eyes wide open (section 19)

I made a phone call at 8.oo in the morning to George Doyle, and this man has played a hugely significant role in the film. George was the Creative Director for a company in Kerry entitled 'Stockbyte' that was sold for a huge sum a couple of years ago, the brain child of Jerry Kennelly's genius. George is a first class photographer and to my mind one of the best in Ireland. He had phoned me a couple of days earlier offering his help as he had been away in South Africa on a project and was just returned and had heard all about the Red Camera Feature I was putting together. Barry Murhpy was the man responsible for that, and is also as far as I am concerned the best interiors photographer in the country. After that initial phone call I had considered him for 1st AD (assistant director) but was also bordering on taking on that role myself as I thought that I would probably be able to articulate for Daniel on certain matters. But this was unrealistic since I still had so much ground to cover and there was no way I could be on set at all times. Then it clicked and was all too obvious. I asked George if he would take on Continuity to which he immediately said yes, the prospect of having him on board is deeply assuring to me, as one of his many qualities would certainly be his particular diligence, and I am sure he will bring his assiduity and professionalism to this production which I have no doubt will serve to lift this film once again up yet another serious notch. And by the way for all of you that have been enquiring about who took these magnificent photographs, well here he is, seated between Samantha and Angela Boyle who assisted him on continuity. Looking like a rock star.


Almost all the photographs through out the course of the blog were shot and colour adjusted by George, the weaker ones were done by me as I search through Aperture and my own collection to substantiate the story. And there it was established over one phone call, we had a first class Stills Photographer, and a man willing to sacrifice three weeks of his time, and it is the men and women of this ilk and character that have collectively made this feature a real contender.

Despite last nights carnage everyone is up reasonably early, as we need to get Samantha into the actors to do make up and then get them to Shindig where we will meet with Gary Brosnan and there they can rifle through the store for costumes, all of which we managed to accomplish for about 12.30. After this we were off to the location as the crew had already been there for a couple of hours preparing for a pre-light and to run some camera tests. The actors were well impressed by the location as Daniel guided them through their footsteps in the manner they should enter according to script. All of our lights from Cine Electric had been brought in to the house and from now on a lot of the gear was going to remain in the location and Kevin was going to act as security guard as well as master of props. There was no way we could break down in the evenings, so I informed our insurance company of these altered plans and got the go ahead.


We have a 6KVA generator courtesy of Alan and with this Sean is trying to establish as to whether that will be sufficient for the job, he has done a thorough investigation into all possible options and we brought in an electrician also to have a look over the location with him and the conclusion is that we will have to use a generator plane and simple, no choice. The house electrics being in such a precarious condition to say the least. After the numerous tests were done I brought the actors to do some shopping for extras they would require in relation to their costumes, and also as I had done previously with Joanne and Sam, shop for some food stuffs as we initially planned to supply breakfast elements to the apartments, cereals, tea/coffee, butter, bacon, eggs, sausages, beans, black and white pudding, milk, water, bread, juice, toiletries, and so on.

There was a gathering of various interested parties showing up to have a look see. My parents arrived, as well as my sister and her daughter Aoife who will have a small role to play, her friend Molly Regan came along as did a plethora of guests, all of which I was glad to see and show them around, as this was the time to do it before we start the lock off so to speak and get cracking, can't afford to escort people about while scenes are being shot, we will need absolute quiet on set, and I will have to be pretty strict about that. The noise of the generator is already posing a problem and in fact we have gone and got another one as Alan's will not be sufficient, we will hire an 8KVA super silent and test this one for sound first thing in the morning.

After these preliminaries were dusted over we drove to my home in Ballyheigue, where we met with Daniel and I fixed something to eat while we all had a laugh looking out pretty tired and peering brain dead off across the distant horizon over some glasses of wine. Tomorrow we are going to start in earnest, and will need to start stabbing home the ice picks one by one as we attempt to scale an unknown ascent. While we hung about Aofie my god daughter and Molly had been busy making themselves up in horror make up, and were both bags full of girly giggles and so excited but too shy to come out and show us, so I went in and strung them across my shoulders and brought out these little bursting artists much to the enjoyment of everybody and then it turns out that Emma and Amy were inspired by what they had done and so was Daniel, and it was decided as a result that Amy's make up would be changed thanks to these creative little souls. The future is bright. And Emma and Amy cooked up an idea where Aoife would be perfect for a part in the film. Good on you girls, and Daniel has decided to run with it.

What lies ahead for us is now slouching from its darkness and we are about to discover what trials and tribulations this experience will sling at us when one dares to take on the enormous task of making a feature film. We will all need to be capable of working like crazy for the next 21 days. I wonder how much partying will go on and how individuals will hold up to the pressures we are about to endure. I dropped the actors back to their apartment, and then went and joined the crew for dinner, eventually getting home about 11 O’Clock to write this and prepare for the morning, Daniel and I will talk no doubt and laugh and enjoy the teasing prospect of the madness we are about to dive straight into with eyes wide open.