Tomb Raider: Legend, and to sum the game up in a word, I'd use: "anti-climactic". Here is a game that was FINALLY wrestled from the hands of a developer who had remade the franchise literally every year without a graphics makeover, a game that could remake or rebreak the series, and in the end the story turned out to be less enticing than alot of wannabe TRs.

Story: not so good. Tried too hard, wound up wrapping itself up without any real resolution...and in a really cheesy way. There was all this build-up but no villain, characters that existed for no reason other to be background in a story that could still meander lazily into the future. It seemed too much like the new developers where trying to establish a new universe for Lara Croft, new friends, new histories, and instead of creating ones specifically for this game's storyline, just has them around in case they need to revisit them in future games. Know what I mean? Take any Bond flick, remove the villain, throw in more helpful characters, and cut off the ending. BOOM - Tomb Raider Legend.

The gameplay was arguably the best part of the game (music was strong, too), but in the end I wound up abusing the targeting system and spent most of the fights locking on, strafing, moving to the next target, locking on, strafing, and so on. There are a few options for cooler combat stuff, but it's just not as effective. To get into the middle of a fray with melee attacks or stop shooting to use the grappling hook ment getting shot - every time. The combat was more like one of those WW2 simulators with an occassional gatlin gun to use but mostly just switching between your AK and handguns.


I would have preferred to see less variety in levels and more of just a solid, hours-long dungeon exploration. Overall there are about 8 different levels, and none of them takes more than an hour or two to navigate. Tomb-wise it's disappointing - every time I got to the end of one, I'd re-realize that the original would have taken me days to figure out. This one was so straightforward that I never really had to explore the levels - there was one path to take - period. What I loved about the original game was a feeling of desperation and clausterphobia - tombs just went deeper and deeper underground, getting bigger and bigger. The level design in Legends felt more like a Crash Bandicoot-style game, pushing you down a lane with carefully-set obstacles to jump over.


Overall, blah blah blah, the game was fun to play, but there's little to replay it for. I should have waited and picked it up when it was $20, because it's value as entertainment is around that area. Chad out.

WTD day 9

Today was a good day - the first of 6 in Bayonne, NJ. In addition to having a film-friendly, generally nice populace (minus a few yahoos who drive past honking their horns), it's pretty suburban if you compare it to Manhattan. Hmmph, maybe I'll never think a city is a city with that comparison...=

Anyway, today I got a couple job offers, nothing concrete, but a look at what I might be into in the near future. I was telling John Acardo (great guy, awesome PA) that I'm at a really comfortable place, PA-wise, and that makes thinking about moving on even harder. Let's see...steady work, ok pay, versus interning as an AC or a Grip.


Before I fall asleep, here are the last few days' images. I don't have the time, currently, to label 'em all or even just tell you what's happening. Just know that we DID barbeque in a Lutheran cemetary.

images from day 9
images from day 8
images from day 7

ugh.a.. . falling asleep at keys....taste it-

WTD day 7

I witnessed a full-blown 3-way SQUIRREL FIGHT outside my window this morning, after a potential Holding person called and woke me up. It was amazing. Two of them were facing off on the fire escape, clacking their teeth and barking like miniature poodles. All at once one of them would jump at the other, and the two would go into a mock-dance, where both would not strike but rather get really close and run around places. The third squirrel did a run-in later on in the match.


this is not me.


It is 7am, people. I am not so much sleep-drunk as I am sleep-wasted. It's been 20 hours of physical exercise since I slept last, and it'll be 5 hours before I wake up to do it again. Gotta love the biz.

Today, we shot at a bar in a "bad section" of Brooklyn, where not only are there more churches per block than anything else, but some of those churches (including our Holding area) share their space with other congregations! It's crazy. The sections of town that need the most help are covered with sin, God, and occassionally, indy films. I just hope we have as great an experience when we shoot in a similar area two weeks from now - - the rumor is that the street has a cesspool system for pooping, so we'll be port-o-pooping it.


I literally have to go to sleep now to catch 4.8 hours of sleep, so images will come later! Stay tuned for BBQing in the middle of a cemetary, bad engrish, funny store signs and other crap I thought was interesting! Rrar!

WTD day 6, kinda

gotta run, will finish later -

yesterday:

- holding was in a giant cathedral (not the last time we'll use one) that once housed the Sopranos for a week

- interns were swapped between set and the office for a week, so we got fresh faces

- Trinidi and I talked seriously about banding together for some film projects

- this was after Trin razzed me all day about missing Pirates 2, which he says was awesome

- another day in night-shoot paradise. I love waking up to the sun, even if it's only been 5 hours

- hung out with crazy, hilarious guys from the Hax Cafe. shout out to Clarence!



and. .. . yeah. pictures and stuff on their way. Gotta run!

