Tough week but definitely much better

Yesterday I worked 20 hours. Yep. I started at 10am , pre-lighting the bar. The when the shoot crew came in and I handed over, I moved on to rigging the night exterior which involved a walk and talk shot down an industrial block. We put 2 12,000Watt lights on a cherry picker, set up deep lights in the background and ran cable. It was par for the course of a night exterior, sometimes they get a water truck to come in and wet the street (looks more cinematic). I actually finished pre-lighting that by 8pm and had to wait till they finished shooting out the bar to de-rig it. Turns out they didnt leave the bar till 4am and I didn't derig till 6am. It was pretty brutal. I don't have my car with me (small accident last week - won't bore you with deets) so I couldnt go home and chill while waiting. Anyway they kept coming over from the bar and changing the shot so I was lighting till the end.

Also despite repeated warnings to production, they didn't post a PA to watch some of the lights in the deep background and 4 of them got stolen. A PA (production assistant) fresh from school costs $120 a day and they lost $1000 worth of lights. I would say it's a good investment.

It's a turning point though, I've realised. I'm less worried about doing well. I've gotten several compliments on my rigs - I am always finished on time (a huge commodity in this business - time) and I don't really run over budget unless they throw last minute schedule changes at me. The gaffer always makes a point to thank me and coming from a friend as well as a colleague, it really matters. I didn't realise how stressed I was mentally about doing well till today.

Funny note - Mary Kate Olsen introduced herself to me when we were hanging out in the craft services truck. We chatted for a while about the weekend (my plans were to sleep and do laundry, she was going to the Hamptons to see James Livingston) about pot smoking (I dont do it, she does it with Snoop Dogg) and other things we have in common...(hahaha) I thought she was very sweet and painfully eager to be treated like a regular person. I liked her. In contrast to Sir Ben who's been quite aloof with the rest of the crew it's nice. We aren't a big budget movie so there's less of a divide between case and crew than usual.