Nine months after my initial first draft park session, I found myself at 11:55 at night, poorly-postured in the atrium of Gilman Hall. I was fervently typing, filling in the last information I needed to submit to the Studio North Film Grant. Months and months of work all leading to this moment. Stressed and sweaty, I melodramatically raised my finger high above the enter key, looked around to give the overdone cliche its proper pacing… not yet… and then brought my finger down. Before that, though… how did I get here?
A copy of the COCAINE TO LONDON draft submitted to the Studio North Film Grant.
The process to apply was expansive and multi-phased, however all extraneous material revolved around one thing: the script. For the rest of the summer I spent time working on that initial draft. I had already accepted that, in the short time before the application was due, I could not perfect it. So instead of nitpicking the story, I focused on one major aspect of this application process: logistics.
See, the application is judged in terms of two different categories: the effectiveness, creativity and success of the script, but also the feasibility of actually turning it into a film on a small budget. And currently my script was about fifteen pages too long, had about four or five too many characters and involved a literal POLICE CHASE. After a few weeks of lying to myself that this was shootable (“maybe they have some police cars for rent on Travelocity”) I finally accepted that making the script feasible would not be an easy feat. I had to rehash almost everything.
This time though, in order to avoid this same issue, I went into this rewriting process with a new mindset. While it was very cathartic to sit down for eight hours and write a nothing-off-the-table draft, I realized I needed to acknowledge and consider the logistical side of film as I wrote. So, when I sat down to write the new draft, it was not at some park. It was at my desk where I had full access to the internet and could Google any information I needed. It did not take eight hours like the first one, but multiple days as not only was I just writing, but experiencing my first taste of pre-production.
And looking back on it, many of the decisions and realizations I made at this moment have stuck all the way until now. For example, this is the moment where I recognized that I simply had too many locations for how much I wanted to do with this script. I recognized this from doing some research on normal setup times for the camera I wanted to use (an ARRI AMIRA) as well as asking some past grant film winners how long it took them to move locations when they did. In order to accommodate for these high times, I decided I would make the script something of a bottle film with most, if not all, of it taking place in a recording studio. Through some more research, I found that the JHU-MICA Film Centre has a recording studio in its building, which meant my crew would not even have to move location at all since all equipment would be in the Film Centre to begin with. This was the first major breakthrough in terms of logistics and while it did mean that I would have to force my script into the confines of one location, I strangely did not feel at all restrained. In fact, I felt rejuvenated. As someone who has never dealt with the producer side of film, and was very skeptical if they would enjoy it or not, it was very surprising how rewarding this moment felt.
The JHU-MICA Film Centre Recording Studio where COCAINE TO LONDON will take place.
From that moment on, I had a strange desire to work on the producer elements of this pre-production phase and I found myself moving away from the script and onto the Pitch Packet, the other major element of this application. A Pitch Packet is a large document that includes nearly all aspects of your project from a summary of the story and its characters, to the way you plan to shoot it and even a preliminary budget sheet. Surprisingly, these next few weeks were some of the most fun I had during this entire pre-grant process.
I found the production process was much less rigid than I anticipated and actually involved a lot of thinking on the fly and finding clever solutions around things. I found myself researching everything from restaurants that offered the most coupons and how to obtain them to how to properly time a shot and make a shooting schedule to prop and production design research. I truly felt connected to the script in a way I hadn’t before. It felt like the fleshing out of a character. My script was no longer just its story, but a living, breathing organism.
While this did make me more invested in the project, it also made me realize just how much work and stress it would take. This early production phase was not all perfect. As I began researching more and more I realized just how much I would have to juggle from making shots to casting to budget, etc. Worst of all, though, I realized just how much money I would need. The grant would only give $2,000, a figure that because of my plan of an 8 day shoot, would barely cover the cost of on-set food. I would need to do a lot more fundraising, a lot more promotion and even then probably have to make budget cuts. I realized this film would not be a walk in the park and while it worried me for a moment, the emotions then turned to excitement. I realized I was ready and at that moment I decided… this film would be made. I’d make sure of it.
So as 11:59 hit, I finished my email, read it over once, thought back to my preparation and this promise I made to myself… and hit the enter button. Then, I actually clicked send with my mouse because I remembered the enter button doesn’t send an email. Whoops.
Until next time…
Devin