I’ve had the privilege of getting acquainted with a drama group called “The Revelation Is Christ (or T-RIC for short). I had sat in on one of their practices and wrote a little piece on them for the Equip newsletter. Their big focus is to highlight serious abuses and crimes that are happening in their community, and there are more then enough of those to go around in Liberia. Topics of their skits range from domestic violence to ritualistic killings. Not exactly your average acting group. They’ve decided that they have a couple stories that they want to make into a movie and since I’m the “queepoo” (white-man) with a camcorder, I get to film all the action.
My cell phone alarm clock woke me up bright and way to early at 7. I was out the door and at the designated gathering place in half an hour. It took till about 9 before everybody was actually gathered so I killed the time by playing with some of the kids in the neighborhood.
Speaking of kids, I MUST go off on a tangent here because as nice as Liberia is, it’s the kids that I have fallen in love with. There are a lot of kids here. I mean, a lot! And you know that whole “don’t talk to strangers” thing that parents always told you when you were young? It doesn’t apply here. They practically throw themselves at you; except for the real little ones that take one look at you and start crying. Over 50% of the population of Liberia is under 18. Think about the implications of that for a minute.
I digress.
Once everybody was finally assembled, we were still a long way off from actually filming anything yet. We were going to shoot a scene that involved using a number of fake AK-47s. So we had to whisk off to the local police station to let them know, lest anybody freak out. One cop, seeing an easy way out of a tedious day, instantly declared that he needed to come along to supervise, so he came back with us.
It was then declared that we really needed a car, so somebody rushed back into town to rent one for the day. So by about 11 about ten of us piled into a tiny Toyota Corolla and headed off to our first scene, the rest following on motorbikes.
Once we actually got the camera rolling, things were still kind of crazy. First off, we had no tripod. I would try and keep my arm still or find something to prop the camera, but everything is still a bit shaky. But hey, apparently that is in style these days. Secondly, the actors were clearly just as new to this movie business as I was. They would constantly deliver lines when they were miles away from the camera frame. Since there wasn’t really a script to go by, actor would completely change their lines and sometimes even the plot during different takes. Thirdly, Liberians are curious by nature. So whenever we were filming a crowd would gather to watch the action. They were, of course, always in the way and always making a lot of noise. Oh well.
It was altogether a thrilling experience and its not over. We’re filming again today.
Here's a completely unrelated but absolutely adorable photo of a puppy:
2 comments:
That puppy is tiny! Wow, imagine fitting 11 people in my car! Some must have been riding in the truck and the roof...
I think there were more people on the outside of the car then the inside.
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