A First Time...

Tracey Schawsmidth

Editorial

Spike Lee on the State of African-American Cinema

Student Filmmakers
Get a Taste of the
Cannes Film Festival Courtesy of Kodak

A First Time Producer's Worst Case Scenario

Chuck it on the Net

(c)Black Filmmaker Publications 1998:
All right reserved

This was supposed to be my big chance:
I had written my first ten-minute film
and I was gonna produce it myself.

The main protagonists in the film were a black Jamaican female and her daughter. Naturally, I thought I'd need a black director: someone who understood where I was coming from, able to translate what I had written on paper into a visually dynamic film. I found my black director. He talked the talk, walked the walk, looked the part and loved my script.

I was full of confidence and enthusiasm, about to make the short film of the century. We had three months of pre-production but didn't have much money - less than £2,000 - so I had to beg, grovel and call in a lot of favours. Fortunately, I have a very supportive family and friends who helped me out where and when necessary. So, I started by making a list of all the things I needed to do such as sorting out a crew, locations and actors; everything was running smoothly - I was happy. There were only two locations, one of which was a house. My uncle agreed to let me se his, which was empty and on the market and was in walking distance of the other main location.

I approached local acting agencies who surprisingly didn't have any black actresses on their books so I advertised on the local community radio and in community centres for a black actress who could speak Jamaican patois. Eventually we found our actress - but she didn't turn up for rehearsals and ignored my phone calls. So I resumed my search. Once again I found one, who agreed to do the part but slapped us with demands for payment. We had to let her go.

Two weeks before the shoot, I got a telephone call from my uncle. He'd changed his mind and didn't want a crew trampling through his house - I was distraught. Three days before the shoot I still had no lead actress and still could not find a replacement for my second main location. I had a deadline to meet (a showing at the first British black film festival in Sheffield) and I was cutting it fine.

Finally, a friend stepped in. She wanted to break into TV but didn't have a showreel, I needed an actress: it was a perfect match. Then, one day before the shoot Sheffield city council gave me an unfurnished flat to use as my second main location.

Unfortunately, with all these problems popping up I hadn't kept close enough tabs on my director. For two weeks I'd been asking for a shot list but never got it until the morning of the first day of filming. He'd made a few sketches which were supposed to be a storyboard. On set tension built up between the director and the actress; by the second day they had a blazing row. The atmosphere was uncomfortable and the director seemed more interested in flirting with my lazy female runner whose cleavage distracted the whole of my male crew and vexed all of the other women on set.

Complaints came from different crew members due to a breakdown in communications: the make-up and art departments were totally ignored by the director which led to continuity problems, and the camera-man and director didn't seem to share the same vision, which was problematic. When we got the rushes back from telecine I was horrified. The luminous colours were hideous and a number of shots were out of focus or too dark. This meant doing some re-shooting with a different cameraman but I was unable to get hold of the same locations so we had to use a studio. The mix of new shots with what we already had gave the film an interesting experimental look.

What I learnt from this catastrophe is: Work extremely closely with your director. Your partnership from the beginning of pre-production until the end of post-production must be like a marriage; your film is the baby and you both have to make it together!

Your crew members are your in laws, handle them with care. Be diplomatic yet firm and treat them with respect. Remember manners don't cost anything and they go a long way.

Don't expect much thanks or gratitude from your husband (the director) or in-laws (the crew). Most of the hard work that you do will go unnoticed and there will be times when you will feel very much un-loved, used and abused.

. Don't stress out! It's your job as the producer to work the problems out as smoothly and efficiently as possible.

Tracey Schawsmidth