The End of An Era

Well, I do believe that I've done my last shoot on the Boardwalk...at least for the first season. This was what we were all hearing yesterday, at any rate.

But to backtrack for a minute...

First of all, I dutifully went and did my transcription job on Tuesday, mourning the loss of a day on the Boardwalk. However, they called in the afternoon, so I did Boardwalk on Wednesday...i.e., yesterday. AND I heard from everyone who was there on Tuesday that it was a ghastly awful shoot because of the weather - 55 degrees and raining. So except for the money, I'm glad I missed it.

However, yesterday was pretty ghastly too...did you know it hit 92 degrees yesterday? Do you know that we were all out tromping around on that damn Boardwalk in the hottest part of the day? In those heavy costumes? Some of the women were lucky because they have the light summer chiffon dresses on, but it didn't help them a lot...we were filming bits and pieces of fill in stuff, so about every ten minutes, those who had heavy winter coats as part of their costumes had to put them on. Luckily, I'm the same at all times (nobody loves me...I want a chiffon dress!), but I'm still wearing four layers of clothing...suffice it to say that when the SAG rep, Leif, came by, he negotiated heat pay for us...yay, SAG! And we were out there from 10:30 am until after midnight. In case you were wondering, it didn't get a lot cooler. The only bright spot was the fact that people came by and sprayed us with water, since the first shot was supposed to be in the rain. We get paid for wet work, too...isn't that nice?

But, as far as I know, no more Boardwalk until next year...and boy, will I miss those paychecks. Two came in the mail today...one for a quickie shoot that only paid minimum for $122.80, and one for a LONG day's shoot for $305.09. Just to give you an example of what SAG pays you for doing, it broke down like this:

Regular 8 hour day - $134.00
Meal penalty (meaning, we got served lunch later than the rules allow) - 80.00
Smoke (I tried one of those herb cigarettes at the request of a director - ugh) - 14.00
Night premium (meaning anything after 8 pm or maybe it's 9 pm) - 4.81
2 hours of overtime - 55.50
2.30 hours of double time - 85.10

Then deductions...ending me up with a check for 305.09. Dear, lovely SAG...this, you understand, was for ONE DAY OF WORK.

Tonight I rehearsed for the play, which goes up a week from Monday, God help me. I'm slowly getting the lines down, but the fact that my character is nutty as a fruitcake and doesn't have a connected thought in her head is slowing me down considerably...it's like trying to memorize the path of a hyperactive grasshopper. But I shall persevere...

Now I'm going to finish my beer and go to bed. And tomorrow, oh, frabjous day...no filming, no rehearsal...just one long and glorious day to...learn lines. Um, wow...freedom?

Love, Wendy