Tag: Los Angeles

Life Changing African Adventure: Judge at National Drama Festival in Zimbabwe

THIS IS A REPRINT OF A STORY FROM OCTOBER 2016. START OF A NEW SERIES CALLED AFRICAN ADVENTURES.

National Flag and Symbol of Zimbabwe

THE START

In 2012, I accepted an offer to take a temporary job in Africa. At the time I did not know that this opportunity would quite literally change the entire fabric of my life. This trip would be so much more than just an adventure but in fact would be an overwhelming experience that would lead me to change the entire direction and focus of my life.

In 2011, my life was kind of falling apart. A three-year relationship with a woman who I loved very much had ended. I was still reeling from the aftermath of the world-wide economic downtown that had closed my real estate investment business and was forcing my house toward foreclosure. To cover the expenses of running my suddenly upside-down house, I was renting out every extra bedroom that I had to college students who went to school at the close-by University of Southern California. My only other income at the time was running a small non-profit theatre where I served as Producing Artistic Director. Theatre is one of the great passions of my life, but after 25 years leading a small non-profit arts group, I was exhausted and burned out.

I desperately needed a break, or as one friend put it best – “I needed an escape from my own life”. Yet, there was no lifeline nor escape. As my house edged ever closer to foreclosure, my despair grew, and my options were shrinking fast. It was at that moment that one morning an email arrived in my inbox. It was an email that I had been expecting, but I was not really sure how I felt about it. I had been communicating about a possible gig job with an arts group in Zimbabwe. One of my former theatre students when I taught at Pepperdine University in Malibu, CA., was from Zimbabwe, and her mother was a volunteer administrator for this organization. My former student had put us together and on a lark, I had applied to work for them.

Harare, Zimbabwe – Capitol city of Zimbabwe

THE JOB

The job was to be the Judge or Adjudicator for a national drama festival that takes place in Zimbabwe every year. The drama festival was part of an even larger series of arts festivals run by a group known as the National Institute of Allied Arts. The National Institute of Allied Arts is a 100-year-old volunteer organization founded by the British colonials to instill public speaking, drama, music, literature and visual arts into the white children of Zimbabwe. But over time and with the change of governments and Zimbabwe getting its freedom in 1980, the organization become one of the first to open its doors to all the children of Zim. Every year about 30 thousand+ children take part in 4 festivals a year in music, visual arts, literature and drama.

If hired I would be the first American to adjudicate their national drama festival. The job would take about 2 to 3 weeks and the adjudicator would see about 15000 children perform in various theatre and public speaking categories. The job paid a small salary and promised all living expenses would be covered. The catch was the adjudicator had to figure out a way to get to Zimbabwe and pay for it themselves. But who ever came as a reward, they would be given a two-week tour around Zimbabwe. They would see places with names that I had never heard but would soon become very familiar with in the coming weeks and years. Places like Harare, the capital city, Kwekwe, Gweru, Great Zim, Matopos National Park, Vic Falls, Bulawayo, and so many more.

The email offered me the job and seeing this as the escape that I needed and desperately wanted, I quickly said yes. The Festival would be in June and so the plans began in earnest. Being broke and not having the money to pay for the trip, I lied and told them I did. I swiftly started a campaign to raise the money. I wrote a small grant through my theatre, held a garage sale, and ran a Kickstarter fundraising campaign. Plus I also got 500 dollars from the US Embassy in Zimbabwe, but more on that later. In a matter of 3 weeks, I raised the 1500 dollars needed for the flight.

Zimbabwe here I come!!!

With the help of another friend, I managed to get a small guest teaching job in Rome, Italy for a week on the way back from Zimbabwe. I would spend a week there and then have two weeks of traveling very cheaply in Europe. Upon my return to the US, I would still be broke but maybe not in despair anymore.

LAX in Los Angeles

Wednesday, June 13, 2012, Los Angeles
Still I leave in 4 days. The rush to get everything done. What to pack? How much is too much or too little? The excitement! The fear! Of flying and being away for over two months! The voice of my doctor in my head. Don’t eat that, don’t drink that, wash all your food yourself, sanitize everything, don’t touch anything – really? People live there, what do they do? I am sure that every person who goes out to dinner in a large city in Africa does not ask to wash the vegetables. Next he would have told me not to breathe the air just to be on the safe side.

There are certainly concerns about health issues, I get that. Drink bottled water, be careful what you eat, be observant of the things around you. But if we are all that cautious, we would never leave our home. As Ben Franklin said – “all things in moderation.” I find that to still be one of the best pieces of advice every given. Try everything, do everything – just be reasonable about it.

I rented my own personal room out at my house. So even if I want to come back – I have to sleep on the couch. So, I might as well just stay overseas, right.
I am packing for two different hemispheres, and it is crazy. Winter in one place – seems mild in Zimbabwe. Pleasant days, chilly nights. It will be blazing hot in Rome in mid-July. You need to bring enough, but you want to travel light. Ahh, adventures in packing. And of course, it never fails no matter how organized you are when you are somewhere over the Atlantic, you remember that “most important” item aside from your passport that you left behind.
I leave in 4 days. The adventure begins. Whether I am ready or not. The plane leaves in 4 days. I am on it!!

“A journey is like marriage. The certain way to be wrong is to think you control it.” – John Steinbeck

Delayed passengers inside Terminal 7 at Los Angeles International Airport line up to go through TSA security check following a false alarm event in Los Angeles, California U.S August 28, 2016. REUTERS/Bob Riha Jr

Monday, June 18, 2012, DAY 0. Los Angeles.

I take off in 3 hours. After 8 months of work and luck and reaching out, it is about to happen. I take a red eye to DC. to meet my plane to Addis Abeba, Ethiopia. Than on from there to Harare. There are no words to describe how I feel at the moment. Excitement, fear, apprehension, joy all mixed up together. Here is praying for a safe journey to Harare. If you have good thoughts, please send them along.

My way to Zimbabwe – Ethiopian Airlines

“The whole object of travel is not to set foot on foreign land; it is at last to set foot on one’s own country as a foreign land.” – G. K. Chesterton ]

Next update from DC on Day 1. Cheers –

Starstruck: Mel Gibson and My Cat’s Unexpected Meeting

The true real life encounter of my cat with Mel Gibson.
Part of a new series about my real life in Hollywood-
Up In The Attic.

In a bygone era, I was the proud owner of a quaint theatre nestled in the heart of Hollywood—the Attic Theatre. My partner, Denise Reagan Wiesenmeyer, and I ran this cozy establishment, complete with a 50-seat auditorium, a small company of actors, administrative offices, and a rear dance studio that we leased out for classes and rehearsals.

Our theatre found its home in an aging edifice on Santa Monica Blvd. The building itself had witnessed decades of history as it was right in the middle of film soundstages, lighting and equipment companies, small production companies and the industrial part of the film business. I knew little of its early days, except for a fascinating tidbit: during World War II, the building had housed a parachute factory. Back then, parachutes were a novelty and considered a military weapon, and the building stood under military watch as these life-saving contraptions were meticulously packed.

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The building’s owner, an elderly gentleman, treated it as a mere revenue stream. Maintenance was an afterthought, and the structure bore the scars of neglect. I acquired the theatre from a man named Bill Sorrell, who, along with the Swayze brothers—Patrick and Donnie—had birthed the Attic Theatre. The Swayze siblings, fresh from Texas, had ventured to Hollywood with their wives, eager to make their mark in the film industry. Their fateful collaboration with Bill Sorrell gave rise to the Attic Theatre.

Perched on the second floor of the ancient building, the Attic Theatre became our creative haven. Denise and I assumed control in 1987, launching a vibrant repertoire of plays. By 1990, we had also taken over abandoned office space within the same structure and fashioned a humble four-room apartment complete with a kitchen. It lacked opulence but offered proximity to our artistic endeavors.

