THUG Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry

So 2007 was a pretty big year; I got off probation, graduated college and moved to LA. So far so good, and it can't be taken away from me, but the kiss of death would be talking about what's going to happen in 08. Right now I'm sitting on my party porch, drinking Mexican beer, and listening to Frank Sinatra. Today I got to work on a commercial for Nickelodean with Jack Black. Jack Black is the coolest actor I've worked with so far. Dude is amazing on camera and he was the nicest guy. So far he's the only actor I've seen that requested multiple times to do more takes without the director asking. He never complained, he was nice to everyone and he is so much funnier in person than on screen. The whole stage was cracking up when he was doing his shit. Like Ice Cube once said, I gotta say today was a good day. Ohhh waaa.

New thing I've found out about LA: The indy/artsy look for dudes is taking over this city. The directory today had on a scarf with a jean jacket, tight jeans, slip on shoes, black rimmed glasses and hair that shagged over them. Dude had on a fucking scarf. I've seen this before, a lot, but it clicked today when the 2 hottest girls on set (graphic designers or some shit) were all over him. Now, I know what you're thinking, he's the director, of course he gets the poon. BUT, this realization ceased when some random asian dude dressed the exact same way was balling around with the other 2 hottest girls on set (there's usually a lot of hot girls on set). If the Apple version of Bruce Lee was directing he'd be rolling in the vag like P Diddy in the I love it when you call me big poppa video. Speaking of Apple, this neo tech art look has 5 basic requirements: 1) You have to LOVE Mac, that's numero uno period. You at least have to have a powerbook and an iphone to fall in this category 2)You have to wear black rimmed eye glasses 3)You have to smoke 4)You have to feel comfortable shopping for clothes like a woman and 5)You don't have blood, you have Starbucks. Now, don't get me wrong, both of these dudes were super nice and cool guys, it's just the male way of living out here is alien.

I've done some cool shit besides the Jack Black thing since my last post...

I landed a gig on a commercial with John C. Reily aka Dewey Cox/the Magicman. It was a cross promo for Walk Hard and Monday Night Football on ESPN so needless to say it was a high quality production. John C. Reily was cool and really funny, and I'd have to say it was the most pro job I've worked since getting out here.

My last job of 07 was doing sound for an indy comedy called "See Dick Run" with Kel Mitchell and Page Kennedy. Kel got famous doing the Keenan and Kel stuff for Nickelodean, and Page Kennedy is U Turn from Weeds. Kel is a cool guy, but I got excited when I saw U Turn show up on set. I started quoting U Turn and he loved it so we chatted about Weeds and got a little buddy buddy over the weekend. At one point he was rehearsing his lines with me and he actually said I was doing decent with my lines. Now, holding a boom mic for 12 hours a day with a mixer strapped to my chest on a harness was the opposite of fun. The production was cheap, and poorly run. It was one of those situations where everyone complained about how shitty production was but never did anything to make it better. Surprisingly the script was funny, but other than that and hanging out with U Turn it was my worst job yet. The last time I do sound, fo sho.

So now I'm looking for my next job, just kind roaming around LA and Hollywood and hanging out with the roommate and the neighbors. We had a party on New Years that didn't get too out of control but had its moments. We came up to this very porch I'm on right now and watched fireworks fire off Hollywood Hills. Not a bad way to ring in the New Year. Happy 08 bitches and niggas. Wish me luck

Spin Kicks Do Work

I started working a little over a week ago and I've gotten some pretty sweet jobs but before I get into that...

I went to see Between the Buried and Me last night at the Knitting Factory and it was my first look at the LA scene. The kids definitely go ape shit here, which was nice to see cause shows in Orlando were starting to get really soft and boring. I'm not sure if you've ever seen anyone hardcore dance but it's basically a cross between a black girl fighting mixed with spin kicking in a mosh pit style environment. Anyway, the second band, August Burns Red, goes on and the floor opens up. Some kid is in there doing his thing and out of no where he gets blasted in the face by a spin kick gone wild. When I say blasted I mean this dude got his shit rocked and knocked out. It was kinda like that video where the breakdancer owns the baby. After seeing that I resorted back to my old pit rules to stay safe but still be in the mix:

Pit rule # 1: Find the most metal dude around and place yourself between him and the pit. How do you find the most metal dude around? Look for long hair and/or a big beard. If he's wearing a black metal band shirt then you're all set. If that person has on a Slayer, Pantera or Cannibal Corpse shirt then you're in real business.

