Ladies and Gentleman, welcome to this National Arts Festisal Production.

Chasing
Photo with thanks to Amitie Lee and Cue Pix

Performing in Grahamstown is always the highpoint of my year. Being at the National Arts Festival, watching shows and being inspired by the works of both accomplished and emerging artists. Being surrounded by thousands of posters, and constantly being handed flyers, and bumping into people you saw give a breathtaking performance just last night is all part of the festival experience for me. And nowhere else in South Africa will you ever see so many people with dreadlocks in the same location.

But being little known, and performing on The Fringe you are not always guaranteed and audience. On more than one occasion I have performed to an audience smaller than the cast of eight on the stage, and at one of these performances a reviewer was in the audience gave us an award. So when you don’t have a well known name, or twitter following rivalling that of Gaga you need to market you show. A lot. Or else you might be performing to the technical crew. So every year, we go with our posters, and flyers, and this year our matchboxes with the show times stuck on them. And we hand out complementary tickets, and we chat people up and inform them about our shows, and what we do. And sometimes despite the flyers and press stick and making sure your posters don’t wash off the walls in the rain you know will happen at some time during festival you still don’t get a sizable audience. This year, however, the past two years of marketing started paying off…

The Ladies of Chasing before our first performance in
Centenary Hall in Grahamstown in our make-shift dressing room.

When we had performed in Pretoria in one of our “Preview Performances”, before we left for Grahamstown, we were not informed as to when exactly the show would be starting. Due to some technical difficulties with ticket sales we knew we would be starting slightly late, but that was as much as we knew. The cast was standing in the wing, knowing that, at some time in the near future someone would announce something and we would start. And as we stood there I noticed a backstage light that would potentially disturb the show was on, and as I reached the furthest point to turn off the light the music which started our show started playing. I tripped on the stairs running to make my que, while one of my fellow cast mates whisper-screamed for me in panic. I made it. Barely. But was rather paranoid about not being on stage in time for every other performance thereafter in Grahamstown. And it nearly happened again in Grahamstown. Being myself, and constantly getting myself into awkward situations I had cut, or more accurately sliced my finger quite badly. And after contemplating my next action, for too long apparently, I decided to run backstage and put a plaster on my finger. As I ran up the stairs the pre-show announcement started, and I ran back down again.

Before our first performance of Chasing we stood in the artificially warmed girls dressing room. Due to the fact that most of the performance venues in Grahamstown are make-shift and have various other functions for the other 355 days of the year, there is no system for the technical crew to let us know backstage when we are about to perform. So again, we stood and waited for the voice over, every show in Grahamstown plays before the show starts. Ladies and Gentleman, welcome to this National Arts Festisal Production... 

As we stood backstage in Grahamstown, literally in the dark, and in the dark as to exactly when need to be ready to perform one of the cast members commented that even if nobody came to watch our show we should do a run of the show just to make sure that all the technical aspects were correct. And then we walked onto stage in the blackout to start the show, and the venue was almost full. Centenary Hall, with a capacity of almost 300 people, was almost full. And as we took our bow at the end of the show, the entire audience rose to their feet.

In my career so far it was probably one of the most humbling moments. And all the infected floor burns, blistered feet, hours of rehearsing, hours of travelling and technical rehearsals were all worth it. For that moment, before I walked off stage. And it’s for those small moments that we do what we do.

And this week I get to do it again. If you are in Pretoria, or close by, drop in by the Krekvars Student Arts Festival on the University of Pretoria main campus. Come and support the experimental and the young and upcoming. And catch As Night Falls, tonight and Wednesday at 21:45 at the Masker Theatre and see what the rave was about in Grahamstown.

Going Grahamstown: Old hat, new mittons!

Today marked our first performance of As Night Falls at the  National Arts Festival in Grahamstown. Tomorrow marks our first performance of  Chasing, and two days ago we performed at Smithfield for the Platteland Preview. The day before that too.


