This week the Esperanza Center is running its annual Cine Mujer film festival.  I'd missed it the last two years.  It's a week of films by and about women, with an emphasis on the global peace and justice movements.  And it's free.  Monday, March 26th through Sunday, April 1st.  Over thirty films: shorts, features, documentaries, narrative films, and experimental work.  I missed yesterday's opening night, but I made it to tonight's screening with my friend Alston.

I like the Esperanza Peace and Justice Center because they are always pissing people off.  Maybe, on occasion, they alienate those kindred individuals and organizations who are philosophically in agreement with them … but, the problem is, I still haven't lived in this town long enough to work out all the history and back stories of how San Antonio cultural non-profits interact.  You know, all the bad blood and the petty bullshit.  But, damn, Esperanza runs some great art events, especially films with a radical of progressive edge.

Tonight the program opened with a grouping of three shorts.  “Bingo Nation” took a lighthearted look at a bingo parlor and the women who obsessively show up to win.  This ain't no quilting bee.  One of Alston's friends — a woman named Frieda, who is, I'm guessing, 70ish — came and sat with us.  As the end credits rolled on the bingo film, I heard her whisper to Alston:  “Oh, my.  I hope I don't become like that.”

“Light As A Feather / Heavy As Lead” was a video montage of a performance piece where a woman in a Puritan dress is submerged in a giant fish-tank as a poem was read about testing for witches (you know, float or sink) … as well as other metaphors.  Visually, it has a wonderful element of ritual.  The glass tank, the black dress, the audience sitting on the floor in the background … and the tank was just large enough so that the woman in the dress could maneuver in a gentle choreography, with the dress billowing around her like a jellyfish.

“Clean” is a work in progress from a local artist who I've not heard of.  Julia Barbosa Landois.  I'm curious as to why an unfinished 6 minute piece was submitted, unless the artist is a friend of the Esperanza Center.  It's a poem about the eradication of that which is unwanted.  And that which society wants cleansed isn't always what the individual herself wants cleansed.  The cleansing metaphor is the egg ritual used by curanderas.  We watch as a woman (the artist?) rubs herself with an egg.  It's a visually stunning piece.  The poem works fine.  But I don't need to see a six minute work in progress.  Go ahead and finish it before showing it to an audience.

“Black and White.”  A 17 minute piece about the relationship between photographer and model.  The two subjects of this piece are from New Zealand.  The model is Mani Bruce Mitchell, who is designated as “intersex,” what some might call an hermaphrodite.  The photographer is Rebecca Swan.  Mani appeared in one of Rebecca's books, and filmmaker Kirsty MacDonald showed up as they were working on a second book.  It's a wry and moving little film that probably would have lost focus or turned mawkish were it longer.

“Look Us In the Eye: The Old Women's Project.”  About thirty minutes of old women talking about their political activism.  They're funny, mildly crass, and have been working in the trenches of political activism even before they turned old.  The core group is just three.  And often they organize events with hundreds showing up.  There was a little clip of a young woman who, and here I paraphrase, praised the three leaders of the Old Women's Project as: “They're hilarious — they bring this wonderful combination of levity and gravitas.”  There's the quote for the DVD box.

“Transitional Tradeswomen.”  This is a feature-length documentary on female construction workers in Asia.  The piece was directed by an American construction worker and trade union activist.  It was okay, but could easily have been twenty minutes shorter.  There were some technical problems that were very intrusive. Someone needs to give Vivian Price a grant to re-edit this piece.  The information is great, but the final product is a mess.

“Border Cafe.”  This was the only narrative of the night.  It's an Iranian feature film about a recently widowed woman trying to run a restaurant which serves tourists and truck drivers on the north-western frontier of Iran.  It's a wonderful little film.  And I think it's crucial for American audiences to see films like this which have been produced in those countries which we deem our enemies.  What “Border Cafe” shows us is an Iran which is willing to admit that it has problems with gender equality, the inflexibility of Koranic law, and occasional repressive behavior with movement through its borders.  International films are a great panacea for the obscene Yankee propaganda that makes us think that the devil resides in occupied Palestine, Cuba, Iran, Venezuela, and whatever current region of this planet onto which our country's executive office has turned a suspicious eye.

I'm going to Cine Mujer tomorrow night.  Be there or be square.  I did say it was free, right?  No excuses, mofos.  

I started riding mountain bikes about ten years ago when a touring cycle I had back then was ripped off from a garage apartment I called home during my Fort Worth years.  I decided to make the move to the studier frame and the fatter tires so I wasn't constantly judging whether the pothole or sewer grating coming up on me and fast was to be feared or sneered at.  One Peugeot trail bike later, I sneered at all obstacles and I never looked back.  Often people give me hints as to challenging trails they think I'd love to explore, zooming along loose and bumpy terrain. That's not my bag.  Unpaved fire roads in state parks are fine, but I'm not in it for the adrenaline rush.  The bottom line is I'm too fat and clumsy to venture on the rougher trails — except very slowly.  And today, while on an unpaved path atop the levy of the San Antonio River just behind Mission San Juan, I decided to take the incline down to the grassy floodplain.  It was hardly what you'd call steep, and the gravel surface seemed innocuous enough.  But halfway down I realized the recent rains had loosened the larger rocks.  Also, heavy dredging machinery had used this road, tearing it up even more.  I kept my focus on that area just around the front wheel.  A bad call.  You really need to take stock of the next ten or twenty feet.  I saw a chunk of limestone a smidge bigger than a softball.  I swerved and rolled over a section of wood the size of a tallboy.  The gravel was too loose to brake hard.  And then I saw that I was heading for a section where the “gravel” was nothing but those softball-sized chunks of limestone.  I tried to push on through, but by them I was bouncing too much.