Pit Rule # 2: Stay away from the boyfriend girlfriend duo that's trying to be up front to see the one band they share the most love together for. Why? Cause all night all he's going to try and do is push back through to get to his girl while she complains that its too hot and crowded through the whole set.

Now on to my work...

My first job was a commercial for Kellogs cereal featuring John McEnroe (old school pro tennis player). I was a PA (production assistant) and I didn't do much. Basically I helped load and unload all the gear and did video playback. I did it for free.

It's going to be hard to top my 2nd job. I got a phone call to get on a short film shooting over a weekend (Fri, Sat, and Sun) to help out doing grip and electric work (set up the lights and power everything). I took it at 50 bucks a day not knowing anything about the short at all. Later that night I got the call sheet and not only saw that it was a horror short, but that the female lead was Danielle Harris from Halloween 4 and 5 (she was also a babysitter in the Halloween remake). Needless to say I couldn't have been more excited. Make a long story short I did such a good job that the gaffer/key grip (head electrician/grip) fought with the producer to get my rate bumped up to 100 bucks a day. The producer wouldn't do it so the gaffer, Orlando, took me to an ATM and paid me the rest of what he thought I should have gotten paid out of his own pocket. Amazing! I couldn't have had a better weekend, plus John Frances Daly (Mitch in Waiting) was in it too and he was way cool.

Last Monday and Tuesday I worked on music videos as a PA: Monday was for Chiodos and Tuesday was for a folk singer named Brett Dennens. Those were both 100 bucks a day and both really long days although I met some amazing people. The owner of the company for the Chiodos shoot manages Daughters so I made friends with her quick.

After that I took a few days off but I've got 4 days coming up for a Monday Night Football promo with John C. Reilly who played Cal Naughton Jr. in Talladega Nights. He's doing a cross promo for his new movie Walk Hard so I get to hang out on set for that all day Tuesday. I'll be delivering one of the equipment trucks, then I get to shoot the behind the scenes of the commercial for the production company. Should be pretty rad. The other 3 days I'll be in the office helping out with pre production and wrap.

Few new things I've found out: First, there are a lot of women that dominate in this business. I've met 20 something producers and directors that are women, and the company I'm working for right now is all women except for the executive producer (and I don't even think he's straight). I'm only bringing this up because of how cool I think it is so don't go all feminist on me thinking I'm bringing this up in a different light. It's just nice to see cougars out there doing work.

Second thing is I think right now I want to work on being a grip or electrician. If not that then I want to work my way up to AD (assistant director). As far as set work goes those are the most interesting things to me right now.

Third thing, I hate working on music videos, I like working on commercials, I love working on movies. I've yet to do a TV show so I got no take on that yet, but just like I thought before coming here, movies are where I wanna be.

Last thing, the fucking barbershop up the street is amazing. It's called Rudy's and it's a bunch of punk rock girls with purple hair and shit doing all the cutting. It's a tad pricey (I spent 25) but I just told her to do whatever she wanted with my hair and, at the risk of sounding gay, I got an amazing haircut.

Few other things: Mexican Coca Cola is incredible, Pam's Thai food on the corner is equally as incredible and I think I'm completely used to driving in LA. It's almost fun.

I know that was a lot to jam in but believe me thats the short short version of pretty much everything. If you guys want to know more about whatever just ask. I got some pretty sweet stories from the horror movie shoot. Also, sorry I haven't been keeping up with answering messages or posting on here. I'm just getting used to the work schedule. Sometimes I'm on for 16 hours so there's lots of nights that I'm running on auto pilot.

Keep checking back for my John C. Reilly experience. I miss you all.

Goth servers, the Studios and a Job

When I made my last post on here drunk as shit. Travis came home on Sunday and we just kicked it with the neighbors that night. On Monday he took me to NBC Studios where I got my first look at the WGA on strike. All up and down this road called Brahman (I think), which is where NBC and I think WB and a few others are, the writers were picketing, walking over the crosswalk at every red light and asking that you honk to acknowledge their cause. We honked everytime.

