Rain, rain go away, come back on Mother’s Washing Day…some chance. So it rained all day – big surprise and we got behind. The poor actor who turned up to play the Sea.Doo dude hung around and never got to work. I hate it when that happens.
Unsung heroes of the set – Part One. Script Supervisors. What do they do? (They used to be called continuity ladies at one time but of course you could never do that now – though I’ve never met a continuity ‘chap’). Ours is called Pam and she’s the best. She takes a note of every take, which are my favourites, which lens we used, focal distance, f-stop, footage count etc. She then keeps a note of which hand the actor was using to hold the door when he climbed into the Indian, which person entered first, which lines were missed, which lines were stepped on etc. It’s an endless, thankless task. She tells the actors what they did in the last take and actors aren’t always ready to ‘hear’ what she has to say so it takes great tact and patience. She’s also the only person on the set in a ‘one person’ department. No-one around to take over for half an hour, cover for her if she oversleeps and without her we’d be lost. Every movie has one and every shot you see on your TV or movie screen has been watched over painstakingly by someone like Pam. As you settle-in in front of the TV this evening give yourself a test. After 5 minutes ask yourself which hand the bad guy was holding the gun in when he raced out from behind the building? Which hand did the good guy hold his drink in when he started the speech, which hand did he have the cigarette in at the end of the speech? Bet you get it wrong.
Say a thank-you to all the Pam’s of the world. Without them you’d notice all these stupid things that would take you out of the movie and destroy your enjoyment of it.