No Ordinary Monday
The No Ordinary Monday podcast brings you the most incredible tales from people's working lives. Each week, we meet someone whose work is anything but ordinary - they may be clearing landmines, blowing up movie sets, or exploring uncharted caves.
We dive into the how, the why, and a life-defining moment they’ve experienced on the job. Whether it’s spine-tingling, hilarious, or just plain jaw-dropping, their stories will challenge what you thought a “career” could be—and maybe even change the way you think about your own.
No Ordinary Monday
The Art of Controlled Disaster (Special Effects Artist)
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Have you ever wondered how those incredible physical special effects in movies actually work? Not the CGI, but the real explosions, practical weather, and dangerous stunts that make your jaw drop? David Rigley-Williamson pulls back the curtain on the fascinating, challenging, and sometimes absurd world of special effects artistry.
From humble beginnings as an art student with no clear career path, David found himself building elaborate special effects for major productions including the Emmy Award-Winning Star Wars Andor, where he created many effects, like the massive memorial fountain on Ghorman in season 2 – a feat that took months of precision engineering. He even scored an acting credit as an X-Wing mechanic, allowing him to appear in the Star Wars universe he helped create.
The heart of our conversation centers on David's most incredible challenge: constructing an elaborate quicksand effect for a celebrity prank show in the desert. Picture a 20-meter square, 6-meter deep tank filled with water and cork granules, a custom hydraulic platform, and safety divers waiting in pitch-black water – all operating in 50°C heat. When celebrities drove their 4x4 vehicle onto what looked like innocent sand, they'd watch in horror as it began to sink and their driver disappeared beneath the surface. The engineering challenges, dangerous conditions, and logistical nightmares David faced during this 31-day shoot without a single day off will leave you astounded at what goes into creating these seemingly simple effects.
For anyone fascinated by filmmaking, interested in unconventional career paths, or simply curious about how movie magic happens, this episode offers a rare glimpse behind the scenes with one of the wizards who makes the impossible look real. Subscribe now.
Behind the Scenes from the Artem Quicksand shoot - https://www.artem.com/projects/ramez-goes-underground
Some of the reactions of celebrities to the pranks - https://www.hindustantimes.com/bollywood/shah-rukh-khan-almost-punched-a-prank-show-host-for-scaring-him-in-komodo-dragon-costume/story-vaFr9eZj5kY7eSF1uMMK3L.html
David's IMDB profile - https://www.imdb.com/name/nm4894917/
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Stranded in Quicksand: Prank Show Intro
Speaker 1You're strapped into a 4x4, driving deep into the desert, and then, out of nowhere, the car hits something Quicksand. The driver jumps out but vanishes beneath the surface.
Speaker 2So then everybody in the car just starts panicking because they're like where the hell has he just gone? He's drowned in quicksand. And then so they start trying to climb out the roof of the car and as they're coming out this giant lizard appears and it's crawling towards them and spitting at them and stuff.
Meet David Wrigley Williamson: Special Effects Artist
Speaker 1But what looked like disaster was in fact, entertainment designed and constructed for a prank show. Beneath the sand lies a deep tank, a hydraulic lift and safety divers hidden in pitch black water. And for this week's guest, it was one of the most difficult, dangerous and unforgettable builds of his career career. Hello and welcome to another episode of no Ordinary Monday. Thank you so much for joining us. I am your host, chris Barron, and each week I sit down with a guest whose job is far from ordinary. We explore how they got there, what it's really like behind the scenes, and then I ask them to relive the single most unforgettable experience of their career. Now, if you're enjoying the show, make sure to follow us or subscribe, and that way you won't miss out on any of the incredible guests we have lined up for you. And our guest this week is one of the wizards who helps conjure up movie magic, not with CGI, but with real fire, water and effects. From detonating double-decker buses in London to building elaborate alien worlds on Star Wars Andor, his job is to make us believe it's real. David Wrigley Williamson is a special effects artist whose work has taken him from small indie sets to Emmy award-winning masterpieces, and he's even picked up a Star Wars acting credit along the way. And, as you heard in that intro, david's big story takes us to the deserts of Abu Dhabi, where a prank show turned into one of the most cursed and difficult shoots of his career. So stay tuned for a gripping behind the scenes. Look at what it takes to create these effects and the surprising challenges that come with it.
Speaker 1You're listening to no Ordinary Monday. Let's get into the show. All right, david Wrigley-Williamson, welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today, man? Great to see you. Okay, you too. Thank you very much, man. Your beard is looking majestic, as ever, I have to say.
Speaker 2No, you too. Mine is probably a lot whiter than when you last saw it.
Speaker 1I think that I want to start.
Speaker 1I mean, we were housemates when I moved to London way back in the day when I was working and we became good friends there and I think that just before we get into your stuff, I wanted to share an anecdote for kind of how badass you are in some ways. And the anecdote is when I asked you to come and help me on a documentary project for the bbc about hypnosis, do you remember? I do? Yeah, so to give you to preface this, I was doing a documentary for the bbc about placebo effect hypnosis and I found a dentist in glasgow who who offered, um, essentially drug-free wisdom tooth extraction and funnily enough, I couldn't find anyone who was crazy or silly enough to do one. And then we were in the car one day driving somewhere and I was like, oh, I'm struggling with this.
Speaker 2We were on the way back from climbing.