This is the fourth year I`m performing in Grahamstown, and even though some things are old hat, each brings something new, but this year marks many firsts. This year is the first time that I am performing in two shows at Festival (Or Fest, as the locals and regulars call it), it is also the first time that our director is not here, the first time that we performed on our way down to Grahamstown, the first time we didn`t sleep over in Colesburg. The first time we had preview performances in Pretoria as well, and the first time we had to raise funds to buy costumes and props and have money for our S and T.

But, it is also the first time our first performance had an audience of over 80, and when you are relatively unknown and performing on the Fringe and audience bigger than our cast of 8 is something to be proud of. Especially considering how or technical rehearsals went. Our technical rehearsal for As Night Falls was scheduled for 23:30 to 01:00 last night to this morning. Upon arrival at the theatre the LED lights (which provide much needed colour and atmosphere for a dance show) were not working. Someone was sent to replace the cable. The lights also decided to replot themselves half through the process, and our cast and technical people struggled on until our lighting states were planned, lit and recorded into the lighting board. Which meant that we left the theatre this morning at 02:00 and were all up again at 07:00 to get ready for our 10:00 performance today.

And yet, considering Smithfield, we can`t complain too much.

Performing at Smithfield was interesting, as the small town was not particularly equipped for a dance show. Performing on a slippery, raked stage, we skated more than danced the first night, and despite  our efforts again the second  night. Instead of running, and `chasing` each other across our makeshift stage, we...walked with great energy and intention. 

And tomorrow morning I will arise again at 06:30 to perform at 10:00 (Chasing requires me to wash my hair before the show), and again at 14:00. Tomorrow evening I will be bruised, I will disinfect the multiple burns on my feet, I will laugh with my cast members about the mistakes we made, wondering if the audience noticed. We will joke about an audience member walking out of the show or arriving late. We will complain about the mistakes the technical team made, and I will be happy. Happy and excited to perform again the next day. Cause this is what we aim to do. To perform.

Shows will go on!

The whole point of rehearsals, studying and training, costume fittings, technical rehearsals and struggling with lighting boards and CD players is to perform, eventually. So, this past week was the type of week someone like me lives for. Last Saturday my show at the State Theatre, Today’s Youth Tomorrow, for the Youth Expressions Festival opened. We moved into the theatre at 8 that morning, started a technical rehearsal at about 10, and performed our show in front of an audience for the first time at 12 that day. We had a fantastic performance on Saturday, with a standing ovation, but the day had not started off that well. I left my flat that morning at 7:30 to fetch 2 benches which were incremental to our show, and upon which we had been rehearsing. I picked up two cast members and headed to the space in which we had been rehearsing. The benches, try as we may, did not fit into my car. Bailey, the most experienced of our cast of four, and the glue that held me together during this process, decided that we would surely find a substitute once we reached the theatre. When we did reach the Momentum theatre in which we were performing, we found the set piece which the set department from the State Theatre had prepared for us.

I had asked for a chair, resembling that of a tennis umpire. I had also mentioned, repeatedly, that the cast would be climbing onto this chair. The rickety chair standing in the middle of our stage, kept upright by about six stage weights would not support an orange, never mind an actual dancer. It was removed from our stage pronto. Then Bailey and I took a brisk walk through the loading bay to find something appropriate which we could use to substitute our flat benches we had been rehearsing on. We found two benches, which were stable enough for us to dance on and which were of the correct size, but unfortunately they had backs. We moved the benches on stage, and changed the choreography to work on our brand new set pieces.

The cast of Today's Youth Tomorrow: Myself, Bailey Snyman, Mdu Nhlapo and Chanel van Wayk
in our dressing room at the South African State Theatre

And after the high of Saturday’s performance, I rehearsed until the early evening on the two other shows I am dancing in which opened respectively on Friday evening and Saturday evening. Sunday we had off in order for our bodies to rest, bruises to heal slightly, to disinfect the floor burns we got during the week and usually to catch up on work we didn’t have time to do during the week.

Apples and Oranges: Setting the stage
for Today's Youth Tomorrow.

