The actors,-supporting actor -Esteban Viaña

[We asked Esteban Viaña, who plays Javier, the former boss of our hero Luis, to provide us with a brief account of his acting career.  Here is what he wrote us (translated from Spanish):]

One can say that my varied experience as an actor began in grammar school, when I participated in an activity called "Speech and Verse."  From that time on, encouraged by my teacher, I started down the road of acting, something that still excites and inspires me, and which I intend to continue until I die or am no longer physically capable of continuing.

Antonio de la Malena (Luis) and Esteban Viaña (Javier) listening to the director.

I have acted for a number of different theater groups.  I've also acted in musicals, usually in the role of a comic tenor.  I have acted in religious productions [something Spain is noted for], both in plazas and in front of churches.  I have performed on many different stages, one of my favorite of which is the spectacular, old roman theater in Bolonia, Spain, in the ruins of the Roman city of Baelo Claudia.

My acting career has allowed me to visit many cities in Spain, a great pleasure for me.  Although I tend to be type-cast as a comic actor, I have also had dramatic roles of various types, but the truth is I feel most comfortable playing the comic roles.  One role for which I have particular affection and which I have played numerous times is the comic role of Payaso [a character in Spanish theater for children], partly because I enjoy children so much.

Esteban Viaña (blue sweater) in a street scene.

I would like to add that my experience as an actor has been very satisfying for me.  I especially enjoy the immediacy of live theater, and the ability to transmit to the public the different emotions that I feel as a person, at the moment that I feel them. 

NOTE:  Part of a scene with Esteban Viaña is in the trailer on the web site DominotheMovie.com.  And another note--we have improved the sound of this trailer, but for technical reasons, our web master is having trouble mounting this on the web site.  Our apologies.

We've finished shooting.

In my just-ended five week trip to Jerez, we finished shooting Domino.  In fact, we finished two days before I flew back to California.

Hooray for us!  Fireworks!  Cheering crowds!  We did it!

This may not seem like a big deal to you, but it was to me and to our lead actor, Antonio de la Malena, playing Luis.  To me because I really like the project and after quite a lot of time and effort, it felt good to have it "in the can," as it were.  To Antonio de la Malena because he likes the project too, but also because, well, I think by the end he was kind of tired of having me say "Hey, I decided to add just two more little tiny scenes...."

But I did add in all the scenes I wanted and to tell you the truth, I think they really make the drama complete.

"Luis' street," as seen last year.  Now, some of the houses have been painted other colors.

 For some of the last scenes we shot, Antonio was the only actor and he had no dialogue.  I did all the shooting of those by myself.  A five to seven person crew seems unnecessary if, for example, you simply need a shot of one person going out the front door of his "home" and walking down the street, passing in front of the camera as he walks.

But even small things like that had to be shot 5 or 6 times because it's hard to keep someone in frame and with a good spacing within the frame if the person is first moving towards the camera, and then away from it.

For that particular walking-out-of-the-door shot, several neighbors came out to watch because--a confession here--we used the front door of my flat as Luis' front door.  They were all very quiet while we were shooting, and when we finished, they gave us some applause. 

Good neighbors.

Another memorable shot was where I had Antonio (as Luis) walk in front of the major demonstration organized by the Moviemiento 15-M (los Indignados), similar to our Occupy Wall Street.  Here, we used a 4 person crew.

The protestors' camp in Jerez' central square.

 As we suspected, the demonstrators did not pose for our camera nor did they wait to start their march until we had the camera set up at the angle I wanted.  The result was that we got the back of the parade, we got some reasonable sound, we got Antonio walking in front of the tents (with a sign saying "Liberty" behind him),etc.  

Note that Liberty is something Luis does NOT have, due to his financial problems.

The "Liberty" sign.

BUT to make the scene complete, we had to go back another day, shooting  a DIFFERENT demonstration (but involving the same groups) marching down the street past the camera.

All that aside, I am really delighted with what we have, and really pleased that shooting is done.  Now, for fine cut editing, background music, and various kinds of technical work.  Considering money concerns as well as other matters, my guess is that Domino will be finished by summer of 2012.

Double and triple duty--producer-director, etc., Eve A. Ma

Yes, we do have a crew.

For most scenes, we have a camera person, a sound tech, a boom operator-best boy, a continuity-script person, a floor manager, and a director plus assistant to the director who is also our lead actor. 