On those rare occasions when I lose control of a bicycle, it's always a smooth separation; like the lower stages of a Saturn V, the bike just falls away from me as I somehow manage to launch myself into unencumbered freefall.

I love those magical moments.  I was laughing as I sent a lone expletive toward the sky.  I'm not sure how fast adrenaline hits the bloodstream, but the rush hit me then, truer than were it delivered by a hypo.  I reached out with my left hand to brace for impact onto the rocks — and there was a smooth interval of time where I turned to smile at the bicycle rotating above me, heading toward the grass, and then I looked back down and watched a rock-strewn puddle rush up at me.  I skidded first on my left palm (padded by my glove), and them I took most of the impact on my shoulder, splashing down into the muddy water.

And then time was back to normal as I found myself back up on my feet, grinning like an idiot.  I picked up the bike and continued along the path, walking it beside me.

My iPod continued playing Christine by the band Deckard, but it wasn't meshing with my mood, so I switched it off.

This is exactly why people ride bikes down mountains … on purpose.  A spill isn't really a bad thing.  The biggest problem with a surge of adrenaline after you crash, is waiting to see what the real damage is.  This whole hormonal component of the fight or flight reflex keeps one in the dark — the pain comes later.  Sometimes not for hours.  But that all was seven hours ago, and it looks like I lucked out.  Just a stiff thumb.

And Drew, if you're reading this, the bike I'm borrowing from you, came through it all unscathed.  Kudos to the lowly Schwinn.

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I was able to enjoy a Saturday on the bike trail because the shooting for Leftovers took a weekend off.  When Robin called me the other day, I was a bit baffled.  No movie?  What was I to do?  My weekends had been filled with production for — well, it seemed like a very long time.  Besides, I'm not a fan of weekends.  When given the choice, I prefer working on weekends and taking off a couple of weekdays.  Weekends are crammed with a bunch of assholes running around getting in my way.  But what am I griping about?  My current status of self-employment allows me to enjoy my weekdays to the full.  So, really, today was just another day.  I worked on the Josiah Festival.  And I laid out a course for the up-coming NALIP Meet-the-Maker film series I'm curating.  It's too early to starting talking much about my plans until I speak Monday or Tuesday with our nonprofit co-sponser.  And I still need to contact the filmmaker I want to bring to town.

I've been lucky enough to have friends who have provided financial assistance to get me through this rough patch.  But I'm currently working on three different film events — all with budgets!  The payment might come slowly on two of them, but I've got some breathing room.

Now what am I doing tomorrow?  I know I'm not making a movie ….  Oh, actually, this will be the first time in over a month I'll be able to go to Pepe's Cafe for their Sunday lunch special of Enchiladas Verde.  And that, my friend, is the cornerstone of any successful Sunday.  That is, for us unbelievers — hellbound, perhaps, but definitely well-fed.

I've come to the realization that I do indeed have a problem.  That's the first step, or so I've heard.  Last night I found myself without my computer, and thus, internet access. All it took was several ounces of hibiscus tea, sticky with a super-saturation of sugar, spilled across my keyboard.  I sponged, rinsed, and dried the board with a box fan set on a gentle breeze.  But nothing could bring it back.  These are the times one realizes the depths of ones internet dependency.

It was like some life-affirming PSA.  While the fan was doing its work, I sat down on my porch to enjoy a perfect night.  I watched as a curious skunk waddled across Jerry's yard and between the fence slates to nose around in Hope's rose garden.  A frisky rat scampered along the telephone line above my driveway, and leapt into Marlyss' palm tree.  Matt came out to put his trash on the curb, and we chatted.  He said he's leaving at the end of the month to move into a small house over near Brakenridge Park.  Phil stopped for a moment while out walking his dog. He give us an update on his inept contractors who have pulled up his kitchen floor yet seem not to know how to put in a new one.  Phil and Cutesy padded off down the street and Matt told me that the firm he works for, Lake Flato (one of the more reputable architectural firms in the country), was currently involved in only one local project.  It's that cool four story building off the river walk where the Circus Museum used to be.  And years earlier, it was the downtown branch of the public library.  He suggested that I give him a call next week, and he could tour me around inside.  I sure as hell will.  It's done in a style I have a weakness for.  What I refer to as Nuremberg Gothic.  That depression era style with clean lines and just a hint of deco.  It's Empire Period placed in the hands of the WPA.  At that moment five cyclists with halogen lamps strapped to their heads glided past, their skinny tires make no more noise than a dog passing gas.  Wow.  There's just all this stuff going on around me that isn't associated with a www.  How quaint. How empowering.

The next morning I gulped down my espresso and choked down a couple of oat cakes while I sat at my desk where — any other morning — I'd be reading foreign papers online, or listening to recent archived shows from Pacifica Radio.  When I'd finished my breakfast I drove out to Office Depot.  They had a few relatively cheap keyboards with USP connections which professed to be Mac compatible.  They had the aesthetic appeal of a parsnip.  But it was the best I could do.  I sure as hell wasn't driving to the Apple Store.  The pretentious hellhole was way up in La Cantera shopping center — a place which has the same effect on me as when vampires inadvertently stumble onto consecrated ground.

Well, my new keyboard (branded with the word “Microsoft” in 72 point type) worked straight out of the box.  But my old beautiful Mac keyboard had come with additional USB ports on the upper rail. Two of them.  One I used for my mouse.  The other for my jump drive.  But now, I have to plug my mouse into the second USP port on my CPU, just below my keyboard feed.  And that's all I have.  Two.  Until I figure this out, I'm SOL when is comes to my printer and my jump drive.

