My Other Life

For those of you who don't know, I have another, secret, life.
When I am not publishing and editing magazines I am an actor and director.
I'll tell you more about the directing some other time, for today we're talking acting.

I just spent the last two days on set for a UK commercial for a fence sprayer (hey I never said it was glamorous). Below is the previous commercial I shot for this product two years ago. Press play and have a laugh.


A year ago I did this ad for Bavaria. (I'm the guy with the meat!!)

I cannot begin to tell you how hard this commercial was to shoot. 5 days with only 9 and 1/2 hours of sleep, covered in mud or dirt, or just soaked, carrying raw meat in 35 degree heat and pretending to love every second of it.
Like I said, glamorous it ain't.

What it is, is an obscene amount of work and pain like you have never felt before, pushing your body and mind to unbelievable extremes followed by hours in the shower to wash all the muck off.
And a ton of fun.

I've being doing this as my primary profession for over 17 years now and I have been treated like shit one week and like a star the week after. It all depends on the set and on the crew and, most importantly, on the director.

I call them the Holy Triumvirate (no-offence meant), they are the director, the 1st AD, and the D.O.P. - They are the people that will make your life on set an absolute pleasure, or a fucking nightmare.
On a good shoot, you have a calm, prepared director who knows exactly what he wants, and how to get it done, quickly, and efficiently and most importantly manages to maintain total rationality during all the inevitable crises.
The 1st assistant director is equally important as he or she is your point of contact. The 1st AD pretty much controls the set and tells everyone what to do. He takes orders from one person, the director. It is the 1st AD's job to make sure the director gets exactly what he wants, and if it is not possible then it is his job to tell the director that. He is on the side of the cast and crew when talking to the director and on the side of the director when talking to the cast and crew.
On a film set the 1st AD is God.
The D.O.P. or Director of Photography (cinematographer) controls the lighting and the cameras. From an actor's point of view this is the person who is going to make you look good.

Forgive me if you already know all of the above, I don't mean to patronise.


Anyway, the point of this discourse is that I love my job.
It is without a doubt the best job on earth.
I may not sleep for a week on a shoot, or be washing sand out of my ears for two hours after wrap, or be peeling spirit gum off my face with cold cream for just as long. I may be dancing with a hose-pipe at 7am on a winter's morning in a public park, or running fully-clothed through a river, or waking up at 2:52 am (when I got to sleep at 11:30pm the night before) or smashing through a plate glass window with a piece of raw meat dangling from my teeth.
But I still love my job.

Anyway, back to Editing Issue 3...
goodnight y'all