NBC Studios was pretty sweet, mostly just a giant labyrinth of hallways and buildings, but still cool nontheless. We tried to get on the Tonight Show set but it was locked. Got to see the Tonight Show greenroom and where they all park and stuff. I also got to meet a Production Manager named Wendall who works for Moving Parts Productions who produces NBC programming. In Wendall's office there was a mock up drawing of all the new American Gladiators which was really sweet. Wendall was really nice and Travis was nice enough to let him know I'm new in town and looking for work so hopefully that pans out. Only other cool thing we did Monday was eat at Big Wangs. I didn't misspell that, Big Wangs son. It's a pretty amazing chicken wing joint and if you've ever seen the show Rob and Big it's the place that Big Black enters the wing eating competition for Rob. Good stuff.

Yesterday was pretty monumental for the fact that I landed 2 jobs. I'm working for free with Travis tomorrow on a web commercial and I'm totally happy with working for free for a few reasons: if I screw up anything they're not out any wasted money, I'll obviously get to learn a lot, I might be able to get some office days if I do good, and he said they'll throw me any leftover money if they got it so for me it's win win. Travis also hooked me up with a job on a music video next Monday the 3rd. I'll get 100 bucks to be an assistant, basically just help out with anything they need, and hopefully I'll get more work out of it.

I've learned that out here you really only get work because of who you know and I'm really fucking thankful to have moved into this situation with a guy who knows the right people and is willing to help me out.

Couple of other cool things: I ate at a diner called Fred 62's for lunch yesterday. Aside from the food being really good all the servers dress goth which means I'll be frequenting that place. We had late dinner at El Gran Burrito which is a few blocks over from where we live. El Gran Burrito is great for a few reasons: 1 - it's all outdoors and made to order, 2 - It's cheap, I got a forearm sized burrito for 4 bucks, 3 - the lady that takes your order speaks english, but no one else does, so I had to learn spanish on the fly last night when the cook dude is asking me about my order in spanish. He starts asking me something and I catch "Aqui" so I'm like "aqui aqui" for here and not to go. Then he looks at me and says "Carne?" and without hesitation I bust him with "Asadaaaaaaa." Finally he waves his hands over all the toppings and I say, "EVERYTHING MUCHACHO!" He knew.

I Turned Into a Martian

Not really but I think I found my bar of choice here, the Good Luck bar which is about a half a mile away. It's got a lounge/chinese motif, which sounds weird but basically it's really dark with asian style lamps and mixed drinks named after asian folklore (i.e. the Fists of Fury, Jade Buddha, etc...). I didn't mess with those, just had a few bloody mary's and a couple bottles of the chinese beer they have called TsoTsing I think. The jukebox was incredible; I saw the Misfits and Bad Brains after a couple of turns and played them all night. Needless to say I was happy just because of that. The bartenders were really cool, and prompt, and everyone there was really nice. There were two girls sitting next to me that ended up asking if I wanted to ride with them to another bar but I respectfully declined. I stayed for 3 hours and ended up leaving when it started getting really packed.

Earlier in the day, around 5:00, I decided to just walk around. I took Sunset Blvd. to Vermont and ate at another taco stand on the corner. I kept walking down Vermont and ran into the Dresden! Now for those of you who have never seen Swingers you won't understand how amazing it was for me to see the Dresden. I went in for a few drinks and it was everything I expceted. The bartender was really old and Mexican so he had a sort of suave to him, and all the servers and barbacks were really old too which I thought was funny. By the way, if you know Swingers than you'll appreciate the fact that Marty and Elayne play there everynight, besides Sunday, from 9 p.m. to 1 a.m.

After the Dresden I hit Starbucks then walked over to Good Luck.

New things I've found today: Bars here don't serve beer on tap, it's all bottles. I stopped at a few bars in between the ones I spoke of and none of them had draft so I found that out and that liquor is the drink of choice around here. I found out my neighbor Martin is cool as hell. And it's pronounced Marteen. I found out there's a shit ton of places for me to go within walking distance, I didn't drive anywhere at all today. Oh, and they sell 40's here. I bought a 40 of High Life on my walk home and I feel so much more gangster.

News Update! Fires hit Malibu today. It was the first of my fires sweeping California experiences and it was all over the local stations today when I woke up. The fire was only in Malibu and the only celebrity house in danger was, get this, Axl Rose. Oh yeah, Axl from GnR was the only celeb talked about to have had a home in the path of the fire.