Speaker 1Yeah, we were on the way back from climbing.
Speaker 2And I was like oh, my week's been really tough.
Speaker 1I can't find someone and you're like I'll do it.
Speaker 2Yeah, didn't. Oh, my week's been really tough. I can't find someone and you're like I'll do it. Yeah, yeah, no, yeah, I remember I had like an annoying wisdom tooth was growing at a funny angle and I never got around to sorting it out at all and I was like, yeah, sure, why not, that could be fun. Uh, I obviously had absolutely no idea what I was getting myself in for, um, but yeah, it was. That was a hell of an experience and you literally like and again.
Speaker 1It's one of those things. I wouldn't have believed it unless I was in the room filming it. You, you did. There was nothing else apart from hypnosis. Sat you in the chair going to trance and then literally extracted a wisdom tooth from your mouth without anything, not even a paracetamol Sweet.
Speaker 2I never really sort of believed in the stage show sort of hypnosis, but I had a pretty open mind. I was like, well, let's see what happens.
Speaker 1Yeah, and your pain levels out of 10 never reached beyond. What was it?
Speaker 2It was a two, like it was crazy. You know what, if, if you struggle with it, with the injections and stuff, I I would recommend it for sure. Well, maybe have a little bit more uh time learning the ins and outs of it than I did, yeah, brilliant.
From Art Student to Film Industry
Speaker 1Well, the reason I wanted to tell that story is because I think that that's something that I would struggle with, because and many people but like, I've got a very analytical brain and very sort of like not to say, you don't, but I think that you've got a more artistic brain, you're more open to things, and that sort of I guess leads me to like what you've chosen or what you've gotten into as a job, um, so I guess I guess what is the most interesting way to describe what you do for a living?
Speaker 2well, I, so I work in special effects, film and tv, uh, and it's basically like that. So I do do physical effects and rather than CGI or anything. So we, we create all of the physical things that you have to interact with, and that's anything from like wind and rain and or like a prop that has to do a very specific thing to massive explosions and, yeah, it's, it's a prop that has to do a very specific thing to massive explosions. Uh, and, yeah, it's, it's. It's that sort of physical interaction with it. That, um, yeah, it's, it's. It's definitely the most interesting part for me. Uh, and the, the, the, the crazy things that you end up doing. Uh, is, is, is, yeah, I love that every day, is is a completely different challenge. Um, and, yeah, it's. The project can be ridiculously long. Or you and you've got loads of time to do it, or you've you've got 45 minutes and I need that thing immediately so even even on these big, big, massive, multi-million dollar projects, like you would still.
Speaker 1They've been planned in the planning, sometimes for years. Oh, you might have someone on sunday go like. Oh, by the way, I've had a new idea.
Speaker 2Out of nowhere can we do this it could be that, or it could even literally be. You're in the middle of filming and your director or whoever just has it as an idea, and they're like, oh, wouldn't it be cool if we could do this, uh. And and you're like, yeah, yeah, let's, yeah, sure, let's uh go back to the workshop and see what we can, we can do. And I think that's the bit that I enjoy the most is the um, is is that sort of problem solving aspect of it, and it's how the hell can we just grab all these things we have around us and and make something of it, you know.
Speaker 1And what's some of the weirdest, coolest, most incredible stuff that you've been making recently on set that you can tell us about? Cause I guess some of those projects that you're working on now are kind of still under wraps and NDAs and stuff right.
Speaker 2Yes, no for sure, Probably. So the the thing that I think is the coolest thing I've worked on recently would be so it was season two of Andor, the Star Wars series, which is amazing.
Speaker 1Thank you very much. I'm giving you full credit for it.
Speaker 2By the way, no, no one else deserves yeah thank you very much, but it actually just uh got nominated for an emmy for special effects brilliant well deserved.
Speaker 1Oh for special effects yeah is that your first one?
Speaker 2it's the first project I've ever been on that's been nominated. Yeah, oh, congratulations.
Speaker 1That's amazing.
Speaker 2Yeah, thank you very much. Yeah, I was amazed. It was by far the biggest production I've ever been on, and just every day on set you were just in awe of the world building that they created. It was just absolutely incredible, and so, my point of view, it was a much bigger project than I'd ever worked on and I was given a lot more responsibility in terms of some of the things we were building um, one of the first things that I had to do.
Speaker 2So when you watch it in the series, uh, I don't know, really spoil it for anyone who's not seen it but the, so the, the um, the goldman, uh, planet, yeah, the square that you see you can see it in the trailers and stuff um, there's a big like memorial fountain in the center of that, and that fountain we had to make practical um, so it doesn't look like a lot, you don't even think about it when you're watching it, but to make that thing practical was incredible task, wow. And this thing was the size of like as the size of like a 400 meter running track. It was huge, it was absolutely incredible. And the end, what was amazing about it is that the whole, the entire thing, was built from scratch alone. It took I think it was nearly three months to from start to finish for that fountain alone, with me and another sort of four or five people and there's nothing like.
Speaker 1It's not. You can buy any of this stuff like off the shelf. It's all. Every time you you have to create like unique solutions to everything 100.
Speaker 2Yeah, so we, we had to build our own uh cool heater and filter from scratch. Oh my god, um, I did all of the plumbing stuff, so it was all new to me at the time. I've done a lot of other stuff in the past, but not of this scale. And then I had to design a system where I could turn on and off various different parts of the fountain oh my God, and make sure that. Well, one, you had this massive tank outside. We had 20 000 liters because we needed a top up, but you got these massive tanks outside. You have to keep on top of, like, how much water you're pumping into the set as well as how much you're pumping out, so that you don't flood the set.
