I've decided to move my blog home to a new address:
http://dennisagle.wordpress.com/
I've added a few entries there since my last entry here.
Saturday, February 28, 2009
Saturday, January 24, 2009
"Jonah" leaps off the page
At a middle school in the middle of January 2009, the Liken version of “Jonah” made the leap off the page into the real world as we staged our first-ever public read-through of a script.
Our thought was that in the past, we’d read the script together as a group just before we started to shoot. But that was mostly to help the cast gel and find our characters before we started shooting the next day. There was no time to take a step back and look at the show to see if it was accomplishing what we hoped it was accomplishing, let alone revise it.
We had even talked about how beneficial it would be to put on a stage version of a production before we shoot it, so we’d have plenty of opportunity to revise the script, songs and performances to the point where we felt like it was ready to lock it down in movie form. But baby steps.
Our plan here was to assemble a top quality cast, rehearse it for a few hours, then listen to them perform the entire script, including songs, with a small audience. Then we’d assess how it went, make some revisions, then try it again about a month later with a different cast. It’s not a full-fledged stage version, but like I said, baby steps.
We’d been auditioning actors for about a month for the read-through. I was greatly impressed with the caliber of talent that was coming through our doors, which made the casting decisions difficult. Casting is always a bittersweet process. Most of the time, for every role you cast, you have another few actors you’d love to be able to work with, but can’t. At least not this time. On the other hand, we could console ourselves at least somewhat by the notion that we would be putting together a second cast for the read-through in February.
But back to the January read-through. About a week before the read-through, we started making our calls to notify the actors and get them links to copies of the script and songs. Although we were planning on doing the read-through with script in hand, our hope was that they’d be familiar with their lines and certainly their songs, because we knew our rehearsal period would be brief.
The day before the read-through, I met most of the day with Scott Eckern, my co-director on this project. Scott’s been in the musical business for many years, and we feel very blessed to have the benefit of his experience on Jonah. Scott and I read through the entire script out loud, pausing to map out some basic blocking, paring down the narration script, and working through any issues we thought might arise.
Then, on Saturday, Jan. 17, we assembled our cast at Mountain Ridge Junior High School in Highland, Utah, at 2 p.m. As is the Liken way, we opened with a brief word of prayer, had everyone introduce themselves, then dove right into the script.
The set up for the read-through was fairly simple. We did the whole thing in front of the curtain. We had a two rows of chairs on each side of the apron, then two mics set up in the middle of the apron, about 10 feet apart from each other. Directly off center stage, on the floor of the auditorium, was the piano, where Masa Fukuda would do his magic. (Masa was amazing. We had no sheet music, so he merely listened to Aaron’s demo tracks, then worked out how to play it.) On a riser stage right was another microphone for our narrator.
We quickly realized that the four hours we had allotted for the rehearsal would barely be enough to work through the script once, factoring in time for the basic blocking, such as which actor goes to which mic for which bits and the limited amount of staging that we did. I had thought we’d get through the script at least twice, with maybe a little extra time to polish any rough spots. But I knew that plan was out the window when we broke for our first break an hour and a half into the rehearsal and we were only about a quarter of the way into our script.
The time crunch meant abandoning some parts of the show that I had hoped would be in there, so that I could see how they played in front of an audience. It also meant there was little time to work with the actors and their characterizations. But the show had to go on, so focused on certain key points and left it at that.
To make matters more interesting, one of my key actors let me know just before we broke for dinner that something had come up and he wouldn’t be able to make the evening performance. So I had to scramble to find a replacement about an hour before the performance. Fortunately, the evening before, I had gone to a wedding reception with my wife, Suzanne. The reception was for the daughter of one of Suzanne’s former employers. We hadn’t seen this family in over 20 years, and our communication since then had been largely limited to exchanging Christmas cards. But we received an invitation, so we made the drive up to Salt Lake City. And when we walked into the reception hall, we were met by a young man who I recognized as having auditioned for a part in Jonah, but who happened to be the groom’s best man. Although we didn’t have a part for him in the cast for this read-through, I had made a mental note to do my best to find a part for him in the next read-through.
His name is Justin Williams, and as luck would have it, it turned out we got there just as he was about to sing a pair of love songs that the bride and groom had dedicated to one another. Justin’s accompanist turned out to be one other than Masa Fukuda. Small world. They did a great job with both songs, and as we were leaving, Justin had mentioned that he was planning on coming to the read through the next night.
So when I found out I had a hole in my cast, I found Justin’s number and asked if he was still planning on coming and, if so, would he mind coming a little sooner than he planned so we could have him in the show. He was completely gracious and a good sport. When he came in, I sat him down with some headphones and let him listen to the main song his character would be singing a few times. Then Jason Celaya, good sport that he is, helped him rehearse his basic blocking during the dinner break.
After the dinner break, we opened the doors and welcomed an audience of probably about 250 people, which to me was just about the right size – not so big to be overly intimidating to our troupe of actors who, as professional as they were, had only been working together for about four hours on this project, yet big enough to feel like it was a performance as opposed to another rehearsal.
