Sunday, April 08, 2001
Spring is Sprung!
What a glorious day! Yesterday was cold, rainy and positively yeechy. What a difference a day makes! As I write it is just shy of 20°C and bright with sun. The sunshine seems to have energized me, as I set outside to do some tidying up of the yard and porch. Also called my Aunt Edith in Britain to let her know of our intention to visit next month. Today was "my day", as Erika took Vanessa, to see a friend of hers who has twin girls. So after finishing off further yard-work, I set off to the ROM, this time to have a proper look at the Scythian Gold exhibit (I had a 5 minute look at it yesterday, but Vanessa was getting tired and was not terribly interested in it), as well as an unhurried look at in the ROM shops for a possible birthday present for Erika.
No such luck with regards to the present, but the "Legacy in Gold" exhibit about the nomadic Scythians of the Ukraine was well-worth taking a second look at. Have seen a number of these pieces illustrated before, but hadn't realized their origin. Many pieces are very Greek in origin, yet more lively (though often looking cruder to my eyes than their Greek equivalent). What I find amazing are that these were ostensibly nomadic peoples, and I find it amazing that they could construct such huge burial mounds, had their own accomplished goldsmiths, and lugged around with them large bronze drinking and storage vessels. There's more to this story to be revealed, I believe. Thought about picking of the catalog for the show, but $90 seemed a bit much.
Headed to The Eaton Centre afterwards, and ended ordering a copy of the board game Quarto, what looks to be a good travel book on London, and a small wooden "Frank Lloyd Wright" photo frame -- destined to contain an image of Vanessa -- as an ancillary birthday gift for Erika.
The evening was pleasant enough that we could eat outside on the patio, and Erika cooked a great meal (home cooking! Yum!) Before and after dinner Vanessa spent time with the two girls next door, playing ball, hide and go seek etc. I managed to spend some more time clearing up the back yard, including the dismantling of some cheesy garden lights installed by the previous owners.
In bed that night I mentioned that I thought it was a very good day; Erika smiled.
After work today, I headed with Vanessa down to the set of Death to Smoochy again, this time located at the Canadian Broadcasting Centre building downtown. In the voluminous indoor stages within the building, we tracked down Erika, who was fast asleep on a comfy couch during her break. After Vanessa woke her up, we headed up to the craft services area for a quick dinner. We came near the end of Erika's break, so we chowed down on some great catered food, while Erika headed back to set. Once we finished, we made our way gingerly to the sound stage, in case they were actively recording. In between the two sets of doors, we had a "celebrity moment", as we met director Danny DeVito in there, who had a pleasant word with Vanessa before letting us both onto the set.
And what a set! They were shooting the intro scene to Smoochy's "Smoochy-Land" set. We got there just in time to see the initial practice choreography for this scene with all of the dancing "Rhinettes" (Smoochy's cast of 8 or so midgets dressed in variously coloured rhino costumes), coming down a colourful hill set in the middle of an improbable forest containing purple logs, a giant tree festooned with multicoloured leaves, and a large painted grassy area. It all looks delightfully childlike and fake, which I am sure is the intention.
Vanessa was the center of attention by a good chunk of the crew, who all commented on the red "party shoes" she was wearing. At first Vanessa was rather overwhelmed by it all, but over the course of the following couple of hours began to get into things, and couldn't wait for them to shoot another take of the scene. During one of the extended breaks we both took her out to the set, where she played with the sound recordist's two kids who were also on set, running around wildly, playing Simon Says, inspecting the details of the film set and having a great time in general.
The whole time we were there, they shot only a single scene, which was the opening sequence for Smoochy's TV show. After the initial rehearsals -- with all of the actors partially suited up -- they brought on board a hundred or so children, from about 5 years on up, to the film set. While eating dinner, I ran into the bus driver for all of these kiddies, who told me that they all came from a Burlington dance/acting school. All were colourfully dressed, and behaved very well on set. After Danny gave them instructions on not looking directly into the camera, they commenced filming, at first with a camera up on a crane-mount, then with a camera at stage-level, then later with a steady-cam. All of this was filmed using the canned intro music, so there was very little for the sound department to do, other than to record the cheering of the kids at the end of the sequence for atmosphere. There was also a guy constantly stalking Danny and the principles with a hand-held video camera, so I think it's safe to say there's going to be a "behind the scenes" video or perhaps extra stuff for a DVD release when the movie eventual comes out.
Vanessa loved it when all of the kids came on the stage and danced with Smoochy, and though the offer was extended for her to dance with them, she shyly declined each time. I don't really know Ed Norton, and I couldn't get a real reading from him in terms of his character, though he did his Smoochy scenes well, putting across a lot of energy during his sing-and-dancing routine. Once the dance sequence was over, he was very workmanlike in checking out how the scene looked during playback. I remember a small bevy of girls who were all excited about the possibility of meeting him, talking about who should go up to see him first. He didn't go out of his way to make it easy for them unfortunately, but then perhaps he could be quite rightly be sick of such incidents after doing much of the big scenes in the movie in the company of young kids -- though notably Danny did his best to make the kids comfortable and play things up for laughs.
The whole thing was a big blast for me, and I enjoyed seeing the scene filmed over and over (for perhaps a half-dozen times or so) as much as Vanessa. It reminded me of when I was a young child on the set of the old TV show Uncle Bobby many, many years ago, and it was nice to introduce Vanessa to the fantasy-land of movies, and to see how much work and practice goes into it.
