Bronze VIP Archive for July 15, 1999
Warning! Possible Spoilers!!
- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 12:38:37 1999 169.132.153.9)
- silla: Maybe someday. Right now I just want to show things to my stunt guys and directors for projects that we work on. I may do a special stunt tape one day similar to Jackie Chans' "My Stunts"
Megs: I watch dailies when I have time just to see how things are working.
FanUK: Well.. she doesn't kickbox. That's sort of an exageration that's gotten into print. So please don't challenge her to a death match like some people have tried to do.:)
DingoBaby: I don't think I appear in that one.
Anyway... I gotta go now. ENTERTAINMENT WEEKLY is actually doing a special on BUFFY and the crew. They'll be calling in a minute for an interview with me and Sophia. Please check it out when it hits the stands. They are going to have pics of lots of the crew and talk to them about making the show and how we all do our jobs. Pretty neat.
take care everyone and thanks for talking to me today. I'll catch you guys later on.
- Jeff Pruitt
gone again*
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 12:25:23 1999 169.132.153.9)
- Ajo: The Faith vs. Buffy fight I choreographed very carefully. Joss had certain lines that were to be inserted into the fight and so I had to be very careful to make sure that the girls faces would be in a good position for those moments and that it would match what he felt was right for the mood. He wanted to include the handcuffs and wrote it into the script. There was quite a lot of fighting out on the roof that I had planned, but we had to cut it all out and simply get to the ending. It involved fancier movements and weapons work. We had to let it go. Besides Joss loved the quick cominations we did inside the apartment and felt that we had gotten just what he wanted to accomplish done.
The stuff in GD2 was very different. There was no plan at all. I would just wait and make things happen on the spot as Joss instructed. I really was not able to make a clear plan the way I did on GD1. The truth is that he had so much to shoot that we had to see what there would be time for on the day. He just wanted some chaos and arrows hitting the vamps and Angel punching out a few of them. So that's what we did.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 12:17:23 1999 169.132.153.9)
- Fan UK: I can't recall what he said. A stunt guy borrowed my tape last night so I can't check. I do recall that he was belting out orders for the other kids to follow.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 12:14:22 1999 169.132.153.9)
- Cobby: Don't worry. My stunt guys from BUFFY are all over ANGEL and they are taking care of the fights. Everything will be great I can tell you that. They even forked over extra money for some big stunt equipment that I never have gotten to use on BUFFY as well as having a schedule that is much longer than ours. It should be really cool.
silla - Ask me again because I must have missed it before.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 11:56:36 1999 169.132.153.9)
- mildly obsessed - Joss felt that he had gotten his cool Martial arts fight between B & F in GD1 so he didn't want me to choreograph anything special for GD2. He would just tell me at the moment what he wanted to see in a shot and we would quickly make that happen. He had a plate full of things to shoot and so that's how we had to do it. He only requested that we really shoot some stunt guys with real arrows. So that's just what we did.
Megs - I've mostly directed fights as the second unit director or action director for the past ten years. It just grows out of being the stunt coordinator. I've only directed entire shows a few times and I've never thought much about that. I'm lucky in that people have come to me and asked me to do that. The project I mentioned comeing up is something that some guys down at Dreamworks asked me to direct. I think it is all due to the success of the Matrix that that happened. They know that I designed the harnesses being used on those shows and they want that kind of action. That
's all. I would suggest graduating from a top film school. It may or may not make you a good director, but it will open the door to get those jobs. And even if you suck there will always be a DP or stunt coordinator there to help you anyway.
