Running a production is tough stuff and can feel incredibly overwhelming, so I wanted to share my experience with you guys! I kept a production blog for my newest piece,Classic Alice, and tweaked it a little bit to make sure the experience was educational for anyone out there thinking about working a production.
Writing & Preproduction…
December 2013. I discussed writing a little bit last time, but obviously the writing process is more detailed than “I sat down and wrote things”, so I wanted to share that with you.
I’ve attached (some) of my handwritten outlines to give you an idea of how I start. I can’t just bounce right to a computer and start pounding out a story. I have to trace my world out first, at least a little, and I prefer to work by hand in the beginning. I usually start with the characters (who they are, what they want) and go from there. I establish ‘objective’ (or goal, or need, or want, or whatever language you like) because it provides a specific drive for the story. As an actor, you’re taught to find what you need in the scene and chase it — get it, no matter what. The same goes for writing. Characters need something! Sometimes, as in Alice’s case, it’s something they didn’t even realize they needed.
Once I map my characters out I start to look at the larger picture, which is where that story circle I mentioned last time helped me out. I generally traced the story for my protagonist (Alice), but as I went along, Andrew began to develop his own circle and his own arc. From that circle, I mapped out the steps of my show on the page below the circle.
As I wrote before, I initially wrote a ‘mockumentary’, so this outline actually follows that story line more than what the show became — but you can see the bones of it. Once I moved into Scrivener, I used its tools to further map my show. And, of course, I had to readjust to make it more “vlog format” friendly.
December 2013. The holidays are a deadzone in Los Angeles, so I knew I needed to grab a team together if I was going to prepare to produce the show in early January. Having lost my former production team, and having produced a show before, I knew I didn’t want to create a show all on my own, so I put out the call via social media for friends and colleagues to see if anyone wanted to jump on board. The response was overwhelmingly positive; a lot of people wanted to work with me, which felt pretty damn cool! I eventually brought on Aaron from AntiKaiser as my co-producer and we signed papers (SIGN PAPERS. When you hire people to perform a job, I do not care if they are your friends or not: you sign papers that clearly state expectations and division of labor and money) then go to work!
Preproduction is a lot of scrambling: a lot of “who do you know who…” and phone calls. So we called and we made lists and we took meetings and we tried to figure out who would be the best cast and crew. We attached my director from The Concession, J.D. Compton, and pulled in a director of photography, editor, sound guy, and all the other amazing crew members we would need (and who could work for buttons on these first six episodes!) in order to create a quality show.
December 2013/Jan. 2014. Simultaneously, we had to cast the thing! Alice was easy. Because it was me. After her, however, we had no real leads. Very early on in the process, my incredible friend Arielle Brachfeld recommended Tony Noto, who wound up being just perfect for the role. But because the part required an actor who would neither make me look older nor look too old himself IN ADDITION to having fun chemistry with me AND being a little bit ‘full of himself’ AND still lovable, I wanted to make sure I was seeing enough people to guarantee the perfect fit. I had a few auditions (including one, which Tony had to attend, in the middle of a rainstorm. With my roof leaking.), but the second I read with Tony, I knew he was perfect. My coproducer agreed and we hired him!
The role of Josh, the R.A., who appears in episode 3, was initially a security guard, but Aaron and I decided it would be easier to cast from our age group and our pool of friends (AND we wouldn’t have to hunt down a security officer costume), so we changed the part to an R.A. and I reached out to Gentry White, who accepted and joined our cast. Cara, Alice’s roommate, went through some back and forth. Aaron and I initially had a lot of interest from a few friends of mine, but they were also redheads and we were concerned that people might think we were sisters. We also wanted the show to have some more ethnicity and I’ve wanted to work with my friend Elise for a while, so we pulled Elise Cantu into the show.
With everyone cast over the holidays, we were almost ready to begin shooting… Next time, we’ll talk the end of preproduction and the beginning of SHOOT DAYS!
See you guys soon! As we at Classic Alice say: Top Aces!
And make sure you check out our site: classic-alice.com