Set Diary -- Teasemania!

Dear Set Diary,

For the second time, we’re going on location – which is convenient for me, because today’s set is literally next door to my office. 

With the premiere coming up on September 30, and a clip show on September 23, there's work to be done.   A crew from ABC.com is here filming teasers to follow the writers video-blogs that our associate producer, Sparky Hawes, set up for this season.  Michael Morris had the idea to give the 4th floor assistants a crack at taping the teasers.  Fun, right?

Wrong.

Sparky:  "This exhibit is now closed!"

What this means is that three of my closest colleagues, Beth, Ben and Dan, are anxiously buzzing around my office in rehearsal.  To judge by their actions, the fate of the world is in the balance that hangs not five feet from my desk.

Beth dabs her forehead, wiping sweat off her brow.  “Now I know how the actors feel.”

Ben wraps himself in a blanket, sips an English Breakfast tea, and “gets into character.”

Dan stares at the light switch and God knows where his mind has gone.

The pressure of the camera has turned them into fidgeting jellyfish.

Ben has a different blankie for every day of the week.

Meanwhile, our set dressers have finished converting Cliff Olin’s office (the one next door to mine) into a, well, writery-looking office.   There’s a white board, a Red, White & Blue poster and, per Mark Perry, a dart board. 

The lights have turned on and the camera is powered up.  “Who’s ready?” asks one of the dot-com producers.  Beth conveniently rises from the couch.  “I have to get notes from Mark.  Someone else should go.”  Dan looks at her as she leaves, wishing he could have come up with the same excuse.

Ben takes a sip of tea and coolly declares, “I am.”  Dan looks at me as if to say – thank God.  But we both know his reprieve will be short lived.  Ben takes a seat in Cliff’s office and the cameraman readies his mic.

Mark Perry said he wouldn't change a thing.

Several of the writers notice the action and pop their heads inside.  “What the --?”  But after eyeing Dan’s nervous face, they realize the response wouldn’t be worth their time and duck away before it comes.

Beth reenters my office just as Ben walks out.  “That was great, Ben,” declares the producer unconvincingly.  Beth and Dan exchange looks. 

“Don’t worry, they’ll edit out anything you screw up,” says Ben.

Dan is next.  Rehearsing the lines in his head, Dan takes a loooong time to sit down and look at the camera with any semblance of ease.  He looks like someone working a little too hard at passing a field sobriety test. 

Dan pretending to like Beth's teaser for episode 204.

The door closes behind Dan.  God be with him.

Now it’s just Beth.  She tips her head in my direction and the blood has suddenly washed her face white. 

“Oh my goodness, I’ve forgotten what my episode is about.  Do you remember 203?!?!” asks Beth.  The air leaves the room.  Before I can speak up and remind her it’s just a podcast and not Saturday Night Live, Beth flashes a smile.  She’s only kidding.  “God, why do you look so nervous?” she says.

The door opens and Dan has finished in less time than it took for him to walk through the doorway.  I wish Beth luck and she confronts the camera.

A quiet descends on my office.  Dan has gone wherever he needs to detox.  Ben is back to taking notes in the writers’ room.  And I’m secretly wishing the online crew would burst out laughing and someone would yell, “Man, that’s gonna be HUGE on YouTube.”

Jennifer Cecil and Mark Perry had no problem at all with the writers video for 203.

As I reflect on the morning and the turmoil my friends, all of who are writers in their own right, have put themselves through, I can only come to one conclusion. 

Don’t put writers on camera.

-- Andrew Major

Comments

[will]

Dan, WHY DO YOU LOOK SO GD THIN? I blew up the pic of Beth & you, and you look terribly unhealthy. I need to feed you WHOLE FOODS. Organic fruits & veggies, nuts & seeds & grains, unpolluted protein. Raw milk....NURSE YOU BACK TO HEALTH.... REAL food from NATURE to make your body FLOURISH. Revitalize your mind, give you a fresh new lease on life... You look like you're living completely on coffee & junk food.... (Please take care of your health, Dan. I happen to connect with your rather outre writing style).

Andrew: Thanks for the backstage business. The idea of writer vlogs sounds kind of cool.

[ilovemylife]

Thanks for the fun read. The "inside" stuff is always welcome. Just makes me a little envious of you all.

"Countdown time" to the first episode of the season. I'll be in D.C. when it's aired...but will schedule it in my Standnow.org conference weekend.

It's always fun to "hang out" here.

Bring the Olympic Dream to Darfur - ONE WORLD, ONE DREAM
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Sandra Hammel
Portsmouth, RI
http://ilovemylifebrothersandsisters.blogspot.com/

[will]

Not quite sure what to make of the notes on the board directly behind Mark Perry....