Speaker 1Yeah, um it's worth mentioning, like if, if anything goes wrong, like if the fountain doesn't work on a set, just give us a sense of like what's at stake, like what would happen if you're in the middle of like an important take and your fountain suddenly starts to overflow or underflow or something like what, how much?
Speaker 2pressure is on to nail it it would be. It would be well, millions and millions and millions of pounds wasted because, um, on, on those sets we had like four or five hundred extras, all you know, all writing in in the square. You had, um, you know, tens of stunt performers and all the main actors and, uh, you know everything going on at the same time and, yeah, you're just sort of operating it in a, in a container at the back on radio and you've got no eyes on the thing.
Speaker 1So it's just yeah, do you feel that pressure it's?
Speaker 2quite, uh, I I really enjoy it, like I really enjoy being on set and seeing it all come together and, uh, it's a little bit of chaos every time you're doing something like that.
Speaker 1It's, yeah, it's really cool to see it all come together for sure, did you ever think like I mean, stepping onto a star wars set like must be absolutely surreal every time you do it.
Speaker 2It really was. It really was. The bit for me was when we had that TIE Avenger in the forest and we were doing nights for weeks and weeks and weeks doing that sequence, and they were really brutal nights as well. It was cold, it was wet because it was heavy rain. So you know, it was a pretty miserable time, but it was also absolutely incredible because you'd stand in there at night, you've got all these lights on it and then you know we were freeing the smoke in and just that thing sat there. It looked like you were in in the scene. It's just yeah, it's mind-blowing.
Speaker 1I loved it god, I'm so, so jealous. Yeah, literally living people's dreams, man I was um, I was checking out your imdb before we jumped on and I noticed you have one acting credit. I do. I do tell us what that?
Speaker 2I thought that'd be really funny um, basically on an it right in andor, uh, there's a few scenes where you have the the big bangers and stuff with the x-wings, and the Rebels are getting ready and they wanted people in the background to be welding and fixing things. So we have these spark generators that we use, that you know, on a button, just spray out a load of sparks, and yeah so. But the thing is we couldn't really you can't hand over these to anybody. You've got to know how to use them. So it ended up that a few of us got dressed up, we got put into costume and yeah, so I became an X-Wing mechanic for several weeks.
Speaker 1That's so cool man.
Star Wars Andor: Creating Practical Effects
Speaker 2Yeah, so it was quite funny. I was sat there watching it to when I when I might turn up. And yeah, you don't see my face, but you see my, like me from a distance. And then me, uh, just my back, welding away on top of the next ring, sparking away.
Speaker 1Yeah, you've definitely got more of a rebels look than imperials look for sure, yes, and they're for sure they did want.
Speaker 2They were like they were unsure about the beard, so I had they, like tucked it all underneath and made it look a bit shorter really which was interesting.
Speaker 1I mean, come on, dude, like if they asked you to to trim your beard, would you have done it for I'd be like absolutely not, I'm not doing it.
Speaker 2No, you get somebody seriously wow the beard comes before a star wars cameo. That's, that's insane yeah, no, I, I'm all good, I'll keep it, someone else can do the world. It'll grow back man yeah, I know, but I haven't seen my chin in years. I'm all good brilliant, brilliant.
Speaker 1Well, um, I I like to ask folks to jump on about their, essentially their, origin story. You know, what did you want to be as a kid, do you remember?
Speaker 2I haven't got a clue. All I know is that I remember being a kid and just I knew I like I've definitely always been I've always loved like taking things apart and seeing how they worked and building stuff. Like my, my family have always done diy and, like you know, done everything themselves, and I've always stopped out all the time and I definitely remember that I had no idea what I wanted to do in life.
Speaker 2I didn't have a clue to the point where I remember being at school one day in art and the art teacher was like what do you want to do?
Speaker 2I was like, no, I don't know, she's like well, why don't you go to an art degree? I was like, cool, I'll do that. So yeah, I got into Loughborough University and did fine art and I actually loved it. It's a great time, you know, I did work really hard, I came out with a good degree and yeah, but I still, even after leaving uni, I did not know what I wanted to do at all, know what I wanted to do at all. Um, I sort of specialized in photography, um, and when, towards the end, I did like a photography um part of the course and that for me was was I really enjoyed it. So I, when I finished uni, I was like um maybe I'll become a photographer, I don't really know.
Speaker 2But at the same time I didn't really want to be like a wedding photographer or anything like that. I've never been very good at taking photos of people. And then a mate at the time he was like I'm moving down to London because he was doing a PhD. So him and a mate had a flat and they had a spare room down in South Wimbledon and he was like do you want to come? I was like so I'm not doing anything else. So I just went and I moved to London on a whim. Wow, yeah. And when I got there, I didn't really have much of a plan thinking back, no plan, in fact to the point where I ended up being on the dole for two weeks. Oh, wow, because I was just like well, now what do I do? Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2So I frantically searched for a job. I got a job in a pub. I've done a lot of pub work before, so it was quite good, easy work. And it wasn't until, basically, my housemate shouted at me saying what are you doing? Like you're just bumbling along working in a pub.
