Kretchmer on Kretchmer
John Kretchmer, the hardest-working director in Neptune, recorded a very interesting podcast for this week's episode. It gives a lot of great insights into making the show and this episode specifically, but, unlike previous podcasts that were more casual and in an interview-ish format, this is basically Kretchmer reading an essay he wrote.
It took me an hour to transcribe eight minutes. The man wrote a lot. Here you go.
Hello. My name is John Kretchmer, and I was the director of the episode of Veronica Mars entitled "Postgame Mortem." The script was written by Joe Voci, who's not a staff writer on the show but who did a terrific job.
During the preparation to shoot this episode, my thirteenth for Veronica Mars, Rob Thomas told me it was important that we see Logan's development from someone who after breaking up with Veronica, again, didn't care about anything to someone who could move on with his life. The key to this development was his growing friendship with Heather, who, despite his wishes to the contrary, would bring him out of his self-imposed isolation and show him that, regardless of difficult and painful emotional issues, life can be embraced. The crux of this would rest on the talent of the actress playing Heather, and I think that after seeing the episode you will agree that Juliette Goglia did a remarkable job.
As episodes go, this one was fairly simple to shoot and did not require much more than our scheduled eight twelve-hour days, which is not always the case. In fact, my next episode, entitled "Unamerican Graffiti," which I am currently in the process of editing, was a very difficult and expensive episode to shoot, requiring many more hours of overtime. There's no hard and fast rule about this; each script is different and provides different challenges. "Postgame Mortem," however, proved to be a fortunate confluence of a small amount of night work, few sets and locations, combined with a wonderful cast, and so shooting went smoothly.
While we're on the subject of actors, I must mention that Veronica Mars is blessed with a sensational casting director, Deedee Bradley, and on this episode in particular, I was fortunate enough not only to have the regular stellar talent but a great many supremely gifted actors in the guest roles. Several were returning actors, with whom I had already worked, and others were new to me, but not to the show. Jaime Ray Newman, who plays Mindy O'Dell; Robert Ri'Chard, who plays Mason; David Magidoff, who plays Jeff Ratner; Jeremy Roberts, who plays Mel Stolz; Mario Ardila [Jr.], who is Arturo; and Anna Campbell, who is Tina the hotel clerk. Rob brings these people back because they're able to take a small role and do something special with it. An example of this is Adam Rose, who played Max in my previous episode and who will be playing an increasingly important role in the show in episodes to come. My point of all this is that the show is beautifully cast with equal care given to every single role, no matter how brief. A good case in point is John Bisom, the hotel manager, who takes a simple line like "We're running out of salt and pepper shakers" and does something unique and wonderful with it.
This episode is something of a hybrid; when it was originally outlined, it included much of the action from the next episode, which was directed by Harry Winer, another familiar name to those of you read the credits on the show. The problem was that it made this episode too big, too complicated, and too expensive, so Rob and the producers decided to split it into two episodes. My job was to help set up the storylines to they could be concluded in the next episode. I urge you to watch it next week; the script is terrific and provides some great Veronica Mars twists.
The most difficult scenes to film were in Logan's Neptune Grand suite. Not, thankfully, because of any acting issues. On the contrary, Jason Dohring and Juliette had a great relationship, on and off the set, and as soon as Juliette spoke her first word, I knew she would be perfect as Heather. But the Neptune Grand is our toughest standing set to shoot in because it is so large, because it requires us to hang each light individually, which takes a tremendous amount of time, and because we must deal with the TransLite backing outside the balcony, which, if we aren't careful, will look phony. Joaquin Sedillo, the director of photography, who's been involved with the show from the pilot, takes a great deal of care to ensure that this doesn't happen, but he must constantly face the Time Demon. In television, the clock is the most powerful decision-maker. How much will it take, how much will it cost? There's a saying in television: "Do you want it good, fast, or cheap? Pick two."
