Downtime: Assemble

Rob decides to make a movie. Part two in a five part series.

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Hi, I'm Rob. Tale number 57. Downtime Part 2. Assemble. In the weeks after my phone call with Larry, I got to work writing the script for Downtime. It was loosely based on my real life and the slow, grinding boredom that everyone who worked at the golf course felt. I was still talking to Larry on the phone a few times a week, and once I got the script to a place where it felt like it could actually be a movie, Larry mentioned that he would act in it if I wanted him to. This was incredible. The last movie he had acted in was Batman Begins, so that meant he'd be going from Batman to my movie. We picked a start date of September 1st, which was about two months away, and booked his flight and hotel. His wife Hannah would be joining him, and they were going to be in town for two weeks for the shoot. After Larry, the first person I got on board was my friend Adam. He had helped with a vampire movie and was one of my best friends, and he also worked at the golf course with me. He has been a huge supporter of nearly every creative endeavor I have ever taken on. To this day, twenty years later, he is always down to help. If you've listened to every episode of the podcast, you've actually heard him before. Back then, none of my weird little ideas would have ever gone anywhere without Adam. And that goes for my friends Josh and Ben too. Not that this matters to anyone other than those that know me, but this is Ben F, not Ben L. Josh and Ben helped a lot on downtime, especially in the early stages and the first part of the shoot. They worked a lot so they couldn't be there every single night, but they helped get it off the ground, and they had also both been there for the vampire movie. This was an exciting time in my life, but it was also very nerve-wracking, because now I had to find a cast and a crew to help me make this thing, and I still did not have permission to shoot it at the golf course. I probably should have confirmed that before booking Larry, but I hadn't. So once again I found myself nervously asking if I could shoot a movie in the golf course clubhouse. It was a much bigger commitment than the vampire movie, and I wanted to give myself plenty of time, so I told them the shoot would take over a month. And everyone was on board. I still had to shoot at night, and they added an additional request that since it was the busy season they did not want me missing work to shoot the movie. So I'd need to work my regular schedule while making the movie. Work in the day, shoot at night. This seemed fair to me, and our location was set. Now it's time to find a cast and crew. I took over a private meeting room at the golf course as my little office for auditions and meetings with potential crew members. I learned that Craigslist was where most people posted cast and crew calls for their movies. I put up a few ads for a cinematographer and a sound mixer to record sound. I also made posts about the parts that I needed to cast. This was way before the Atlanta movie boom, so there were not nearly as many people in Georgia interested in the movie industry, but I got a pretty decent response. Larry encouraged me to use his name to convince people that the movie was legit and that they should take part in it. This sorta worked, but also a lot of people had no idea who Larry Holden was, so it only went so far. The way it worked with crew members was I would have them drive to the golf course while I was working my shift, and then I would have someone watch the cash register for me while I met with potential crew members. I narrowed the candidates for cinematographer down to two people, Enniola and Dustin. They both had cameras and were both ready to commit to a one month shoot. Dustin wanted fifty dollars a day, and Eniola said he would do it for free. I talked it over with Larry, and he suggested that I ask both of them to do it. That way if one of them quit, I'd still have someone to shoot the movie. This seemed like a great idea, and I presented it to Dustin and Enniola, and they both signed on to shoot the movie. Next, I needed a sound mixer. This was the most difficult position to fill. You can make an argument that the sound mixer is the most important crew member. You need good sound. Again, Atlanta was not a movie town back then, so there just weren't very many sound mixers available to hire. I interviewed a few people, but none of them could commit to the schedule. A solution presented itself when two people contacted me saying they were filmmakers from India that were about to shoot a movie in Atlanta and were interested in coming on to downtime as producers. Their names were Parthy and Kumar, and I had no idea what a producer was, but what they pitched was being on set to support me in any way that I needed support. They would make sure everyone was there on time each day, help me set up every scene to shoot, they would make sure meals were ready to go. I mentioned my sound problem and they said they had a microphone and I did not need to worry about sound anymore. They would take care of it. Awesome. They were in. A few more people signed on as producers, and even more than that signed on as production assistants. Producers and production assistants basically did the same thing on downtime, but producers were there every single day, and production assistants came and went depending on their availability. Next was casting. I had put together some sides for people to read during auditions, but there was a lot more to it than that, and I needed help. Also, I felt like I'd already called in every favor to every person I knew, and I also knew I was going to need even more help during the shoot than I did during auditions, so I was worried about wearing everyone down before the shoot even began. My solution was to go to my younger sister and ask for her help during auditions. She was a senior in high school and gathered a small army of friends to head up to the golf course on audition nights and keep everything going. On the first day of auditions, people drove to the golf course from Atlanta, about a forty five minute drive. We were casting for the role of Dave, the manager or boss of the golf course. I believe Ben and Adam were there, along with my sister, her friend Cody, who had some acting experience and helped a lot with the casting process, and a few other people she had invited. We created a waiting area with snacks in the restaurant, and then had a little side room set up for the auditions. My sister was going to be reading one side, and then the potential Dave's would read the other side. The first guy walked in, I was very nervous. He made a comment about how there was no need for everyone to be so serious. He was right, but I didn't have any other setting in a situation like that. The side for that character Dave started with a pretty big chunk of dialogue. Then my sister was supposed to respond, and then Dave would keep going with some more dialogue. So the guy reading for Dave reads his first chunk of dialogue, he looks at my sister, waiting for her to respond, and she doesn't. I look over at her, thinking maybe she's lost her place in her script, and I see that her face is bright red. And then she erupted into laughter right in this guy's face. And she couldn't stop. She got up and ran out of the room. I was very apologetic to the actor. To be fair to my sister, she did nothing wrong. It was a strange experience for all of us. I'd basically forced her to do this, and it was really weird if you're not an actor. And beyond that, the guy gave like a huge reading of these lines. He was on the verge of screaming. Still, I felt terrible, but luckily the actor was a good sport. Everyone calmed down and we got back to the audition. I definitely considered him for Dave, but ended up going with someone else. We finished casting over a period of about two weeks, and now we had everything we needed to make our movie. Or at least that's what I thought. The cover art is by Marcella Johnson. She also came up with the title of the podcast. Our theme music is by Mitchell Hardidge. Thanks to Ben, Gordon, Marcella, and Melanie, who are always there to bounce ideas around. You can find us on Instagram and at robtellstales.com. And thanks to you for listening.