Apple, Microsoft … why can't you boys just learn to play together?

At least I have a keyboard.  My shakes were beginning to level off when Pete stopped by.  He was working a bartender gig at some sports event at the Alamo Dome.  He, understandably, cringed at the thought of 10 dollar parking.  So I drove him to the entrance, and said I'd await his call to pick him up.  Maybe not until midnight.  That sounded like one damn long day.  I hoped he'd get a mountain of tips.

Back home I waited on news from one of my actors to see if things were go for tonight's final shoot for my Short Ends short film.  When I found out it was a no-go, I started making the calls to cast and crew.  With those fires out, I headed over to Urban-15 to see how things were coming with this film festival I'm coordinating for them.  George was over at the Smithsonian (the San Antonio annex) working on his installation piece.  So, Catherine helped me get access to their website's mail server so I can begin adding contact emails to the address book in anticipation of the first wave of calls for entry.  She explained that their web-master would be by around 6.  I told her I'd try and make it back then, but I had a few things to do.

Things like stock up on coffee.  That internet withdrawal had been harrowing enough, but I sure as hell wasn't going to wake up Friday with nothing but herbal tea.

After my shopping trip, Russ dropped by.  He'd spent a long day teaching at Harlendale.  I told him we'd not be shooting, so we might as well grab a late lunch at Tito's Tacos.

At Tito's, Russ entered ahead of me.  He chose a booth and took a seat, forcing me to take the opposite side, in line of sight of the TV.  I want an absolute moratorium on TVs in restaurants.  When did this happen?  And why?  Anyway, it was the news.  Some crap about Anna Nicole Smith's mom.  Won't these people ever go away?  I kept trying to look away — but, like most Americans, I was practically raised by the TV.  And then I saw Tim Gerber.  He was standing in front of the Alamo Dome, cautioning commuters to take an alternate route, because this big sports event was causing a major cluster fuck (though I believe he used a different phrase).  It's always a treat to see someone you know on television (unless, you know, they kill someone or embezzle from an orphanage).  Tim's the hubby of actress Anne Gerber, and he always appears so relaxed, doing his schtick effortlessly.  How refreshing.  Most news folks come across as smarmy jackasses.  You just wanna smack them.  Not Tim.  Yeah, he can put that on his CV.  “I do not want to smack Tim Gerber,” –Erik Bosse.

After the overload of cheese enchiladas at Tito's, I waved goodbye to Russ and checked my email.  It was pushing eight.  I felt over-fed and bloated, but decided to head on over to Casa Chiapas (which was pretty much across the street from Tito's — but hell, they are both in my neighborhood).  NALIP was having a member meeting.  It started at 6:30. But when I got there, things were still in progress.  Seven people sat around the table in the back room.  I wasn't surprised by the low turnout.  I got the email yesterday.  It was Roger Castillo, Lisa Cortez-Walden, TJ Gonzalez, Robb Garcia, Dora and Manuel Pena, and some guy whose name escapes me.  They were in mid-meeting, so I took a seat a bit back, and tried to get up to speed.  They were mostly talking about the recent national conference many of them had attended in California.  When Lisa mentioned something about one of the upcoming film series that needed attention, I piped in that if they needed help, I could organize it.  I was already gearing into event manager mode with the Josiah Festival and the 48 Hour Film Project.  She shrugged.  Prez Roger said, sure.  Then I learned it was a paid curator position.  Not a lot of money, but something.  I guess it was a good thing I showed up.

I headed home and lounged around until midnight when Pete called.  I drove to the Alamo Dome, half fearing a crush of fans trying to drive home.  But, no.  It was just Pete, standing forlorn at the entrance to parking lot A.

Seems it was not the gold mine of high rolling tippers he'd been led to believe.  The final analysis, he was wise to avoid paying ten dollars on parking.  What we do for money … shit.

Anyway, this is a rambling post that might bore most people (except perhaps Anne's mom who gets to read a snippet about the son-in-law), but I'm offering it as a typical day in my life.  I do lots of things, most which don't amount to much.  I'm usually immersed in several projects — some that pay, most that don't — and they all are subject to the uncertainty that comes with collaborative work.  You have to be flexible, and you have to learn to get over those things that piss you off — the quicker the better, because you need to figure out a new course of action.

Last week when we were shooting the Short Ends film, Thorne made a comment.  We were packing up the equipment after a fairly short and successful night of shooting.  “I want Erik's life,” he said, while collapsing a Lowell light stand.  I made some quip about how I've heard people say that before, and that “everyone wants my life, but me.”  And Thorne quickly returned with:  “Well, I want certain parts of Erik's life.”

Fair enough.  We had just finished a wonderful rock-out scene where Roze, Adrian, and Laura were pantomiming playing their instruments (actually, Roze was really playing his drum kit).  And I was running around spritzing down the trio with a spray bottle of water.  So I think I know what he meant.  I can't complain when I find myself in a situation where I'm spraying fake sweat on a heart-achingly beautiful girl playing a Fender bass.  At the point, yes, indeed, life is good.  I hear you Thorne.  But otherwise, it's buying coffee or trying to be in the right place at the right time when you can score a job as a curator or event organizer … or get paid to go to Mexico to make a film.  Sometimes it's not bad being Erik.  Even without the spray bottle.

I spent the day waiting on an email or a phone call that might allow me to move a particular project forward. Futile, as it turned out. If nothing else, it gave me a chance to catch up on some of the blogs I subscribe to. (I highly recommend an RSS “reader” or “aggregator” to alert you when a blog you read has been updated — there are loads of free programs and services out there).