Speaker 1Why don't you do something?
Speaker 2You're probably like 20, 21 by this point I think, yeah, I was early 20s, early 20s. At this point I did four years at uni. Yeah, yeah, something like that. And he was like you're really good at building stuff, why don't you what did you, you know? Find a? Find a job in, yeah, in set construction? And I was like, what do you mean? Because I'd it never even crossed my mind that I could do something like that. Yeah, um. So I, yeah, I sent some emails about um.
Speaker 2I literally googled set construction at the time. Uh, and one of the first things that popped up was um is this guy, michael mulligan. He was a like a bit of a one-stop shop for for um. He was like an art director, construction manager, prop master, all-in-one uh did of like commercials, music videos, things like that. But his website was really impressive. He got all of the right things on there. So I was like this looks really cool, big outfit. And, yeah, I sent him an email. He got back to me, needed to set hands on something. It was a History Channel advert, I think. And yeah, got there and he got me straight to work. We were like painting the studio and then he was like I need to make this little fire, just a gas fire, can you drill some holes in this thing? I was like, yep sure. So straight away. I think we gelled quite a lot there and then, yeah, became his, his right-hand man for, I think, for nearly four years yeah, um, that's just off that sort of random email that's roughly.
Speaker 1When we met as well, I think you were working with michael yes, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2So it was still very early days of me working in the film industry and, yeah, and it was very much jumping in the deep end because he was a, he was a one-man band and he was. You know, it was a hell of a lot to to figure out. I'd never worked in any film respect whatsoever, um, so it was finding finding out the hard way of you know how, how it all works and who's who, and because there is a bazillion different people on the set, there's so many different departments and knowing who's who and who's responsible for what. And yeah, that was a lot to learn, um, but it was good because some, some of the things we did, because he was a bit of a one-stop shop. It it meant that we had to do everything ourselves. Yeah, you know, like one day you're building these little props to do something, or the next day you're building a sort of an entire house for a film. You know we did literally anything, um, and then I I think that like it sort of set me up really well because we were doing a um, a build for oak Boot Experience or something I can't remember. It was basically this thing that went around like Westfields and you could go and win stuff. It was a big like Wheel of Fortune and I built all of the sort of set part of it and the wheel and everything but the motor mechanism that made it spin when you press the button.
The Desert Prank Show Challenge
Speaker 2That was built by Artem. It was a special effects company and they basically came along, uh, to do something on the motor and they saw that I built everything and they're like you know, if you've got any downtime when you come work for us? I was like, yeah, cool, so that that was basically I. I can't remember when it was. I think it was about early 2015 was when I first started working at Artem and, yeah, I basically never looked back. Everything they'd built there was amazing at the time. You know, all different things under the sun you can, you can dream of. It was a. Every day was different. I loved it.
Speaker 1Um, yeah, because it was kind of like michael, as I say, it was just like you know, small scale, one guy and you basically building everything you know, doing a lot of stuff and then our team was like next level up I visited a couple of times it's a big. It was a big outfit, you know.
Speaker 2Yeah, it was yeah, yeah, it was a hell of a learning curve, a whole new set of things to learn. And you know because I'd obviously I've never done anything like you know big fire jobs, or you know we started learning how to do pyrotechnics and yeah, um, I remember was.
Speaker 1It is artem that you. There was a, a film that you were doing was the jackie chan one, or the the foreigner, the foreigner, where you blew up a bus on a bridge somewhere.
Speaker 2Yes and like yes, yeah, lambeth bridge in the town, that's insane, like you literally like rigged a bus to blow up. Yeah so it was, um, basically, we got this bus in uh into the workshop and we spent a couple of weeks stripping it all out back to complete shell Needs to still be able to drive, and then we had to reinforce it because the lower deck of the bus had to have about 20 stunt performers on it.
Speaker 2So the bus itself was actually had people inside it when it exploded. Um, which was crazy. Yeah so, but it was. Yeah, it was quite, it was very far. We stood on the bridge when it, when it went off, then it was incredible to witness yeah, what's that feeling?
Speaker 1seamlessly when you see it, when I mean when all that work goes into a single explosion and it goes well like. What is that feeling like?
Speaker 2it's just. It is definitely what. What makes me love this job is just that you can put months and months and months of work into something for a single moment. It could be a second um, but if it works flawlessly it's amazing, like I love doing. One take wonders amazing.
Speaker 1So you? You start with michael small set. You're doing some good jobs. You got recognized by artem, jumped over there for a bit doing with artem and then similar thing happened again when you jumped to star wars, was it yeah?
Speaker 2so definitely. I got to a point in our term where I was just doing a lot of the same, like similar jobs, and I really wanted to, you know, get my teeth stuck into something, a bigger production. But the thing is it's like it's still very much an industry where if you you need to know people, it's it's really tricky to to get your foot in door. They still don't really do CVs or anything. It's word of mouth to get work.
Speaker 1Patience, also being good at your job, being patient but also networking to a degree where you're meeting the right people and the right time.
Speaker 2Yeah, for sure, I don't think I'm very good at selling myself, but I do believe in like hard work, and if you always put as much effort as you can into everything you do, then eventually you'll get notice, and I feel like that's sort of how I've ended up where I am um brilliant, because, yeah, I've never been very good at networking at all like I've just fallen into where I am now and I know I'm very lucky.
