Tuesday 22
I arrive in New York and have rented an apartment in the East Village area of Manhattan. When I was studying at NYU I used to live in this neighborhood so now whenever I come back to New York I always stay here. I know where everything is – the subway stations, coffee shops, bars, bookstores. I feel at home here.
After settling into my new home for the next month, I take the subway to The Namesake Production office at 35th street and 10th Avenue and arrive just in time for the big production meeting at 2PM. This meeting is the first and last time all the main crew members will meet before shooting begins. The three key creative people are here – Mira, the producer, Lydia Pilcher, and the DP, Frederick Elmes, who I am happy to meet as I admire his work with David Lynch (Blue Velvet, Wild at Heart). There are about 30 other people at this meeting. They are all the department heads – lighting, sound, costume, production design, transportation, accounting, location, catering, etc.
The meeting begins with everyone going around the room to introduce themselves. I am quite nervous as I don’t have any official position and hope that nobody laughs at me. When it’s my turn I tell them the truth – I am here to learn from Mira and will be sitting next to her at the monitor when she is directing. I will also be going to all the different departments asking questions and learning what every person is doing. Some guy says he wishes he were me because I have the easiest job on the set. Everyone laughs.
The production meeting lasts until 6PM. Michael DeCasper, the 1st AD (assistant director), starts from page 1 of the script and talks through each scene so that all the departments know exactly what is happening. Anyone who has any questions can ask them. But in truth all the departments have been in preproduction for over a month already. This meeting is just the chance for everyone to say hello to everyone else. After all, making a film is like going to war for 3 months. It’s important for the crew to know each other.
Wednesday 23
I have jetlag and wake up at 3AM. I read the final version of the script which is written by Mira’s usual screenwriter, Sooni Taraporevala. She has written most of Mira’s scripts since her first film Salaam Bombay! Overall I find problems with the script as I think it suffers from the common weakness of novels being translated into movies. It tries to squeeze the whole novel into a two hour movie and so there are too many scenes and not enough character and details. But then I remember that Salaam Bombay! was nominated for the Academy Award in 1988 so I’m sure Mira and Sooni know a lot more about writing a good script than I do! Maybe that’s the first thing I learn here – keep your mouth shut and your eyes open. That’s the way to learn!
I can understand why Mira turned down the offer to direct Harry Potter 5 to do this film. The story is about an immigrant Indian family that moves from India to America. Mira was born in India and moved to the US to attend Harvard University. After graduation she moved to New York City to pursue her dream of making movies. Her life is almost the mirror image of the main character in the novel. I think for her it’s a very personal story. I respect that she had the courage to turn down a huge film like Harry Potter to do this smaller project. She told me that her salary for directing Harry Potter would have been half of the total budget of The Namesake. The budget of The Namesake is 10 million dollars!
Thursday 24
The shoot doesn’t officially begin until Monday but today is a pre-production shoot. They have scheduled some shots for today because the weather forecast is for snow and Mira wants snow on the streets to sell the “winter look”. And we’re in luck! It snowed last night and continues to snow in the morning as I sit in the production van for the 30 minute drive to the set in Yonkers (north of New York City). When I get there, everybody is in a bad mood because it’s the first day and very cold. I am freezing as I am not used to this New York weather yet.
The shots we do in the morning are mostly establishing shots of the snow. I meet the two lead actors - the character of Ashima Ganguli is played by Tabu. Her husband Ashoke Ganguli is played by Irfan Khan. They are both famous actors in Bollywood (Indian film industry). Mira chose to use actors from India as there are not that many Indian actors who are working in America. The exception is the main character of the film, their son, Gogol Ganguli, who is played by the rising star Kal Penn. He is a 26-year-old actor in Hollywood who is Indian. He was the main character in Harold and Kumar go to White Castle, a comedy I really liked last year. After acting in The Namesake, he goes to work in the new Superman film as Superman’s best friend. Today he is not on set.
