Day Thirteen: Stormy Weather

It has been a while since I last posted anything, so I will try to give the highlights in no particular order.

This morning we shot at a lovely historic home called Whitehall. Big white columns. Lots of floral wallpaper. Sprawling gardens. Rabbits running around the yard. Think old South and weddings with big tents and champagne flowing. This doubled for our "country club" tennis team, the Fountain Club. Weather reports indicated the possibility of heavy rain. It arrived early and in buckets. Though much of the morning was going to be interior shoots, not all of it was going to be. A quick revision of the screenplay allowed for a scene that was to take place on a tennis court to be moved to an office instead. The result was something much more comedic (which we needed) thanks to our crack production design team, headed by James Wise (the most cheerful, overworked man I have ever met and his sidekick Hannah, lovely and cheerful and talented, as well). Dash Mihok's hysterically funny performance also helped make the scene even better.

By lunch, Kathryn and I were rallying the team to see if we could get back to the Louisville Boat Club where we'd spent two of the hardest days of my professional life. The LBC is a fantastic tennis club on the river where for two Mondays we have shot the finale of the film, the climactic showdown between our hero and his team and the evil Fountain Club team. Both days were hellish. On me. On the crew. On the cast. On the Boat Club. Blazing hot sun on clay courts. Two dozen characters, most of them playing tennis (most of them actors who have never held a racquet until this movie), a hundred or so extras and an exhausted crew, since Tuesday is our only day off. Long story short - I didn't get everything I needed. So we begged Mark at LBC to return today for a couple of hours with a smaller crew and two cast members, Josh Hopkins (the hero, Owen) and Dash (Charles, of the evil Fountain Club). I knew that if I could get just these two guys back on the LBC courts, I could get what I needed to cut together the big scene at the end of the film. But other things needed to cooperate, especially weather, which had not been cooperating. Sidebar: It's difficult to concentrate on any scene when you know that the BIG SCENE you need is incomplete and can't be complete because you (1) have lost the location; (2) have run out of any extra time to shoot anything else; and (3) one of your lead actors finishes his work that day (Dash). So lots working against us. I wonder if any of this is making sense. Hope so.

Okay. Our fabu associate producer Laura Morton negotiated some time at LBC with Mark, who said we could come to the courts, but he wouldn't know until 3 or 4 if it was safe even to put a camera out on the clay. The rain had pummeled them so hard, the dolly might sink into the court clay. We took the chance and quickly shot everything we needed at Whitehall and moved to LBC.

The weather cleared! And we got what we needed, I hope.

I want to write more so I don't forget how incredible this experience has been and continues to be, but I am going to fall asleep. More rain in the forecast, but for now I am hopeful - and hoping - for sunshine.