I gave the audience a brief intro to the project, the actors and key behind-the-scenes people, then made my way to my seat in the audience and said a prayer that it would come together. And I have to say that, given that we had never been able to do a single run-through of the show, the way the show came off was nothing short of miraculous. My hat is off to that cast and Masa.
Since our usual delivery format is DVD, I must say that it is a real treat for us to be able to experience a Liken with an audience. To be able to hear them react with laughter and applause is something we don’t get to experience much in the DVD world.
When the show was over, we asked everybody to complete comment cards. We had a version for those 12 and over, and because the opinions of the kids are also important to us, we had another version for those under 12.
I’ve since read through all the cards. We were impressed with how many people took the time to complete the cards, as well as with how serious they took that responsibility. That, along with the results from a focus group session we held immediately after the screening, has formed the basis of a rewrite that I will be tackling soon.
In the meantime, we learned a lot about the read-through process and how we might do things differently next time, but I must say that I am very grateful for how well it went and for how useful the process and feedback was in our efforts to make “Jonah” the very best Liken we can.
Next up, we’ll restart the audition process for a different cast for the February read-through and see how our revisions to the script and songs fare with a new audience. More details on that later.
But for now, let me close by thanking and listing our final cast for the January read-through of “Jonah & the Great Fish”: Jeremy Elliott (Jonah), David Burton (Humphrey, the Great Fish), Dan Beck (Capitan), David Weekes (King of Nineveh), Jessie Clark Funk (Queen of Nineveh), Jeff Stevens (Chum), Edgar Zuniga (Chuy), Justin Williams (Logan), Jason Celaya (Ryder), David Smith (Alejandro), Paul Cartwright & Josh Tenney & Levi Larsen (The Sharks), Brittni Smith & Kimberly Roderick & Meagan Rudd (The Crabelles), Ashlyn Anderson (Chloe), Hailee Hodgson (Hope), Kade Tyson (Ramsey), Aisha Garcia (Lila), and Nathan Garcia (Lloyd).
Our thought was that in the past, we’d read the script together as a group just before we started to shoot. But that was mostly to help the cast gel and find our characters before we started shooting the next day. There was no time to take a step back and look at the show to see if it was accomplishing what we hoped it was accomplishing, let alone revise it.
We had even talked about how beneficial it would be to put on a stage version of a production before we shoot it, so we’d have plenty of opportunity to revise the script, songs and performances to the point where we felt like it was ready to lock it down in movie form. But baby steps.
Our plan here was to assemble a top quality cast, rehearse it for a few hours, then listen to them perform the entire script, including songs, with a small audience. Then we’d assess how it went, make some revisions, then try it again about a month later with a different cast. It’s not a full-fledged stage version, but like I said, baby steps.
We’d been auditioning actors for about a month for the read-through. I was greatly impressed with the caliber of talent that was coming through our doors, which made the casting decisions difficult. Casting is always a bittersweet process. Most of the time, for every role you cast, you have another few actors you’d love to be able to work with, but can’t. At least not this time. On the other hand, we could console ourselves at least somewhat by the notion that we would be putting together a second cast for the read-through in February.
But back to the January read-through. About a week before the read-through, we started making our calls to notify the actors and get them links to copies of the script and songs. Although we were planning on doing the read-through with script in hand, our hope was that they’d be familiar with their lines and certainly their songs, because we knew our rehearsal period would be brief.
The day before the read-through, I met most of the day with Scott Eckern, my co-director on this project. Scott’s been in the musical business for many years, and we feel very blessed to have the benefit of his experience on Jonah. Scott and I read through the entire script out loud, pausing to map out some basic blocking, paring down the narration script, and working through any issues we thought might arise.
Then, on Saturday, Jan. 17, we assembled our cast at Mountain Ridge Junior High School in Highland, Utah, at 2 p.m. As is the Liken way, we opened with a brief word of prayer, had everyone introduce themselves, then dove right into the script.
The set up for the read-through was fairly simple. We did the whole thing in front of the curtain. We had a two rows of chairs on each side of the apron, then two mics set up in the middle of the apron, about 10 feet apart from each other. Directly off center stage, on the floor of the auditorium, was the piano, where Masa Fukuda would do his magic. (Masa was amazing. We had no sheet music, so he merely listened to Aaron’s demo tracks, then worked out how to play it.) On a riser stage right was another microphone for our narrator.
We quickly realized that the four hours we had allotted for the rehearsal would barely be enough to work through the script once, factoring in time for the basic blocking, such as which actor goes to which mic for which bits and the limited amount of staging that we did. I had thought we’d get through the script at least twice, with maybe a little extra time to polish any rough spots. But I knew that plan was out the window when we broke for our first break an hour and a half into the rehearsal and we were only about a quarter of the way into our script.
The time crunch meant abandoning some parts of the show that I had hoped would be in there, so that I could see how they played in front of an audience. It also meant there was little time to work with the actors and their characterizations. But the show had to go on, so focused on certain key points and left it at that.