After shooting in the snow in Yonkers in the morning, we move locations to Rockaway Beach in Brooklyn to shoot a flashback scene in the afternoon. From the snow to the beach in one day! The scene has the father Ashoke talking with his four-year-old son Gogol on a beach. It’s a difficult scene because 1) it’s very cold 2) there are large waves crashing all around the actors and the crew 3) there is a small boy in the scene and 4) it is the first day of shooting and the crew is still not 100%. We are all hurrying to finish the scene before the sun sets at 6PM. What I see today is that filmmaking is the same anywhere in the world whether it’s a short film in Thailand or a $10 million feature film in America.
There is never enough time. People are under pressure. But the heart of filmmaking is always the same - a director creating a scene. This never changes. When I was younger I always thought that big Hollywood films were different from my own. I thought the famous directors worked in a different way. But today I am surprised to see that Mira Nair works exactly the same way I do. She gets frustrated the same way I do. She is worried that the sun is setting just like I do. She even forgets to shoot a shot just like I do.
Seeing this gives me a lot of confidence that I can do what she can do. Throughout my month in New York I will see and learn many things – but what I learn on this first day will be the most important lesson of all.
Friday 25
Today I wake up at 8AM and take the subway to DuArt, the film lab located on 48th street. We are watching dailies from yesterday’s shoot. I get there and sit in the theater with Mira, Lydia the producer, Fred the DP, and Stephanie, the production designer. The shots we did yesterday were done with bleach bypass, a developing process that gives the image more contrast. It’s a nice look and gives the film a gritty urban feel. The team is happy with the footage and the actors are good. That’s the most important thing because when the audience watches a movie – that’s what they’re watching.
I am happy just to see the dailies projected in the theater. In Thailand, when you shoot a film you never get to see it projected in the theater. You always watch dailies on video. This is much better because you get to see exactly what the audience will see.
Monday 28
First day of Shoot!
Shooting in New York I learn that the crew vans don’t leave from the production office. They leave from random street corners around the city and it is the responsibility of the crew to be at the street corner at the right time to board the van. Today we are shooting in Yonkers again so the crew van meets at 96th street and Broadway at 6.20AM. When I get out of the subway and run to the van it is still dark and freezing cold. There is nobody on the street except for these crazy people who choose to spend their life making movies.
Today is the first official day of shoot and Mira does an Indian-style blessing ceremony (buang-suang). It is similar to what we do in Thailand – to give blessing and good luck to the production. She mixes rice and red paste and then walks around the room placing a red dot on each crew member’s forehead with her finger. When she comes to me she puts a dot on my forehead and, because I am her protégé, I receive the honor to put the dot on her forehead. (If the film turns out badly, I hope she doesn’t blame me!)
Now the film begins!
Like last Thursday, we are shooting in a small apartment and there is not much room to move around. Throughout the day I sit next to Mira at the monitor to watch her work. All around us, 60 people are running back and forth, working like crazy. Between shots she will turn to me and talk. Sometimes I ask her questions but other times she just wants somebody to chat with to take away the pressure. When she is very busy and frustrated, I walk away to chat with the other crew members so that she can have some space for herself.
There are always three people sitting in front of the monitor - Mira, me, and the script supervisor. She is a nice woman from South Africa named Robyn who has worked with Mira many times before. Because films are shot in pieces out of order, it is the job of the script supervisor to keep track of the continuity of every shot. The script supervisor is the editor’s representative on the set. They make sure that what the director is shooting will not be a problem for the editor to cut. This includes props, costume, actor’s movement, and even actor’s dialogue. This is a very important position and that is the reason she sits next to Mira always.
We wrap shooting at 8.30PM. It has been a hard day full of cold and rain. We went overtime and Mira did not finish all her shots. I don’t get home until 11PM and crash into bed.