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My sister, who works for a large chain book store in Dallas, writes that next week Lauren Bacall will be at her store signing books. As she's already scheduled to be in town for the AFI film fest, it makes sense that she makes the rounds. Paula ponders: “I wonder if Miss Bacall would be offended if I showed up with a can of Fancy Feast for her to sign?” Hell, give it a try. Make a few test runs with a Sharpie on the upside of a cat food can to see if the signature won't rub off. And don't forget to video tape the whole request and signing, so that you have a better shot selling on eBay. I had forgotten those Fancy Feasts commercials. YouTube brought it all back. I had remembered that the pampered cat was served from crystal stemware, but I hadn't noticed before that the opening shot is a famous stock photo of a romantic medieval village on a Greek island. I know for a fact that THAT cat wouldn't stand for Purina products introduced into her Aegean villa. And then there's the matter of Ms. Bacall. How did the world's most beautiful woman make it from Key Largo and Dark Passage to hawking pet products? Maybe she should have never done those Rockford File episodes. The slippery slope must have began somewhere.

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On Pamela Ribons' blog, she's imagining a conversation between her and her girlfriends as they consider the possibility of a version of Wuthering Heights starring Johnny Depp and Angelina Jolie.

KATEY: That's…
PAMIE: I know. I know!
KATEY: Oh. Oh, my God.
LIZ: I just… God, I want to fuck that movie so hard.
PAMIE: I know! I want that movie inside of me.
KATEY: I so need that movie in me.
PAMIE: Right now. In me. Right here. I want that movie on my face. I want that movie screaming my name.
LIZ: Oh, my God. That is a seriously hot movie.
PAMIE: Even if it sucks, it's going to be SO AWESOME.
LIZ: I want to bend that movie over and just… oh, man!
KATEY: Why isn't everybody talking about this all the time?

I love these riffs Pamela does. I've never watched the Mind of Mencia, but I can only assume that her talents are wasted writing for that show.

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And Thorne, in a recent blog, writes about building a character he's going to play in my Short Ends film by analyzing the behavior of someone he observed while we shot last week. I was there watching him watch this guy. A double whammy of voyeurism. He likens this guy's bird-like movements to an Emu. He's right. I really enjoy watching people go through this sort of process to create a character. When I write, I do this sort of thing all the time. But because I'm tinkering with characters, revising while I write, the process isn't so apparent. Not even to me while I'm doing it. But for performers it's all about building up that character so that when the curtain rises or the camera starts to roll, it is all realized and ready to unfold.

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It was a grey lifeless day, with low banks of clouds occasionally dripping down with just a breath of rain. My weekly hike with Dar was re-scheduled for today. I decided to try Eisenhower Park, up near Camp Bullis. I had been there only two or three times before, with Pete and Cooper. On those occasions we had kept to the paved paths. Today me and Dar just meandered. We found some very nice rough and rocky trails.

She brought me up to speed on her film festival, SAL (San Antonio Local). This will be the first year for SAL, as well as the two film events I'm hired to promote (Josiah and the 48 Hour Film Project). We are already exchanging information and contacts, but it occurred to me that we probably need to sit down with a couple of people who've experience running these sorts of things for some years already. People like Adam Rocha and Denise Crettenden.

What a lot of work. I'm exhausted just thinking about it. Truly, life would be so much easier were I living in a villa on Corfu with an aging Hollywood starlet serving me dinner out of a can … and placed into crystal stemware. No cares, no woes.

My auto insurance company called last week telling me that my drivers license was expired. Now if only the state of Texas could mange to be so efficient. I could hardly blame them, as I failed to notify them I had moved from Fort Worth. However, as I tried to find out what sort of information I needed to get the thing renewed, the failings of the Texas Department of Transportation became glaringly apparent. They are obviously understaffed. I tried the phone numbers of all six San Antonio substations. One was no longer in service. All the others were constantly busy as I tried for about thirty minutes, moving from one number to another. Even the customer service office in Austin was busy. And it wasn't those sadistic automated voices that keep you hanging on the line listening to bilingual PSAs or light jazz. All I got was a “because of the high telephone traffic, we are presently unable to assist you — hang up and try later.”

So I just drove down to the offices on the southside. It was just coming up on noon, and I knew that was a mistake. Yep. The parking lot was choked. I walked up to the door, and before my hand even made contact with the metal handle, I saw the sign: “payment in cash and check only,” and I spun around and headed back to my truck, and drove home to get my checkbook. I had seen on the website that they accepted credit cards, but I guess that was just if you were going to pay online. I decided to stop for lunch at a little taqueria on S. Presa. So when I went back, the noon rush at the DOT had subsided a bit. Just a bit. I had to stand in line to get a number to stand in line.

I sat and filled out paperwork in a plastic chair. The woman behind me started a conversation with a man next to her. It seemed they had mutual friends at the sports bars they tended to hang out in. “You know Manny?” “The guy with the tattoos right here?” “Naw. But I know him too.” “Oh, I know who you're talking about. He works the back bar on weeknights.” The woman was afraid that when she got to the counter and gave the clerk her paperwork that some message would surface from the computer concerning her three outstanding warrants. “Speeding tickets,” she said. “Mostly.” And then a woman behind her chimed in about how they most likely would arrest her on the spot. “My cousin had like a million tickets and warrants, but the computer didn't say shit. He got in and got out. He was lucky. They have a sheriff in the back room. I was here three years ago, and my name came up. I didn't have a thousand dollars for the fine, so I had to go to lockup. They have awful sandwiches. And the cookies … those weren't what I'd call cookies. All they served was this nasty orange drink.”