* McCallister's assassination attempt. Justin saves.

*Kevin sits vigil by Scotty's bedside

* Nora ID's rapist in line-up

* (obscured) pregnancy is viable

This seems all fairly standard "...and then this happened....and here's what happened next..." brand of storytelling. I have learned it's really not WHAT you tell in the story (since there's only a finite number of stories to tell & they've all been told anyway) but HOW you tell it.

What I personally hope for in this season is just that: a more cohesive & integrated style to "Brothers & Sisters". A personal artistic STYLE that sets you apart from the primetime ratpack. A world where you create your own oxygen & you own rhythms. I think the slight veneer of blandness we sometimes sense in the over-all B&S first season....is too many chefs in the kitchen, waterng down the original writers conceptions.

At any rate, here's hoping you locate that creative ZONE to do something truly amazing this year. To give us pop entertainment AND ART! (& decent ratings wouldn't hurt either). Good luck.

[JoAnne]

Your Family Album show, reminded me again why I love this show.

[CeCe]

A very cute blog!! How fun to have a job that is so much fun! Although it may not have seemed fun at the time!

I actually came in to squeeee about the Family Album show that just finished tonight, and to say how excited I am to have these Walker freaks back in my life each week! OH, how I have missed them!

HOW can I cry at partial 10 second clips? HOW??? I'm hopeless!! And cannot wait until next Sunday! It's like I had forgotten how much I loved the Walkers and how amazing the show was, and the episode tonight made me all tingly and in love again and excited for a new phase!

Could I have possibly used more exclamation points in this post???!!!! Hee!

[will]

Notes on the Family Album
(in real time).

Wow. Again, this is an incredibly CAUCASION gathering of actors. An entire screen of whiteness. Isn't there ONE person of color in all of Pasadena that is represented by more than an extra....?(an african-american or latino occasionally lurking in the background, sometimes even given a line to say....) This is not the Pasadena I know. Oppressive. Diminishes the proceedings all around.

I'm totally grooving listening to Matthew speak in his native tongue....makes me appreciate his talent that much more. He seems to have the gift of completely embodying, INHABITTING a character, form the inside looking out (with those nuances that bring a character alive....YEAH! A living character, artfully - & artlessly - created).

Marion Ross was very un-nuanced as the grandmother. That's probably because she didn't get a chance to build a character like the others.

Goddamn! Another Matthew comment here....he is such a frigging NATURAL, spontaneous (again, his character somehow manages to encompass a BIGGER space, bigger heart, more liveliness, realistic sarcasm, he JUMPS out at you, sometimes subtly...or it that just because I'm predisposed to LIKE his character cause he's gay? Hope I'm not that shallow).

Holly (to Sarah): "Keep your washed-up husband away from my little girl". Pure SOAP dialogue. No art. Art-less in the worst way. This brings the show to a halt. Holly is such a weak link in the chain. Poor storyline? Actress choices? Something....(I LIKED Patricia speaking directly to the camera. Somebody has to write a Holly that is actually ALIVE & dimentional; deep down I feel Patricia can redeem this half-baked stock role. Something about the way she adressed the camera - as Patricia - was inspiring...I actually saw a human being).

Not impressed too much with Emily yet....still undefined (maybe I should say not impressed with Rebecca then). VERY impressed with Ken Olin. He seems to have an easy-going grasp of these guys. Mark Perry too. Show's in good hands.

OH NO! A reminder of the promised, dreaded "gay uncle Saul" storyline! I am wincing, but hopefully this is just my horrible habit of pre-judging everything....then regretting it later.

AVERAGE, smashingly mediocre... just say it, BANAL song: "Pictures of you, pictures of me" are some woozy lyrics. That sneer is returning to my lips.... A positive note: I listened to the new James Blunt CD this weekend & thought a couple songs would work for B&S ("Carry you Home" for one), although of course they need to fit into an appropriate context.

Here's hoping this new season finds its wings. You know I'm ready to be transported - I'm such a stupid romantic - by an intelligent story, maybe with some art in it.

[will]

A Kitty & Kevin Appreciation (redux)

I hope you guys let Matthew & Calista have more screen time together this year. They RIFF so beautifully off each other. The half-insults they hurl each other's way kind of bounce & rebound & ricochet off the walls. There's always this air of sibling over-familiarity....they're fussy & pampered & prima donnas in practically the SAME WAY.... I'm not talking about the "bitch", "whore" stuff, outside drinking lattes....that was "cute" like a hammer over the head.

Kevin: You're the lying whore of the family.

Kitty: You're the stuck up bitch.