Tuesday 29
Today I spend a lot of time talking to the sound man, Ed Novick. He has been a sound man for 25 years and has worked on hundreds of projects both for film and TV. When I was studying in film school I was also a sound man on many projects so I am interested to learn more from a professional. In Thailand, when we make films, we just put the microphone on a boom and swing the boom around and try to get every line. But Ed is more experienced. He switches between using a boom microphone and a wireless microphone and usually uses a combination of both. Sometimes he even uses two booms. I am surprised how creative his job is. He must know the script from a creative perspective to be able to perform his job 100%. His choice to use a boom or a wireless is not always which one sounds better, but which one is more correct in “feeling”.
Ed works with two people – a boom woman and an assistant. He records sound, the boom woman holds the boom, and the assistant runs all the cables and connects all the wireless microphones. And that’s all! The sound department only has three people. Ed recorded sound on Spiderman, a $100 million film, and his department had the same three people! He says to me “my costs are always fixed”.
On set, Mira is frustrated with Irfan, the lead actor playing Ashoke. She tells me that a director needs to get used to the rhythm and style of each actor because everyone is different. She tells me that Tabu is more flexible.– she can change every take to satisfy the director. Irfan needs more preparation time. You have to tell him exactly how you want it and he can only give you that – he cannot improvise. The shoot wraps at 9PM and again Mira doesn’t have time to shoot the last scene which is a love scene. Mira, Lydia the producer, and Michael the first AD talk to each other and decide that instead of going overtime, they will reschedule the love scene to shoot on a soundstage later in the month. Tough decisions.
Wednesday 30
Today we are shooting in a small apartment in Oyster Bay on Long Island and Mira is sick and in a bad mood. Kal Penn is acting for the first time. The apartment set is so small that everyone is out in the hallway and there is not much to see so I leave early. Rolex has sent a photographer from Switzerland to shoot photos of me and Mira and I have to go and meet him for dinner. The van gives me a ride back to Queens and from there I take the subway into Manhattan. I’m starting to feel like a New Yorker again.
Thursday 31
Today is an exciting day. We are shooting at Goldwater Hospital on Roosevelt Island, a small island located in the East River off Manhattan. The location is beautiful. It is a very large old hospital with long scary-looking hallways. It is the perfect location for a Korean horror film. In fact it has been used in many New York films before and can be seen in the movie Jacob’s Ladder. Today the weather is warmer and it seems Mira is happier and working faster. For the first time, we do scenes with more than two actors.
It’s interesting for me to see a large scene with extras in the background. I’m surprised to see that Mira never talks to the extras. She is only concentrating on her main actors in the foreground. The background extras are all directed by the 2nd AD. He is responsible for understanding the scene and choreographing the background action. This is very important. Although you don’t notice the background extras in movies, if they are directed badly, it can ruin the scene. On my own films, I always talk to every actor in the scene. But on a large film like The Namesake, the director just doesn’t have time. She has to trust that everybody on her team understands the story and is doing their best because she doesn’t have time to do everything herself.
A film is not made by one person. You have to trust your team.
I learn that on a large film, the job of each crew member becomes more specific. For example, in Thailand we have the production designer and he brings several assistants. But here, there are no “assistants”. Everyone in the art department has a specific job and position. One that I learn is:
Scenic
She is a very nice woman named Jessie Walker and her job is to “make the set look old”. As many scenes in this film take place in 1977, her job is to make all the props and sets look “old”. She paints the sets and props to make them less shiny and more old-looking. That’s it! That’s her job! On a big film, even this specific job requires a trained person. She has been a scenic for close to 20 years!
The last scene of the night is very interesting. Ashoke is calling his wife on the phone from the hospital. The production design department installs a fake phone booth in the hospital hallway. The scenic makes sure it looks “old”. The make-up person makes actor Irfan Khan look 55 (he’s in his 30s). And the sound man has set up a system so that when Irfan is on the phone he can really hear his wife’s voice. Tabu had recorded her lines to a sampler and Ed plays it back into the phone while Irfan is acting in the scene. This way he feels like he’s really talking to his wife and it helps his acting. Finally, the 2nd AD choreographs extras walking in the background. Everything in a film is fake!
We wrap at 12.30AM