As soon as I left the Hotel, I was lost.

Two weeks ago, Amit Bhattacharya, a Director of Photography, Facebooked me. It had been about 10 years since I’d seen him. He was the D.P. on my brother-in-law’s film, ‘It’s a Shame About Ray’. I saw it as a divine sign and gave him a call. He said YES! We decided to meet for breakfast to discuss the production. We had no script, no location…hmmmm, what the fuck are we meeting about? Anyway, I had eggs benedict and he had a bagel & lox. Mine was pretty good. Here I was at a meeting with my D.P. and we had nothing concrete to discuss. What had I gotten myself into? I was panicking. I told him that all I had aside from him was two actors and he said, get this, ‘Sounds Good’. Good? That’s it? No panic? Why couldn’t I be that calm? Did I mention he doesn’t drive? Maybe that’s his trick. So, I asked him for his wish list and he coolly asked for a Panasonic PDX100, a couple of C-Stands, some China Balls w/ Dimmers and an Apple Box and a bunch of other stuff we probably wouldn’t need, but who really knows, when you don’t know…

Sitting around was driving me crazy…Fucking Crazy’s more like it! I’d put the TEAM together and now I needed to sort out my options in Vegas, (where to shoot and where to stay,) so I flew out, rented a car and figured out quickly that I knew no one and had no business out there, it’s a different place when you’re not there for the usual reasons, like losing money and hoping for a free room. There was an orientation mixer, but I missed it because I was still on the waiting list and avoiding my girlfriend at the time. So, without a clue to what to do, I ordered room service and read the rules one more time at (www.48hourfilm.com) and realized I wasn’t required to shoot the short in Vegas, I just needed a representative at the kickoff. I couldn’t be more relieved, that’s not true, I could…and tomorrow, the madness will continue…