To make matters more interesting, one of my key actors let me know just before we broke for dinner that something had come up and he wouldn’t be able to make the evening performance. So I had to scramble to find a replacement about an hour before the performance. Fortunately, the evening before, I had gone to a wedding reception with my wife, Suzanne. The reception was for the daughter of one of Suzanne’s former employers. We hadn’t seen this family in over 20 years, and our communication since then had been largely limited to exchanging Christmas cards. But we received an invitation, so we made the drive up to Salt Lake City. And when we walked into the reception hall, we were met by a young man who I recognized as having auditioned for a part in Jonah, but who happened to be the groom’s best man. Although we didn’t have a part for him in the cast for this read-through, I had made a mental note to do my best to find a part for him in the next read-through.
His name is Justin Williams, and as luck would have it, it turned out we got there just as he was about to sing a pair of love songs that the bride and groom had dedicated to one another. Justin’s accompanist turned out to be one other than Masa Fukuda. Small world. They did a great job with both songs, and as we were leaving, Justin had mentioned that he was planning on coming to the read through the next night.
So when I found out I had a hole in my cast, I found Justin’s number and asked if he was still planning on coming and, if so, would he mind coming a little sooner than he planned so we could have him in the show. He was completely gracious and a good sport. When he came in, I sat him down with some headphones and let him listen to the main song his character would be singing a few times. Then Jason Celaya, good sport that he is, helped him rehearse his basic blocking during the dinner break.
After the dinner break, we opened the doors and welcomed an audience of probably about 250 people, which to me was just about the right size – not so big to be overly intimidating to our troupe of actors who, as professional as they were, had only been working together for about four hours on this project, yet big enough to feel like it was a performance as opposed to another rehearsal.
I gave the audience a brief intro to the project, the actors and key behind-the-scenes people, then made my way to my seat in the audience and said a prayer that it would come together. And I have to say that, given that we had never been able to do a single run-through of the show, the way the show came off was nothing short of miraculous. My hat is off to that cast and Masa.
Since our usual delivery format is DVD, I must say that it is a real treat for us to be able to experience a Liken with an audience. To be able to hear them react with laughter and applause is something we don’t get to experience much in the DVD world.
When the show was over, we asked everybody to complete comment cards. We had a version for those 12 and over, and because the opinions of the kids are also important to us, we had another version for those under 12.
I’ve since read through all the cards. We were impressed with how many people took the time to complete the cards, as well as with how serious they took that responsibility. That, along with the results from a focus group session we held immediately after the screening, has formed the basis of a rewrite that I will be tackling soon.
In the meantime, we learned a lot about the read-through process and how we might do things differently next time, but I must say that I am very grateful for how well it went and for how useful the process and feedback was in our efforts to make “Jonah” the very best Liken we can.
Next up, we’ll restart the audition process for a different cast for the February read-through and see how our revisions to the script and songs fare with a new audience. More details on that later.
But for now, let me close by thanking and listing our final cast for the January read-through of “Jonah & the Great Fish”: Jeremy Elliott (Jonah), David Burton (Humphrey, the Great Fish), Dan Beck (Capitan), David Weekes (King of Nineveh), Jessie Clark Funk (Queen of Nineveh), Jeff Stevens (Chum), Edgar Zuniga (Chuy), Justin Williams (Logan), Jason Celaya (Ryder), David Smith (Alejandro), Paul Cartwright & Josh Tenney & Levi Larsen (The Sharks), Brittni Smith & Kimberly Roderick & Meagan Rudd (The Crabelles), Ashlyn Anderson (Chloe), Hailee Hodgson (Hope), Kade Tyson (Ramsey), Aisha Garcia (Lila), and Nathan Garcia (Lloyd).
Sunday, January 04, 2009
In Awe of Auditioners
I have the utmost respect and admiration for those who willingly subject themselves to that most hideous of tortures called The Audition.
Personally, I’m batting a thousand when it comes to auditioning for roles and getting them. I wish I could say that was because of my masterful skills in auditioning. But the truth of the matter is I’ve maybe auditioned a handful of times in my life, and the roles that I’ve auditioned for mainly required a guy with a pulse who could stand in the background and move his lips like he was singing.
My first role was as one of the King of Siam’s kids in “The King and I,” as staged by what is now called BYU-Hawaii. Yep, for about three weeks, I played an Asian kid. To help achieve the effect, I dyed my hair black (it was supposed to be this temporary dye that washed out, but it stayed with me all summer that year – looked really weird as my bright red hair started growing back in and I was this two-tone haole). I also wore some serious eye makeup. (I remember how mortified I was after one daytime performance returning to school only to find out that I had forgotten to remove my eye makeup. After a classmate finally stopped laughing enough to point out this fact, I raced to the bathroom where, without any makeup removal cream, I resorted to rubbing my eye area red raw with damp paper towels. Looked like I had been crying for days which, in elementary school, was only slightly less embarrassing than wearing eye makeup.)