The old building 2016. The Attic was on the second floor left side. Building was shut down in 2001 and we moved to Culver City area.

As struggling artists, our lives revolved around the theater. We juggled outside jobs to make ends meet, but the Attic was our sanctuary—a realm where autonomy reigned supreme. No one dictated our choices; we were masters of our own destiny.

Our little theatre somehow defied the odds. Despite our shoestring budget and the building’s faded grandeur, the Attic Theatre thrived. We churned out good plays and sometimes even great productions. We were earning a reputation as a haven for artists—a place where creativity blossomed, and dreams took flight.

I had taken a brief business trip and Denise, my capable partner, held down the fort while I was away. She was the beating heart of our operation, both a good administrator and a wonderful theatre producer. Upon my return, we convened to discuss the theatre business and that is when she told me that a company by the name of Icon Productions had booked the dance studio for a reading of a screenplay. The name immediately caught my attention because I knew Icon Productions was Mel Gibson’s production company. In the early ’90s, Mel wasn’t just an actor; he was a cinematic force, weaving tales both in front of and behind the camera as a producer and director. I was shocked that such a prestigious outfit would choose our modest theatre. Our place, though well-maintained, was a little low rent for a major film company to use for their reading.

ICON Image

I kept the news from Denise. She idolized Mel Gibson, and I didn’t want to raise her hopes prematurely. But curiosity gnawed at me. Why here?

Days later, the phone rang—a production manager for Icon Productions was on the line. His concern? Parking. The executives attending the reading needed ample space. I inquired about the headcount: around 30. Our parking lot, alas, was a postage stamp—a handful of spots shared among tenants. I explained this to the manager, emphasizing that the spaces weren’t mine to allocate and that the executives would have to park on the street or arrange other alternatives. He assured me that this would not be a problem.

Mel Gibson as he is today.

It was then that I informed Denise that it was Mel Gibson’s company who was renting our space and that he might be there. She became so excited that I thought she was going to faint. Even though the production meeting for Mel Gibson’s company was still two days away, she went back there and immediately started cleaning up the studio to make it look as perfect for Mel Gibson as she could.

The day finally arrived—and my worst fears came true. The Hollywood elite, their luxury cars began arriving and filling the parking lot. Land Rovers, Mercedes, Jaguars—all vying for our meager parking spaces. The other tenants, unaccustomed to this overflow, erupted in protest. I was caught in the crossfire, played reluctant traffic cop, my pleas drowned out by irate voices.

The production manager, seemingly impervious to chaos, stood his ground. Executives, he declared, wouldn’t be relegated to street parking. Our arrangement meant nothing to him. I told him that maybe the cars would be towed by the other businesses. He shrugged his shoulders and walked away. I watched helplessly as the luxury cars multiplied, stacking atop one another while the other businesses’ patrons were relegated to the curb, and the tenants hurled colorful expletives my way.

And there, amidst the parking mayhem, Denise was star-struck. She’d met Mel, her eyes wide as saucers, and guided him upstairs. The plain and unassuming rehearsal studio was now filled with high powered movie execs including Mel Gibson as the executive producer, while production assistants scurried, setting tables, arranging chairs, and stocking coolers with drinks and lunch.

Example of a table read for a film. This was not Mr. Gibson’s read.

The script that they were reading was a new one that they were considering producing as a movie. There were no other movie stars there besides Mel. It was just executives hearing the production assistants read the movie out loud to see what they thought about it.

Occasionally Denise would go to the rehearsal hall to check if they needed anything, but I think it was secretly to see Mel. Down in the parking lot I had morphed from theater manager/owner to an impromptu parking valet, my frustration simmering beneath a veneer of professionalism. Yet, I wanted to keep their business in case they ever come back. Often, I would go upstairs to get keys from the production manager for a certain car to move so the other tenants’ customers could use the space. I was pissed off, but I just wanted to get through the day. They were booked for only four hours, and I managed to hold off the other businesses owners until finally it was over. Than all the executives began to leave and all the luxury cars that had been crammed into our parking lot like sardines, now vanished into the afternoon traffic. Eventually, everyone was gone, and I walked up to the office.  

Denise, her starstruck glow undiminished, wanted to thank Mel personally. So, we wandered back through the theatre, through the backstage, and opened the connecting door to the rehearsal hall.

Now remember we lived at the theatre space, and we had a cat. Our cat was named Squirrel, a beautiful female that we’d had since just after she was born. One day, a few years before, a very tiny kitten had somehow managed to survive extremely busy Santa Monica Blvd and had wandered up the stairs to our theatre and just sat there. Denise did not live with me at the time and so I tried to shoo the cat away, but she wouldn’t leave. So eventually I fed the tiny little kitten, and from then I belonged to her. Cats have a way of just kind of staking their claim on you and that’s what Squirrel did. There’s an old saying about cats that goes “dogs have owners, cats have staff”, and it is very true. Our cat got her name when Denise moved in because of the way she bounced and ran around all over the place like a crazy squirrel out in your front yard.

Mel Gibson as he looked at the time of kicking Squirrel

So, Squirrel had followed us back as we were saying goodbye to Mel Gibson and the production manager who had booked the space. There were still 2 production assistants there folding up the tables and chairs and packing up the food. Now Mel Gibson is not a big man. He is probably about 5’6 or 5’7 and had on cowboy boots to jack him up another couple of inches. Most leading men in Hollywood are actually quite short. He seemed fairly nice, and both Denise and I were fans of his. She was more gaga than I was, but I was very impressed that Mel Gibson was standing in my business.

While we are standing around saying our goodbyes, Squirrel who was a very people friendly feline was wandering around and she rubbed up against Mel Gibson’ leg. Inexplicably Mel Gibson drew back his boot and forcefully kicked Squirrel about 6 feet across the rehearsal room.

OWWWWWW!

I was shocked at his action and quickly checked to see if my cat was ok. I looked over at Denise, and the look on her face made it clear she was as upset as I was. Turning to Mel Gibson, I asked, “Why did you just kick my cat?”

Mel Gibson looked at me and said, “I don’t like cats. I don’t want them anywhere around me.”

I responded, “Well she’s our cat and this is her house. She only trying to be friendly.”

Mel Gibson said, “I don’t give a damn! Keep the cat away from me.”

Maybe it’s because I was irritated from 4 hours of re-parking the cars of over privileged and inconsiderate movie executives who had showed no regard for my business or the people who worked in the building, yet without hesitation, I told Mel Gibson, “I think it’s time for you to leave.”

Everybody in the room froze. The two production assistants regarded me with astonishment, as if I had blasphemed the Almighty.  The production manager was completely shocked. Mel regarded me for a second and said, “Well, you have a crappy theatre anyway.”

I said, “That may be true, but you’ve already paid me for it. Have a good day.”

At which point Mel Gibson turned, and he and his big cowboy boots stomped loudly down the wooden stairs to the parking lot. After he had quit stomping down the stairs, the production manager turned to me, “People don’t speak to Mr. Gibson that way.”

“Well people don’t kick my cat either. When you guys get all packed up, you can go as well.” I asked Denise to make sure that they left, and I picked up our bewildered cat and went back to our apartment.

I understood that some people have an aversion for cats for whatever reason, but you do not go into someone’s home or business and kick their cat that hard. I thought it was very arrogant and a cruel way to treat someone else’s animal and pet.

Mel’s mug shot after his arrest.

It was a few years later that, Mel Gibson had his major blowout with the Jewish policeman who pulled him over for drunk driving in Malibu, California. Mel berated the man, calling him all kinds of ethnic and racial slurs. When I heard the story, I was not shocked. During our encounter in the rehearsal room, I had concluded that he didn’t seem like a very nice man.

I’m still a Mel Gibson fan to a degree. I think he’s a wonderful director and a good actor, but I probably would not want to speak to him if given the opportunity. That is the true story of when Mel Gibson kicked my cat.

