By now it was time for lunch. TG knows that a well-fed crew is a happy crew, and she hired one of the best caterers in the business to keep everyone content. This caterer always makes eight or ten different dishes per meal, and every one is delicious. I didn’t want to hurt his feelings, so I took some of each! Yum, yum! (Note the Asian Pear box. It indicates that the produce is from the USA, Chile, or Mexico. The last time I looked, none of these countries were in Asia.) [Whew! I just knew there was an explanation for this picture too. Now this second picture, it doesn’t need as much explanation. I like those as well.]
Caterer Jun patiently explained porn set etiquette to Michael Ninn including:
- Don’t call 911 when the girls scream. They aren’t dying.
- Don’t look directly into the girls’ eyes.
- Don’t look at the girls for more than three seconds at a time.
[Huh. That pretty much explains my dating philosophy through college. Maybe I missed something?] (I’m not sure where he got these rules, but he is very polite, and hasn’t ever offended anyone on set, so I guess they work!)
Lunch over, I went to see how the second scene was progressing. Tall Goddess was overseeing the finishing touches on Britney Manson’s makeup and hair. Then she affixed a feather neck corset (that TG had made herself, by the way) to Britney’s neck. [Of course she did. Otherwise it would make no sense.] The look was amazing but uncomfortable, so TG said she would wait as long as possible before attaching the corset for real.
A mannequin, dressed in lingerie and tied in elaborate Japanese full-body bondage ropes, stood in the old fashioned elevator downstairs. TG had done all the tying herself at home, and it had taken hours to tie every knot perfectly. Bondage knotting is an art form, and the mannequin looked gorgeous. The fact that she had a bird cage on her head and red duct tape on her mouth didn’t detract from her beauty a bit! [By this time the heat had obviously gotten to D.Minion too.]
The day was reminding me a little of the absurdist literature I’d read in college. Desperately looking for some “Cliff’s Notes” I asked TG what the scene meant. TG called it “The Bird That Cannot Sing.” It was about imprisonment and freedom. The mannequin is in a bird cage prison and cannot sing, talk, or fly. Britney, in beautiful feather accoutrement, is the bird that can fly, or can at least have sex, which is a lot like flying! (That is, when it’s done correctly!) [Oops. She asked the artist to explain.]
Oops. The mannequin was missing a hand. It was found in the trunk of body parts, but when TG tried to attach it, she discovered that it was broken and wouldn’t adhere to the arm. We didn’t have the time or the material to weld it together, so repaired it on the fly with duct tape. (That’ll fix anything!) Red tape on the wrist matched the tape on the mouth perfectly, and we put some on the other wrist to balance the effect. If you didn’t know better, you’d think we’d planned it this way! [Oh, we clearly did plan it this way. We just told DM that the hand was broken so she would spill the beans about our amazing brilliance.]
The props were now perfect, so now it was time for the talent. Britney Manson arrived downstairs, dressed and coiffed to perfection. In her extremely uncomfortable feather neck corset, Britney gamely posed for Pretty Girl photos in the elevator with the mannequin.
Our crew always goes the extra mile, as evidenced by stills photographer Mario Rossi climbing up into the elevator shaft to get the perfect photo of Britney. [Mario was just showing off, ever the loveable cad. And in the way of foreshadowing, we should mention that in this particular case the strategy worked out perfectly.]