And early on Monday morning I got ill…violently ill. My presence at rehearsals for all three shows was cancelled and when I got to the doctor on the public holiday I was informed that I was the third patient he had seen that morning with a 48 hour stomach bug. I required it to be a 24 hour stomach bug, as I had to perform Today’s Youth Tomorrow at 2 the next afternoon.  And propped up on medication, vitamin water and jelly babies I did. I left the stage feeling nauseous and dizzy, but proud that I had survived the entire show. Along with the stomach bug, I had to deal with a new technical team, as the theatre did not apparently deem it necessary for our lighting and sound operators to actually know the show, and with no stage manager from the theatre back stage to act as a bouncer we had a surprise guest artist appear on our stage, in school uniform halfway through our show. But the representative from the festival who came to watch our show was on his feet during the curtain call.

Tuesday evening I was back in rehearsal as we plotted lights for the opening of our shows on Friday and Saturday. Thursday evening we replotted the lights for our shows, and then had our first full dress rehearsal, under the lights and the watchful eye of a video camera. And the next evening we performed As Night Falls. Saturday afternoon I performed Today’s Youth Tomorrow and at 7 that evening I performed Chasing.

Bruised and Burnt: My feet on Saturday evening after
performing three dance shows in two days.

Three different shows in two days. It’s been a wonderful week.

They tell me its one week...

This past week has been high on stress, low on time and crazy on the body. As life would have it, after stretches this year of not having much work, and stretches of unemployment which will still come, I am currently working on three dance shows simultaneously.

My very first non-university show, TODAY’S YOUTH TOMORROW opens at The State Theatre in six days. Which means that including today I have five rehearsals left with my cast, and in the limited time I have had to create the show, with the limited availability of my actors rehearsing has not been easy. I also leave for Grahamstown, performing in Smithfield along the way in 16 days to perform CHASING and AS NIGHT FALLS at the National Arts Frestival. And, just because that’s how things work out, I had a two day intensive Laban course and an unexpected audition in Johannesburg this week. And the cast of As Night Falls had to perform at UP Drama’s Head of department’s inaugural speech on Thursday evening, which required rehearsals from Monday as well. I feel like this week of my life was exactly what they meant with the whole raining and pouring scenario.

Myself and fellow dancer Mdu Nhlapo, waiting backstage to perform
at an inaugural speech.

And the powers that be decided that my show needed to be viewed by The State Theatre in this week too. Considering the amount of hours my cast of very understanding friends and fellow dancers have had to rehearse together I feel we had come quite a long way, and yet not in my opinion, far enough to be viewed this past Saturday. And when our Friday evening rehearsal needed to end earlier than expected I tried to cancel our viewing the next day, but to no avail. And then on Saturday morning one my cast members informed me a few hours before our said viewing that he would not be able to attend. After an out-of-breath phone call, in my five minute water break while rehearsing for the shows I will be performing in Grahamstown, my said viewer informed me that, no matter who was or was not present, I would be viewed that day. I bluntly informed him that if this was the case, he really would not be seeing all that much. He steered on, apparently non-plussed that a quarter of my cast would not be present.

So, innumerable stomach knots, curses and a rehearsal later a dancer from The State Theatre arrived to view our little incomplete cast. We walked through choreography and I discussed the flow of our show with him (which had changed again about an hour after our viewing). To my absolute surprise considering what we had shown him he was very impressed with the work that he had seen. With the concept of the show and the style in which we were working. I think the relief rolled off my physically as he left the rehearsal space about ten minutes after the last quarter of the cast arrived to rehearse. And we could, eventually, carry on with our much needed rehearsal, and the precious time that we four have to dance together.