Anyway, that's that. Just got a pizza delivered and I'm about to hit my 40.

Niggas is Crazy in LA

**Quick Note** I started this blog over a year ago to talk about movies and what I was doing to get into the film biz. Now I am officially in LA and will use this blog to document my adventure, and of course still talk about movies.

I hope no one's offended by the title of this post, but as far as a first post of what life is like in LA this was really the only fitting label.

Brett and I got into town around 7:00 Thursday night, which was coincidentally Thanksgiving. After we checked out the house we decided to go to Wal Mart to pick up a few things. Even after TomTom told us Wal Mart was located on Crenshaw and MLK Blvd. we still decided to go. Upon pulling up to the front it didn't take us long to figure out we needed to turn around. I don't really have to go into details why, I'm sure whatever you can come up with is pretty close. What we saw happening at the stop light though you just can't make up.

Across the intersection there was a guy side kicking the metro bus sign as hard as he could. He wasn't even doing it wildly, he would set up, kick the shit out of it, wait a second and then set up to do it again. The best part wasn't that he was wearing a Cobra Kai gee (cause he wasn't) but it was the sight of a group of people standing around him acting like it was every day business.

A guy kicking the shit out of a bus sign at 8:00 on Thanksgiving night with a group of people unphased by his actions...welcome to LA.

Currently both of my roommates are out of town until Sunday. I still haven't met one of them, Hugh, but I've heard good things so I'm optimistic. The house is pretty sweet, 3 stories but one of them is the garage. First floor is living room, kitchen, full bathroom, and 2 bedrooms. 3rd floor is a loft, half bath, a balcony and my room. The main floor is hardwood and the upstairs is carpeted. I'm living on a street called Edgemont which is sandwiched between Sunset and Santa Monica Blvd., which is fucking awesome. I had dinner at a Denny's in Hollywood tonight and made my first friend, a waitress named Heather. Earlier I ate at a taco stand on Hollywood Blvd. and went to a horror store which was like a slice of heaven. Other than that it's mostly just been buying the essentials and unpacking. I am having a little trouble with this time difference though.

I've been here a little over a day and I'm still too new to form an opinion. So far I love it, everything about it.

I love that everyone drives like they have the balls of a Nascar racer but for some reason it works out well. I love that 3 blocks to one side of me is a town filled with Eastern European gangsters, but 3 blocks the other way is million dollar houses. I love that I saw a resturaunt called "Chinese food and Donuts." I love that I found a store dedicated to horror movies, horror books and horror memorabilia. I could go on, but the point is I'm pretty happy with everything so far but a lot of that has to do with the fact that its still so fucking new to me.

Countdown to Transformers

Days like today make being a nerd really exciting. A year after the first teaser hit the web, it is finally opening day for Transformers. I don't know about everyone else but the cartoon was a pretty big part of my childhood, so I'm thinking today could be a pretty big part of my adulthood, which is still very childlike.

Transformers is unquestionably the most anticipated movie if the year. Interestingly enough, it's the only really big movie of the year that's not a remake or a sequel, and even more interesting is that it's a Michael Bay flick. Seriously, I never thought I would be this excited to go see a Michael Bay movie, but in hindsight this is the first summer that's really been a throwback to the old school blockbuster summers we used to get in the 90's so the fact he's involved in making this summer so big isn't really surprising (see The Rock).

So the million dollar question is, of course, will Transformers live up to the hype? Rotten Tomatoes has it at a 68%, 21 good reviews, 10 bad ones, and most of the bad ones just talk about how there's nothing under the hood. On the flip side, the good reviews claim it's better then sex. In about 10 hours, I'll be the judge of that.

I think since Spielberg is attached to it then it has to be good. I see Spielberg as like the dog owner and Bay as like a crazy fighting pit bull. Bay just wants to go completely ape shit and Spielberg's there to keep him on a leash. Seems like a good relationship. Obviously Spielberg won't let his name be attached to something shitty either (for instance the Island, or all the horror remakes Bay's produced, or Armageddon, or Pearl Harbor, or...).

What sucks is that I'm really expecting a lot, and when that happens it takes even more to make me happy. God I hate Internet hype and movie trailers (see Spiderman 3). Oh well, at 10:55 p.m. I get to see Optimus Prime on a movie screen in all his glory for the first time since I used to play with the toy and make the transforming noise with my mouth as he went from semi truck to bad ass. Can't say that too often.