A couple more voices entered, and I wish they were in front of me, so I could watch as well as listen. Mostly they were talking about their personal experience in jail. The sort of stuff this woman could expect. When the woman's number came up she got phone numbers of her new friends. “If my name doesn't come up on their computers, you're all invited to party with me tonight.”

Later, as I was standing in line, the woman emerged from the final room beaming. She rushed over to the rows where her seat-mates still sat, waiting.

“Party tonight!” she said quite loudly, and I watched her give a little jig. I only wish she had emerged from that final room with a cheerleader victory dance and had shouted to us all: “Damn, I beat the system! Tonight I'm gonna get tanked and drive like a maniac!”

The sad thing is she was about my age. This is what you encounter in these bureaucratic offices. The poor and the fuckups. I guess I fit into both categories. Our social betters do this stuff online, through the mail, or over the phone. Oh, wait, there is another group. The old codgers. They haven't embraced technology. They vote, pay bills, renew drivers licenses, and all that, in person. They've done it that way for over half a century, and the only way it's going to change is when they climb down into the ground. You can spot them easily. They are the ones not wearing flip flops, and their hats are not on crookedly. They have trousers with pressed seams, their nails are clean and trimmed, and they often clutch accordion folders with a solid decade's worth of pertinent documents. And they haven't a clue as to what sort of sandwiches are served in the Bexar County lockup.

I finally made it to the front of the line. After an eye-check, a electronic signature, and biometric scans of both thumbs, I wrote out a check for 24 bucks, posed for a photo in front of the classic blue backdrop, and got the hell out of there. (The one thing that surprised me was that they had me remove my glasses “because of the glare.” I remember one time maybe two decades ago when, in a moment of vanity, I removed my glasses just before the drivers license photo was to be taken, and the clerk chastised me. “We want you to look the way you usually look.”)

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After I got that out of the way, I stopped by Urban 15. George is deep into work on his video art project for San Antonio's Smithsonian Museum. He and Herman were running a mockup of the hardware in the basement space. The current scheme is to run three HD projectors, each connected to a committed PC. The video piece is using a specific program that allows one massive, and horizontally long, QuickTime file to be spread across these multiple projectors so that there is no seam from one projected quadrant to another. The video images themselves are presented in collage form, in constant motion.

I spent a bit of time with George talking about the upcoming Josiah Youth Media Festival I'm helping them run. We're still waiting on putting out the call for entries until their web-master creates the festival's website.

Last week I finally got around to seeing some of the works of Josiah Neundorf. He was a former high-school student of George Ozuna. He then went off to study film in Boston. But shortly before his 21st birthday, he passed way because of a rare form of bone cancer. Much of his work is animation. Stop-motion, with clay as well as real objects (in the manner of Jan Svankmajer), and also drawn images. He did one piece with found, archival footage which reminded me of a very early experimental piece by Peter Greenaway. And there is an excellent live action narrative about a man inadvertently making a deal with the devil. It's a strong piece, well shot with smart set ups. Good actors. And all in Spanish — with English subtitles.

The kid was an artist. As young as he was, he had a definite and an emerging style. To attached his name to a film festival — a youth film festival — makes perfect sense. Josiah was walking down his own path in life, and making work that any of us would be proud of.

One of the things I wanted to add in yesterday's entry was the people pushing their way on to set. The house in Seguin is on an out-of-the-way road running along the river. Not a lot of traffic. And you can only gain entrance into the property through an automatic gate. Early on during the day, an SUV followed in one of our actors. Two women bounced out of the vehicle, asking where the garage sale was. We had to chase out these interlopers. And sometime around noon, I was walking around the front of the house, with the electric gate clicker in my pocket. When a car pulled up to the gate, I naturally let it in, assuming it was an actor. The car didn't hesitate to enter. It snugged up against another parked car. Engine was turned off. A young professional-looking woman in a rather long skirt got out of the drivers side of the car. It was a very recent black Cadillac. The passenger door opened. An old man in an immaculate Brooks Brother suit stepped out. He walked with a pronounced stoop. I was fascinated. Was there a change to the script? Could this be the old family doctor come to, I don't know, provided some door-to-door estrogen replacement therapy to the women in this film? The stove up old man limped right up to me and pulled from a folder, a flyer whose art work shouted (from forty paces, at least) “religious nut.” Turns out they were Jehovah's Witnesses. And I gave them the boot. But it occurred to me that the Witnesses have been doing pretty well if they are driving luxury cars and wearing expensive suits. Most likely set crashers hot to get in front of the camera, no matter that it takes.

Today we shot some of the restaurant scenes at Shilos downtown. This is a German place famous for its split pea soup and homemade root beer.

The place is a San Antonio institution. We were able to get it because Sherrie's sister manages the place.

We got there at nine. We shot five or six scenes, with loads of extras. What fun. I love working with this unwieldy number of people. They were all damn professional. Even the older tourist couple we met on the sidewalk while shooting an establishing shot. We promised them a free meal. They came on in and spent the whole day with us.

Young Matt Hensarling arrived to play the nerdy restaurant manager. He's fucking amazing. Each take he added some new improv line. Each time fascinating and very funny in its own way.

Everyone was in top form. Sherrie and Andrea gave us a cozy and flawless scene, with every take perfection. Andrea and Anne were wonderfully natural together. And Martha Prentiss nailed it as the disgruntled customer with a poorly cooked steak.

Robin kept the energy going, and we were able to get some great work done and get our last shot off by the deadline, eight pm on the dot.