Speaker 1But oh well, deserved as well. Yeah, so, um, saying that you, you've done star wars, you've done big films with big actors, you've done big explosions and and all sorts of stuff you know, and, and in saying all that on this show, we ask our guests to kind of bring us or share with us that one sort of extraordinary tale. That sort of stands out amongst all the rest. But so I mean, what is it in your perspective? What story stands out for you?
Speaker 2what story stands out for you? I think I think the one for me bar like the incredible worlds that I've worked on in the star wars I think the one that still stands out that was the most intense, crazy job I've ever been on was um, back in 2017, uh, and it was a Middle Eastern prank show and I think from day one we should have known how crazy it was gonna be. But so, basically, he's a he's a famous artist that likes to prank celebrities, and so basically what he did was he got a lot of celebrities and invited them to go on like a four by four sort of desert challenge thing, and so they'd come along and then they'd be. You know, they wouldn't know that he's involved at this point. They've just been invited to go on a drive in the desert, yeah, and so they'd have this driver.
Speaker 2They were in like a Land Rover Defender and driving over the dunes and all this sort of stuff and then they come over the top of this dune and there's like a pretty innocent-looking patch of sand. So the driver drives down and goes into it to find out that it's quicksand and immediately the Land of uh land rover starts sinking. So he tries to. The driver tries to get out to sort of help, but he just disappears into the sand um, he's gone like, so he goes under like he's.
Speaker 1He's under the quicksand. Yeah, gone, oh my god, uh.
Speaker 2So then everybody in the car just starts panicking because they're like where the hell has he just gone? He's drowned in quicksand, uh. And then so they start trying to climb out the roof of the car. Yeah, um, and as they're coming out, this giant lizard appears, um, and it's crawling towards them and like spitting at them and stuff. So everybody's just utterly panicking at this point, like what is going on, uh. And then it's revealed ram is like he pulls off the head because he's inside the lizard, it's a, it's a creature costume and uh, he's like I gotta use it, I think, and everything. All hell breaks loose at that point. But, um, jeez.
Speaker 1So basically, the brief was like we want it. We basically want to drive a car to quicksand, the driver has to get sucked under and then a big lizard has to come out and scare everybody.
Speaker 2Exactly, yeah so they broke it down a little bit and an amazing creature effects company from la came over to do the the lizard. So they they built all of the creature costume and put all this stuff into it, but our task was to figure out how to make a car disappear in quicksand. Yeah, oh, it looked like quicksand, um. So what we ended up doing was um, one team in the middle of the desert built this like massive steel tank, so dug a huge hole in the ground and built this, this god, this tank. That must have been I think it must have been about 20 meters square, this huge tank with like slope sides, and then a really deep bit in the middle yeah um and then.
Speaker 2So what we did was like how, how deep, how deep is it? I think it was a good six meters deep, it was it was massive 20 by 20 in a six meter deep tank, it's like central tank, yeah, big square thing, um.
Speaker 2And then so what we did was we built this, uh, basically a hydraulic scissor lift, but from scratch, um, because the idea was that the the scissor lifts down in the bottom of the tank and it is it like at its full extinction level with the ground, and then you have these two ramps that come out to the scissor lift. So imagine there's no quicksand there or whatever. The car drives down, drive along these two ramps onto the top of the scissor lift, comes to a stop and then, as the scissor lift lowers, the ramp sort of like detaches and the scissor lift lowers the car down. But like that bit was, you know, is a challenge to build a scissor lift from scratch and also not to say that you need to get a very good driver to hit the marks perfectly right, because he misses a lift and everyone's screwed yeah, he's just in.
Speaker 2He just he did a couple of times in the tests um, because we had these little bumpers on the side of it, so it sort of forced his wheels to go. Yeah, but yeah, we we had some very um tactical plants, uh, that sort of showed him where to go.
Speaker 2Yeah and yeah. So basically back in the workshop, we built this scissor lift and so it had to be completely flat packable because obviously we had to ship it out to Abu. Dhabi. Yeah, so just a lot of steel work all welded together, hydraulic rams and a hydraulic controller, and then we, we tested it in the car park again, so set it all up, put a car on top of it and send it up down a few times and a few days, um, and then, yeah, packaged it all up and I think it took about two months to get there oh wow, that's yeah.
Speaker 2Very much in advance went on a boat. Yeah and then yeah. So we built it all, got all prepared and we didn't really know what we were getting in for in terms of what it was going to be like. None of us had ever worked in the desert before. I mean to be fair, thinking back now, it was an absolute nightmare even getting there. I think it took us like 32 hours to get to Abu. Dhabi.
Speaker 1What from the UK?
Speaker 2From day one on that job. When we left it was chaos. So we got on the flight. I think about an hour in, somebody in first class was smelling smoke. So're like right, we've got to land in Frankfurt. So we dropped us off there, sat for eight hours till another plane arrived, got on that plane and then a massive storm had happened by this point.
Speaker 1Yeah, that should have been your first, first red flag that this shoot is cursed yeah, honestly, we were like, okay, right, this is the start of the job.
Speaker 2And then, yeah, then we got there and nobody had told us that the hotel we were staying at. We thought it was a different hotel, but the hotel we were staying at was an hour and a half away from the location, and every single day we were all piled into these pickups and had to drive across sand dunes for like hours to get to the location in the middle of the desert yeah, it was.
