Dallas, TX | May 20

Call time was 7:30am this morning and we’re an hour and a half from the location so I got up at 5am for a 6:00am departure. It’s going to be a long day.


(from left: Sherman, Me, Cris, Don)

In the car we have Cris Andrei (Executive Producer), Don Smith (Director of Photography), Sherman Ward (Line Producer and Assistant Director), and myself. A little background. Starting from the top is me, who is a bit of an anomaly. First, I’m the Creative Director from the agency, second I’m a Partner with the agency, and third, I’m the Director. This is a little unusual but in my opinion provides a serious benefit to production, the agency, the client, and the entire shoot. It gives me tremendous power to make decisions and be a conduit between the production company, the agency and the client. In essence, that amounts to being able to make decisions about a wide range of issues on the fly and creates an efficient exchange of useful information without the requisite politics usually involved.

Next is our Executive Producer, Cris Andrei, who is a literal wealth of information on everything and anything concerning film production. He’s worked as a production assistant, production coordinator, production manager, line producer, assistant producer and executive producer for everything from feature films, independent films, commercials, and IMAX films. He’s worked and lived in Romania (his birth place), much of Europe including Paris, Indonesia, and many parts of South Asia. To put it simply you’d have to work hard to find someone as knowledgeable and resourceful and Cris.

Cris’s job is Executive Producer and in a nutshell it’s his job to both make sure everyone is doing what they’re supposed to be doing as well as protecting the interests of the production company that he works for. And my interests as well, at which he’s very good at.

As I said, Cris was born in Romania, but left during the Soviet era and lived for awhile in various refugee camps before immigrating to the US at the age of 17. Suffice it say, Cris has more stories than Mother Goose. I’ve worked with him for years and on shoots we can spend some 10-15 hours a day together for weeks at a time and after all this time you’d think I’d heard all his stories, but so far it’s a rare occasion that he repeats a story.

Cris can be hard man to figure out. I think for most people, their initial reaction is a closed man who is all business and no funny stuff. Once you get to know him, you realize he has a wealth of dry humor that can leave you in tears. Not always intentional. He’s one of my favorite people in the world and invaluable when it comes to film production. I don’t even usually agree with him on creative issues, but you don’t discount anything he says with a light touch. You might not agree on the face of it, but you’d better listen carefully and make your decision accordingly.

Next is Don Smith, our Director of Photography or DP for short. It’s Don’s job to make sure that the visuals we capture on film are both technically correct, viable within the budget, and conform to my vision. His vision and technical capabilities bring together the artistic and the technical aspects of filmmaking.

Don is without the doubt the funniest DP I’ve ever met. It’s not just that he’s smart, well-read, experienced and just damn good at his job, he’s funny. Now, unless you’ve spent time with a lot of DP’s, you have no idea how unusual this is. It’s like finding a funny IT guy. Unless it’s obscure jokes about RAM and LAN, they’re usually not that funny. Don is a constant wealth of stories and quick witted retorts. He’s definitely worth the price of admission.

He told us the following story:

Don was in a hotel, having just finished a job and he had been talking to the concierge about a side trip to some ski resort. As he was standing there, he heard a voice say, “Are you Don?”

He turned around and who was standing there but Arnold Schwarzenegger, who wasn’t the governor then, just an aging action hero from the movies. Arnold stood there smoking a cigar and Don, pleased to be recognized, replied, “Yes” and put out his hand.

Arnold replied, “Well if you are done, then get out of the way.”

Having been kicked to the curb by the Terminator, Don meekly stepped aside and Arnold moved towards the concierge. The concierge very politely addressed him saying, “I’m sorry sir, but there’s no smoking here.”

Arnold, spun the cigar in his mouth and replied dryly, “Really.”

We worked that story for all it was worth. Whenever someone told you something had to be done, or there was some ultimatum, we would turn, pause and reply, “Really.”

Finally, out of our happy little family, is Sherman. Sherman is a character in every sense of the word. In fact, it’s as if he popped directly out of an adult cartoon somewhere, possibly a villain in Heavy Metal.

Sherman acts as our line producer, meaning he reports to Cris, but also as the Assistant Director, which means in many ways he has the hardest job on the set. He’s kind of responsible for making sure everything goes according to plan, and the plan according to me can change at any time.

On his days off, Sherman sings lead in a rock band. He’s suggested I come see him play and I think I’m going to this summer. Sherman has a summer home in Rehobeth Beach, Delaware, just a ferry ride away from Cape May and he’s said I can crash at his place. So, some weekend, I’m going to go see he and his band rock the house….or whatever it is that they do.

