Liars and Lunatics :: Film Blog

Check out the Liars and Lunatics Behind the Scenes Featurette — Part 2…

Missed Part 1? Check it out.

Saturday was Mad Hatter Day. And in honor of this, we’ve put together a bunch of photos of, what else? People in the cast and crew of the feature film Liars and Lunatics… wearing so many different hats…

For some of us, it was all part of the costume.

{{ photo :: left - Fumbles (Myron Buchholz) getting ready for his big scene in the courtroom :: right – Hume (Bruce Nicholls) enjoys a game of backgammon in his party hat }}

For others, we had to wear the same hat…

{{ photo :: left – Hudson Chambers as Davie :: right – Maya Serhan as Paige }}

And then there were the hats worn at the Costume Party.

{{ photos :: Our background actors dressed for a Halloween Party. }}

Some of us seemed to use our hats to help us concentrate.

{{ photos :: Blaze Kelly Coyle jotting down some notes in her costume notebook :: Maria and Kim seem to be enjoying the costume party }}

And then there were the people on the set who used hats to conceal their identities.

{{ photo :: A mystery person and Kevin Wiley look at the monitor. }}

When we were doing up the shooting schedule for Liars and Lunatics (okay, so we’re using the term ”we” loosely here… it was actually Maria who came up with the schedule), we had to use military time. For example:

#	Actor	Character	On Set	Turnover
01	Joseph Halsey	James	11:00	11:15
02	Allison Lane	Frolick	11:00	11:15
05	Patrick Mitchell	Staples	13:00	13:15
08	Amanda Short	Avie	14:00	14:15
09	Hudson Chambers	Davie	14:00	14:15

This was all actually thanks to the Screen Actors Guild (aka SAG). That’s right, apparently we had to get our SAG actors to sign in using military time. Guess it had something to do with not being confused about whether it’s am or pm.

In Europe, they use military time anyway. And all those people in the military… well, they shouldn’t have a problem, either…

But for the rest of us? Well, it’s not as easy as it may seem. You’re always trying to do calculations in your head about the “real” time! So, it was no surprise when one of our production people (probably Maria again) got a phone call from one of the actors. “What’s my call time? 16:00?”

Yep! That’s 4:00 pm for the rest of us…

Meant to post this yesterday, but ran into some issues with regards to getting it up on YouTube. The file was actually too big, so we had to lower the resolution a bit. Not as clear as we’d like, but it works.

Anyways, check it out! Our Liars and Lunatics Behind-the-Scenes Featurette… At least Part One of it. We’ll be working on Part Two to post at a later date.

Working on some sort of behind-the-scenes featurette of Liars and Lunatics to post to YouTube. Not sure when we’ll have that ready. Hopefully within the week…

(Hmmm… That was kind of a short post…)

Today is the one year anniversary of the beginning of principal photography for Liars and Lunatics. And this scene is the very first thing we shot.

Let’s see, that would be Scene 24…

“EXT. Hospital Gardens — Day”

We were getting a bit behind schedule. We had to contend with a nest of wild parakeets making a bunch of noise that morning. And then the sun decided to come up over the edge of the building a little faster than we had anticipated.

So, instead of going to the close-ups, we decided to move inside and go to our next scene. It was a bit of a rough start, but the rest of the day went well. We eventually came back to do the close-ups. Can’t remember now whether it was later on that same day or if we stuck it in on the next day.

{{ photo :: James and Frolick walking in the Hospital Gardens. }}

The camera never lies… right?

Well, according to our production stills, apparently we did quite a bit of pointing during the film shoot for Liars and Lunatics. And we didn’t even realize it until we noticed a common thread in some of the photos.

“Hey you! Don’t you mess with Super-Jay!”

That’s right, he can see through brick walls with his x-ray vision. Don’t let the Hawaiian lei fool you.

Or, maybe it’s just Joe Halsey, tired out and ready to go home at the end of Day 10.

“Objection, your Honor!”

Prosecutor Dubious is at it again in the courtroom…

That’s his job. To object to everything and anything. And Carson Grant does quite a job in portraying this “bad guy”. Pointing fingers and all.

“You there! Sit down, or else I’ll have to take you in…”

Michael Kricfalusi takes his position as Bailiff very seriously (although, that might be because he’s also the 1st AD on the film).

