A Full Cast

Hello Everyone!

Welcome back to my blog.

Yes, we pulled it off.  We now have a full cast again.  And, believe it or not, I think we have a better cast than what we started with.  Such is the nature of the beast.  Everything is on target so the camera can roll on Monday morning - early!  We are shooting in blocks of three episodes.  And we are shooting all three in one week.  That's 12 pages a day.  Yes, you heard right - 12!

Thought I would throw in a few shots of what is Africa to me.  This first shot is of the road where I am living.  I will have to find the names of these trees because they are everywhere and completely indicative of Africa.  And i would say there are as many people walking and bicycling as there are driving.

The next shot is what I call a Lily Tree.  It's just outside my door and is so fragrant that is fills the apartment.

Of course, if you don't like lilies it'd be awful! You'd have to move.

And this last shot is the entrance to what we would call an average strip mall.  Notice the pot hole just in front of the truck.  It's much bigger than it looks.  

Welcome to Kenya!  

The Casting Scramble

Thought I would send an update.   We're going to camera Monday and now, three days before camera, we have to recast 4 major roles.

I started reviewing the casting tapes last night and we'll have a session tomorrow - Saturday.  Actors, never give up hope.  Things could change in your favour at any given moment!

Production meeting this morning.  Should be a good one.  The afternoon will be calling actors to come in for tomorrow's session.

I'll keep you posted.

Neil

PS
Totally off topic.  Here's a photo I thought all you North Americans would appreciate.  And, Ekwa, I know you will!

Back to Blogging

My apologies everyone for having to set up a new blog.  For some reason my account was shut down.

Life in Kenya is something a North American has to experience to even coming close to understanding.  People do what they can in order to make things "work."  For instance, time.  If someone tells you they will meet you at 2 p.m. you shouldn't really expect them until 3.  But, there is the off chance that they will arrive at around 2 p.m. so you must be there waiting for that hour.  So what I have learned to do is to keep myself occupied from 2 o'clock onward so that I am not sitting and waiting.  And I do something I can quickly stop when the person arrives.

Visually, you see some of the solutions they come up with that someone else sees and then copies the idea. For instance, it is fairly common to see someone pulling a "trailer" made out of the axle of a car with car tires on it.  The drive shaft has been turned into a yoke to pull the trailer and a platform is put on top of the axle area so goods can be carried.  These are pulled by hand.  If there is a big load there might be 3 men pulling it and if it's a light load, one man is pulling.  Today I someone running with one that had a couple of sheets of plywood.

There are very few traffic lights here too.  A few downtown that create more of a traffic jam than they solve.  In a city of well over 3 million people with only a few sets of traffic lights you can imagine how many uncontrolled intersections there are.  And I have yet to see a traffic accident!

But life is teaming here and there's no stopping it.

Now back to the project at hand.  Today I met with the Sound recordist due to my concern about the crappy sound I have heard on some Kenyan shows.  After showing me his demo reel and answer a few questions I felt confident that the sound on this series is going to be of high quality.

The actors that have been cast came by today to pick up their scripts and sign their contracts.  There aren't any talent agents here so the actors do it all themselves.

I also met with the Art Director today and went over, in detail, the dressing for the locations.  He's a fun creative guy who has worked on such features as "The Constant Gardener" and "The Ghost and the Darkness."

Here are some photos:

My Executive Producer - Dorothy Ghettuba

My Producer Andrea Sapsford from the UK.

Ndanu and Kemei working in the production office.

The production office in Nairobi, Kenya.

And here is a photo of the guest house I am staying in.

And I was invited to my 1st AD's parents' house for his mother's 50th birthday celebration.  What an experience that was.  This is a middle class family that live on the eastside of Nairobi, a part of the city that tourists do not travel to.  Very nice people.  I had a great time meeting their family and friends on the weekend.

Here's a photo of his parents.  His dad is Masai.

We go to camera on February 1st.  Our first production meeting is on Friday with all the Department Heads so I am getting very excited.  This is my television directing debut and I have been lucky enough to have final say on all the casting - even of the leads.  The network and producers gave me carte blanche on that.  Oh, and because of that and a few other things, I am also earning my first Producer credit as well.

It's all very exciting.

Signing off.  Do expect more updates now that I am online and operational!

From Nairobi, Kenya,

Neil