WTD day5

Last night was a night shoot, which meant that I could finally sleep in before our 2pm calltime. However, I totally screwed up, thinking that I had more time than I actually had (or really was just in denial due to all the free time) and was nearly late 3 times.

At first I was playing Tomb Raider: Legends and finally got to the coolest boss of the game so far. With 15 minutes to noon, I knew I should quit and come back, but something inside of me drove me on to fight and figure out his formula. At noon I glanced at the clock, eyes widened with fright, threw down the controller and ran out the door, cursing. I AM NEVER LATE. In fact, I'm always so paranoid about being on time that I'm always at least 1/2 an hour early. This would be the first time ever - and I couldn't have that.

I ran to the subway station. No trains were there, which was odd for Ditmars, because it's at the end of the line and at least one train is usually sitting there, letting on customers and chilling out. 10 minutes later one came, but here's where some bad karma began. After a couple stops, all the lights went out on my car. Most of the passengers were cool with it, but some left to the adjacent R trains at Lexington. I stayed. At 57th, the conductor must've figured it out because our train didn't leave the station. Other trains came and went - again, I stayed, hoping that this decision wouldn't screw me. After about 15 minutes, we all had to evacuate our car for other ones on the N, and were finally off - slowly.

After exiting at Penn Station, I RAN. Dan Glockner called to say that he was going to be a minute late - I laughed and said that I was probably further away than he was. With just moments to spare I hightailed it to 30th St and arrived - exactly at 1pm. Phew!

...
30 minutes later our caravan of trucks was stuck in gridlock on the NJTP toll plaza. Such is life. Such is irony.

.......


Past all that it was a great night. People in small towns are much more appreciative and receptive to film crews and big stars like Lucy and Cillian. During our night hours in the small town of Scotch Plains, we holed up in the Public Library (a huge, air-conditioned, tables+chairs ready, bitchin place) and were treated with respect and admiration by the crowds of curious onlookers that showed up all night to check us out. We pulled a double-day, which is great for the underpaid, and at the end of the night everybody was sleep-drunk and singing songs / telling jokes over walkie. I love working in film.=

image dump

WTD day 4

booooooooring.



boooooooooring.





I nearly fell asleep being the sole dude stuck at Holding today. I sincerely hope that this isn't a growing trend, because I know deep down that it's my responsibility. There was nothing to do from 10am - 5pm. Dang.


I've been working out some script ideas and fleshing out some art (this helps the thought process bang out), but today I was too tired and flaked. In 1 minute, I will ascend to the nearest CVS to get more snore strips, because without them, I am a snoring machine that wakes up every 10 minutes and ruins any chance of recovery for the next Production Day.

Z was telling me that I go through cycles when I sleep without snore strips. First, since I go to sleep upon impact with the bed, she pushes me a bit to get me to stop snoring. If the push is not done, the snoring gets worse until she nudges me or I start to choke and wake myself up for a second. Over the course of the next 10 minutes, the snoring returns and gets louder and louder. When that magical 10th minute lands, poof! I awake to choking. I think I've been doing this for years.

Anyway, tomorrow is night shots, so I actually get to sleep 8 hours! Weehee!

image dump!

WTD, day 3

next it'll be LOL SHOES
******************* ******** ***************************

Today Cillian's wife came to set, along with their very young baby. I had heard that they ALL flew up to spend the month here during filming, and now I know why. Related story - on my way to set one of our PAs ran up with fear in his eyes, telling me about some sort of 'baby accident' and asking for toilet paper ASAP. I booked to the Unit Truck and ran over to the 2-banger as fast as my widdle wocations wegs could carry me. There stood Cillian, holding the very stinky baby. Thankfully, the poo-explosion had already been contained, but the failure to communicate a lack of TP on any other day to me was obvious. I ran back to the Unit and stocked his trailer full of toiletries as the threesome made their way to set.

In contrast to that mini-nugget of a story, I've been reading a book by a psychologist who only helps actors reclaim their 'inner child'. She compares acting blocks to social blocks, and says that to fully be relaxed, which is what every actor needs to be to fully utilize their tools, they must go back to their childhood and finally deal with extensive issues. Thinking about it today, I wonder if our young actor was ready to face the scene...or maybe he's just so good that it didn't even phase him.

Am I obsessed with stars? Maybe I should just get it through my head that they're regular people, just with bigger on-screen presence than everyone else. Oh, btw, Lucy is now officially SUPER-AWESOME; she's making our production RECYCLE. Freaking brilliant! If you only knew how much trash films/TV goes through in a day...

