Exploiting Hollywood 1980

October 19th, 8:00 p.m.

This is the call time for the first day of filming of "Fast-paced Richmond High School". All actors and staff must arrive at the filming location - Sherman Oaks Department Store before this time.

Director Ronald arrived at the filming site 30 minutes in advance.

First Assistant Director Al has been working here for nearly an hour in advance.

Today is the first day of filming, and everyone arrived early to adapt to the unfamiliar working environment and personnel.

Ronald was taken to the dressing room on the top floor of the mall by Al. It was originally the office of the department store. In order to film, 5 dressing rooms for actors and warehouses for props, costumes, and other staff were set aside.

"Everything is OK?"

"Everything is OK. The actors will be in place soon. The makeup and hairstyling department will start applying makeup and eyelashes to the two leading actresses. Actor Robert Romanus has arrived and is getting his hair done. The costume will change his clothes soon."

"Very good. Have the producers Linsen and Mr. Azoff arrived?"

"Mr. Linsen has arrived. He went to say hello to Jennifer. Mr. Azoff will be here later. He is coming from the MCA Music office. His secretary called me."

Ronald inspected the departments and found Cameron Crowe at the location of the first shot.

Crow and his girlfriend Nancy Wilson were watching the director of photography Matthew work. It was their first time to watch a movie being made on the spot.

"Hi, Cameron, Nancy." Ronald greeted them. "Why don't you see Hecklin?"

"She was here just now. She said she was going to pick up an important person."

It was nothing more than inviting someone from the upper level to stand on the platform. Ronald knew what he was doing. He was not worried. Besides the fact that he also invited someone to stand on the platform, Hecklin's behavior did not conform to the rules of the set.

Filming is a large-scale operation involving hundreds of people, which is similar to the military fighting a war. The crew is a hierarchical society, and the director is the head of the crew, and he emphasizes discipline.

If someone does not obey orders and wastes a shot, it will be a huge loss of property and time. In a capitalist society, time is property.

For an extra day of shooting time, all kinds of people in the crew have to pay an extra day's salary. The minimum wage for a basic supporting role is $315. "There are many supporting roles in the fast-paced crew, plus some permanent extras, and the actor salary alone is several thousand dollars.

So for a long time, Hollywood has formed a customary rule. No matter how the upper-level struggle is, you have to listen to the director's orders in the crew, even if you think he is a fool.

Hecklin wants to replace her director position, and she can only fire herself on the grounds that her sample quality is not up to standard, and then replace him. This reason can only be used after a few days of shooting.

In the first few days, all she could do was to win over more actors and staff in the crew and find faults with her directing.

"Where are the cars prepared by the crew's stuntmen?" Ronald asked assistant director Al.

"Here, a Toyota Corolla and a Volkswagen Beetle." Al led him to the side, where the stunt team rested.

"The Corolla first drove through the lane close to the camera, and then the Beetle drove through the distant lane, stopping at the entrance of the mall halfway, and the positioning point was there. "Ronald gave the order in a few words.

The stunt team during filming is not like what some people imagine, doing lightsaber stunts like in Star Wars, but refers to all actions that the actors themselves do not do. The most prominent one is vehicle driving, which is usually done by stuntmen.

One of the drivers in the stunt team is a rare woman in this industry, named Debbie Evans. She gave Ronald a thumbs up, indicating that she understood. Stuntmen like to order specific directors in this way so that they can design operations.

"Matthew." Ronald returned to the position of the camera and called the director of photography again, "This is the first shot. I want a fixed camera position to aim at the gate of the mall for a panoramic view, and then the scalper Mike will enter from behind the camera and send him across the road and into the mall. "

The director of photography expressed his understanding, "Did you hear it all? The director has spoken, get moving. "

"Very good, I'll go upstairs to rest, and I'll be here before the shooting starts at nine o'clock.

After instructing the camera crew, Ronald went upstairs in the mall again. In the small room specially provided for him, he opened the folding chair with his name on the back, sat on it and closed his eyes to rest.

It had been more than two years since he last directed a movie. Finally, he had the opportunity to give orders and direct a movie again.

And this time, he was the official director and had a chair with his name on the back.

At half past eight, the crew assistant knocked on his door.

He had gone through the shots to be shot today several times in his mind. Ronald stood up, took his folding chair, opened the door and walked out.

The crew assistant quickly took the chair in his hand and handed over a metal thermos cup with Lipton black tea in it. This was the refreshing drink ordered by the director.

When he arrived at the shooting site, the lights had been turned on, and the light feeling of the scene was restored very well, not very bright. It felt like night, but it also illuminated the characters and background.

