Night 2 Forms: Scene 1

Right now there's a lot of discussion and formulating and loudness about what we're shooting and what direction we're going. It seems like a lot of dissension and chaos, but I think it's important to take a step out of the discussion and look down on it. We're actually making big strides towards working in unison in the same direction, and the negatives brought up just narrow our focus. In the end, it's starting to make the positive more positive.

Last night I thought we shot a couple really great scenes, not only content-wise, but also process-wise. As the scenes developed, we got a better direction of where we're going, and ended up with material that's not only usable as-is, but provides a great opportunity for exploring writing and developing and expanding.

The first scene was in the really hideous green room, and reaffirmed both Travis's call for production design and Isaac's call for lighting. I mean, this room is ugly, and while I think we navigated it pretty well, there's no harm in a little bit of movie magic (George's words). Joe and Michael were there and got right into it, Michael sitting on the ground tuning and playing an auto-harp, and Joe smoking by the window. I found a weird spear-like curtain rod which I just played with while watching Michael. I was antsy and zoning out. Then Jacob came in having scavenged chocolate from the hotels he was checking out (part of the end world/new world prompt) and tries to get Joe to eat some.

I liked this scene a lot, especially as we kept going. One of the big issues George has outlined is that we aren't actors, and so if we try to be actors, it's going to be rough. I'm embracing the no-act idea, and really encouraging going wherever the mind normally goes. Jacob starts the conversation with Joe with a constructed opener, but it can develop from there in any direction. It doesn't have to be about chocolate for very long, and once we started talking that out, I think Joe got more natural, which went great. We also made Michael try to "play" the auto-harp, even though the thing was totally busted, and he was disgusted at the idea, but did it anyways. This was great; Michael thought it was futile, but did it anyways, and didn't try to pretend he was going to be happy with the song that resulted, while we didn't really have much of a clue. That gap in understanding was a big part of the scene that was worth investigating.

Mood, action, method, and dialog all came out of this scene that I've started to construct. If we were to shoot it again (we will), I would set it up as follows, based on our findings:


The musician sits on the floor with the auto-harp, tuning up, concentrating. This is his main focus and task.
The smoker stands at the window with a cigarette. He is on a break from the rest of the house, and providing the musician with some "companionship."
The prop-holder is sitting against the wall, concentrating on the musician, preparing to return to the rest of the house.
The chocolate-bringer has returned from scavenging. He wants to share and engage.

C-B engages in conversation with smoker. C-B offers smoker some chocolate.
Smoker declines.

Smoker offers his cigarette to musician.
Musician declines.
Smoker returns to his window. Smoker and C-B watch musician finish tuning and start playing.

Smoker: Do you have something like this?
C-B: I'm not much of a musician, but I admire what he does.


Just that dialog at the end, with Michael's frustration of playing the auto-harp when it's "unplayable," made this scene.