Day 2 Images
marker from SpiderMan 3
5AM at 1st Set, Marshall + Nick, two badass team players
OMG!
Somehow this pasta package wound up onTOP of the catering truck
Holding @ Public School 154

the most ridiculous neighbors, by SMELL (I walk past them every morning)

everything else

wtd 2

DAY TWO

Today Cillian and I said 'whadup', thus destroying any doubt that he is a cool doode.

What started out as a horrible day turned out not so bad. I have basically been responsible for scouting / booking each holding on our schedule. Today, I found one thing I overlooked in every single location: Air Conditioning. When I was out and about, I paid no mind to AC, saying to some that said they had none "ahh, that's no biggie!" and othersuch nonsense.

Well, one person said they'd quit if we didn't have it at the next one, tomorrow. Guess what? WE DON'T. Dramaaaaaaaaaaaah! There were two accounts of major construction to deal with, as well as one power-washer operated by some not-so-cool dudes down the block. In each situation, my awesome boss, our Locations Manager, Marshall, came through, and, handled, the, people, involve,d in very, clever, ,and helpful,,ways. Needless to say, it was an educational day.

Yesterday we had Cat Wranglers, today it was catty HMU people. Both days = learned something new.

IMAGE DUMP! (a note: most images are from WTD holding areas and locations)

times

I met Lucy Liu today.

She came around and met every single crew member; we all told her our names and said hi - and MAN, what a difference that made. It totally takes the edge off of talking to / working with her from now on - which stems from a fear of getting your toes stepped on by asshole actors. Some actors go around thinking that because they're famouser than you, they can step on your nuts while simultaneously calling you an idiot for whatever you were doing. Screw that guy/girl. Taking the initiative, making sure that we got off on the right foot and basically giving a crap gives us all the fuzzy feeling that we're working with one of the good guys.

In the other hand, take Cillian Murphy. For whatever reason he didn't extend the same courtesy, and honestly it leaves one with the suspicious feeling of dread, that he might be one of those actors that is a total power-hungry douschecok. I'm not saying he is...there's a perfectly legitimate reason which probably includes nervousness or no time. Our crew's perception on day one: Lucy Liu: total sweetheart. Everybody else: don't know!

...except for that one actress who wouldn't even look at me when I asked her name, like she was above giving me half a clue. I am SURE that she is an asshat. PAs become directors someday, you lousy human being.

gifffff

internets are for gifs.

pooik

FAGFEST PICTURES + 4th of JULY!




EXPLOSION!@


I can't believe they're painting over this ad. Below the "Let there be Q" crap was a vision of NYC with all the world's monuments in it, like the city had absorbed them and everybody was cool with that. I really liked staring up at it on my way back to the lot last month, and it was the only thing I really liked about 8th Ave. Now there's this Q guy and he's all white with white clothes and a white phone. Funk dat.

Christian and I made a music video to Labrynth, but I have yet to finish it so I'll post it later, like weekend later.

FAGS

Yet another time at IRON EDITOR, stiffed.

Yesterday Z, Shael, Devon, and I spent a good three hours stuck in traffic, arriving at FAGFEST around 6 and whisked right into Iron Editor's Challenge 2. Since the lake had risen due to the recent East Coast floods, the cottage was out of commission ((but not damaged), so we held the main events at Josh's house. BTW, Josh is the man for hosting. I really hope everybody else paid him for the amount of alcohol we all consumed, because he, Pappy and Joe_Cam go out of their way to provide the lot of us with gallons of expensive alcohol. I threw in my extra buck$ when it was pizza time.

In case you didn't know, I.E. is a four-hour competition where teams of editors cut together a music video based on a judge-selected movie and their own music track. Every 1/2 hour each editor takes a mixed shot, and the non-alcoholics drink something .. disgusting.

This time in Iron Editor there was a feud! Rez and I had gone our separate ways, and since Devon was present again the three of us became captains. At the helm of three mac minis (technically, I used Z's laptop), we chose each other's partners and began to edit the judge-selected movie........LABRYNTH. Out of the entire house of partygoers, Z and I were the only ones to have recently watched it. Everybody else had to remember as they went or fudge it.

My partner wound up being Christian Pacaud! We found early on that both of us were passionate about editing; he specialized in sound and me video. After rushing through our collections of CDs, we decided on the main theme from "Suspiria", a creepy, ambient / 70s rock track from one of the creepiest suspense movies ever made. WATCH IT! Choosing a serious track that fit the movie better than a comedy song would be our downfall, but neither of us cared. We pressed on, confident that we'd feel better making something quality instead of wacky.

In the end, our piece (described later by others as amazing, full of skill and creepy) got THIRD in favor of runner-up Rez/Jerry and the winner, Devon/Taucer. It was the shaft we were expecting, but disappointment still ran deep. Both of us did some smack-talking, ate some pizza, and passed out.

When I get the video completed / exported, you'll be able to see what I'm talking about.