Speaker 2It was crazy, uh, and they had to like stop off and let all the air out the tires. He had grip on the sound yeah, all these local drivers take you up and over the sand dunes I mean the desert.
Speaker 1The desert is massive. I mean I was there recently. It is massive in that area, like I mean why would they? Do you know why the location producer picked like some random spot?
Speaker 2The particular place that they'd found was actually quite close to a very, very nice hotel, like a really really like whatever it is now six-star hotel, and that was where they were helicoptering in all the celebrities too. So they start here let's go on your sort of desert drive here, but where we was staying was miles away, uh, and it was a nightmare to and from. So day one we were like all very hot and bothered.
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Speaker 1Uh got to the location and this is summertime as well, right, yeah, it was 50 degrees c someday, oh jesus, it was utterly like we were not prepared for that whatsoever.
Speaker 2Like most days it was high 40s, but some days it was 50, incredibly, that's insane, dangerously hot, yeah. So we got there and all of the equipment had been sort of unloaded and by that I mean thrown off the side of a lorry into the sand. So stuff was just and it had been there for like a week before we got there. So it was covered in sand. We had to like dig all the bits out and we were like what is this? And then it wasn't even quite in the right place. So we had to load it all onto this massive, like it looked like something out of Mad Max a huge lorry I've never seen anything so big in my life load it all onto that and drive it up over the dunes to the location.
Speaker 2And by that point the this local crew had started building, like digging a hole and building the tank and whatever. So we just turned up to this massive metal hole in the ground and was like right, you've got to assemble this scissor lift. Yeah, um, and yeah, we. So we got cracking with that and everything together. Uh, day one, they kind of forgotten us that we were there. So it was just me and two other guys in the middle of the desert with a couple of local workers and the. The production team had driven off to go do something else. Uh, but it was hours, hours and hours in the middle of desert until they came back for us and we've just been working away, uh, and we're like this is too much.
Speaker 2So from that point on we, every day we went back to the nice hotel and and uh had a rest for, like the, the hardest part of the day for three hours because it was just too much, and then you work a bit later into the night but we we never sort of realized it was going to be like that and it was just so grueling, really, really grueling, and um and the heat just takes it out of you, doesn't it?
Speaker 1honestly?
Speaker 2you just you're lifting heavy bits of steel, yeah, and then you know lowering it down in and bolting all together. Um, but I, it was quite bad. I I got really sick on like day three. I got really bad food poisoning.
Speaker 1Maybe you got food poisoning yeah, that was.
Speaker 2That was really tough if they didn't. So I was out for a couple of days and, uh, so, um, one of the guys at the ring of washington he was like you've got to send some more people, we can't just do this with two of us yeah, um, so a couple more of us came out and they ended up, you know, building it all, and so the the plan for it was you get this tank, you go, this is the lift where the car drives on to, and then, in order to make it look like quicksand, was you fill it full of water? Yeah, and then on the top of that, you float, um like cork granules. Yeah, um, so you can get them in all various different sizes and whatever, but there's one that, at a distance, looks like sand, um, so it was convincing was it like if you, if you were just driving over the top of it, you're like you wouldn't really notice.
Speaker 2It was yes something different, the one that, the one we got, was like it's a bit darker, yeah, but what we ended up having to do was, uh, like spread it out across the desert a little bit, yeah, just to sort of try and blend it in. So it just looked like a bit of a because we put like some trees in there, like palm trees and things.
Speaker 1So it was a different space, a wood patch.
Speaker 2Yeah, as not just yeah. Exactly Something to look at, I suppose, jeez.
Speaker 1So you basically got this like 20 by 20 and a six meter deep tank filled it with water up to I mean, how deep was the cork layer Up to about?
Speaker 2two foot from the top, so it was quite a thick layer of cork.
Speaker 1So two feet of cork.
Speaker 2Yeah, it was. I cannot remember how many hundreds of bags of cork were emptied onto this top of the water, but obviously because it's like the tank wasn't perfectly sealed and also incredibly hot, so every day a new tanker of water would have to come and top it up, because it sunk down a little bit. Um, but yeah it was. It was incredible. You couldn't. You couldn't see the edge of the tank. We all fell in it at least once, because you're just walking along, because you have to blend in the edge, yeah, um, so like the director fell in once, ramez fell in.
Speaker 1You know, it's like when you fall in like, is it easy to swim like you put the edge of the tank? When you fall in like, is it easy to swim like you can keep yourself afloat, or is it like?
Speaker 2it was. It was so the the wider part of the tank was shallow enough that you could stand up, okay, yeah, um, so you know that you wouldn't go too deep. If you went to the center where the sizzle lift was, you would go under, um, yeah, and so for that, well, and and for the, the bit where the driver disappears, they basically had two specialist divers and they came in because they're they're trained, because this is pitch black there's no lights, like cave diving completely honestly.
Speaker 2Um, I think they tried to put a couple of little early delights in there, but it just didn't work. The the dust from the cork had just settled in the water, so the guys like the hand in front of her face and, um, yeah, so they had these divers, like they'd start the day, they'd go, get ready and whatever. I'm like, right, okay, we're ready to go, and they get in the water, just disappear, and then for how long?
Speaker 2of them. So I thought for like an hour or so at a time because I think we did two. We did two episodes a day, yeah, um, so yeah, they just just I don't know how they did it it was incredible and they'd get in. There's been complete and they'd wait because there was no radio communication or whatever.