When Denise left to move back to Illinois because of an illness in 2000, the new owner of the building began trying to force all the tenants out. He raised our rent 4 times in 4 months. I was forced to move the theatre to the Culver City area on Washington Blvd and continued running it until 2016 when I sold the theatre company to another group.

The front door to the old Attic Theatre in Hollywood. Building is now vacant.

For the official record, I hereby attest that the following account is my own personal recollection of the events that transpired, over a quarter-century ago, within the confines of my theatre. The building is still standing on Santa Monica Blvd., though now abandoned since the year 2001. The other tenants and businesses have all gone or moved. I am unconnected to their present whereabouts.

My dearest friend and confidante, Denise, she passed away in 2007, her laughter and camaraderie forever etched in my heart.

As for the employees of Mr. Gibson and his company, I never knew them or their names, and have no idea where they currently may be.

The building as it looks now in 2023. Completely abandoned and derelict.

COPYRIGHT 2024 – CAREY ON CREATIVE, LLC., ATLANTA, GA.

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Buy This New Book

The new book of short stories by James Carey. On sale at Amazon and Kindle.

Subject: Exclusive Pre-Sale Offer: “Three Days in Hamburg & Other Stories”

Dear Friends, Family, and Esteemed Subscribers,

I want to thank you for being readers of TripswithJames. I have enjoy writing my articles for you over the years about travel and the film business. I’m truly thrilled to announce the pre-sale launch of my debut book, Three Days in Hamburg & Other Stories. 📚✨ I could use your assistance in making my first book a success.

About the Book:

Three Days in Hamburg & Other Stories is a collection of eleven captivating tales that will transport you to intriguing worlds. From crumbling marriages to lost fortunes, superpowered aliens to Viking zombies, these stories promise excitement, mystery, and unexpected twists.

Why You Should Grab Your Copy:

  1. Early Access: Be among the first to delve into these enchanting narratives before the official release.
  2. Special Price: For a limited time, the e-book is available at an unbeatable price of $0.99.
  3. Support a Dream: By purchasing during the pre-sale, you contribute to making this book a bestseller.

AMAZON LINK – http://amazon.com/author/jrc.128

How You Can Help:

  1. Order Now: Visit Amazon and secure your copy.
  2. Spread the Word: Share this exciting news with your book-loving friends and family.
  3. Leave a Review: After reading, leave an honest review on Amazon—it makes a world of difference!

AMAZON LINK – http://amazon.com/author/jrc.128

Let’s Make It a Bestseller:

Our goal? To achieve bestseller status by May 1, 2024. With your support, we can make it happen!

Thank you for being part of this incredible journey. Let’s celebrate the magic of storytelling together.

Amazon Pre-Sale Link – http://amazon.com/author/jrc.128

Warm regards,

James R. Carey Author, Three Days in Hamburg & Other Stories

P.S. Remember, this special pre-sale price won’t last long. Grab your copy now: Amazon Pre-Sale Link – http://amazon.com/author/jrc.128

MY NEW BOOK – THREE DAYS IN HAMBURG & OTHER STORIES – NOW ON SALE AT AMAZON.COM

James R. Carey’s debut on Amazon at $0.99 at www.amazon.com/author.jrc.128 , the book comprises personal, fantasy, and memory-based stories. The title short story, inspired by his own dissolving marriage amid the pandemic, is a semi-true story based on real life events.

This is my first book – one of several to come I hope. You can find it on Amazon.com for the price of $0.99 as a presale special. I hope that enough people will buy it and make it head for bestseller status. (One can dream).

Follow the link www.amazon.com/author/jrc.128 and that will take you directly to my Author page and you can buy directly from there. An excerpt to the title story follow below.

EXCERPT FROM THREE DAYS IN HAMBURG

“My cell phone rang at exactly 11 PM. I picked it up and looked at the caller ID. It was my wife. The call caught me by surprise as we had been having some tough times for the past few months. She was calling from Hamburg, Germany, where she had gone to visit her mother. There’s a 9-hour time difference between Hamburg and our home in West Adams, an area of Los Angeles where we had lived for 5 years. That made it 8 AM in the morning there. We hadn’t talked on the phone for a week, and our few emails to each other had been very terse.

“Hey, how are you?” I asked as I answered the phone.

Silence.

“Hey, can you hear me… Are you there…?”

“Yes, I’m here,” she answered in her odd combination of American & German accent. Something that I had always found very sexy.

“What’s going on? Everything okay?”

“Look I need to talk to you about something very important,” she said in a very flat voice. Hackles rose on the back of my neck and red flags began to appear. “I have been doing a lot of thinking, and I’m calling to tell you that I’m not coming back.”

“For how long? Is everything okay with your mother?” I asked, still unsure which direction this conversation was going to go.

“Mother is fine. I’m calling to tell you that I’m not coming back to you. I’m going to stay in Hamburg for a few more months, and when I come back, I’ll probably file for divorce.”

“What the fuck?”

“Look I don’t want to fight with you about this, please?” she said in a stern voice, cutting me off. “We just do this all the time. I’m tired of the tension. I’m tired of the arguments. I’m tired of being tired and stressed. I love you very much, but I just can’t go on living like this. So please respect my decision. Don’t call me and don’t write me one of your long angry emails. I just can’t take it. Please. And if you do call me, I’m just not going to respond. Okay? I love you, but I just can’t live like this anymore. I’m sorry.” With that, she hung up.

Shocked, I sat staring at the wall for what seemed like hours. Yes, we had not been doing well but I didn’t think it was this far gone. She went to Germany about three weeks before to celebrate her mother’s 70th birthday and to take a break from us and the tension in our house. It was the middle of the semester and I had not been able to leave my teaching gig. I had Face-Timed with my mother-in-law on her birthday and had briefly spoken to my wife. Things had seemed to be okay at least for the moment. This came as a major surprise.

Then I got angry. Really angry. I tried to call her back, but of course, it went straight to voicemail. Predictably, I left her an angry message. Then I poured myself a large Jack Daniels and stormed around the house for the next couple of hours holding imaginary conversations between myself and her telling her what a bitch she was, how unfair she was being and defending myself from all the supposed wrongs that I had done to her over the last few years. Finally, at about 1 AM, I took several hits of pot and fell asleep on the couch.

Somewhere I heard the distant ringing of a cell phone and some part of my brain realized that it was mine. Pulling myself from a deep sleep, I reached out for the phone where I had left it last night. Hoping that it was my wife, I looked at the caller ID and saw the number for work. It was 9:45 AM and I was an hour late for work.

In a groggy voice I answered, “Hello?” Lynda, my department head goes, “Where are you? You’re an hour late for your class.”

My thoughts just could not seem to connect last night to this morning, but I knew I had messed up in a major way. I just decided to tell the truth. “Lynda, my wife is leaving me. She’s in Germany and I have to catch the next plane to try and save my marriage.” – End of Excerpt!

(Excerpt from the short story “THREE DAYS IN HAMBURG” by James R. Carey. From the Book, THREE DAYS IN HAMBURG & OTHER STORIES. Copyright© 2024, James R. Carey. All Rights Reserved. Published with arrangement with CareyOn Creative, LLC, Atlanta, GA .)

Can be found at www.amazon.com/author/jrc.128

I HAVE ALWAYS WRITTEN –

My original plan for this book over four years ago was to be a few short stories surrounding a novella called The Ticket that I’ve been writing for about 5 years. It’s a great story in my head but it never has quite come together the way that I wanted it to on the page. So, it has never been finished.

That was the idea and then real life came along changing everything. A crumbling marriage, the pandemic, a move to the other side of the country, and a new city and start all seem to move the stories in another direction. The stories began to take on the form that they wanted to take, and I just kind of followed along.

Some stories are very personal, others are fantasy. Some are memories of people or places, and some are combinations of all the above. Some are new, and some are old. Some came very easily, and some took months to write. This collection of stories is quite different than the one I intended, but it is the one that came to life.