And here she is!

The infamous one behind all the stills. Yep, Thea’s the one who caught all the pointing fingers in the first place. (Hmmm… if she’s in front of the camera, who’s taking the picture????)

Yet another pointing finger…

Rumor has it that there are at least two Moon Brothers in this photograph. Maybe three.

There’ve even been reports that if you look carefully, you can see four of them. Or five, or six, depending on the source you talk to. But, then again, maybe not. We never listen to those rumors anyway…

We can safely say that no animals were harmed on our Liars and Lunatics film shoot…

Oh… Hmmm… Except… Maybe… One.

Ooopps! Guess we can’t use that statement after all in the film credits. Because, to our knowledge, at least one animal was harmed during the film shoot. And not only harmed, but brutally massacred. Killed. Dead. Gone.

That’s right. A poor house fly lost the battle in the ruthless onslaught against its life.

Here’s what happened. We were filming in “James’ Library”. There was fly buzzing about. Now, that might not seem like much, but to the sound guys, this was the end of the world. We needed to get rid of that fly. Quick!

Unfortunately, we were not properly equipped with the right weapons for the mass destruction of flies (Some people like to call these weapons “fly swatters”). So our boom operator decided to take matters into his own hands. Literally. He smacked the fly with the palm of his hand. The fly was dead. But what our boom operator didn’t realize (before committing this rash act) was that the fly would have his revenge.

That clever house fly was sitting on a cement wall. And if you’ve ever smacked your hand against a cement wall, you might find out what our boom operator found out. Your hand gets sprained. He had to keep ice on the hand for days. Not easy to do when you’re trying to hold up a boom microphone. All because of a little sound problem called a fly…

Hmmm. Maybe we can put:

“No animals—except one house fly—were harmed during the filming of this motion picture.” 

{{ photo :: No, it’s not the fly. But perhaps it’s a close relative of the slain. }}

Hair and makeup… Makeup and hair… What would we have done without them? Here are some photos of the good-looking people that populated the set of our feature film Liars and Lunatics.

“Here Fumbles. How about a little powder?”

There she is… The amazing Blaze. Our super-duper makeup and costume wizard!

Blaze Kelly Coyle helps Myron Buchholz (Fumbles) with some touchup before filming his scene.

“Looking Good!”

Amanda Short admires herself in the mirror as she waits for her next scene as Avie Malvideo.

Disco’s not dead…

At least not as long as this guy’s around.

One of the background actors strikes a pose on his way from wardrobe. We were filming the hospital hallway scenes… hence he’s wearing pajamas!

Another morning with the Curling Iron

Allison Lane curls those golden locks. Every morning, she arrived on set to get down to business… making sure her hair’s just right.

(Looks like that mirror needs to be shined up a bit.)

A little powder for Bruce…

Thanks to Amanda (dressed up in her costume for Avie), Bruce Nicholls is looking good as Philosopher Hume.

His forehead must have been a little too shiny…

Send in the Clowns?

Is that really a clown helping out on the film crew?

Yes, believe it or not, it really is... One of our techies seems to be getting into the spirit of things for the costume party scenes. 

Or, then again, maybe it’s just someone who likes to wear brightly colored wigs…

(Continued from Part One…)

Months prior to filming the first footage of Liars and Lunatics, we began our search for for the perfect ballerina figurine. There was one problem. We hadn’t found anything that suited our purposes.

And then, a few days before principal photography began, there she was. A dark-haired ballerina! But with one drawback; there was only one figurine available.

One of the scenes in the screenplay called for us to smash the ballerina to pieces. With that in mind, we had intended to buy at least two identical figurines in order to get at least two takes. Oh well, we’d just have to be extra careful.

As it went, we scheduled the “smashing of the ballerina” to occur on the final day of shooting. But then we had second thoughts…

We discussed all sorts of scenarios: whether or not to drop it, throw it against the wall, smash it into a mirror. What if we didn’t like the take? We couldn’t go back and redo it since we only had the one ballerina. Maybe we shouldn’t smash her at all?

So…what happened to our ballerina? Sorry! You’ll have to watch the movie…

{{ Photo :: To smash, or not to smash the ballerina? That is the question. }}