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So the day came when I had to make the phone call. My cousin had warned me that her father-in-law was the quiet, stoic type and that he would probably say very little when talking to me but not to be put off by that. So I dialed his number and waited as the number rang. He picked up and I introduced myself. He remembered me (I had him perform the ceremony at my Mom & Dad's 50th wedding anniversary when they renewed their vows), and I thanked him for letting us use his junkyard. Then I told him about the things that he might find objectionable. The phone was silent on his end as I reiterated the fact that the junkyard was crucial to the making of the movie. Finally, he said that he co-owned the junkyard with his brother, and that they would have to talk it over before making a final decision. Damn. I had hoped to settle this one way or the other right then. But I thanked him and said I would call back in a few nights to hear what he had to say.

Meanwhile, I had the best actor, Olev, from the auditions come over to my house for a call back. He sat with the other two already cast, David and Windham, and did a great job. 90% perfect reading of the lines. I told him I would send him the script to read, then we would talk further. After he left, I discussed him with the co-stars, and we all agreed that we liked him a lot. I emailed him the script and moved on to my next order of business: finding a SPFX makeup artist. A friend of mine put me in touch with Travis Pates, who got excited about the project and loved the script. We talked on the phone and discussed what makeup effects would be needed, as well as a timeframe for creating them.

THE night came, and I called the junkyard owner, only to get his voicemail. I left a message, reminding him that I was calling to see about the junkyard and if he'd made a decision. Now, in the meantime, a fellow director had turned me on to SAG's Ultra-Low-Budget Independent Film Option, that would allow me to use SAG actors in my movie. I faxed over the paperwork to a SAG office, and the director warned me that I would be getting a thick stack of papers in the mail to fill out. The site mentioned that someone would call, and after three days of silence, I got nervous, but the same director told me that if no one was calling, it probably meant that everything was actually all right.

The producer of our movie was still very excited about the film and invited me and my husband down to San Diego to talk about the production some more. This would be over Easter weekend. We agreed, thinking that it would be nice to get out of L.A. for a day or two.

An email from Olev said that he had not yet read the script, but he would get to it by the end of the week. This struck me as weird, as I thought an actor really excited about a project would tackle it right away.

I discovered a voicemail on my cell phone.  I felt sweat break out on the back of my neck as I hit "Play". It was the owner of the junkyard. He had discussed things with his brother and decided that we could use the junkyard, but any shots with nudity or swearing had to be done somewhere else. Whew. At least we could shoot the majority of the film there, and the guy's son told me there was another junkyard up the road owned by a friend of theirs where we could shoot the "blue" stuff, as he'd have no problem with it. So the location was locked.

Now, I needed to complete the casting. I still had not heard from Olev about the script, and I had three female parts to cast, two with nudity. Travis, the spfx makeup man called and said he had set up a head casting session for our guest star, and could I bring him to L.A. then take him over there? I asked who was doing it, and he told me: Rob Burman. I called our celeb actor and asked him if he was free that weekend. He said yes. So I made arrangements to go to LAX that Saturday to pick up the person I had decided would bring a "name" to my film: Evil Ed from FRIGHT NIGHT...Stephen Geoffreys.

To be continued...

DOCTOR 13

Guys, I've been really busy, but I'll try to catch up with you!

Time was passing quickly. I still needed about half my cast, including one of my three male leads. I put the call out to some director friends of mine, Sean Abley and Rob Williams, asking them if they could recommend anyone. Sean couldn't but Rob told me to check out Jon Gale. I liked his IMDB page and contacted him, asking if he would audition. He was SAG, as well as Windham Beacham, but he agreed. I went back to the list of guys who'd been to the first audition but were no-shows, and realized that one of the ones I'd really been interested in seeing, an actor named Benjamin Lutz, was one of the ones to not appear. I contacted him, asking if he would be interested in trying again, and he enthusiastically agreed, saying he'd missed the first audition because another one had kept him too late. I sent the script to both men, making sure they had no objections to anything in the movie. They were fine.

