So here we were...a nice DVD distribution offer, champagne was flowing, and I was already thinking of the millions of dollars sure to come...and then just to make sure I had everythingready to go, I found a flaw.c

We were missing one single actor's release form.

If you refer back to my "making of" journal...er, blog...or what's the cool internet term for this stuff now? Calling it a diary isn't very good because I'm not a ten year old girl. Anyway, we shot a scene with an actor friend of Jason Russler's named Mel Railo. She had never signed her release form, and Jason tried to get her to do so for awhile afterward, but she never did. I don't know if it was because she decided she didn't want to be a part of the movie, or if it was her just dragging her feet for whatever reason.

I tried to get in touch with her via e-mail and she wouldn't respond, which I find to be extremely lame. At least if she could have told me she didn't want to be in the movie anymore, I could continue with that knowledge. In the end it's no surprise that this happened because when one of Mel's ex-friends (I don't think she has any other kind) heard that she hadn't signed the release and we were trying to contact her, he just laughed and said "you're screwed."

I think it's a shame because Mel's acting was actually very good, but unfortunately she suffers from the disease called "psycho actor."

So what to do? We couldn't have her in the movie and I couldn't simply cut the scene because it held an important clue for our hero. The only option was to reshoot the scene, and we had to do so sooner rather than later.

Calling Bette Cassatt!

Bette is a great stage actress in the DC area, and I met her when she played the co-lead in my friend David Stewart's movie Confinement. Christi Etcher, who is of course one of the stars of this movie, had recommended her for that role. I asked Bette if she would be interested in playing this role and thankfully she agreed. We got together to figure out her character. One of the things I was always a little disappointed with in Mel's portrayal, even though it was very good, is that the scene wasn't really sleazy at all. So we got together to figure out how to sleaze up this character who really doesn't have a purpose in the script except to move the plot from point A to point B.

One version that Bette liked is that the character might be harsh and dismissive. She would snap out the dialogue. Ordinarilly I wouldn't mind this, but the problem is that the character gives our hero a good deal of information, and a dismissive character wouldn't do that. So we tried it the way I imagined the character...

This version of the character would be high on drugs, and she would give the information because she was too doped up to care. But in doing some read throughs, I realized this was no good because now it took forever for Bette to give the speeches. So we decided on a mix of the two...the character is obviously messed up a little and she's enigmatic, but she willingly gives the information simply because she doesn't care and she's thinking about other (unspecified) things.

And here's Bette laughing at me when I asked her to do the scene in her bra. We decided on this outfit. Or to be more precise, I decided on it and Bette was a good enough sport to humor me.

So now it was time to shoot! Jason Russler offered up his apartment, which was perfect because it's so girly. It has yellow walls, candles, lots of poofy pillows, and peacock feathers all over the place. Jason had mentioned his friend Marty might be interested to do the scene and he sent me a picture of him:

I instantly fell in love and Knew That I Must Have Him. Marty would add some extra non-yellow color to the movie, and could bring some menace as well...two things that were lacking in the original scene. As you cam see, he even came equipped with his own pointy parts! So we got him on board, I rewrote the scene to accomodate this new character (it was originally just the woman) and now we were ready to go!

Except...

The scheduling was getting to be an issue. Jason Wauer was fairly busy, but we had to get the scene shot. So I quickly came up with a stupid plan! We would shoot the scene with a double for all of Bette and Marty's shots, then bring Jason in at a later time and do his bits. So we set it up and one Saturday evening, we got together for the shoot.

Everyone showed up and Bette started to put on her makeup while Marty worked hard to get into character in his own way.

And now we introduce out next victim, Chris Mindel.

I gave Chris the honor of getting to portray the hero of a movie! Okay, he's doing it as a stand in and he has to wear a stupid wig, but still...a hero! Of a movie! Wow!

We had an excellent wig for him to wear. Well, it would look excellent to a blind Mongoloid. But that was okay because we had a secret can't-fail weapon...scissors!

As you can see in the above pic, Jason Russler wanted to eat off the cowlicks, but I thought it would be better to just cut them off via conventional methods.

And slowly the transformation began...from Chris into a great looking stand in for Jason Wauer, and from me into an effeminate hairdresser. Some people remarked they didn't notice a difference.

I think that at this point, we were talking about skin moisturizers while Jason's cats laughed at us.

And then, like a butterfly, Chris emerged as a beautiful movie star! You see folks, it's JUST THAT EASY! You can't even tell the difference!

So shooting began and things went pretty smoothly. Bette looked beautiful against Jason's yellow walls, and we confiscated one of the peacock feathers to use as a prop.

One part of the script was a little boring because she has to give a small monologue telling the lead character some important information, so I had Marty whisper really vile things in her ear to break it up. Marty said he was very ashamed.

And that was that! We shot the scene in a few hours and Bette was off for some well-needed rest. She had been kind enough to do this scene even though her schedule was very busy, and she was tired. So many thinks goes to her. Also, thanks to Chris for wearing the wig, and to Marty for putting up with me having him do fifteen takes of whispering in Bette's ear even though his back was really hurting. And thanks to Jason Russler for letting me rearrange his apartment for the weekend, and then for putting up with me inviting myself to watch the season finale of Survivor on his high-definiton tv. Truly, his sacrifice will be rewarded in Heaven.

And to finish off, here's my favorite shot of the evening because it looks like it would fit right into one of those fancy boudoir magazines. Or at the very least, a Sears lingerie ad.