As our show is physical theatre I am more of someone pulling draw strings together in the collaborative process of generating and making movement/dance material for our show, and I feel that the title of choreographer doesn’t necessarily suit my position. But at the end of the day I am responsible for the content going on stage, and I feel like I am in a cocktail shaker of emotions at present. I am elated that I will not only be performing at The State Theatre for the first time, but that ‘my’ first show will be on stage soon. I am also stressed out about the fact that the show is not entirely finished as of yet, that I still have costumes and props and makeup to buy and songs to learn and music to edit. And somewhere in between all the ‘I have to’s all the ‘I must still’s and  my Stage Manager that can’t be present at my technical rehearsal, I have faith in the people I am working with, my training and myself. Saturday will bring an amazing Today’s Youth Tomorrow to The State Theatre, come hell or high water.

But that, it seems, is how theatre life goes. 

Making a show!

I’ve always maintained, that the only way to make it in our ‘industry’ is to create your own work. To hunt down every opportunity with the expertise and patience of a ninja. And apparently, when you’re really blessed, sometimes opportunity falls on your lap unexpectedly, with an SMS at eight in the morning on an unexceptional Friday.

I’m not a morning person and luckily for me I tend to rehearse late at night, or work into the early hours of the morning on my dissertation so I tend to sleep in sometimes. So when an SMS woke me up before eight on a Friday morning after I had been up working on my dissertation all hours of the evening it took me a moment to focus on what I was reading. The moment my blurry brain comprehended the message however, I was wide awake.

A contact, and friend, I made a year ago during an audition and call back is involved in a festival aimed specifically at youth. The festival required a dance show, to be choreographed by a female, and he had recommended myself and another girl for the slot. I needed to submit a  name and proposal for an hour long dance show, to be performed 4 weeks from that morning, via SMS, immediately. The thinking cap went on, and a call to my mother and a very creative friend later I had a proposal, I had a title, and I had an SMS. A few hours and a phone call later I had the job. To conceptualize and choreograph and hour long dance show.

That Monday I went in for my very first production meeting as choreographer/director and as I learned from my 30 page long contract I read later that day that my title for this production also encompassed the role of co-producer. Within the frenzy of the past two weeks I have signed contracts, drawn up budgets, planned, re-planned and again reworked the concept and structure of the show. I have laid on my stomach on a tar road taking photos of apples for the poster of the show with my iPad as my camera decided that the appropriate day for it to stop working would be the day that I had to send in my poster. I’ve spent hours downloading music, sourcing costumes and had stretches of doubting whether I was up for what has been put upon my path. Basically, I’ve learned that everything I’ve always known about putting your own show together takes about three times longer than you would think.

The most amazing part of the experience so far has been the people I’ve worked with. Amazing friends who are willing to be in my show for almost no pay. A friend who has far more experience, and a name that carries actual weight in the industry who is willing to not only perform in my show, but has been mentoring me through the process, and has been great help at dispelling my indulgent moments of doubt. Parents who support me, and friends who are happy for me.

After all the paper work, all the shopping, all the emails and all the planning rehearsals truly begin. And its two weeks to curtain up!

Challenging a Repeat Performance

Each show has its own set of challenges. Whether its simply stamina, challenging emotions or a costume that's really difficult to get in and out of.  This year for the National Arts Festival I will be performing in two shows (presented by Tuks Drama and The Matchbox Theatre Collective) that we have performed in Grahamstown previously. Both shows choreographed and directed by Nicola Haskins. So this year, instead of learning a new show, or creating something new we are relearning work we did in the past. And I’m learning that this presents its own challenges too.

A still from As Night Falls in 2011, choreographed by Nicola Haskins.

In 2011 our cast of 8 performed the physical/dance theatre piece AS NIGHT FALLS in Grahamstown, and again at the Krekvars Student Festival and Aardklop. A lot has happened since 2011 and most of us can't really remember much. That, and two of the original cast members needed to be replaced. Watching the video of the show I started to remember pieces of the choreography which had once been second nature. Like an amnesiac recollecting out of place moments in their past that don’t quite complete the puzzle I would remember flashes, not only of what I did on stage, but back stage too. Then we started to remember all the mistakes, all the fun we had backstage, out of breath and dying for a bottle of water that we had left in the wing opposite. That time that my lamp broke apart on stage and the batteries rolled across the stage, or the performance where I didn’t catch that bottle that came hurtling at me at a not to optimal angle and I had to run clean across the stage to catch it.  That time in Grahamstown when my fascinator fell off my head, or when audience members, ‘shocked by our work’ walked out halfway through the show while the other half of the audience loved it. Or during a different festival when the lighting operator made a mistake and we did the opening scene, which is supposed to happen in darkness with the cast creating patterns of light with head lamps, under full lights. And I think our cast’s favourite moment, when, during the third movement of the show the music cut out, and we carried on seamlessly...in silence.

