QUIET ON SET!

Here's a very cool and very fun fact about filmmaking: everything takes SAUR MUCH LONGER than you think it will.

I knew this, intellectually. I've been making videos for years. I've done enough production days to understand that "quick shoot" is an oxymoron. But somehow I still arrived at my friend Ella's apartment at 2 thinking "oh, we'll probably be done by like 9 or 10," and then found myself guerrilla-filming in a school parking lot at midnight in the rain, wearing shoes three sizes too big, my hair a solid immovable mass of hairspray, delivering lines about Satan's buddy system into a fake WARN 7 News microphone.

Reader, it was 1:27 am before I was in my PJs.

The video I'm working on right now covers a lot of ground with regards to misery lit, fake memoirs, the satanic panic, and more broadly the whole ecosystem of how trauma gets packaged and sold. Somewhere along the way, I decided it needed a period-appropriate parody news segment. Because when you're making a video about moral panics, you kind of have to recreate the media that fuelled them, right? Right!!!!

To sell the bit, we needed the look. 1980s local news anchor realness! Aggressively big hair. Blue eyeshadow up to the brow bone. Power shoulders. Red lip. We also needed the tech. Vintage boombox. Cassette tapes (actual Maxell UR 120s, the real deal!) And an oscilloscope OBVIOUSLY.

Fortunately, I know exactly the right person for this.

Ella Grant (polyestermeteor on TikTok, where she makes surrealist shorts these days) is one of my favourite people. We're both autistic, but in completely different directions. My autism comes with "I made an entire online wiki for our three-person DND campaign based on my literally 250,000 words of transcribed notes so that I can more easily tell my friends about my OCs" energy. Hers comes with a genuinely almost supernatural level of expertise on vintage everything. Like EVERYTHING. Fashion, equipment, music, aesthetics, you name it.

Her apartment is a treasure trove. Every day, Ella is in a full-on vintage Look from one era or another while I'm over here not bothering with mascara. Both of us are envious of the other for this exact reason.

For this shoot, she provided: the hair, the makeup, the wardrobe, the oscilloscope, the boombox, the camcorder, and honestly, the entire visual language of the segment. I showed up with a script and a willingness to be transformed (and payment, OBVIOUSLY). She did the rest.

Here's how the day unfolded:

2:00 PM - Arrival and Acquisitions

I show up at Ella's apartment with optimism and a vague sense that we have plenty of time. We immediately leave again. The WARN Channel 7 mic flag needs superglue. Ella needs provisions (chicken satay at Thai Basil. TASTE but personally I always get the same thing every time which is pad krapow). I need to go to Shoppers and buy approximately $30 worth of makeup because we've realized we don't have the right shades for the look.

Back at the apartment, we start setting up. The oscilloscope is glowing in the corner (actually if you saw the intro for the narcissist scare video, it's the same oscilloscope!) We drape sheets over furniture to create a neutral background. We test the boombox. We dig through Ella's closet for power blazers and pearl necklaces. Production design is HAPPENING!

^ a more innocent me

4:00 PM - Hair Gets Wet

The plan is to wet my hair now so it can air-dry while Ella does my makeup. Then, once my face is done, we curl the dry hair. This definitely is a very sound plan. This ends up taking much much longer than either of us expected because everything has to be more intense than it would be in real life because (a) it's the 80s, and (b) camera flattens everything. Makeup that looks absolutely unhinged in person will read as polished and normal on screen, especially through a camcorder at night. IT MUST BE DONE

6:30 PM - Face Is Emerging

Eyes are done. Brows are done. Concealer is on. My face is slowly becoming Brenda's face. I can almost forget the fact that all I had to eat today was a lox bagel at like 10 am because I was too locked in to grab food while Ella was grabbing food. Thisisfine.png

7:15 PM - ??????????

Lash glue and I have a complicated relationship. Let's leave it at that.

7:15-8:15 PM - The Curler Hour

And now: the hair.