From a purely selfish standpoint, the sequence that was most fun to film was when Veronica and Josh go to the PCH overlook. I say "selfish"; perhaps I should say "indulgent." I enjoyed working with a camera crane, and we were able to do several crane shots, but I was also disappointed. Due to time considerations, I was forced to eliminate a shot that, in retrospect, would have made the scene even better. Rob had emphasized to me that he wanted to lead the audience briefly into thinking that Josh might have brought Veronica to the cliff in order to push her over the edge. I had hoped that the crane-up from the cliff would be sufficient, but I also wanted to do a shot of Josh's point of view of Veronica standing at the rim. Regretfully, I did not have the time or [sic] daylight to do it. On this day, I had to finish the sequence and move the company to the exterior of Josh's house in order to film Veronica arriving and then she and Josh leaving, all before the sun set. Since we shot in December, we had very little daylight with which to work. I could see that I would have to drop the shot of Josh's POV in order to get to his house in time. As a television director, you must constantly prioritize. Even Robert Zemeckis, one of our most successful directors today, says, "Directing is compromising from the time you wake up till the time you put your head on the pillow at the end of the day. Lemme tell you another Zemeckis story. He said that being a director was like being attacked by a herd of ducks: individually, they can't harm you, but collectively, they can kill you.
I was particularly pleased with the performance of Jonathan Chase, the actor who plays Josh. His work with Kristen in the jail was particularly wonderful. Kristen is such a skilled actor that there's always the danger that she may inadvertently make any other actor pale in comparison. Happily, Jonathan held his own in these scenes.
Let me talk a little bit about the elevator scene where Veronica and Ratner accidentally run into Logan and Heather. I shot twelve different angles here, which is a tremendous number for a scene that is only 1 6/8 pages long. I knew this would be time-consuming, and yet I budgeted my day to allow for it because I knew that I would use every single one of those angles. You'll have to decide whether or not the scene works, but it is an example of how scheduling a shoot is more of an art than a science. Normally a scene this short would be given only two-and-a-half hours to shoot. It took us much longer than that, but we knew it ahead of time and could arrange the day accordingly. It also meant that I would have to shoot several other scenes that had a much longer page count in a manner that allowed us to move more quickly than normal, meaning I would have to design shots that accomplished a lot of pages of dialogue without using too many angles. An example of this would be the scene where Veronica hears Nick Lachey's song on the radio in the Neptune Grand kitchen and then bumps into Ratner.
The scene in Mars Investigations which follows Veronica's questioning of Landry about Kiss Kiss Bang Bang was not in the script originally but was added fairly late into the shoot, and yet it became a favorite of mine. I like the sentiment behind it, in which Veronica and Keith decide to honor Dean O'Dell's memory by finding his killer, and I like the way Joaquin shot it, through the doorway of Keith's office. I was very disappointed not to get to work with Ed Begley Jr., who played Dean O'Dell, because I had worked with him twice before, once when I was a second assistant director on the original film of The In-Laws and then again when I was a first assistant director on the film Protocol. Michael Grillo once said that you can always tell how long someone has been working in show business by the number of times they've worked with Ed Begley, Jr.
Working on Veronica Mars has been among the most satisfying experiences of my career as a director because of the incredible quality of the scripts, the remarkable talent in front of and behind the camera, and, most of all, because of the amazing Kristen Bell, an actor who can do anything and do it brilliantly: act, sing, dance. When you watch the show, pay particular attention to the amount of detail she brings to her work: detail on her choices on how to read a line, detail on the physical use of her entire body and how it enhances the moment in the script, and detail in the manner of how she conveys an emotion without speaking. Acting is listening. What you can't see is the detail I see in how she remains consistent from take to take and from angle to angle, which is vitally important when I get into the editing room. I cannot tell you the number of times I have had to settle for a subpar performance from an actor simply because he or she did not give that consistency from setup to setup. In the three years and fourteen episodes that I've had the pleasure of directing on Veronica Mars, this has never happened to me with a performance from Kristen. Nick Marck, another director on the show, put it succinctly: "She's perfect."