The last role I auditioned for was when I was 21. I had just moved with my family to England, and a local church group there was putting on a musical called “My Turn on Earth.” Say what you will about that show, all I know is that it paired me up with this adorable young beauty in a number called “Eternity is You,” a sign from heaven so apparent that even I could not miss it. Suzanne and I were married about a year later.
I enjoyed being in the few shows that I’ve been in, and would’ve loved to have been in many more, but wasn’t. Partly, it was because I had seen and heard myself on tape, and realized that that my gifts were likely elsewhere (I hoped they were at least somewhere), besides on the stage or in front of the camera. But if I had to be honest, the bigger reason I wasn’t in more shows was that most of them required that I first do this horrible process called The Audition. Who invented this, I wondered? The Marquis de Stage? It was horrible. My entrance into the audition room that I mentally practiced to be so full of wit and charm would turn into this catatonic shuffle by some open-mouthed mute boy. In front of The Table, my well-rehearsed monologue would vanish from my brain without a trace, which didn’t really matter much, because my voice, which projected so well in front of my mirror at home, would turn into this barely audible, breathy thing.
Though it has been many years since I have mustered up the courage to personally audition, I am freshly reminded of the pain they inflict as I witness my daughters venture off to audition for various projects in school and in the community. I see the prep, the battle of nerves, the waiting for the phone to ring.
While I have personally left the ranks of the auditionees (somehow the world of theater survived in my absence), I have the utmost empathy, admiration and appreciation for those who willingly subject themselves to this process. Those of us on the other side of the table at Liken could not do what we do without you.
Whenever anyone comes to audition for Liken, I try to imagine that he or she is a family member. Treat them with respect. Express appreciation for their time. Find something positive to compliment. Let them know what’s next. Takes a little longer doing it this way, but it feels like the right way to do it. At least for those of us at Liken anyway.
After conducting perhaps a thousand auditions, a few things have occurred to me about the process that I wish I could pass along to everyone who auditions for Liken. Again, I don’t profess to be an expert at auditioning, this may not have much applicability outside of Liken, and I only offer this for what it’s worth.
1. Audition a bunch. Yes, it’s a horrible experience. But if acting is in your blood, it is an unavoidable part of the process. The more you audition, the more likely you are to get over the awkwardness the process is, and the more you are likely to be the character you want to be.
2. Separate your performance in the audition from the outcome. I know this is easier said than done, but my dream is that those who come to audition could somehow manage to gauge their audition against a different set of criteria than whether or not they got the role. When your audition is done, assess yourself on how well you kept your nerves under control, how well you sang your song or delivered your monologue, how well you handled the cold read or whatever else was thrown your way in the audition. Don’t even glance at the phone. Instead, start working on lining up and preparing for your next audition, rather than wasting any energy on whether or not you got the part. I only mention this because sometimes we have people nail their audition, but because of various circumstances that maybe we didn’t even anticipate, we may not have a role for them in the current production. It pains me to think that someone might beat themselves up wondering what they did wrong or, even worse, that someone might throw in the towel just because they didn’t get a certain role.
3. Build your resume. Most people who are in a Liken have had a number of leading roles in stage productions and have studied their craft at school and in courses. Except for some very young actors (the child who played Baby Jesus in “The First Christmas” comes to mind), it is uncommon for us to cast someone in Liken who doesn’t have extensive experience. This is not an artificial screening mechanism we employ – it’s just that there is a lot to be said for how an actor’s experience on stage or on camera carries into the audition room. It’s also nice to know that an actor has been able to withstand the rigors and nerves that come with a production. The last place we want to see somebody freeze up is when there are dozens of crew people, cameras and lights staring at him.
4. Become the character. By this, I don’t mean you need to start speaking immediately in your character’s accent when you walk into the room or wear a period costume to the audition. But I do mean that when you start to sing or say your monologue, makes us believe that these aren’t lyrics or lines you’re delivering, but the heartfelt expressions from the bottom of your character’s soul. Our productions attract singers, and we are grateful to have had many talented recording artists in Liken. But the ones that can make the leap from the recording booth to a Liken are those that understand the need to let their character shine through their faces as well as the words they are singing. Don’t sing the whole song with your eyes closed. Don’t just stand there, hands at your side. Don’t be a afraid to take a step or two. Gesture. Get into it. Be the character.
5. This is a special note for parents of child actors. I suspect the urge to join your child in the audition room is tremendous. And I can certainly appreciate it. For one thing, if you don’t go in, it will be difficult to provide feedback to help your child in future auditions. For another thing, this is your child we’re talking about, and chances are you don’t know much about whoever is conducting the audition. I know that some people advise against going in with your child at all costs. The concern is that the child might be distracted by the parent. At Liken, we always let the parent decide. If they don’t come in, we typically have a glass window that the parent can watch through or leave the door open so they can at least hear what is going on. And we honestly don’t mind if they choose to come in. However, part of the audition process is to see how well your child responds to us as directors. We’ve had occasions where it is hard for us to get a word in edgewise during the audition, because well-meaning parents have taken over in an effort to get their child to do what they know they can do. As a parent, I completely appreciate the urge to chime in. But from our perspective, it is much more helpful if, when the child looks to the parent for direction or feedback, the parent simply turns the attention back to us with a simple nod our direction or a gentle word.