In these rehearsals I have been surprised by how my body has been able to remember more than my conscious mind. How, when we left the music on there were large sections of choreography our bodies would just do instinctively two years later. 

So far the greatest challenge I have found in relearning is how to keep my performance fresh. How not to be trapped between memories of the past, and what we used to do and to stay present in the moment this time around. And that is one of the beautiful  and challenging things about theatre to me. As a theatre performer you know a show backwards, forwards and sideways before you go on stage. Most of the time you know more than just your own part or choreography. But every night when you go on stage you need to deliver your performance to a paying audience who is seeing the show for the very first time, no matter if your audience is smaller than your cast. And every performance needs to be fantastic. 

Making a short!

I’ve heard from enough people in our ‘industry’ that it does seem to be a fact: It’s who you know rather then what you know that makes the difference sometimes. I’ve never really been good at that…making ‘connections’ getting ‘contacts’. I prefer not to think of life as some great form of high school where knowing the cool crowd is what gets you in. And yet…

I bumped into a friend of a friend at an event whom I had met once briefly last year sometime. I knew that she was an actress like me, and I recognized her, but I can’t say I knew her name specifically. We met truly this year in March, when we exchanged knowledge of names for the first time, and a facebook friendship request later I received and message from Denel Honeyball on a Monday morning.

She was part of the One Day Movie Collective, at that stage still in its infancy, and they required an Afrikaans actress to be in a short film. I said I would do it, without regard for content now that I think about it, attached my email and waited for the script to be sent to me.

And before I had printed the scripts I was part of the inner circle with a few more facebook invites to pages and groups. An actress, part of the One Day Movie Collective, and one of a diversely skilled group of people. All in love with making movies.

So last Sunday, after leaving a choir camp, early, and after a morning rehearsal for upcoming dance shows, I headed off to Johannesburg to film a short film, entitled Droom.

In the film I play a lesbian, and I was informed the wardrobe required would be an 'indie-rock vibe'. So I decided to go in a dress, simply because its easiest to change clothes underneath, and forgetting the layers of tape on my knees that I require lately in order to dance I arrived at our director’s home in Johannesburg. When I met her she looked at my knees:

“Is that your interpretation of a lesbian?”

After removing the muscle tape from my knees, rather quickly, I met our director (in the style that really counts with an exchange of names!), cinematographer and our director’s girlfriend, a professional photographer by trade who was taking stills during the shoot and helping out in general. Like holding reflector boards, or making sure passing hobos didn’t steal our equipment while we were shooting. Denel and I ran our lines together in the car on our way to location, did some quick makeup touch ups in a bathroom mirror, while the rest of the team scouted the ideal location, and headed off to shoot the first film for the One Day Movie Collective.

If you live in the Gauteng area you will know that last Saturday was inexplicably cold, wet and generally miserable, so we were thankful for the brief moments of sunshine we did have on Sunday for our outdoor shoot. We rehearsed and set up the shot, then waited for the glimpses of sun between the clouds and did takes as best we could with passing moments of sun shine before it was lost again for a while! Standing outside in the cold in my dress our director decided to go with I was freezing while our cinematographer tried to estimate when the sun would shine bright enough again so that we could film the shot. There wasn't exactly   opportunity to do many retakes. So as actresses Denel and I had couldn't fumble. That added to the fun.

A still from Droom with Denel Honeyball and myself.

It was such fun, working with people from such different professional backgrounds, working together to make a film simply because it was something we wanted to do. A film that we wanted to make. It was an honour to work and get to know these people, with all our little fumbles. Including me forgetting that my microphone pack was clipped to the bench and not my clothes. I fact I was reminded of sharply as I tried to stand up in the take!

