Yesterday I was fortunate enough to get some onset experience with an extremely large production. The location manager explained an average hour of Australian drama television costs approximately one million dollars to get to air; this production was going to drop six. The vibe was crazy and electric and very exciting. A thousand individual components crashed together in perfect synchrony to tell a story. I think a good example of this was when runners began handing out custom lunch orders to everyone – hundreds of people- yet when “rolling” was called out by the 2nd A.D and relayed to our earshot by one of the 3rd A.Ds it instantly became silent. And when “cut” was called the collective response a rolling wave of cracking cans of soft drink. So disciplined.

TRANSLATION:

Like ‘Singin In The Rain’ (1952) or ‘Hail Caesa’ (2016) I imagine a film within a film type deal. Following an hour on set of a runner whom is solely in charge of delivering lunch to the cast and crew. The runner has to navigate food allergies and hangry boom swingers who want their gluten free risotto half an hour ago. I would implement constant movement of both actor and camera to convey the frenetic energy of this job. While also including a comedic undertone expressed through the runner’s foolish mistakes, maybe a little slap stick?