The title story was written in the early days of the pandemic in my home office in Los Angeles as I tried to come to grips with my dissolving marriage. My then wife and I were still speaking, and she was the first to read it. Her appraisal of it was “very hard for me to read but it’s very good”. Not sure if she meant that or not, but I will take it.

As a young boy I wrote ideas for stories and comic books. First it was crazy little stories about flying turtles or other idiotic ideas, but I thought they were funny, and it kept me entertained as I listened to my parents argued downstairs or sitting by myself in the school cafeteria. Later in my teenage years, the stories became dark ones of loneliness, escape, teenaged angst and desire. However, they could never finish because I wasn’t old enough to know where life was supposed to take you. So, if I didn’t throw them away, they got stuck in a drawer.

In college I discovered three things that I loved. First, was girls. The second was music so I wrote a ton of bad poetry and awful songs, truly little of which has survived to this day. The third thing I discovered was theatre so I wrote some unbelievably bad plays and screenplays. Not any of those survived.

Yet, I still continued to write down little ideas, thoughts, dialogue, situations, dramatic conflicts and the best of those got stuck in that drawer.

When I moved to Los Angeles, I had a writing partner for a while, so some of those ideas that had been stuck in the drawer for years came out. They were dusted off, reexamined and rewritten. Some were used, some were thrown away and some got stuck back in the drawer. Later when I opened my own theatre in Los Angeles with my partner Denise Ragan Weihenmayer called the Attic Theatre Ensemble, we had a lot of stage time to fill and actors to keep busy. So, I started adapting short stories and updating old plays to fill that void. The reaction to those adaptations was positive. I continue jotting down ideas and dialogue.

Eventually, I got married to a minor television star in Los Angeles and when her TV show got cancelled, I wrote her a play. She never performed in that play because we got divorced before I finished it. I did finish it, however. The play was a full-length comedy with dancing and the Devil, and a lot of food called Dancing in Hell. It got produced twice. Once at a university near Los Angeles, and once at my own theatre. It got complimentary reviews, but when those two productions were over. I put the script in the drawer.

I wrote a couple of short film screenplays that got produced, Owlman and A Cost of Freedom, but this was before the Film Festival circuit had become so big. So, the films and the screenplays went in that drawer.

An opportunity to start doing theatre festivals both in the United States and other parts of the world presented itself. This became a time period where I would write and perform one man shows and tour them around these various venues. The first one called Coming To Zimbabwe which debuted in Africa and was later optioned by a German production company to be done as a radio play for German speaking audiences around the world. It was the story of the first time I ever went to Africa and what a life-changing experience it was for me during a difficult part of my life. My second one-man show was called Mi Casa Su Casa where I talked about my large old house in the West Adams area of Los Angeles where I ran an Airbnb for 11 years and the people from all over the world who stayed with me. That was performed in Los Angeles, Atlanta, New England, and various parts of the United States and won several awards. Yet when those shows had run their course, those scripts got stuck in that drawer.

I married my second wife; a Danish woman and we had a very passionate but turbulent relationship. As our marriage fell apart, the pandemic struck, and I found myself stuck in my house in Los Angeles by myself for months. To keep myself busy I decided to paint a couple of rooms including one that had been my home office for over 15 years. As I was clearing out the room and moving items, I discovered that drawer with all the ideas, conversations, dialogue and scenarios that I had left shut for such an extraordinarily long time. As I read through the material, I realized that I had written a lot of stuff. I had written award-winning screenplays and theatre plays. So, with all this time on my hands, I decided to try and write short stories and see what happened.  I started and finished the first short story that I had written in probably 25 to 30 years and polished it in a couple of days. Then I rewrote a couple of stories that were in that drawer except now I was approaching them from an adult perspective. I changed them around a good bit and they’re in this book as well. With my marriage finally coming to an end, I wrote a fictionalized version of the last trip that we took together to Hamburg, Germany. Parts of the story are absolutely true, and other parts are as they used to say in an old television show, “the names have been changed to protect the innocent”. That story turned out to be Three Days in Hamburg and became the title story of this collection.

Over the past three years I’ve written more short stories, discarded them and written new ones. I have a novel I’ve been trying to finish. A memoir about my time in Africa that I have worked on sometimes. Written three more screenplays and a couple of them have being produced, but this book of short stories was always something I wanted to finish.

Now I have and I hope you enjoy it. I can’t say it was easy to write but it brings me immense joy to see it in its published form. Thank you for taking the time to pick it up.

Can be found at www.amazon.com/author/jrc.128

© Copyright Tripswithjames.com 2024. All rights reserved! Tripswithjames.com is a domain owned by CareyOn Creative, LLC, Atlanta, GA.

2 Gripping Spy Films: Traitor And The American

Some great films from early 2000s that feature known stars, great acting and storylines, excellent direction, and beautiful cinematography.

Are you looking for a couple of spy/thriller type movies that do not fit into the James Bond or Jason Borne genre. Maybe something that makes you think just a little before the action starts? Maybe something you did not see when the movie first came out but still is a really good movie? Well, I have two great films from the early 2000’s that feature known stars, great acting and storylines, and excellent direction and beautiful cinematography.

First up is TRAITOR (2008) starring Don Cheadle and Guy Pierce. The movie is beautifully rendered by Director Jeffrey Nachmanoff, who also wrote the screenplay that is based on a story written by Steve Martin. Yes, Steve (Wild and Crazy Guy) Martin.

Rotten Tomatoes gave it a rating of 65% based on 169 reviews, and Roger Ebert of the Chicago Sun-Times gave it 3 stars out of 4 and wrote in his review, “The movie proceeds quickly, seems to know its subject matter, is fascinating in its portrait of the inner politics and structure of the terrorist group, and comes uncomfortably close to reality. But what holds it together is the Cheadle character.”

This is a terrorism spy thriller that is both intelligent and exciting. Featuring the always interesting Don Cheadle, one of my favorite actors (and in person, a really nice guy), as a former Sudanese American US soldier with a background in explosives who seems to have crossed over and joined a terrorist organization. He is the prime suspect as the bomb-maker in a string of global terror explosions aimed at civilians. Hot on his trail is an FBI agent played by Guy Pierce, who as the movie progresses starts to wonder what Cheadle’s true intentions are.

“Traitor” weaves a web of conspiracy and intrigue, crosses politics with thriller elements, and never quite answers its central question: In the war between good and evil, how many good people is it justifiable for the good guys to kill? Maybe that question has no answer. It is probably not “none.” That ambiguity works in the film’s favor. As Cheadle’s character (Samir) enlists on the American side and then is seen as a remarkably effective agent for terrorist jihadists, we are kept wondering where his true loyalties lie.

This is not a typical terrorism film where all Middle Easterners are inherently anti-American and evil. This is a movie that takes the time to examine the beliefs and motivations behind the people who commit terrorism and the roots of terrorism. It tries to give us a reason why some people do these terrible things, and by doing that the “villains” all of a sudden, become people not just caricatures. It gives a depth and understanding to these characters that is chilling, extremely disturbing, but crystal clear as to what their motivations are.


Another thing that I (and Roger Ebert) found interesting about the movie was the way it goes inside the terrorist organizations – to the people who carry out the day-to-day operations of such groups. This is not a movie about the James Bond type villains who have billions of dollars and want world domination, or to bring America to its knees in one big explosion. This is a film about the little guys who do the grunt work. Who do what they do out of belief or anger or need, not the desire for world conquest.

Shot on location in Toronto (posing as Chicago), Marseille, France, and Marrakesh, Morrocco, the scenery is a beautiful background to the fast-paced action. The actors are all excellent from Cheadle and Pierce, to Said Taghmaoui, who plays Omar, one of the grunts who believes in the cause, but you can see his individual pain each step of the way. The film also co-stars Jeff Daniels, Neal McDonough and Archie Panjabi. This is a particularly good movie!