Corvus - I'll go wherever I'm invited if I can. I enjoy talking with people who share my interests in action filmmaking.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 11:33:57 1999 169.132.153.9)
- fibs - If you look at the guy who is wielding the flame thrower along with Larry in GD2 you'll see that it is Mike (Angel's stunt double) Also in Femme Fatales this month there is a picture of Sophia and I with Vamps. There is another guy on the far right in black. That's him. I'll try to get him to the PBP.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 11:29:16 1999 169.132.153.9)
- MeeB - I think it's just that the people here all know Sophia. The rest of the country never notices such things. Really. But I do know that there are times when it is impossible to shoot the angles we need and we have to comprimise and keep going. There is just not enough time to shoot everything on our schedule. I'm always amazed that we are able to accomplish so much and still make it look good.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 11:24:25 1999 169.132.153.9)
- sandman - The thing I most love about the show is the fact that Joss does have so much control. It is much easier for me to have one single vision to try and follow. Instead of getting it on all sides from other producers, directors and sometimes actors about what they think Buffy should be. I used to get memos everyday from network execs on another show I did. Each one wanted the show to go in a different direction. I understand that some at the WB wanted BUFFY to be a kiddie show for after school and could not imagine what Joss had in mind. I plan on clinging to his very word and trying before every show to determine what he wants. That way when some new director comes in and orders me to do something totally at odds with what Joss intends I can look right at him and say, "Sorry dude. Joss says do this and that's what I'm gonna do." He really does know what's best for the show and although I ususally think along the same lines as he does anyway, at times he even surprises me. I've learned to simply trust him. He is my favorite producer. I like the fact that the creator of something gets to maintain control instead of turning it over to a committee of formula followers.
BellaDonna - The prop department provides us with all of our weapons.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 11:14:10 1999 169.132.154.218)
- Bishop - The stunt team on DRIVE is actually my old stunt team and the coordinator is my former assistant. Joss does not like that kind of thing. That is the reason I have not done it on BUFFY. Plus, the only way to get that effect is to direct and edit it myself. That's why Steve Wang made sure that he had final cut on all of the fights. He and I have discussed the fact that without that those fights would have been destroyed. It is not something that is taught in film school. You have to learn it through experience. Steve is the only American director I know who is on par with us in the action directing category. Eveyone else is just a beginner fumbling around trying to imitate. They are not quite there yet. It has to be a part of you for many years before you reach that level. None of the BUFFY directors are experienced in that kind of thing.
Brewster VK - I like creating new stunts. I hate just doing the same old decelerator/ratchet/high fall schtick that everyone else has done over and over. But you have to be in the right environment to make that happen.
Angle Man - There is a plaace in New York where they use tapes of me directing action scenes as a part of a course on Hong Kong style filmmaking. They also do the same thing in some film courses in Australia. I've never had the time to participate in them myself. I'm just flattered that they are interested.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 11:02:03 1999 169.132.154.218)
- TouroGal - No I don't mind at all. Just remember that we do our little fights in only a few hours (mostly with main unit). The fights are the first thing to be cut down. We just have to fight while cameras roll. I don't get to use any of my editing tricks and techniques on BUFFY. It is kept very simple because it has to be. Otherwise there would be no fight that lasts anytime at all.
Those movies you mentioned take weeks to shoot a single fight which they have prepped way in advance. I usually have to make up our fights on BUFFY there on the spot with no rehearsal or special camera techniques involved. We spent a month shooting the "Ooze fight" on the Power Ranger movie. Jackie Chan will take 3 weeks to shoot his big battles and he and his stunt team is in full control. Trust me, it is not easy to do what we do on a consistant basis.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:53:59 1999 169.132.154.218)
- MeeB - Actually I can tell you that we did shoot all coverage on the flip in the harness and various angles of the stunt. There were many ways to edit that, but they chose that way. I'm just glad we at least got to see the vamp hitting the floor. One thing that is sorely missing from that fight is the tremendous hit that the vamp fighting Angel took when he flew over the table and was thrown into the wall - then slid down to the floor. It was brutal and the whole crew winced. He almost took out the whole wall. You don't get to see it in the final edit. I wasn't there for that so I can't tell you why certain decisions were made. I wish you had seen it cause we did shoot it.
btw - It's possible that next hiatus I will spend directing an action film starring Sophia and a few name stars. (It is briefly mentioned in Femme Fatales magazine this month) If we do the project I can promise you that it will have some fights and stunts the likes of which you have never seen. Nothing will be edited incorrectly and it will all be up on the screen with FULL impact. That's a promise.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:45:02 1999 169.132.154.218)
- Digital Grand - Most of the time the close up insert shots of Buffy's hands are done by stand-ins anyway because they are usually shot later on and Sarah is busy shooting other things that ustilize her face. Whenever the breaking of a prop or bending or what ever is involved Sarah prefers to have Sophia do that. The girls have leraned through painful experience something that stunt guys have known for years: Just becasue the label says "break-a-way" doesn't mean that it is all that soft or flimsy. Most of the time those objects are nearly as hard as the real thing because if they made it too weak it wouldn't survive all the handling. So Sophia just does that business while she is shooting the stunts.
