How To Be Two Places At The Same Time...In Rush Hour Traffic...On The 405

One of the more exciting projects Zach has been involved with lately is the filming of a pilot in downtown Los Angeles.

The pilot focuses on a group of young ladies trying to make it in Hollywood (think ladies that look like they could be on "The CW" but better dressed).

The call time for The Artist was 6pm on a Friday.  No problem....Right?

Wrong.

Zach's agent called at 2:15pm with a last minute audition scheduled for 5:50pm.  In Santa Monica. On a Friday afternoon.  Off the 405.  With no earlier audition times available.

Blergh.

Don't get me wrong.  We appreciate the audition.  This was just going to be a tight fit time-wise.

The first call was to the producers of the pilot.  They told us they understood our situation but if Zach wasn't there by 6:30pm they would have to shoot without him.

Zach and I headed out early to Santa Monica.  The earliest you could arrive for the audition was 4:30pm.  We pulled up at 4:28pm and (Miracle Number One) there was a parking space directly in front of the building!

We walked into the casting office and (while we were signing in) I explained our situation to the casting assistant.  She made no promises but she would try and get Zach in earlier than his appointment time.

Three minutes later, The Artist was paired with another teenage boy to improvise their audition in the hallway.  They would see the casting director in about five minutes (Miracle Number Two).

Zach completed the audition and we ran out the door to race to the set....And promptly saw two of his pals.  After too many minutes of talking, I got him to be quiet and get in the car.  It was about 5:45pm and we still had the 405 and the 10 to contend with on our drive downtown.

I'm not really sure how I avoided a speeding ticket (or five) but we made it to the set with about four minutes to spare (Miracle Number Three).

The set was located near the Fashion District AKA a fun section of town during the day and a "watch your back" section of town at night.

We entered the building and made our way to the set.

The first sight that greeted us was this elevator that had a bigger creep factor than Tower of Terror.

After filling out Z's paperwork it was time to get him into costume for the shoot.  His costume made him look exactly like a good 70-80% of the working actor population in Hollywood.

"Can I Take Your Order Please?"

Zach's good friend, Elyssa Rose, is featured in the pilot.  She's a talented young lady so feel free to check out her music at Ellysa Rose You Tube Page.

The set teacher was "Captain Rules & Regulations".  The shoot was on a Friday in downtown Los Angeles but he was determined to make sure the underage actors got their maximum amount of "down time" on set.

Not only was he "The Keeper of the Rules", he was also a camera hog!

I left the set about 9:30pm for a few reasons:

*I had been awake since 4:30am and was ready to call it a night.

*One of our best friends was on set with her kids so she offered to take Zach home.

*The Dodgers game from Australia was on at 1am so I needed a pregame power nap.

I headed to the truck and decided to tweet while walking.  My tweet set off a series of tweets between my sweet innocent self and the Downtown Los Angeles Twitter feed.  Here was my tweet that angered their Twitter guru:

9:30pm & I'm wandering around on foot in @DTLA. Here's hoping my body is not the top story on the 11pm news. #inthehood #LosAngeles

Somebody can't take a joke!  It was a sketchy walk and I stand by my statement.  (FYI...Downtown LA was crowded and full of life three blocks away from our location)

One more photo from the set.

The footage I saw of the pilot that night looked great.  I can't say too much about it because of non-disclosure forms, politeness and my tired state that night has left a few holes in my memory.

I can't wait to see the finished product!

A Click A Day Helps The Kid's IMDb Page!