--

The day went as planned for the most part. Nothing too scary. We started off going through film like water and were forced to rehearse more and shoot less, but other than that we had a pretty good shoot day. Almost too much to tell and then again, nothing happened. We worked hard. Had a few laughs. Then went home.

Tomorrow and the day after are still shoots.

Dallas, TX | May 19

Monday was a down day. Typically, you have a day between your tech scout and your shoot day (at least) so you have time to make changes or additions to your equipment order and anything else that comes up on the tech scout. We spent the morning doing god knows what then around 11am, we headed over to Dealey Plaza to see the sight of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy.



There's really not much to mark the site, which I found strange. There are two "x's" painted on the street. The first is where the first shot hit Kennedy in the neck, then 30 or so yards later, a second "x" which was the head shot.



There are, however, guys standing around who will sell you a newsprint commemorative paper detailing all kinds of conspiracy theories. We bought one. Seriously, how could you not? But we hung out for awhile amazed at how small the area actually is, and how it wouldn't really have been that hard of a shot. Not like we thought it was.

We also visited the "6th Floor" which is the museum at the Dallas School Book Depository Building. Supposedly Oswald shot Kennedy from a window on the sixth floor. It was an interesting museum and I actually learned some things I didn't know, but then I'm not much of a conspiracy theorist, so I've never read much on the Kennedy assassination. I didn't even see the Oliver Stone movie.

The client's came in later that afternoon, we went through wardrobe quickly then they went out to dinner and myself, Don, the director of photography, and Cris, the producer, went to dinner and discussed the shoot.

Actually, one other thing. We were sitting down to dinner at this Italian restaurant and they both were going to order clams. Now I'm not a frightened eater by any means but the idea of eating shellfish some 1500 miles away from the ocean, the day before a long shoot.....

Well, let's just say they changed their order.

Dallas, TX | May 18

Sunday was our tech scout for the TV commercial. This is where you get all the department heads: Camera, Lighting, Grip and Art Department, along with the director and producer and you scout the location. The purpose is to familiarize everyone to what the shoot will entail and determine any equipment needs.

So, we headed out to Itasca, which is about an hour and a half Southwest of Dallas, to the farm of Don Mayfield. Don was an electrical engineer for 40 years with the local electric company. He retired early and he and his wife traveled for a couple of years but quickly bored of it. So they bought 500 acres of farmland and became farmers. It’s just the two of them—no other help. They’re in their seventies.



The scout went great. The weather is simply incredible. Dallas can be beastly hot and humid, like South Beach without the ocean breeze. And it’s been raining for weeks. But this entire week is supposed to be low eighties and low humidity. There’s not a cloud in the sky and even though most of us are wearing jeans and long sleeve shirts to protect ourselves from the sun, we’re not hot.



Of course, we all get sunburned anyway.



On the way home we stop outside Fort Worth at the Stockyards, which used to be real stockyards and is now mostly touristy. There were lots of bikers, tourists and western gear shops. Don and Sherman both bought hats.



The sun is strong here and you really need to wear a hat if you’re going to spend several days in the middle of a wheat field.

And I'll tell you one thing. Texans are proud of being from Texas. Never seen anything like it.

Dallas, TX | May 17

The area of the city we’re in reminds us all a little of Venice and other parts of LA. They have old streetcars running up Kinney Avenue, which I totally didn’t expect to see. Small, neat homes. Manicured streets. Lots of restaurants and bars and it all sounds good, but there’s just something a bit off that I can’t quite put my finger on.

Everybody keeps telling me how friendly everyone is (maybe they’re trying to convince themselves) but I’ve had one bad service experience after another.



Had breakfast this morning with Cris Andrei, my executive producer. As always, he was telling stories. Since it was raining, today’s story involved weather in Jakarta. Cris was living there and they were on a big film shoot. He explained that there’s no such thing as weather insurance in Indonesia, because the weather can change so rapidly. What they do have are Weather Shamans. They cost between $50-100 a day. Cris loved putting this into budgets because everyone always questioned the line item. He would explain that regardless of what they thought, most of the crew would be Indonesian and if they didn’t have one, the crew was going to worry and wonder why the executives would be so foolish as to try to shoot without weather protection. Also, what could it hurt? Would you really want to risk angering the weather gods for a measly $100?

