Filmmaking / Directing : Filming BASEMENT – part 1, or how we shot a feature film in 9 days, on an ultra-low budget, during the Covid-19 pandemic by Robert Rosenbaum

I began planning the production of BASEMENT in October of 2019. After months of planning, assembling a crew and finding a location, in January 2020, we hired a casting director to cast the film, scheduled to begin shooting in April 2020. However, as my people say, “I planned and God laughed.”

With pre-production in full swing, by early March it was clear that we would not be filming in April. We thought maybe June or July, but come July and we were still pushing the production start date. However, we had began our negotiations with SAG. Under normal conditions, you agree to the contracted that fits your production, prove you’re for real and SAG approves your movie. These, of course, were not normal conditions. With Covid-19 in full force, we had to put together a plan, following New York State and SAG guidelines, to keep our actors and crew safe. And we had to show SAG how we would adhere to this plan. To that end, we hired a Covid Compliance Officer that is a medical doctor and arranged for testing of our entire cast and crew every two days, among a myriad of other things. In the end, adherence to our Covid-19 protocol increased the budget by nearly 60%. However, jumping ahead, no one got sick.

By September 2020 we had cast our movie, found a new location on Long Island (our old Brooklyn location couldn’t have possibly been made Covid compliant) and finally got approval for our SAG contract. Our incredibly expedient, nine day shoot began on September 28, 2020. The 90+ page script meant we would have to average nearly 11 pages a day, but our shooting schedule was restricted by our SAG contract to 10 hour days. We put up the entire cast at a hotel, five minutes from our location, in order to reduce travel times and keep everyone safe.

Our location was the basement of a storefront, newly vacated due to the Covid pandemic. We also secured the storefront above and next-door, along with the alley behind the buildings, to set up holding, dressing rooms and eating areas. We installed an exhaust system, to be run between takes, in the basement, in order to comply with our Covid plan. Our production designer and art director, along with their crew, painted, staged and set the immersive location beautifully. The location served it’s purpose perfectly.

We worked with a skeleton crew on set, as the basement was only 16 x 70, and with a cast of up to eight people, at times it could get quite crowded. Several monitor stations were set up in the storefront above, so cast and crew could watch without being below. I directed on set during filming. Everyone wore masks, all the time, except the actors during filming and lunch, where cast and crew sat 2 to a 6 foot table. No visitors were aloud on location.

Despite the inability to hide lights on the set, (the ceiling was at 7 feet) our cinematographer artistically lit each shot. We used a Sony Venice Digital camera, with a Kowa anamorphic lens set, shooting hand held, on steady cam, slider and sticks. The results look way beyond our time or budget.

Working with limited rehearsal time (in fact our first rehearsals were done on Zoom) our most talented cast delivered tour de force performances, that exceeded everything I had hoped for. We wrapped shooting, on schedule, on October 9, 2020. I cannot say the production went off without a hitch, but the amazingly skilled cast and crew pulled off what seem to be an impossible production, especially given the extenuating circumstances, and they did it magnificently.

Production went by in a blur. It seemed a bit surreal, but watching the clips, I can see we really did it. Now in postproduction, editing a rough cut, I am marveling at the footage that we shot. The images are gorgeous and the acting is powerful. I can only hope my story holds up to the high standard of the production.

And now I have the first rough cut finished. Next comes music, polishing, FX and color grading. And oh yeah, there’s that little thing called selling the film. Here’s hoping. But whatever happens, it was a wonderful experience. I am so grateful to my most talented and dedicated cast and crew. We made a movie.

http://subterraneancinema.com

BASEMENT - Starring Brian Krause and Rizwan Manji, Hunter Emery, Shannon Marie Sullivan, RJ Brown, Christie Prades, Salma Shaw, Aariq Manji and Jordana Rose - Cinematographer Leland Krane - Production Designer Stephane Pain - Set Decorator William Bishop - Costume Designer Engie Hassan - Casting Lisa London - Producer Matthew Panepinto - Writer and Director Robert Rosenbaum

#basementthefilm #indiefilm #BrianKrause #RizwanManji

Read the whole series at: https://www.facebook.com/BasementTheFilm/posts/689751125011511

About me: http://rprose.com