Yup... got a full blown dose of the Post Movie-Making Syndrome after a few days of ' starring' in the cinema, I'm ready for a quiet night with an old video and a cool beer..

Mindless reptition of dumb stuff followed by wiating on important folks to get their act together and then more mindless repetition of stupid stuff [ gee, sounds almost like the military ]..

anyway, I'm done and the only consolation is the fat wad of cash to slap in the bank until the next bill comes due..
The CBS shoot was dull and dumb.. oh, sure they had lots more 'polish' and more money to toss about which gets you a ' slick' product but[ and don't tell anyone 'cause I make so much money at this ] they didn't need my ' expertise ' for what they ended up doing..

I got my 10 young men, stalwart and true and done them nice in their T-shirts and shorts [ a brisk Canajan Fall doubling for someplace else ] and they shivered and stomped around until having to look like they were sweatin' in the sunshine when the cameras rolled.. Then later in camo pants and khaki T's they jog-marched back and forth shouting the usual rhyming couplets the Us military is famous for..I smiled, ponted out bits of 'theatre' they could add to make the scene a bit more belieivable and pocketed my consultant's fee of just under a grand US [ sweeet ]..
Still don't know what the show is about or who is in it as we were assigned to the second unit which films bits and pieces, inserts and stunt work/background stuff too unimportant for the stars to show up at...still.. fun,fun,fun...

Contrast that to the shoot on Friday/Saturday...almost ashamed to take their money [ almost ]...definitely not the well-oiled machine of the US Tv production...

After being ' nudged' out of bed by the dog [ the Good Padre being ' away' until middle of Nov. ] I loaded by car with an assortment of kit and kaboodle and headed out to make my on-set call which was 1030 hours for 1100 start in some place in the middle of nowhere just past somewhere...[ took along youngest son and No. 2 daughter, the Lt. as roadie/wardrobe assistants - and a good thing, too ]...

We arrive at what turns out to be a horse ranch/riding stables with an adjoining ' wilderness trail system '... Park and wait...

about 1130 a small car zips up with the line producer aboard to say their running a 'tad' late at the previous location and that she was heading off to find someplace to order up lunch...

1230 hours.. a buddy, Jim, arrives, apparently he has a part in this production as well [ Jim is an Cayuga-Onandega native and one of those rare individuals, a Canadian Viet Nam vet who served with the US Air Cav - wounded four times and ' retired ' in '65 BAO - before agent orange ]

We stand around reminiscing and waiting.. slowly some other cars pull up, the aforementioned producer, the sound and camera guys, a make-up girl, the ' Host/Star 'of the programme, a fat, middle aged, bleached blonde Brit-accented grumpy, chain-smoking woman who- damn - turns out to be the ' director ', and a late 20-something guy who is portraying the ' hero' of this scenario, Billy Green.. [ cue tinkling of faint alarm bells - Billy Green was a pimple-faced early teenager-so the history books agree -this guy ain't that -even with the slapping on of a bad hair piece and a tri-corn hat. My son, who is 13 could have done the role better, but they had already shot some stuff before with this guy and tis not my place to suggest a whole reshoot ]..

We're to film two sequences - American forces moving through a wooded area on a scouting mission and Billy, bless him, ' discovering' the soldiers and hightailing it for help from the British garrison some leagues hence.

I duly haul out my Rubbermaid tubs of all things 1812 American and discover that the director wanted to shoot just me as the ' entire' American force in the woods, but has come to realize that maybe that's a bit of a stretch in the visuals department even though it would have saved a bit in cast salaries... She soon is deep in discussion over the ' look' of things and they return to 'suggest' that I m,ight be able to flesh out the military with some ' extras'.. After a brief re-working of my ' consultant's fee ' to cover tghis new contingency.. I pull the rabbit out of the hat.. I dress and kit up my young son, my daughter, a production assistant, the line producer herself [ I make her an officer - politics what can I say ] and add to the numbers with a stable hand and Jim's girlfriend -[ an impossibly georgeous petite long blonde-haired babe who is, in reality a bass-playing rock musician with 3 gold records to her credit ]

seeing a pattern here?.. Me and son- male...four US soldiers all female...what the hell... braid/cue their hair, slap on a shako or chapeau bras with plume and stuff 'em all in blue coats/grey pants and long coats and they look passable - if filmed at a long distance through leafy brush...hand out a sword and my and the boy carry the two muskets - I borrow Jim's short blunderbus and stick it in the hands of the girl who look least likely to cringe...

Off we go into the woods and the ' location'. A small defile that widens as it descends, muddy puddle at the bottom.. The director wants us to meander single-file through this leafy paradise toward and past the camer position in various takes..