Thanks for listening, and I hope you enjoy the show. If you do, please tell as many people as you can to watch it. Those of us for whom Veronica Mars is a labor of love wish to be able to return next year. With your support, and with even higher ratings, you can make that happen.
It took me an hour to transcribe eight minutes. The man wrote a lot. Here you go.
Hello. My name is John Kretchmer, and I was the director of the episode of Veronica Mars entitled "Postgame Mortem." The script was written by Joe Voci, who's not a staff writer on the show but who did a terrific job.
During the preparation to shoot this episode, my thirteenth for Veronica Mars, Rob Thomas told me it was important that we see Logan's development from someone who after breaking up with Veronica, again, didn't care about anything to someone who could move on with his life. The key to this development was his growing friendship with Heather, who, despite his wishes to the contrary, would bring him out of his self-imposed isolation and show him that, regardless of difficult and painful emotional issues, life can be embraced. The crux of this would rest on the talent of the actress playing Heather, and I think that after seeing the episode you will agree that Juliette Goglia did a remarkable job.
As episodes go, this one was fairly simple to shoot and did not require much more than our scheduled eight twelve-hour days, which is not always the case. In fact, my next episode, entitled "Unamerican Graffiti," which I am currently in the process of editing, was a very difficult and expensive episode to shoot, requiring many more hours of overtime. There's no hard and fast rule about this; each script is different and provides different challenges. "Postgame Mortem," however, proved to be a fortunate confluence of a small amount of night work, few sets and locations, combined with a wonderful cast, and so shooting went smoothly.
While we're on the subject of actors, I must mention that Veronica Mars is blessed with a sensational casting director, Deedee Bradley, and on this episode in particular, I was fortunate enough not only to have the regular stellar talent but a great many supremely gifted actors in the guest roles. Several were returning actors, with whom I had already worked, and others were new to me, but not to the show. Jaime Ray Newman, who plays Mindy O'Dell; Robert Ri'Chard, who plays Mason; David Magidoff, who plays Jeff Ratner; Jeremy Roberts, who plays Mel Stolz; Mario Ardila [Jr.], who is Arturo; and Anna Campbell, who is Tina the hotel clerk. Rob brings these people back because they're able to take a small role and do something special with it. An example of this is Adam Rose, who played Max in my previous episode and who will be playing an increasingly important role in the show in episodes to come. My point of all this is that the show is beautifully cast with equal care given to every single role, no matter how brief. A good case in point is John Bisom, the hotel manager, who takes a simple line like "We're running out of salt and pepper shakers" and does something unique and wonderful with it.
This episode is something of a hybrid; when it was originally outlined, it included much of the action from the next episode, which was directed by Harry Winer, another familiar name to those of you read the credits on the show. The problem was that it made this episode too big, too complicated, and too expensive, so Rob and the producers decided to split it into two episodes. My job was to help set up the storylines to they could be concluded in the next episode. I urge you to watch it next week; the script is terrific and provides some great Veronica Mars twists.
The most difficult scenes to film were in Logan's Neptune Grand suite. Not, thankfully, because of any acting issues. On the contrary, Jason Dohring and Juliette had a great relationship, on and off the set, and as soon as Juliette spoke her first word, I knew she would be perfect as Heather. But the Neptune Grand is our toughest standing set to shoot in because it is so large, because it requires us to hang each light individually, which takes a tremendous amount of time, and because we must deal with the TransLite backing outside the balcony, which, if we aren't careful, will look phony. Joaquin Sedillo, the director of photography, who's been involved with the show from the pilot, takes a great deal of care to ensure that this doesn't happen, but he must constantly face the Time Demon. In television, the clock is the most powerful decision-maker. How much will it take, how much will it cost? There's a saying in television: "Do you want it good, fast, or cheap? Pick two."
