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Footloose Shirt Logo

Several months ago my friend Barbara asked me to design a T-shirt for her husband (my former propmaster) Dwight and his prop crew, busy on the set of the remake of that Bacon-infused 80s dance hit “Footloose”. I confessed to Barbara that, while I knew it involved dancing and people wearing Chuck Taylors, I’ve never actually seen the movie. I looked at stills and screen captures from the original movie and I dropped by set of the remake a few times. Despite having “done my homework”, inspiration didn’t strike until the film was very nearly wrapped and let’s face it, the design you see here is pretty simple: just the word “Footloose” spelled out by one particularly long shoe string attached to a classic Chuck Taylor sneaker. As long as the movie has been around I can’t help but think some artist has done this same thing at some point in the past, but it was new to me! Since I’d had recently used discharge ink for another shirt design with great results that’s what we decided to do with the Footloose Prop Department shirts. I understand folks on the crew liked the design. What do you think?

Update: there were only 20 of these shirts made, so they’re super rare!

Zombieland Ate Katrina Rice

(Please Tweet this if you get a chance) Last night I went to see the new hit comedy horror film “Zombieland” with a bunch of my friends who were on the crew and I must confess right up front that I’m extremely jealous that I didn’t work on this show; what it lacks in plot it makes up for with style, and it’s certainly going to look great on their resumes. I am, however, disappointed about one thing this film left out:

Katrina Rice didn’t get a screen credit.

Now, those of you outside the film industry need to realize that this is something Continue reading Zombieland Ate Katrina Rice

Robocop 3 : Boom, Baby, Boom!!

While Tim Burton’s film Batman may have been my first exposure to a big budget feature, Robocop 3 was the very first film I was paid to work on as a crewmember. Mind you, that pay came late in the day, as I’d been working for free as an intern before that. Being a intern to Props in the late 1980s entailed a lot of: Continue reading Robocop 3 : Boom, Baby, Boom!!

Poor Man’s Pile-Up

One day, during the first season of the Aaron Spelling television series “Savannah“, we found ourselves faced with shooting a scene between the characters Dean (David Gail) and Lane (Robyn Lively). The scene was set at night and featured our two actors sitting in a parked pickup truck beside a moderately busy highway. The problem was, it was in the middle of the day and we were inside the old lumber warehouse that had been converted into our ersatz stage.

We were going to have to fake it.

To simulate a busy highway in the out-of-focus background, it was decided that we’d use a clumsy Continue reading Poor Man’s Pile-Up

Robocop the Cosmonaut

This afternoon I began porting old video from a cache of VHS-C tapes sequestered deep in the bowels of the Drewcave. One of the first tapes I wanted to “take digital” was footage we captured from the 1991 production of the movie “Robocop 3”, a lackluster sequel to the original blockbuster. This footage is from actor Robert Burke being sealed into the Continue reading Robocop the Cosmonaut

Give Me the Barrel

The year was 1998.

The place was a bend in the Yellow River, just south of Porterdale, about 40 miles east of Atlanta.

The movie was False River, a film best viewed while intoxicated, being savaged by weasels or in the throes of a malarial fever dream.

We had just returned to work after a weekend of torrential rain and the river was high. Really, really high.

Remarkably high.

Dark shapes keep appearing along the top of the churning, rock-strewn rapids then slipping below again.

Those were turtle heads.

Snapping Turtle heads to be precise…. and they were everywhere.

Dozens of them covered the width of the Continue reading Give Me the Barrel

The Day That Drew Stood Still

Fox is about to release a remake of the Hollywood classic “The Day the Earth Stood Still” in a week or so and I realized that this is as good a time as any to tell you the story of my connection to the original 1951 version of that film. Be warned: it is a long and rambling story, filled with teenage nudity, a strip club, a Waffle Continue reading The Day That Drew Stood Still

Saratoga Summer

This year I made it my goal to share all of my on-set photos with all of you via my Flickr account. The most recent batch of photos I’ve uploaded are from an ABC made-for-TV movie originally titled “Saratoga Summer” (released as “A Horse for Danny“). Shot in Lexington, Kentucky and Evansville, Indiana, the movie tells the heartwarming tale of a spunky girl named Danny (a spunky young Leelee Sobieski) and her horse-training Uncle Eddie (Robert Urich) as they struggle to make their mark in the hurly-burly world of horse racing. Young Leelee was Continue reading Saratoga Summer

Sticky Stuff Hits YouTube

Hey look! It’s my friend Joe in his very own YouTube-style infomercial showing off his cool temporary adhesive product called “Joe’s Sticky Stuff”. I did the artwork for the product tin, but Joe and his family have been the people making this product a success. I think they did a great job with this video because in one minute you know exactly what the product does! Fast and clean, just like Joe’s Stick Stuff!!

Black Dog: Behind the Scenes

Camera operator Tom Weston and actor Patrick Swayze in the cab of the hero truck of Black Dog. A stunt man drove the truck from a rig on the roof of the cab.

Here’s a post from behind the scenes of the production of the film Black Dog, starring Patrick Swayze and featuring rock legend Meatloaf as a villain. A lot happened on this movie, from an actor bowing out to an accidental explosion near the end that injured several crewmembers.