You can find TRAITOR currently available to stream with a subscription on STARZ for $9.99 / month. You can buy or rent Traitor for as low as $1.99 to rent or $5.99 to buy on Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV, iTunes, Google Play, Vudu, YouTube, and AMC on Demand.

THE AMERICAN (2010)

It was early September 2010, and all that summer I had seen clips for The American, a new movie starring George Clooney. It looked like a typical spy/action-adventure movie with chases, girls, guns, and an undefined evil. Yet what did we get instead of a James Bond/Jason Borne retread? We get a sparse, tightly controlled movie filled with silence, long takes, and a growing sense of dread.

The American was loosely based on a 1990 book called A Very Private Gentleman by Martin Booth. It was adapted for the screen by Rowan Joffe.’ It was marketed as a high action-adventure spy thriller and the reaction to the film from the audience was disappointment. What they got for their money was a slowly paced story of a hardened yet haunted assassin. This is a quiet movie, a thoughtful movie, a movie built on character, not plot. Ironically, The American is very European in feel and style. It is filmed for the most part in Italy, and cinematographer Martin Ruhe filled the movie with beautiful lingering shots of a lonely Italian countryside that seems as old as time itself. This timeless quality makes you almost imagine that you are about to see some Roman legion marching over the next hill off to conquer some far-off place.

We never know what George Clooney’s character did or why anyone is after him, but from the first minute of the film, a chase is on. George’s character, Jack, is fleeing for his life from a group of Swedish hitmen. Yet the pace of the movie or this chase is slow and unhurried. Instead of watching the wild chases and unending action as spies trying to kill other spies for world domination or getting revenge for passed deeds, we descend into the life and mind of a skilled killer, an American version of a samurai warrior. Stoic, impervious and expert, with a focus so narrow it is defined only by his skills and his master.

The tale is straightforward, but many questions remain unanswered even at the end of the movie, but they are not really germane to the core story. The movie opens on a snow-covered field in Sweden. Jack and his current lover/friend are walking through the snow when shots ring out. In short order, Jack kills two unknown men out to kill him plus his completely innocent lady friend for no other reason than she happens to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. With fewer than 10 lines of dialog we learn that Jack is a skilled and ruthless killer, who will do anything necessary to stay alive. Who and why is Jack being hunted we never learn, but we get swept up in the chase as he flees for his life from the unknown “Swedes.”

We next find him getting off a train in Rome and arranging a meeting with the mysterious Pavel (Johan Leysen). Pavel is his handler/boss/agent/manager? It is never quite clear what the relationship is, or who Pavel, and by extension who Jack work for. Are they CIA, MI-5, free-lancers? This we never know. Yet it is clear that Jack works for Pavel or serves him, because he never questions Pavel’s orders (Just like a samurai following orders from his master). Even when every fiber of his being tells him that Pavel is setting him up.

I won’t give you the whole plot here – I hate that by reviewers that never really review. They just retell you the story. So why see the movie?

George_Clooney_The_American_movie_image

Let just say that this is a wonderful movie. The director is Anton Corbijn, who shot the bio pic Control (2007), the story of Ian Curtis, lead singer of Joy Division, who was a suicide at age 23. There is not a wrong shot. Every performance is tightly controlled. Clooney is in complete command of his effect. This is a wonderfully shot study of the loneliness of a bad man searching for redemption and a way out of the incredibly sad and terrible life he has created for himself.

For me one of the best movies of that year 2010.

On Rotten Tomatoes, the film holds an approval rating 66% based on 224 reviews. The website’s review states: “As beautifully shot as it is emotionally restrained, The American is an unusually divisive spy thriller—and one that rests on an unusually subdued performance from George Clooney.” Roger Ebert gave it 4 out of 4 stars saying, “Here is a gripping film with the focus of a Japanese drama. It is so rare to see a film this carefully crafted.” Leonard Maltin called it a “slowly paced, European-style mood piece, short on dialogue and action and long on atmosphere.”

Couple of interesting facts about the film are that the director purposely paid homage to the American spaghetti western in many of his scenes. In one scene the Sergio Leone film Once Upon the Time in The West plays on a TV set in the background while George Clooney eats alone in a restaurant. Also, whole chunks of dialogue that are spoken between Clooney and his prostitute lover, Clara, are lifted verbatim from Graham Greene’s The Honorary Consul.

You can find The American on Amazon Prime, Microsoft Store, iTunes, Vudu and Apple TV renting for 3.99 or to buy at 14.99. It is also available on Google Play and YouTube, but no pricing was available.

George_Clooney_The_American_movie_image

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2023 Was A Great Year!

2023 was a watershed year for me. It was the best year that I’d had in a decade. The last really good year that I could remember was 2014 when I got married to my ex-wife. The day that we got married, I was full of love, happiness and incredibly enthusiastic about the future. I had a woman that I loved, my professional career seemed to be going extremely well and financially I had bailed myself out from the ruins of the worldwide fiscal crisis of 2008. What I didn’t realize was that would be the high point for a long time.

They say the first year of marriage is terrible and I can agree with that. After the euphoria of getting married had worn off, the day-to-day just dragged on my ex-wife, and while I didn’t know it, she was already planning her escape. Not every year was bad. In fact, each January as I looked at the coming year, it seemed like exciting things were going to happen both professionally and personally but by December our lives were filled with chaos, pain, question marks about our relationship and professional inertia. Then came a hard divorce, followed by the Pandemic, followed by a need to sell my house and leave my chosen home city of Los Angeles and a move to Atlanta, GA. The first couple of years in Atlanta were difficult. I found friends, and work but I never quite felt like I fit in here, and I missed parts of the life that I’d had in California.

And then in 2023, it all seemed to come together. I wrote, directed, produced and released an award-winning short film, Love Potion. The film did not win as many awards as some of my previous films had but we took a shot for the big time and film festivals like Sundance and Tribeca. We did not get into them, yet I am immensely proud of the film and feel it is my most complete movie. I acted in five movies, I appeared in five commercials, I was in two music videos including a game changing country western music video by Tyler Childers where I portrayed a gay coal miner who fell in love with another miner. The controversy that music video created was an amazing thing to watch and I’m proud I was part of that project. I bought a condo and put down new roots. While I did not travel internationally as I usually do during a year, I found myself working as an actor in Baltimore, Austin, Nashville, Charleston and Rock Hill, SC. I put the finishing touches on a book that I hope to release in 2024. Both personally and professionally, I felt more satisfied and complete than I had in a long time.

While 2023 was an amazing year, it was also a year of hard struggles, doubt, wondering where all this was leading, and a lot of personal reflection. One of my siblings faced a life-threatening blood disease and thanks to the stars above, they managed to survive. With all the professional success that I had during 2023, that was without a doubt the most important thing that happened in my life. My sibling survived, and because of that situation I took a look at my own personal life and my legacy. I realized I was closer to the end than I was to the beginning and needed to change my perspective on life and work. My life has often been about the end result. Producing the product, getting the job done, what is the end goal and how to find the next job. The older I get, the more I realize it is more about the journey than it is about what you accomplish. Completing the work and making sure that the project is excellent are extremely important, but paying attention to the day-to-day journey through life is equally as important. As John Lennon said, “Life is what happens while you’re making other plans.” In 2023, I found that to be absolutely true.

I hope 2024 will be as successful both personally and professionally. It’s already shaping up to be what looks like an interesting year, but rarely does it happen that you have two incredible years back-to-back. I’m talking to a producer about directing a feature for them, my film partner and I are in discussion with another producer about a project we’ve already done that they might want to take to the next level. I’ve been hired by a local theater group to direct 2 plays for them including the American classic, The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams about which I’m excited. Yet, I’m trying to keep everything in perspective and remember it’s about the journey and living in the moment.

To all of you, I wish a happy and successful 2024, and I hope your journey is exciting and fulfilling.

@ 2024, Carey On Creative, LLC., Atlanta, GA. Tripswithjames.com is a copyrighted entity of Carey On Creative, LLC.