The final scene was a last minute idea by Robin. It was a two page scene where Andrea, Rick, and Matt are interacting in the kitchen of the restaurant. Robin pointed to the hatchway where food is passed from the kitchen into the waitress station. “Why don't we shoot through this opening?” she asked. Russ was intrigued. He found the perfect composition. I tossed in some light. And he shot the scene. The first take was ruined when a noisy ice maker kicked in. The controls were out of reach, so we waited for its compressor to cycle off. As we waited, I decided we needed to see a plate of food placed into the extreme foreground on the shelf of the order-up hatch. It was a lovely shot. The actors were spot on.

A damn fun day, well-orchestrated and very productive. Congratulations Robin, Kevin, Sherrie, and Russ.

I saw Nikki on set for the feature film Leftovers Saturday. She made some comment that I haven't posted a blog in a while. I explained that my short film I'm doing for Short Ends Project has turned into such a nightmare that I need some distance before I write about that particular part of my life. Last week we shot Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday. I had problems with rain when I wanted to shoot outside, a warehouse space I was prepared to pay for which evaporated at the last minute, two actors who went MIA on me, and a raft of miscellaneous problems (most too miniscule to bother me when dropped in to my lap two or three at a time, but in a good-sized wave crashing down, well, it can put a guy off his footing).

The footage we've gotten, I hasten to add, it wonderful. Our actors shined and the crew pulled together admirably. I never felt things were veering too far out of control, as I had Martha Prentiss and Laura Evans in the cast. More about the brilliance of these incredible actors later when I get around to giving a blow-by-blow of the short.

But, as I'm giving my take on the Leftovers production, I'll bring it up to speed.

Saturday, I got up at a sane time. Six-thirty. I had an eight forty-five call time in Seguin. I had time for an espresso and some oatmeal while catching up with Amy Goodman on radio over the internet.

When I got to the location, with maybe five minutes to spare, I noticed that one of our actors, Tasha, had arrived. Her car was parked off the road on the grassy verge. I waved, and shut off my engine, and pivoted so I could put my feet up on bench seat of my truck and wait. I fished a tattered paperback of Marcus Aurelius from behind my seat, and waited. The Seguin location is a beautiful house on the banks of the Guadalupe River. It's perimetered by a fence. An electric gate keeps people out. Russ is our contact person with the owners (who are gracious enough to give us full run of the place — they shift to their second home in Austin to keep out of our hair). He has the electric clicker to get us inside. There had been some confusion about the call time. Robin had put it at 8:45 because some of the crew (and I'm not naming names) were always running late. What happened was that a lot of people showed up at 8:45, and we got into the place at nine.

I don't think the ploy worked.

The day started out bad, and it got worse. We were all unfocused. Tracie was down in the carport using my compressor to inflate a prop child's wading pool. The box made it took massive. It was a very involved affair with about six different air compartments. It had an inflatable slide. And this weird giraffes' head that sprayed water from its nose. When finally assembled, it was small enough to fit atop a folding card table. When Robin, in passing, asked how the pool was coming along, I asked if she was expecting the pool featured in a photo on the box. “Well, yeah,” she said. “FYI,” I muttered, “it looks like the models were midget children.”

Upstairs, I found Russ and Robin talking about the best window to shoot through so that our star, Sherri, can be looking through to see her character's husband playing with the three boys thrown into their foster care. I'd expected a shot through the kitchen window. But I found Russ and Robin in the rear bedroom. It was a great view. I would have liked some sense of preproduction planning. Some story-boards. Shot lists. But all I could do as Russ and Robin moved through a series of miscommunications, was to pull out the window screens so we could have a clean shot through the windows. Erin appeared out of nowhere and began cleaning the window glass. Kevin drove off to NewTek to borrow their large crane.

I gelled all out six Lowell lights, and defused them. It was still not enough to fight the sunlight coming in through windows on three walls. We wanted a shot with Sherri in a close one-shot with windows behind her. I used three sheets of 2×2 foot neutral density filters to tame the sunlight. With all the windows at this location, I wish we had huge sheets of ND filters. Sadly, we don't.

We did pretty good on Saturday, even thought we had neither focus nor energy.

We got all of our scenes shot (though we stayed late).

The final bedroom scene took way too long. And I'm still not sure why. We lit it blue for moon light with 2000 watts of light coming through the venetian blinds, and a 250 watt Lowell Pro Light washing in from the bathroom.

There was something about the choreography of Sherrie and DB rolling around on the bed. Robin wanted one thing. Russ wanted something else.

I'd lost interest in the whole thing. I was in the adjacent room, readied if my name was called. I opened a book on table titled Dogwalker. It's a collection of short stories by Arthur Bradford. This guy's good. The power struggle in the other room between Director Robin and DP Russ — it paled under the cunning prose of Bradford.

Damn this daylight saving time. Actually, I like the additional hour of sunlight in the spring. But this year we have it forced on us at a nontraditional time. Our computers and cell phones are unprepared, unprogrammed. In fact, my antiquated computer (a Mac G4, purchased four years ago, and still running on the original operating system) can't seem to update on it's own. I just now manually updated it's clock, 22 hours after the fact. Also, my cell phone didn't automatically reset. Well, it did, but only after I shut it down, and then rebooted it.