What a glorious day! Yesterday was cold, rainy and positively yeechy. What a difference a day makes! As I write it is just shy of 20°C and bright with sun. The sunshine seems to have energized me, as I set outside to do some tidying up of the yard and porch. Also called my Aunt Edith in Britain to let her know of our intention to visit next month. Today was "my day", as Erika took Vanessa, to see a friend of hers who has twin girls. So after finishing off further yard-work, I set off to the ROM, this time to have a proper look at the Scythian Gold exhibit (I had a 5 minute look at it yesterday, but Vanessa was getting tired and was not terribly interested in it), as well as an unhurried look at in the ROM shops for a possible birthday present for Erika.
No such luck with regards to the present, but the "Legacy in Gold" exhibit about the nomadic Scythians of the Ukraine was well-worth taking a second look at. Have seen a number of these pieces illustrated before, but hadn't realized their origin. Many pieces are very Greek in origin, yet more lively (though often looking cruder to my eyes than their Greek equivalent). What I find amazing are that these were ostensibly nomadic peoples, and I find it amazing that they could construct such huge burial mounds, had their own accomplished goldsmiths, and lugged around with them large bronze drinking and storage vessels. There's more to this story to be revealed, I believe. Thought about picking of the catalog for the show, but $90 seemed a bit much.
Headed to The Eaton Centre afterwards, and ended ordering a copy of the board game Quarto, what looks to be a good travel book on London, and a small wooden "Frank Lloyd Wright" photo frame -- destined to contain an image of Vanessa -- as an ancillary birthday gift for Erika.
The evening was pleasant enough that we could eat outside on the patio, and Erika cooked a great meal (home cooking! Yum!) Before and after dinner Vanessa spent time with the two girls next door, playing ball, hide and go seek etc. I managed to spend some more time clearing up the back yard, including the dismantling of some cheesy garden lights installed by the previous owners.
In bed that night I mentioned that I thought it was a very good day; Erika smiled.Friday, April 06, 2001
Return to Death to SmoochyAfter work today, I headed with Vanessa down to the set of Death to Smoochy again, this time located at the Canadian Broadcasting Centre building downtown. In the voluminous indoor stages within the building, we tracked down Erika, who was fast asleep on a comfy couch during her break. After Vanessa woke her up, we headed up to the craft services area for a quick dinner. We came near the end of Erika's break, so we chowed down on some great catered food, while Erika headed back to set. Once we finished, we made our way gingerly to the sound stage, in case they were actively recording. In between the two sets of doors, we had a "celebrity moment", as we met director Danny DeVito in there, who had a pleasant word with Vanessa before letting us both onto the set.
And what a set! They were shooting the intro scene to Smoochy's "Smoochy-Land" set. We got there just in time to see the initial practice choreography for this scene with all of the dancing "Rhinettes" (Smoochy's cast of 8 or so midgets dressed in variously coloured rhino costumes), coming down a colourful hill set in the middle of an improbable forest containing purple logs, a giant tree festooned with multicoloured leaves, and a large painted grassy area. It all looks delightfully childlike and fake, which I am sure is the intention.
Vanessa was the center of attention by a good chunk of the crew, who all commented on the red "party shoes" she was wearing. At first Vanessa was rather overwhelmed by it all, but over the course of the following couple of hours began to get into things, and couldn't wait for them to shoot another take of the scene. During one of the extended breaks we both took her out to the set, where she played with the sound recordist's two kids who were also on set, running around wildly, playing Simon Says, inspecting the details of the film set and having a great time in general.
The whole time we were there, they shot only a single scene, which was the opening sequence for Smoochy's TV show. After the initial rehearsals -- with all of the actors partially suited up -- they brought on board a hundred or so children, from about 5 years on up, to the film set. While eating dinner, I ran into the bus driver for all of these kiddies, who told me that they all came from a Burlington dance/acting school. All were colourfully dressed, and behaved very well on set. After Danny gave them instructions on not looking directly into the camera, they commenced filming, at first with a camera up on a crane-mount, then with a camera at stage-level, then later with a steady-cam. All of this was filmed using the canned intro music, so there was very little for the sound department to do, other than to record the cheering of the kids at the end of the sequence for atmosphere. There was also a guy constantly stalking Danny and the principles with a hand-held video camera, so I think it's safe to say there's going to be a "behind the scenes" video or perhaps extra stuff for a DVD release when the movie eventual comes out.
Vanessa loved it when all of the kids came on the stage and danced with Smoochy, and though the offer was extended for her to dance with them, she shyly declined each time. I don't really know Ed Norton, and I couldn't get a real reading from him in terms of his character, though he did his Smoochy scenes well, putting across a lot of energy during his sing-and-dancing routine. Once the dance sequence was over, he was very workmanlike in checking out how the scene looked during playback. I remember a small bevy of girls who were all excited about the possibility of meeting him, talking about who should go up to see him first. He didn't go out of his way to make it easy for them unfortunately, but then perhaps he could be quite rightly be sick of such incidents after doing much of the big scenes in the movie in the company of young kids -- though notably Danny did his best to make the kids comfortable and play things up for laughs.
The whole thing was a big blast for me, and I enjoyed seeing the scene filmed over and over (for perhaps a half-dozen times or so) as much as Vanessa. It reminded me of when I was a young child on the set of the old TV show Uncle Bobby many, many years ago, and it was nice to introduce Vanessa to the fantasy-land of movies, and to see how much work and practice goes into it.
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