How I Survived the Road of Death in Zimbabwe

A Zimbabwean Adventure

What is the Road of Death? It was a stretch of highway that went from the city center of Harare to an upscale suburb called Borrowdale.

Zimbabwe Flag

In 2013, I returned to Zimbabwe for the second time for a couple of reasons. First, I had been invited to present the world premiere of my one man show, Coming to Zimbabwe at the Harare International Festival of Arts (HIFA), and secondly, to help create a rural teaching program for drama with the National Institute of Allied Arts, Drama Division whose artistic director was Gavin Peter. 

Harare, Zimabwe

Gavin had hired me in 2012 to come to Zimbabwe and be the first American judge or adjudicator of their national drama contest. The month that I spent in Zimbabwe during 2012 was a life changing experience. The opportunity to work with almost 8000 kids over a three-week period had been exhausting but also exhilarating as I watched these talented African kids do monologues and scene work, recite poetry, do improvs and work in many other performance styles. Plus, the two-week tour that NIAA sponsored for me to travel around the country to different historical sites in the company of the Republic of Ireland’s representative, Gary Killilea and his family was a joy and wonder, and helped cement Zimbabwe is one of my favorite places in the world. The beauty of the country and the hospitality of the people was unmatched, and I had resolved to return as many times as I could. 

Countryside of Zimbabwe

The chance to return came very quickly for me. As the adjudicator of the drama festival, I watched as the dedicated volunteers of NIAA kept meticulous records over where students came from and in what performance categories they had participated. Some students would only be in one area while others might be in 9 to 11 different areas of competition. At the debriefing at the end of the festival and working with Gavin, we managed to streamline some of the requirements for the participants and the number of areas they could participate in. We also found out that the students from the cities mostly focused on drama presentations while the students from the rural or country areas focused on poetry. Now Zimbabwe is mostly an agricultural country so that made sense, but this was primarily a drama festival and if most of the students in the rural areas were participating in poetry that meant there was a disconnect somewhere in the education system.

Robert Mugabe

Zimbabwe had become a poor country over the 40-year reign by their former dictator Robert Mugabe, and one of the fallouts of his terrible economic policies was that teachers in the countryside hardly made any money whatsoever. It was hard to retain teachers who taught English and drama although it was required as part of their education requirements to graduate. We found in our research that the rural teachers who were instructing the drama students were science and math teachers, or physical education teachers or soccer coaches. Well-meaning individuals who had no idea what they were supposed to do for the festival, but they had been ordered by their principal to get the kids ready. These poor individuals having no knowledge of what the contest required just did what the teacher of the year before had done which was recite poetry. 

So, Gavin and I came up with an idea of creating a training program for the teachers in the countryside to help them understand what dramatic literature was, where to find it, how to direct a play or a scene and best practices in terms of how to get their students motivated. During the year while I was back in the United States, I also recruited other Americans to come and work in Zimbabwe with NIAA to help move the program forward. 

Poster for Coming to Zimbabwe

Yet when it came to providing me with air flight back to Zimbabwe, they just did not have the money. Gavin concocted an unusual solution. That year, he was also the Artistic Director of HIFA and said if I could come with a show, he would ensure I got a superior performance slot. The idea of a one-man show based on my experiences in Zimbabwe had been floating around my head for about six or more months and now I put it down on paper. I workshopped it a few times at my theater in Los Angeles, the Attic Theater and knew I had a good show. Because Zimbabwe was a dictatorship, I had to send the script to a government office there to make sure it was not offensive in any way to Zimbabwe or President Robert Mugabe. To their astonishment there was an American who was writing wonderful things about their country and proclaiming it a wonderful place to visit. Gavin true to his word gave me a wonderful time slot and the show sold out before I even got on the plane to go to Zimbabwe, and extra performances were added. It was that money that allowed me to buy a round trip ticket to Zimbabwe.  

On the Marque at Reps Theatre, Harare

So, that is how I got to Zimbabwe, but the title of this article is ‘I Survived the Road of Death.’ What is the Road of Death? It was a stretch of highway that went from the city center of Harare to an upscale suburb called Borrowdale. This road was a four-lane highway and was one of the major thoroughfares in the city. It also ran right by the Presidential Palace. In fact, you could spit out the car window as you went past and hit the building. It was that close. Following an attack on Mugabe’s residence in 1982, a 6pm curfew was introduced to prevent any traffic passing in front of the Palace. This curfew was in place from 1982 till 2017. During this time, if you traveled down that road after 6:00 PM you could be shot in the head by one of the army soldiers that patrolled that area of the highway, and that is why it was called the Road of Death. Now the Presidential Palace by 2013 was only used for ceremonial reasons and President Robert Mugabe had a huge house/complex on the outskirts of the city where he lived. Yet, the standing law was that at 6:00 PM every evening this four-lane road would be blocked off next to the presidential palace until 6 AM in the morning. If you were trying to drive to Borrowdale from downtown or vice versa you had to find an alternative route because there were soldiers with rifles everywhere. In fact, there was an army barracks right across the street from the Palace where the security guards lived. 

Presidential Palace, Harare

After I completed the successful run of my one-man show, it was going to be about 10 days before Gavin could meet with me to discuss this educational tour that was being sent out into the rural areas. While I had friends in Harare, they could not constantly keep me entertained and I had no transportation, so I was often stuck in a hotel room or in a guest room of some kind person who let me share their house. After about a week of this I was bored, so I rented a car and drove up into the Nyangani Mountain area near the Mozambique border to stay at a little inn for three or four days and explore that part of Zimbabwe. That is a whole different adventure, but I had rented the car for several days. When I arrived back in the capital city, I was invited to a social function at the house of my good friends, Keith and Jeanette Nicholson who had kind enough to be my hosts for the first two weeks that I was in in Zimbabwe during 2012. 

Harare at night

Harare is an exceedingly difficult city in which to travel during the night. The reason for that is there are almost no street signs or working streetlights, because they have been stripped of all their copper wiring. Why is that you ask? Because the economy is in ruins, and no one has any work. So, some people steal what they can steal just to be able to put food on the table. So, I had to be careful in plotting my route to the Nicholson’s home is Borrowdale to avoid the Road of Death. I found an old map of Harare and laid out a route that I felt confident would avoid the Palace. At 6:30 PM, I walked out to my car and started driving towards the Nicholsons. It was winter and already dark. As I got close to where I was going to turn left and head out towards Borrowdale, I recognized that I was right next to the presidential palace and about to turn on to the Road of Death. 

From my car, I could see a large blockade and there were armed guards everywhere. I freaked out. There were two lanes of traffic to my right which were turning toward the city center, but it was rush hour and there was no room for me to cut in. If I turned left, I was sure I would be shot. I was terrified. The only other direction I could go in was straight so that is what I did. 

Zimbabwe army barracks

I drove straight and ended up in the parking lot of the army barracks that protect the presidential palace. It was extremely dark, so it was impossible to read my map. Being the only white man in a parking lot full of black soldiers with rifles made me feel very uneasy. No one bothered me or even said anything to me, but they gave me strange enough looks that I knew I was not supposed to be there, nor was I welcome. I quickly called Keith and explained the situation. I must have seemed a little hysterical because he told me to calm down and gave me explicit instructions about how to get around the presidential palace and follow a road that would lead me toward Borrowdale. Following the explicit instructions of my hosts I drove around the presidential palace and ended up approaching the Borrowdale highway. At this point I was supposed to turn left and go towards the suburbs, however I mistakenly turned right and headed back towards the Presidential Palace. 

I went about half a mile when I realized that the street in front of me was blockaded and that I was back at the Palace. I was so rattled by now that I did a quick U-turn in the middle of the highway, hit the gas, and bolted down the street. The entire time I was driving I thought a sharpshooter was going to blow off the back of my head. I was sure because I was the only car on the highway that I was breaking some law and that the entire Zimbabwean Defense Force was following me. Every tank, every Jeep, every helicopter, and every soldier was hot on my tail, and I was going to end up either dead or in a Zimbabwean jail which would be the same thing. 