There are probably other things that I’m missing at the moment, but maybe the above is an okay start. Believe me, when you walk into the audition room, both you and we want the same thing: for you to really nail the audition. What they say about us needing you more than you need us is true: without talented actors, there is no Liken. We look forward to seeing you in the audition room and – at some point, we all hope – in a future Liken.
Personally, I’m batting a thousand when it comes to auditioning for roles and getting them. I wish I could say that was because of my masterful skills in auditioning. But the truth of the matter is I’ve maybe auditioned a handful of times in my life, and the roles that I’ve auditioned for mainly required a guy with a pulse who could stand in the background and move his lips like he was singing.
My first role was as one of the King of Siam’s kids in “The King and I,” as staged by what is now called BYU-Hawaii. Yep, for about three weeks, I played an Asian kid. To help achieve the effect, I dyed my hair black (it was supposed to be this temporary dye that washed out, but it stayed with me all summer that year – looked really weird as my bright red hair started growing back in and I was this two-tone haole). I also wore some serious eye makeup. (I remember how mortified I was after one daytime performance returning to school only to find out that I had forgotten to remove my eye makeup. After a classmate finally stopped laughing enough to point out this fact, I raced to the bathroom where, without any makeup removal cream, I resorted to rubbing my eye area red raw with damp paper towels. Looked like I had been crying for days which, in elementary school, was only slightly less embarrassing than wearing eye makeup.)
The last role I auditioned for was when I was 21. I had just moved with my family to England, and a local church group there was putting on a musical called “My Turn on Earth.” Say what you will about that show, all I know is that it paired me up with this adorable young beauty in a number called “Eternity is You,” a sign from heaven so apparent that even I could not miss it. Suzanne and I were married about a year later.
I enjoyed being in the few shows that I’ve been in, and would’ve loved to have been in many more, but wasn’t. Partly, it was because I had seen and heard myself on tape, and realized that that my gifts were likely elsewhere (I hoped they were at least somewhere), besides on the stage or in front of the camera. But if I had to be honest, the bigger reason I wasn’t in more shows was that most of them required that I first do this horrible process called The Audition. Who invented this, I wondered? The Marquis de Stage? It was horrible. My entrance into the audition room that I mentally practiced to be so full of wit and charm would turn into this catatonic shuffle by some open-mouthed mute boy. In front of The Table, my well-rehearsed monologue would vanish from my brain without a trace, which didn’t really matter much, because my voice, which projected so well in front of my mirror at home, would turn into this barely audible, breathy thing.
Though it has been many years since I have mustered up the courage to personally audition, I am freshly reminded of the pain they inflict as I witness my daughters venture off to audition for various projects in school and in the community. I see the prep, the battle of nerves, the waiting for the phone to ring.
While I have personally left the ranks of the auditionees (somehow the world of theater survived in my absence), I have the utmost empathy, admiration and appreciation for those who willingly subject themselves to this process. Those of us on the other side of the table at Liken could not do what we do without you.
Whenever anyone comes to audition for Liken, I try to imagine that he or she is a family member. Treat them with respect. Express appreciation for their time. Find something positive to compliment. Let them know what’s next. Takes a little longer doing it this way, but it feels like the right way to do it. At least for those of us at Liken anyway.
After conducting perhaps a thousand auditions, a few things have occurred to me about the process that I wish I could pass along to everyone who auditions for Liken. Again, I don’t profess to be an expert at auditioning, this may not have much applicability outside of Liken, and I only offer this for what it’s worth.
1. Audition a bunch. Yes, it’s a horrible experience. But if acting is in your blood, it is an unavoidable part of the process. The more you audition, the more likely you are to get over the awkwardness the process is, and the more you are likely to be the character you want to be.
2. Separate your performance in the audition from the outcome. I know this is easier said than done, but my dream is that those who come to audition could somehow manage to gauge their audition against a different set of criteria than whether or not they got the role. When your audition is done, assess yourself on how well you kept your nerves under control, how well you sang your song or delivered your monologue, how well you handled the cold read or whatever else was thrown your way in the audition. Don’t even glance at the phone. Instead, start working on lining up and preparing for your next audition, rather than wasting any energy on whether or not you got the part. I only mention this because sometimes we have people nail their audition, but because of various circumstances that maybe we didn’t even anticipate, we may not have a role for them in the current production. It pains me to think that someone might beat themselves up wondering what they did wrong or, even worse, that someone might throw in the towel just because they didn’t get a certain role.
