Week 1 Blog – Dahlia Hellerstein
This week I started out with 0 roles on a film set. I had not heard back from either director who had asked to see my work over the break, and was feeling overall very disheartened. However, one of my friends, Bella, in the course had a film that she was no longer able to work on and connected me with the director (Anastasia) so that I would have a role to fulfill! I reached out to her and confirmed a role as either a Boom Op or arts department PA. Now I am just waiting to hear back on dates to make sure that the role will work with my March schedule.
As for my current takeaways from the master class with Stuart Cadenhead:
- Being a first AD is more like being a Producer then being a Director, it seems a little bit more intensive on the planning side and less on the creative side but you do get to get close with the director and build up a
- Planning ahead is necessary but can only get you so far
- Producers right hand man on set, a lot of the job includes risk assessment and knowing how to say no to an idea when it gets too big without changing the directors vision too much
- On a larger set where their are multiple AD’s each has a different role they fulfill
- As I will not be working in the this part of the film industry during this project, the main takeaways I can get from a first AD is how to interact with people on set to make sure that I can focus on my job and not interrupt other people while they are trying to do their jobs
