the location whisperers

In the immortal words of the saddest man in the world, Chris Isaak: “Things Go Wrong.” They especially go wrong on film sets, or in pre-production, usually in the last week before you go to camera, when you’re past the point of no return and all you can do is shut your eyes, put your head down, and bull forward. It happens on every film, in some form or other. As in life, we all have our issues to deal with, our challenges to overcome, our fires to walk through.  If you’re really fortunate, blessed, and have thought to save the right people’s phone numbers, when things go wrong, a guardian angel steps in to turn it all around.  If you’re the lucky recipient of a miracle that day, the catastrophe becomes a gift, and your film turns out to be even better than it would have been.

That’s what happened to The Wasting. We got two angels, both called Webb. 

With the Webbs, laughing in the face of danger

When a medical issue led to the loss of our main location right before our start day, we didn’t have time to panic. We had to fix it, pronto. I summoned the rolodex in my brain, flipping through everyone I’d met on my early summer recces in Upton-upon-Severn. I came up with Peter Webb, who was the mayor when I met him at some sort of strawberry social in the town hall. Now he’s the ex-mayor, which meant he had lots of time to meet me down at the Anchor for a pint and a strategy session.

Peter and his wife, Rosemary, for whom the word unstoppable was invented, didn’t bat an eye when I rattled off the daunting list of places we needed – bedrooms, livingrooms, an impressive exterior, woods, a pond and more.  They went into a huddle, and before I was halfway through my pint, they’d come up with a plan. 

Rosemary with producer Jeanne Stromberg

 And oh, what a plan! It’s hard to fathom now, because our original location was so amazing it seemed irreplaceable. But Peter and Rosemary replaced it, in grand style. They called on everyone they knew (aka everyone in Upton) and before you can say “Roll camera” we had access to houses, buildings, woods and spooky cellars that put the original to shame. They were BETTER than what we'd lost, logistically, creatively and visually. Our production value went from zero to sixty in four seconds. And that was only the beginning. 

Awesome location. One of many.

Peter and Rosemary’s flat became our unofficial production office. Our DOP Michal Wisniowski and I parked ourselves there for a week and worked, while our new best friends made calls and rounded up anything our hearts desired, usually within minutes of asking. Need a guitar to bring into the woods? Got one, ten minutes later. Need an ambulance? Here ya go. How about a boat? (That from the audacious Michal – and yes, we got a boat.)

U & T = Upton & Toronto

Peter and Michal plot boat-procurement

And so on. And so on. Etc. Etc. They never got tired of us knocking on their door or ringing their phone.  End result: When things went wrong, our shoot went right. 
 
Thank you, Peter and Rosemary.