Anyway, last night after I returned from Saturday's shoot in Seguin, I checked my email. I discovered that my Short Ends location, which I felt so confident about, had evaporated. I now have no place to shoot this coming week. This really pissed me off. I decided to just go to sleep and worry about it later. I had a hard time falling asleep. I'd spent the day drinking coffee, as well as those tasty Starbucks bottled Frappuccinos. So, I was amped on caffeine. And it was also hot. I opened windows to get a cross breeze. And when that wasn't doing it, I hauled a fan from my closet. The fan was a nice touch, but then a dog started barking. So I had to put the fan on high, and aim it away from me so I wasn't trying to sleep in a wind tunnel. I had my cell phone (which I also use as my alarm clock) set to 5:30, so I could make my 6:30 call time at a grocery store downtown. (It's an up-market boutiquey grocery on Market across from the courthouse). I kept waking up, about every hour or two. And around 5am, I decided to just get up. I loaded my espresso machine, and began checking my email. And then I realized I hadn't reset my phone/alarm clock. Maybe it did it automatically. A quick internet check told me it was not five, but six.

I rushed through a shower, grabbed my coffee, and headed out.

I arrived late. I hate being late. Robin was there. Ezme had her make-up station set up. Anne had arrived — always dependable. Some of our child actors. And Erin. Erin is always on time. She puts us all to shame.

I unloaded some equipment, and found a parking space about six blocks away. Who would have thought so few parking meters would be free on a Sunday at 7am? Where were all those people?

Me, Kevin, and Mark set up about half our lights. But when Russ showed up (sometime after Rudolfo, but I'm not keeping score), he decided that the grocery store's practical lights, in combo with the sunlight through the floor to ceiling windows along one side wall, were just about perfect.

I left him and Robin to set up the first shot, and caught up with Tony and Dawn Boult. They showed up as extras. It's been over 6 months since I'd last seen them. They're looking great, and, of course, managed to kick up the fun quotient, in classic Boult-style.

Nikki arrived, not just in her capacity of child acting coach, but also as a featured extra. I watched as she wandered the aisles, with the same rhythm, the same actions, for each take. I sidled up to her between takes.

“Hey, Nikki, what's you're back story?”

Without a beat, she answered me. “I've just come from the gym.” Yep. She was wearing a maroon velour workout suit. “And I thought I stop and pick up something for dinner.”

“Ah,” I said, peeking into her basket. “I see you're serious about carbo-loading with a bag of hominy grits, and some Gatorade. So, what flavor sports drink goes best with grits?”

“Blueberry all the way,” she answered, looking up to see that Robin was setting up for a new take.

Kevin Grady (AKA Intern Kevin, AKA Other Kevin) today took a break from his role as the perfect production assistant, to play Stockboy Number One. He did a great job. I don't know if he has any thoughts of pursuing acting, but he held his own with Sherrie and Anne.

But probably the location's best performance was Cameron Wafford. As young Connor, he plays brat to the n-th degree. He was screaming for “candy, I want candy, and more candy,” as he flailed about and threw cans of food on the floor.

I left the location before the shoot was over. The second location of the day was back at my apartment. I needed to arrange my place to best recreate the previous week's shoot.

When the production caught up to me, we set up for a simple pickup shot as Kevin prepared lunch. I think the second half of the day went smoothly enough. Miss Patty had another scene. And after she wrapped, she gave us all hugs (also, for some lucky folks, back and shoulder massages), and as she was waving goodbye to us from her car, Cameron shouted to her from where he sat on the porch. “We Don't Salute, We Wave Like Queens!” And he lifted his hand as though to wave, and he rotated it back and forth, in the Queen Elizabeth manner.

This is the same campy, kooky child who will say, with a smile as sweet as it is evil: “I want to bomb the world with candy canes.”

I don't know where he gets this stuff.

We were shooting our final scene on my porch. I was pressed back out of the shot as I held a reflector, trying to bounce a bit of warm light on Dallin's face. Halfway through the take, some electronic device began to beep. Robin called “cut.” The beep wasn't my cell phone's ring, but I fished it from my pocket anyway. Well, it was me. But it was the alarm clock setting. I had inadvertently set it for 5:30pm, instead of 5:30am.

I had exposed myself as all kinds of stupid.

Saturday, another early morning shoot on the set of Robin Nation's feature film, Leftovers. The first location was the offices of the NewTek. We needed a generic area to function as the back room of a grocery store. The character of Anna has just been involved in a feisty altercation with her kids while shopping. The manager has taken them to the back to sort things out. Robin had initially considered utilizing one of the cubicles used for storage purposes.

Robin was talking with our actors over in NewTek's commons area (which, like so many companies run by techie geeks, was awash in an abundance of cool toys and games). The kid actors, their siblings, and even their parents were entertaining themselves. And after Kevin started the coffee and had set out our breakfast choices, he showed me the area where we would be shooting. The huge sprawling interior was illuminated with these free-standing upwardly pointing lights (HMIs?) with buzzing ballasts. I pointed out that Rudolfo (who had yet to arrive) would have issues with the buzz making a muddle of his sophisticated audio equipment. Me and Kevin track down the most expedient way to shut off the lights.

By then, Robin had found an area of the building that would work better. It would give us the company's time-clock as an item in the background. We quickly set up our lights, turned off their lights, and rearranged the area, so that we had dressed the set with a jumble of cleaning supplies, boxes, and employee protection posters on the walls.

Don Frame showed up to play the role of the grocery store manager. Apparently he'd been in The Water's Edge, Robin's previous film. But I don't remember him. However, I did recall him quite well from Kevin William's feature, Sandwich. He had played a bank manager with a fondness for playing his accordion at work. It was an endearing, yet eccentric character. I loved it.

Also, we had another newcomer to the shoot. Patricia McDoulett, AKA, Miss Patty. She's from Oklahoma. Her role is the caseworker from Child Protective Services. Both Don and Patty were wonderful to work with. Absolutely professional and completely engaged by the film and all the rest of the cast and crew.