So they’re shooting and to the north of them it’s raining, to the south of them it’s raining, as well as to the east and west. Everywhere except where they’re shooting. And the Shaman is squatting under a tree holding his pee, which apparently is what he does.



It rained all day today. Nothing heavy, but it was constant. Supposedly we’re going to have great weather this week, so hopefully, it’s just getting it out of the way.

Cris and I did some errands than drove to Wild Bill’s, a western outfitter. I bought beautiful, new Lucasse cowboy boots and a traditional straw Stetson hat. Cris also bought a hat but not so traditional. He also bought gifts for his family. I bought my family nothing.

Dallas, TX | May 15

On our first day here, our production coordinator Suzanne was hit by a car while bringing back lunch. She was crossing the street when a woman in a BMW pulled out of the hotel and didn’t see her until she was on the hood of the car. I’m told she didn’t spill any of the food, but was concerned that she’s lost control of the iced tea. She’s okay, albeit a broken ankle, and back to work. You gotta love that in a person.

I mentioned to everyone, that in a way, this was a good omen. That hopefully any tragedy was behind us and Sherman reminded me of the scene from The World According To Garp, where they’re looking at a house with a realtor when a plane crashes into the house. Garp turns around and proudly announces, “We’ll take it!”

This is a strange city.

I came in last night and of course my flight was delayed in Philly for no good reason. I met the guys at the bar and we had a couple of drinks then went to bed because we had an all day casting.

So we went to casting outside the city somewhere. Sherman, our line producer and assistant director, Dawn, my associate creative director, and me. Cris is coming in tonight.

Casting went great and I think we got some great choices.

May 12 | Allergies

Last night got down to 47° and we had the air conditioner running in our bedroom. I find this hard to deal with as I grew up with a father that was so cheap (we also may have been a bit poor) that in the winter, we all had handmade afghans and down vests which we wore instead of turning the heat up. But, I love my wife and she's been suffering terribly from spring allergies. I fought the impulsion to turn it off and let it run.

Oddly enough I was talking to my mother tonight and she explained that my father refuses to open the windows because he's afraid of the pollution of the outside air. I realize this makes my father sound like a nut (which he is just a bit), but the reality, at least in his mind, is that he has severe allergies to all kinds of toxins, and he believes that the air is causing him to suffer. Therefore, they have air purifiers throughout the house and run the air conditioner on the fan setting even when it's 45° outside.

What can I say, this is the family I was born in to.

My mother and I were talking about the definition of normal. Is there really such a thing? I grew up with parents that moved from state to state like some people change socks. We ate strange (presumably healthy) foods. We ingested handfuls of vitamins. Saw wacky doctors and weren't allowed to listen to the radio or watch TV (at least for part of my childhood).

And yet, we were well loved. At least I believe so. I have a few siblings who might dispute HOW we were loved, but no one disputes our parent's intent.

We grew up with a mother that worked from home and was always there for us. My father didn't travel and was always home at night for dinner. We ate together. Went to church as a family every Sunday. We had friends over, and stayed over at friend's houses. In the summer, we left the house in the morning and played all day, coming home for dinner when my mother rang the bell. We did arts and crafts. I mowed the lawn.

I know a lot of people who experienced terrible, unforgivable childhoods, and ours wasn't one of them.

So, that's a lot to attribute to air conditioning, I guess. Actually, as a child, we didn't have air conditioning. We had fans like most everyone else I knew.

May 10 | Happiness

I have been reading a book on happiness written by a grump called "The Geography of Bliss". Jeremy Bentham, a London lawyer in 1776 came up with a mathematical proposition to calculate happiness. His theory was that you add up all your pleasurable experiences and subtract the unpleasant ones, and the result was your level of happiness.

I was sitting on my front porch with new Boston ferns swinging in the morning breeze and the sun warming my toes. This got me thinking. Was I happy? I decided to do the math.

I love my home with all its creaks and cracks. The crooked floors, mismatched chairs, svelte lawn and manicured garden. My wife, a beautiful blond woman with tanned skin, dirt under her fingernails and a love of her vegetable garden. Three beautiful children who I both adore and whom drive me crazy in equal measure. And our dog Seamus whom I would donate a kidney for.



I love living at the beach with all its peculiarity. The smells, sounds and sights of living in the low country. Early mornings on the beach with my good friend Bob, searching for waves and drifting among the dolphins. Long days at the shore with sandwiches packed in ice and cold iced tea. Even the seagulls, which can be rats with wings, make me smile. Fresh baguettes smeared with pesto and feta cheese. Hotdogs. Fresh, sweet corn, which as Garrison Keillor has said is better than sex. An outdoor shower, which after a day in the sun at the beach is proof of a loving God. Our screenhouse full of surfboards, fishing poles, a mini fridge full of cold beer and a fan to blow all your troubles away.