If any writers, actors, cinematographers, camera operators, directors are editors want to get involved with the One Day Movie Collective click the link and like the facebook page to receive updates. And if you don’t mind holding up a reflector board to see what making movies is all about, then you can click too!

The stars do shine brighter in Africa: At the Naledi Awards

I’m not someone who believes in coincidence. So when the head of the college where I teach at ‘happened’ to let her students know that she had managed to get tickets for the students to attend the Naledi Theatre Awards on Monday the 17^th I knew the timing was not a coincidence. So, as the drama and theatre lecturer I called and asked if there would be a ticket for me as well. A weekend spent on tenterhooks and Monday morning provided a message: She had managed to get a ticket for myself, and for my boyfriend/partner/long-suffering-plus-one.

So straight after a Monday morning audition I hopped through my second shower of the day to get ready for the awards, and then head off on the trek from Hatfield to the Lyric Theatre at Gold Reef City.

A red carpet, wine on arrival and circulating snacks set the tone for an evening of glamour. And surprisingly for me, running into some acquaintances.  A few people that had studied at the university while I was there, and some friends I had met along the way. I also saw some faces that I recognized from shows and put faces to names that were familiar. As someone who grew up in a small town, and an actress who is in awe of a lot of these people I felt a little like Alice in Wonderland seeing these people, and attending the same function. I bumped into a friend, and as I didn’t know for certain that I would be attending until a few hours before the awards ceremony I hadn’t read through all the nominations. I asked, rather sheepishly:

“It’s probably in bad taste to ask at the awards, but are you nominated?”

He laughingly replied that he hadn’t been, and had ended up at the awards in a similar fashion to the way I had.

The awards themselves were amazing with performances from some of the musicals performed in South Africa in the past year (including Phantom's Phantom Jonathan Roxmouth and Cabaret's Samantha Peo), as well as some firm favourites and the amazingly talented Allan Committee who was the hilarious Master of Ceremonies and had the audience in fits of laughter throughout the evening (which ended in just over two hours).  As a young actress, attending for the first time it was nice to be to there without having been involved in a production that was nominated, as if I ever am in the future it creates perspective. No matter how many stunning performances there are, there can be only one winner. And at the end of the show, I’m not working for awards, I’m working for every audience member who attends each show.

At the end of the evening I was talking to a fellow actress when I was asked to stand for a photo just before we left to go home. I didn’t think much of it, until a photo I posted of the Nalide awards on Instagram got a comment

.

Mika Stefano, a South African entertainment and gossip blogger commented on my photo that he had a photo with myself with fellow actress Denel Honeyball and choreographer Nicola Elliott and that he would be posting it on his facebook page. And so it was…

Nicola Elliot, Denel Honeyball and Myself, photo courtesy of Mika Stefano's facebook page.

International Pool-Side-Ho: De-Robing

I’ve always told my students that they need to decided what they are willing to do on screen or stage, and what they aren’t because once you are pressured with an offer you might end up doing something you regret. I am certain that nudity is not something that I am comfortable with, but I had never considered being clothed in a shot with other actresses who are nude. And by the time I found out that this is exactly what I would be doing there was no turning back. And to be completely honest I’m still not sure how I feel about it. I do know that I, as a clothed actress, was treated very differently on set by the male crew members than those who weren’t.  

Two aspects of the shoot were entirely new to me, the first was the nudity. In light of how exceptionally conservative coke and been when it came to what we ladies were and were not showing it was quite a shock for me that no one was trying to cover my cheeks in between shots, or make sure that my cleavage was not showing. The second aspect was the pyrotechnics, as we were shooting an action series. One of the sequences we shot involved a large gun fight and explosion during the evening. Personally I like to think it was because of my acting skill, but it might have more to do with the fact that I’m blonde and was wearing a neon pink dress over my bikini and I would therefore be visible in the weaker light, I was chosen to be involved in this shot. Along with two of the ladies who were doing nudity. While robed we rehearsed ducking under tables and chairs while actors screamed, without much enthusiasm considering they were actors ‘bang bang’. Then on the cue of the explosion we were to run inside the house of the location we were shooting on. One the first rehearsal we three ladies, all still robed, ran into the house, as we were told to do, and not to stop until we were in the kitchen. Once we were in the kitchen we were greeted by the family who owned the property we were shooting on, along with their two young sons of roughly 10 and 12.