3. Build your resume. Most people who are in a Liken have had a number of leading roles in stage productions and have studied their craft at school and in courses. Except for some very young actors (the child who played Baby Jesus in “The First Christmas” comes to mind), it is uncommon for us to cast someone in Liken who doesn’t have extensive experience. This is not an artificial screening mechanism we employ – it’s just that there is a lot to be said for how an actor’s experience on stage or on camera carries into the audition room. It’s also nice to know that an actor has been able to withstand the rigors and nerves that come with a production. The last place we want to see somebody freeze up is when there are dozens of crew people, cameras and lights staring at him.
4. Become the character. By this, I don’t mean you need to start speaking immediately in your character’s accent when you walk into the room or wear a period costume to the audition. But I do mean that when you start to sing or say your monologue, makes us believe that these aren’t lyrics or lines you’re delivering, but the heartfelt expressions from the bottom of your character’s soul. Our productions attract singers, and we are grateful to have had many talented recording artists in Liken. But the ones that can make the leap from the recording booth to a Liken are those that understand the need to let their character shine through their faces as well as the words they are singing. Don’t sing the whole song with your eyes closed. Don’t just stand there, hands at your side. Don’t be a afraid to take a step or two. Gesture. Get into it. Be the character.
5. This is a special note for parents of child actors. I suspect the urge to join your child in the audition room is tremendous. And I can certainly appreciate it. For one thing, if you don’t go in, it will be difficult to provide feedback to help your child in future auditions. For another thing, this is your child we’re talking about, and chances are you don’t know much about whoever is conducting the audition. I know that some people advise against going in with your child at all costs. The concern is that the child might be distracted by the parent. At Liken, we always let the parent decide. If they don’t come in, we typically have a glass window that the parent can watch through or leave the door open so they can at least hear what is going on. And we honestly don’t mind if they choose to come in. However, part of the audition process is to see how well your child responds to us as directors. We’ve had occasions where it is hard for us to get a word in edgewise during the audition, because well-meaning parents have taken over in an effort to get their child to do what they know they can do. As a parent, I completely appreciate the urge to chime in. But from our perspective, it is much more helpful if, when the child looks to the parent for direction or feedback, the parent simply turns the attention back to us with a simple nod our direction or a gentle word.
There are probably other things that I’m missing at the moment, but maybe the above is an okay start. Believe me, when you walk into the audition room, both you and we want the same thing: for you to really nail the audition. What they say about us needing you more than you need us is true: without talented actors, there is no Liken. We look forward to seeing you in the audition room and – at some point, we all hope – in a future Liken.
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Fishing for characters
Among the big challenges of "Jonah" is that of figuring out how to do the fish scenes. For this script, it's not just a matter of a whale quickly swallowing Jonah and then spitting him out three days later on shore. The scriptures tell us that the Lord "prepared a great fish" to swallow up Jonah (Jonah 1:17). So we're taking a little license with that to develop this subplot story of Humphrey, an oversized fish who doesn't fit in and wishes he could be like the other fish. Over the course of the story, he'll come to realize that there is a reason the Lord made him the way he is.
Originally, we were thinking of doing those sections as animation. But the Humphrey story constitutes a fair chunk of the script. Kids these days are raised on amazing animation, and that isn't cheap (budget for "The Incredibles," for example, was over $90 million). There are less costly ways to do animation, but if it doesn't look good, then it can detract from the story.
At one point, I wrote a draft that omitted the fish story entirely, figuring that if we can't do that part of the story right, then perhaps best not to do it at all. I called it "Jonah & the Ninevites." I shared it around with some people here. Nobody was too excited about it.
Then I saw some clips from the Broadway version of "The Little Mermaid." And it reminded me of how we handled the lions in "Daniel & the Lions," where the faces of the actors were prominently featured and helped define their animal characters. And it made me realize that that approach is much more "Liken." We need to figure out a way to make our actors characters shine through and stage the underwater scenes of "Jonah" as if it were a stage production (which we hope someday it will be).
So we brought in Brian Higginson, who has helped us with the graphics of much of our Liken work of late, and we brainstormed some ideas. He went away for a couple of days and came back this week with some rough concept sketches, which you see here. We went over them, talked about what we liked and disliked, and he is now working on refinements, which should be coming soon.
I know concept sketches are one thing, and actually making those into real costumes is another. But I like the direction this is heading.
Friday, November 14, 2008
Soundstage Shopping
We shot the musical portion of the first two Liken movies on the soundstage of a television station near the Salt Lake Airport. An old friend of mine worked there and was able to make it feasible for us to shoot there. But he no longer works there, and even if he did, the stage there isn't quite big enough to set up more than one set at a time. So to shoot there, we would need to tear down a set right after it wrapped, then build the new set and paint it ready to go the next day. Obviously, that makes for a long night, not to mention a wet floor the next day when we're ready to shoot.
When we moved to Utah in 2004, we looked for an office with warehouse space where we could shoot our productions. We found our eventual "home" in the East Bay area of Provo, where we shot the next six Liken movies. The space wasn't ideal (too small, ceilings too low, inadequate power, inadequate AC, inadequate restroom facilities, etc.), but we made it work, because that's what you do in the indy movie project world.