Zim side street not far from Palace

I quickly saw a road off to the right and with screeching tires I made the turn. I found myself in a housing development. I took the next right and the next left and I parked in the first driveway I could find. Turning off my lights, I crouched down in my seat hoping that they could not find me. I quickly called Keith and tried to explain the situation to them. Just as I began talking to him there was a knock on my window, and I turned to find a Zimbabwean soldier with a rifle standing next to my car. 

Zimbabwe Soldier

 I exclaimed to Keith, “Oh my God, they found me already.” I told him to stay on the phone and put my cell phone down on the car seat and rolled down the window. I immediately started babbling to the soldier trying to explain why I had turned around and driven away from the Palace. I gave him my passport, my international driver’s license, my work visa, the contract that said I was there to work with NIAA and all the official paperwork that I had to carry around with me all the time. He took each document and looked them over. I just kept babbling the entire time telling him I was sorry. I made a mistake, and please do not arrest me. That I was an American citizen and at least give me a chance to call the embassy. On and on and on until finally he had all my documents and I had nothing left to say. I just knew he was going to shoot me now. The waiting felt like an eternity. 

He quietly handed me all my documents back and just looked at me for a moment, then he asked me, “Do you have a smoke?” 

“What!?” I asked? 

And just like any American tourist who has gone to a foreign country and do not speak the language, the cliche is that we always talk slow and loud as if that is going to make someone understand, he did the exact same thing to me. In a very loud voice speaking very slowly, he went, “Do you have a cigarette?” 

“No, I don’t smoke,” I stated 

Zimbabwe soldier walking

“Ok,” he said, then turned and walked down the driveway headed towards the main road. It was then that I realized there were no jeeps back there. There were no tanks, there were no helicopters, there was no one. No one had followed me. This lone soldier was walking to the Palace to go to work. Most soldiers are so poor they cannot afford a car. Here was an immaculately dressed soldier carrying his automatic weapon walking through the neighborhood to the main road, and then he was going to walk the mile or so to the presidential palace to check in. And the whole time that this was dawning on me that this had just been a strange confluence of my fear and the weirdest of circumstances, loud laughter poured from the cell phone on the seat next to me. Keith thought this was the funniest thing he had ever heard. 

Laughing, not Keith Nicholson.

Now red faced with embarrassment, I picked up the phone and told him that everything was ok, and I would be there in 10 minutes. Keith repeated one more time how I was to get there, and I followed his instructions to the letter. I arrived at their house where there was a big wine celebration going on and of course all the Zimbos laughed at me because they thought it was very funny that the American who traveled around the world got lost and scared driving around the Presidential Palace. 

Well, the joke was on me. I took the good-natured ribbing for the rest of the night, had three or four glasses of wine to calm down and so that I would not get lost or die on my way back home my friends were kind enough to let me crash in their guest room. 

And that is how I survived the Road of Death in Harare, Zimbabwe. 

Below are photos from the NIAA school tour that we took after this adventure happened. Shots of myself and good friend Musa Saruro teaching improv and acting technique in and around Bulawayo 2013.

All opinions expressed are the personal opinions of the author. Tripswithjames.com is a copyright of Carey On Creative, LLC. 2023. Atlanta, GA.

Preview of the new film, LOVE POTION Coming July 2023

LOVE POTION THE FILM

PREVIEW OF LOVE POTION, A New James Carey Film, An Attic Studios Production, Produced by Lainie Smith, COMING JULY 2023

www.lovepotionthefilm.com

Watching the monitor as actors Alix Efaw and Jon Rust film a scene from Love Potion

LOVE POTION is a psychological horror story with supernatural overtones written and directed by award winning filmmaker James Carey and starring and produced by Lainie Smith. The Cinematographer  is Ahren Steis and Melissa Steis serves as the Production Coordinator. 

DIrector James Carey works with actors David Caprita and David Lee Garver

The cast includes David Lee Garver as Chris, a young man obsessed with getting his ex-girlfriend, played by Alix Efar, back at any cost. David Captria and Lainie Smith play the two people who can help realize that dream by selling him a magical love potion. Yet what is the price to your soul for making a person love you again after they have moved on.

Director of Photography Ahren Steis films a scene

The other cast members featured are VJ Roberts, Aubri Ebony, Shannon Thomas, AnaLisa Patterson, Elizabeth Gibbs, Rebecca Lambrusco and Samantha Goodell.  Our 1st AD was Justin Nicholson, sound was Rio Richardson, HMU was Samantha Goodell, and costume coordinator was Todd Graham.

#lovepotionthefilm #shortfilmmaking #filmmaker #atlfilm #horror #suspense #supernatural #films #movies #director #writer #producer #filmmakers #filmfestival2023 #awardwinning #madeingeorgia #atlanta #ATL #indiefilm #doityourself #justdoit #doingwhatwelove #producers #actors

In Praise of Francis Ford Coppola

For four days, I sat on the movie set of Megalopolis, an upcoming American science fiction epic by director/producer/screenwriter Francis Ford Coppola and watched as the master filmmaker slowly and meticulously made his movie.

My Four Days on the Set of Megalopolis

By Jane Doe, Guest Author

(Ms. Jane Doe is an actress who worked on the movie Megalopolis as a background artist. She is using a fake name because she’s legally obligated not to speak about the film. She had signed an NDA to that effect, but her article was so compelling that we decided to publish it. We have signed an NDA with her not to reveal her name and claim our First Amendment rights of free speech to publish this article.)

For four days, I sat on the movie set of Megalopolis, an upcoming American science fiction epic by director/producer/screenwriter Francis Ford Coppola and watched as the master filmmaker slowly and meticulously made his movie. Coppola is the director of such amazing award-winning movies as the Godfather trilogy, Apocalypse Now, The Conversation and other movies like Bram Stoker’s Dracula, The Outsiders and The Rainmaker. He has also served as the producer of over 50+ movies through his American Zoetrope production company. The simple premise of Megalopolis is that in a New York City set sometime in the future and with a culture very much based on early Rome, a young woman is divided between loyalties to her father, who has a classical view of society, and her lover, who is more progressive and ready for the new future. Of course, the film has many much deeper plot points like an autocratic society, democracy versus a dictatorship much like early Rome itself, and morality and what is moral in a strict futuristic society.

Rumors and speculation about Megalopolis which is being shot in Atlanta and based at Trilith Studios have been swirling since the film began its five-month shoot in November of 2022. Stories of budget overruns, mass staff and actor defections, and just general disfunction as theories began to spread that Francis maybe was too old (84) to make another movie or that he just did not understand how to make a film with all the modern technology available now. 

Francis Ford Coppola started writing Megalopolis in the 1980s and has been trying to get the movie made since that time. He came close to production in early 2001 when he recorded roughly 30 hours of second-unit footage of New York City, but when the tragedy of 9/11 happened the film was placed on indefinite hold. By 2007 Coppola publicly announced that the film would never be made. Yet in 2019 just before the pandemic it was announced that Coppola was going to try and make the movie. However, since he had not had a money-making movie in several years he could not find a studio that would finance what would be a multimillion dollar science fiction epic.

Coppola is not only a world-famous filmmaker but he’s also a very shrewd and successful businessman. His empire includes several wineries including Coppola vineyards, magazines, restaurants and hotels, cannabis, and online activities. In 2021 Coppola sold several of his wineries and when he could find no one to finance his film, he announced that he would self-finance the movie himself. At the start of production, the budget was set at $120 million and by January 2023 the reported overruns had cost the film an added $30 million. The film was originally to be shot using OSVP technology also known as The Volume. This is a system where a set is surrounded by 40-foot-high LED panels on which backgrounds and scenes and locations can be projected making that your scenery. This technology has been used in movies produced by Marvel and Star Wars. However, the technology of this system is extremely costly, and the budget quickly ballooned. Then Coppola and his team decided to pivot to a less costly and more traditional green screen approach.