As we walked back to our first positions one of my co-stars looked at the other:

“We have to run in their just now without our robes. And the kids are sitting there”

They both panicked. One of the crew members involved with pyrotechnics, who we had been talking to earlier walked by. He was very Afrikaans and rather animated. We had signalled to him to come closer. He shrugged and mouthed “Why?”

One of the ladies called: “The boys are inside” and pointed to her robe.

We could visibly see the gears change in his mind as realization of what was about to happen dawned on him and speedily changed direction to run inside the house and ask the family to temporarily vacate the kitchen.

When we did shoot the scene the directors decided not to have us ladies running around. I have to admit the first time we shot with the noisy blanks I was not prepared for it. I was required to very little acting considering how real ammunition rounds sounded surrounding me (we were trapped in the cross-fire of the shooting) and how loud the rounds we were. As we ducked under tables and deck chairs all three of us convulsed as the shots were ‘fired’ around us. Even by third take our bodies reacted to the sound of each ‘bullet’ being fired. And then there was the explosion!

Our Afrikaans pyrotechnics friend had set of the small explosion two or three times the day before to test what was supposed to happen. I will never forget watching him converse with the third assistant director, who was very British. His ‘English’ was so peppered with Afrikaans words in all the functional places in the sentences that I could read the confusion on the British Third AD’s face as the Pyro Guy was explaining what he was about to do. He didn’t have the heart to tell Pyro Guy that he didn’t know what he was saying and just nodded as if in confirmation and walked away. Pyro Guy was none the wiser, and carried on with his job.

Now as the explosion was to be set off with some sort of radio device the entire cast was to switch off their cell phones, as a cell phone could potentially accidentally activate the explosion. And nobody needed to be told how dangerous it was. I do not have any understanding of pyrotechnics in film, but I assume they are meant to be more flash and less bang. Although we were very far for the explosion I could feel the heat on my skin every time it flashed up into the night sky.

On one of our takes I had to dive underneath a table during the explosion, exactly where one of the crew members had dropped a glass earlier during a previous sequence. I had a piece of glass in my forearm, and didn’t fancy it getting infected considering that I had been crawling around on the floor with a bleeding arm for about 20 minutes. I went to the third AD who worked mostly with us. All I really wanted was a plaster, but the medic was called and I was inspected, disinfected and plastered, all the while under the eyes of about 50 male crew members.

“Hey Alvin, you never spend that much time helping any of us”

This was followed by general laughter. I smiled graciously to my make-shift audience, and went back to my ‘first position’ to redo the take.

As with any job, a number of things happened that were new and funny. An apricot fell out of the tree I was standing under just just missing me as the director called ‘action’.  Jewellery was forgotten and snuck back on, and prayers were said that no one in continuity would pick up on it. Three Champaign glasses were broken. I had to do a scene walking across a blistering hot pavement. And in between each take I was hopping from foot to foot to the amusement of the crew. But one of my top moments was that of the ‘poisoned food’.

Two of us clothed ladies were to stand around a table filled with food and feed it to one of the cartel members. One of the crew members came to us and asked if we were comfortable with our assignment and as he was leaving said nonchalantly: “And by the way, the food is poisoned”. We rehearsed the scene, and the cartel member we were acting with took a bite of some of the food placed all around us. One of the female crew members walked up to us:

“Guys, don’t eat the food it’s been sprayed with insecticide.  We have to do it so flies don’t sit on the food during takes. We usually have sings up”

They guy from earlier chipped in: “I told you it was poisoned”