With the long lay-off between Likens, however, it didn't make sense to keep renting the warehouse space. So we moved all the walls, props and costumes to off-site storage, which costs about a tenth as much as the warehouse space.
But it does mean that we need to find space to shoot "Jonah." So we went soundstage shopping. It doesn't appear that there is a huge number of options here in Utah. But we managed to find one up in Salt Lake City that we think is big enough to handle all of our sets at the same time. That makes the prospect of rehearsing and shooting (on dry floors!) an appealing possibility. We still need to check out a couple more options before we firm up those arrangements, but it looks like we will be heading north to film "Jonah."
Another plus to shooting in SLC is that it is a little more central for our friends in that area as well as the Ogden area. But it will add a couple of extra commuting hours a day to our Utah County contingent. Hey -- just like shooting in L.A...
When we moved to Utah in 2004, we looked for an office with warehouse space where we could shoot our productions. We found our eventual "home" in the East Bay area of Provo, where we shot the next six Liken movies. The space wasn't ideal (too small, ceilings too low, inadequate power, inadequate AC, inadequate restroom facilities, etc.), but we made it work, because that's what you do in the indy movie project world.
With the long lay-off between Likens, however, it didn't make sense to keep renting the warehouse space. So we moved all the walls, props and costumes to off-site storage, which costs about a tenth as much as the warehouse space.
But it does mean that we need to find space to shoot "Jonah." So we went soundstage shopping. It doesn't appear that there is a huge number of options here in Utah. But we managed to find one up in Salt Lake City that we think is big enough to handle all of our sets at the same time. That makes the prospect of rehearsing and shooting (on dry floors!) an appealing possibility. We still need to check out a couple more options before we firm up those arrangements, but it looks like we will be heading north to film "Jonah."
Another plus to shooting in SLC is that it is a little more central for our friends in that area as well as the Ogden area. But it will add a couple of extra commuting hours a day to our Utah County contingent. Hey -- just like shooting in L.A...
Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Cue: Jonah songwriting
Aaron has started writing songs for "Jonah and the Great Fish."
Typically, the way we work is I'll write a script, we'll massage it over time, get it fairly well nailed down. But it won't have any songs, just "song notes," which will be usually a quarter to a half page of suggestions on music mood, a description of what the song needs to accomplish, ideas for some fun business that could occur during the song, that kind of stuff. Then Aaron will do his magic, and then we'll massage the songs a bit, then I'll work the lyrics back into the script, which may need to be revised with more or less dialogue before or after the song, depending on how much the song covered or to accommodate any changes of direction it may have gone.
For "Jonah," the first one he worked on is the first song from the movie (it doesn't always happen like that -- Aaron says he takes them in the order that they come to him). This song is a bit of a departure from the full-cast, high-energy opening that most musicals (including Likens) typically open with. Of course, it's good to give the audience something big and fun to set the mood.
But structurally, this episode seemed to want to go a slightly different direction, because we want to open with Jonah (who's sorta the star of "Jonah"), but we couldn't open with him in Nineveh, because he doesn't go there until the end of the story. So to put Jonah in a big setting, we'd have to create a whole new town, like maybe his hometown. And, not that budgets should matter, but creating towns for Liken and populating them with villagers is sorta expensive. And in the Liken world, budgets do matter. We decided it would be better to save the money on creating a town setting for Jonah's opening song and instead use it to create a cool set for Nineveh.
But this left us with a slight problem for the opening: it was scripted to feature just one man -- Jonah, right after he receives a revelation to go to the dreaded city of Nineveh. So we thought we'd put him in the wilderness, maybe in a tent, like he's on a mission heading somewhere. A solo opening. Risky. But I felt like if we kept it brief, and kept it lively (there are opportunities for humor as an anxiety-ridden Jonah tries to decide if he's going to accept this mission), we could maybe make it work.
Aaron sent me a version of the song that had a fairly sedate opening verse, with Jonah pledging to do whatever God asked of him, and then he gets the revelation and it all falls apart. It was nice, but I was worried that we were already pressing the good graces of our younger audience in particular with our one-man opening, and then to give them a minute of this slow ballad before it turns fun -- extra risky. I hesitated to mention it to Aaron, because it was the first song he had submitted on this project. But then I realized that this would be the first song in the the first Liken after a lengthy absence, so we really want to get this right. So I mentioned my concerns to Aaron, and he was totally cool about it. We brainstormed some possible revisions to the song, like maybe just lopping off the ballad-like opening as well as some other ideas. Aaron went away to think about it.
A couple of hours later, he calls me and says he wants to go in an entirely different direction with the song, and asks if it would be OK if sometime during Jonah's song, three fish girl backup-singer types pop up out of a nearby stream and sing a little counterpoint melody that chides Jonah in a fun way. My first thought was water feature (ka-ching), three backup singer fish girls (ka-ching, each with costumes, ka-ching x 3). But my next thought was it would be a great way to make that risky solo-opening a lot fuller and more fun. Plus, as Aaron pointed out, it introduces the concept of fish as sentient beings in this show. All that has to be worth at least one or two ka-chings. When Ken (my brother/producer/budget man) and I sat down to lunch, I ran it by him, and he laughed at just the thought of the three fish popping up and said he thought it would be well worth it.