I love the winter, where we pack ourselves away indoors in front of the fire and read books and watch movies. I love roast chickens, mashed potatoes, canned green beans, and red wine. I love the smell of sawdust as it spills out of the back of the chainsaw and the sight of our dogs lounging in the dry leaves. The long walks on Sundays where we walk in a circle and talk of nothing. Football and hot wings. Hoodies and warm socks.

I love quiet mornings where it's just me and a book, a journal and the dog. The feeling that you have the whole day ahead of you and you're the only one awake. In the winter it's in front of a crackling fire. In the summer it might be on the beach with a newspaper and a steaming cup of coffee.

I don't want to detail the things in my life that are unpleasant, but suffice it say, they are do not add up.

And for than I am happy for today.

May 9 | A Hint Of Summer

I was standing on my porch smoking a cigarette during the middle of a severe thunderstorm when a man riding a John Deere riding lawn mower drove past my house against traffic, which I found strange.



It had been a beautiful day and Jane and I spent a few hours searching for Pelargonium peltatum, which I learned are Amethyst Ivy Geraniums, and are apparently harder to find than you would think. Or maybe you wouldn't. Normally I wouldn't enjoy driving from garden center to garden center on a lovely, warm, sunny day, but Jane and I had a nice time. We needed the time together.

We never found the exact plant we were looking for but we enjoyed ourselves and when we got home I lit a fire outside, opened a beer and read a magazine while Jane planted flowers.

It felt like summer. Jane had been marinating chicken for a couple of days and I grilled the chicken along with new, red potatoes coated in sea salt, fresh rosemary from the garden and olive oil. Add a little steamed broccoli and you have yourself a pretty nice, summer meal. It almost made me nostalgic and homesick at the same time.

I'm looking forward to getting home from Dallas and spending some time at the beach.

As the sun began to set, dark clouds moved in and we began to hear thunder in the distance. Eventually we moved inside and began to watch TV. I heard some loud cracks of thunder and went outside on the porch to smoke. As I stood there, the rain began to fall in sheets, the lightening glowing in the distance and the thunder echoing against the house.

And then I heard a lawnmower. It's good to be home.

May 7 | Dallas

I'm sitting in my room at the W Hotel in Dallas, Texas. It's what you'd expect. Very chic. Very nice. Very modern. But not a lot of personality. It all seems a bit cold to me. Maybe I'm tired.

I admit, I was up a little later than I would have liked. But that's not the tired I'm talking about. I'm tired of being on all the time. Making decisions. Impressing the clients. Making other people happy. The travel is really taking its toll. I need to be home for a few days with nothing to do. The problem is, when I do get home, I really need to help Jane out around the house. She's doing it all herself and that's not fair. We need to put the air conditioners in, which I hate more than just about anything in the world. I don't know why. I just do. I really need to look into having central air installed in our 285 year old house. Sounds wrong, doesn't it?

What I really needed to do was take my vacation AFTER all of this, but it doesn't always work out that way. I don't even want to go anywhere. Truthfully, even all that "fun in the sun" can get tiresome.

I'd like a morning that lasts all day. Quiet. Maybe a little soft music. A book and my journal. Coffee. My dog at my feet. No phone.

When I was younger I was definitely a night person. Most young people are I guess. But now the time I cherish most is the morning. Maybe it's because I get so few of them that aren't complicated by work or travel.

I'm reading a book called, "A Three Dog Life". It's a memoir of a woman who's husband was hit by a car and suffered brain damage. He lives in a home and has almost no short term memory. He knows who she is and can remember things from his past, but he can stand in front of the bathroom mirror for over an hour with his toothbrush in hand because he can't remember what he's supposed to be doing.

She moved from their apartment in NYC into a small home in the country to be near him. She has three dogs (hence the name of the book). She's a wonderfully honest, funny writer.

One of the lines I wrote in my journal: "Ironically, the last several years of my life have begun to feel shapeless, like underwear with the elastic gone, the days down around my ankles."

Another was, "And what is home anyway, but what we cobble together out of our changing selves?"

I don't even know what that means but I like the sound of it.

May 6 | Dallas

All this comfort food is making me very uncomfortable.

