Tora, Tora, Taxi

This post appeared, in a slightly different form, first in my e-newsletter I WAS BIGFOOT'S SHEMP. 

Although principal photography on my new feature SMART HOUSE really starts on Saturday, I feel like I pre-gamed a bit this past weekend.  I drove to the Farmland Community Center, where I shot scenes for both THE GIRL IN THE CRAWLSPACE and SCARECROW COUNTY, to record some voice over with Katy Wolfe. I got to see that the Cake Walk, which my late beloved dog once won a cake for me on, is still there; that this exists confounded many of my Ohio cast and crew, who could not understand our ways.

It was neat to be back in that space where I had several long days but good memories.  Katy and several people from the cast of both of those previous movies perform in plays and recreate old time radio shows there, and I arrived on a performance day and got to catch up with some familiar faces.

You only hear Katy on the phone, but she has a big role.  A lot of SMART HOUSE is about people trapped in various circumstances, physical and psychological, but even though Katy's character Alicia is blind and seems housebound she in fact galvanizes the other characters into action.  Naturally, she is named after Alicia Masters, the blind sculptor in the FANTASTIC FOUR comics.

Then I raced over to Dayton for a last-minute production meeting with producer/director of photography Henrique Couto to go over gear and crunch the production schedule, even though the main thing is that I wanted to eat at Marion's, the legendary Dayton pizzeria.

I've been getting up early, working through lunch, and working every night (while my wife is working out some Hank Williams Jr. on the guitar) so we can go straight to post and deliver this film sooner than I have my previous two.  The main reason is we have been fortunate to already secure streaming and physical media distribution for the film, based on the strength of our previous films under the Midwest Film Venture banner, so not only are you loyal readers hopefully eager to see this movie, but some people who are giving us money are, too.

I updated the production schedule Sunday, based on notes from that glorious pizza meeting, wrote out a prop list Monday, figured out the food for the weekend last night, and still have a ton of things to do. 

Tonight I want to spray paint a coffee can to hide the logo and then find a bunch of old thumb drives to put in it (IT MAKES SENSE IN THE MOVIE--maybe).  Then tomorrow I'll go hunting two cheap, identical plates, one I can smash on the floor, for another scene.  I've got dinner with writer/producer Richard Pierce on Friday, all the way from Vegas with his family, and some of the crew is coming in to sleep in my grandsons' room.  We will have a lot to talk about, for sure.

Speaking of props, I like including art from people I know in my movies.  In CRAWLSPACE, all of the "Outcast Swords" RPG art was from my friends Ray Otus and Dyson Logos as well as actor Tom Cherry.  There was a tee shirt from Tim Shrum (who did the killer's mask) and one from Steven Paul Judd.  They are all blink or you miss it things, but I was glad to have friends represented in there.  Same with SCARECROW COUNTY, with cartooning from actors Tom Cherry and Rachael Redolfi as well as director Joe Sherlock and screenwriter Dan Wilder.

For this one I decided to use a shirt designed by Ashlee Britt, who worked on the crew of SCARECROW.  It just sort of caught my eye, and I am going to have Tom Cherry wear it throughout.  If you think it is cool also you can get it on sale right here.

Speaking if shirts, if you want to look hip in front of all of your friends this holiday season you can also grab this boss Midwest Film Venture tee now.

If you don't already follow me on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter, go hunt me down at @johnoakdalton to ride along with all of our adventures, big and small, this first weekend of shooting.  And I will check back in with more secret content, on the other side.  Thanks for reading.