Having already compromised on the ' troops' issue, I indicate, in my military-advisor role, thjat the US troops would not go single file on a scouting patrol, but be in pairs and moving in parallel so that they could see and protect each other and scatter/go-to-ground if finding the ' enemy '..
After a few menacing puffs, she squints at me and mumbles ' whatever ' and reworks the scene...then she leaves.. wanders off.. to chain-smoke and fume about ' the help ' no doubt, and the cameraman and I lay out the shots and film multiple takes for ' coverage '...
She returns in time to catch one bit of business where, as we're walking through the brush, my son stepped on some brush and flushed a chipmunk out which ran across the path.. she thinks this ' business' is a great bit - snappingbtwigs, scattering wildlife and wants to get a covering shot- scloeup - of that same bit to ' add tension ' .. cameraman and I suggest that maybe the chipmunk isn't in the actor's union and might not want to come back for a second take..she wants to try it, anyway...Cue ol' Rocketeer's new role as rodent wrangler -.. We reverse the camera angle [ as the wee beastie is now on the other side of the path ] and my boy takes up his position, foot above the brush.. camera slips into place and we wait to things to quiet down.. then I go into my act..as luck would have it I have a crucny granola bar in my pouch from lawdy knows when event - I crumble it along the path from where we last saw the beast to a point just near the lad's foot and brushy bits...

greedy little bugger pops out and starts to eat his way along the trail and when he gets near the brush the boy steps down cracking the twigs.. on cue the little fellow skitters and scampers in a flash right past the camera.. tension filled close-up accomplished..

geez...

Well a couple more vista filled shots of us moving along ridges and reflected in muddy pools leaves us all feeling like Snow White's seven dwarfs off to the mines and the job is done.. I leave them to film shots of Billy discovering us and interacting with the host/star for the preand post game interviews and I'm back at base camp collecting my kit and bits from the 'cast' and signing waivers for the pay.. Son andc daughter pick up $ 75 each for appearing on camera, I get a 'wardrobe fee ', my consultant's technical advisor fee, my 'on-camera ' fee and effusive thanks from the ' professional ' set [ camera, line producer and others who knew how much I had ' saved' them ] and nary a word from the director or star who, of course, are 'busy' elsewhere...

I only hope this never makes it past late night cable community access on channel eleventy-seven on the satellite..

I pocket my stipend which has nicely blossomed from the 'additional services rendered ' and drive home 3 hours later than expected giggling like an idiot and telling the kids about the magic of the film/TV business versus the ' reality' which they have now experienced first hand...

to quote daughter: ' Dad that was sh*t and a waste of time ' Me: ' Yeah, but the pay was great ' Her: ' when's the next one? '

Sounds like fun. Wish I could have been there to watch the second one being filmed. I believe I would have been entertained by the filiming itself if not the movie. lol

So we're going to see our famous rocketeer on the screen again. Got to get the jack and popcorn.

Mech...

only if you're quick with the remote and got a good ' pause' and ' rewind ' function on the TV feed.. another ' blink and you'll miss me ' extravaganza!! it'll take you longer to eat the popcorn than to watch my ' performance '...

I did that for Glory. Got pretty good at it. The wife isn't impressed, but I was.

Again? Tell me about it. I may not have noticed the first time.

This adventure sounds interesting and perfect for the cultural black hole of television.

The movie Glory with our own Rocketeer staring?

' starring ' - ha! I like that, mech... I'm racking up my 15 minutes of Fame one nano-second at a time...

Hey, what the hey, it works for me. Wasn't it a NJ troop the you were portraying?
Still trying to butter you up to finish that story.

Well, even so, I intend to watch it! Looking forward to it too!

Just getting asked, and getting paid to be a consultant on a film, along with roles in it, is no small thing. Major coop in my book.

Just look at yer drinkin buddy an that Russell Crow movie, Master and Commander. Looks like yer foots in the door for future endeavors !

You had to remind me of that, didn't you, Gunny.. Yeah.. and my other 'associate ' spent last Christmas in the Dominican Republic as consultant on Pirates of the Caribbean Parts 2 &3 and still no invite to ' assist '...
[ *((&^&%$$$#^ ]

anyway..I do have a pretty nifty phottie from the earlier shoot but I haven't a clue as to how to get it from my computer onto this thread...

In the meantime I'm defaulting to my ' other life' as lecturer and giving some talks on military history around and about.. supposed to be in London in February and , I think, Tennessee in May among other ' gigs '...

such a boring life...

I'll take it, getting tired of thye rat race around here. Any tanker movie in the set?

Revisited the ' Hades Factor " set this evening.. they've taken the Defence Medicine building over and relabled it USAMID or something like that,,kind of funny to see Ol Glory flying from the standards...A whole bunch of desert cam'd Humvees, trucks and jeeps in the parking lot and on the taxiway at the airport they've got a transport plane revving up and down the tarmac as they zip along on camera cars beside it..

I'm thinking this TV show is about biological warfare or something along the lines of that Dustin Hoffman ' action ' flick a few years back - Outbreak - I think it was called.

Its pretty funny to be standing around with a bunch of CF Army types in their cadpats just back from a weekend Ex watching a squad of actors pretending to be USMC in their gear doing mindless stuff for the cameras...

movies is a funny business