Speaker 1Oh my, God, so dangerous and the water was 50 degrees. I guess the water was like hot as well.
Speaker 2I think it was warm. For sure it's from the ambient temperature, but it wasn't hot because the cork sort of insulated it, yeah, fair. So it, the cork sort of insulated it, yeah, fair, um, so it wasn't like bath water or something, no, but it also was grim, yeah, like they put drinking water in it, but there's no real filtration system.
Speaker 2So within days it had gone green or the algae immediately grew on it, yeah, and then we just covered it up, so it wasn't the best conditions, um, and yeah, they basically had to wait down there. So one of them was a safety guy on one side of it, just in case anybody fall in, you can help them out, yeah. And the other one, um, he was there so that we had this mini, like mini scissor lift. It's meant for, like, uh, fixing your motorbike or whatever so we bolted one of them to the bottom.
Speaker 2Uh, so where the driver gets out, you can get out onto this lift and then we can lower it down. Yep, so he goes into the water and, um, yeah, so basically one diver's waiting there for the. You can tell when this car drives onto this lift you know it's noisy comes to a stop, so he knows the action, he knows about how long the time it'll take until the guy steps out. As soon as he steps out, he sort of grabs his leg so he knows he's there. Yeah, then sizzler starts going down and then he just pulls him under and hands him a regulator and they both just hide hide in darkness.
Speaker 2Yeah, and uh, it was. Yeah, so, from it took us a few, you know, a couple of weeks to build everything and we didn't we, we didn't have a day off. We didn't stop because it was just too much to do. Yeah, um, I think we ended up working like 31 days straight, uh, throughout the whole thing, because we were building everything. There's lots of delays, you know, sick or whatever, yeah, uh, and then, yeah, then the shoot and start for filming two episodes a day. It was just go, go, go, um to the point where we had to have a spare uh vehicle. Yeah, so we'd prepped all the vehicle and I drilled loads of holes in it so it'd sink nice and quickly. Um, but there was a, there was a guy there, uh, a maintenance guy that would basically take the car back to a workshop and clean it all out and get it running again, because they've just sank it in a tank of water and cork and everything, yeah.
Speaker 2Yeah, you'd open up the bonnet and it was just full.
Speaker 1So you had to jet one. When you're sinking the car. How deep is the car going? Like up to the windows, Like is the water coming.
Speaker 2The car completely disappeared.
Speaker 1The car completely goes under.
Speaker 2It completely goes under. So by the time that, like the celebrities are panicking and start to escape and they're on the roof, and then you don't know what they're going to do they just jump off the side or jump towards the trunk and get out of this thing. Oh, they're panicking. And then the car's gone trying to get out of this thing and they're panicking.
Speaker 1And then, yeah, the car's gone. Oh jeez, so did you have any? Because you've only got two divers in the water. Yeah, so did you have any celebrities that did freak out and go? I'm just jumping and trying to swim for it.
Speaker 2There's quite a few definitely that tried to run away and just get out. But luckily the way the tank was made that if you jumped off the side of the car you were always jumping into the shallow part so they could stand up it would still make them jump, they'd jump out and they'd go up to the dodgers in this cork and then they're just flailing to try and escape. I think it was. I think, being where it was it?
Speaker 1uh, that the health and safety was a little lax, for sure, um, but it's is that um, the the sort of closest you've ever been to be like, but I guess you're still fairly green so you can be like. You know if this is if I was on that job now I would walk off, yeah you would just be like I can't this.
Speaker 2This was like sort of what would have been maybe three years into me working in effects, so I'd obviously been in the industry for a little while.
Speaker 1But yeah, what is? What is the main?
Speaker 2the main things that you took from that sort of crazy experience yeah, I think the main thing is just being able to, like, push through all the crazy things that are happening and still be able to get the job done. And yeah, it was a hell of a challenge that it was. Yeah, it was really difficult, but looking back on it, I'm still glad I did it like, yeah, it was crazy, yeah, and I've never had to have the opportunity to go work in the middle of the desert somewhere and be part of something that is like that was brilliant. But yeah, I don't think I'd do it again, or certainly if it was on a production.
Speaker 2yeah, I'd like to do it a bit safer. Yeah, and I'd like to.
Speaker 1Maybe do it in the wintertime rather than the summertime.
Speaker 2Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1Yeah, so you've done Star Wars. You know two big Star Wars series, yeah, and other things as well. I mean, where do you go from here, and other things as well? I mean, where do you go from here In terms of projects you want to look towards in the future, or if it's a project or maybe even there's a particular special effect you want to do, what's the future looking like for you?
Speaker 2There's a bit of a bucket list for me of things I'd like like to work on. The main one is I would absolutely love to work on a bond. Yeah, that's, that's the pinnacle for sort of uk uh production for me. Yeah, I'd absolutely loved, because I think that's one of the things that sort of subconsciously drew me to this is as a kid watching Bond and all his gadgets and stuff, it was just absolutely incredible.
