Harry Potter
& the Half Blood Prince
Leavesden Studios - 2008
This is the one where Ron kisses Lavender; I was never very good at following the plot of Potter apart from identifying these landmark romances. David Yates returned to put pictures to the script. I was surprised he got asked back for the next Potter, but maybe a safe pair of hands was more important to this movie 'cash cow' for Warner Bros than any creative progress in the series. Even the three leads seemed to put up no fuss about this, but I would have thought with the economic power they now held over the studio they could have at least mentioned other directors they wanted to work with, but they went with the flow and that riptide was revenue. So here he was again straight from the allotment, the millions he must have earned from the previous film clearly had not troubled his wardrobe.
An example how careful you sometimes have to tread while filming is a moment on set while shooting a sequence involving Helena Bonham Carter. She was sat in her chair while a lens change was happening and I went over to say hello and make small talk having done the same on, 'Charlie & The Chocolate Factory'. I do this because it lets the actors know that you are onset filming and they didn't find you too irritating last time, it does work, as they want to know you are a studio insider and not some external movie news show. Well, the unit publicist Amy, who one of my sound recordists, Mike Donald, dubbed 'Aimless', caught sight of this and threw dagger looks at me as if I had gone up to Helena and kicked her in the face. I later got a verbal bollocking from ‘Aimless’ like a naughty schoolboy who had just drawn a huge cock on the Bible!
During filming we try to get each actor to do an interview for the EPK (Electronic Press Kit) that is all the cast except Alan Rickman who never did one preferring to seal Snape in suspended belief he was real. We set up one for Michael Gambon who agreed to do his while waiting for lighting to be finished on the 'Drink of Despair' set (a 'crystal' rock construction) and he dutifully arrived with a floor assistant who said we had about 15 minutes before he was required on set. Well after no more than six minutes later the assistant returned to say Gambon was needed so off he went, only to return a few minutes later with an explanation that he was about to walk up onto the plastic rock when, in his words: “the f**king Health & Safety officer halted proceedings claiming it was a potential 'trip & slip' hazard and he had to make a full assessment before filming could proceed”. We completed the interview, H&S completed their paperwork and Gambon was allowed to continue with the perils of filming the scene now fully assessed.
Another landmark kiss in this one when Ron kisses Lavender Brown in the Gryffindor common room; and interestingly I was allowed to film this kiss unrestricted. Personally I think they faked it going for the 'Disney' kiss, which just bypasses lips, but from the camera angle looks real, there is a montage of this technique on YouTube if you want to review the method.
Although Jo Rowling never visited during filming she was clearly closely involved as I recall one day the director wanted a random spell to add to the dialogue and filming was halted while the producers called JK to ask her advice. After an hour she called them back having devised a suitable word for the spell and filming continued; a welcome tea break for the cast and crew.
Dan's time was utilised with military precision from hours in education to floor runners waiting to whisk him the length of the studio in a golf cart when everything was ready to shoot a scene. He would stride swiftly on to set, met by Gary (props), the keeper of the hallowed Potter glasses who would hand him a pair, having decided if they should have glass in the frames or no glass (because of reflections), shoot about six takes then back on the golf buggy and we wouldn't see him again for many hours. One day a helicopter landed at the studio and after shooting a scene Dan was flown to London, about 20 miles away, timed perfectly for him to accept another award for Potter, then flown straight back in time to continue filming, but I think he relished this cyclonic flow of his life.
April 2008 was Emma’s 18th birthday, a day the media seemed to drool over with a lecherous countdown towards the day. Emma wanted to add a brief video thank you on her website and publicity drafted me in to shoot this for her. My sound recordist, Sam Diamond and myself lugged the equipment to the second floor corridor where, Dan, Rupert and Emma had their dressing rooms. We had both been filming out on the backlot so our boots were loaded with wet mud and when I opened the door (Emma was not in yet) a sea of two inch thick snow white carpet presented itself. We had no choice but to remove our boots and instead treated Emma’s lovely fluffy floor covering to our steaming sweaty socks. The main room consisted of a small sofa, flat screen TV and DVD player, and a desk. There was a separate changing area and ensuite bathroom with shower. I chose the obvious desk for Emma to deliver the greeting and dressed the background with the few cards and balloons that were in the room.