The range of darkness and light that a camera can recognize is called dynamic range, which is much narrower than that of the human eye. The job of a director of photography is to make the light captured by the camera on the film negative feel pleasing to the eye.

This is a job that requires both theory and experience, and Matthew did a great job.

Called Robert Romanus, who played the role of Mike the Scalper, and checked his clothes and hairstyle.

Ronald thought there was no problem, and signaled to the first assistant director Al to prepare for filming.

It was nine o'clock in the evening. The mall was usually closed at this time, but today the lights were still bright. The extras pretending to be customers were ready to walk on the street.

The assistant director held a bullhorn and asked all units to pay attention to the preparation for filming. Then the sound on the scene stopped, leaving only some faint motor sounds, which were the stunt vehicles being prepared.

"Recording?"

"It's on."

"Camera"

"Full speed of the motor"

"A!"

Al repeated loudly with the bullhorn, "A!"

The camera was aimed at the entrance of the mall and took a panoramic shot. The extras played passers-by and customers, walking on the road, or entering and exiting the mall entrance.

The stuntman drove a white Toyota Corolla car and passed by the driveway in front of the camera.

Robert Romanus, who played the role of Mike the Scalper, wore a slightly oversized light-colored suit with high shoulder pads, dark blue pants, a peaked cap, and leather shoes. He ran into the frame from the right rear of the camera.

He ran across the street quickly, waited for the Beetle to stop, went around the back of the car, walked onto the opposite sidewalk, and walked into the mall door.

"Cut!"

Ronald looked at the director of photography, and after getting Matthew's confirmation, he said to the assistant director, "We'll do another one after this print."

After shooting this scene, Ronald ordered the filming here to end, and the camera crew disassembled the camera and prepared to move it to the top floor to shoot the remaining scenes for today.

This shot that just finished was also the first shot of the movie. This was not Ronald's intention, but a coincidence.

Because there was only one shot outside the mall, the shots for the next week were all shot inside the mall. For the convenience of arrangement, he simply mentioned that it was shot first. After that, the mall could turn off the lighting equipment in front of the door and close the door to ensure that the shooting was not disturbed.

Ronald went to the top floor first, which was divided into two shooting areas. On one side was the cinema, where the male protagonist, the ticket inspector Mark, and the scalper Mike were shot.

On the other side is Perry's Pizza, where the heroine Stacey and Linda are talking about a handsome male customer.

Today, the crew hired hundreds of extras to play customers and staff. After the mall closed, all the lights were turned on normally. Several fast food restaurants were still open, and their staff were still making fries, pizza, and hamburgers as midnight snacks for the actors and staff.

In return, their store signs will be filmed in the movie as free advertising. The snack shop clerks can also be mixed into a background shot.

Art director Dan is installing fake "Richmond Department Store" signs, various pompoms and banners in the mall.

Director of photography Matthew is directing the lighting team to speed up the installation of lights designed and debugged in advance to save time.

The lighting arrangement of indoor scenes will take a lot of time.

However, the art director and the director of photography know that Ronald is an expert and respect them very much. So they are ready to work hard this time and show some real skills.

They jointly designed a lighting system to hide the lights in the position of normal mall lighting, so that the light path looks like the original lights of the mall.

But the brightness of the light is much brighter than the original shopping mall bulbs, which can fully illuminate the scene for shooting, so the main light is very stable.

The lighting technician does not need to spend two hours to re-light every time the camera angle is changed. He only needs to adjust some secondary lamps for fill light, which greatly saves time.

Ronald first stood at Perry's Pizza.

While shooting in the pizza shop, the lighting supervisor would go to the entrance of the cinema to prepare the fill light for the next scene. When the shooting is finished here, the fill light is just finished there.

Since the actors on both sides are different, the lighting can be carried out in parallel with the shooting on the other side, saving a lot of time.

This is a fast shooting method discussed by Ronald, the director of photography and the art director.

If we can grab some shooting progress in the first week, it will be a good thing for the shooting of the entire crew.

While the camera crew was measuring the focal length, Ronald talked about the play to Phoebe Cates, who was standing still and waiting to be measured with a tape measure by the focus staff.

"Remember the feeling I said, Phoebe. You are telling a story to Stacey, played by Jennifer."

"Okay..." Phoebe Cates nodded fiercely. This director Ronald is much more relaxed than the director who filmed "Paradise" before. He will tell the actors some scenes and the actors' inner thoughts, but he does not prescribe his own performance methods.

He also gives the actors a lot of time to prepare, allowing them to quietly brew emotions without being disturbed.

Soon, Jennifer Jason Lee, who plays Stacey, was also ready. The two girls are not famous stars, and there is no stand-in. They waited for the photographer to prepare honestly. The makeup artist was still arranging their false eyelashes.

