May 2013

Kaleidoscope

Images © Elisabeth Mochner or © Huan Vu, see filename

Beyond the Wall of Sleep

It’s a wrap! The storm is over, sunlight’s crashing through…

It has been an exhausting three-days-shoot, but also very rewarding. Loved every minute of it and our thanks go to our awesome crew and our talented cast for embarking on this ship and trusting her captain. Our short journey to the other side went pretty well considering the fact we haven’t shot anything since “Die Farbe” exactly five years ago and that we had to antedate.

On our first shooting day it didn’t look that well, since we started with a delay of more than three hours due to necessary changes to the production design. Many props came out much too dark in front of the white walls, and since we didn’t expect the contrast to be that strong and unpleasant, we had to re-arrange everything, paint some props and use white cloths to create the mood we were aiming for. In the end our first shooting day took much longer than planned and we couldn’t realize two shots, but since they weren’t that important, we could live with that and were happy to get at least a couple of hours of sleep.

Unfortunately our second shooting day didn’t start much better. Again we had to face a delay, this time over one hour, due to production design issues. Windows with intact glass were discovered in the house and our production design assistants tried to put them into the window frame of the room we shot in. They had to be fitted and it took some time, but again the outcome was worth it. It looked more natural, no additional VFX work was needed and the actor could touch the glass in one particular shot. Despite the delay we managed to shoot all scheduled shots but one, a complex bluescreen shot, though we managed to go back to one of the two shots from the day before. that had to be omitted. It would have even been possible to reach planned target if there wouldn’t have been a special event that very evening… an event called Champion’s League Final…

Thus, we had to get that bluescreen shot on our third and last shooting day and the scheduled rest in the remaining time – and we succeeded! One could see that crew and cast grew stronger together from day to day. It’s a pity that everything had to end just when we started to really get to that level. Hope we can continue to push beyond the Wall of Sleep again someday soon!

Future Dreamers

Tomorrow we will start! We will bring all props and our equipment to the shooting location and prepare the set for the first shooting day on Friday. Our two actors from London, UK, will fly in on the same day:

 
BEN STERNBERG (to the left)
In 1945 at age 16, Ben was chosen to play in the British premiere of Morning Star by American playwright Sylvia Reagan, at the Alhambra Theatre, Glasgow. A wise old actor he met shortly afterwards advised him not to embark on an acting career until he was older with some experience of real life, before attempting to ‘mirror’ it. He took his advice and embarked on multi-faceted business activities.

Aged 45, the ‘Theatre Bug’ started biting hard, so he did a refresher course at LAMDA and achieved their Silver Medal, but Actors Equity (the actors union) was a closed shop at that time and refused to admit him as they had lots of unemployed members. And without an Equity card it was impossible to find work. So back to the commercial grindstone…

Two years ago when Ben closed his last business, he decided he’d experienced enough ‘living’ and was ready – at 82 years old – to launch his acting career.

He has participated in six short films since then and has been short-listed for a cameo part in a feature film.

 
SCOTT CHAMBERS (to the right)
Scott Studied a BTEC Diploma in Acting, became a member of the National Youth Theatre in 2009 and then in 2011-2012 Scott trained with various acting coaches including Mel Churcher as well as training at The Actors Centre, London. Scott is now signed to Curtis Brown, one of London’s top agencies for actors.

Scott’s recent theatre credits include: Chicken (Southwark Playhouse, London), Siamese Twins (Theatro Technis, London), Dick Whittington (West Midlands Children’s Theatre/UK&Ireland Tour). Scott begins performing his new play “The Precariat” in July 2013 (Finborough Theatre).

Scott’s recent film credits include; UWantMe2KillHim? (Andrew Douglas/Bad Hat Harry Productions), Ticking (Chris New), A Place For Us (Tom Hunter). Soon Scott will begin filming for the feature film screen adaption of “Chicken” reprising his role as ‘Richard’, filming begins summer 2013.

 
SCOTT CHAMBERS will take over our hero character ROLAND, a young orphan struggling with his destiny, and BEN STERNBERG will impersonate THE TERRIBLE OLD MAN, an old sailor living in solitary, feared by the other villagers. In the scene we are going to shoot, you will see both embarking on an unbelievable fantastic journey – a journey to the DREAMLANDS!

Filling the Void

Only five days till shooting begins! In the last three weeks more and more props started to fill my appartment. But it wasn’t until last week, when a beautiful auctioned model ship arrived and when we discovered a fantastic old door by chance, that the pieces really began to come together.

I was struck by the strong symbolic power of a ship next to the idols and artifacts that we have gathered: It suggests and hints that they all have come from for away. It links everything together and it all starts to make more sense now.

Our old house door is a heaven’s gift: We got permission by Freilandmuseum Wackershofen, where we have shot a big part of “Die Farbe”, to have a look into their archive of museum objects to find a suiting table, bed and door for our purposes. Inside a huge hall that Dr. Henry Walton Jones, jr. would be proud of (somewhere there in a dusty corner, you might stumble upon the Ark of the Covenant) we found a unique door at the end of a dark hallway. We went out to get a normal wooden door, but this surpassed our expectations, it looks really interesting and fits nicely into our planned colour scheme.

In the next blog article I will present you our two actors that will fly over from London to join us on our trip to the Dreamlands.