Rob Zombie is my hero

In case you haven't heard, Rob Zombie is remaking Halloween and so far it looks like he's dialed right in. A few days ago the official site was launched complete with the full trailer and the first released artwork for the film. The background of the site is the poster and it really couldn't be any better. If you can't tell, I'm pretty excited. Be sure to check it out.

Official Halloween Site

The 100 Scariest Movie Moments

The people over at retrocrush.com have put together a an awesome list of the 100 scariest movie scenes.

With 100 scenes nothing is really left out, and they are working on adding youtube clips for all 100.

The list is great and has a good balance between surprises and obvious choices, not to mention the people that write it are pretty funny.

Included are Jaws, Halloween, the Evil Deads, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the Ring, the Shining, and some choice cuts from David Lynch, along with some real treats like Suspiria, Fulci's Zombi, Return of the Living Dead, Nosferatu, Event Horizon and even Pee Wee's Big Adventure.

Click the title of the post, or here, to check it out.

John Rambo will fuck you up

A promo has been posted online for "John Rambo" aka Rambo 4. Yes, Rambo 4.

It's basically 2 minutes of Rambo's soft side, and 2 minutes of Rambo's fuck you up side.

This clip is so official you may not even believe it's real, and I'm not even being sarcastic. If you hate militant terrorists in Bangkok and love black mullets then this is for you so click the title of the post to link up, and enjoy.

Style vs. Narrative

I just got done watching the Russian action/sci fi/horror/thriller Nightwatch and I gotta admit, I wasn't as impressed with it like many others. The "Watch" trilogy uses the same basic formula as Lord of the Rings: a bunch of good characters that aren't human racing against a bunch of evil characters that aren't humans to find the one thing that will determine if good or evil prevails in the end. The idea of a R-rated version of LOTR seemed wonderful, and "Nightwatch" is even based off of a book so it's like a Spanish person taking Spanish in high school, it gets a B just for showing up.

Now, when I got done with it I found myself strangely unsatisfied. Actually more like an emptiness, and I struggled with this because throughout the whole movie I kept thinking to myself how amazing the film looked and how unconventionally it was directed. Then I came to this crazy (sarcastic) realization about how much I really didn't care about what happened in the movie (kind of like I felt after "300").

So after nearly 18 years of watching movies that I can remember I realized that, to me of course, narrative is far more important in determining whether or not I like a film then style is. That's sort of an obvious statement, I know this, but at the same time it led me down a path of reminiscing about movies I should have liked but didn't, and ones that absolutely blew me away.

Funny conclusion, most of the ones that blow me away treated style and narrative equally. Let's examine...

Take Spiderman 3 for instance. I was so confused after this one I couldn't even review it. The first person that asked me what I thought about it, I told them "that was a lot of movie to take in." I still think that, and now I know what I mean. Instead of focusing on the style of Spiderman I think Mr. Raimi and co were relying way too heavily on narrative. Raimi attempted to show us arcs and emotional instability in Spidey, Parker, Brock, Venom, MJ, Harry/Goblin, Sandman, and Gwen Stacy. How hard is it to tell us about how 9 people feel in the beginning, and why they feel different in the end?

Hard enough to get a lot of people hating your movie.

You look at the first 2, there's style, that Raimi style he built off the Evil Dead trilogy and Darkman, and it's combined simple paced, question raising narrative that we can balance with the visuals.


How about the first Matrix, a perfect balance of style and narrative. Probably the most obvious example I can come up with.

With the Matrix, we realize that when the bar is raised with style, the bar must similarly be raised with the narrative. The film opens when a girl with a Pat Riley haircut dressed in bondage leather kicks the shit out of a whole platoon of cops, and lets not forget the infamous spinning camera shot all in the first 5 minutes. With that dish served so fast anything less then you telling me the entire world is a fake computer program built so that humans will survive in a coma like state so machines can use us as a power source to generate their being is going to make me leave unsatisfied.

This is where I realize there comes a point in every film where the director, in some way, decides what's more important, style or narrative, and I think it's the lack of taking on the responsibility to focus on both that's leaving us walking out of the theatre saying "that was alright" time and time again.