When Emma had completed whatever scene was being shot that day she arrived accompanied by Head of Publicity, Vanessa Davies and thankfully not the painful unit publicist, Aimless. She had clearly already worked out a scenario for how to deliver the piece as was carrying her breakfast, a bowl of strawberries and muesli, and explained that she wanted the shot to be wide enough to see it as she would start with a line about just finishing breakfast,blah,blah..
I rolled to record, and Emma ad-libbed her way through her brief birthday acknowledgement, then looked to me for approval. I suggested it sounded a little forced and came across as a bit insincere; I’m sure had unit publicist ‘Aimless’ been there instead of Vanessa, I would have been hauled out of the room for such crushing criticism; Fortunately Vanessa just let me say what I wanted. I suggested a few ideas about how it could look more relaxed and good old Emma just agreed and we had another go. A few more collaborative tweaks and take three was perfect. Emma asked to review it and we both agreed there was no point having another go as it looked just right. In my head I was mentally packing up when Vanessa took that moment to throw a spanner at the pair of us. She was concerned that the fawn cardigan Emma was wearing (part of her costume for that day) had not been ‘approved’ by Warner Bros and it may be safer to do it all again with some alternative inoffensive garment?
Well, if you could see Emma’s face morph as she mustered one of her finest looks of disdain, drawn from the archive of her rainbow repertoire, you would not believe it; this one was her most convincing award winning version! She said to Vanessa, “Paul says it’s perfect, I don’t want to do it again”. Oh dear. So Vanessa sensing a standoff said she would go make a call to Warners to just check it was ok, remember we are talking about a completely unbranded anonymous fawn cardigan you could probably get from any high street store. So Sam and I shuffled our now nicely dried socks through the pimped up shag pile of Emma’s carpet while she paced her face of disdain around the room. Vanessa returned in a remarkably quick time with the thumbs up from the Warner costume centurions, Emma returned to her usual jaunty self and we made a hasty exit. I do wonder if Vanessa really did make a call to get approval; it seems unlikely she got through to Burbank in Los Angeles and found the right person who could give the word and return in such a short time? I suspect she just stood around the corner and counted to sixty. I cut the clip on my Mac Book in the lunch break and uploaded it to her website; and for this extra curricula work I was paid the princely sum of nothing; didn’t even get a birthday kiss out of it but it was amusing I suppose.
I found it interesting that for all the carefully crafted efforts of David Yates to wrench nuanced performances from the three leads the dialogue would often just have to be replaced in a recording studio because the actual sound was rendered unusable due to the drum of rain bouncing off the tin roof of the studio, as Leavesden was just an amalgamation of large sheds. Those re-recordings called ADR (Automated Dialogue Replacement) cannot have been the same performances teased out on set. I suppose in the end did it really matter? The process was factory line like and went on for an extraordinary length of time for a movie. I did once ask the producer if there was a budget the film worked to and he coyly replied, more or less. I think in truth Warner’s would throw any amount at the film. It was a bit like the well that Mickey Mouse draws water from in Fantasia, every time he drew a bucket the well just refilled to the brim, so what was another $20 million dollars or so to finish the film when a billion dollar return was on offer?
I must give a mention here about Tom Felton who clearly revelled in bringing Draco Malfoy to life. He was such an unassuming well-grounded young man, instantly likeable and would chat freely with all crew members without a whiff of ego in his demeanor. I think by now my enthusiasm and curiosity about Harry Potter was just about spent, although often work that becomes a routine, you then tend to crave one more fix when it all ends. Half Blood Prince of course came to an eventual end and this time I can't say the desire to be back on set troubled waking hours; don't get me wrong it was good while it lasted and I'm glad I was invited to be involved but it was enough, so I left before any contempt began to infect the work.
I was genuinely pleased to learn that the person hired to finish the series was a good friend of mine, Eric Marquis, who had been my camera assistant on Alien3 and 1492. He had in the intervening years become an excellent documentary cameraman in his own right and we remain friends to this day.