My hair straight up does not hold a curl. Like, at all. Under normal circumstances, I can curl it, watch it look beautiful for approximately fifteen minutes, and then observe it fall completely flat like it's given up on life. We were racing against the clock from the moment the first roller went in.

Ella has many many many foam rollers. The process of putting them in takes about an hour, and involves approximately half a can of hairspray at every stage.

^ me halfway through

It needs to set. I am hungry. The curlers need time. We need food. There's really only one solution here.

8:45 PM - Dinner at Earls, Looking Completely Normal

I treat us both to Earls because I am a FANCY GIRLIE!!! My hair is STILL in curlers. I'm wearing a scarf to protect (and hide??) said curlers and I look like a very glam babushka. My makeup is fully done. We get compliments from the hostess and she asks what we're going out for and I'm like "oh we're filming" and she's like "oh! what are you filming" and then I have to admit with a slightly embarrassed tone "oh ummm... just a YouTube video" and she's like "oh cool! A YouTube video about what?" and I don't really know what to say so I'm like "oh it's just a parody news segment" and she's like whoa cool!

9:45 PM - The Oscilloscope Situation

Back at the apartment. Now we need to film the indoor segments, specifically the part where we play the "satanic" cassette tape and see the waveform on the oscilloscope.

What I never knew about oscilloscopes because I didn't know what they were a year ago is that they display waveforms of audio signals. So to get a good visual for the "playing the tape backwards" bit, we need actual audio running through the oscilloscope. But we're not actually playing a real tape. So. I download a megaphone app on my phone. We hook the phone up to the oscilloscope via an audio cable. When I speak into my phone, my voice creates a waveform on the oscilloscope display. It's absolutely janky and also it works perfectly. The waveform dances around on the little screen, looking extremely scientific and official. That way we can also just play a recording of the reversed audio directly from the phone folder. No actual tapes needed. HA HA

video setup below

10:50 PM - Furniture Tetris

Quiet hours in Ella's building start at 11 pm. Her neighbour is not someone you want to cross.

We realize we've rearranged a significant amount of furniture to create our shooting setup, and if we don't move it back right now, we're going to be dragging tables across hardwood floors at 1 am and incurring the wrath of the building. My hair is still in curlers btw

11:45 PM - The Hair Reveal

The curlers have been in for over three hours. Now, they are Removed and Styled. My hair is enormous. Straight up it feels like a single solid object that happens to be attached to my head. Full on Polly Pocket type shit. Ella doesn't let me turn around for the entire time she's taking out the curlers and separating curls because she doesn't want to spoil the reveal, and I'm extremely grateful because I did in fact break quiet hours by loudly being like HOLY SHIT on the spot and I had to be shushed. BUT CAN YOU BLAME ME LOOK AT IT!!!

12:00 AM - Midnight Filming Expedition

Okay so we do not have filming permits. Ella went to actual for-real film school and I did not, so she was appropriately worried about this and I was not. I was like "ehhhhh it's probably fine" and she's like "GIRL I DON'T KNOW" but to be honest this is part of why we filmed it so late. We leave to film the outdoor segment. I am now fully Brenda. I'm also wearing Ella's shoes, because mine aren't period-appropriate. They do not fit so I straight up have to shuffle on the way to the school parking lot..

Ella films. I deliver my lines. The rain streaks down. My hair, against all odds, holds its shape because the hairspray is doing the lord's work (Satan's work?). It looks GOOD!!! Honestly I like the vibe the rain adds.

12:28 AM - That's a Wrap

We're DONE!!!!!

^ You can even see how much my hair has fallen in less than thirty minutes. See what I mean???? With that said I like this photo because I feel like I kind of look like Italiana Grande. Objectively the least problematic Ariana for me to look like.

I make it home by 1:03 am and I reaaaaallly do not feel like washing my hair and all the makeup because it's late and I'm sleepy but I am SOOO brave about it and I do in fact shower and wash the absurd amount of hairspray out of my hair before it can become a problem tomorrow.

Editing is still going to be done on this (music, sizzle reel maybe? logo?), but I can now show you the fruits of our labour. 10000% WORTH IT