The last two weeks have been busy, shooting in Los Angeles and Detroit.  After this past Monday’s shoot we have a small break, but we’re planning to go back to LA in August to shoot Kevin Eubanks’ band at a jazz club called The Baked Potato and to New York to shoot legendary jazz pianist Dave Brubeck.  So, although we are not shooting this week or next we are planning.   

One thing we’ve all but decided is that what we shot at the Cadieux Stage with Gretchen needs to be reshot.  Gretchen was uncomfortable and didn’t really warmup.  I asked her questions that I knew the answers to and she gave me different answers or not at all.  So the thinking is that we will shoot her again with some changes.  I think, that we will move the interview site from the Cadieux Stage to the Dirty Dog Cafe. We will adjust the shot so I can be in close proximity to her and we will clear the room.  Hopefully, she will relax and give a better interview.

We've been doing constant schedule-juggling with crew, talent and locations.  This project was originally slated to be shot in April.  But getting all of the musical talent lined up proved to be a bigger challenge than we thought.  I’m used to real people or actors; when you say to them, we’re going to do a movie they say, great, when do you need me?  But the jazz musician has a whole different groove.  You've got to track them down and they could be anywhere. We finally caught up with Sean Jones in Brazil. Right, Brazil, South America, that one.  And of course it wasn’t a straightforward call.  Our producer reached him once by phone, then they lost the connection, so she texted with him back and forth from Brazil to set things up.  So the point I’m making is that it took time and that delay affected people's schedules. 

I’m lucky to work with some of the best DPs in the state - Kevin Hewitt, Lon Stratton and Jeff Dougherty.  Kevin is my man, you know, the shared WDIV history, but, since the project went so long, Kevin took another movie.  So the schedule worked out like this, Kevin would shoot the week in LA and Lon would shoot the Detroit week.  You don’t really want to change DPs in the middle of a shoot, but what can you do?

But everything is good; Lon does a great job and we’re golden.  

So Kevin Hewitt and Lon Stratton are willing to work on your project.  If you have to switch DPs midstream, it's good to have these guys to choose from!