This past Friday, we got our first taste of what some of our characters will look like as Kelley Slagle and Bess Kaye suited up as an Ebon Spider and Daughter of Tairol respectively. We shot in Whitemarsh Park in Bowie and we learned some valuable lessons. For one thing, you should wear long pants when shooting in the woods. I decided that I’d wear shorts due to the heat and ended up with some nice thorn-induced lacerations. Fortunately I didn’t pick up any ticks or poison ivy. Lesson two is that plaster gauze is not an ideal mask making material. Kelley was a trooper as she choked on mouthful after mouthful or plaster flakes. By the end of our two hour shoot, the mask was disintegrating. Back to the drawing board on that one. But it did look pretty cool in the set pics.

Then on Sunday, we held fight auditions with fight coordinator Robb Hunter. We had a few dozen people come out to the Coors Dance Studio on G St. in D.C. to show Robb their stage combat abilities. Some of our already cast principal cast mixed up with fight troupe hopefuls. Just about everyone was eager to throw down. I mean, swinging steel swords at each other, who wouldn’t want to do that? By the end of the day, some people had lost feeling in their hands. I’ve got a new appreciation for what goes into making a sword fight look good on camera.

-Francis