(click here for more photos; photos by basselal)
After my previous attempt at directing a film for this film group, I was determined to do much better. By this time, our group had grown, we’d learned a lot of lessons, and we’d improved by leaps and bounds.
Aiming to do a comedy, we looked around for someone to submit a script to us.. Manny told me about a guy named James Shade who had a couple of scripts tucked away. One that he showed me–and that I took to immediately–was a cute, hilarious story called “Tomboys.” It is about three tomboys–a jock, a mechanic, and a cowgirl–who lament the fact that they can’t seem to get–or keep–dates, because they are too intimidating. So they decide they’re going to try to act more girly in order to impress guys. And of course, zany hijinks ensue.
There were two big challenges (which I had to deal with because not only did I direct, but I co-produced with Manny). One was that this script had FOUR locations. And we shoot all our films in a single day. With the help of another local writer, Chuck Norfolk (James was stuck in jury duty), we did some rewrites that helped quite a bit. The story then had two scenes in a restaurant, one in a bar, one in a women’s clothing store, one outside, and one at a paintball field. I know it seems like we just added more locations, but what we ended up doing is finding a women’s clothing store and a restaurant within a block of each other; the restaurant had a bar, and we got permission to film outside behind the women’s clothing store. If the paintball field wasn’t in the middle of nowhere, we would have consolidated further and tried to cluster ALL our locations within a few blocks of one another, but that’s the best we could do. We started our shoot on a Sunday at the paintball field (b/c that’s when they were least crowded–when everyone is typically at church), then moved everyone over 10 miles away to the restaurant & clothing store area, and stayed there for the rest of the shoot.
The other challenge was finding three actresses to play the leads who 1) could act and 2) had good chemistry with each other. Same with the three supporting male actors. We didn’t get many male actors, but we REALLY lucked out with the ones who did audition. We had a lot of ladies to choose from, and it was a tough decision, but I was extremely happy with who we picked. I had two rehearsals with them–one with just the actors and me, doing a table read and fleshing out the characters. That rehearsal was important, I think, because I got to know the actors a bit and I wanted them to trust me and know that I was there to support them. Our second audition included a number of other key people, like our DP, and it was at that point that we worked out the (considerable) physical comedy portions of the script. By the time we got to shooting day, the actors were ON IT. I am so proud of them, and the quality of this film has a lot to do with their great performances.
Another important aspect of this shoot were the extraordinary efforts of our makeup (Closed Casket Creations again) and wardrobe person (Lacy King). The actors had to go from dressing up in paintball gear and battle makeup to date clothing (in the women’s cases, very fancy dresses and makeup); and for the final scenes that were shot (which are the first scenes in the movie), the ladies had to get into their stereotypical tomboy outfits (jock, mechanic, cowgirl). The transformations from one scene to another were astounding, and made the storyline even more effective as a result.
One of my goals for this production were to be as efficient as possible. I wanted to move people along, not have people standing around doing nothing, and only keep people there as long as I needed them. Although, due to intensive pre-production, I believe I did a fair job of doing that, our shoot still lasted 12 hours. And I still had to cut some non-essential shots and one short, non-essential scene that would have required yet another wardrobe change and re-lighting. I did storyboard and create a shot list, and I did visit all the locations with Brad, my DP. But I could have prepared even more. Brad and I still did some discussing on set, when ideally, everything should be figured out ahead of time. I didn’t appreciate how long makeup takes (and hair), and I should have gotten more helpers and gotten my actors in the makeup chair sooner at the beginning of the day. But these are small things.
“Tomboys” is currently in post-production. Once we get that first edit locked, I’ll be able to work with our composer, Eric Helin, and get a soundtrack laid on top of it. I dare say, this may be the first film I’ve directed that I’m not at least a little bit embarrassed to show people!
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