And Then The Chunk Of Plaster Fell Where My Head Had Just Been

The shoot for Amanda Palmer's "Leeds United" went better than I could have dreamed yesterday, considering that I had such nerves the night before that I wanted to kill myself. I don't know why I was getting myself in such a state, it was only a mixed narrative and performance video with 120+ extras, 8 dancers, choreo, 6 backing musicians, a giant sign made of lights and a very independent-minded (but gracious and intelligent) singer. And 16 hours to shoot it in. What could possibly go wrong?

The answer is, for once, nothing did - mostly thanks to my producer and my crew, who redefined the word "legends", and to Amanda, who delivered an absolutely electric performance (20 times in a row) while remaining the Queen of Good Sports and ambling around chatting to our huge and enthusiastic group of extras. The Coronet is also a great location to shoot in - their production and tech staff are really on the ball, and if it weren't for Keith Of The Lighting Desk, our job would have been about a million times more difficult. Crikey, this is droning on like an Oscars acceptance speech, isn't it? How dull. Here, controversy: there were some last-minute changes worked out a day before the shoot. They stressed me out, for I are Kubrickian control freak, but they made the video better. I will write more interestingly about the video later, but meanwhile, have a few of photographer Michael Brydon's production stills:

This doesn't even hint at the insane ornateness of the video, but it is incredibly rock and roll, no? Amanda was not fond of that sign (she worried it would look too egotistical, if folks didn't understand the video is a parody of the whole diva/female singer going solo thing - especially when lifted out of context, like here) but I was adamant about having it. So, the sign: all about my ego, actually. It (the sign, not the ego) was made by Pink Floyd-founded London experimental theatre collective The People Show. More:

We borrowed this jacket on Saturday from London designer Aimee McWilliams - we were working out Amanda's wardrobe up until about 10pm the night before the shoot. "Elvis mic" courtesy of cabaret enchantress Tricity Vogue.

A very few of the amazingly dressed crowd of volunteers who turned up to be in the video. Any experienced director or DoP generally feels terror in their hearts at the prospect of a video whose visual success is strongly determinant on a lot of friends and fans of the band showing up to be in the video - it's usually an utter failure, as the number of first videos shot in a club where there are 8 bored people pretending to be "a crowd" will attest. Plus, the Coronet (our shoot venue) is MASSIVE. But luckily Amanda has a very creative, involved, and well dressed fanbase - some of whom had driven down from Manchester that morning to be in the video, which means they had gotten up at 3.30am to brave the M1. Thanks, girl in pink, and your awesomely understanding mom!

Today was spent mostly sleeping and having a long hot bath, rejigging a music video pitch for someone else (no rest for the wicked) and a brief wander down the South Lambeth Road to see Stephen about re-cutting our as yet unfinished video for "I Loved London" and using it instead for his big pop single off that same album, "Last Words".

Then, just now, as I was lying in bed munching some toast & jam and reading an old MOJO story about the girls from Roxy Music album covers, a chunk of plaster the size of a manhole cover detached itself from the ceiling and fell onto where my head had been just nanoseconds before. It was so heavy it broke the toast plate. For some reason I find this hilarious.