Well That Part's Done

Well I've been meaning to write so often over the last couple of weeks.  The magic of color and the glory of sound happened simultaneously.  That in between Jack's FIRST birthday and Molly's SEVENTH left me composing posts in my head in bed at night instead of publishing them.  What an incredible journey. On Friday of last week I crossed off my very last note for color.  I turned the pile of paper over with a satisfied breath and then felt a sudden wave of emotion knowing I was letting go of the film.  Setting it out into the world to find it's way.  What a rush.
The last week my mind has been suddenly filled with images and sound bites over the last two years.  The first call from my producing partner Jason Potash when he read an early draft.  The first pitch meeting at an agency while battling morning sickness.  Location scouts in Michigan.  Getting talent!  Losing talent.  Getting new better talent!  Raising money. Losing money.  Pushing the film.  Meeting Gina Resnick and being told we'd 'have to shoot in NY'. Having JACK.  Getting back into pre-production with a brand new baby.  Missing when Molly lost her second tooth and missing HER for 5 weeks too long apart.  Buying proper Director shoes.  Toasting the 100th roll of film. The EDIT. The month off. The seemingly endless search for the end title song.  The gorgeous strings that came to life in Prague.  Collaborating with Matthew and listening to score with the baby monitor in the background.  Telling the story with color.  What a great ride. I'm so grateful to everyone who came on this part of the journey with me.

For now it's wait and see time.  Which will be interesting.  And I'll have to learn even more patience.  But boy am I ready.  Ready for whatever comes next.

Listen Up

Lately it's all been about the sound of it all.  What kind of bag is that- would it land with a small, dull thud or a crinkle?  Do those fluorescents hum? All day teeny tiny questions and answers that add up to the gorgeous soundscape that surrounds the living and breathing world of a film.  I love it. And my sound design team of Andrea Bella and Michael Feuser are astoundingly detail oriented and passionate and creative in ways that blow my mind right off.  Working with them in the past sincerely shaped my writing going forward.  I always pay attention now to how a character may be sonically experiencing their world and I love to incorporate these tiny elements into a draft.
I was in New York with them last week and we recorded a bunch of the ADR for Light Years.  Even a loop group which was an extra thrill as I spent a lot of time at Sound One participating in Loop Groups as an actor (thanks to Mamet actually but longer story on that later)  I was able to work with Scorcese's Thelma Schoonmaker a true legend and known to participate wholeheartedly in adr.  It was a pure joy to create for her and I had many other rewarding and sometimes crazy looping experiences.  It felt magically kismet to be listening in to my own lovingly assembled loopers (mostly friends and former students of course).  Another component that brings the bars and lecture halls and office cubicles to life.  Can't wait for the mix...

directorial choices

Heading into the homestretch and picture l o c k.

Or we shall see after this weeks test screening.  I had a couple of weeks where I went back into actor head I think- any note felt like one I should take and incorporate.  Right?  I mean these are the people standing on the outside looking in so they should be able to tell me what I'm doing is or isn't working.  Right?  Wrong.  Well sort of.  My amazing editor has reminded me that sometimes something just is a directorial choice.  And well if I want to do something a little stylized or different in service of telling a greater story than I feel like this of all times is the time I should.  Not to say that the smart good note isn't welcome.  Just when it comes down to taste I want to hold onto mine.

Telling Stories

All I want to do is tell a good story.  At a party, with a post, with a film.  It should come naturally you'd think, but sometimes we miss the mark and lose our audience. Somewhere along the way our storytelling skills get muddied.  My mom can tell a good story- sometimes she'll get lost in the detail of someone or something and it sends her down another road, but usually, somewhat magically she gets back on track and sums it all up.  Molly, at 6, tells wonderful stories- with conviction and expression and unbridled enthusiasm.  She's chomping at the bit just to get it out and you can't help but get swept up in it.

I think it's best to start out and not know how it will come out in the end but have a clear understanding of the heart of the matter- the moment- or the one single picture in your mind that sums up the piece for you.  I found my heart or image today in my film.  A scene we shot late in the game- a big wide of the two characters standing in the midst of a green filled park, face to face, a path running by them on one side and a field on the right.  It's just the shot I thought we'd use to get into the scene and never out.  But then, there it was in the midst of all this other stuff we were looking at and it just revealed itself as a slice, a center, a thread of what the whole business of this story I'm trying to tell is.  And it got me thinking about the center and all of the other details and sequences of events being important but certainly not as important as the core- the reason you want to tell the story in the first place.  Starting here- with that one singular thing somehow gets the rest of it back to it's place and the order of things is restored.  And once that's done we can just take a breath and begin again.

Cutting Teeth

There's a line in the film about 'wanting to transcend'.  That feeling artists have in the early steps where we know somewhere deep down we can achieve greatness and create something that will elevate the experience for those who come into contact with it.  Then we set out to do it and the space between actually achieving this goal and what we first deliver is the hard stuff.  In the beginning there is just you  and your story and the pictures in your head.  Then you have to find the way to get it out into the world and both listen to the critiques that guide you and keep at bay the inner and outer voices that keep you from the truth.  (That sounds like a schizophrenic lady talking, but trust me we all have inner and outer voices telling us what they think).  Trusting that there is something beneath the surface that will indeed transcend if you let it, is the even harder part.
I saw the amazing film TAKE SHELTER this week and went and heard the writer/director Jeff Nichols speak last night.  He was a little cocky- but- well his film won the Grand Prix at Cannes this year and it's quite an extraordinary piece of art.  For me- it transcended.  It took me to another plane and the deeper story beneath the one of the surface is still jumping around in my head.  My favorite moment of the night was when someone asked what the ending meant- was it a dream or real or a message or something else- and very politely he answered that he wouldn't answer- that those were all good questions and he did indeed have his own answer but that he wouldn't share.  The point- he stressed- of making the film independently and not having to answer to a studio was to have an ending like that- one that ignites a conversation and begins an inner inquiry.  I went home thinking about the questions I wanted to have left looming in my work.
Today I discovered Jack's first tooth had made it's appearance- a small white sliver piercing up out of his pink gum.  It's been coming for some time.  There have been hard days and other days where it didn't seem like it bothered him at all.  All that time it was working below the surface and now that it's presented itself it will continue to grow and serve him.  It reminds me of my own journey into this world of filmmaking- for the work to transcend I've got to keep cutting teeth I think.  I've got to trust it's underneath and it too will make an appearance one day soon.

The Beginning

I've avoided the world of well- blogging- because of an admitted aversion to the word blog.  Sounds like an act of something you'd rather not be caught doing.  That being said I've decided to get over myself and consider the importance of documenting the interior thoughts fears hopes short stories adventures of a  filmmaker, mother of two young children, actor, artist, wife to rockstar, New Yorker/Brooklynite come Angeleno woman that I am.  If, for no other reason, than to remember all of it better one day.

So.  Today I am here. See photo ^
Editing LIGHT YEARS with Cindy Thoennessen whose in from NY this week.  We are sitting in the sun room slash play room slash office whittling away the fat and searching for the soul of the movie.  It's taught me patience.  And balance to name just two.  I feel completely confident and entirely at sea.  Today matched this.  Chopin played on the radio while Jack slept in the back and the palm trees looked ominous against the rare gray February LA sky.
Tomorrow will be another pass and another balance and I say to the challenging dichotomy- bring it.