That night came, and Jon Gale was up first. My immediate impression of him (mirrored by his own concerns) was that he was too old for the part. Brewster, the truck driver, was to be played by a man in his late 20's/early 30's and Jon was definitely in his 40's. I had him read and thanked him for coming. I thought he was very good, and that perhaps he could play one of the smaller roles. Then Benjamin came in. Dark, handsome and tall, physically he fit the part very well. Could he act? He read the scenes and did very well. I gave him some direction and he took my notes and incorporated them. After he left, I talked about him with Windham and David, his co-stars, and they agreed that they thought he'd work well. I called Benjamin the next day and congratulated him on getting the part.

The weeks began to pass quickly. I flew a quick trip to Indiana for one day to check out our locations. Jennifer, our unit production manager, showed me a small junkyard. It was basically a bare yard with a small pile of junk in one corner. "What would we shoot here?" I asked. "The 'blue' material that we can't shoot at Franklin Salvage?"

She hemmed and hawed, then said that maybe we could shoot the entire movie there. Impossible. But I realized something was wrong. "What's up?" I asked her. "Is your father-in-law having second thoughts about us shooting in his junkyard?" She said that he had given us permission and he wouldn't take it away, but he WAS having doubts about us being there, moaning to his wife and family that he had made a big mistake. I told Jennifer that we wouldn't put the name of the scrapyard on the film and that no one would know, but she said that people in the local community would know and tease him. WTF?

So I asked her about the other scrapyard she had mentioned earlier, the one where we could shoot the "blue" material. It was called S.I.R., she told me, and she would take me there. We arrived at this new location and it was awesome: PAVED roads, mountains of scrap metal, large spaces, cranes and wrecked cars. We walked onto the property and a large man with frizzy hair approached us. "Can I help you?"

I told him that I was a director from L.A. who was making a low-budget film and needed a junkyard to shoot in. "This isn't a junkyard," he said, winking, "this is a scrapyard. The junkyard is up the road," referring to Franklin Salvage. "But sure, we'd love to have you shoot here," he said, "let me show you around." My mouth dropped open as he took us around the place, showing us areas where we could put the truck at night, a building where the crew could eat, hang out, store equipment, use the bathroom, kitchen facilities and a makeup room. As we walked around, I grabbed Jennifer's arm. "Look at that," I said.

Along one side of the yard was a 12-door loading dock! This was a location we had been trying to find, but with little luck, and now, here it was! "Let us know anything you need," the guy said. "We'll move scrap around for you, build big piles or flatten them out. Anything you want." My head was swimming as a pickup truck pulled up. It was the on-site manager. Our guide talked to him briefly, trying to convince him that we weren't playing some kind of practical joke. His name was Jeff and he said yes, they would accomodate us any way they could. I told him we needed a pickup truck to set fire to, and he said that would be fine and they would even give us a truck to use. He showed us how to climb onto the roof of a building to get high-angle shots and how to open and close loading bay doors. I told him that we were going to have lots of violence, gore, blood and female nudity. Would that be a problem? "The only problem with that," he said, "is trying to keep my men away when you're shooting it." So basically, I told him, we need to be able to show up at 7:00 each evening, have the run of the place, then leave about 5am, then do that for 14 nights. For free. He shrugged his shoulders and said it would be fine.

"I do have to okay this with corporate headquarters," he said, "but it shouldn't be a problem." I shook his hand and we left. As I slid into the SUV seat, I looked at Jennifer and said, "That was INSANELY easy." She agreed.

Next, my brother and I drove to a state wildlife reserve to check out the trestle bridge. There it was, big and green and made of steel, looming over a river. It was perfect. It was three miles deep inside the reserve, and I thought we could shoot the scenes there guerilla-style and not ask for permission. Great! There was also a really picturesque country road we could use, a little cemetery if we needed it, and after hiking a quarter-mile through the woods, my brother showed me the ruins of an old mill and a deep dark tunnel with a creek running through it. Nice location, but not for this movie, I thought.

Back in L.A., I started looking for actresses to play the small roles of the waitress, Stephen Geoffreys wife, and the Vampire Girl. I also had to do my script breakdown, my storyboards, my shot list, find crew people local to Indiana and cast the role of the junkyard owner, the vampire men and find a trained dog. I sent all the materials that SAG required for the Ultra-Low Budget Agreement in to them, confident that this would all go smoothly, but I was mistaken. Windham was an amazing actor, but his affiliation with SAG would cause major problems, the first of which would pop its head up within two days.

To be continued...

DOCTOR 13