So the three fish-girl backup singer opening concept was in. Shortly thereafter, Aaron sent me an mp3 of the rough version of the song. He even did the girl fish voices -- that guy can truly hit the high notes (although he confessed that after he recorded
it, he had to sit down for 5 minutes because the high notes gave him a massive headache). And talk about a fun song! It's called "No Way!", and it is short -- about 2 minutes. But it is high energy, fun and will get this show off to a great start.
Typically, the way we work is I'll write a script, we'll massage it over time, get it fairly well nailed down. But it won't have any songs, just "song notes," which will be usually a quarter to a half page of suggestions on music mood, a description of what the song needs to accomplish, ideas for some fun business that could occur during the song, that kind of stuff. Then Aaron will do his magic, and then we'll massage the songs a bit, then I'll work the lyrics back into the script, which may need to be revised with more or less dialogue before or after the song, depending on how much the song covered or to accommodate any changes of direction it may have gone.
For "Jonah," the first one he worked on is the first song from the movie (it doesn't always happen like that -- Aaron says he takes them in the order that they come to him). This song is a bit of a departure from the full-cast, high-energy opening that most musicals (including Likens) typically open with. Of course, it's good to give the audience something big and fun to set the mood.
But structurally, this episode seemed to want to go a slightly different direction, because we want to open with Jonah (who's sorta the star of "Jonah"), but we couldn't open with him in Nineveh, because he doesn't go there until the end of the story. So to put Jonah in a big setting, we'd have to create a whole new town, like maybe his hometown. And, not that budgets should matter, but creating towns for Liken and populating them with villagers is sorta expensive. And in the Liken world, budgets do matter. We decided it would be better to save the money on creating a town setting for Jonah's opening song and instead use it to create a cool set for Nineveh.
But this left us with a slight problem for the opening: it was scripted to feature just one man -- Jonah, right after he receives a revelation to go to the dreaded city of Nineveh. So we thought we'd put him in the wilderness, maybe in a tent, like he's on a mission heading somewhere. A solo opening. Risky. But I felt like if we kept it brief, and kept it lively (there are opportunities for humor as an anxiety-ridden Jonah tries to decide if he's going to accept this mission), we could maybe make it work.
Aaron sent me a version of the song that had a fairly sedate opening verse, with Jonah pledging to do whatever God asked of him, and then he gets the revelation and it all falls apart. It was nice, but I was worried that we were already pressing the good graces of our younger audience in particular with our one-man opening, and then to give them a minute of this slow ballad before it turns fun -- extra risky. I hesitated to mention it to Aaron, because it was the first song he had submitted on this project. But then I realized that this would be the first song in the the first Liken after a lengthy absence, so we really want to get this right. So I mentioned my concerns to Aaron, and he was totally cool about it. We brainstormed some possible revisions to the song, like maybe just lopping off the ballad-like opening as well as some other ideas. Aaron went away to think about it.
A couple of hours later, he calls me and says he wants to go in an entirely different direction with the song, and asks if it would be OK if sometime during Jonah's song, three fish girl backup-singer types pop up out of a nearby stream and sing a little counterpoint melody that chides Jonah in a fun way. My first thought was water feature (ka-ching), three backup singer fish girls (ka-ching, each with costumes, ka-ching x 3). But my next thought was it would be a great way to make that risky solo-opening a lot fuller and more fun. Plus, as Aaron pointed out, it introduces the concept of fish as sentient beings in this show. All that has to be worth at least one or two ka-chings. When Ken (my brother/producer/budget man) and I sat down to lunch, I ran it by him, and he laughed at just the thought of the three fish popping up and said he thought it would be well worth it.
So the three fish-girl backup singer opening concept was in. Shortly thereafter, Aaron sent me an mp3 of the rough version of the song. He even did the girl fish voices -- that guy can truly hit the high notes (although he confessed that after he recorded
it, he had to sit down for 5 minutes because the high notes gave him a massive headache). And talk about a fun song! It's called "No Way!", and it is short -- about 2 minutes. But it is high energy, fun and will get this show off to a great start.
Wednesday, November 05, 2008
A Logo is Born
Started work on a logo for Jonah. We typically do two over the course of the production. The first we use during pre-production and production. Then sometime during post-production, when we know a little more what our movie looks -- and feels -- like, we do our final logo.
As we are now in pre- pre-production mode on Jonah, we asked Brian Higginson to develop something for us. Didn't want something too whal-ish, since the "great fish" angle is something we're exploring in this retelling. Brian gave us several looks, and we ended up choosing the one you see here. I like that it captures the feeling of both the ancient scriptural nature of the story, but with a touch of whimsy. Thanks, Brian.
So now we have a logo. All we need is a movie. More on that to come...
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