I'm talking about the dialogue that comes at you so quick & loose it's hard to process it. You just sit back and WATCH these two siblings being Kitty & Kevin. They do this neurotic B&S bantering BETTER THAN ANYONE else in the cast. It's always a winner. These 2 actors are so natural & subtle & deft when it comes to reacting off each other...they're so IN TUNE to each other's individual neurosis.... & feeling out the meaning in their scenes....they're a match made in comic heaven.

Speaking of "loose"....I wish the show had a LOOSER feel to it. More loose, less "packaged".

My 2 cents.

[Kate]

All I have to say is that the during the great clip show I almost FELL OFF MY COUCH. It happened when Matthew Rhys opened his mouth as himself (as opposed to as Kevin-his American alter ego) and that SWOON-WORTHY Welsh accent filled up my living room. I literally cranked the volume for all of his comments and WISHED he was actually there. WOW! He is such a talented and gifted actor and obviously very handsome--but in his native tongue????? OMG--swoon-worthy. With the accent he is so sexy--beyond HOT! WOW! Loved all the actors and producers comments--found them insightful and also generated more excitement for the season premiere--which I was already but excited about. I think it was very telling how affectionately they all spoke of their characters anbd working with this amazing group of actors and that does permeate their stellar performances......on a lighter note can we have some fantasy sequence where Kevin has to speak in Matthew's accent??? I know LAME-O but it was worth a shot! Thanks for the blogs--I love em.

[Kate]

OMG--Matthew Rhys speaking in native Welsh accent was enough to make me want to fall off my couch. He is such a talented and strong performer and obviously very good looking (love those eyes) BUT in his native tongue---WOW--he is sexy hot! Maybe there can be some fantasy sequence where Kevin has so speak in Matthew's accent--I know completely lame-o but worth a few daydreams. He is SWOON WORTHY!!!!!

[Lucy]

I'm begging you to stop posting Will's comments. PLEASE.

[Kate]

Matthew Rhys speaking with his native Welsh accent equals=me almost falling off my couch because of how swwon-worthy those moments were! HOT!

[Michelle]

Matthew Rhys speaking in his native Welsh accent= unparalled hot and sexiness--bring it on!!!!!!!!!

[CeCe]

Hey Lucy...if we stop posting will's comments because YOU ask, then I'd like to request that they stop posting YOUR comments because I ask. And so on, and so on, and so on. See how that can be a bit unproductive?

Here's a better idea: how about you live and let live? Or maybe let people have their own voices without trying to shut them down? Or maybe, just maybe, try to open your mind to other thoughts? Or if you don't think you can do that, maybe close your browser? Irregardless (is not a word)...it is not your place to say whose thoughts can or should be posted here.

In other news...Kate and Michelle? Totally with you on this one...Matthew Rhys speaking with his accent and that goddamn (tm Ms. Field) twinkle in his eye? GUHHHHHHHHHhh.

[will]

Hey, thanks CeCe.

Listen, I was rooting around the comments section of previous B&S shows - I know, I'm such a freaking dork, but I was compiling one of those stupid "top 10" lists of wacky B&S posters - & I must've come across 6 or 7 of your comments.

EVERY SINGLE frigging time I came to one of your comments, I was struck by your style, CeCe: your writing is breezy, unpretentious, & it always gives me a little lift in some artistic way (this is a clumsy analogy).

Think for a second of visiting the Getty Museum (I have just recently gotten into renaissance painting) & all a sudden you get a JOLT of adrenaline because some painting - or section of a painting, by Michealangelo or Titian, say - is so gorgeously beautiful-unusual....you marvel at what the human mind is capable of doing....

Well, like good painters, I also admire creators of good sentences....and I am very happy to know you Ms. CeCe. Your prose is like a nice sunny day at the beach, surfing the waves & walking the boardwalk. With no care in the world. I hope you keep on posting & enriching my B&S experience.

[JoAnne]

I second that CeCe !

[Christina]

I love brothers and sisters i watch it all the time with my mom! can't wait until tomorrow to watch it!

[Kate]

Hey CeCe--
I second all you had to say (or write rather) about letting everyone have their opinions AND I am glad you agree re: Matthew Rhys speaking in his native tongue and YES that twinkle in his eye. YUM,YUM and YUM!!!! I keep thinking of him reading a great novel or poetry in his native tongue--AAAAHHHHHHHH. Enjoy the season premiere--cannot wait. :)

will...I am speechless. Thank you. Really.

{{JoAnne}}

Kate: "I keep thinking of him reading a great novel or poetry in his native tongue--AAAAHHHHHHHH."

Did it just get really hot in here???? Whew!

[CeCe]

Yeah...that was me ^^ up there. D'oh!