Speaker 2And, yeah, to be able to like I've worked with the guy that's built all the gadgets for all the Bonds in the past. He's an incredible man that you know made all the bits and bobs and all the guns that flip out the lights and all these little gizmos and gadgets, and I'm like that's what I want to do. You know, made all the bits and bobs of the guns that flip out the lights and all these little gizmos, gadgets, and I'm like that's what I want to do, you know, yeah, and I think that would be an absolute dream job for sure. Um, but I've definitely found myself like I'm sort of specializing in quite intricate things, uh, like building flamethrowers and things like that, which is really fun. I didn't think that when I was burning things as a kid that it'd become my job, um, but yeah, no, it's, uh it's. It's become a very fun place, uh, to work and literally, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 2Working in a toy shop most of your career, yeah every day it's like make this thing be that okay cool, let's grab a load of bits and smash it all together. It's great yeah um.
Speaker 1So I always like to ask sort of people, um, towards the end of the show, just about their advice for anyone who wants to follow in your footsteps but may not have even a clue where to start. What advice would you give to people who want to try and do what you've done?
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Speaker 2So I actually got an email from my old school saying what do you do for your career? And so I think I'd really like to, you know, go back to my school and and just try and social people, what's out there, because I don't think it would be very good. I don't really like talking in front of people but, um, I think that it'd be really cool because even if there's just one kid that hasn't got a clue what they want to do in life and doesn't understand, you know, not very academic or whatever, but is just creative that there are so many things in film you can do, and I just think that, certainly for people that are creative, there definitely needs to be more awareness of all the different things you could possibly do you know, um, even people that are not even people that are already like in an industry outside of film.
Speaker 2Like we have plasterers and chippies and you know painters and yeah. So you don't need a degree, not at all, like. Like I know quite a few people that have done the special effects degree, um, and it gives you a good like basic understanding. But basically, if you've got your head screwed on and you you just want to get stuck in, you don't need a degree at all to to work in film. You just want to.
Speaker 2You know, come do something creative and I think the there are a lot more avenues these days of getting in contact with, with various things, but I still think the best way is just get some some contact details and and send some emails and just be like I really want to be part of this industry and can I come try it out? And nine times out of ten, we always need more people. We gotta owe it. We're always on demand and if you, you know if we can get a trainee in, that's just super keen and you know you could be. You know, never gone to uni 18, come straight in and and go from there and yeah, I really wish I'd been able to do that, because I don't think I can't even remember how old I was when I came into effects. You know like mid-20s before I found it, you know, so I'm I'm a good seven or eight years behind some people. Wow, yeah, yeah, I just yeah. There definitely needs to be more awareness in schools about other jobs you can do. You know it's tough.
Speaker 1It's really really tough, because you know, doing this podcast, you become aware of just the sheer variety and immense landscape of different ways you can make a living it is my and I don't even know how the careers counselor even scratches the surface when they've got you know 300 students to talk to or whatever, or work with.
Speaker 2I don't need to yeah, but also I'm definitely one for just not putting too much pressure on yourself. Like you don't need to know at 18 what you want to do for the rest of your life. It's uh, also you don't need to do something for the rest of your life. Well, I don't know why people say that, yeah, like, careers evolve. You're like, just, if you don't like it, do something else. Yeah, um, I think, well, I don't know, maybe I'm just lucky in that respect that I could do that.
Speaker 1But well, yeah, I think that anyone, anyone who loves getting up in the morning and doing what they do is is extremely they've won.
Speaker 2They've won life yeah, for sure, I know I am very lucky in that respect, but yeah, brill.
Speaker 1Dave, absolutely lovely to speak with you. Um, at the end I always sort of say um, is there anything that you would like to plug, or any socials, or even films or shows that you've worked on that you want people to go and watch?
Speaker 2um, I mean definitely watch andor, yeah, I, I second that series.
Speaker 1They're, yeah, one of the amazing, amazing shows.
Speaker 2Certainly, from things I've worked on, that's my favourite, is it? Yeah, that's the top of the list, is it?
Speaker 1I mean you're in it as well. Yeah, true, starring role. That's maybe why X-Wing Mechanic number 7 yeah. I think it's episode 9 and episode 12.
Speaker 2You'll see me on the wing somewhere. Yeah, brilliant man. Yeah, yeah, oh, brilliant man, well, listen.
Speaker 1um, lovely to speak with you, as always. Thank you so much for taking the time to chat and uh it's great man, it's good yeah. Have a great day. We'll speak to you soon.
Speaker 2Yeah, thank you very much too. All right, cheers Bye.
Speaker 1And that is it for this week's episode. A huge thank you to David again for sharing his extraordinary stories and, of course, a big thanks to you as well for listening. For photos, links and more about this episode, head to knowordinarymondaycom and look for the episode page. You'll also find stuff on our socials Facebook, instagram and more. Next week we are leaving the desert behind and heading to the Arctic.
Speaker 1My guest is Sue Stockdale, an explorer who became the first British woman to ski to the magnetic North Pole. She's faced freezing winds, deadly ice and moments where her life and her team's survival has hung in the balance. So follow us and subscribe now so you don't miss it. If you'd like to share your own career story with us, we'd love to hear from you. Get in touch via our socials. You can email hello H-E-L-L-O at noordinarymondaycom or you can use the submit your story page on our website. And if you've enjoyed this episode, please do two super quick things for us Just click five stars and, if you've got time, just write a quick review. Do two super quick things for us just click five stars and, if you've got time, just write a quick review. And the other thing is tell, tell a friend. It really helps us grow the show and attract more amazing guests and inspire new listeners. This show is produced, hosted and edited by me, chris barron. Thank you so much for listening and have a great monday everyone.
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