Some thoughts on Santa Fe. The water tastes good. Everything is ten minutes away from everything else. The buildings have these cool exposed logs holding up the ceiling. Everybody seems pretty nice. A tenth of the people drive really slow. It's fantastic.
I went straight to bed after coming back to the hotel last night (I called it "home" at first), and it was 5AM when I got into bed. I've been trying to keep myself in the best shape possible, health- and emotion-wise. I've been making a point of eating fruit and fiber, trying to keep regular. That can be such a hang up when traveling to a new place. I've been writing about my experience, here, kind of like a diary. I've been -- crucially, crucially -- using the elliptical machine in the hotel for thirty minuets each "morning." The first time I did it, I felt great afterwards. I was like "I pity the soul who's not doing a half hour of elliptical every morning on this shoot." Two things: 1) I am able to leave earlier than most of the crew (who has to pack up gear). Plus there's people in the production department who have to figure out things like call sheets and stuff for the next day who are working way past when we wrap. And 2) Sorry to say the half hour on the elliptical is not the silver bullet I hoped it would be. I am tired.
I've been bopping back and forth between seeing everyone on the crew as supremely attractive, talented, and amazing -- a marvel to behold! -- and seeing everyone as annoyingly egoistic, inefficient, insufficiently committed to the project. On day four of shooting it was a lot more of the latter. (Of course, ideally I just start seeing everyone as regular coworkers, i.e. mostly boring, but there's something intense and fizzy about being on set. Like we're all going on a study-abroad trip together or joining a cult.) In general in my life, I feel like I'm more interested in people than ever and also more annoyed by them.
Yesterday, one of the crew members threatened to walk off set in the middle of a take. They slammed their laptop lid shut and walked right through the shot. They have been shit talking the director the whole time, and actually said they were going to walk off set within hours of the first day. I've been around this crew member the most so far on the set. We're friends-ish, or as much as you can be having only met each other this week. They know that this project means a lot to me. They walked off because they want the director to be nicer to them, to listen more to their suggestions. Fair. Fine. The director has been treating this person with the same manic directness as he has with everyone else, including the DP and AD, so it's not a hierarchy thing. Anyway, when the crew member walked off like that, I felt instant rage. The AD went to talk to them, then the director. They came back after a couple of shots. But I couldn't look at them. I went outside in the cold and paced. When I talked to the director, ironically he was more blasé about their behavior. Defending them, telling me not to worry, that he had sorted things out. I'm trying to goldfish it today, start fresh. But like, how do you make the whole production about you? (I'm saying to that person in my head.) I'm probably not giving them a fair enough shake. The complexities are not really fitting in my head at this point. But I'm curious to see whether this person shows up to set today. If they do, I'm going really try to let it go. If the director can, then I should be able to. If this person doesn't, then fuck them forever. Probably.
Okay yikes Amy. Pull it together.
Oh, post script -- we've got enough in the can that I'm starting to feel more confident about the project. The scenes yesterday looked really good. The camera and electric department people are champs, and the actors -- especially Emile -- have been putting in great work. I'm impressed by them.
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