Ronald was about to tell Jennifer some key points.

"Ha, Ronald. Nice to meet you." A nasty loud voice came. It broke the actor's quiet emotional preparation.

Ronald heard that it was Tom Mount, the president of Universal, and he felt uncomfortable. Why did a president condescend to come to the crew on the first day of filming? Is he so impatient? And he didn't understand the rules of the set. He spoke loudly before filming, which destroyed the actor's emotional preparation.

"Good evening, Mr. Mount." Ronald was ready to hug him.

Mount stretched out his hand to shake his hand. Ronald quickly changed his position and shook hands with him, maintaining the appearance of kindness.

"I happen to be free, and Heikelin and I came over to check on the crew." Mount took the initiative to explain.

"Okay, please bring Mr. Mount a chair." Ronald asked the assistant director Al, then grabbed him and said in his ear, "Go to Cameron Crowe and ask him to find out how Something happened.”

Jennifer and Phoebe reset their mood and the lights were in place. After communicating with the director of photography, Ronald and Matthew, they thought it was okay to start shooting, and announced the start of the first shot of this scene.

The camera was positioned behind Phoebe Cates. It was an over-the-shoulder shot, focused on Jennifer, filming their conversation.

"Do you think he's handsome?" Stacy said to Linda.

"Don't you think he looks like Richard Gere? Look at that sexy little ass." Stacey replied.

"Do you want to serve his table instead of me?" Stacey was a little shy, wanting to strike up a conversation but afraid of being rejected.

"What are you waiting for? If I didn't have a wonderful boyfriend in Chicago, I would have done it myself." Linda encouraged, "Go ahead, just give her the order."

"After ordering, look him in the eyes, and then whenever he tells any joke, pretend it's the funniest joke in the world and laugh loudly at him. ... Well, and don't forget to smile."

"Hehehe..." Stacey smiled, still a little nervous.

Linda arranged her clothes and hairstyle and asked her to go over.

"Cut!"

Ronald thought it was great. Even though Jennifer was already 19, she could play a 15-year-old girl very well, and she expressed the emotion of being shy but wanting to meet a handsome guy very well.

Phoebe Cates completely listened to her instructions and told Linda a lot of pick-up experiences and on-site guidance. She spoke like she was telling a great story, very convincing.

"Matthew?" Ronald asked the director of photography.

"Okay." Matthew asked the operator who was in charge of the camera. There was no problem in the whole process.

"Let's do this print again." Ronald ordered, preparing to change the angle after finishing the shooting and take another set of over-the-shoulder shots, this time aimed at Phoebe.

"Wait a minute, don't you think Phoebe has a little emotional problem?"

A harsh voice came over, and everyone in the crew shuddered and looked over.

It's associate producer Amy Heckerling.

"I'm not interfering with your thoughts, director, but there is a place to discuss." Heikelin lowered his voice and walked over to talk to Ronald.

The whole crew swiped again and focused their attention on Ronald.

"I think Linda's tone here seems to be telling someone else's story. I think this should be a more mature Linda, like Stacey who doesn't have a boyfriend yet, imparting her own experience, so she should start from her own experience. Said, there should be a sweetness that reminds me of my boyfriend.”

Heckerling talked eloquently.

Tom Mount also sat up from his chair, pretending to be listening intently.

"What do you think? What do you think?" Ronald did not discuss with him matter-of-factly how Phoebe Cates should act, but questioned that she should not challenge her authority on the set.

"I think we should give it a try. What Heklin said makes sense. Why don't we shoot one according to her idea and make a decision when we look at the samples tomorrow?" Mount spoke up and put forward his own "suggestion."

"Why don't you come up with one yourself?" Ronald gestured to Assistant Director Al and let Heckerling do the acting, while he gave up his position.

Because he saw Crowe standing outside the crowd and winking at him, as if he had some news.

Heckerling began to tell Phoebe and Jennifer about the scene. The staff and actors looked at each other, not knowing what was going on. Who do you listen to?

Ronald took two steps back to the outside of the circle. Cameron Crowe came over and said, "I called Lin Sen's assistant. Spielberg's box office statistics for last weekend were calculated. 'The Lost Ark of the Covenant' was released again." Reached the top.

\u0026’s studio celebrated his success. Mount initially disagreed with filming ET, but now he is a little passive and wants to do something to restore the impact. "

"So you come to me to find confidence?" Ronald thought to himself.

"But Spielberg went to celebrate? He won't come today, right?" I reminded Spielberg's assistant Catherine during the day.

"It doesn't matter. Even without Spielberg, I won't lose." Ronald's mind was racing. How would he refute Heckerling when he watched the samples tomorrow? How to win support from producers?