Raul's Take: Day 09: Hospital Room

by Raul Viceral, Assistant Director

Shooting at the old university building on College Ave. is such a blessing! This morning all we had to do was drive over and the equipment and props were already there waiting for us. Sweet!

Yesterday we had shot all of the day scenes of Tom in the hospital so today we're shooting all of the night scenes. C figured this would be more efficient setting up the room for day, then night rather than trying to bounce back and forth between the two set ups. And it worked out perfectly.

The first scene of the day was of Tom and the nurse, played by Ellie Pearce-Ell, who comes in to change his sheets.

"That was great, Ellie. But on this next take, don't be so rough with the enema bottle."

C is a hands on director. Here she mushes Don's face into the emotion she wants. Brilliant!

Ellie did wonderfully as the nurse even though she doesn't have a lot of experience with speaking roles. But C got a lot of great takes of Tom and the nurse's awkward conversation.

Then it was time to move the bed a bit and get some POV shots of Tom looking at his hands.

It took several takes but Don was finally able to count all ten fingers on his hands. Good job!

After getting some quick shots of that, the crew got set up for the Mama/Tom scene.

Bernie, Kristine and Kevin putting up a fake window shadow, called a cookie in the TV and film industry.

Megan Fries returned as Mama. C's professors, Gerald Saul and Leesa Streifler, came by the set to visit too.

Leesa listens in while C talks to Megan about the scene. Bernie is in the background about to set a fire.

We also were joined by Minna Harmaala, a Finnish reporter from the Finnish American Reporter, who will be hanging out with us on set for the next few days. She's writing an article on C and the making of her movie. Cool! Below is C and Minna chatting while the set is being set up for the next scene.

"And can you tell me again why you left San Francisco and moved to Regina?"

The Mama/Tom scene turned out great. Andrew, Trevor and Bernie did a great job lighting Mama to give her an ethereal glow while keeping Tom cold and bleak. These guys are pros. Here Tom's mama's ghost visits him in his room. Spooooky!

"Thanks for sewing my name into my hospital gowns, Mama. You're the best!"

Long hours, hectic pace and very little sleep can affect a crew in two ways, either we all start getting crabby and grumpy or we get silly and punchy. Luckily with this crew, we got silly and punchy. We'd better get Andrew some sleep fast though.

We hope he's as good with the camera as he is with that makeup brush.

Even our fearless director wasn't above going a little crazy now and then. Here she takes the wheelchair around for a little test drive.

"Where's my tapioca! I want my tapioca!"

After the mild spell of insanity, it was time for some lunch. Kali wasn't available for lunch today, so Dauminique had a couple sandwich platters flown in from Subway. Oh man were they good.

Everyone enjoying their 3-1/2 minutes of lunch before we got back to work.
"There will be time to chew when I'm dead."

The next scene we shot is a really cool one where Tom gets out of bed and wanders off into the hospital. The hallway outside of the room we were shooting in looked too modern and nothing like a 1940 mental hospital at all. But we had scouted a great looking hallway down in the basement of the building that looked perfect. But first, we had to figure out how to kill the lights down there. Bernie quickly found the breaker switches.

"Uh... hey Bernie, are you sure you want to turn all those switches off?"

Andrew and Trevor and Bernie did a great job again lighting the basement hallway. It looked great. We were also happy to have Jacquie back on set with us, this time though as an actor! Here she is playing the part of the night shift nurse who finds Tom out of his bed.

Not only does it look like a mental hospital, it feels like one too.

This is a very surreal scene that will edit together with a prairie shot of younger Tom on the deck of his ship.

"I'm not Mr. Sukanen, I'm an end table."

Don and Clara taking a break while we reset the camera. Someday we'll be able to afford chairs for everyone.

Soon we had all of the scenes shot and in the can, as they say. It was time to tear down the equipment and say goodbye to the hospital room set.

Thank you hospital set! We had a great time!

There was nothing left to do but pack everything up and take it all back to C's studio at the university. But it's a mere 5 minutes away, at least we didn't have to drive back from Moose Jaw.

Staging everything down on the first floor.

It was another puzzle trying to get everything to fit in the vehicles. This was when we were really missing Jacquie's trailer! Thanks to Kevin's dad who lent him his truck for a few weeks. We couldn't have done it without it.

We've got all the chips and juice boxes, the rest of the lights and camera equipment will have to stay.

After unloading everything at the university, we headed home. C and Andrew and I stayed up a for a couple more hours snacking on cheese and crackers while viewing the dailies, as well as some test footage of Sisu The Musical.

I've seen enough. Let's crank up Guitar Hero!

Tomorrow we head east of Regina to Avonhurst where Chris St. Amand has built a full scale mock up of the skeleton of Tom Sukanen's keel. C is very excited to see it. So stay tuned!

Until next time... adventure!
R-