It was a fairly short and straightforward scene. We took longer than we probably should have. And I'm afraid that the footage will look a bit flat and washed out because we were shooting against industrial white walls. However, the look did fit the script. And, as I said, it's a short scene. So, I'm sure it'll play out just fine. We have lots of set-ups to cut back and forth. And we have eight people in the scene.

After we broke down the equipment, we were all set to move to our second and last location of the day. The house in Seguin.

It was a beautiful day in a beautiful house with windows all around. A perfect view of the Guadalupe river. About half of the windows were open. And it seemed criminal to close them, but we needed to control the sound as best we could. Some people in the surrounding homes were mowing lawns, and a truck would occasionally pass on the nearest road. From our two Lowell light kits, we supplemented the ambient sunlight with three Omnis and one Pro, all gelled blue, to match the daylight.

We still had Miss Patty for another scene. He character pays a house call to Carol, the protagonist. We shot Miss Patty with a stained glass window behind her, so that she was bathed in an angelic glow.

With Sherri, we threw a light over her left shoulder. It added warmth to her hair, and molded some delicate shadows to her face. But the key light coming from behind her was harsh in only one area — that bosomy region. Russ mentioned some scheme to remedy the solution. It involved … oh, I can't recall. At the very least, moving a light.

I grabbed a bounce board, and used it to block the light. It worked a charm. Then, we realized that Mark, who was operating the slate, could use the slate for that other purpose as well. So, for the next few shots, the slate became the infantile entitled “boob board.”

For the final scene of the day, we needed to shoot Sherri, DB, and Ayla in the kitchen. The problem is that the kitchen has four windows, and a glass door. The sunlight streaming in would be gone by the time we finished up the scene. It was over four pages, and involved ten to twelve camera set-ups. I wanted us to shoot a wide establishing shot that showed the windows. We'd know it was daytime. And then, we could make sure every subsequent set-up was lit for daylight (with the motivating direction of our lights coming from where most of the windows were), but we never again placed a window in the shot.

I know that, after the establishing shot, we had pretty lighting for all our camera placements. But I'm curious to know if the initial establishing shot will match. There was so much sunlight coming through the windows in the wide-shot, that, to keep the windows from being blown out (“so it doesn't look like the apocalypse outside,” cautioned Robin), we had to step down the aperture so much that we had to compensate with our light kits. I'm not sure we lit the scene well enough.

As the evening progressed, I noticed that Sherrie and Russ were quite freely sampling the prop wine. From Russ' gargling and lip-smacking, I gathered it was quite a tasty Merlot.

We fell into a groove of allowing Sherrie and DB play this longish emotional scene all the way through with every take and every set-up. This is common when you find yourself working with such solid actors, who know their lines and their parts so well that they can explore nuances of their character's interior selves by tinkering and playing with their deliveries.

Towards the end of the night I was standing next to Ezme, our make-up genius. We were watching the scene unfold. And when Robin said, “cut,” she turned to Russ. “Wow, they did great. How did it look in the monitor?”

Russ removed the half-filled wine glass from Sherrie's hand. He finished it off. “The composition and lighting was impeccable. But what do I know? If you haven't noticed, your DP is drunk.”

I could tell Ezme wasn't listening to Russ and Robin's exchange.

“Get me a tissue, Tito” she said to me in a whisper.

I was impressed that I'd made it into the inner circle with Ezme. It looked like I had a nickname. And it looked like she needed a tissue to do some make-up adjustment on one of our actors. I snagged a box of Kleenex from the desk over by one of the windows. When I offered it to her, she crossed her eyes in confusion. Then she punched me in the arm.

“I didn't mean it like that,” she said with exasperation and a hint of a laugh.

It was a figure of speech, it seemed. Maybe a film or music reference. She meant that Robin's dialogue and our actors' deliveries were hitting her hard.

I returned the tissues to the desk.

My impending move has been delayed. I gave some thought to the reasons I was leaving this place. The biggest problem is that it costs too much. That hasn't changed. But I realized that the place I was considering moving into wasn't really my choice. It fell into my lap. No — the truth is, it was pushed upon me. Alex needed someone stable and dependable to sublease to. I fit that need well enough. But what would I get from the move? Less rent. But if that's what I need, I really should look around, and make the decision about where my new home will be.

I told Alex I couldn't do it. He's a great guy. But I don't think I want him as a landlord (or whatever you call someone you sublease from). I told him that there was way too much going on in my life at the moment for me to make a move. That was true. But I'm still keeping me eye open for a cheaper place to live. In this neighborhood, or that area a bit to the south.

Rosemary, my landlady's property manager, came by yesterday. She pounded a For Rent sign in the yard. I explained that I wanted to remain for at least an additional month. Made no difference to her — she was good with it. She pulled up the sign, and headed back home.

There's this sense of rudderlessness in my life. Truly, it's nothing new. Ideally, I'd just crawl off to some other place, some other possibility. But I have a commitment to finishing a short film, as well as coordinating two film festivals between now and mid July.

I've looked into getting accredited to teach English abroad. It's not what it was for the expatriates of the past. Now it looks like you need credentials. I found a company that runs classes. Actually they work through one of the universities here in San Antonio. A thousand bucks. But it seems like there are other organizations which are significantly cheaper when it comes to gaining a certificate. I guess what it all boils down to, is which “schools” are best at placing their students. The whole thing sounds like such a racket. But there has to be an answer. Some way out of this pointless and empty cul-de-sac down which I've wandered.

It's a good city with so many wonderful people. But there's something missing. I'm trying to find reasons to stick around. Ramon has mentioned some possible funding for another documentary down in Mexico this autumn. If he can wrangle the finances, I'll gladly find a way to survive until then.

Wait and see what happens.