From a purely selfish standpoint, the sequence that was most fun to film was when Veronica and Josh go to the PCH overlook. I say "selfish"; perhaps I should say "indulgent." I enjoyed working with a camera crane, and we were able to do several crane shots, but I was also disappointed. Due to time considerations, I was forced to eliminate a shot that, in retrospect, would have made the scene even better. Rob had emphasized to me that he wanted to lead the audience briefly into thinking that Josh might have brought Veronica to the cliff in order to push her over the edge. I had hoped that the crane-up from the cliff would be sufficient, but I also wanted to do a shot of Josh's point of view of Veronica standing at the rim. Regretfully, I did not have the time or [sic] daylight to do it. On this day, I had to finish the sequence and move the company to the exterior of Josh's house in order to film Veronica arriving and then she and Josh leaving, all before the sun set. Since we shot in December, we had very little daylight with which to work. I could see that I would have to drop the shot of Josh's POV in order to get to his house in time. As a television director, you must constantly prioritize. Even Robert Zemeckis, one of our most successful directors today, says, "Directing is compromising from the time you wake up till the time you put your head on the pillow at the end of the day. Lemme tell you another Zemeckis story. He said that being a director was like being attacked by a herd of ducks: individually, they can't harm you, but collectively, they can kill you.
I was particularly pleased with the performance of Jonathan Chase, the actor who plays Josh. His work with Kristen in the jail was particularly wonderful. Kristen is such a skilled actor that there's always the danger that she may inadvertently make any other actor pale in comparison. Happily, Jonathan held his own in these scenes.
Let me talk a little bit about the elevator scene where Veronica and Ratner accidentally run into Logan and Heather. I shot twelve different angles here, which is a tremendous number for a scene that is only 1 6/8 pages long. I knew this would be time-consuming, and yet I budgeted my day to allow for it because I knew that I would use every single one of those angles. You'll have to decide whether or not the scene works, but it is an example of how scheduling a shoot is more of an art than a science. Normally a scene this short would be given only two-and-a-half hours to shoot. It took us much longer than that, but we knew it ahead of time and could arrange the day accordingly. It also meant that I would have to shoot several other scenes that had a much longer page count in a manner that allowed us to move more quickly than normal, meaning I would have to design shots that accomplished a lot of pages of dialogue without using too many angles. An example of this would be the scene where Veronica hears Nick Lachey's song on the radio in the Neptune Grand kitchen and then bumps into Ratner.
The scene in Mars Investigations which follows Veronica's questioning of Landry about Kiss Kiss Bang Bang was not in the script originally but was added fairly late into the shoot, and yet it became a favorite of mine. I like the sentiment behind it, in which Veronica and Keith decide to honor Dean O'Dell's memory by finding his killer, and I like the way Joaquin shot it, through the doorway of Keith's office. I was very disappointed not to get to work with Ed Begley Jr., who played Dean O'Dell, because I had worked with him twice before, once when I was a second assistant director on the original film of The In-Laws and then again when I was a first assistant director on the film Protocol. Michael Grillo once said that you can always tell how long someone has been working in show business by the number of times they've worked with Ed Begley, Jr.
Working on Veronica Mars has been among the most satisfying experiences of my career as a director because of the incredible quality of the scripts, the remarkable talent in front of and behind the camera, and, most of all, because of the amazing Kristen Bell, an actor who can do anything and do it brilliantly: act, sing, dance. When you watch the show, pay particular attention to the amount of detail she brings to her work: detail on her choices on how to read a line, detail on the physical use of her entire body and how it enhances the moment in the script, and detail in the manner of how she conveys an emotion without speaking. Acting is listening. What you can't see is the detail I see in how she remains consistent from take to take and from angle to angle, which is vitally important when I get into the editing room. I cannot tell you the number of times I have had to settle for a subpar performance from an actor simply because he or she did not give that consistency from setup to setup. In the three years and fourteen episodes that I've had the pleasure of directing on Veronica Mars, this has never happened to me with a performance from Kristen. Nick Marck, another director on the show, put it succinctly: "She's perfect."
Thanks for listening, and I hope you enjoy the show. If you do, please tell as many people as you can to watch it. Those of us for whom Veronica Mars is a labor of love wish to be able to return next year. With your support, and with even higher ratings, you can make that happen.