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I've been acting a few years now, mainly in
independent films and shorts. My biggest exposure to date was background
work on several VH-1 movies and a CBS movie of the week. That is until
Friday Night Lights rolled into Houston during the Spring of 2004.
Based on the best seller by Buzz Bissinger,
produced by Brian Grazer of Imagine Entertainment, directed by Peter Berg, and
starring Billy Bob Thornton and a slew of remarkable young actors. You can
learn more about the cast and crew and their previous movies at IMDB.
I worked for three weeks on this film as a sideline fan and made some lifelong
friends (like Laurie, Lee, and Walter) I also learned a lot more about the
business. During shots that I was not involved in, I spent time talking to
the crew, watching from behind the cameras and monitors, and observing how they
set up for each scene. Some would find this 15 hour day starting at 5AM
exhausting, but I found it exhilarating and fascinating.
We shot for three weeks in the Astrodome.
The setting is the 1988 state championship game for high school football.
It was ironic, because I was in the Astrodome in 1991 for my high school
football championship game where Dulles (14-0) lost to Killeen. We also
shot one day in Galena Park where Houston had its coldest, wettest winter day in
mid April. We huddled between takes to keep warm and ran to the bathroom
between shots to get out of the wind. In the movie, this scene is supposed
to be one of the hottest practice sessions of the season. But if you look
closely, you can see our goose bumps.
I was fortunate to meet, take pictures with, and
get autographs from most the cast. All of them were very generous to 'us
extras', especially Billy Bob Thornton, Derek Luke, and Gavin Grazer.
Several evenings, Laurie and I joined some of the cast and crew for a jam
session. On any given night there were musicians playing various
instruments including piano, guitar, flute, and harmonica and singing. I,
of course, was part of the audience.
FNL came back into town in August for three
days to film some pick up shots and reshoots. Joe Grisaffi (who was
responsible for hiring me for 5 films now) contacted me to work one more
day. I had one more chance to talk to the very polite Billy Bob, who had
remembered me from four months earlier. The film has received raving
reviews. It is released October 8, 2004.
The following was written by a fellow actor on the set of Friday
Night Lights.
- "Film of
Dreams"
- (Written by Karl
Paul)
-
 It is 6am in Houston -
first light. But the lights that I see are far above me and flicker
momentarily as darkness turns to light. The light reveals tens of
thousands of empty seats - red, orange, yellow, grey. And beneath them
all is 100 yards of brilliant green turf. This is the AstroDome -
circa 1988-
- There is an eerie calm
in the air as I take a look around. The sidelines are wallpapered with
banners reflecting an era now almost forgotten. "Pan
Am" "Gulf Oil" "Fanta" "Oilers--National
League Champs '86" "Cowboys take State in '88". The
clock shows 30 seconds remaining in the game, the score is 34 to 28, Cowboys
are winning. But .... the field is empty, the fans are absent, and the
clock has stopped - forever. This is my last day on the
set of the film "Friday Night Lights" - a film version of the
bestselling novel written by H.G. Bissinger. Day 21 for me.
-
- What a rush it was to
hear the director call out - " ACTION !! ", the first day of
shooting. What a ride it has been to see the football teams
hammer out the plays these three weeks. What a drag it will be to hear
the director call out - " CUT !! ", the final time later tonight.
-
- Slowly, the football
players begin emerging from the locker room tunnel as carts full of film
production gear begin rolling out from the opposite end of the field.
The quiet purr of golf carts break the silence, and suddenly, the roar of
the eighty-foot 'condor' lighting crane reminds me that the set is now 'UP'.
Time to put on my "game face".
-
- Working as both film
crew and specialty extra for the last four weeks has been a film student's
dream come true. It has put me within arm's reach of famous producers
and has put my hand in the hand of the film's stars and the directors -
Billy Bob Thornton, John Cameron, Peter Berg, Allan Graf, Tobias Schliessler,
Eric Heffron. It has been an amazing experience to watch them all
work. And, to watch them play. Never knew that Billy Bob
could kick a field goal.