Narrator - Lee Whitaker doubles Seth in and out of Werewolf garb.
Margot - I also liked the message in EARSHOT. I won't talk about it yet except to say that it shows something that I wish the jocks at Columbine would have thought about a year before.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:34:10 1999 169.132.154.218)
- Touro Gal: Thanks. They let me direct that one too (with David) The only problem we had was that the visiting cameraman couldn't seem to make himself follow the stuntguy as he fell and stayed on the Angel character instead (although he was David's stunt double) the carmera operator said he was trained to stay with the main character only. So there is a spot where we shouldn't be just there on Angel standing for so long. The problem was that the table (which was real) had broken and we didn't have another one to have David hop off of for his shot later. Thus the importance of following the stuntman doing his stunt becomes even more important for editing. I hope that's a lesson that the camera folks will absorb. The actors are not the stars of the fight scenes - the action is. Actors faces should be used for communicating to the audience what is being felt by the characters, but the most important thing is following the stunt in the most advantageous way. Otherwise you get a really weak and watered-down version of what the scene could have been and lose a lot of the impact. Camera and editing make all the difference. It can make or destroy an action scene. Believe me, after shooting thousands of fight scenes I know.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:19:00 1999 169.132.154.218)
- Cosmic Bob: That was David and Sophia doing the fall and Sophia crushing the vase and kicking the table. All the acting stuff was Sarah. (I do know some guys around here who tend to play that drink me scene in slow motion. Something about the expression on Sarah's face that they approve of. I guess they just appreciate great actors, huh?)
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:14:59 1999 169.132.154.218)
- You can click on my name and email if you want to about that question Green Falcon that way nothing gets spoiled story-wise for the others. That's the only thing Joss asks us to avoid on here.
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:11:51 1999 169.132.154.218)
- Thanks thy Slayer. (directed that one myself) and I got to do a wire gag which is rare on BUFFY, but Joss told me that that was what he wanted for the scene - so there you go.
see no more blue for the aged eyes of Mr. Bob to suffer through...
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 10:03:20 1999 169.132.154.218)
- In honor of the Green Falcon I'm now trying that color to see if it works:)
Things are great and I just got my new office set up with a new computer for the internet - so I'm able to get back online and see whatzup.
I'm glad that the people who saw EARSHOT liked it. I just remember that the script was one of the ones that choked me up a bit when I read it (just as LIE TO ME had done before)
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- Jeff Pruitt says:
(Thu Jul 15 09:56:30 1999 169.132.154.218)
- quick note to the bronzers who emailed me about those SPRITE commercials on MTV -
The first commercial aired during June on MTV and BET. The Coca Cola Company felt that since it starred famous Rap artists that no one would "get it" except a "black" audience. So they decided to air the spots only on those networks.
The second spot started airing during the premiere of "THE REAL WORLD" and then all commercials were put on hold. It seems that myself and the stunt guys found that we were being cheated out of our residuals and so legal action had to be taken. Therefore they decided to wait until the thing is settled and then resume airing the spots. It is possible that they may air before we straighten this out. I have no idea. They just finished editing all of them yesterday and I just got my copy of all the finished spots. It looks really cool and I hope you get to see them.
We did shoot a long version with more elaborate stunts that won't air. That is because the director (Antoine Fuqua) wanted to put together a reel of kung fu action in order to get Warner Brothers to back a big budget movie for the two of us to make later on. So far the answer from them is "Yes." So at the moment we are scrambling to have the right script written. I'll let you know if it all works out. It's fun for me to make the "flying people" fights.
In the meantime, I hope you get to see those spots sometime.
Thanks for being interested,
Jeff
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