Been in the Big D for a couple of days now. Everyone keeps taking us to greasy spoon diners, I guess because it's like showing you were the locals hang out. The thing is, what they call comfort food isn't as comforting as I remember. It's just a heart attack on a plate. I can't say that I'm an extremely healthy eater, especially compared to many people I work with who order Salmon or a salad, or something else high in some type of cancer fighting ingredient, but compared to these people, I'm practically a vegan! I wouldn't mind so much if it was decadently bad for you. But it's just not that good. If I'm going to eat with abandon, I want to really enjoy it.



I was down here about a month ago and Cris Andrei, my producer, and I were staying at a very nice, chic hotel. We were a bit tired so we decided to just to eat at the hotel restaurant. I was looking at the menu and it had all the right ingredients to be a chi-chi, modern restaurant: heirloom this artisan that. But upon further inspection I found a dish that absolutely appalled me. Chicken fried Kobe beef. The whole point of battering and frying a piece of beef is because you're using cheap meat. The fried batter and the gravy is there to disguise the quality of the meat. You just don't take the most expensive beef on the planet and fry it!

So, I'm calling for a moratorium on diner food for the remainder of my time here. I want to eat lunch in a place where the menu selection is greater than: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner. Call me a snob. Call me arrogant. I don't care. I'm already doing enough damage to my body through lack of sleep, alcohol and cigarettes. I don't need any more help.

May 4 | Home For A Rest

My good weather luck seems to have finally given out. First I had Mexico, then unusually good weather in Moscow and London. Now I'm home again and it's cold and damp. But, I leave early tomorrow morning for Dallas and it's going to be in the eighties, so I'm not doing too bad.

It's true, that travel can be exciting. But sometimes it's more fun to have been there than to have gone there. In other words, it's great to see the sights and have the memories, but the process is grueling. Even tomorrow I have to get up at 3am to catch a 6am flight. Getting up at 3am is ridiculous. One time I woke up and realized that the ice in my bedside drink hadn't even finished melting and I said to myself, "That just isn't right." Jane laughed.



I'm going to Dallas for two reasons. First, we to do casting for a photoshoot and television commercial for a client in Calgary. That's right, we're an agency in New Jersey flying to Dallas to shoot a commercial for a client in Canada. What can I say, it's the only place we could find where there is mature wheat at this time of year. The concept is shooting models in the middle of a wheat field. Can't say any more. The next day we have one final scout of the locations. I've been told that the fields suffered some frost damage and I don't yet know what that will mean to me.

The second reason for going to Dallas is to present creative to a new client there. Just coincidence, but the timing fell close enough that it made sense to combine the trips. Since we were planning on staying over and taking the client out to dinner, I leave Tuesday, do the casting, location scout on Wednesday, present to new client on Thursday, come home Friday.

The following Tuesday, I go back to Dallas and am there for ten days. There's a lot of pre-production work to be done. Wardrobe. Props. Technical scout. Fittings. Working with the art department (set designers), director of photography, producers, etc....

I hope to buy cowboy boots.

The worst part of all this is the packing. I like to have everything I need, or might need, so I tend to overpack slightly. Just slightly, as of course I'm quite practiced. But, for this trip, I need my camera equipment, sound equipment, tripod, laptop, portable drives, battery packs, not to mention clothes both for casting and scouting (shorts and flip flops will do since it's 85°), but for client meetings (slacks and sportcoat or suit, depending). Toiletries. Portable DVD player for the plane, along with headphones (and I have to charge it first). Book (you never know when you have time to kill). Journal (how do you think I remember all this shit). Boxers (this is a bigger deal than you might think. When you're traveling as much as I do, laundry is constant). And whenever possible, I try not to check bags. In this case, is inevitable because of the size of some of this stuff.

And especially when you're tired and just finished unpacking, it can be difficult to wrap your head around the task. I've been home for weekends every two weeks, or something like that it seems. Get home Friday or Saturday. Leave Monday or Tuesday.

But there are upsides. We stay in nice hotels. Sometimes we're in First Class, but not always. We eat well and generally have a good time entertaining clients. Plus we get to see other parts of the country and the world. But not as much as you might think. Unless we have time off for ourselves, which is rare, we're working, not sightseeing. So, like in the case of Moscow, we spent our time touring shopping centers, not Red Square. Which is why all my photos are of retail and dining, and very few tourist attractions. Yes, I've been to Moscow, but name the top ten tourist destinations there and if I'm lucky, we drove past them.