-
- From Best Boy to Ball
Boy, everyone performed in this Hollywood Orchestra. The production
was a template for technical efficiency. Three units, eight cameras,
two video assist, two audio consoles - but only one power cable going onto
the field! All wireless video and audio, plus DC power to all
Panavision camera units. The technical bullpen looked like a mobile
weather station with all the antennae.
-
- Get the picture from
last week. First unit is shooting Billy Bob Thornton and the
coaches at the sideline on the field, while second unit is shooting tight on
Tim McGraw and fans in the stands, while a splinter unit is setting up in
the SkyBox for booster club shots. Between shots, there is barrage of
radio noise as lighting, camera and technical position changes are made.
Meanwhile, football players are rehearsing 'half-speed' in the middle of the
field as the stars sit off to the side to be groomed for the next shot.
In all the apparent chaos, there is a master plan. The stadium chatter
is regularly interrupted with the VOG (aka Voice of God) as the 1st A.D.
barks commands that transform the set from one scene to the next.
Everyone moves, crossing the set like a swirling school of fish, and then
everyone settles in position like a huge billboard that rotates its panels
to morph into a new advertisement. In as little as ten minutes, the
crew has re-struck the lights, re-laid the camera tracks, and re-located the
technical bullpen which is the home for the producers' & directors'
chairs.
-
- In the process, the
language of filmmaking is becoming a staple for hundreds of extras.
"Picture is up" "Roll sound" "Background"
"...and ACTION". As I return from getting a water bottle, I
hear desperation in the voice of a new extra as she hurries her friend,
"...Teri! Picture is up!! " Her friend, obviously having
been on set longer replies, "... Relax, they haven't called for
'background' yet...".
-
- It may seem like an
odd choice for a film student to work both as an extra and as crew, but my
experience on this film fulfilled all that I had hoped for, and more.
After working one week as crew, I chose to work as a specialty extra rather
than sit in a production office. That decision put me on the set, on
the field, in front of the camera teams and with the directors. I
could get close enough to see the details of the camera setups and hear the
directors as they choreographed the action. In the end, I was able to
meet and talk with the directors, the principals (aka 'stars'), and the
camera teams. ArriFlex 435se with Panavision Hubble Zoom &
Chapman Dolly--$500,000. SuperTechno 32 foot Crane with PanArri
plus Prime lens---$1.2 million. Having a beer in a no-name HTown
bar with Peter Berg, Tobias Schliessler and Dave Luckenbach----priceless.
-
- Well, today is the
final day of shooting. Only the second unit remains to capture the
full-field hard-hitting football action. As anxious as everyone was
just yesterday to hear "That's a wrap" after a 15 hour day, there
are sad 'goodbyes' as we all sense that it is near the final 'take'.
Hundreds of people from all over the country (and other countries),
all came to this set for as many different reasons. I have had
the good fortune to meet many of them during the four weeks of 5am crew
calls and 9pm 'wraps'. There were friendships formed which may last a
lifetime, contacts made which can catapult a career, and even rumors of some
'fired' extras performing unscripted acts in the skyboxes.
-
- The 1st A.D. (John
Scotti) just made the call for Allan Graf (the Unit Director), "IT'S A
WRAP!! Thank you Houston! Thank all of you for sticking it
out." But, after a short outburst of cheering, the cast and
crew seem to leave the field in slow motion as they realize that it is no
longer a magical time in their life. It is no longer 1988.
We are no longer players & coaches, media & skybox reporters,
cheerleaders & fans. The AstroDome is no longer the set for a
Hollywood feature film.
-
- I sat a while to watch
as everyone left - slower than they had entered. Soon, it was
all quiet again. My gaze turned upward to the roof of the
AstroDome where I stood a couple weeks ago looking out over Houston. I
wondered if anyone would ever read all the graffitti on the beams... or,
would turning out the lights on "Friday Night Lights" be the end
for this 'field of dreams' - the 8th wonder of the world.
-
- As I walk up the East
Ramp to leave, I turn to take one last look around and try to imagine what
it was really like to witness that historic football game in 1988.
But then, I guess that the closest anyone will come to that will be on
October 15th, 2004 "...at a theatre near you".
-
- (Karl Paul - fnldidessa@yahoo.com)
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- Click below to access the Official Friday Night Lights website
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