A Good Start

Kennedy asked me to write a little something about our first few days of shooting. Overall, it would appear we are off to a good start on the production. The crew all arrived in Penticton late on Sunday night and set-up to film the actor playing Buck being attacked by the Ogopogo. Through the dense clouds of smoke from the fog machine and ‘special aquatic effects’ (i.e.: buckets of water) the first scene of The Beast of Bottomless Lake was finally filmed.

After only a few hours sleep we were all up the next morning and off to Kelowna to visit our friends at CATO. Further interviews of potential crew transpired. We even had one résumé with "Pyrotechnics (self taught)" listed. It was nice to catch up with familiar faces from the casting last year.

Shari, our excellent DP decided on sushi for lunch and we managed to find the slowest take-away in the Okanagan.

We visited the Kelowna Princess and looked around, chatting to Bob the skipper. We found out that over 25 weddings have taken place on the boat, all on the same day! It was then off to see the Summerland yacht club where we found they have had a new bar put in. They must of known I was coming.

The next day saw us at a marina to film the real Buck and his news interview. Despite cold temperatures the crew soldiered on. Patrick, our slightly eccentric sound guy insisted the sub-zero weather was nothing and wore a T-shirt. He then removed a sock to help fashion a furry! The more sane members of the cast and crew grabbed whatever was near to hand to keep warm, be it other crew members' clothes or the crew themselves. Kennedy, our illustrious writer, found that his raging heart was all that was needed to keep him toasty and proceeded to flirt with our glamorous newscaster Dorothy. Obviously, as I run an equal opportunities production, I will now be insisting he flirts with all our actors, both male and female, for the rest of the shoot.

The search still continues to fill our final crew positions. We were hoping to hire more locals from the Okanagan but it seems they are all still hibernating from the cold. If anyone out there is interested please contact Provost Pictures, you never know you may end up part of the dream team. There are only a few weeks to go till production starts.

In the afternoon the sun came out and we filmed Chief Bigsky (pronounced Big-ski). It was a beautiful moment that reduced our sensitive director to tears. An eagle even soared overhead watching the set with a keen eye. That reminds me: I really must cut the craft services budget.

We are still looking for a van for the film. If you or anyone you know has a VW camper-style van, please get in touch. There are also the last few shares in the movie available for sale. I’m sure investment analysts around the world are rushing for these, so act fast.

— David Jevons, Producer

Going Dark

I'm about to head out the door to our second day of rehearsals.

But before I do I figured I should do a quick entry. What may be my last entry until we return from the Okanagan, possibly even 'til we're finished production.

I'm trying to encourage Craig to do one last entry too - if I'm not going to get to write, he certainly isn't.

For the next while all the entries in here will be done by cast and crew. Enjoy their journey!

I also wanted to acknowledge that from this entry onwards, the posts are original to this blog, not transfered from the old one.

T-Minus one week. Yikes!

- Kennedy

Beastly Dreams

I wake up yesterday morning to my wife looking at me kind of funny with this grin on her face and she says, “You were sleep-talking last night.”

I reply with, “Oh yeah, what about?”

“You woke me up talking about casting for the movie. You were talking about casting a female and her audition was pretty great and what did I think. You kept on talking and I finally pinched you and asked if you were awake and your reply was, ‘Of course I'm awake!’ in a rather grumpy tone and that was the end of it.

“The conversation ended and I went back to sleep knowing you were asleep the whole time.”

Okay, when one starts talking about the movie in one’s sleep, one is a little obsessed.

But I am glad that I am obsessed.

I'm glad that this is all-consuming.

I'm glad that I am dreaming out loud about our dream of making The Beast of Bottomless Lake.

- Craig

Hugs all around!

What a fabulous evening that was! Meet the cast and crew. With the exception of having met the director, Craig, once at the audition, everyone else was a total stranger to me. By the time I had to run to catch my ferry, well…

I’ve done much more work on the stage than I have in film. I love the rehearsal process of theatre as much as, perhaps more than, the actual performance. Strangers gradually become acquaintances, often friends. In front of your eyes actors’ personalities morph into something else; characters who develop relationships with each other, with the cast, with their creators. It’s a beautiful, crazy time.

I felt the beginnings of that process last night; like being part of the birth of a new family. I’m usually a ‘day player’ in film so I miss out on most of this process. I feel so excited and privileged to be joining this project in early days. Well, not that early really. The project has been working up to last night for about eight years. But I feel like I’m entering the flow way upstream this time, and I’m excited about the trip.

The first time I read the sides for my audition, I knew there was something special about this film, and I felt the first pangs of “I want to be a part of this.” When the director came over and gave me a hug after the audition, I was hooked.

Apparently he hugs a lot, but what are families for? So let’s hug away and watch this baby grow.

Cheers,

— Gordon / ‘Clive’

Audition Excitement

What an exciting week! Two days in Vancouver and two days in Kelowna casting for our soon-to-be-shot movie, The Beast of Bottomless Lake. I laughed my ass off, and for those that know me, that is no easy accomplishment.

I don't think I have had as much fun in my whole career as I am having now.

The actors brought so much creativity and genuine talent to the words Keith, Kennedy and I have written that I truly feel we are blessed to be surrounded by such amazing talent. It also saddens me a little to know that so much incredible talent is under-utilized in the system that is Hollywood North. I wish that these wonderful friends and new friends could be recognized by the industry as I see them, a much deeper pool of talent than what the industry constraints place on them.

Wake up L.A. and L.A. North, see what I see and start taking advantage of the great talent that exists here, eh?

- Craig

The P.A. BBQ Incident

This Blog Entry (A.K.A. "The Cunt Post.") has been temporarily disabled.

It will return... in all it's infamy.

Sincerely,

- Kennedy

Dust this off...

Oh wow… look at this over here… it's the old Provost Pictures blog, all dusty and left forgotten.

Jeez, look at this stuff… "Kennedy, Craig and Wendy…" Oh that's a laugh… Wendy was two producers ago.

Oh, and look at this quaint title to the next most recent entry "A Big Few Days" - oh how naive I was. Twice over.

And so much else has happened… media… trips… more staff and crew… promises from actors…

It goes on.But what's this about entries disappearing?

Hmmm… I guess I won't invest too much time in this. That was the issue before. Too much time for stuff that didn't exist in the end.

One last thought before I go… and I have no idea if I'll be back, so this really could be the last…

This came up on a Google search. Right now I Google us at least once a week to see where we're coming up. Some of it's pretty damned funny (not as funny as Juanabees fan mail, but pretty funny). I was actually wanting to find a blog entry about us that amused me. Very funny. I want to put it in my video diary (which better serves my needs than a blog). But this is the first time that this blog ever appeared — and only once in the entire search, no redundancies. That alone might be its saving grace. I had forgotten it existed. Presumably now I'll get an occasional hit.

- Kennedy