You'll note there's some doubling up here.  Sometimes,  some of these people have to double up even more, for example, to cover lighting.   And SOMETIMES, if the place where we'll shoot is very restricted, or we're dealing with children, or if it's a very, very simple scene, there will be a lot more doubling up.

We have a director and crew of 2 for the want-ads scenes.  Here the crew is, relaxing with the lead actor,

Sometimes, in fact, I personally have had to be script writer, producer-director, camera operator, lighting tech, sound tech, and always, basic editor.  No, it's NOT easy.

In fact, it gets very complicated.  When we were shooting in Peña Chacón for the second time, for example, I was producer-director, camera operator, continuity person and lighting tech.  This resulted in some errors, because the director was too involved in camera angles and directing to notice that two actors missed their lines.  One of the missed lines was very important.

In addition, I was so focused on the image in the camera that I centered the mini-spotlight perfectly on the actor I wanted to light while I was setting up, but the minute I turned the camera to ¨"record," my hand relaxed and the mini-spotlight wandered to the left.

SIGH.

Three crew members out of 6 for that day, plus the director.

We had to re-shoot parts of those scenes, hence, part of the reason for the third time at Peña Chacón.  (The reason for the second shoot was my camera person did NOT understand what I wanted and, being in the land of the macho male, even though he´s a great guy, he kept thinking he knew better what I wanted than I did.  Plus we had some lighting problems.)

As for the newspaper scenes and such, what the hey, I just grabbed a camera, tripod, shoulder mount, digital recorder, mini-tripod for the digital recorder, microphone...

...and I shot it all by myself, with only the lead actor/assistant to the producer-director with me.

I won´t say which one started crying.  And we also had a teenaged boy.

PHOTO

And when trying to shoot the kids in a small space, well, I won't go there except to say that kids are kids, although they all really did their best, even the little girl that burst into tears at one point and said she could not go on.  But she did, but it all turned out ok.  And that's what it's all about, right?

Shooting in Peña Chacón

Let's face it--some scenes are harder to shoot than others.

My near-Waterloo came with the scenes we shot in Peña Chacón.  First of all, let me explain:  Peña Chacón  as well as all flamenco peñas is a flamenco club.  They present flamenco shows once a week for a chosen month.  The various peñas alternate months, so that most of the year, every Friday there's a flamenco show SOMEWHERE.  They also present a flamenco show during the big, annual, world famous flamenco festival of Jerez de la Frontera.

The bar area with actors--main center of interest for these scenes.

Peña Chacón is a cool location.  It's big, has photos of famous flamenco performers all over the walls, and has a bar in a corner, as well as a stage and other things you might need if you were going to present a flamenco show.

By the way, the flamenco shows in the peñas are all free.

The guy who manages the peña is a friend of our lead actor, Antonio de la Malena.  He's also a nice guy.  And he's a well-know palmero (flamenco percussionist--he does the hand clapping rhythms).  His name is Ali de la Tota, and he got the peña's president to agree to let us film there free of charge.

Ali de la Tota.  Nice guy.

The scenes we were to film were the opening scenes.  Because they're the first thing the audience will see, it's really important that they look good.

I, of course, had written the scenes to have a combined total of about 10 actors, with two "centers of interest."  This is complicated.  I have never done anything nearly as complicated before in my life.  You might think that the music and dance documentaries I´ve done, which in some cases involve more people in front of the camera, would be more difficult but in the documentaries, the musicians all stayed in one place, and the dancers, well, they all danced in the area we specified.

AND for the documentaries, we had three cameras.  That meant if one camera angle didn't look good, we had two others to choose from.

The table with domino players--our secondary area of interest.

With the scenes in Peña Chacon, for the most part we only had ONE camera, although by the time we were shooting for the third time, I decided to have us bring in a second camera for parts of the actual game of dominoes.

Adding to the complications, the lighting in the bar area is very poor.  The bar area was where our more important actors had their scenes, and it is dark and very cramped.  It was hard to get the camera in the right place and it was hard to get the lighting correct.

The result was that we had to shoot those scenes THREE TIMES.  Man, was it ever complicated.  Man, did I ever make mistakes.  Man, did I ever learn a lot.

I am now satisfied with what we have.  Sure, it could be better.  If we shot it a fourth time, it might look even nicer...but enough is enough.  It's decent.  It gets its message across.  It looks fine, and in some places, it looks really good.

Just so you'll know.

OUR NEXT BLOG will be about some thanks are due to Bar Gitaneria.  (We´ll thank Peña Chacón later, when I have the photos I want.)