September 21st, 2008: Cast Read Through for Pricks

So we have our cast for Pricks. Most of them anyway. Today, we’re bringing them all down and see how they fare with each other. Before hand we’re having a meeting to gab about the show, as well as some other things that we need to talk about, such as Santa’s List, some Lot B stuff, some concert stuff, and other things.

So far this show has seen a communication breakdown. Yeah, that’s right. I referenced Zepplin. Eat me.

I’m thinking everyone is assuming that everyone else is jiving on the same page. It turns out that we’re not. It turns out that we all think everyone is talking to everyone else about the project, and we’re not. Bill and I discussed it, and we’d like to get everyone on the same page at this meeting today. It was originally scheduled for 11am, but after Bill and I talked yesterday, he would like the meeting for 10, because we got a lot of shit to go over.

Scheduling this meeting hasn’t been the easiest thing to do either. Pat Murphy, who plays Cleon in our Lot B series, is the lead in this script, but he’s back to school at Guelph. He’s bussing it down here, but there isn’t the appropriate bus to ride on the weekend, so we have to push the cast read through back until two, and someone is going to have to go pick him up in Hamilton at 1:30 or so.

So after dragging my ass out of bed at 8, I get the hankering to watch the remake of 3:10 to Yuma again at about 9:30. I bring my laptop outside and start watching the flick, planning on turning it off when people start arriving.

I totally dug this flick the first time I saw it, and it’s even better the second time. I don’t know why, but I’m really inspired by westerns lately, and while I’m peeping out the movie, I’m getting some good ideas for my own script I have yet to pen for LA Director.

Alicia calls and says she’s running a little late as she had to print up some extra copies of the script. That’s cool, because I’m really into the movie, and a little more than halfway now and I’d like to finish it.

Bill calls at around a quarter after ten and tells me he should be hitting the road in five.

Alicia arrives at about 10:30 and we wait for Bill and Steve.

At about ten after eleven Bill shows up and explains that the reason he’s late is because he just got off the phone with Steve, who I guess was unaware of the meeting. It’s the climax of the flick, so I ain’t turning it off for anyone now. We wait for Steve while Russell Crowe and Christian Bale finish their turns of being badass cowboys.

Steve arrives and we start the meeting, flying through it like no meeting before. I’m glad I wrote out an itinerary of shit we needed to cover the night before with Bill. The only thing we don’t have time to get into is Santa’s List. The important stuff is out of the way though, meaning Pricks, which is on the immediate horizon. The only reason I wanted to talk about Santa’s List is because I know if we don’t jump on that, it’s going to arrive and bite us in the ass unprepared. I like being prepared. That way I don’t get bite marks in the ass.

Bill and Steve book to Hamilton to pick up Pat while Alicia jets to pick up Jaimie Godard from his house, who is a friend of hers that acted in King of Hearts, and Dean Buchanan, a dude she worked with before, who is being grabbed from the bus terminal.

Alicia comes back with Jaimie and Dean, who are both totally cool cats. Andrea Szyjka (don’t even ask me how to pronounce that) arrives, who is a friend of Steve’s, and is playing a role in this show as well. She’s a cool chick I met back when we shot the first incarnation of Neighborhood Watch at her house. I say first incarnation because I believe it’s on the backburner as something we’re going to shoot again.

We kick around shooting the shit for awhile until Bill and Steve arrive with Pat and Cheryl, who is also playing a role, in tow. Joe Vomvas would round out the cast we have right now, but is unable to make the reading.

We go through the script a couple of times, much like the read through of Desolation Row, on my back deck, then move the activities to my backyard, which I am now calling a ‘grand backyard.’

I call it that because it’s huge.

The day goes pretty well with Alicia and me filling in for a couple of roles, and then me filling in the shoes of the great Joe Vomvas. Joe, I hope I did you justice buddy.

The read through ends, and Steve and Cheryl take Pat to his place where he’s hitching a ride with his Dad back to Guelph. Alicia and I give Dean a ride to Chapters where he’s meeting up with his woman, and drop Jaimie off back at home. Andrea skips off on her own at some point, but who cares, she’s a Baltimore Ravens fan.

Let me clarify a bit. I’m a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. Baltimore and Pittsburgh don’t get along. Mainly because Baltimore sucks but they fail to realize it. Case closed.

Bill also takes off to go to his bowling league. Check it, I’m tired of people digging into Bill because he’s in a bowling league. You guys are all just jealous. I’ve been in bowling leagues before, and not only is that shit fun as hell, I knocked the balls out of those leagues. You want to challenge my ten pin skillz, hit me up biotch, and we’ll do it right.

Later on that night we head to the Grim to check out some locations for the shoot. We kick around the Grim for a bit, then head to Vineland and Beamsville, which are both a bust. Back in St. Catharines, we find one location that might be suitable.

I’m the director of photography for this show, and it looks like Bill’s going for locations which are already lit, so it’s going to make my job a hell of a lot easier. I was thinking we would have to lug the generator out and do it up with some extra crew. We might need another hand with the dolly which Bill has planned to use, but this show will hopefully be easier than I thought. We’re hoping to get Bob back into the mix to snap some pics and do some crew as well. I hope he’s up for it. I miss that dude.

At some point in the next week, we’ll have to go jump to Niagara on the Lake for a location we still need. We go into production on this in about two weeks, so while we have most of our shit together, there’re still some ends we need to tie up.