I was very excited when I was cast as a wedding guest in an opulent scene that required about 300 background artists. I was going to get a chance to see Francis Ford Coppola directing up close and to see if the rumors about the film’s dysfunction and his decline were either true or false.

Most background fittings usually take 30 to 45 minutes tops, mine took over 4 hours. I was astonished at the number of costumes that I saw that took up an entire soundstage and the attention to detail on each costume. It quickly became clear why the costumes were so elaborate. Four-time Oscar winner, Milena Canonero was the costume designer and her staff was painstakingly fussy over each and every item. The style of the film costumes, hair, and sets might be called “modern Roman”. All our hair and gowns were done up in styles that would resemble what wealthy women wore during Roman times. Each morning after we got dressed in our lavish costumes, our hair and makeup took about an hour each day for each person. My hair alone took over an hour as my stylist pinned my long blond hair up, adding hair pieces and finally a fake diamond tiara that gave me a headache it weighed so much. The elaborate makeup took another 30 minutes. Multiple that by about 100 or more women and you can see how long it took for just background to get ready.   

The first day that I reported for shooting our location was Gas South Arena in Duluth, GA which was being used as a facsimile for Madison Square Garden. They had covered the entire floor of the auditorium in a thick layer of red dirt and on that placed three rings that gave it a circus atmosphere. That day we watched a chariot race, and male and female wrestlers perform in each one of the three rings. My first impressions of Mr. Coppola when he finally appeared on set surrounded by his massive crew and Roman, his son who is a cinematographer/director was that he was old and a little disorganized. Yet as I listened to background artists who have been working on the film since its beginning, it appeared that the overtime that it took to get the OSPV LED screens to work correctly was where much of the budget overruns came from. The other rumor was that many of his star actors came to set without knowing their lines. With great interest I listened to one background person who had been part of this scene with at least ten of the major stars for over a week and what had happened. The plan appeared to be for Mr. Coppola to spend two or three days filming this complex scene. Yet none of the actors seemed to know their lines and when they tried to rehearse, it just became obvious that this would not work. Instead, Francis decided to spend an entire day focused on each individual actor to get the different takes and styles he felt he needed. This expanded the time from two or three days to 10 days all with star actors on the clock getting paid. It seemed it was recurring situations like this that had started to cause budget overruns.

By the time I got to set, they had corrected that situation by ending each day after 12 hours. They had also gone to the green screens exclusively. What people forget about Francis Ford Coppola is that he is an improvisational director. Yes, he is done gigantic epics like Apocalypse Now and supposedly that ran into all kinds of budget overruns and time problems. However, early in his career Coppola was a filmmaker who made small personal films and was very improvisational in how he shot them. Sometimes he would change things at a moment’s notice. He brought that style to Megalopolis, and it was obvious that it was frustrating for the crew and perhaps even the cast. It’s hard to be improvisational when your crew is over 100 people, and you have four cameras going including a crane camera but somehow that’s what he managed to do.

On our second day we reported to the same location and the three rings of the circus were gone and replaced with a giant platform on which a Greek style temple had been built. That day we sat in the bleachers that posed for Madison Square Garden again and watched a parade of scantily dressed women walk around the stadium. Then four female aerial artists and Grace Vanderwaal, American singer, and actress, who plays one of the leads performed for about three or four hours to recorded dance music and vocals by Vanderwaal. After the scene was done the way that it was written, Coppola would begin to ask for changes: move the camera here, can you do the scene this way and then on the next take he would change it again. He might move a camera to another position or ask the crane to come in a different way or ask the dance number to change. With the crew this large it took time to make all these changes and it might seem confusing to somebody who had not been on the set for 24 hours over two days but it became apparent he was in complete control and knew exactly what was going on. They had a riot scene planned at the end of the dance section, and watching the stunt coordinator and Coppola add layer upon layer to the fight scenes was so interesting.

On top of that Francis is an old school gentleman. We never heard him curse or raise his voice. Each day he was dressed in a suit and was wonderfully nice and complementary to everyone and treated us with great dignity. Because the set was so big and he is 84 years old, he used a microphone to talk to everybody. The first day I was on set people talked over Francis and that did create confusion for people.  That did not happen on the second day.

When I returned a week later to complete this wedding scene we were now at Trilith Studios and our numbers have been reduced down to about 100. To get us in the mood for what we were going to be working on that day, Coppola showed a 5 minute clip of what we had shot the week before with Grace Vanderwaal and the aerialists It was amazing. The color correction, the editing, how the scene flowed together with this beautiful song sung by Grace was stunning. It’s not often on a film set that actors, background, and entire crew members stop to applaud a little vignette but that’s what happened. That day we watched parades of people walk by with us applauding for them. The group passing by included Dustin Hoffman, Talia Shire and Giancarlo Esposito. I almost got bumped up to have a line with Talia Shire unfortunately it went to someone else, but for a few moments I thought I was going to have a line in a Francis Ford Coppola movie.

I don’t know if this movie will be a success. I don’t know if the movie will be good or if it will make any money. All I know on those four days that I sat there and watched Mr. Coppola interact with his crew and his cast and all the background was a man who still knows what he’s doing and is in command of his craft. Perhaps chaos is part of his creative process, but it’s helped him make three of the greatest movies ever made and served him well through the rest of his career. If that little 5 minute sequence that I saw is any indication, Megalopolis is going to be beautiful and amazing. Thank you, Mr. Coppola. It was an awesome four days watching you work.

LOVE POTION THE FILM

LOVE POTION is a psychological horror film with supernatural overtones that we are shooting in Atlanta, GA in January of 2023. It is what is called a “proof of concept” short film to present to producers/movie studios as the showcase for a possible longer film or TV series based on the story elements of our film. We also plan to release this film on the film festival circuit as well.

I do not usually promote my filmmaking projects on this site. I try to keep it just about travel related blogs and information, but two big film related events are coming up for me that I am really excited to share.

First, a film of mine (A Cost of Freedom) that I have talked about here a few months ago is going to screen on Nov. 10th in Los Angeles. I am flying out for the event from my new home in Atlanta, GA. I will do an entire post on the event, the red carpet, the response to the film and Los Angeles in general since I have not ever just been there as a tourist. I always lived there when I wrote about it. More to come on that exciting event.

The other event and the one I am talking about today is the launch of the website for my next film project LOVE POTION. The site is live right now and starting to draw attention which we are super excited about. The site is also a base for our crowd funding which will officially start on Tuesday, Oct 25th when we kick off our Indiegogo.com page. We are trying to raise $8000 to produce the movie and I hoping that you support the project by sharing information and these posts, following and possibly even contributing to the film at www.lovepotionthefilm.com

LOVE POTION is a psychological horror film with supernatural overtones that we are shooting in Atlanta, GA in January of 2023. It is what is called a “proof of concept” short film to present to producers/movie studios as the showcase for a possible longer film or TV series based on the story elements of our film. We also plan to release this film on the film festival circuit as well.

Ahren Steis, Lainie Smith, James Carey

I wrote the script and will be directing the movie. The leading actress and Co-Producer of the film is the award winning Lainie Smith, a very well known Atlanta actress and motivator of this project. The Cinematographer  will be Ahren Steis, and his wife Melissa Steis will serves as the Production Coordinator. We have assembled a stellar cast which will be announced at a later date.  

There will be many more travel articles coming your way, but we ask you if you would SUBSCRIBE, FOLLOW and SHARE our information about LOVE POTION. This way YOU CAN BE PART of the film as well. Reach out to us at any of our social media sites listed at the bottom of this page or email us at :

info@lovepotionthefilm.com

#lovepotionthefilm

Facebook – @lovepotionthefilm

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