Liars and Lunatics :: Film Blog

Benjamin Franklin once said:

“Beware of little expenses. A small leak will sink a great ship.” 

This could easily be one of our mottos. We are very careful with how we spend our money… which seems kinda counter-intuitive considering that we’re in showbiz (which is synonymous with the spending-money-like-water mentality).

Actually, we’re usually over-careful with how we spend our money. But we also wanted our film Liars and Lunatics to look like it cost a million bucks. So in order to keep costs down, we scrounged around for costumes and props, frequenting thrift shops, tag sales, our own homes, etc. For example: the brown curtains in Frolick’s office came from the home of our production designer.  

And all those candles? We originally found them lying in a drawer in the church where we were filming. They were already half-used, so we asked if we could use them, promising to buy the church some new ones. Well, we burned those candles down on the very first day of shooting.

We had the church secretary order some new candles; a box for the church and a box for us (as we thought we might  need to do some more shots with the candles… which we did). Well, when we got the bill, it was a little higher than we expected. (How much could candles cost?!)

Well, apparently these candles were of the top-notch variety! With a top-notch price tag… In fact, it turned out that of all the props we purchased, those candles were the most expensive prop we used.

We’re glad to say that they actually made it into the movie…

As opposed to the cutting-room floor!

Good ole Ben was right: little expenses do begin to pile up. Especially, on things that you never really intended to buy in the first place.

{{ photo :: The ballerina surrounded by those expensive candles. }}

There’s an important lesson here. By nature, we’re actually very careful with being economical and saving everything. We don’t like to spend money unless we have to.

Last summer, when we were filming Liars and Lunatics, we had to do a scene where Dr. Donovin (played by Carson Grant) has to spill his coffee. (See photo…)

Well, our “props department” got ahold of these blue paper coffee cups with a Grecian motif on them.

The trouble came after we began the editing process. We realized that you couldn’t really tell that the coffee had spilled. So we decided a close-up was in order. Another problem. We didn’t have the Grecian paper cup anymore!

We went back to the coffee shop where we got it in the first place, but they were using different cups now. Well, we had to do the insert of the close-up using a different cup.

Most people probably won’t even notice it, though. (Unless those film extremists who watch the movie 100 times and start looking for all our continuity errors!)

Lesson learned: Never throw away your paper coffee cups!

{{ photo :: Dr. Donovin (Carson Grant) and Dr. Frolick (Allison Lane) talk in the hallway of the mental asylum. If you look carefully, you’ll notice the coffee cup in Donovin’s hand. }}

Looking over all our pix for our feature film Liars and Lunatics. We noticed that our stills photographer took scores of pictures of the ballerina figurine. In fact, the ballerina probably has had a total of more photos taken than any of our actors in the film!

We counted. And out of the 1,000+ pix, about 20% of them are of the ballerina! That’s right… 1 out of every 5 photos features the ballerina figurine.

Okay, so some of the photos are pretty much the same, taken at slightly different angles. Others turned out slightly blurry. But the fact remains that the ballerina was one popular photo magnet.

Take a look…

And just in case, you want to see yet another angle on the ballerina, here she is… again!

(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. }}

You may have noticed photos of a ballerina figurine on some of our webpages for our film Liars and Lunatics. There’s a story behind that…

In the movie, the ballerina represents the James’ dead girlfriend, Paige. (It makes some sense when you realize that Paige is a dancer.)

After Paige’s death, the ballerina comes to act as an idol of sorts for James; something he won’t let go of. (Which, it seems, is one of the reasons why he finds himself in a mental asylum.)

Our screenplay called for the ballerina to be smashed to pieces in one of the scenes. So, in order to prepare for this, we searched high and low for the right ballerina. In fact, several versions of the same figurine so we could do multiple takes if we needed them.

The thing is, we had trouble finding any ballerina figurines.

And all the ballerinas we did come across had blond hair and looked like they were five years old. Well, since our Paige (played by Maya Serhan) didn’t have blond hair—and she’s considerably older than five!—we had to persist in our search for the perfect ballerina figurine.

To be continued…

{{ Photo :: Paige (played by Maya Serhan) looks down at the ballerina. }}

Principal photography for our indie film, Liars and Lunatics, took place in August 2006. One of the most difficult scenes to shoot was one featuring Staples and James… filmed up on a rooftop patio. But because of nearby LaGuardia Airport, we were having trouble with the sound. It was also a very emotional scene.

It didn’t turn out as well as we’d hoped. So, the next day, we did the same scene again. This time in the Boiler Room on location of the “Hospital” scenes. We decided to use a yellow ladder we found there as a prop for James.

Later that day, we used the yellow ladder again… this time for Staples and Frolick. Although the script did not call for a ladder, we decided to use it in this scene because, as Allison Lane (Frolick) recalls: “We were having technical difficulties.”

The joke became, that if we encountered a problem, all we needed to do was bring out the yellow ladder!

{{ Photo above left :: Joseph Halsey (James) and Patrick Mitchell (Staples) try to concentrate on a very intense scene in the boiler room. }}

{{ Photo above right :: Joseph Halsey (James) and Allison Lane (Frolick) have a playful moment on the ladder. }}